Intelligence report cast doubts over Iraq venture

1.00pm - By RUPERT CORNWELL

A deeply pessimistic US intelligence assessment of the situation in Iraq has cast further doubts over the Bush administration's attempt to rebuild the country, and given Democratic challenger John Kerry a new opportunity to move the Iraq crisis to the centre of the Presidential election battle.

A new National Intelligence Estimate, drawn up in July and representing the distilled wisdom of the entire US intelligence community, sketches out three scenarios for Iraq.

The grimmest is a descent into civil war; but even the most favourable of the three foresees no better than a precarious stability, under threat at any moment.

The conclusions of the latest NIE, first reported by the New York Times, contrast sharply with the upbeat tone of Mr Bush, who in campaign speeches continues to insist that progress is being made in Iraq, deriding Mr Kerry for his alleged vacillation on the issue.

The NIE's assessment reflects the view of most nonpartisan Iraq specialists here, that the insurgency is becoming more sophisticated and more dangerous, and that for the US the war in Iraq is politically, if not militarily unwinnable.

"There's a significant amount of pessimism," said one government official of the 50-page report.

Officials refused to discuss the NIE's findings, but the Bush camp remains relentlessly upbeat about the situation in Iraq 18 months after hostilities commenced.

"You know, every step of the way there have been pessimists and hand-wringers who said it couldn't be done," Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman, said at the latest news briefing on Wednesday.

"And every step of the way, the Iraqi people have proven them wrong because they are determined to have a free and peaceful future."

The White House position, however, errs on the side of optimism, at the very least, most pundits acknowledge.

Many cities, especially in the 'Sunni Triangle' north and west of Baghdad, are in effect no-go areas for US forces, the Pentagon admits.

Even the White House acknowledges that the violence is likely to continue beyond both the November elections in the US, and the Iraqi elections, still scheduled for the end of January at the latest.

The bleak prognosis by US intelligence comes in the same week the administration asked Congress to approve the shift of US$3.6bn of the US$18bn earmarked for longer-term reconstruction in Iraq into short term measures to boost security and protect the country's oil industry.

Even Republicans on Capitol Hill are enraged at how under US$1bn of the promised US$18bn gas been spent.

Richard Lugar, the chairman of the prestigious Senate Foreign Relations committee, described the delays as "exasperating."

Nebraska's Republican senator, Chuck Hagel, was even blunter.

"It's beyond pitiful, it's beyond embarrassing, it is now in the zone of dangerous," he said.

Mr Kerry has homed in on the administrations handling of Iraq in recent days. On Wednesday he questioned whether it would be possible to hold elections in January as scheduled.

"I think it is very difficult to see today how you're going to distribute ballots in places like Falluja, and Ramadi and Najaf and other parts of the country, without having established the security," Mr. Kerry said in a call-in phone call to Don Imus, the radio talk show host.

"I know that the people who are supposed to run that election believe that they need a longer period of time and greater security before they can even begin to do it, and they just can't do it at this point in time. So I'm not sure the president is being honest with the American people about that situation either at this point."

Thus far - despite Mr Kerry's fierce criticism, not to mention the ever growing chaos and bloodshed on the ground - Mr Bush has succeeded in depicting Iraq as just one part of the 'war on terror', where he scores far better in opinion polls than his Democratic opponent. But Democrats now plan to turn that tactic against Mr Bush.

"The President has frequently described the Iraq as 'the central front in the war on terror,' said Senator Joe Biden, a possible Secretary of State should Mr Kerry win the election.

"By that measure the war on terror is in trouble."

The Massachusetts senator was planning to step up his attack on Mr Bush's handling of post-war Iraq in a speech to a National Guard association yesterday.

But administration officials hope to generate some positive news with a high profile visit here next week by Iyad Allawi, the tough-minded Iraqi interim prime minister, who will make a forthright case for a continuing US commitment to Iraq.


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Herald Feature: Iraq