McGovern goes for Rumsfeld.

Finally located the complete video of Rumsfeld getting questioned by Ray McGovern.



You'll notice that Rumsfeld claims he said he knew where "suspected sites" were. That's a lie. As you can easily check here, what he said was:

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Finally, weapons of mass destruction. Key goal of the military campaign is finding those weapons of mass destruction. None have been found yet. There was a raid on the Answar Al-Islam Camp up in the north last night. A lot of people expected to find ricin there. None was found. How big of a problem is that? And is it curious to you that given how much control U.S. and coalition forces now have in the country, they haven't found any weapons of mass destruction?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Not at all. If you think -- let me take that, both pieces -- the area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.

No mention of suspected sites, he's clearly talking about knowing where the WMD are.

He also tells a lie of omission during this clip. He states, "I am not in the intelligence business". This ignores the fact that he headed The Office of Special Plans who's entire function was:

to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true - that Saddam Hussein had close ties to Al Qaeda, and that Iraq had an enormous arsenal of chemical, biological, and possibly even nuclear weapons that threatened the region and, potentially, the United States.

So it's slightly disingenuous of him to pretend that he had nothing to do with the intelligence that led to the war. The Office of Special Plans was set up precisely because the CIA weren't giving the administration the intelligence it needed in order to invade.

Rummy and the OSP willingly provided it. And it all turned out to be rot.

He also towards the end of the clip offers the bizarre defence that soldiers wouldn't have worn chemical weapons suits if they didn't believe Saddam had WMD. Of course, the soldiers believed this. They believed it because people like Rumsfeld had told them it was true.

Tags: Rumsfeld, McGovern, Iraq, Lies, Tikrit,