WP: CIA Pessimistic About Iraq

[kskiska]

Situation Worse Than Portrayed, Analysts Say

Wednesday, September 29, 2004; Page A01

A growing number of career professionals within national security agencies believe that the situation in Iraq is much worse, and the path to success much more tenuous, than is being expressed in public by top Bush administration officials, according to former and current government officials and assessments over the past year by intelligence officials at the CIA and the departments of State and Defense.

While President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and others have delivered optimistic public appraisals, officials who fight the Iraqi insurgency and study it at the CIA and the State Department and within the Army officer corps believe the rebellion is deeper and more widespread than is being publicly acknowledged, officials say.

People at the CIA "are mad at the policy in Iraq because it's a disaster, and they're digging the hole deeper and deeper and deeper," said one former intelligence officer who maintains contact with CIA officials. "There's no obvious way to fix it. The best we can hope for is a semi-failed state hobbling along with terrorists and a succession of weak governments."

"Things are definitely not improving," said one U.S. government official who reads the intelligence analyses on Iraq.

"It is getting worse," agreed an Army staff officer who served in Iraq and stays in touch with comrades in Baghdad through e-mail. "It just seems there is a lot of pessimism flowing out of theater now. There are things going on that are unbelievable to me. They have infiltrators conducting attacks in the Green Zone. That was not the case a year ago."

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58183-2004Sep28.html

[skooooo]

1. oh pshaw!

The CIA is full of girlymen!

[Cocoa]

5. they're pessimist naysayers!

and they're just guessing anyway!

[vickie]

2. It seems as though the CIA is going out of its way to leak info

that should be damaging to the Dim Son.

[greatauntoftriplets]

3. Jeez, are they just figuring this out????

How much $$$$ do the taxpayers fork over for the CIA??? Jeez, I coulda told them that for maybe a cool million or two.

[Disturbed]

4. The US Neo Fascists have a solution.

Iraq will be subdued and the US Puppet Govt. will crush the evil doers that hate freedom.

Bomb the cities into ruble! The Iraqis will bow down to the Colonization or the US will bomb them back into the stone age. If it takes a million or so Iraqi deaths, so be it!

[skooooo]

6. That'll show them freedom-haters!

[Eloriel]

7. Infiltrators attacking in the Green Zone -- yeah, I'd say that's bad

Lordy, Lordy.

[bloodyjack]

8. Planet Earth to CIA: WELCOME TO REALITY! MAY I TAKE YOUR COAT?

[struggle4progress]

9. These professionals are an irritation to blind ideologues everywhere! eom

[DeepModem Mom]

10. kick

[HysteryDiagnosis]

11. When they say "mission accomplished" what they mean is "my

mission is accomplished" laying the foundation for WWIII.

[leftchick]

12. Gen. ( I am in denial) Meyers on NPR Tues. said.....

"Iraq is on the road to Democracy" oh about a hundred times in the short time I could stomach lstening to him. He downplayed the violence as being no where near as bad as that awful media portrays. good God I thought it was 30 years ago and I was listening to Gen. Westmorland!

[Richardson08]

13. There is a new story on the mishandling of Iraq every day but the polls

show Bush has the edge on Kerry concerning the Iraq situation

[lancdem]

18. Kind of leaves you scratching your head, doesn't it?

[Emboldened Chimp]

19. Because it's not on television...

These stories do appear in the newspapers, but only 11% of the population reads them on a daily basis. So of course Bush has the edge when Fox, CNN, et al. routinely misinform the 89% that don't read papers.

[unfrigginreal]

14. According to a WSJ reporter in Baghdad, things couldn't be much worse

Check it out a Kos.

One could argue that Iraq is already lost beyond salvation. For those of us on the ground it's hard to imagine what if any thing could salvage it from its violent downward spiral.

The genie of terrorism, chaos and mayhem has been unleashed onto this country as a result of American mistakes and it can't be put back into a bottle.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/9/28/204822/230

[drscm]

15. Don't tell the boy king, not that he'll listen anyway. eom

[xyboymil]

16. Kick

[UpInArms]

17. kick

:kick:

[ewagner]

20. Hint, hint......

The CIA didn't get it wrong on Iraq, WMDS, or 9/11 They just got the blame from the boy-king...........

they're pissed.

Payback time...........

[Mike Daniels]

21. Not one named source in the majority of this article

Perhaps if someone had the guts or integrity to actually go on record with these claims these type of articles would gain more traction in the public.