The Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction is a panel created by Executive Order 13328, signed by

U.S. President The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal government of t ...

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...

in February 2004. The impetus for the Commission lay with a public controversy occasioned by statements, including those of Chief of the

Iraq Survey Group The Iraq Survey Group (ISG) was a fact-finding mission sent by the multinational force in Iraq to discover the extent of Saddam Husseins' Weapons of Mass Destruction program that had been the main ostensible reason for the invasion in 2003. Its ...

David Kay David A. Kay (June 8, 1940 – August 13, 2022) was an American weapons expert, political commentator, and senior fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies. He was best known for his time as United Nations Chief Weapons Inspector follo ...

, that the Intelligence Community had grossly erred in judging that Iraq had been developing

weapons of mass destruction A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a Biological agent, biological, chemical weapon, chemical, Radiological weapon, radiological, nuclear weapon, nuclear, or any other weapon that can kill or significantly harm many people or cause great dam ...

(WMD) before the March 2003 start of

Operation Iraqi Freedom The Iraq War (), also referred to as the Second Gulf War, was a prolonged conflict in Iraq lasting from 2003 to 2011. It began with the invasion by a United States-led coalition, which resulted in the overthrow of the Ba'athist governm ...

. President Bush therefore formed the Commission, but gave it a broad mandate not only to look into any errors behind the

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

intelligence, but also to look into intelligence on WMD programs in

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

and

Libya Libya, officially the State of Libya, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya border, the east, Sudan to Libya–Sudan border, the southeast, Chad to Chad–L ...

, as well as to examine the capabilities of the Intelligence Community to address the problem of WMD proliferation and "related threats." However, the commission was not directed to examine the extent to which the Bush administration may have manipulated the intelligence. Following intense study of the American Intelligence Community, the Commission delivered its report to the President on March 31, 2005, the so-called Robb-Silberman Report.

Findings

Regarding Iraq, the Commission concluded that the

United States Intelligence Community The United States Intelligence Community (IC) is a group of separate US federal government, U.S. federal government intelligence agencies and subordinate organizations that work to conduct Intelligence assessment, intelligence activities which ...

was wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction and that this constituted a major

intelligence failure Failure in the intelligence cycle or intelligence failure, is the outcome of the inadequacies within the intelligence cycle. The intelligence cycle itself consists of six steps that are constantly in motion: requirements, collection, processing ...

. The Commission's report also described systemic analytical, collection, and dissemination flaws that led the intelligence community to erroneous assessments about Iraq's alleged WMD programs. Chief among these flaws were "an analytical process that was driven by assumptions and inferences rather than data", failures by certain agencies to gather all relevant information and analyze fully information on purported centrifuge tubes, insufficient vetting of key sources, particularly the source "

Curveball In baseball and softball, the curveball is a type of pitch thrown with a characteristic grip and hand movement that imparts forward spin to the ball, causing it to dive as it approaches the plate. Varieties of curveball include the 12–6 curve ...

," and somewhat overheated presentation of data to policymakers. The 601-page document detailed many U.S. intelligence failures and identified intelligence breakdowns in dozens of cases. Some of the conclusions reached by the report were: *the report notes in several places that the commission's mandate did not allow it "to investigate how policymakers used the intelligence they received from the Intelligence Community on Iraq's weapons programs," *One of the main and crucial intelligence sources for the case in Iraq was an informant named Curveball. Curveball had never been interviewed by American intelligence until after the war and was instead handled exclusively by German intelligence agents, who regarded his statements as unconvincing. An October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate that concluded Iraq "has"

biological weapons Biological agents, also known as biological weapons or bioweapons, are pathogens used as weapons. In addition to these living or replicating pathogens, toxins and biotoxins are also included among the bio-agents. More than 1,200 different kin ...

was "based almost exclusively on information obtained" from Curveball, according to the report. *Information about aluminum tubes to be used as

centrifuges A centrifuge is a device that uses centrifugal force to subject a specimen to a specified constant force - for example, to separate various components of a fluid. This is achieved by spinning the fluid at high speed within a container, thereby s ...

in a nuclear weapons program were found by the commission to be used for conventional

rockets A rocket (from , and so named for its shape) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using any surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely fr ...

. *The Niger Yellowcake scandal was due to American intelligence believing "transparently forged documents" purporting to show a contract between the countries. There were "flaws in the

letterhead A letterhead is the heading at the top of a sheet of letter paper (stationery). It consists of a name, address, logo or trademark, and sometimes a background pattern. Overview Many companies and individuals prefer to create a letterhead template ...

forged signature Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die. Forging is often classified according to the temperature at which it ...

s, misspelled words, incorrect titles for individuals and government entities". *While there were many reports that Curveball was actually the cousin of one of

Ahmed Chalabi Ahmed Abdel Hadi Chalabi (; 30 October 1945 – 3 November 2015) was an Iraqi dissident politician, convicted fraudster and founder of the Iraqi National Congress (INC) who served as the President of the Governing Council of Iraq ( 37th ...

's top aides, the Commission, while discovering that at least two INC defectors were fabricators, said it was "unable to uncover any evidence that the INC /nowiki>Iraqi National Congress">Iraqi_National_Congress.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Iraqi National Congress">/nowiki>Iraqi National Congress/nowiki> or any other organization was directing Curveball."

Recommendations

The report also looked forward, recommending a large number of organizational and structural reforms. Of the 74 recommendations to the President, he fully accepted 69 in a public statement released on June 29, 2005. The Commission's mission is, in part, "to ensure the most effective counter-proliferation capabilities of the United States and response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

Findings

Recommendations

Commission members

See also

References

External links