CIA KNEW Australia funded Saddam - Bush & Blair BETRAYED soldiers?

TopJedi - I would agree in general that "Intelligence" can be an oxymoron - as appears to be the case in relation to intelligence failures over 9/11, Iraq etc. However the axiom "It's the economy, stupid" definitely applies to the key role of National Intelligence in relation to Trade - indeed WARS (and hence Intelligence) have always quintessentially been about RESOURCES as exampled below.

Warren Reed (a former Australian Security and Intelligence Service (ASIS) agent) was asked by Australian Broadcasting Corpration (ABC) journalist Helen Vatsikopoulos whether it was possible that Australian Intelligence (a minor player in overall Anglo-American Intelligence) would NOT have known about the AWB kick-backs to Saddam Hussein. Warren Reed's response was (in part):

"Absolutely impossible, Helen, that they did not know. In fact, if you look at the core part of the governmental system in Canberra that has to do with our international survival, our role on the global stage, particularly trade-wise, Foreign Affairs, even eaves-dropping, the whole intelligence apparatus that's geared to knowing these things. There is no way, absolutely no way, those sorts of people didn't know … So the Government did know. And I would defy the Prime Minister on oath to say he'd never heard anything about it, he had no knowledge at all that this could occur. If Mr Downer [Foreign Minister], and Mr Vaile [Deputy PM and Trade Minister] and our prime Minister had not an inkling that this sort of thing was going on, then they should be shot at dawn. They are unfit to hold these positions. That's the extent to which everybody would know about it." (see: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1567628.htm ).

TopJedi - I agree with you that we can't "leap to conclusion" which is why I have written "If ..." and posed the question "Bush & Blair betrayed soldiers?".

Indeed in Februrary 2006 Australia's new Ambassador to the US, Dennis Richardson (immediate former Head of Australia's peak Intelligence organization, the Australian Security and Intelligence Organization, ASIO, and presumably on instructions from the Australian Government), assured Senator Norm Coleman (Republican, Minnesota) that the former Australian ambassador had not KNOWINGLY mislead him back in 2004 in denying AWB corruption (see: (see: http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/13823304.htm and http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200602/s1559372.htm) - and hence stopping a US Senate Committee Investigation of AWB.

Senator Coleman's suspicions about the AUSTRALIANS were CORRECT (as proved by the Volker and Cole Inquiries) but he was apparently fooled by an utterly misplaced faith in the integrity of the Australian Government (the world has now been given a damning testament as to the sheer NON-BELIEVABILITY of Australian government, corporate and public official assertions). Traders had already known of the "normality" of commercial kickbacks to Saddam from the middle 1990s - the question was simply whether the BIGGEST PLAYER (AWB) in Iraq's BIGGEST food import (wheat) was doing what many others were doing i.e. paying huge bribes to Saddam.

According to an AWB official at the Australian Cole Inquiry, simply looking up the commodity prices in the daily newspaper would have immediately shown back in 2000 that the Australian wheat contract prices were grossly inflated over Canadian and US wheat contract prices.

Of course "impossibility" is not sealed - but BOTH the probability and the implications of Bush and Blair KNOWING are so significant that patriotic Americans and Brits of whatever political persuasion should really get their TEETH into this matter and be absolutely IMPLACABLE in demanding the truth.

I SPY - I agree - indeed the problem of Echelon is what to discard from a mountain of information, this being technically addressed by informatics. However in the case of the AWB rort the ONLY thing they needed to find out was the (grossly inflated) AWB-Iraq contract price - the US, Canadian and World contract prices were available every day in the daily newspapers; further, as testified by traders and diplomats the existence of kickbacks as a prerequisite for trade with Saddam's Iraq was not a secret but an open reality for everyone involved from the middle 1990.

All Intelligence had to do for CERTAINTY (as compared to highly plausible supposition in the context of a well-known kickbacks regime) was to determine the contract prices of the biggest seller (AWB) in the biggest Iraq food market (wheat) and then turn to the commodities page of the business section of any newspaper. Actually Australian Intelligence has recently given evidence before the Australian Cole Inquiry but the evidence has been kept secret "in the national interest" - however Australians would like to know when they knew and who they told about the inflated AWB-Iraq wheat contract prices.

While it utterly beggars belief that lowly Australian Intelligence didn't know (as indeed forthrightly testified by a former Australian intelligence agent) (see: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1567628.htm ) the Australian Government denies knowing - and, when faced with the smoking gun of 28 e-mails and cables, denies that any Minister actually read them. No doubt Bush and Blair will adopt a similar position of sustained DENIAL if generally unethical and irresponsible Mainstream Media get round to asking the question.

I reiterate that patriotic Americans and Brits should be unswerving in their demand for the truth over whether Bush and Blair KNEW - because if they DID know and did nothing they BETRAYED their people, their allies and their own soldiers in the field.

No "leftist mantra" is involved here - the rightist Mainstream Media have finally reported the absence of WMDs etc etc , the absence of Al Qaeda-Iraq links, and Iraqi polls indicating overwhelming opposition to foreign occupation (so much for "democracy").

It was NOT "intelligence" failure but anti-scientific selective abuse of intelligence by Blair and Bush for political reasons that have led to the present situation (which is certainly NOT a failure from the point of view of the military -industrial complex, Israel or the Israeli US lobby - even if it IS a disaster from the point of view of ordinary Americans and Americans in the 80% of the US economy not involved in war).

Thus in 2003 Australia invaded Iraq with the US and the UK on the basis of the numerous Bush-Blair claims of WMDs and other Iraqi threats that were subsequently shown to be false - and which the Australian Security and Intelligence Organization (ASIO) knew at the time to be false or unproven to the extent that a courageous and highly principled top Intelligence officer, Andrew Wilkie, resigned in protest from the companion Office of National Assessments (ONA) in the week before the war stating that the Australian Government was MISREPRESENTING the actual intelligence position (see: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/05/30/1054177726543.html ). The Australian Government still denies – with craven public support from a politicized ONA – that it does not know how many Iraqis have died post-invasion (there have actually been about 0.5 million avoidable post-invasion deaths) (see MWC News: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/5872/26/ ).

Gross political abuse involving misrepresentation of "secret intelligence" does not constitute "intelligence failure". Further, WHY people SHOULD believe that the CIA or NSA had knowledge of the AWB-Iraq deal is simply because (a) everyone else with an interest (except for the Australian Government on their say so) - traders, diplomats, UN officials, journalists - KNEW of the "normality" Iraq kickbacks demands since the middle 1990s, (b) such bribery is "normal" for Australian and other trade with such Asian countries, (c) AWB was the biggest trader in the biggest food commodity, namely wheat - why should AWB be the standout exception (d) the KEY information needed was simply that of (grossly inflated) contract prices - readily accessed by "classical" means (Australian corporate officials are notoriously corrupt) or readily accessed via Echelon access to corporate e-mails, telephonic communication).

INDEED by 2000 the existence of Iraqi kickback arrangements was common knowledge among intelligence, trade, diplomats, foreign affairs officials and key officials in the US and Canada (Australia's competitors in the wheat trade) – while the Australian Government "knew nothing". Charles Duelfer (senior member of the UN inspection team in pre-war Iraq and head of America's Iraq Survey Group post-invasion) has declared that "It was really systemised, I think, in 2000. And I don't think it was, you know, it wasn't a big secret"; and Samir Sumaidaie (current Iraqi Ambassador to the UN) has told the ABC Four Corners investigative TV program that Australian diplomats would have known about the kickbacks system, stating that "Trade officials and embassy, if they are well informed, they should know. I mean, it's part of, it was at that time, I would say, general knowledge or public knowledge" (see: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1617236.htm ).

Persistent IGNORING and DENYING - even now after official public exposure of the scandal through the Volker and Cole Inquiries - simply demonstrates the helplessness of democratic societies in the face of political abuses of "secrecy". Intelligence can only report to Governments - and Governments are free to "deny", "ignore" and "spin" - even when the occasional courageous Intelligence officer (like Andrew Wilkie) throws away his career by protesting the dishonesty in the public interest.

Americans, Brits and Australians have been victims of demonstrated GOVERNMENT dishonesty over Iraq. A significant question remaining is whether Bush and Blair KNEW about the AWB rort that handed $250 million to Saddam Hussein - if they did know and kept quiet then they betrayed their people, their Coalition allies and THEIR SOLDIERS IN THE FIELD. And why such betrayal? - "it's the Endless War, stupid".

Our soldiers in the field were manifestly BETRAYED - and it up to decent Americans, Brits and Australians to find out WHO exactly did the betraying (in addition to corrupt Australian AWB officials and their immediate connections). Those opposing or obfuscating such exposure are simply accessories after the fact of BETRAYAL of our soldiers in the field.