Bush says we are on track in Iraq, the National Intelligence Council says "Not"

A National Intelligence Council measurement of the situation in Iraq, prepared in July 2004, points to some very serious problems developing in that country.  The overall tone of the report is pessimistic at best, and the US should brace for getting caught in the middle of a civil war by 2005. It should be noted that the conclusions of this lastest report were reached before the present worsening of the rise of violence and death in Iraq.  

The acting CIA Director John McLaughlin, and the leaders of the other intelligence agencies, approved the intelligence document, which runs about 50 pages, which is rather bleak to say the least.  Bush still maintains we have won the war in Iraq – in direct contrast to the findings of the intelligence community.  

The Senate Intelligence Committee found widespread intelligence failures that led to faulty assumptions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, however, Bush was determined that we would engage in Iraq and the WMD was the pretext for that war.

"It's beyond pitiful, it's beyond embarrassing, it's now in the zone of dangerous," said Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb.

All indications are that Bush has seen this document but still persists in his gun-ho “we’ve won” attitude.  Having said this, it appears that Bush is using Iraq as a lynch-pin for his reelection and he might be hoping to do damage control later on. 

Over 850 men and woman in our Armed Forces have died since Bush declared victory awhile back. Within the last 24 hours, two Americans and one British citizen have been kidnapped in Iraq.

Michael Berglin