It's About Time

OK, so it's four years too late, but better late than never:

Intelligence provided by former undersecretary of defense Douglas J. Feith to buttress the White House case for invading Iraq included "reporting of dubious quality or reliability" that supported the political views of senior administration officials rather than the conclusions of the intelligence community, according to a report by the Pentagon's inspector general.

Feith's office "was predisposed to finding a significant relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda," according to portions of the report, released yesterday by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.). The inspector general described Feith's activities as "an alternative intelligence assessment process."

An unclassified summary of the full document is scheduled for release today in a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which Levin chairs. In that summary, a copy of which was obtained from another source by The Washington Post, the inspector general concluded that Feith's assessment in 2002 that Iraq and al-Qaeda had a "mature symbiotic relationship" was not fully supported by available intelligence but was nonetheless used by policymakers. * * *

The Inspector General, although not labeling Feith's actions as unlawful, did -- in perhaps the greatest understatement of the millennium -- call them "inappropriate."

Feith's response to this report is also one for the ages. He denied that what he was doing was an alternative intelligence assessment, and responded that "[i]t was from the start a criticism of the consensus of the intelligence community, and in presenting it I was not endorsing its substance."

OK, that's fine. But tell me, Doug -- don't you think it might have been more helpful to the whole process if you would have told us that four fucking years ago?!