Baseball fans know that curveballs are treacherous. The ball is thrown with such spin that its trajectory becomes unpredictable for the batter. «Curveball» was also the code name given to an American intelligence informant in Germany in 2003. The source claimed to have proof of weapons of mass destruction held by Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime. Margaret Henoch, then an analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), quickly detected the inconsistencies in his statements.
Sitting in a café near Washington, she vividly recalled that pivotal moment when Secretary of State Colin Powell addressed the United Nations Security Council to justify the United States’ military intervention in Iraq. Never before had intelligence work been so manipulated for political ends. A few days before the speech, she had crossed out large sections of the draft text. None of her corrections were taken into account. «The chief of the Europe division had asked me to come to his office. When I heard Colin Powell’s speech, I thought my head was going to explode. I couldn’t sit still. I got up, I wandered around, I swore,» she said.
In hindsight, she said, there were two simultaneous trends. First, there was the «breathtaking» incompetence of those above her in the hierarchy who were tasked with interpreting the gathered intelligence. Meanwhile, CIA leadership refused to acknowledge the actions George W. Bush’s administration was about to take, based on a false interpretation justifying a military venture against Hussein’s regime.
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