Book:  Iraq evidence was White House forgery

OLBERMANN:  Well and that’s what we need.  But in the interview, I presume the Maguire and Richer interviews are on tape, is that right?

SUSKIND:  You bet, yes.  And there’s a lot of them.  They’re very detailed.  The book is full of really nuanced renderings by both men, not only of what occur but how they felt.  You know, how people reacted in the book.  Context, what people were thinking as to what this all meant.

OLBERMANN:  How did this man Habbush go from the man who basically said, “There’s no there there, there’s no WMD here, look, I’m telling you, there’s WMD there,” repeatedly, to being the man who’s name appears on a forged document that sets up this aided-along, self-fulfilling prophecy?  You know, not only, it’s not a question of WMD anymore, it’s Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9/11.  How did he go from one extreme in the story to the other end?

SUSKIND:  It’s interesting because Habbush pops up in early 2003.  And that point, the book shows clearly that the case for WMD was a rickety structure ready to fall.  Habbush arrives at that point.  January, he starts his meetings.  Richer helps set it up with the British intelligence guy, Michael Shipster from the region.  It goes on every week, every other week through the month.

And it’s interesting to see the havoc it creates inside of the administration, at the upper-most levels, because there are two sides here there’s the operational side, guys like John Maguire or Rob Richer for that matter, who say, “We can use him.  He might be able to take out Saddam Hussein.  We have a window into Saddam’s inner circle.  We can send him disinformation.  Maybe we can get Habbush to go in and take out Saddam.”  “We can walk to Baghdad,” Maguire says, rather than fight our way.”

On the other side, you have the explosive issue of the information Habbush is giving to undercut the case.  There are really separate things.  And the agendas start to collide.

So, in February, when Richard Dearlove, the head of British intelligence, flies over to deliver the final report to George Tenet, that’s when Tenet reads it and says to Richer, “They’re not going like this downtown.”

OLBERMANN:  Which you couldn’t make it up there in a million years.

(CROSSTALK)

SUSKIND:  You know, where is the screenplay?

And at that moment, the side worried about how this will look for the case for war essentially wins out.  And that’s obviously the White House team.

The president, the vice president, and Condi Rice are briefed about this.  At that point, the channel gets cut off with Habbush.  And folks at CIA including Maguire lives could be at risk because you’re worried about this guy undercutting your case.  That doesn’t make sense.  This war rages through the administration.

But Habbush, of course, has his deal.  He met, it was understood that there would be a resettlement, and off we go where Habbush becomes, in a way, the most explosive single entity, you know, certainly in terms of the U.S. government for years now.  Five years they kept him in hiding.

You know, it’s interesting, Keith, all the way through this period, he’s resettled when we invade.  And then, as we move forward, t’s fascinating to watch the reactions of everybody, because as it becomes clear to the world that some of the suspicions before the war that there were no WMD is now obvious.

OLBERMANN:  Right.

SUSKIND:  And, you know, Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame popped up that summer.  As Maguire says, “Everyone was terrified that Habbush would pop up on the screen.”  That’s his quote.  At that moment, they dotted the “I’s” and crossed the “T’s” on his financial arrangement of his resettlement.  And they agreed to pay him $5 million.

Now, by almost any reckoning, considering what he provided and that we didn’t use him for anything else going forward, that would be considered hush money in almost any parlance.  Now, what’s fascinating is at that point, you see this great kind of disconnect going on in the government.  Rice and Cheney were happy we had him, but in some way, he’s the last man they want to talk to.

OLBERMANN:  Of course.

SUSKIND:  The operational guys who are handling Iraq are saying, “He’s a gold mine, go talk to him.  He used to be the police chief of Iraq, he’s their intelligence chief.  He can help us understand the country so we don’t get into trouble.”  No, no, he’s not touched all through the summer of 2003 until fall.

Interestingly, then the White House figures out, “Well, we might have something he can be useful for.”  That’s when they come up with the “Habbush letter” concept.  And that’s when they deliver it to CIA.

OLBERMANN:  And that’s when he actually earns his $5 million for something he had nothing to do with.

SUSKIND:  Well, you know, it’s hard to see what that kind of earning really amounts to, but clearly that was the idea.

OLBERMANN:  Let me get your reaction to the reaction of the White House and Mr. Tenet.

George Tenet said, quote, “There was no such order from the White House to me nor to the best of my knowledge, was anyone from CIA ever involved in any such effort.  It is well established that at my direction, CIA resisted efforts on the part of some in the administration to paint a picture of Iraq and al Qaeda connections that went beyond the evidence.  The notion that I would suddenly reverse our stance and have created and planted false evidence that was contrary to our own beliefs is ridiculous.”

Meanwhile, Tony Fratto, the deputy press secretary working at the White House, told Politico.com, “The allegation that the White House directed anyone to forge a document from Habbush to Saddam is just absurd.  Ron Suskind makes a living from gutter journalism,” which is I presume the category in which you won the Pulitzer Prize.  “He is about selling books and making wild allegations that no one can verify including the numerous bipartisan commissions that have reported on prewar intelligence.”

They’re coming at you kind of forcefully.  What’s your response to that forcefulness and these comments?

SUSKIND:  Well, the fact is, a lot of this is expected.  I’m one person who is standing at this point with the sources behind me, those who are holding firm, and, obviously, they’re under acute pressure to say this is an action that has constitutional implications along with, you know, the possibility of impeachment proceedings.  All this in an odd way, you know, character assassination is what they do when they have nothing else to say.

OLBERMANN:  Ask Scott McClellan.

SUSKIND: We’ve seen a lot of this and in some way, this is, I think, a kind of homage to how they’re reacting to what they’re actually saying.

OLBERMANN:  It’s almost a verification.  It’s the last confirmation for the sources in the book, I would imagine.

SUSKIND:  Right.  I remember when I was a kid, the Nixon’s enemies list, they used to stick that up on the wall as a point of pride.

OLBERMANN:  That’s it.  If you got a picture on it, it was even bigger.  I’m sure there’s a very big picture of you at the White House tonight and it has appropriate numbers at each rung.

Ron Suskind, the book is called “The Way of the World”—great thanks for coming in tonight.

SUSKIND:  My pleasure, Keith.

OLBERMANN:  All right.  Best of luck with this.

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