85th in continuing blog series on the administration push to war. White House efforts to maintain the claim about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction continue sporadically. A more sustained effort goes to cashing in on the Iraq war by business entities intimately connected with the White House. Meanwhile, the Joseph Wilson part of the Iraq-Niger uranium saga begins to heat up more. May will be another busy month for the White House and the OVP.
May 5-7, 2003:

 

May 5, 2003 – A new company named New Bridge Strategies, L.L.C., files for existence in Washington, D.C., and in the northern Virginia suburb of Alexandria. New Bridge Strategies LLC states that it “was created specifically with the aim of assisting clients to evaluate and take advantage of business opportunities in the Middle East following the conclusion of the U.S.-led war in Iraq.” The limited liability company is headed by Joe M. Allbaugh, formerly chief of staff to Governor Bush in Texas, then National Campaign Manager for the Bush-Cheney 2000 campaign, then Bush-appointed Director of FEMA. Other officers of the company include GOP political operative Ed Rogers and two executives of Crest Investment Company, John Howland and Jamal Daniel. Crest is among companies contracting to pay Bush’s brother Neil M. Bush a stipend. The web site for New Bridge Strategies offers the company as “your bridge to success in Iraq.”


May 6, 2003 – A New York Times column by Nicholas Kristof, “Missing in Action: Truth,” says the Niger uranium story is wrong and refers to Joseph Wilson’s trip to Niger, although without naming Wilson. www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/unmovic/2003/0506missing.htm

 

Same day -- Bush names J. Paul Bremer Presidential Envoy to Iraq. Bremer, who has had business connections with the Bush team, later becomes head of the Coalition Provisional Authority. The two appear in a joint photo op:

“Q Mr. President, Defense officials are now saying they are confident they have found a mobile biological lab, exactly what Secretary Powell described before the United Nations. Are you aware of the details? What can you tell us about that? And has Secretary Rumsfeld given you any details?

THE PRESIDENT: I'm not surprised if we begin to uncover the weapons program of Saddam Hussein -- because he had a weapons program. I will leave the details of your question to the experts, but one thing we know is that he had a weapons program. We also know he spent years trying to hide the weapons program. And over time the truth will come out and the American people will see that when we rid Saddam Hussein from -- got him out of power, we made America more secure.

Q Would you mind if we ask Secretary Rumsfeld if he could share --

SECRETARY RUMSFELD: I like the President's answer.”

 
If this joint announcement about a ‘mobile biological lab’ is intended to deflect attention from the Kristof column, it partly achieves its purpose, at least initially.

 

May 7, 2003 – In a joint photo op appearance with Aznar of Spain, Bush announces that he is lifting sanctions against Iraq. This move frees up U.S. companies to bid for contracts in Iraq reconstruction:

“Today I removed the sanctions imposed by the United States against Iraq's old government. First, based on the authority recently given to me by Congress, I am suspending the Iraq Sanctions Act, which restricts the export of certain equipment necessary for Iraq's reconstruction.     

    Secondly, I am directing Treasury Secretary Snow to relax administrative sanctions on American companies and citizens conducting business in Iraq that contributes to humanitarian relief and reconstruction.”

 

Same day -- Another Judith Miller article on Iraq WMD appears in the Times. Perhaps impelled by the Kristof piece the previous day, this one seems to reflect a special effort. Varying the WMD story line a little, this time the smoking gun is ‘mobile weapons laboratories’, more commonly known as trailers, as announced by Bush and Rumsfeld the previous day:

“Senior Bush administration officials in Washington said today that a joint British-American team of experts had concluded that a tractor-trailer truck found in northern Iraq several weeks ago could be a mobile biological weapons lab.        

       The trailer's design closely fits that of a mobile biological weapons laboratory described by a defector, but the officials could not say whether it had ever produced biological agents for weapons.        

       "While some of the equipment on the trailer could have been used for purposes other than biological weapons agent production, U.S. and U.K. technical experts have concluded that the unit does not appear to perform any function beyond what the defector said it was for, which was the production of biological agents," said Stephen A. Cambone, the under secretary of defense for intelligence.”

(“AFTEREFFECTS: ILLICIT ARMS; U.S. Aides Say Iraqi Truck Could Be a Germ-War Lab,” A12)


Same day -- In a CIPA hearing, Judge Leonie Brinkema, in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., orders the government to determine whether the interrogations of the detainees are being recorded.

 
Judge Brinkema’s order is one of several questions arising in the courts about records on the torture of detainees. This one will be allegedly violated by a false response, see later.