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White House tries to end 'frenzy' over Iraq-Africa
« on: Jul 14th, 2003, 12:37pm » |
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White House tries to end 'frenzy' over Iraq-Africa line
Fleischer: 'The bottom line has been gotten to.'
From Dana Bash
CNN Washington Bureau
Monday, July 14, 2003 Posted: 12:45 PM EDT (1645 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Attempting to stop what he called a "media frenzy" over the president's disputed State of the Union claim that Iraq sought uranium from Africa, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Monday the line was not a major part of the U.S. justification for war.
"This revisionist notion that somehow this is now the core of why we went to war, a central issue of why we went to war, a fundamental underpinning of the president's decisions, is a bunch of bull," Fleischer told reporters Monday.
Echoing an argument used Sunday by National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, Fleischer said the claim was only one component in a broad argument for deposing Saddam Hussein.
Friday, Central Intelligence Agency Director George Tenet accepted responsibility for allowing the line to stay in the January 28 State of the Union address, but many Democrats say the White House still has explaining to do. (Full story)
Fleischer indicated the White House does not intend to find or disclose answers.
"The bottom line has been gotten to," he said.
Fleischer was peppered with questions about who in the White House put the line into the speech, and who knew of intelligence agencies' concerns about the claim.
"The president believes the vetting process here did not serve the White House," was as far as Fleischer would go in answering those questions.
"The president also believes the issue of whether or not Saddam sought uranium from Africa was not a central matter," he said.
Referenced British reports
The president referenced British reports in his State of the Union address, and Fleischer said that because the British government stands by its intelligence, "it still may be fact."
The White House has confirmed intelligence officials successfully excised a line in the president's speech in Cincinnati last October about Iraq seeking nuclear material from Niger.
Fleischer sought to explain why that was taken out, while the reference to Africa remained in the State of the Union.
"The reference that the CIA recommended be taken out of the Cincinnati speech was a very specific to the country of Niger and to the quantity of uranium that Iraq sought from Niger. ... The language in the State of the Union says 'sought uranium from Africa,' not just Niger, because there was other reporting from other countries beyond Niger," said Fleischer.
Many Democrats are accusing the White House of misleading the American people in the State of the Union address.
Fleischer attributed that to a "media frenzy" because of the media misinterpreting the reason for going to war in a way that "puts it in the center of the decision. .... That was not the reason we went to war. Whether or not [Saddam Hussein] sought uranium from Africa, he was still reconstituting his nuclear program."
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