CNN.com - Kennedy: Tenet explanation needed on Iraq / Flap continues over absence of WMD

CIA Director George Tenet must explain why he waited until last month to "set the record straight" that Iraq posed no immediate threat to the United State in the months leading up to the war, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy said Friday.

Kennedy, D-Massachusetts, said Tenet must explain why he never corrected President Bush and others in the administration when they warned of a nuclear threat building in Iraq.

"Where was the CIA director when the vice president was going nuclear about Saddam going nuclear?" said Kennedy in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations. "Did Tenet fail to convince the policy-makers to cool their overheated rhetoric? Did he even try to convince them?"

Kennedy, a persistent and vigorous Bush critic, said the administration distorted and manipulated the intelligence, when "the only imminent threat was the November congressional election."