Was Berlusconi Behind the Pre-Iraq War Yellow Cake Story?

It was one of the biggest of the American pre-war blunders. Iraq, documents showed, had tried to buy uranium from Niger. The papers, though, soon proved to be false. But who forged them? Now, a new article in an Italian newspaper says that the Italian government was heavily involved.

In February 2003, then- US Secretary of State Colin Powell went before the UN Security Council with proof that Iraq was producing nuclear weapons. The yellow cake story didn't quite make the cut. But that didn't keep US government officials from continuing to offer it up as evidence.

Remember the Niger "yellow cake" scandal? Back in the days before the US invasion of Iraq, nobody -- except of course the UN weapons inspectors on the ground in Iraq -- was really sure whether Saddam had the Bomb or not. US President George W. Bush was desperately looking for some shred of proof that might work as pretence for invasion. In 2002, he thought he had just what he was looking for. Iraq, or so it seemed based on some documents turned up by the CIA and British intelligence, had been attempting to buy so-called "yellow cake" -- a substance rich in uranium -- from Niger. Indeed, the yellow cake deal became one of the main early foundations for the US justification of an Iraq invasion.

Problem is, as we all know, the documents were falsified. But where did they originate? A new, three-part series (Part one here, part two here, and part three here ) by the Italian daily La Repubblica -- and translated by blogger Nur al-Cubicle -- digs deep into the secret-services netherworld and comes to a rather surprising answer. The article implicates none other than Silvio Berlusconi. (Read the original Italian here .)