John Kerry on Release of Phase II Report on Misleading Iraq Intelligence

The truth is out now and it comes as no small surprise...

The Senate Intelligence Committee said today that there is no evidence that Saddam Hussein had prewar ties to Al Qaeda and one of the terror organization’s most notorious members, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The N.Y. Times reports that the report, is sure to "intensify the debates over terrorism and the Iraq war before the November elections, contains dozens of pages of findings about the former Baghdad dictator and the terrorists who plotted and carried out the Sept. 11 attacks, and finds that they had little in common."

John Kerry issued the following statement today, in response to the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee Phase II Report on Misleading Iraq Intelligence:

“After more than two years of stonewalling, even the Republican-led Intelligence Committee confirms that the Administration intentionally manipulated intelligence to mislead the country into war in Iraq.

“They knew Saddam had nothing to do with Al Qaeda or 9/11 but led Americans to believe the opposite. They knew the information from the Administration’s paid advocates at the Iraqi National Congress was based on lies, but used it to deceive Americans anyway. To this day, there’s been no accountability. It’s beyond insulting that for this trumped up case for war, George Tenet got a medal and Ahmad Chalabi got a seat next to the first lady at the State of the Union Address. Worst of all, the administration still won’t level with the American people about their disastrous war in Iraq.”

AP reports that the "report also faults intelligence gathering in the lead-up to the 2003 invasion."

In an Aug. 21 news conference, Bush repeated the lies that there was a connection between 9/11 and Iraq, and said that people should "'imagine a world in which you had Saddam Hussein' with the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction and 'who had relations with Zarqawi.'"