Bush Says Parts of Secret Terror Report To Be Made Public
White House
26 September 2006
President Bush says he will make public parts of a secret government assessment of the war on terror. Published reports say the document links the war in Iraq to an increase in the global terrorist threat. The president says those reports do not tell the whole story.
The president says portions of the document reported in the media were taken out of context. He says while terrorists have used the war in Iraq for propaganda reasons, it is wrong to draw a direct link between the Iraqi conflict and an increase in the terrorist threat.
"Some people have guessed what is in the report and have concluded that going into Iraq was a mistake. I strongly disagree," Mr. Bush says.
Speaking at a news conference with visiting Afghan President Hamid Karzai, President Bush criticized those who secretly give classified information to the media. He said, in general, he does not believe it is right to respond to such leaks by releasing classified materials to the public.
But Mr. Bush said in this case, he has told the Director of National Intelligence that such action is warranted.
"John Negroponte, the DNI, is going to declassify the document as quickly as possible. He is going to declassify the key judgments for you to read yourself. And he will do so in such a way that we will be able to protect sources and methods that our intelligence community uses," Mr. Bush says.
The document, which is formally known as the National Intelligence Estimate, is a compilation of data and analysis from all 16 U.S. government intelligence agencies. The report, the first of its kind since the start of the war in Iraq in 2003, was completed in April.
President Bush said the timing of the disclosures to the media is suspicious, noting stories appeared in print weeks before elections in November that will determine which political party controls the U.S. Congress.
"And here we are coming down the stretch in an election campaign and it is on the front page of your newspapers. Is not that interesting? Somebody has taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," Mr. Bush says.
The president has long maintained that the war in Iraq has made the United States safer. But critics of his Iraq policy say the National Intelligence Estimate provides proof that the war has worsened terrorism.
On Capitol Hill, Senate Democrats went before reporters after the news conference at the White House to talk about Iraq. Senator Hillary Clinton, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said the president's war policy is flawed.
"The Bush-Cheney administration has stretched our military to the brink, stretched the facts to fit their ideology, and stretched the patience of the American people with rhetoric instead of results," Mrs. Clinton says.
A short time later, Democrats called on the House of Representatives to go into an unusual closed door session to review the National Intelligence Estimate. Their request was rejected in a vote that split almost exactly along party lines, with all but two of the Democrats voting for the motion and all but one of the majority Republicans voting "no."
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