Da Los Angeles Times del 27/09/2006
Originale su http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-092606nie,1,1779979....
Iraq War and Terrorism Report to be Declassified
di Joel Havemann
WASHINGTON -- President Bush denied today that the world is more dangerous for Americans because the U.S. war in Iraq has created more terrorists than it has eliminated, and he ordered some of a classified intelligence report made public to prove it.
"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 declared at a joint press conference with Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, after meeting with Karzai at the White House.
An April national intelligence estimate, prepared by the government's 16 spy agencies, states that the U.S. war in Iraq has radicalized many young Muslims and made the world more dangerous for the United States, the New York Times first reported on its website Saturday.
"I'm not surprised the enemy is exploiting the situation in Iraq and using it as a propaganda tool to try to recruit more people to their murderous ways," Bush said.
But he added that the last 20 years have shown that staying out of Iraq would not have yielded "a rosier scenario, with fewer extremists joining the radical movement."
Even before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the subsequent invasion of Iraq, Bush said, "thousands of fighters were trained in terror camps" in Afghanistan. American forces were not in Iraq when terrorists bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 and U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 2000, he said.
"If we weren't in Iraq, they'd find some other excuse," he said. "They kill in order to achieve their objectives."
Bush fell back on a familiar argument, saying that "the best way to protect America is defeat these killers overseas so we do not have to face them here at home. We're not going to let lies and propaganda by the enemy dictate how we win this war."
The national intelligence estimate was prepared by U.S. intelligence agencies under the leadership of John Negroponte, Bush's national intelligence director.
Negroponte said he hoped to have a declassified partial version of the report available by the end of the day after he had excised sensitive passages.
Bush said it was no accident that the 5-month-old national intelligence estimate was leaked to the newspapers in the heat of the campaign for the congressional elections that will determine whether the Democrats can wrest control of either the House or the Senate from the Republicans.
"Somebody's taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," Bush said.
The classified report dominated the questions for Bush and Karzai, who met at a time when the Taliban, whose government was ousted by U.S. forces and replaced by Karzai, is resurgent.
"The Taliban and other extremists have tried to regain control, mostly in the south of Afghanistan, and so we've adjusted tactics, and we're on the offense to meet the threat and to defeat the threat," Bush said.
Karzai expressed his gratitude to Bush "for all you have done for Afghanistan ... from roads, to education, to democracy, to parliament, to good governance efforts, to health and to all other good things that are happening in Afghanistan."
Karzai and Pervez Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, will have dinner at the White House on Wednesday. High on the agenda will be the lawless, mountainous region on the border between the two countries, which is thought to be a haven for terrorists, including Osama bin Laden.
"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 declared at a joint press conference with Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, after meeting with Karzai at the White House.
An April national intelligence estimate, prepared by the government's 16 spy agencies, states that the U.S. war in Iraq has radicalized many young Muslims and made the world more dangerous for the United States, the New York Times first reported on its website Saturday.
"I'm not surprised the enemy is exploiting the situation in Iraq and using it as a propaganda tool to try to recruit more people to their murderous ways," Bush said.
But he added that the last 20 years have shown that staying out of Iraq would not have yielded "a rosier scenario, with fewer extremists joining the radical movement."
Even before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the subsequent invasion of Iraq, Bush said, "thousands of fighters were trained in terror camps" in Afghanistan. American forces were not in Iraq when terrorists bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 and U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 2000, he said.
"If we weren't in Iraq, they'd find some other excuse," he said. "They kill in order to achieve their objectives."
Bush fell back on a familiar argument, saying that "the best way to protect America is defeat these killers overseas so we do not have to face them here at home. We're not going to let lies and propaganda by the enemy dictate how we win this war."
The national intelligence estimate was prepared by U.S. intelligence agencies under the leadership of John Negroponte, Bush's national intelligence director.
Negroponte said he hoped to have a declassified partial version of the report available by the end of the day after he had excised sensitive passages.
Bush said it was no accident that the 5-month-old national intelligence estimate was leaked to the newspapers in the heat of the campaign for the congressional elections that will determine whether the Democrats can wrest control of either the House or the Senate from the Republicans.
"Somebody's taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," Bush said.
The classified report dominated the questions for Bush and Karzai, who met at a time when the Taliban, whose government was ousted by U.S. forces and replaced by Karzai, is resurgent.
"The Taliban and other extremists have tried to regain control, mostly in the south of Afghanistan, and so we've adjusted tactics, and we're on the offense to meet the threat and to defeat the threat," Bush said.
Karzai expressed his gratitude to Bush "for all you have done for Afghanistan ... from roads, to education, to democracy, to parliament, to good governance efforts, to health and to all other good things that are happening in Afghanistan."
Karzai and Pervez Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, will have dinner at the White House on Wednesday. High on the agenda will be the lawless, mountainous region on the border between the two countries, which is thought to be a haven for terrorists, including Osama bin Laden.
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