Fitzgerald Grand Jury Concerns With New UK Memo

If you're in real trouble, you rely on doctored timelines.

But if you're in this deep, you trust your friends to confirm events, even when those statements contradict what you've later said.

Things are looking bad for not only the President, but also his wider associates. There were detailed ruses and plans that were staged. These actions related to creating the illusion of a "good faith effort to find WMD," knowing full well that this was simply one of the lines of "evidence" being created as defense to war crimes.

It remains to be understood who was specifically involved in developing this timeline and staged pre-invasion events. The net result of this apparent phony concern with WMD is to mislead a grand jury about the basis for a decision; and hide the President's involvement with the decision to consciously engage in an unlawful invasion of another country.

Further, this conversation shows evidence that the planners speculated, despite the hoped for Congressional support for an invasion, that there could be a problem, and that other lines of evidence needed to be established in advance as a defense for the Chief Executive and his staff.

It is likely the Grand Jury can see this is a ruse, further confirming that the war was not only knowingly unlawful, but there were pre-invasion plans in place to implement a cover-up should there be questions related to war crimes and impeachment.

In short, this pre-invasion planning shows there was a larger effort to not only intimidate the public to support unlawful war, but that many were engaged in specific plans to cover-up and mislead investigators should the full scope of the criminal conspiracy be exposed.

The American Republic now has the evidence to show the Congress was not only mislead, but it was mislead by a well planned and orchestrated conspiracy that took the time to develop a back-up plan to protect the President, but failed to take the time to ensure the troops on the ground had the requisite armor in place for force protection.

This group cares more about protecting war criminals, than in ensuring those put in harms war are protected. They look at Americans as pawns.

* * *

Revelations from London widen the net, suggesting ruse conversations took place between the President and Prime Minister.

These conversations, if they did take place, appear to be part of an orchestrated plan to support the President's contention the war was based on a real fear of WMD. However, the apparent evidence available to the Fitzgerald grand jury suggests the opposite: That the decision to go to war was based without regard to the legality of the decision, or the real evidence.

The latest revelations from London also raise doubts about the testimony of others before the Grand Jury. If we are to believe that their public statements about the "nature of WMD in the state of the Union" are to be taken at face value, then these revelations out of London contradict the assertion that "there was no direct reliance on WMD, but just a concern."

This revelation raises more questions which the Grand Jury will likely use to find that other witnesses from the State Department have lied, and that there was a plan in place, well before 2002 to create a ruse of a timeline to support the legality of war, all the while knowing the war was not legal.

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Via Raw:

Mr Bush said he "wanted to go beyond Iraq in dealing with WMD proliferation, mentioning in particular Saudi Arabia, Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan," according to a note of a telephone conversation between the two men on January 30 2003.

Let's consider a few things when going over this section of the Guardian pieces.

At this point, in light of the Downing Street Memo, we know that the White House viewed the WMD as an excuse.

Also, the conversation was in Jan 2003, several months after the unofficial invasion of Iraq began in the summer of 2002.

They key point: Why would the President talk about "going beyond WMD", when he knew that the WMD was a ruse?

I suspect, that the conversation wasn't about an actual plan, but about a confirmation for purely the record, that they were taking the action in Iraq based on WMD.

This is non-sense.

And it appears to be the same kind of convenient memo/e-mail which Rove sent to Libby when he said about Miller, words to the effect, "I didn't spill the beans." Apparently, Rove was so good at "not spilling the beans," that Miller can't remember the sound of opening the jar of beans.

* * *

If these notes about "what Bush and Blair supposedly talked about" in Jan 2003 are real, then we have to explore a fundamental issue.

Was the phone call, if it did occur, made around a time when there were other events occurring that would raise doubts about the content of that phone call.

Specifically, given the poor planning in Iraq, and well-placed reports that were ignored, it seems curious, despite this lack of planning, that the President would talk about "going beyond Iraq." One cannot argue credibly that they are both outside the planning, but then planning.

How did he propose to do this, given that the "reason for going beyond Iraq" was another fiction of WMD?

One cannot start a war based on a fiction of WMD, and then propose to expand that war with more fiction.

* * *

Further, if the war was proposed to be one that was going to go beyond Iraq, but this was discussed in Jan 2003 with the knowledge that the case for WMD was being manipulated, we have to ask whether the call was made with the intent to create a fictional timeline, therefore affording the President a get out of jail free card.

If you can convince a Grand Jury that "you really thought there was WMD, as evidenced by this phone call in January 2003 about WMD," then maybe you can convince some that you didn't knowingly commit war crimes; and didn't direct others to fix facts.

But the Downing Street Memo suggests the opposite: That the participants knew the WMD ruse was just that: A ruse to justify the war.

If they're going to take the time to fabricate evidence for a war, then it looks like they'd also fabricate a phone call as a backup if that primary plan failed.

That back-up plan appears to be in full swing. That is why things are not adding up before the Grand Jury: The same flawed plan that failed in Louisiana and Iraq, is now doing no better: The back-ups were never actually expected to be implemented. But now that they are, their weaknesses are being exposed.

Thus, given these inherent flaws with the basis for war going forward, as evidenced by the Downing Street Memo, it is not surprising JTTF and the White House spent so much time and effort intimidating the 535 that were part of the real decision.

If you can convince the Congress that the "people speaking out" were crazies, then you can get them to commit to something that "was not crazy."

This is how a tyrant and arrogant leader to embrace absurdity, all the while that they know they have no lawful foundation and lack the inherent ability to actually do what they envision. Theirs was the goal of outcomes, without regard to facts or details. Today, we have far worse: Merely the desire for change, without any clue what those details might be, much less consider a back-up plan.

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Let's consider what we know today in 2005.

At this juncture, given the ongoing combat operations in Iraq that had continued since 2002, and the already well known risks that the plans were defective and ignored; it is not plausible to believe the contrary: That the president was then taking the considered time to carefully plan something.

This is far too convenient, and at odds with the way the President works. He's already shown that he's taken a hands off and "I didn't know" approach to the details about 9-11.

Also, we know that Cheney's many visits were actually not to plan, but to brow beat the CIA into accepting a conclusion regardless the real evidence, and the actual perceived risks.

Thus, I conclude that the timing of this information about what was said in 2003 is not related to a real Presidential desire to expand the war in search of WMD; but a desire to create a record that would serve as a useful defense against impeachment.

However, the Downing Street Memo shows that the evidence for WMD was an illusion; and the President's conduct in re planning was totally at odds with what he would have us believe he is involved in.

But let's put those arguments aside and ask some simple questions:

What's the relationship between the "timing of this release" and the potential probative value it may have on affecting public opinion;

Is there a desire to create a false illusion about what the President was or wasn't doing in January 2003;

Were there actual notes from this conversation; and

If the conversation actually did occur as reported, why is the subsequent planning, despite this planning phone call, so abysmal?

* * *

One cannot simply point to a phone call and say, "Aha, evidence of a smoking gun" when the facts on the ground suggest the plan, if it was discussed" was supportable with neither evidence, actual resources, nor a motivated government system that would support that objective.

Further, given the WMD data in re the Number 10 Dossier has been shot fool of holes, we have to question why, despite the President not taking responsibility for the statements for WMD in Iraq, that he would suddenly be the subject of a note in Britain stating the opposite.

Recall, we've heard several times that the "President didn't mean what he said in the state of the union" and "nobody every said there were WMD's there" [put the fantasy aside for the moment].

Bluntly, if the memo is true, and they did talk about WMD in January 2003, then all the statements from Rice and others in the White House about "whether the nation was relying on WMD arguments in the state of the Union Address" now go out the window.

The President has a problem. Either he's taken action to create a record that he knew was contrary to the actual evidence; or conversely, the written record, even if part of a ruse, contradicts what appears to have been given to the Grand Jury.

Either way, this revelation isn't a sign of a grand vision for the President. It's but another inconvenient datapoint that further undermines not only the President, but casts the apologists with a new light of obstruction of justice.

It appears far more likely that these notes are to create the illusory impression in the mind of the Grand Jury that the discussion was about WMD; but the evidence we have seen in public suggests the opposite: They all knew the connection to WMD was a ruse.

Thus, we consider these notes from Number 10 interesting, and evidence there were sham conversations being planted in order to create, what we now know a flawed defense to war crimes.

These notes suggest there were many not only ensuring they were "talking about the illusion of WMD," but that there were people orchestrating the timeline to ensure that the notes were in place, despite the knowledge that there was no reason to have this conversation.

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The scope of the Grand Jury inquiry widens:

How was the President "too busy" to view the CIA material with the Vice President, but had enough time to "talk to Tony" about WMD he knew, or should have known were illusions?

Why should we believe this "planning phone call" was substantive, given the President rarely took much interest in planning; and at best, ignored the bad news, and simply jumped in without regard to prudence, timing, schedules, or the laws of war?

These "planning phone calls" appear to have been staged as a calculated defense against later, and likely allegations of war crimes.

It remains to be understood who, despite the Number 10 legal advisor later resigning over the sham WMD evidence, still proceeded along the Downing Street Memo timeline and ignored the reservations of the legal team.

Counsel must have been involved in the decisions of this planning before the Phone call. That person was Gonzalez; and the question before us:

Where was Miers in 2003 when this was going on; and what did she know about the disconnect between what the President would have us believe about the planning, and the actual evidence showing the WMD-argument was insufficient to legalize this invasion of Iraq?

We are a nation of laws, not the blind faith in fantasy. Nuremberg shows us that civilians can be indicted for war crimes, even if they honestly believe in their own illusions.