The Pot Calling the Kettle Black

Condosleezza Rice on CBS television this morning:

Well, no, if talks between Solana and the Iranian representative Larijani can get us to a suspension, that would be terrific. But the international community also has a credibility issue. We've said as of August 31^st suspend or we will pursue sanctions, and so we are talking with our partners about that course as well.

She was discussing the situation with Iran and accused the rest of the world of "credibility" issues. Wow. Where to begin... Maybe with our hypocrisy on the entire issue of nuclear weapons....

You see we allowed Pakistan to export their nuclear technology to Iran and other nations because we needed their help in Afghanistan. Even when A.Q. Khan was finally arrested all he got was a slap on the wrist. If we were really serious about Iran's program we'd have shut Khan and his cohorts down years ago. This is bull.

Then there's the issue of why, earlier this year, we gave India the green light to build as many nukes as they wish. I bet you missed that bit of news. Why is it alright for India but not Iran?

Then we get to my favorite part: Condi's credibility. Let's face it, she has none. You can't believe a word the woman says. Some of her famous (or infamous) quotes:

"I don't think anybody could have predicted that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile."

"It's not as if anybody believes that Saddam Hussein was without weapons of mass destruction."

"We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

"Saddam Hussein -- no one has said that there is evidence that Saddam Hussein directed or controlled 9/11, but let's be very clear, he had ties to al-Qaeda, he had al-Qaeda operatives who had operated out of Baghdad."
Source: Meet the Press, NBC (9/28/2003).

But we know that there was training of al Qaeda in chemical and perhaps biological warfare. We know that the Zarqawi was network out of there, this poisons network that was trying to spread poisons throughout . . . . And there was an Ansar al-Islam, which appears also to try to be operating in Iraq. So yes, the al Qaeda link was there." Source: Fox News Sunday, Fox News (9/7/2003).


"Going into the war against Iraq, we had very strong intelligence. I've been in this business for 20 years. And some of the strongest intelligence cases that I've seen, key judments by our intelligence community that Saddam Hussein . . . had biological and chemical weapons . . . ."
Source: National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice Interview with ZDF German Television, ZDF German Television (7/31/2003).


"[H]e had . . . an active procurement network to procure items, many of which, by the way, were on the prohibited list of the nuclear suppliers group. There's a reason that they were on the prohibited list of the nuclear supplies group: Magnets, balancing machines, yes, aluminum tubes, about which the consensus view was that they were suitable for use in centrifuges to spin material for nuclear weapons."
Source: NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, PBS (7/30/2003).


"Now, I can tell you, if the CIA, the Director of Central Intelligence, had said, take this out of the speech, it would have been gone, without question. What we've said subsequently is, knowing what we now know, that some of the Niger documents were apparently forged, we wouldn't have put this in the President's speech - but that's knowing what we know now."
Source: Press Gaggle with Ari Fleischer and Dr. Condoleezza Rice En Route Entebbe, Uganda, White House (7/11/2003


"And there were other attempts to, to get yellow cake from Africa."
Source: This Week with George Stephanopolous, ABC (6/8/2003).


"At the time that the State of the Union address was prepared, there were also other sources that said that they were, the Iraqis were seeking yellow cake, uranium oxide from Africa."
Source: This Week with George Stephanopolous, ABC (6/8/2003).


"Already, we've discovered, uh, uh, trailers, uh, that look remarkably similar to what Colin Powell described in his February 5th speech, biological weapons production facilities."
Source: This Week with George Stephanopolous, ABC (6/8/2003).


"But let's remember what we've already found. Secretary Powell on February 5th talked about a mobile, biological weapons capability. That has now been found and this is a weapons laboratory trailers capable of making a lot of agent that -- dry agent, dry biological agent that can kill a lot of people. So we are finding these pieces that were described."
Source: Capital Report, CNBC (6/3/2003).


"We have found, in Iraq, biological weapons laboratories that look precisely like what Secretary Powell described in his February 5th report to the United Nations."
Source: Dr. Rice Previews the President's Trip to Europe and the Middle East, White House (5/28/2003).


"Now the al-Qaida is an organization that's quite disbursed and --and quite widespread in its effects, but it clearly has had links to the Iraqis, not to mention Iraqi links to all kinds of other terrorists. And what we do not want is the day when Saddam Hussein decides that he's had enough of dealing with sanctions, enough of dealing with, quote, unquote, "containment," enough of dealing with America, and it's time to end it on his terms, by transferring one of these weapons, just a little vial of something, to a terrorist for blackmail or for worse."
Source: Face the Nation, CBS (3/9/2003).



There is no question in my mind about the al Qaeda connection. It is a connection that has unfolded, that we're learning more about as we are able to take the testimony of detainees, people who were high up in the al Qaeda organization. And what emerges is a picture of a Saddam Hussein who became impressed with what al Qaeda did after it bombed our embassies in 1998 in Kenya and Tanzania, began to give them assistance in chemical and biological weapons, something that they were having trouble achieving on their own, that harbored a terrorist network under this man Zarqawi, despite the fact that Saddam Hussein was told that Zarqawi was there."
Source: Larry King Live, CNN (2/5/2003).



"We do know that there have been shipments going . . . into Iraq . . . of aluminum tubes that really are only suited to -- high-quality aluminum tools [sic] that are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs."
Source: Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, CNN (9/8/2002).


"We do know that he is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon."
Source: Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, CNN (9/8/2002).


"We know that he has the infrastructure, nuclear scientists to make a nuclear weapon."
Source: Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, CNN (9/8/2002).


"The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."
Source: Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, CNN (9/8/2002).

You can see how she was rattling the war drums against Iraq with repeated statements about nuclear weapons. These were designed to invoke fear and panic in Americans if we didn't invade. Some of these were said within a year of 9/11; the context is critical.

Those trailers were for making hydrogen gas for aerial artillery balloons. The aluminum tubes were for conventional artillery shells. They knew all this and also that the uranium claims were forgeries and false also. They lied us into war. Knowingly.

And now Condi Rice has the gall to accuse the rest of the world with credibility issues? Please Condi, do everyone a favor and shut the hell up.