In response to his sending me Frank Rich’s latest attempt at suggesting that systemic intelligence failures are brought about by self-serving Bush administration policies, I brought this Chris Caldwell Weekly Standard piece to the attention of one of my hardcore lib buddies, and he about flew out of his sandals and blew bean sprouts out of his nose. “Low Profile”:
George W. Bush waited until he was safely in Europe to declare that he wanted no independent investigation into the ‘Phoenix memo,’ written in the summer of 2001, which detailed links between al Qaeda and young Arabs enrolled in American flight schools. The congressional intelligence committees are the “best place” for any inquiry, he said. Is the president acting to protect American intelligence? Or to protect his own skin?
Neither, as it turns out.
He’s probably not protecting intelligence assets. We can tell because we already know the memo’s author: FBI Special Agent Kenneth J. Williams, of ‘Squad 16.’ Williams has been described in various news accounts as an ‘expert,’ and even a ‘superstar.’ Thanks to the crack reporting of Fortune magazine’s Richard Behar, we even know the contents of the memo, which had an executive summary that read: ‘Usama bin Laden and Al-Muhjiroun supporters attending civil aviation universities/colleges in Arizona.’
And clearly Bush is not protecting his own skin. The very smokiness of this gun absolves Bush of the charge that he’s covering up his own incompetence. Had this memo reached the White House, no president could have failed to act on it without risking impeachment.
The real scandal of the FBI memo is that it wasn’t passed up the line. And we can make a pretty good guess why it wasn’t. In May 8 hearings held by the Senate Judiciary Committee, Dianne Feinstein asked FBI director Robert Mueller what had happened. Mueller replied, ‘There are more than 2,000 aviation academies in the United States. The latest figure I think I heard is something like 20,000 students attending them. And it was perceived that this would be a monumental undertaking without any specificity as to particular persons; the individuals who were being investigated by that agent in Phoenix were not the individuals that were involved in the September 11 attack.’
What a load of nonsense. Any small-town newspaper reporter could have narrowed down that 20,000 to under a hundred in an afternoon, just by focusing on names like . . . oh, I don’t know . . . try Mohamed, Walid, Marwan, and Hamza. Couldn’t the entire FBI have done the same?
As it turns out, no. And the reason is, whoever got Williams’s memo would understand that there is one commonsensical way to implement it: Look for Arabs. And given congressional pressure on racial profiling and the president’s own outrageous pandering on the subject during the 2000 election campaign, Williams’s lead was something no agent with an instinct for self-preservation would want to touch with a barge pole. Mueller’s thinking must be taken as representative of the agency’s. His invoking of ‘specificity as to particular persons’ sounds like a term of art learned from some diversity consultant.
That’s the scandal of the Phoenix memo. And if delicacy about the racial-profiling demagoguery that took root in Washington in the Clinton years interferes with a full accounting of the intelligence failures in the months before September 11, then that would be a bigger scandal still.
Granted, Caldwell probably overstates the case a bit: poor decision making is clearly at play here, and it would appear that there exists an almost institutionalized disconnect between desk supervisors and field agents in the FBI. But still, the effects of the PC culture on the intelligence community can’t be ignored.
My friend’s reply to Caldwell’s piece:
Is he saying that the Phoenix memo wasn’t passed along because someone was afraid of being branded a racist? That’s absurd, and a pretty pathetic attempt to to somehow blame 9/11 on PC culture (i.e., Democrats). Good Christ, how desperate have these conservatives become? Seems to me that what happened was, people simply didn’t do their jobs — not out of fear of being sued by Al Sharpton, but out of laziness, complacency and incompetence. Bush and Cheney would do better to fire Mueller and others — show some real leadership — instead of trying to divert attention from their own incompetence by sounding more terrorist alarms. As Frank Rich said, you don’t have to be a cynic to see what’s going on here.
My reply:
I […] believe there’s plenty of blame to go around. But a perfectly legitimate response to all the carping about ‘what did he know, and when did he know it’ — rhetoric clearly meant to invoke Nixon-era shenanigans (same words, for Chrissakes!) — is to flood the media with the warnings the government has received.
I find it comical that Rich writes, ‘If [Bush] had received foreknowledge of an attack that morning, he would have acted upon it, and no Democratic leader has said otherwise (despite Dick Cheney’s smears to the contrary)’ — even after Cynthia McKinney’s well-documented ‘questioning’ of Bush’s complicity. Rich is correct in only the weakest sense, which is to say, he’s right that no word-parsing politician (McKinney excepted) made the mistake of ‘saying’ that Bush received foreknowledge of an attack and didn’t act. Instead, many Democrats intoned their predictably non-committal ‘gravely concerned’ meme, coupled with the aforementioned repeated invocations of the Nixon-era mantra (replete with all its baggage). To Rich I’d reply, “regardless of what they said, we knew what they were hoping to suggest, and we know why, too” — but they quickly backtracked from their attempt at political gamesmenship once the news hit of the 1998 intelligence report that’d landed on Clinton’s desk.
[…] With regard to Caldwell’s essay… Yes, he’s saying that fear on the part of some politically-minded bureaucrats in the FBI of appearing culturally insensitive is one of the reasons why the Phoenix memo wasn’t handled with the seriousness we now know (in retrospect) it deserved. To willfully ignore how such considerations played into management decisions is to engage in the same kind of attention-diverting you’re so prone to accuse the Bush conspirators of.
The culture of the FBI certainly needs changing, but why would you fire Mueller, who inherited a mess, and needs time to fix things (these are government employees, remember? — very difficult ot get rid of)? Isn’t that a bit like a baseball team’s owner firing the manager to mask his own failures (which, as I’ve mentioned to you before, are bipartisan failures, in my opinion, and date back nearly thirty years)? Certain members of the FBI management structure didn’t do their jobs. They should be shithammered. But why would you turn a blind eye to other institutionalized problems within the intelligence organizations — one of which happens to be a dangerous PC mindset?
Why these things need to be hashed and rehashed, I have no idea. Hell, I’m not even a Republican — and yet I find myself forced to defend them so often I may as well be…
The fact is, if this had happened on Clinton’s watch, the Republicans would have….well, you know the rest. Unfortunately for the Republicans, one of the great disasters in the country’s history (no, not the 2000 election) happened on the watch of George W. Bush, and sometimes the buck stops at the top. This won’t go away no matter how many calculated “terror warnings” they want to cynically throw at us from their fortified bunkers and undisclosed locations. Granted, none of this is nearly as serious as the Clinton sex scandal that the sainted Republicans dragged us through at a cost of $40,000,000 (even as the 9/11 terrorists planned their dirtywork); but I think an independent inquiry into this mess is inevitable.
*sigh*
Again, somebody’s gotta go bringing Clinton’s twisted pecker into this. The reasoning? The Republicans went after Clinton for getting a blowjob, so it’s okay to go after the Republicans over intelligence failures because they happened on Bush’s watch.
As I’ve said, I’m not a Republican. I just wish we could examine this through the lens of non-partisanship. But what is so infuriating is this tit-for-tat bullshit. The time, energy, and money spent going after Clinton was silly. If you agree, Dishwasher Magic, why would you cynically wish to see such nonsense repeated? Cause this time it’s <i>your team</i> that gets to do the chasing?
That’s pathetic, you ask me…
I voted for Clinton in 92. Then I went after him and sought his impeachment in his second term because he committed perjury, obstruction of justice, and went on tv and shook his finger at the nation while he lied through his teeth. I never gave a fuck who he screwed, blew, slurped, or yurped. It was what he did to cover it up that I cared about.
I was in Italy when the whole MonicaGate thing broke. After a while, I think it was pretty clear Clinton had lied, pretty clear <i>why</i> he had lied, pretty clear what he did, pretty clear that he was going to wriggle out of the most serious of repurcussions, and pretty clear that—after a certain point—the tenacity with which he was being chased was counterproductive.
My point still remains that we shouldn’t be talking about Clinton’s prick with regards to bureaucratic snafus within the FBI management structure. There’re plenty of other reasons to invoke Clinton in that regard, but what’s important (I think) is that we fix the problems, not point fingers. Political grandstanding won’t help, either.
There’ll be plenty of time for blue-ribbon panels and whatnot <i>after</i> we do what we have to do to win this war. At least, I <i>hope</i> that’s the case.
Several thoughts:
Many Republicans (usually not the politicos, but certainly the dyed-in-the-wool types) felt that going after Clinton was justified because of what happened to Nixon and (to a lesser extent) Reagan. That HIllary had served on the Congressional staff for Watergate just poured blood in the waters.
Small wonder that Democrats, after the rancor of the 2000 election, should feel at least partially justified in doing the same.
That being said, I suspect it’s impossible to keep partisanship out of the issue. Democrats, in this regard, are no better than Republicans in the wake of Pearl Harbor (but, unfortunately, even more tone deaf—the latter had no historical counterpart to look at).
What is far more worrisome, however, is that the Democrats (not all of them, but too much of the party leadership) have no or very little understanding of intelligence and military affairs. The fact that warnings existed means that they should have been known and understood. You’ll notice that Dem members of the Joint Intel Cmte are <b>not</b> among those taking the more partisan stands—they understand the system, including its failings.
Similarly, there’s an almost complete lack of understanding of how military operations work, what’s involved, and how is this all different from Vietnam, so that EVERY combat death generates a series of stories of “what went wrong”, and despite warnings of a long war, some Dems are already carping about “How come the war isn’t won yet? We must be losing.”
And, for too many Dems, even those too young to actually remember it, EVERY war is Vietnam, and the only question is when the current edition of the Vietnam Papers will be leaked to prove it.
I’m with Bill on this one. I also voted for Clinton in 1992. I didn’t agree with his morals, but when you start hiding the truth, you lose the public’s trust. It also happened to a guy named Nixon. If Bush would just come out and say what happened, he wouldn’t be so vilified in the press.
But what is it, exactly, that Bush is supposed to say?
In both the Nixon and the Clinton cases, there were cases of <b>legal</b> malfeasance. Nixon ordered wiretaps (and other things) on American citizens. Clinton lied to a grand jury. You can argue about whether the initial investigations were justified or not, blahblahblah, but the point is he lied.
But, w/ Bush, what is the malfeasance—where is he hiding the truth? It would seem that it falls into one of only a few categories:
Bush knew and said/did nothing. You can argue WHY he said/did nothing, be it the McKinney “Enrich Dad” line, the looney-Left’s “Bush as dictator” line, the liberal “Bush is stupid” implication [since no liberal I know has actually argued he was too stupid to realize what he was reading].
Bush didn’t know because he didn’t even understand what he was being told. [He knew and he didn’t realize he knew.]
Bush didn’t know. As w/ the first, there’s a range of reasons he didn’t know: bureaucracy, insufficient attention, infighting, what-have-you.
Bush says it’s the last. Either he’s lying (in which case, which of the first two do you think he’s part of), or he’s telling the truth, in which case, I’d have to ask why he’s being vilified.
Obviously, there were points–years, really–in the aggressive investigations of both Nixon and Clinton where malfeasance had yet to be proven (it took four years to get Clinton to lie on the stand). Your question of “Where’s Bush’s malfeasance?” can’t be answered yet; a better question might be, “What’s the appearance of malfeasance?”–since that’s the basis of an inquiry. Of course, no one is accusing Bush of “malfeasance”–that is, official misconduct–so much as of his being asleep at the switch, though perhaps it amounts to the same thing. If you’re one of those people who thinks that the timing of the administration’s shrill, unspecific terror warnings (on the day of Ken Lay’s testimony, on the immediate heels of Phoenix memo revelations) is mere coincidence, or that Dick Cheney, in refusing to hand over Energy Task Force papers, is striking a heroic blow for democracy, then you’re probably not inclined to think that the Bushies have anything to hide, ever. But if you’re one of those people who tends to question authority, then you’ll acknowledge that there was, at the very least, a serious breakdown of communication between intelligence and the administration pre-9/11, and that there must be accountability somewhere. As far as Democrats having “an almost complete lack of understanding” of how military operations work (as opposed to Vietnam combatant and war scholar George W. Bush?), I’m not sure how that applies to 9/11. Are you saying that the Democrats’ demands to know “who knew what when” betrays their ignorance about the complexities of war? Or could it be that this was a terrorist attack that, had everyone done his job (presumably, that’s what people with jobs are supposed to do: the failings of “the system” are the failings of individuals), could have and should have been averted?
What in the hell does Ken Lay have to do with this? Christ, Enron, oil, corporations, and Clinton’s pecker. The litany is a ubiquitous as Tom Daschle’s “grave concern”.
And by the way: You can believe Cheney’s doing the right thing and <i>still</i> be someone who questions authority—though you might not be one of those people who thinks questioning authority for the sake of questioning authority is “striking a heroic blow for democracy,” but rather is the annoying tactic of those too lazy to find concrete evidence.
But of course, that’s why we need an investigation, right? To see if we can find evidence on which to base an investigation?
Down the rabbit hole we go…
In the US we have governmental organizations, such as the defense department, the FBI, and the CIA, whose fundamental task is to prevent attacks on the US. On 9/11 they all failed dramaticly. This failure should be investigated. It is generally bad practice for a body to investigate itself, and the failures were of various parts of the executive branch. The proper government body to investigate failures of the executive branch of the US government is Congress.
Out of curiosity: Are the same people who would claim that terrorism warnings were an effort to divert attention from Ken Lay prepared to argue (much less accept) that Clinton’s strikes on Sudan and Afghanistan were motivated by Monica Lewinsky??
As for not understanding military issues and its relevance to 9-11, the very way that question is couched is exactly what I’m talking about. <b>Intelligence</b> (as in military intelligence) is an essential part of military operations, both offensive and defensive. How that system works, including the reality that it is a bureaucracy, as well as how and why surprise occurs is integral to military operations.
While I agree w/ Frank Helderman that there WAS a failure on 9-11, military history shows that surprise (of some sort) is almost inevitable. Just as it’s not possible to affordably insure against <b>all</b> possible disasters in one’s home, so it’s not possible to avoid ALL surprise. It’s not in the culture or the nature of the beast, even BEFORE you run into the bureaucratic, analytical, and other structural impedimentia that forestall accurate, prompt warnings.
An investigation? Sure—to determine WHAT went wrong, and if anything can be done about it. But an apportionment of blame? Maybe it’s having too cynical a nature, or maybe it’s focusing on surprise for too long, but all you’ll wind up with is EITHER a bunch of scape-goats, or a purely political witch-hunt, or both, but you won’t eliminate the chance for surprise.
I don’t know your friend, nor anything about him, so of course I cannot comment directly on the quality of his answer. However, I think he may be guilty of na
In the world of scandals, you can’t have concrete evidence unless you uncover it. You can’t uncover it unless you investigate. You can’t investigate unless there are signs to suggest that an investigation is warranted. Should the 9-11 intelligence failure be investigated? Should anyone guilty of failing to receive, share, heed or act on glaring evidence be held to task? I believe so. But at this point, given the mounting data, and all we don’t yet know, it’s seems just as silly to vigorously defend the Bushies as it is to call for their heads. One thing’s for certain: in this vicious partisan climate the Bushies would do well to share what they know with Congress and the public, whether it be over Enron or 9-11, since the appearance of dog-wagging is often as bad as the real thing.
“Anyone guilty of failing to receive, share, heed, or act on glaring evidence be held to task.”
Wonderful. Pray tell, what the heck constitutes “glaring evidence”??? You really think that there’s a memo somewhere that says, “We were talking to ObL’s deputy, and he said that on 9-11, there’s going to be a kamikaze strike on New York City”?? Even if there were, and it was dated September 1, is that really glaring evidence???
For cryin’ out loud, this has nothing to do w/ Dubya. The same arguments would (and should) be made about Clinton, if 9-11 had happened on his watch. Intelligence is NOT the sort of thing that is ever obvious, not until afterwards. Pearl Harbor, the Battle of the Bulge, Tet, the ‘73 Yom Kippur War, Barbarossa, Bagration, Normandy all have the same characteristics: clear evidence in HINDSIGHT, lots of evidence lost in the midst of the noise prior to the attack.
THIS is what I mean when I say people don’t understand military affairs: intelligence is as much luck as it is diligence, as much inspiration as it is passing things on. There may well be things wrong w/ our intelligence PROCESSES, but to attempt to ascribe that blame to either political party, or to a specific individual or event is silly. (Indeed, the argument can easily be made, and has been, that a bureaucratic intelligence system, seeking to track a variety of opponents, will <b>inevitably</b> succumb, at some point, to surprise.)
You really believe that there’s someone, somewhere, w/ a smoking gun memo that they deliberately CHOSE not to forward? How the heck do you people think the system works, anyway?
“Nothing’s ever obvious?”
By your logic, there can be no such thing as an intelligence “failure,” or even cuplability, since the element of “surprise” by its very definition precludes both. Only problem is, this doesn’t appear to be such an out-of-the-blue bombshell, hindsight notwithstanding. I’ve heard several people with deep backgrounds in military intelligence (maybe even deeper than yours) say that a junior high schooler should’ve been able to connect those dots. Now, I don’t know what axes these retired intelligence folks have to grind, but don’t you at least think it’s odd that Bush would have Ari Fleischer come out and tell the public that there was no possible way we could have anticipated this kind of attack? Which, of course, was a bald-faced lie–there was information available to suggest precisely such an attack, and Bush knew it. Seems there’s an awful lot of scrambling going on. Terror alerts, false denials. Maybe I’m just an ignorant layman, but something sure seems funny. (As for “glaring evidence,” I suppose one man’s info about foreign-born Muslim militants in flight schools is another man’s “noise.”)