‘Curveball’ Caught on Tape; BBC America Has Footage
Iraqi Defector Fabricated Information About Iraq's Alleged Stockpile of Weapons of Mass Destruction
By Marisa Guthrie -- Broadcasting & Cable, 3/25/2008 6:02:00 PM
BBC America has footage of the Iraqi defector who fabricated the information about Iraq's alleged stockpile of weapons of mass destruction -- information the Bush administration relied on to go to war in Iraq.
Codenamed "Curveball" by the CIA, the man is currently in hiding in Germany. The information he provided to CIA officials formed the crux of the agency's flawed intelligence assessment about Iraq and Saddam Hussein's supposed WMD stockpile.
The footage is part of a piece on the war for Friday's edition of Newsnight (10 p.m.) that also includes an interview with Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to former Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Curveball's considerable contributions to the CIA's report on Iraq were detailed in Frontline's Bush's War, an exhaustive four-and-one-half-hour documentary about the administration’s justification for the invasion. It concludes Tuesday at 9 p.m.
