President Bush said Tuesday that critics who believe the Iraq war has worsened terrorism are naive, and he ordered the partial declassification of a high-level intelligence analysis that has stirred heated election-season argument on the subject.
At a White House news conference, Bush acknowledged that the fighting in Iraq has been used as a recruitment tool for extremists _ one finding of the intelligence assessment that suggests the Iraq war has nourished terrorists’ ranks.
But he rejected any suggestion that the war was a mistake. "I think it’s naive. I think it’s a mistake for people to believe that going on the offense against people that want to do harm to the American people makes us less safe," Bush said, standing alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
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He rejected the suggestion that his decision to release a version of the report was a political act, as well. "I want you to read the document so you don’t speculate about what it says … as opposed to relying on gossip," he said.
Bush listed a number of terrorist attacks that predated the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq: the hijackings of Sept. 11, 2001, the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, the 1998 bombings on U.S. embassies in East Africa and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
"To suggest that if we weren’t in Iraq we would see a rosier scenario, with fewer extremists joining the radical movement, requires us to ignore 20 years of experience," Bush said.
"Bush listed a number of terrorist attacks that predated the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq." He can’t stop doing that. We know about those attacks! It wasn’t Iraq that attacked us! Will he never learn to listen to what we’re saying?
"…the partial declassification of a high-level intelligence analysis." Of course we’re wondering, How partial?
3 pages out of 40. That will get you 7.5%.