FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE 11 August 2003
Statement by Director of
Central Intelligence George J. Tenet on the 2002 National
Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq’s Continuing Programs for
Weapons of Mass Destruction
A great deal has been said and written about the 2002 National
Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq’s Continuing Programs for Weapons of
Mass Destruction. Much of this commentary has been misinformed,
misleading, and just plain wrong. It is important to set the record
straight. Let me make three points.
- We stand by the judgments in the NIE.
- The NIE demonstrates consistency in our judgments over many years
and are based on a decade's worth of work. Intelligence is an
iterative process and as new evidence becomes available we constantly
reevaluate.
- We encourage dissent and reflect it in alternative views.
We stand behind the judgments of the NIE as well as our analyses
on Iraq’s programs over the past decade. Those outside the process
over the past ten years and many of those commenting today do not know, or
are misrepresenting, the facts. We have a solid, well-analyzed and
carefully written account in the NIE and the numerous products before
it.
After David Kay and others finish their efforts—after we have exploited
all the documents, people and sites in Iraq—we should and will stand back
to professionally review where we are—but not before.
The history of our judgments on Iraq’s weapons programs is clear and
consistent. On biological weapons and missiles our data got stronger
in recent years. We have had a solid historical foundation and new
data that have allowed us to make judgments and attribute high confidence
in specific areas. And we had numerous credible sources, including
many who provided information after 1998. When inspectors were
pushed out in 1998, we did not sit back. Rather, we significantly
increased our collection efforts throughout the Intelligence
Community. In other words, despite what many read in the media that
the NIE is based on nothing—no sources, no understanding of complicated
procurement networks, etc.—the fact is we made significant professional
progress.
The National Intelligence Estimate remains the Intelligence Community's
most authoritative product. The process by which we produce
NIEs—including the one on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction—has been honed
over nearly 30 years. It is a process that is designed to provide
policymakers in both the executive and the legislative branches with our
best judgments on the most crucial national security issues. This
process is designed to produce coordinated judgments—but not to the
exclusion of differing views or without exposing uncertainties.
During coordination, agencies send representatives who are actively
engaged and change NIE drafts to reflect better the views of the experts
in their respective agencies. It is an open and vigorous process
that allows for dissent to be registered by individual agencies in the
final product. Indeed, alternative views are encouraged.
Finally, the NIE is reviewed by the directors of US intelligence agencies
composing the DCI-chaired National Foreign Intelligence Board, including
in this case, CIA, DIA, INR, NSA, DoE, and NIMA. This rigorous
NIE process has served this nation well.
Building upon ten years of analysis, intelligence reporting, and
inspections that had to fight through Iraq’s aggressive denial and
deception efforts, including phony and incomplete data declarations to the
UN and programs explicitly designed with built-in cover stories, the
Intelligence Community prepared the NIE on Iraq’s weapons of mass
destruction. In it we judged that the entire body of information
over that ten years made clear that Saddam had never abandoned his pursuit
of weapons of mass destruction.
Nuclear program. Shortly after the Gulf war of 1990-91 the
International Atomic Energy Agency and the US Intelligence Community were
surprised at how much more advanced Iraq’s program was prior to the war
than had been judged previously. In fact, the IAEA’s 1996 report
indicated that Iraq could have completed its first nuclear device by as
early as late 1992 had the program not been derailed by the Gulf
war. Intelligence analysts reevaluated Iraq’s nuclear program in
1994 and 1997 in light of the body of inspection revelations and seized
documents and concluded that Iraq could have a nuclear weapon within a
year of obtaining sufficient material and, if unconstrained, would
take five to seven years with foreign assistance to produce enough fissile
material. Those judgments, to which all agencies agreed, have
remained consistent for years.
The NIE points out that by 2002, all agencies assessed that Saddam did
not yet have nuclear weapons or sufficient fissile material to make any,
but never abandoned his nuclear weapons ambitions. Moreover, most
agencies believed that Iraq’s attempts to obtain high-strength aluminum
tubes for centrifuge rotors, magnets, high-speed balancing machines, and
machine tools, as well as Iraq’s efforts to enhance its cadre of weapons
personnel and activities at several suspect nuclear sites indicated that
Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam’s
personal interest in some of these efforts was also considered. DOE
agreed that reconstitution was underway, but assessed that the tubes
probably were not part of the program. INR assessed that Baghdad was
pursuing at least a limited effort to acquire nuclear weapon-related
capabilities, but not an integrated and comprehensive approach to acquire
nuclear weapons; INR was not persuaded that the tubes were intended for
the nuclear program. All other agencies, including DOE, assessed
that Iraq probably would not have a weapon until 2007 to 2009, consistent
with the decade-old judgment of Iraq needing five to seven years to
develop a weapons-grade uranium enrichment capability if freed from
constraints. These judgments and the six elements upon which the
reconstitution judgment was based were agreed to by those agencies during
coordination of the NIE and at the meeting of the heads of all the
intelligence agencies before publication.
- We note yet again that uranium acquisition was not part of this
judgment. Despite all the focus in the media, it was not
one of the six elements upon which the judgment was based. Why
not? Because Iraq already had significant quantities of
uranium.
- Also it is noteworthy that although DOE assessed that the tubes
probably were not part of Iraq’s nuclear program, DOE agreed that
reconstitution was underway. Obviously, the tubes were not central
to DOE’s view on reconstitution.
Even though the tubes constituted only one of the six elements
underpinning the other agencies’ judgment on reconstitution, I will
discuss it briefly. We need to point out that DOE is not the only
agency that has experts on the issue. CIA has centrifuge and rocket
experts. The National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC)—the US
military’s center for analysis of foreign conventional weaponry—has
battlefield rocket experts. These experts, along with those from
DOE, were involved in the NIE process and their views were recorded.
All agencies agreed that the tubes could be used to build gas
centrifuges for a uranium enrichment program, so we are talking about
differences in agency views about intent.
- CIA, DIA, and NSA believed the tubes were intended for that
purpose.
- DOE believed they probably were not part of the nuclear program and
that conventional military uses were more plausible
- INR was not persuaded that the tubes were intended for use as
centrifuge rotors and considered artillery rockets as the most likely
purpose.
- NGIC believed that these tubes were poor choices for rocket motor
bodies.
Not surprisingly, the Iraqis went to great lengths to mask their
intentions across the board, including in their efforts to acquire tubes
with increasingly higher sets of specifications. Thus, the fact that
we had alternative views on the issue would be expected. But the NIE
went to great lengths to spell out those views. Many reading these
alternative views, however, almost certainly recalled how far Iraq had
come in the early 1990s toward a nuclear weapon without our knowledge,
making all the factors leading us to the reconstitution judgment more
important.
Biological Weapons. All agencies of the Intelligence
Community since 1995 have judged that Iraq retained biological weapons and
that the BW program continued. In 1999 we assessed Iraq had
revitalized its program. New intelligence acquired in 2000 provided
compelling information about Iraq’s ongoing offensive BW activities,
describing construction of mobile BW agent production plants—reportedly
designed to evade detection—with the potential to turn out several hundred
tons of unconcentrated BW agent per year. Thus, it was not a new
story in 2002 when all agencies judged in the NIE that Iraq had biological
weapons—that it had some lethal and incapacitating BW agents—and was
capable of quickly producing and weaponizing a variety of such agents,
including anthrax. We judged that most of the key aspects of Iraq’s
offensive BW program were more advanced than before the Gulf war.
Chemical Weapons. As early as 1994, all agencies assessed
that Iraq could begin limited production of chemical agents almost
immediately after UN sanctions, inspections and monitoring efforts were
ended. By 1997, the Intelligence Community judged that Iraq was protecting
a breakout capability to produce more weapons and agent quickly. We
further assessed in 1997, that within months Iraq could restart full-scale
production of sarin and that pre-Desert Storm agent production
levels—including production of VX—could be achieved in two to three
years. And so it was not a surprising story when all agencies judged
in the NIE in 2002 that Baghdad possessed chemical weapons, had begun
renewed production of mustard, sarin, cyclosarin, and VX and probably had
at least 100 metric tons (MT) and possibly as much as 500 MT of CW agents,
much of it added in the last year.
Delivery Systems. The Intelligence Community’s assessment
on the possibility of Iraq having a few covert Scuds has been consistent
since at least 1995. As Iraq continued to develop its short-range
missiles, we collected more data and by 1999 were able to begin
determining that both missiles were capable of flying over 150 km.
Also by 1999 we had noted that according to multiple sources, Iraq was
conducting a high-priority program to convert jet trainer aircraft to
lethal UAVs, likely intended for delivering biological agents.
Again, not a new story for the NIE to judge that Iraq maintained a small
missile force and several development programs, including an UAV that
could deliver a biological warfare agent.
In sum, the NIE on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction was the product of
years of reporting and intelligence collection, analyzed by numerous
experts in several different agencies. Our judgments have been
consistent on this subject because the evidence has repeatedly pointed to
continued Iraqi pursuit of WMD and efforts to conceal that pursuit from
international scrutiny. Modifications of our judgments have
reflected new evidence, much of which was acquired because of our
intensified collection efforts. Thus, noting that Saddam had
continued to pursue weapons of mass destruction was not startling.
That he probably was hiding weapons was not new. That he would seek
means to improve his capabilities using alternative-use cover stories
would have been expected. That we would have alternative views is
respected as part of the process. We stand by the soundness and
integrity of our process, and no one outside the Intelligence Community
told us what to say or not to say in this Estimate.
As with any other topic addressed in an NIE, the acquisition of further
evidence may confirm some of our judgments while calling others into
question. Operation Iraqi Freedom obviously has opened a major new
opportunity for learning about the WMD activities of Saddam Husayn’s
regime. We have no doubt, however, that the NIE was the most
reasonable, well-grounded, and objective assessment of Iraq’s WMD programs
that was possible at the time it was produced.
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