Here in Spooksville, otherwise known as Cheltenham, the spooks (we have four thousand of them here at GCHQ checking out all your emails!) love reading about other spooks, and the second-hand bookshops are replete with spook books. So a couple of days ago, I picked up Malcolm Turnbull’s The Spycatcher Trial. The spycatcher himself was Peter Wright, retired and living in Tasmania, and the Thatcher government went to court in Sydney to try to stop him publishing his book, which revealed that Thatcher had lied to Parliament over a matter of national security. The resulting fiasco for the British government helped Wright’s book Spycatcher rise to the top of the bestsellers.

I would like to share with you a small extract from the The Spycatcher Trial:
After court that Thursday evening, we asked Peter whether he thought Thatcher knew she was telling a lie.
“Oh, heavens no,” he chuckled. “She has just said what MI5 told her. They don’t argue the toss with politicians. We just tell them what to say and the poor beggars have to say it.”
“But the politicians get the blame if it turns out to be false,” I protested.
“Well, of course, that’s their job, isn’t it?” Peter replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

The interesting thing is that this conversation took place more than twenty years ago. Is this the way of the world -- not only for MI5, but for CIA etc? I couldn't help thinking about Colin Powell, who struck me as being a decent and honest fellow!

There is a contrary view, which is that the spooks come up with whatever evidence the politicians require, but I don't think you can take that for granted.

There is a contrary view, which is that the spooks come up with whatever evidence the politicians require, but I don't think you can take that for granted. In the case of George Tenet and the current administration, that Tenet came up with what the politicians required has been pretty well established - by John Conyers, say.

When Bush was head of the CIA, the matter was less clear. During Iran Contra operations, Reagan was of course fed whatever was necessary to give him something to say on TV.

I might be a former spook. Because of this, I want to remind you all that spooks are people too. You don't always get shunted into intelligence because you're stupid or something. We're not all responsible for all of this shit. Have some heart: We have feelings too.http://www.sciforums.com/images/smilies/bawl.gif

That's all I have to say about that.

In the case of George Tenet and the current administration, that Tenet came up with what the politicians required has been pretty well established - by John Conyers, say.
Tenet certainly came up with what suited PNAC and the neocons, but I am quite inclined to believe that he was a pusher rather than pulled. That is, he was propelling the PNAC agenda rather than being drawn along by it, though it is hard for an outsider to be certain. It's worth remembering that Tenet is Jewish, as were the most of the cabal behind PNAC.

After court that Thursday evening, we asked Peter whether he thought Thatcher knew she was telling a lie.
“Oh, heavens no,” he chuckled. “She has just said what MI5 told her. They don’t argue the toss with politicians. We just tell them what to say and the poor beggars have to say it.”
“But the politicians get the blame if it turns out to be false,” I protested.
“Well, of course, that’s their job, isn’t it?” Peter replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
”
The interesting thing is that this conversation took place more than twenty years ago. Is this the way of the world -- not only for MI5, but for CIA etc? I couldn't help thinking about Colin Powell, who struck me as being a decent and honest fellow!

There is a contrary view, which is that the spooks come up with whatever evidence the politicians require, but I don't think you can take that for granted.

This is why information is power. The President isn't the one running this country. He makes the last decision, but only off of information that the lower ranked people tell him. It could be lies for all we know so they can manipulate him to do whatever they like and this goes for all politicians as you mentioned.

Information and charisma is true power. Why go out and do a dirty deed when you can have someone else do it for you and take all the blame when things go wrong?

- N

Thought I'd post some excerpts about the Iraq intelligence debacle from Legacy of Ashes: A history of the CIA, since someone mentioned the Powell thing.

"Tenet provided his own grim warnings in a secret hearing before the Senate intelligence committee. ... Iraq provided Al Qaeda with various kinds of training --- combat, bomb-making and chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear. He based that statement on the confessions of a single source (that had been tortured)." (486).

"On orders from the White House, Tenet issued a statement saying, 'There is no inconsistency between our view of Saddam's growing threat and the view as expressed by the president." (486).

"...under the enormous pressures he faced after 9/11, (Tenet's) one flaw, his all-consuming desire to please his superiors, became a fault line. ... Under his leadership, the agency produced the worst body of work in its long history: a special national intelligence estimate titled 'Iraq's Continuing Programs for Weapons of Mass Destruction.'" (487).

"The CIA confirmed everything the White House was saying. But the agency was saying far more than it knew." (487).

This about the Powell presentation:

"This was not the selective use of intelligence. It was not 'cherry picking.' It was fixing the facts to fit the war plans. It was what the intelligence said, the best intelligence the agency had to offer. Powell had spent days and nights with Tenet, checking and rechecking the CIA's reporting. Tenet looked him in the eye and told him it was rock solid." (491)

A special commission report about the intelligence concluded:

"(The report) found that the CIA's reports for the president's eyes were no different from the rest of its work ... except in one regard. They were 'even more misleading,' the commission found. They were, 'if anything, more alarmist and less nuanced.' The president's daily briefs, 'with their attention-grabbing headlines and drumbeat repetition, left an impression of many corroborating reports where in fact there were very few sources. ... In ways both subtle and not so subtle, the daily reports seemed to be 'selling intelligence in order to keep its customers ... interested.'" (495)