[This denial sounds an awful lot like they did it on purpose and they want the Chinese to know it. Either that or a whole new era of humble honesty has overtaken the CIA.]
CIA picked one NATO target that led to embassy hit
Copyright © 1999 Nando Media
Copyright © 1999 Reuters News Service
By TABASSUM ZAKARIA
WASHINGTON, (July 22, 1999 6:46 p.m. EDT http://www.nandotimes.com) -
CIA Director George Tenet said on Thursday the only target the CIA
picked for NATO's 11-week bombing campaign on Yugoslavia was the one
that led to the U.S. attack on the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.
"It was the only target we nominated," Tenet said during a
congressional hearing to explain the chain of events that led to the
May 7 bombing of the Chinese embassy that U.S. officials have said was
a huge mistake.
Tenet told the House Intelligence Committee that a combination of
factors led to the bombing of the embassy instead of the intended
target, the Yugoslav Federal Directorate for Supply and Procurement,
which was located about 300 yards (meters) away.
One factor was the method used to find the precise location of the
target -- an intelligence officer using land navigation techniques
that should not be used for aerial targeting because they provide only
an "approximate location," Tenet said. That location in subsequent
meetings was then taken as a "mantle of fact" rather than questioned,
he said.
"This episode is unusual," Tenet said, because the CIA does not
normally put together by itself specific targets that include
coordinates for bombing operations. The CIA usually provides more
analytical judgments or specific information on targets selected by
others, he said.
"The attack was a mistake," Tenet said. "Let me emphasize, our
investigation has determined that no one -- I repeat no one --
knowingly targeted the Chinese embassy," he said.
The bombing of the Chinese embassy, which killed three people and
wounded more than 20, sparked days of protests in China and repeated
U.S. apologies.
U.S. Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering went to Beijing last
month to apologize and explain the series of errors that occurred, but
Chinese officials said they were unconvinced.
"It seems clear that this process began with a critical intelligence
failure," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss, a Florida
Republican, said. "However, the Department of Defense also shares
responsibility, since the target package that came from CIA was
reviewed by elements of the DOD and approved," he said.
Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre at the same hearing said in the
approval process the precise location of the proposed target is not
usually questioned, but it is assumed that the right location has been
determined.
Of the 900 targets that were struck during the NATO air war, this was
the only one unidentified during the target development process, he
said.
Both Hamre and Tenet said databases that did not show the new location
of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade were more to blame than the maps
used to determine the target.
"I find it embarrassing we didn't have in our databases the precise
location of the Chinese embassy," Hamre said.
Tenet also faulted the review process.
"There were three meetings at CIA that reviewed the target
nomination," Tenet said. "The method of identification was not
briefed, questioned, or reviewed. Therefore, the initial
misidentification took on the mantle of fact," he said.
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