"this would seem more of a smoking gun than possibly even forged memos"

[understandinglife]

I urge all of you to read the following post by Jane Hamsher at firedoglake and spread this one to any Congressperson or media person whom you can:

That leaves the high-level surveillance tape, compared at the time to "something out of Beckett."

Yet in February 2003, when the U.N. presentation occurred, the local Pacifica affiliate contained an interview with a correspondent in Baqhdad, non-embedded, who watched the live broadcast of Powell's speech with a room full of Republican Guards. When the tape of the intercepted phone conversation was played, widespread laughter erupted in the room. The accents employed by the alleged Iraqi officers were so geographically inappropriate -- attributed by the actual Guards as either Saudi or Jordanian -- that the immediate effect was comical. I don't recall the reporter and can't identify him now. But with all the other pretexts for war now being identified as ill-considered at best and fraudulent at worst, this experiment is easily reproduced: Play the tape for a selection of Iraqi sources and have them identify where the speakers are from. If the result is as described, this would seem more of a smoking gun than possibly even forged memos: Somebody recorded fake audiotapes and couldn't even be bothered to cast the right nationalities -- or else couldn't tell the difference.

The clip itself is here(http://www.state.gov/p/nea/disarm), it's the third clip, labeled "Modified Vehicle." If anyone knows someone out there with a knowledge of Iraqi dialects who isn't presently in some CIA black ops prison camp and could review the tape, we'd certainly love to hear about it.

From Colin Powell, Still 1 for 6 by Jane Hamsher on November 9, 2005

Link:
http://firedoglake.blogspot.com/2005/11/colin-powell-still-1-for-6.html

And, do think of any way you might be able to help Jane Hamsher contact Iraqi's -- in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, France .... i.e., any where DU is read -- who'd be able to listen to the tape and offer comment as to likely dialect(s) of the speakers. They could just post their comments at the above thread or contact Ms. Hamsher directly at the email address on the firedoglake homepage.


Peace.