The Constitution in Crisis: The High Crimes of the Bush Administration and a Blueprint for Impeachment

Constitution In Crisis

The High Crimes of the Bush Administration and a Blueprint for Impeachment

Representative John C. Conyers Jr.

Special contents of this edition copyright © 2007 by Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

Foreword © 2007 by Elizabeth Holtzman

Introduction © 2007 by Rep. John Conyers, Jr.

All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to: Skyhorse Publishing, 555 Eighth Avenue, Suite 903, New York, NY 10018.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The Constitution in crisis : the high crimes of the Bush Administration and a blueprint for impeachment / House Democratic Judiciary Staff; introduction by Representative John Conyers, Jr.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

9781602390096

1. Bush, George W. (George Walker), 1946-—Impeachment. 2. Political

crimes and offenses—United States. 3. Misconduct in office—United

States. 4. Political corruption—United States. 5. Iraq War,

2003-—Causes. 6. United States—Politics and government—2001—7.

United States—Foreign relations—2001—I. United States. Congress.

House. Committee on the Judiciary. Democratic Staff.

E903.3.C66 2007

973.931—dc22

2006038570

Printed in Canada

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Foreword

Introduction

Summary

I - The Downing Street Minutes and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Coverups in the Iraq War

Chronology: Last Throes of Credibility

Detailed Findings

II - Unlawful Domestic Surveillance and the Decline of Civil Liberties Under the Administration of George W. Bush

Chronology: Democracy Without Checks and Balances

Detailed Findings

Addendum

Analysis

Recommendations

Conclusion

Endnotes

Legal Standards and Authorities

Major Reports

Foreword

BY ELIZABETH HOLTZMAN

Former Representative from New York’s 16th Congressional District

The Iraq war, now in its third year, has been a tragic, huge debacle. Both Al Gore and a former head of U.S. Army intelligence characterized it as the worst strategic military mistake in American history. Three thousand Americans have been killed and more than 22,000 have been wounded. The monetary costs could exceed $1 trillion. According to some estimates, the number of Iraqis killed may be as high as 600,000. No one can foretell what the consequences for Iraqis will be—intensified civil war, anarchy, religious dictatorship. No one knows what we, the region, and the world will reap from the whirlwind we have sown there.

The American people have finally realized the catastrophe the war has become, and with a mounting anger about it swept the Republicans out of power in the November 7, 2006 Congressional elections.

The Constitution in Crisis documents in vivid and brilliant detail how the war was foisted on us through a carefully orchestrated scheme of lies and deceptions, half-truths, and misstatements by a President determined for his own reasons—still unknown—to remove Saddam Hussein from power. What this book forces us to come to grips with is what we as a nation are going to do about it.

This is not a war that the American people would have supported absent these lies. And the lies cynically built both on the fear created by the attacks of 9-11 and the desire to retaliate against those attacks. President Bush and his team inflamed and manipulated these emotions in support of our invasion of Iraq.

As The Constitution in Crisis demonstrates, the outline of these lies is clear: 1) link Saddam to Al Qaeda and suggest to Americans that an invasion of Iraq would be justified retaliation for 9-11; 2) raise the specter of a mushroom cloud and make Americans fear that Saddam could attack us with nuclear weapons unless we act immediately to protect ourselves; and 3) claim that the war would be short, sweet and painless, a cakewalk where we would be greeted as liberators, and where Iraqi oil revenues would pay for the costs of reconstruction.

Most Americans believed their President, whose words were echoed and amplified by Vice President Richard Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and a host of lesser officials.

The problem Constitution in Crisis poses is how to hold President Bush and his team accountable. Interestingly, the book spells out a series of criminal statutes that may have been violated in the run up to the war. But there is no practical way of enforcing the statutes against the President and his team as long as the Attorney General, appointed by the very person to be investigated, remains responsible for the prosecutions.

After Watergate, a special prosecutor statute was put into place to avoid this problem. It was designed to ensure that government higher-ups, including a president, could be prosecuted for criminal misbehavior. But the excesses of Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr in the Monica Lewinsky/Bill Clinton affair prompted Congress to let the statute expire. We need to think of resurrecting that law, but with safeguards against those excesses.

Another problem with criminal prosecution is that it is unclear whether a president may lawfully be prosecuted during his term of office. Special Watergate Prosecutor Leon Jaworski believed that President Nixon could not be prosecuted, and he did not permit the grand jury to indict him—although Nixon was named as an unindicted co-conspirator. President Bush will be out of office by the time this issue could be resolved by the courts.

The only real remedy is impeachment and removal from office. Placed in the constitution by framers who were worried about presidential abuses of power, the impeachment power was designed to protect the constitution from subversion. There can be no greater subversion than driving our country into war through lies and deceptions, thereby undermining the ability of Congress and the American people to make a reasoned determination as to whether to go to war on a basis of the actual—not hyped or faked—facts. There is no more serious decision a country can make than whether to go to war, and our framers wisely put the power in the hands of the Congress and the American people, not just the President (except, obviously, in cases of actual or imminent attack on the US where the President must immediately mobilize forces to protect the country).

The framers wanted Congress to have a significant role in war-making. They were prompted by more than just an abstract allegiance to checks and balances or the idea that two heads are better than one. The framers knew from bitter experience with a monarchy and from their study of history that executives are more prone to start wars. They wanted a brake on that predilection, and thought Congress would act as one. As James Madison explained in a 1798 letter to Thomas Jefferson: The Constitution supposes what the history of all governments demonstrates, that the executive is the branch of power most interested in war and most prone to it. It has accordingly ... vested the question of war in the legislative. Although the framers did not shrink from war (after all, they had just won the Revolutionary War against King George), they knew its horrific costs, and wanted to minimize them in the future for the nation.

The advantage of impeachment is that it can remove President Bush from office, and thus put an end to the continuation of the war through a web of lies and deceptions. As The Constitution in Crisis notes, even after the invasion took place, the President and his team kept lying about the war, claiming, for example, that they had found the WMDs that the war was supposed to have been fought over and claiming progress even when the war was going badly. Who can forget Cheney’s June 2005 statement that the insurgents were in their last throes? Or President Bush’s pre-November 2006 assertion: Absolutely we are winning in Iraq—which became, post-election, We are not winning, but we are not losing either.

Removing the President from office ends the danger that he would take us into another war the same way he took us into Iraq—with lies and deceptions. It would also stop him from continuing to violate the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (which this book does not address in depth because the information have only recently surfaced) and from authorizing any further mistreatment of detainees in violation of the Geneva Conventions and the federal anti-torture statute, as well as from other violations of U.S. law.

This is the third time in the last sixty years that presidents have, through lies and deceptions, embroiled this nation in wars or substantial military actions, each of which was disastrous in its own way. In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson, a Democrat, won Congressional authorization to escalate the Vietnam War through the ruse of the Gulf of Tonkin incidents. He claimed that U.S. patrol boats had been fired upon by North Vietnam in two separate incidents and that retaliation was required. The first attack was not unprovoked and the second never took place. But Congress didn’t know this, and overwhelmingly supported military action. We paid a horrific price for the Vietnam War, in blood and treasure. So did the Vietnamese people.

Only a few years later, in the spring of 1969, President Nixon, a Republican, began bombing the neutral country of Cambodia, although Congress had never authorized any military action against the country. The President also ordered that the bombing be kept absolutely secret, and directed that his generals lie about where the bombing was taking place. As with Enron, the Pentagon kept two sets of books about the bombing, one showing where the bombing actually occurred and one for Congressional and public consumption showing that the bombing took place in Vietnam. The Cambodia bombing did not prevent our defeat in the Vietnam War. Moreover, some experts, such as William Shawcross, believe that the bombing led to the rise of the Khmer Rouge, which visited unspeakable horrors on the Cambodian people.

Neither President Johnson nor President Nixon was called to account for these lies and deceptions. During the impeachment proceedings against Richard Nixon, I drafted an article of impeachment based on his deception of Congress about the Cambodia bombing. But it was not adopted. One excuse was that the War Powers Resolution, just enacted, would prevent a president from secretly starting a war secretly, so there was no need for impeachment on this ground. Another was the concern was that the American people would think the Congress was impeaching the President about the war, instead of for his lying about the bombing.

Given this history and the impunity with which two recent presidents used lies and deceptions in the exercise of their war-making powers, it was inevitable that another president, in this case George W. Bush, would follow in their footsteps.

This pattern of immunity for presidents must stop. Impeaching President Bush for lying to get us into a war will not only protect us from him, but also send an unmistakable message to future presidents: never again.

—JANUARY 2, 2007

Introduction

BY REP. JOHN CONYERS, JR.

Scandals such as Watergate and Iran-Contra are widely considered to be constitutional crises. They were in the sense that the executive branch was acting in violation of the law and in tension with the Majority Party in the Congress. But the system of checks and balances put in place by the Founding Fathers worked, the abuses were investigated, and actions were taken—even if presidential pardons ultimately prevented a full measure of justice.

The situation we find ourselves in today under the administration of George W. Bush is systemically different. The alleged acts of wrongdoing my staff has documented—which include making misleading statements about the decision to go to war; manipulating intelligence; facilitating and countenancing torture; using classified information to out a CIA agent; and violating federal surveillance and privacy laws—are quite serious. However, the current Majority Party* has shown little inclination to engage in basic oversight, let alone question the Administration directly. The media, though showing some signs of aggressiveness as of late, is increasingly concentrated and all too often unwilling to risk the enmity or legal challenge from the party in charge. At the same time, unlike previous threats to civil liberties posed by the Civil War (suspension of habeas corpus and eviction of the Jews from portions of the Southern States); World War I (anti-immigrant Palmer Raids); World War II (internment of Japanese Americans); and the Vietnam War (COINTELPRO), the risks to our citizens’ rights today are potentially more grave, as the war on terror has no specific end point.

Although on occasion the courts are able to serve as a partial check on the unilateral overreaching of the Executive Branch—as they did in the recent Hamdan v. Rumsfeld decision invalidating the President’s military tribunal rules—the unfortunate reality remains that we are a long way from being out of the constitutional woods under the dangerous combination of an imperial Bush presidency and a compliant GOP Congress. I say this for several reasons. The Hamdan decision itself was approved by only five Justices (three Justices dissented, and Chief Justice Roberts recused himself because he had previously ruled in favor of the Administration) and was written by 86-year-old Justice Stevens. In the event of his retirement in the next two years, the Court’s balance would likely be tipped back, as he would undoubtedly be replaced by another Justice in the Scalia-Thomas-Roberts-Alito mode favoring an all-powerful unitary executive. In the very first hearing held on the decision, the Administration witness testified that the president is always right and severely chastised the Court’s decision. The Republican Majority* also appears poised to use the decision to score political points rather than reassert Congressional prerogatives, as House Majority Leader Boehner disingenuously declared the case offers a clear choice between Capitol Hill Democrats who celebrate offering special privileges to violent terrorists, and Republicans who want the President to have the necessary tools to prosecute and achieve victory in the Global War on Terror.

Thus, notwithstanding the eloquence of the Hamdan decision, I believe our Constitution remains in crisis. We cannot count on a single judicial decision to reclaim the rule of law or resurrect the system of checks and balances envisioned by the Founding Fathers. Rather, we need to restore a vigilant Congress, an independent judiciary, a law-abiding president, and the vigorous free press that has served our Nation so well throughout our history.

Because of the above concerns, I asked my Judiciary Committee staff to prepare the following Report. I made this request in the wake of President Bush’s failure to respond to a letter submitted by 122 Members of Congress and more than 500,000 Americans in July of 2005 asking him whether the assertions set forth in the so-called Downing Street Minutes were accurate, and in the aftermath of the disclosure by the New York Times in December 2005 and USA Today in May 2006 that the President had approved widespread warrantless domestic surveillance of innocent Americans. I asked for this Report to be prepared because I believe it is vital that we document these allegations, learn from our mistakes, and consider laws and safeguards necessary to prevent their recurrence. I believe it is essential that we come together as a Nation to confront religious extremism and despicable regimes abroad as well as terrorist tactics at home. However, as a veteran, I recognize that we do no service to our brave armed forces by asking them to engage in military conflict under false pretenses and without adequate resources. Nor do we advance the cause of fighting terrorism if our government takes constitutionally dubious short cuts of little law enforcement value that alienate the very groups in this country whose cooperation is central to fighting this seminal battle.

Many of us remember a time when the powers of our government were horribly abused. Those of us who lived through Vietnam know the damage that can result when our government misleads its citizens about war. As one who was included on President Nixon’s enemies list, I am all too familiar with the specter of unlawful government intrusion. In the face of these lessons, I believe it is imperative that we never lose our voice of dissent, regardless of the political pressure. As Martin Luther King, Jr. told us, there comes a time when silence is betrayal. None of us should be bullied or intimidated when the executive branch charges that those who would criticize their actions are aiding the terrorists and giving ammunition to America’s enemies, or when they warn that Americans need to watch what they say, as this Administration has done.

It is tragic that our Nation has invaded another sovereign nation because the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy, and that millions of innocent Americans have been subject to government surveillance outside of proper legal process. However, it is unforgivable that Congress has been unwilling to examine these matters or take actions to prevent these circumstances from occurring again. Since the Majority Partya is unwilling to fulfill their oversight responsibilities, it is incumbent on individual Members of Congress as well as the American public to act to protect our constitutional form of government. It is with that purpose and in that spirit that I am releasing this Minority Report.

I would like to thank the blogosphere for its myriad and invaluable contributions to me and my staff. Absent the assistance of blogs and other Internet-based media, it would have been impossible to assemble all of the information, sources, and other materials necessary to the preparation of this Report. Whereas the so-called mainstream media has frequently been willing to look past the abuses of the Bush Administration, the blogosphere has proven to be a new and important bulwark of our Nation’s first amendment freedoms.

Summary

This Minority Report has been produced at the direction of Representative John Conyers, Jr., Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee. The Report is divided into two principal parts—Part I, released in draft form in December 2005, concerns The Downing Street Minutes and Deception Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Cover-ups in the Iraq War and Part II, released in June 2006, concerns Unlawful Domestic Surveillance and Related Civil Liberties Abuses under the Administration of George W. Bush. (At the conclusion, we include an Addendum including additional matters which have come to light since Part I of the Report was issued in December 2005 and Part II was written in May 2006).

In preparing this Report, we reviewed tens of thousands of documents and materials, including testimony submitted at two hearings held by Rep. Conyers concerning the Downing Street Minutes and warrantless domestic surveillance; hundreds of media reports, articles, and books, including interviews with past and present Administration employees and other confidential sources; scores of government and nonprofit reports, hearings, and analyses; numerous letters and materials submitted to Rep. Conyers; staff interviews; relevant laws, cases, regulations, and administrative guidelines; and the Administration’s own words and statements.

In brief, we have found that there is substantial evidence that the President, the Vice-President, and other-high ranking members of the Bush Administration misled Congress and the American people regarding the decision to go to war in Iraq; misstated and manipulated intelligence information regarding the justification for such war; countenanced torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment in Iraq; permitted inappropriate retaliation against critics of their Administration; and approved domestic surveillance that is both illegal and unconstitutional. As further detailed in the Report, there is evidence that these actions violate a number of federal laws, including:

Making False Statements to Congress; for example, saying you have learned Iraq is attempting to buy uranium from Niger, when you have been warned by the CIA that this is not the case.

The War Powers Resolution and Misuse of Government Funds; for example, redeploying troops and initiating bombing raids before receiving congressional authorization.

Federal laws and international treaties prohibiting torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment; for example, ordering detainees to be ghosted and removed, and tolerating and laying the legal ground work for their torture and mistreatment.

Federal laws concerning retaliating against witnesses and other individuals; for example, demoting Bunnatine Greenhouse, the chief contracting officer at the Army Corps of Engineers, because she exposed contracting abuses involving Halliburton.

Federal requirements concerning leaking and other misuse of intelligence; for example, failing to enforce the executive order requiring disciplining those who leak classified information, whether intentionally or not.

Federal regulations and ethical requirements governing conflicts of interest, for example, then Attorney General John Ashcroft’s being personally briefed on FBI interviews concerning possible misconduct by Karl Rove even though Mr. Rove had previously received nearly $750,000 in fees for political work on Mr. Ashcroft’s campaigns.

Violating FISA and the Fourth Amendment; for example, intercepting thousands of communications to or from any person within the United States without obtaining a warrant.

The Stored Communications Act of 1986 and the Communications Act of 1934; for example, obtaining millions of U.S. customer telephone records without obtaining a subpoena or warrant, without customer consent, and outside of any applicable emergency exceptions.

The National Security Act; for example, failing to keep all Members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees fully and currently informed of intelligence activities, such as the warrantless surveillance programs.

With regard to the NSA’s domestic surveillance programs, we have also found that members of the Bush Administration made a number of misleading statements regarding its operation and scope; the legal justifications proffered by the Bush Administration are constitutionally destabilizing; there is little evidence that the programs have been beneficial in combating terrorism and may have affirmatively placed terrorism prosecutions at risk; and the programs appear to have been designed and implemented in a manner designed to stifle legitimate concerns.

The Report rejects the frequent contention by the Bush Administration that their pre-war conduct has been reviewed and they have been exonerated. No entity has ever considered whether the Administration misled Americans about the decision to go to war. The Senate Intelligence Committee has not yet conducted a review of pre-war intelligence distortion and manipulation, while the presidentially appointed Silberman-Robb Commission Report specifically cautioned that intelligence manipulation was not part of our inquiry.

There has also not been any independent inquiry concerning torture and other legal violations in Iraq; nor has there been an independent review of the pattern of cover-ups and political retribution by the Bush Administration against its critics, other than the very narrow and still ongoing inquiry of Special Counsel Fitzgerald into the outing of Valerie Plame. There also has been no independent review of the circumstances surrounding the Bush Administration’s domestic spying scandals. The Administration summarily rejected all requests for special counsels, as well as reviews by the Department of Justice and Department of Defense Inspector Generals. When the DOJ Office of Professional Responsibility opened an investigation, the Bush Administration effectively squashed it by denying the investigators security clearances. Neither the House nor Senate Intelligence Committee have undertaken any sort of comprehensive investigation, and the Bush Administration has sought to cut off any court review of the NSA programs by repeatedly invoking the State Secrets Doctrine.

As a result of our findings, we have made a number of recommendations to help prevent the recurrence of these events in the future, including:

Obtaining enhanced investigatory authority to access documentary information and testimony regarding the various allegations set forth in this Report

Reaffirming that FISA and the criminal code contain the exclusive means for conducting domestic warrantless surveillance and, to the extent that more personnel are needed to process FISA requests, increasing available resources

Requiring the President to report on the pardon of any former or current officials who could implicate the President or other Administration officials implicated by pending investigations

Requiring the President to notify Congress upon the declassification of intelligence information

Providing for enhanced protection for national security whistle-blowers

Strengthening the authority of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.

We also make a number of additional recommendations within the jurisdiction of the House Judiciary Committee to help respond to the ongoing threat of terrorism, including:

Increasing funding and resources for local law enforcement and first responders and insuring that anti-terrorism funds are distributed based on risk, not politics

Implementing the 9-11 Commission Recommendations, including providing for enhanced port, infrastructure, and chemical plant security and ensuring that all loose nuclear materials are secured

Banning corporate trade with state sponsors of terrorism and eliminating sovereign immunity protections for state sponsors of terrorism

Enhancing laws against wartime fraud.

I

The Downing Street Minutes and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Coverups in the Iraq War

Chronology: Last Throes of Credibility

But I think the level of activity that we see today, from a military standpoint, I think will clearly decline. I think they’re in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency.

—MAY 30, 2005, VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY’S

REMARKS ON THE IRAQI INSURGENCY, LARRY KING LIVE¹

The 2000 Presidential election focused on many issues relating to domestic and foreign policy.² However, the topic of Iraq was virtually unmentioned in the campaign. In a presidential debate with then-Vice President Al Gore, then-presidential candidate George W. Bush emphasized that he would be careful about using troops for nation-building purposes and that he would not launch a pre-emptive war because he believed the role of the military was to prevent war from happening in the first place.³ At the same time, some future members of the Bush Administration, dubbed the neoconservatives, were waiting for war with Iraq. High-ranking officials such as Dick Cheney, Richard Perle, and Paul Wolfowitz were part of this group.⁴

In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, the Bush Administration began to hint at the coming attack on Iraq. In his January 29, 2002 State of the Union Address, the President remarked that countries like Iraq, Iran, and North Korea constitute an axis of evil.... These regimes pose a grave and growing danger. ... I will not wait on events while dangers gather.⁵ On June 1, 2002, during a speech at West Point, President Bush formally enunciated his doctrine of preemption that would be used against Iraq.⁶ It was also around this time that Vice President Cheney and his Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, began making a series of unusual trips to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to discuss Iraqi intelligence.⁷

At the same time, the President’s public statements indicated a reluctance to use military force in Iraq. He assured the public that he had not made up his mind to go to war with Iraq and that war was a last resort.⁸ However, contrary to these public statements, the Bush Administration formed the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) in August 2002 in an apparent effort to bolster public support for war with Iraq.⁹

Shortly thereafter, the Administration began making more alarming and sensational claims about the danger posed to the United States by Iraq (for example, in a September 12, 2002 address to the United Nations), and began to press forward publicly with preparations for war.¹⁰ In the days following the President’s speech to the United Nations, Iraq delivered a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan stating that it would allow the return of U.N. weapons inspectors without conditions.¹¹ But on September 18, President Bush discredited Hussein’s offer to let U.N. inspectors back into Iraq as his latest ploy.¹²

As the Congressional vote to authorize force against Iraq approached, the President and Administration officials raised the specter of a nuclear attack by Iraq.¹³ The President subsequently received from Congress on October 11, 2002, a joint resolution for the use of force in Iraq.¹⁴ Based on the intelligence findings in the National Intelligence Estimate provided to Congress by the Administration, the resolution stated that Iraq posed a continuing threat to the United States by, among other things, actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability.¹⁵

The President’s focus then moved to the United Nations in an effort to persuade the U.N. to approve renewed weapons inspections in Iraq and sanctions for noncompliance. Once again, the President asserted his reluctance to take military action. Upon signing the resolution, the President stated: I have not ordered the use of force. I hope the use of force will not become necessary.¹⁶ On November 8, 2002, the United Nations Security Council adopted U.N. Resolution 1441, which stipulated that Iraq was required to readmit U.N. weapons inspectors under more stringent terms than required by previous U.N. Resolutions.¹⁷

On January 27, 2003, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) indicated that the Bush Administration’s claim that aluminum tubes being delivered to Iraq were part of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program likely was false.¹⁸ In the wake of this claim being discredited, President Bush introduced a new piece of evidence to the public in his State of the Union address on January 28, 2003, to demonstrate that Iraq was developing a nuclear arms program: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.¹⁹

On February 5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell took the Bush Administration’s case to the United Nations Security Council. In a presentation to the United Nations, Secretary Powell charged, among other things, that Iraq had mobile production facilities for biological weapons.²⁰ With its case to the United Nations delivered, for the first time and contrary to earlier claims that the Administration was reluctant to use force, the Administration publicly indicated its readiness and enthusiasm for going to war. The question was no longer whether force would be used, but what—if any—difficulties would accompany the use of force. Vice President Dick Cheney made an appearance on Meet the Press and stated that the war was not going to be long, costly, or bloody because we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators.²¹

On March 18, 2003, the President submitted a letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate informing the Congress of his determination that diplomatic and peaceful means alone would not protect the Nation or lead to Iraqi compliance with United Nations demands.²² On March 20, the President launched the preemptive invasion.

A little more than a month into the invasion, President Bush landed aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and, standing beneath a massive banner reading Mission Accomplished, he stated, Major combat operations in Iraq have ended.²³ Immediately thereafter, it was self-evident that—despite the premature declaration of victory—numerous problems persisted with regard to the occupation. This was not the only post-war mischaracterization of the truth by the Bush Administration. Since then, they have been dogged by misstatements concerning the size and strength of the insurgency; the preparedness of Iraqi troops; the cost of the war; the existence of weapons of mass destruction (WMD); and the war’s impact on terrorism, among other things.²⁴

Another significant problem for the Bush Administration was its failure to find any of the WMD that it had used to justify the invasion. On July 6, 2003, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who was sent to Niger at the behest of the CIA to investigate the uranium claim, wrote in an op-ed piece that the intelligence concerning Niger’s alleged sale of uranium to Iraq was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.²⁵ The following day, the White House issued a rare retraction of the uranium allegations from the President’s State of the Union Address.²⁶ Shortly thereafter, the identity of Wilson’s wife, a covert CIA agent, was revealed in the press through a Robert Novak column sourced to two officials in the Administration.²⁷ Later in the year, Colin Powell also conceded that the information given in his February 5, 2003 speech before the U.N. appear[ed] not to be ... that solid.²⁸ Capping these retractions were the findings of David Kay, the U.S. official responsible for the WMD search as the head of the Iraq Survey Group, who concluded that there were not large stockpiles of newly produced weapons of mass destruction. We don’t find the people, the documents, or the physical plants that you would expect to find if the production was going on.²⁹

Amid these admissions that the case for war was, generously speaking, faulty, the Administration and Congressional Republicans sought to pre-empt inquiries into the White House use or manipulation of intelligence by launching more limited investigations. On February 6, 2004, President Bush created the Robb-Silberman Commission, which later found that the intelligence community was dead wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.³⁰ However, this Commission was specifically prohibited from examining the use or manipulation of intelligence by policymakers.³¹

On March 16, 2004, the Democratic staff of the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform submitted a report to Ranking Member Henry A. Waxman.³² This report, entitled Iraq on the Record: The Bush Administration’s Public Statements on Iraq, details public statements made by senior Bush Administration officials regarding policy toward Iraq. The report indicates that five officials made misleading statements about the threat posed by Iraq in 125 public appearances. The report and an accompanying database identify 237 specific misleading statements by the five officials.³³

On July 7, 2004, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence reported that it had found numerous failures in the intelligence-gathering and analysis process.³⁴ However, that review also was explicitly not intended to look into the Administration’s use of that wrong intelligence in selling the war.³⁵ To date, there has never been a truly independent, comprehensive non-partisan or bipartisan review of the Administration’s false claims regarding WMD or any other aspect of the war.³⁶

On April 28, 2004, 60 Minutes II made public a series of photos taken at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq documenting apparent torture and other cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment by U.S. military and other personnel.³⁷ Since then, reports of other alleged violations of international law involving Iraqi prisoners have been reported by the media and human rights organizations.³⁸

As the war continued into 2005, with U.S. casualties approaching 1,500, Iraq held elections on January 30. The Administration heralded the elections as a symbol of freedom and as an event which validated the initial invasion. By that point, however, the reason for attacking Iraq had shifted from an imminent threat of weapons of mass destruction; to combating terrorism after the September 11 attacks; to regime change; and eventually to promoting democracy and ensuring that those lives lost were not lost in vain.³⁹

While evidence and accounts of Administration insiders strongly suggested a predetermination to go to war and a manipulation of intelligence to justify it, that evidence and those accounts were attacked by Administration officials as inaccurate or biased. Then, on May 1, 2005, the Sunday London Times published the first of a series of important documents known as the Downing Street Minutes.⁴⁰ The Downing Street Minutes (DSM) are a collection of classified documents, written by senior British officials during the spring and summer of 2002, which recounted meetings and discussions of such officials with their American counterparts. The focus of these meetings and discussions was the U.S. plan to invade Iraq. The DSM appear to document a pre-determination to go war with Iraq on the part of U.S. officials and a manipulation of intelligence by such officials in order to justify the war.

The DSM generated significant media coverage in Great Britain in the lead up to the British elections, but initially received very little media attention in the United States. However, a concerted effort to call attention to them by Congressman John Conyers, Jr. and a number of Members of Congress, grassroots groups, and Internet activists was ultimately successful. On May 5, 2005, Congressman Conyers, the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, along with 87 other Members of Congress (eventually 121), wrote to the President demanding answers to the allegations presented in the Minutes.⁴¹ In his letter, Representative Conyers questioned the President on whether there was a coordinated effort with the U.S. intelligence community and/or British officials to ‘fix’ the intelligence and facts around the policy.⁴²

On June 16, 2005, Congressman Conyers and 32 Members of Congress convened a historic hearing on the Downing Street Minutes, covered by numerous press outlets. The hearing was forced to a cramped room in the basement of the Capitol since Democrats were denied ordinary hearing room space by the Republican leadership. The Republicans tried to disrupt the hearings further by holding 12 consecutive floor votes during the hearing, an unprecedented number.⁴³ After the hearing, Congressman Conyers led a congressional delegation to the White House to personally deliver a letter signed by over 500,000 citizens, demanding answers from the President.⁴⁴ To date, the White House has declined to respond to these questions that were posed by these citizens and their elected representatives in Congress.

In the meantime, after some initial false starts, delays, and denials concerning possible misconduct in the Bush Administration’s outing of Valerie Plame Wilson,⁴⁵ then-Attorney General John Ashcroft recused himself from the investigation due to conflicts of interest and, on December 30, 2003, U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald was appointed to conduct the investigation of the Plame leak.⁴⁶ By July 2005, it became apparent that Karl Rove, a senior aide to the President, was involved in the leak; a Time reporter’s notes revealed that he had spoken to Karl Rove about the case.⁴⁷ Then, on July 18, 2005, President Bush conspicuously changed the standard for White House ethics from stating that he would fire anyone who leaked the information to firing someone only if he or she committed a crime.⁴⁸ With a lack of response from the Administration or from congressional Republicans, on July 22, 2005, Congressman Henry Waxman and Senator Byron Dorgan conducted a joint Democratic hearing on the National Security Consequences of Disclosing the Identity of a Covert Intelligence Officer.⁴⁹

Ambassador Wilson was not the only individual facing apparent retribution from the Bush Administration for criticizing its conduct. For example, on August 27, 2005, Bunnatine Greenhouse, the Chief Contracting officer at the Army Corps of Engineers, was demoted in apparent retaliation for exposing Pentagon favoritism toward a Halliburton subsidiary in awarding no-bid contracts in Iraq.⁵⁰ As discussed later in this Report, a long line of individuals was subject to other forms of sanctions and retribution by the Administration for exposing Administration wrongdoing concerning Iraq.

On October 28, 2005, Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Scooter Libby resigned after a federal grand jury indicted him on five charges, totaling a maximum 30-year sentence, related to the leak probe.⁵¹ Patrick Fitzgerald has yet to indict other individuals but has publicly stated that his investigation would remain open to consider other matters.⁵² On November 1, 2005, after numerous attempts to open an investigation on the issue, Democrats demanded answers to the Administration’s use of pre-war intelligence and led the Senate into a rare closed-door session, finally receiving a promise from the Republican majority to speed up the process.⁵³

Since that time, numerous additional disclosures have come out calling into question the Bush Administration’s pre-war veracity concerning WMD intelligence. On November 6, Senator Levin disclosed a classified Defense Department document showing that an Al Qaeda prisoner, Iba al Shaykh al-Libi, had been identified as a fabricator months before the Bush Administration used his claims to allege that Iraq had trained Al Qaeda members to use biological and chemical weapons.⁵⁴ On November 20, the Los Angeles Times revealed that German intelligence officials had informed the Administration that the Iraqi defector known as Curveball was not a reliable source for their mobile biological weapons charges.⁵⁵

Today, more than half of all Americans believe the Administration deliberately misled the public on the reasons for going to war.⁵⁶ The invasion appears to have increased and emboldened the terrorist movement.⁵⁷ As of the date of this Report, United States casualties are in excess of 2,500. The Iraq war costs approximately $6 billion a month, and by some estimates the eventual cost could approach a trillion dollars.⁵⁸

Detailed Findings

Determination to go to War Before Congressional Authorization

There are numerous, documented facts now in the public record that indicate that the Bush Administration had made a decision to go to war before it sought Congressional authorization or informed the American people of that decision.

Our investigation shows that while the roots of this decision existed even before George W. Bush was first elected president, it became a foregone conclusion in the aftermath of the September 11 tragedy. Due to the release of the so-called Downing Street Minutes materials, we are now able to confirm that there were agreements between the Bush and Blair governments in the spring and summer of 2002 to go to war in Iraq. Further evidence of that agreement to go to war exists by virtue of the Bush Administration’s marketing campaign to sell the war to the American people commencing in the fall of 2002, and the efforts to use the United Nations as a pretext to go to war later in 2002 and early in 2003.

Even though the Administration had begun planning an invasion of Iraq, the President and senior Administration officials continued to issue public denials regarding this effort, including misleading statements made before Congress:

September 8, 2002: Vice President Dick Cheney insists that first of all, no decision’s been made yet to launch a military operation.⁵⁹

September 16, 2002: U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld states, The President hasn’t made a decision with respect to Iraq. Didn’t I say that earlier? I thought I said that.⁶⁰

September 19, 2002: Secretary of State Colin Powell states, Of course, the President has not decided on a military option ... nobody wants war as a first resort ... [n] obody is looking for a war if it can be avoided.⁶¹

October 1, 2002: The President made the first in a series of statements, Of course, I haven’t made up my mind we’re going to war with Iraq.⁶²

November 7, 2002: Hopefully, we can do this peacefully ... don’t get me wrong. And if the world were to collectively come together to do so, and to put pressure on Saddam Hussein and convince him to disarm, there’s a chance he may decide to do that. And war is not my first choice, don’t ... it’s my last choice.⁶³

December 4, 2002: This is our attempt to work with the world community to create peace. And the best way for peace is for Mr. Saddam Hussein to disarm. It’s up to him to make his decision.⁶⁴

December 31, 2002: You said we’re headed to war in Iraq ... I don’t know why you say that. I hope we’re not headed to war in Iraq. I’m the person who gets to decide, not you.⁶⁵

January 2, 2003: First of all, you know, I’m hopeful we won’t have to go war, and let’s leave it at that.⁶⁶

March 6, 2003: I’ve not made up our mind about military action.⁶⁷

March 8, 2003: We are doing everything we can to avoid war in Iraq. But if Saddam Hussein does not disarm peacefully, he will be disarmed by force.⁶⁸

March 17, 2003: Should Saddam Hussein choose confrontation, the American people can know that every measure has been taken to avoid war, and every measure will be taken to win it.⁶⁹

■ Avenging the Father and Working with the Neo-Cons

From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go. It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying, ‘Go find me a way to do this.’

—JANUARY 11, 2004, PAUL O’NEILL, 60 MINUTES⁷⁰

Our investigation has found, in retrospect, there were indications even before September 11, 2001 that President Bush and key members of his Administration were fixated on the military invasion of Iraq, regardless of the provocation. A key piece of the puzzle was revealed in a series of interviews between then-Governor Bush and writer and long-time family friend Mickey Herskowitz when, according to Herskowitz, Mr. Bush stated:

"One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.... My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.... If I have a chance to invade ... if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it.’"⁷¹

According to Mr. Herskowitz, George W. Bush’s beliefs on Iraq were based in part on a notion ascribed to now-Vice President Dick Cheney: Start a small war. Pick a country where there is justification you can jump on, go ahead and invade.⁷²

In addition to Mr. Bush’s apparent belief that a successful military invasion could cause him to be seen as a great leader, additional possible motivations include responding to those right-wing critics who blamed his father for not entering Baghdad during the first Gulf War⁷³ and achieving revenge for Saddam Hussein’s reported plot to assassinate his father. Discussing Saddam Hussein on September 26, 2002, Bush declared: After all, this is the guy that tried to kill my dad at one time.⁷⁴

It is also significant that key members of the Bush Administration were part of a group of so-called neo-conservatives or neo-cons who were dedicated to removing Saddam Hussein by military force. The notion of toppling Saddam Hussein and his regime dates as far back as the 1990s, when it had been a priority of a circle of neo-conservative intellectuals, led by Richard Perle, a former Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Reagan, and Paul Wolfowitz, an Undersecretary of Defense for Policy under President George H.W. Bush.⁷⁵ The neocons did not have the power to effectuate their goals during the Clinton Administration, but they remained tied to one another and to Dick Cheney through a number of right-wing think-tanks and institutes, including the Project for the New American Century.

On January 26, 1998, the Project for the New American Century issued a letter to President Bill Clinton explicitly calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power.⁷⁶ Foretelling of subsequent events, the letter calls for the United States to go to war alone and attack the United Nations, and instructs that the United States should not be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the U.N. Security Council.⁷⁷ The letter was signed by 18 individuals; ten of them, including Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, became members of the current Bush Administration. Other documentary evidence of the neocon vision for an invasion is manifested by the December 1, 1997 issue of the Weekly Standard, a conservative magazine, which was headlined by a bold directive: Saddam Must Go: A How-to Guide. Two of the articles were written by current Administration officials, including Paul Wolfowitz.⁷⁸

In September 2000, a strategy document commissioned from the Project for the New American Century by Dick Cheney argued that