The Downing Street Memo

Read the once secret Downing Street Memo. You'll see why everything today is just an object subject to partisan political spinning. When I first heard about the memo, it was through the agency of people like Arianna Huffington or Pacifica station KPFK. They made it sound unambiguously like a smoking gun. Then I read the memo.

Here's the quote liberals fell on like a juicy steak:

"C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action."

It's very damning, but then here's this:

"For instance, what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began? You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary."

The second quote clearly suggests that Bush and Blair really believed Hussein possessed WMDs and was likely to use them.