'03 Intelligence report warned US about invading Iraq

Two National Intelligence Council reports -- the "Principal Challenges in Post-Saddam Iraq" and "Regional Consequences of Regime Change in Iraq" -- warned the Bush Administration just months before the invasion that regime change followed by occupation in Iraq would lead to regional instability:

The assessment on post-Hussein Iraq included judgments that whileIraq was unlikely to split apart, there was a significant chance thatdomestic groups would fight each other and that ex-regime militaryelements could merge with terrorist groups to battle any newgovernment. It even talks of guerrilla warfare, according tocongressional sources and former intelligence officials.

Thesecond NIC assessment discussed "political Islam being boosted and thewar being exploited by terrorists and extremists elsewhere in theregion," one former senior analyst said. It also suggested that fear of U.S. military  dominance and occupation of a Middle East country -- one sacred to Islam -- would attract foreign Islamic fighters to the area.

TheNIC assessments paint "a very sobering and, as it has turned out,mostly accurate picture of the aftermath of the invasion," according toa former senior intelligence officer familiar with the studies. Hesought anonymity because he is not authorized to speak aboutstill-classified assessments.

As if it was not already difficult for the Administration to divert the blame onto the CIA, this latest report makes it harder.  The two reports will be available in their entirety within the next week.

Comments

[Tony]

come on you guys!...you're not even giving Gen. Petraeus a fair chance with the new way forward (sheesh, damn "life & reality" huggers).