Blast from the past, NYT article on Bolton, Cuba

[LittleClarkie]

and I see Carl Ford's name also. A little background for the current Bolton battle. I have several NYT's that I've saved and have been clipping articles from to create my own little tickler files. Sometimes the benefits of letting them sit for a while before I go through them becomes evident. I would have just skipped over this article at the time of its publication. But now it seems quite significant.


http://www.globalexchange.org/countries/americas/cuba/2524.html

In Stricter Study, U.S. Scales Back Claim on Cuba Arms

New York Times
September 18, 2004
Steven R. Weisman
WASHINGTON, Sept. 17 - The Bush administration, using stringent standards adopted after the failure to find banned weapons in Iraq, has conducted a new assessment of Cuba's biological weapons capacity and concluded that it is no longer clear that Cuba has an active, offensive bio-weapons program, according to administration officials.

The latest assessment contradicts a 1999 National Intelligence Estimate and past statements by top administration officials, some of whom have warned that Cuba may be sharing its weapons capacity with "rogue states" or with terrorists.

It is the latest indication that in the wake of the Iraq intelligence failures, the C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies are taking a closer look at earlier threat assessments and finding fault with some of the conclusions and the way the reports were prepared.

The new assessment says the intelligence community "continues to believe that Cuba has the technical capability to pursue some aspects of an offensive biological weapons program," according to an intelligence official.

--------------------
The above link stops several paragraphs from the end. If you have NYT access, here's a link to the full article.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/18/international/americas/18intel.html?ex=1253160000&en=4f309b0155978dbc&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt

[rodeodance]

1. and in his (bolton's) own words!!--and to think--we are going to unleash

him at the UN!! (yes, i do think the senate will confirm him).

......The Bush administration's past assessment accusing Cuba of producing germs for possible biological warfare has been a matter of dispute since it was first disclosed in the spring of 2002. Cuba angrily disputed the charges, and some experts suggested that Cuba's large pharmaceutical industry involved conventional activities and materials that were misinterpreted as a threat by opponents of Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader.

In March 2002, John R. Bolton, under secretary of state for nonproliferation, asserted that "the United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort'' and had also "provided dual-use biotechnology to other rogue states.''

A month later, he ratcheted up his comments that Cuba remained a "terrorist" threat to the United States and that its biological weapons program should be seen in that light. Mr. Bolton declined to comment on the revised assessment on Friday.

Around the same time, Carl Ford, the assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research, reported the same formulation to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Cuba. He listed Cuba as a country over which the United States was "most concerned" in the category of possessing chemical and biological weapons.......

[LittleClarkie]

2. I wish I could show the picture that goes with the article

The dude needs a makeover. Badly.

[killbotfactory]

3. All bullshit, all the time.

100% pure grade A asshole.