A "war in search of a reason"

Set your VCRs!

As the White House launches its latest PR blitz to convince Americans that all is going well in Iraq -- no matter what the media say -- along comes "Frontline" to spoil things. PBS's eminent investigative series kicks off its new season tonight with a devastating documentary on how the Bush administration sold the war and got rid of Saddam Hussein (well, almost) but seems to have overlooked the need for a plan after declaring victory.

"Truth, War and Consequences" (check local listings) paints administration officials as dissemblers as well as arrogant conquerors who paid no heed to warnings about the collapse of security after the Iraq war. Whatever your politics and opinions about the war, this documentary is must viewing for those who seek to understand why the early scenes of liberation have given way to nearly daily reports of attacks against occupying troops.

The 90-minute program, reported by Martin Smith, essentially concludes this was a war in search of a reason. The terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, delivered one. In Smith's telling, a secretive unit in the Pentagon slanted the intelligence on Hussein's alleged weapons of destruction, relying on less-than-objective reports from Ahmed Chalabi's exile group, the Iraqi National Congress, which has been agitating to overthrow Hussein's government for more than a decade.

Update: For anyone interested, or those that didn't get a chance to catch it, you can watch the full program online, here.