Iraq war made world less secure, former analyst says
March 10, 2004
By Shanta Bryant Gyan*
WASHINGTON (UMNS) - A former top State Department analyst, who alleged that White House officials distorted intelligence reports to justify war with Iraq, said the world is "less secure" today than before the war.
"In my opinion, the U.S. is less secure today than we would be if the war had not occurred," said Greg Thielmann, a United Methodist, who headed the State Department's intelligence bureau that analyzed military issues.
Thielmann spoke March 6 during the denomination luncheon at the Ecumenical Advocacy Days for Global Peace with Justice conference.
His last position was office director for strategic, proliferation and military affairs in the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research. He had a 25-year career in the U.S. Foreign Service before retiring in September 2002.
Despite evidence showing that Iraq did not possess stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, a "war party in the highest circles of government" wanted to get rid of dictator Saddam Hussein - by force if necessary, Thielmann said.
"And in order to achieve this objective, these zealots had no compunction about misrepresenting facts to the American people," he said. "Thus, the 9-11 attacks provided not the motive for invading Iraq, but the means."
North Korea's nuclear and missile programs and the war against the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan posed greater threats to U.S. security than "the largely contained problem of Iraqi 'weapons of mass destruction,'" he said.
Thielmann, who monitored intelligence from other government agencies, said his office reviewed intelligence on Iraq, including reports from a variety of defectors and clandestine sources, but many reports "didn't stand up to scrutiny."
"We usually didn't bother to call attention to the questionable reports unless we felt they were going to be given prominence," he said.
By the end of 2001, after assessing intelligence on Iraq, Thielmann said his office made the following conclusions:
Iraq's nuclear weapons program was essentially dormant.
Iraq probably had some chemical and biological agents stockpiled, but the evidence was largely circumstantial.
Missile activity provided the one clear "smoking gun." While Iraq was prohibited from possessing or developing missiles with ranges in excess of nearly 100 miles, intelligence reports detected tests of new missiles with ranges of about 125 miles - a clear technical violation of United Nations sanctions. Additionally, the construction of engine test stands, purchase of missile-production items, and unaccounted older Scud-type missiles raised the possibility of future terrorist attacks against Israel or Saudi Arabia.
Iraq's military was very weak and effectively prevented from modernizing by the U.N. arms embargo.
Thielmann said he was stunned to see reports, previously refuted by the intelligence community, put forward as Iraq policy by senior officials, including President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and Secretary of State Colin Powell.
The British report that Iraq was attempting to obtain uranium oxide from Niger for use in nuclear weapons was "very dubious," Thielmann said.
U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies, with the exception of the Central Intelligence Agency, had generally reached a consensus that reports of Iraq's plan to import high-strength aluminum tubes was not intended for a nuclear weapons program, he said. Instead, they were intended for the assembly of conventional artillery rockets, he said.
Powell's presentation to the U.N. Security Council detailing evidence that Iraq was in violation of its obligations, Thielmann said, "was not consistent with either the evidence coming from the U.N. inspectors or the analysis coming out of Powell's own intelligence bureau."
Powell responded to Thielmann's charges on "Fox News Sunday." "Well, Mr. Thielmann has his opinion...and what I presented represented the best judgment of the intelligence community," the secretary said. "Nothing was juiced, nothing was exaggerated; it was what they believed. And they stood firmly behind that presentation, and they do to this day."
Asked why he and other high-ranking government officials did not speak up about the lack of evidence before the Iraq war, Thielmann responded: "There were too many good people who didn't speak up." After spending 25 years in intelligence work, he explained that publicly discussing top-secret information "runs against everything you've been trained to do."
He also criticized Congress for not following up on intelligence reports produced on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction and for giving the president too much leeway to go to war.
The Ecumenical Advocacy Days event, March 5-8, was sponsored by numerous denominations and faith-related groups, including the United Methodist Board of Church and Society.
*Gyan is a freelance writer based in the Washington metropolitan area. News media can contact Tim Tanton at (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
