THE GENIUS OF SADDAM

U.S. Suspects It Received False Iraq Arms Tips: Intelligence officials are reexamining data used in justifying the war. They say Hussein's regime may have sent bogus defectors. (Bob Drogin, August 28, 2003, LA Times)

Frustrated at the failure to find Saddam Hussein's suspected stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, U.S. and allied intelligence agencies have launched a major effort to determine if they were victims of bogus Iraqi defectors who planted disinformation to mislead the West before the war. [...]

Although senior CIA officials insist that defectors were only partly responsible for the intelligence that triggered the decision to invade Iraq in March, other intelligence officials now fear that key portions of the prewar information may have been flawed. The issue raises fresh doubts as to whether illicit weapons will be found in Iraq.

As evidence, officials say former Iraqi operatives have confirmed since the war that Hussein's regime sent "double agents" disguised as defectors to the West to plant fabricated intelligence. In other cases, Baghdad apparently tricked legitimate defectors into funneling phony tips about weapons production and storage sites.

"They were shown bits of information and led to believe there was an active weapons program, only to be turned loose to make their way to Western intelligence sources," said the senior intelligence official. "Then, because they believe it, they pass polygraph tests ... and the planted information becomes true to the West, even if it was all made up to deceive us."

Furst, it seems like the spooks have been reading too many novels about fictional spycraft if they think Saddam Hussein hatched and carried out such a complex scheme. Second, suppose it's true: he tricked us into destroying his regime. Isn't that clever? Hopefully, Kim Jong-Il is doing the same thing and will harvest similar results. Posted by Orrin Judd at September 2, 2003 10:14 AM