So everyone thought that Saddam Hussein had WMDs? Admiral Thomas Wilson, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, as quoted in the new book by Newsweek investigative reporter Michael Isikoff and the Nation Washington editor David Corn:
"I didn't really think [Iraq] had a nuclear program. I didn't think [Saddam and Iraq] were an immediate threat on WMD."
Another shocking revelation:
The CIA came close to recruiting Saddam Hussein's foreign minister, Naji Sabri, to be an American spy. Through a Lebanese journalist, Sabri passed word to the CIA's station chief in Paris that Iraq had no active nuclear or WMD programs. But senior CIA and White House officials dismissed the intelligence and opposed the effort to recruit Sabri, fearing it would undercut the case for an invasion. The chief of the CIA's Iraq Operations Group told the Paris station chief, "One of these days you're going to get it. This is not about intelligence. This is about regime change." (pp. 45-46, 62-64)
Emphasis added.
