Regarding the dirty business of politics

This from Reuters...

By Phil Stewart

ROME (Reuters) - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, on the eve of a trip to Washington, said he repeatedly tried to persuade U.S. President George W. Bush against invading Iraq.

The Italian leader voiced his unease with the military operation to topple Saddam Hussein during a television interview to be broadcast on Monday -- the same day he meets Bush.

Berlusconi is one of Washington's strongest allies but he did not send troops to join the invasion, preferring to despatch troops only after the fall of Baghdad.

"I tried many times to convince the American president not to go to war," Berlusconi was quoted as saying by La7 television network, which recorded the interview.

"I tried to find other avenues and other solutions, even through an activity with the African leader (Libya's Col. Muammar) Gaddafi. But we didn't succeed and there was the military operation."

One of Berlusconi's staff said he knew Berlusconi had given La7 television an interview, but could not confirm the comments. Berlusconi is scheduled to leave for Washington on Sunday.

Berlusconi pulled about 300 soldiers from Iraq earlier this year as part of a phased withdrawal, leaving about 2,900 troops there. He is trailing in opinion polls ahead of April elections to center-left rival, Romano Prodi, who promises to withdraw all Italian forces from Iraq if he is voted into office.

But wait.. it gets better:

NIGER URANIUM?

The context of Berlusconi's answers in the interview were unclear since La7 only provided small excerpts.

The Italian leader has been defending himself against accusations in Italy that the country's intelligence agency, possibly after government pressure, passed-off fake documents to Washington used to bolster claims of Iraq's nuclear ambitions.

The documents purported that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Niger.

First off, does anybody remember the facts as brought out by this story? I know that Reuters and just about every other MSM outlet seems to conveniently forget that they ever existed.

Now turn to the front page of the June 28 Financial Times for a report from the paper's national security correspondent, Mark Huband. He describes a strong consensus among European intelligence services that between 1999 and 2001 Niger was engaged in illicit negotiations over the export of its "yellow cake" uranium ore with North Korea, Libya, Iraq, Iran, and China. The British intelligence report on this matter, once cited by President Bush, has never been disowned or withdrawn by its authors. The bogus document produced by an Italian con man in October 2002, which has caused such embarrassment, was therefore more like a forgery than a fake: It was a fabricated version of a true bill.

Hitchins goes on to posit:

To say this is not to defend the Bush administration, which typically managed to flourish the only allegation made about Niger that had been faked, and which did not have the courage to confront Mr. and Mrs. Wilson in public with their covert political agenda. But it does draw attention to an interesting aspect of this whole debate: the increasing solidarity of the left with the CIA. The agency disliked Ahmad Chalabi and was institutionally committed to the view that the Saddam regime in Iraq was a. secular and b. rationally interested in self-preservation. It repeatedly overlooked important evidence to the contrary, even as it failed entirely to infiltrate jihadist groups or to act upon FBI field reports about their activity within our borders. Bob Woodward has a marvelous encapsulating anecdote in his recent book: George Tenet on Sept. 11 saying that he sure hopes this isn't anything to do with those people acting suspiciously in the flight schools. ... The case for closing the CIA and starting again has been overwhelming for some time. But many liberals lately prefer, for reasons of opportunism, to take CIA evidence at face value.

Hitchins had it nailed back in July of 2004. Why is it taking so long for the rest of the MSM to get up to speed? I guess you can chalk it up to another case of "it doesn't fit our template so it's not that important anyway."

*****UPDATE*****

And now Captain Ed reports that the Iraqi war itself may well have been unnecessary, save for the recalcitrance of the Arab League.