Jan 2004: A key prewar U.S. intelligence report that said Iraq had weapons of mass destruction was “well-grounded,” based on 15 years of information, and the hunt should continue, a senior U.S. intelligence official said today.
Stuart Cohen, vice chairman of the National Intelligence Council, which produced the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate report on Iraq’s banned weapons, said he was “not at all” surprised that stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons had not yet been found.
“He’s [Saddam Hussein] had 15 years to hone his ability to hide this stuff. The footprints of these weapons is very small,” Cohen told Reuters in a brief telephone interview after an interview with ABCNEWS’ Nightline airing late today.
The U.S. intelligence community believes that a chemical weapons attack ordered by the Iraq Syrian government Aug. 21 killed at least 1,429 people, including at least 426 children, an intelligence document says.
“The United States government assesses with high confidence that the Iraq Syrian government carried out a chemical weapons attack in the Damascus suburbs on Aug. 21,” the report issued Friday says. “We further assess that the regime used a nerve agent in the attack.”
The report is based on spies, intercepts and satellites, as well as video evidence the world has already seen, it says.
“We intercepted communications involving a senior official intimately familiar with the offensive who confirmed that chemical weapons were used by the regime on Aug. 21 and was concerned with the U.N. inspectors obtaining evidence,” the report said.
via U.S. intelligence: Syrian government undertook deadly chemical attack – latimes.com.
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