The Credibility Chasm

With the differences between pre-war claims on Iraq and what has been discovered since the invasion growing ever starker, the White House is trying to get out of what is politely called a "credibility gap," wavering between plowing ahead with the same apocalyptic rhetoric and simply denying that they ever said it. When he was asked by ABC's Diane Sawyer in December 2003 about the chasm between the pre-war claims of massive arsenals of weapons of mass destruction and the post-war discoveries of no WMD at all, President Bush dismissively replied, "So what's the difference?"

Vice President Cheney is a particular advocate of this damn-the-facts-full-speed-ahead doctrine, blithely claiming that nothing has changed. For example, in a January 22 interview on National Public Radio, Cheney claimed that, "We know, for example, that prior to our going in that he had spent time and effort acquiring mobile biological weapons labs, and we're quite confident he did, in fact, have such a program. We've found a couple of semi trailers at this point which we believe were, in fact, part of that program." However, this had been universally debunked months earlier; no such labs have actually been found. (This is hardly unusual for Cheney, who kept insisting that Iraq was behind the 9/11 attacks long after the supposed evidence was discredited. Even Bush had to say publicly that this was not the case.)

Before the invasion, the Administration kept up a constant drumbeat of propaganda claiming that Iraq was an imminent threat to American security. For example:

• "The Iraqi regime is a threat of unique urgency." (President Bush, October 2, 2002)
• "No terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people and the stability of the world than the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq." (Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, September 19, 2002)
• "This man poses a much graver threat than anybody could have possibly imagined." (President Bush, September 26, 2002)
• "Iraq is busy enhancing its capabilities in the field of chemical and biological agents, and they continue to pursue an aggressive nuclear weapons program. These are offensive weapons for the purpose of inflicting death on a massive scale, developed so that Saddam Hussein can hold the threat over the head of any one he chooses." (Vice President Cheney, August 29, 2002)

But after the war, when it became clear just how decrepit the Iraqi military really was and how the much-ballyhooed weapons arsenal did not exist, the White House began a truly Orwellian campaign to convince the public that they never said any such thing. Usually, such efforts revolved around the claim that the actual phrase "imminent threat" was supposedly never used.

Oh, yes it was:

• "Absolutely." (White House spokesman Ari Fleischer answering whether Iraq was an "imminent threat," May 7, 2003)
• "This is about imminent threat." (White House spokesman Scott McClellan, February 10, 2003)
• "Well, of course he is." (White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett responding to the question "is Saddam an imminent threat to U.S. interests, either in that part of the world or to Americans right here at home," January 26, 2003)
• "Some have argued that the nuclear threat from Iraq is not imminent -- that Saddam is at least 5-7 years away from having nuclear weapons. I would not be so certain. And we should be just as concerned about the immediate threat from biological weapons. Iraq has these weapons." (Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, September 18, 2002)

In his State of the Union speech in January, Bush coined the utterly Clintonian phrase "weapons of mass destruction-related program activities" while trying to duck the fact that no actual weapons had been found. In his disastrous Meet the Press interview on February 8, he floundered about looking for an explanation:

"David Kay has found the capacity to produce weapons. Now, when David Kay goes in and says we haven't found stockpiles yet, and there's [sic] theories as to where the weapons went. They could have been destroyed during the war. Saddam and his henchmen could have destroyed them as we entered into Iraq. They could be hidden. They could have been transported to another country, and we'll find out... But David Kay did report to the American people that Saddam had the capacity to make weapons. Saddam Hussein was dangerous with weapons. Saddam Hussein was dangerous with the ability to make weapons. He was a dangerous man in the dangerous part of the world."

Bush did not mention that Kay, the chief U.S. weapons hunter until he quit in January, actually reported that Iraq's "capacity to produce weapons" was in complete chaos, and nothing has been found to contradict it. He seems completely unaware that his credibility has been shredded. He is viewed with deep suspicion by a large segment of the American public, and by the world at large.

Far from a get-tough "war on terror," the true legacy of the Iraq invasion, even more than the hundreds of American and thousands of Iraqi dead, is that the next time Bush proclaims an imminent threat from another country he will not be believed. And if the threat is real next time, we will all pay the price.