2/11/05:IRAQ/US -WMD CONSPIRACY INVESTIGATION(SBS/AUST.)





fwd-5-Nov-2005

US/IRAQ: WMD CONSPIRACY INVESTIGATION

SBS Australia: Archives - November 02, 2005
source: www.sbs.com.au (check for DATELINE program)

Martin Walker Interview

Martin Walker, the Washington editor of United Press International,
talks with Dateline about the political fallout that is rocking the
White House

12:34 secs


GEORGE NEGUS: Martin, we've just seen our backgrounder on this whole
scandal, scenario, whatever we choose to call it about the forged
documents and what's followed. You've been writing about it and
observing it there in Washington for two years. What does it say about
the Bush Administration's case for the war in Iraq?

MARTIN WALKER, EDITOR, UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL: Well, it undermines
it, I think, even more thoroughly than the absence of finding any
weapons of mass destruction inside Iraq. I mean, bear in mind that we
had senior figures inside the Bush Administration - Bush himself,
Condoleezza Rice - talking about the prospects of a mushroom cloud. We
had *** Cheney, the Vice-President, saying he had no doubt about
Iraq's nuclear weapons program, about weapons of mass
destruction. They weren't found.

And now it appears that part of what they were trying also to do was
to knock down dissident voices and to discredit this claim by former
ambassador Joseph Wilson that there was nothing ever in this claim
that Bush made in the State of the Union address that Iraq was trying
to get uranium from the African state of Niger.

GEORGE NEGUS: When the CIA had their doubts, the State Department had
their doubts - they'd almost dismissed the whole idea of the Niger
claim - how did it manage to get into Bush's State of the Union
address then and why?

MARTIN WALKER: The main reason it was done was that they were
claiming, and Bush said this in the State of the Union address, that
they were following on from a report by British intelligence. Now,
this is what really links together, I think, the real flaw in the case
for war because Blair himself in Britain has gone through a very, very
tough political bruising over the claim by the BBC that he quote
"sexed up" the case for war. Now it appears that that same sexing up
case is creeping over the Atlantic and is also damaging the Bush
Administration's case for war.

GEORGE NEGUS: Because their political opponents are saying that they
were actually marketing the whole idea of the war and case for it, as
distinct from having evidence.

MARTIN WALKER: Well, it wasn't just the political opponents saying
that. Andrew Carr, Bush's chief of staff, when he launched the case
for war campaign that was run by this group called WHIG - the White
House Iraq Group - Andrew Carr explained that the reason why he first
did this in September of '02 and not in August was because quote "You
never launch a new product in August." It was quite clear that from
the White House's point of view they were in a big marketing exercise.

GEORGE NEGUS: Tell us about WHIG - W-H-I-G, the White House Iraq
Group, who is in that group?

MARTIN WALKER: Well, the chief of staff was in it - Andrew Carr - the
Vice-President was in it - *** Cheney - the National Security Adviser
was in it, that's Condoleezza Rice, now Secretary of State. George
Tenant attended some of its meetings he was the head of the CIA. It
was basically the very top level - what they call the principles here
- who were not just coordinating the arguments for war but also
co-ordinating their own public appearances and the TV appearances that
they were making to try and press the case for war.

GEORGE NEGUS: In fact the heaviest political hitters in the country.

MARTIN WALKER: Absolutely.

GEORGE NEGUS: How did Rove, Karl Rove, George Bush's adviser, how did
Scooter Libby... Did they really expect that this would not blow sky
high and in their faces with the mud flying in the direction of the
Vice-President and the President at the same time?

MARTIN WALKER: I think you've got to begin from the point that these
two, Rove and Libby, they were believers, they had drunk the cool aid
- they certainly believed that Iraq was as guilty as charged, that
there were weapons of mass destruction. They believed what Ahmed
Chalabi - the Iraqi exile who was their favoured guy to take over when
the Saddam Hussein regime fell - that he was telling the truth when he
was telling them there was a nuclear program, there were weapons of
mass destruction.

They believed all along that they would be vindicated. That's the
first point. The second point, I think, is that this Bush
Administration has been so thoroughly disciplined and controlled and
until now so thoroughly leak-proof, that they reckon that they have
the initiative, they had control of the story.

GEORGE NEGUS: They thought they were bulletproof?

MARTIN WALKER: They thought they were bulletproof but at the same
time, don't forget that for the past three years really until now,
much of the US media has been exceedingly differential ever since
9/11. They've been very cowed by the idea of challenging President
Bush's authority on issues of national security. So they were
believers but they also thought they could get away with just about
anything.

GEORGE NEGUS: Let's have a look at what's happened in the last few
days as a result of Fitzgerald actually telling us what the results of
his inquiry have been and then we'll come back and talk about the
political ramifications of that.

Martin, I think it's worth reminding ourselves of what Thom Cooks, our
reporter, had Pat Fitzgerald saying in those final words - that it's
not over yet.

MARTIN WALKER: Well, I think we're waiting for the second shoe to drop
and quite possibly to drop on Karl Rove. One thing that we do now know
- and this will probably be coming as news to a lot of people in
Australia - is that Karl Rove was literally that far from being
indicted himself. The day before Fitzgerald came out with his public
announcement of the charges, Karl Rove's lawyer went to see him and
said "Look, this is really very, very serious stuff. I've got some new
evidence for you.” Here is a White House log that shows that almost
at the same time, within two minutes of Karl Rove allegedly talking to
Matt Cooper, 'Time Magazine' reporter, he was also emailing another
member of the White House staff about personnel problems and asking
them to come up to see him.

In other words, Rove was so busy, so overwhelmed by phone calls,
emails, personnel meetings, that it was quite understandable that he
might have forgotten about this particular conversation. And that
means, prosecutor, this is what I'm told Rove's lawyer said, "that
means that if it comes to a trial, you're going to have a fairly weak
case on this because we've got an explanation."

Now, the thing about Fitzgerald is that as a prosecutor he wants to
make sure any charges he brings he can get a conviction upon
them. That, I think that final last-minute appeal by Rove's lawyer
gave him enough pause for thought that he didn't go ahead with any
indictment against Rove. But as your reporter said, it's not over,
this inquiry is still going on. And we do know that one of the things
that Fitzgerald has been looking into has been how did these Italian
forgeries originate, where did all of this plot, if there is such a
plot, start.

GEORGE NEGUS: Joe Wilson in the last 24 hours has called for Rove's
resignation. Is it likely that Rove will walk? Or if Rove walks, does
that implicate George Bush by association?

MARTIN WALKER: I think there is no question but that Rove is not going
to resign. Rove is linked at the hip with Bush himself. They've been
together now for 15 years. In a way, Bush is Rove's political
creation. And moreover, Rove has just really strengthened his own
position.

One of the problems about Washington is that it's only really got the
attention span to focus upon one big political issue at a time and
Rove was the man who advised Bush to change the political atmosphere
by announcing this week, on Monday, the new nominee for the Supreme
Court - Judge Alitto, a very conservative figure. This really has
changed a lot of the political dynamics in town. It has rallied the
right wing, the conservatives, the Christian coalition behind Bush
again. And they were abandoning him over the Harriett Miers
nomination. And it's given the right wing a sort of a cause to rally
behind. It's taken a lot of the political oxygen out of the Rove
affair, at least for the moment. But the thing about American justice
is it does grind exceeding small, it does go on.

GEORGE NEGUS: To quote Martin Walker to Martin Walker, you wrote
recently "This has renewed the old saying of the days of the old
Watergate scandal that the cover-up can be more legally and
politically dangerous than the crime."

MARTIN WALKER: Well, if the Democrats were a reasonable opposition
party, they certainly would suffer they'd suffer in next term's
midterm elections. But then the Democratic Party never misses an
opportunity to miss an opportunity.

The refusal, I think, or the stubbornness of the Bush-Cheney team to
step down or to really be held accountable for this means that they're
going to make a fight of it, they've got an awful lot of assets on
their side to do so.

But bear in mind one thing which I think the Democrats have been able
to establish, they keep on saying it, which is that in a way this is
more serious than Watergate. The real root of all of this is whether
or not the American people were taken to war under false pretences and
if so, were they taken to war under false pretences in bad faith by
the Bush Administration.

If they made their mistakes in good faith, that's one thing, it's a
political mistake they can probably be forgiven. If this eventual
trial brings up the sense of there being something really, really
seriously fishy and false about the case for going to war, then I
think it's going to take an awful lot of time for the Bush
Administration to recover from that.

GEORGE NEGUS: So in other words, the Libby trial will amount, if you
like, to a reopening of this whole question of the reasons for going
to war?

MARTIN WALKER: I think in many ways it has to. And don't forget
there's another trial as well going to be coming. It looks like Joe
Wilson, Ambassador Wilson and his wife are going to be bringing a
private prosecution under civil law for the damage done to them and
their reputation and under which Mr Libby is again, I think, going to
find himself in the witness box. And under the rules of civil
prosecution, the Wilsons can make this a much more wide open
affair. In many ways, not just about, Karl Rove, this isn't over yet.

GEORGE NEGUS: Martin Walker in Washington, it's a great time for
someone like yourself. I can see you're chomping at the bit to get
back to it. We'll talk to you again.

MARTIN WALKER: Thank you, George.

END-TEXT


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