Bush, Blair Deceived by Defectors, Wouter Basson Says

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, July 23, 2003

Bush, Blair Deceived by Defectors, Wouter Basson Says

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US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair had been deceived by defectors and intelligence services relying on single sources, Wouter Basson, the former head of Project Coast, South Africa's apartheid-era chemical and biological weapons program, said on Tuesday.

Addressing a Johannesburg Press Club luncheon, Basson, now a heart surgeon in private practice, said much of the intelligence Bush and Blair relied on to state their case for invading Iraq was based on information supplied by defectors.

Basson, who said he had friends in the international intelligence community, said the defectors realized that the US and Britain wanted damning evidence on Saddam Hussein.

Sensing personal advantage and knowing that the information could not be verified, they then gave their "worst case scenario" to intelligence operatives who lapped it up.

"Perceptions can be very bad in the long run. Much of the intelligence they relied on were perceptions that had been turned into facts," he said.

In addition, it was apparent that some agencies had relied on the same source for their information.

When agencies did that it seemed to political decision-makers that two or more separate agencies had independently come to similar conclusions. Political leaders then erroneously assumed the multiple reports were proof their contents were correct.

Basson said it now appeared his sacking by former president FW de Klerk in 1992, along with 23 other generals, was based on a similar assumption.

The urbane doctor, who told his audience he did not like making speeches because he never knew what his audience wanted to hear, further said it was much the same in the case of his "vilification" before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

Much of what was said was untested and came from people who had fallen foul of Project Coast along the way.

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