Hearing hears Iraq War was launched on lies« Thread Started on Feb 10, 2007, 1:27am » --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Truth Exposed by Senate Armed Services HearingSubmitted by davidswanson on February 9, 2007 - 2:21pm.Iraq War | Iraq War Decision | Iraq War Propaganda | Iraq WMD LiesBy David Swansonread at source> http://www.democrats.com/node/11955The Senate Armed Services Committee held a hearing today at which the Inspector General of the Pentagon, Thomas Gimble, testified that – and I'm loosely paraphrasing – the Iraq War was launched on a pack of lies.Gimble has produced a report [ http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/18368 ] documenting the actions of the Office of Special Plans, which included the gathering of "intelligence" and the presenting of that "intelligence" to top administration officials. The Pentagon is not an agency authorized to gather intelligence, and no agency is authorized to do that sort of work without informing the Congress.Chairman Carl Levin called the hearing, and for much of it was the only Democrat present. Most of the Democrats on the Committee never showed. Claire McCaskill (D., Mo.) and James Webb (D., Va.) participated briefly. Hillary Clinton (D., N.Y.) never showed, and her office said she was in New York, according to Medea Benjamin, a CoFounder of Code Pink and my main source for what happened today. James Inhofe (R., Okl.) participated briefly, but for a long time, there were only four committee members present, according to Medea: Levin and John Warner (R., Va.), Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.), and Saxby Chambliss (R., Ga.). This lopsided attendance was reflected in the print media coverage [ http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/18384 ], and will probably show up on the television reports. "Levin was fabulous," Medea said. She and Lori Perdue, who both broke down crying during the hearing (see below), gave me an account after the committee had gone into closed session. "Levin was really tough, charged, determined. But most of the Democrats were missing in action. Three Republicans, Sessions, Warner, and Chambliss grilled Gimble." This grilling, Medea explained, was all in defense of the work of Doug Feith and the Office of Special Plans, a defense that apparently used some strangely contorted arguments. The grilling was only countered by Levin with a little help by Webb and a short assist by McCaskill.McCaskill asked whether the intelligence agencies that legitimately gather intelligence shouldn't carry more weight than an office assigned only to analyze it. But the Republicans, Medea said, kept insisting that nothing illegal had been done, and that the Inspector General's report had been poorly conducted. He had failed to interview Stephen Hadley or Condoleezza Rice. Gimble countered that Hadley had refused to be interviewed and that as the IG for the "Defense" Department he had no authority over Rice. Levin then spoke up with the most encouraging comment of the day: We will make sure they come, he said. If there is any information that you want, we'll get it!Let the subpoenas fly!