90th in continuing blog series on the administration push to war. As the war in Iraq heads into its first summer, all the major claims in support of the war continue to unravel rapidly, both in the U.S. and in the world press. Publication of doubts and rebuttal is particularly sharp in Great Britain and the Commonwealth. Even Judith Miller and the New York Times cave on the ‘mobile weapons labs’—trailers—story.
June 1-7, 2003:

 
 
June 2, 2003 – An article appears in the British Guardian newspaper, “Transcripts Raise Alarm Across NATO,” reporting transcripts of Powell-Straw conversations indicating doubts about Iraq WMD:
 

“Transcripts of a private conversation between Jack Straw and Colin Powell expressing serious doubts about the reliability of intelligence on Iraq's banned weapons programme are being circulated in western government circles where there is a growing feeling that officials were deceived into supporting the Iraq war.”

 

The official version of the story of Jessica Lynch’s rescue is also rapidly unraveling around this time.

 

June 3, 2003 -- Questions regarding U.S. intelligence on Iraq WMD are raised in a US News & World Report article, “Truth and Consequences” (dated June 9):
 

“On the evening of February 1, two dozen American officials gathered in a spacious conference room at the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Va. The time had come to make the public case for war against Iraq. For six hours that Saturday, the men and women of the Bush administration argued about what Secretary of State Colin Powell should--and should not--say at the United Nations Security Council four days later. Not all the secret intelligence about Saddam Hussein's misdeeds, they found, stood up to close scrutiny. At one point during the rehearsal, Powell tossed several pages in the air. "I'm not reading this," he declared. "This is bulls- - -."

 
Same day – An Australian newspaper publishes an article titled “Proof of WMD Is Bush Trailer Trash,” about the two empty trailers found in Iraq initially claimed to be mobile chem labs.

 

June 6, 2003 – A note by Cheney Chief of Staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby reminds him to discuss an upcoming Washington Post article by Walter Pincus on the Niger uranium item with Cheney. (Grand Jury Exhibit 53)

 

June 6, 2003 – Article in the British Independent on the bogus Niger uranium-Iraq link: “The Niger Connection: forged documents, Tony Blair and the case for war.”

 

June 7, 2003 – The British Broadcasting Company (BBC) raises questions about the “dodgy” or “sexed-up” British weapons dossier.
 

The Beeb is not dumb. The phrase ‘sexed up’ immediately becomes part of the global lexicon on Tony Blair’s and George Bush’s campaign for war.

 

June 7, 2003 – The New York Times runs Judith Miller’s final piece as an embedded reporter in Iraq, co-authored with William Broad:
 

“American and British intelligence analysts with direct access to the evidence are disputing claims that the mysterious trailers found in Iraq were for making deadly germs. In interviews over the last week, they said the mobile units were more likely intended for other purposes and charged that the evaluation process had been damaged by a rush to judgment.          "Everyone has wanted to find the 'smoking gun' so much that they may have wanted to have reached this conclusion," said one intelligence expert who has seen the trailers and, like some others, spoke on condition that he not be identified. He added, "I am very upset with the process."

       The Bush administration has said the two trailers, which allied forces found in Iraq in April and May, are evidence that Saddam Hussein was hiding a program for biological warfare. In a white paper last week, it publicly detailed its case, even while conceding discrepancies in the evidence and a lack of hard proof.    

       Now, intelligence analysts stationed in the Middle East, as well as in the United States and Britain, are disclosing serious doubts about the administration's conclusions in what appears to be a bitter debate within the intelligence community. Skeptics said their initial judgments of a weapon application for the trailers had faltered as new evidence came to light.”
(“Some Analysts Of Iraq Trailers Reject Germ Use,” front page)

     

A sarcastic Internet comment says it best: “Using a canvas-sided truck for production of an inflammable gas always made more sense from an engineering standpoint.”