Now Colin Powell comes out swinging

In a stunning statement during an interview on the BBC, Colin Powell says that the White House was never told of doubts about WMD intelligence by the CIA.

Mr Powell, who argued the case for military action against Saddam Hussein in the UN in 2003, told BBC News 24 television he was "deeply disappointed in what the intelligence community had presented to me and to the rest of us."

"What really upset me more than anything else was that there were people in the intelligence community that had doubts about some of this sourcing, but those doubts never surfaced to us," he said.

While admitting that he had been bypassed on occasion by some of the White House hawks and that some discussions with Donald Rumsfeld "were not pleasant", Powell came nowhere close to the position taken by his former chief-of-staff Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson. Wilkerson essentially accused the White House hawks, Cheney and Rumsfeld of running a "cabal" to wrest control of foreign policy away from the State Department.

Powell's position seems to be that everybody, from Bush and himself on down, got bad information from the CIA and then acted upon it. As far as our continued presence in Iraq, Powell was 100% supportive of the Bush administration:

But he told the BBC that "essentially just to walk away, to say that we're taking all of our troops out as fast as we can, would be a tragic mistake". A US presence would be required in Iraq for "years", he added.

"We've invested a great deal in this country, and the Iraqi people deserve democracy and the freedom that they were promised when we got rid of Saddam Hussein and we have to stay with them... until they decide that they can get it now on their own, they don't need us any longer," he added.

This must be causing heartburn amongst the leftie administraters of the BBC who were no doubt hoping for a tell-all fingerpointing tattle tale from Powell. Sorry, mateys.

This comes on the heels of his derisive dismissal of the furor in Europe over "illegal" CIA flights across Erope to move terror suspects from point A to point Ouch.

"There's a little bit of the movie Casablanca in this, where, you know, the inspector says 'I'm shocked, shocked that this kind of thing takes place'.

"Well, most of our European friends cannot be shocked that this kind of thing takes place... The fact that we have, over the years, had procedures in place that would deal with people who are responsible for terrorist activities, or suspected of terrorist activities, and so the thing that is called rendition is not something that is new or unknown to my European friends."

The BBC must be shocked, shocked, that David Frost couldn't get Powell to once mention President Chimplerburton Gitmostein in a bad light.

"The United States is going through a period right now where public opinion world-wide is against us.

"I think that's a function of some of the policies we have followed in recent years with respect to Iraq and in not solving the Middle East's problem and perhaps the way in which we have communicated our views to the rest of the world, we have created an impression that we are unilateralist, we don't care what the rest of the world thinks.

"I don't think it's a fair impression"

Powell's disputes with Cheney and Rumsfeld are well known so there's no there, there. The best that the BBC can do is, and you'll see this if you follow the link above, show a photo of 5 US troops on patrol somewhere in Iraq with this caption:

The state department's plans for post-war Iraq were discarded

I cannot find a transcript of the interview which was shown tonight on BBC World TV and later on BBC News24. In fact, I followed both links and there was no mention whatsoever of the interview on either website. Try your luck.

UPDATE: I spelled Colin Powell's first name "Colon", in the post title, no less. Aaaargh! That's embarrassing.

Not too much comment out there about this, but there is more from:
OpusComm: Thank you Colin Powell

seedyrum musings: I'm sure that a third grader would find this post well thought out and very well written
Susie Madrak calls Powell a "waterboy" and a "lying toady" - no racism out there in leftie land, is there?
The Democratic Undergound says "what a bunch of crap" and their commenters crawl out from underground:
Liar Liar - orwell
Yes - The Convenient Lie Absolves All Sins - mhr
Pleeese, why does he keep on lying?! - goclark
Suck Up Colin.....Suck it up! And, who are YOU working for these days? - KoKo01
Wonder how he gets the taste of shit out of his mouth? - Solly Mack
Oh, Colin! Still carrying water for the boss? - HereSince1628
Go fuck yourself, Colon. - speedoo
yea -- what speedoo said! - DELUSIONAL
I think this is sad, to pimp for ** - realpolitik
I'm convinced someone's got photos of Powell fiddling with kids. n/t - rooboy
Powell is a world-class liar and suckup - daleo
when will this PoS just fade away???? - hadrons
What crap - JoFerret
Colin knew going in, that he was selling a bullshit war. - 0007
lies are SOP for this administration and its toadies.... - mike_c
Ah! Ah! BULLSHIT! Choo!! - VegasWolf
Pathetic - alarcojon
"BEEP-BEEP-BEEP"!!! said the bull**it detector!! "BEEP-BEEP-BEEP"!!! - Media_Lies_Daily
How come we all knew there were no WMD...but they had no clue? - Auntie Bush
Gotta keep the testimony straight in case of war trial - first year law - BR_Parkway
What a pathetic, lying sack of shit! - irkthesmirk
LIAR! I READ about it at the time in USAToday and Knight Ridder - greenman3610
Same here; what a load of shit by CP - madmark
What a load of shit; I read about the CIA reservations on the Iraq - madmark
Rumsfeld must have broken out the blackmail pics... - Hyernel
Bullshit - madmark

TAGS: Colin Powell, George W. Bush, Iraq, rendition, BBC, Europe, Sir David Frost, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld