Politics and Press

Bush and the Germans; Rendition and Iraq

The German judiciary is looking to indict several CIA operatives for their kidnapping of a German-Lebanese citizen suspected of terrorist activities. He was sent to a prison in Afghanistan where he was questioned and – according to him tortured - for five months before being told that “whoops – we got the wrong guy” and sent home.

There are some interesting insights into the CIA program and the run-up to the Iraq invasion in an interview of the former chief of the CIA’s Europe Division (Tyler Drumheller) on the website of the German news weekly, Der Spiegel. Drumheller is the author of On the Brink, a memoir of his time in the CIA. A few quotes from the interview are below. The full interview can be read here.

Drumheller: It was Vice President Dick Cheney who talked about the “dark side” we have to turn on. When he spoke those words, he was articulating a policy that amounted to “go out and get them.” His remarks were evidence of the underlying approach of the administration, which was basically to turn the military and the agency loose and let them pay for the consequences of any unfortunate — or illegal — occurrences.

Drumheller: …I once had to brief Condoleezza Rice on a rendition operation, and her chief concern was not whether it was the right thing to do, but what the president would think about it. …

SPIEGEL: One of the crucial bits of information the Bush administration used to justify the invasion was the supposed existence of mobile biological weapons laboratories. …

Drumheller: … Curveball was an Iraqi who claimed to be an engineer working on the biological weapons program. … Curveball was a sort of clever fellow who carried on about his story and kept everybody pretty well convinced for a long time. … The administration wanted to make the case for war with Iraq. They needed a tangible thing, they needed the German stuff. They couldn’t go to war based just on the fact that they wanted to change the Middle East. They needed to have something threatening to which they were reacting.

SPIEGEL: …it turned out to be the centerpiece in Powell’s presentation — and nobody had told him about the doubts.

Drumheller: I turned on the TV in my office, and there it was. So the first thing I thought, having worked in the government all my life, was that we probably gave Powell the wrong speech.