Hey, according to one poster here (guess who) Feith was just providing a customer with what was wanted. That is, OVP was a legitimate consumer of the intel product, and OSP was filling the stated need for a particular package. How dare the intel community tell the customer he is wrong.

Too bad a beautiful theory, "Preventive War", or the "Clean Break" or "Freedom on the March", or the "One-Percent Policy", or whatever the rationale of the day was, fell victim to ugly fact.

Considering the outcome of Iran-Contra, and the persistence of the infection by authoritarians, this time around there should be consequences. At a minimum there must be a definitive record.

The right wing also spread the myth that Vietnam was a noble cause (thanks so much Ronnie Raygun) that was lost because of the media and the protestors.

Tom

The headline was "Feith Intel misleading but not Illegal", an oddly rapid pre-determination it seems to me. Considering the damage done, one must hope for the sake of our system that there is in fact a legal remedy.When all the dots are connected between the Valerie Plame leak and Colin powells UN presentation and Feiths "special operations" someone better go to jail.

This reminds me that James Woolsey ( along with Dennis Ross now championing the pardoning of Jonathan Pollard) was sent to the UK to investigate the Atta-in-Prague rumor.

Why there? Was his old and dear friend Chalabi the source?

As noted in the September 2006 Senate Intelligence Committee Report--which was issued when the Republicans still controlled the committee:
3. . . .Postwar findings support the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) February 2002 assessment that Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi was likely intentionally misleading his debriefers when he said that Iraq provded two al-Qa'ida associates with chemical and biological weapons (CBW) training in 2000. . . .No postwar information has been found that indicates CBW training occurred and the detainee who provided the key prewar reporting about this training recanted his claims after the war.

I realize that for someone of Seixon's limited intellectual reach such facts are difficult to digest but give it a shot.

As I just asked Larry, what did Feith's office "sex up"? What did they pass on that was used by the White House that was not supported by the other intelligence agencies?

It's a fairly simple question, which it seems Larry Johnson is having a hard time answering.

It also seems lost on you that Larry Johnson was a former CIA agent, and is not exactly neutral when it comes to matters of whether or not the CIA messed up.

While on topic about the Weekly Standard, and their revisionary authors, let us not forget regular contributor Michael Rubin, who was a member of Feith's OSP, and whose AEI 'Resident Scholar' bio states was "Political adviser, Coalition Provisional Authority (Baghdad), 2003-2004".

Political Adviser...That's so Stalinistic.

Also of note in Rubin's AEI bio is that he was a visiting lecturer at three Northern Iraq Kurdish Universities in 2000 and 2001. I wonder who stamped his visa?

These NeoClowns are attempting a classic NeoCon cut-n-runaway from responsibility tactic known as, "Doing a Ledeen". They need to be taken to ground as they scurry from the sinking BuShip towards cover provided by policy orgs of the darkright-side, or this Resident_Scholar_Evil will reappear in a future Administration.

And my questions still go unanswered.

But didn't Feith set up shop right after 9/11? You need to get the talking points straight Larry, you know, especially since it was your VIPS group that was behind much if not all of the original reports on the OSP. Karen Kwiatkowski was quite an asset, wasn't she? You know, until the SSCI faced her down and she had to leave with her tail between her legs as a fabulist.

So it is irrelevant to the facts WHAT Feith gave to WHOM and WHY the CIA director continued to use something you claimed Feith was behind?

The DIA debunked it, the same department as Feith, and then the CIA used it. Care to explain?

Or will you continue to evade my questions and call me names?

Nice try, but the CIA rejected OSP's claims, including the idea that Mohammed Atta met with Iraqi agents in Prague. This is not about defending the CIA. The Agency did an abominable job in the October 2002 NIE. Fortunately, INR made its dissents quite clear.

But your nonsense that Feith was simply seeking truth doesn't hold up to the public record. But, like your hero, Dick Cheney, you can't take no for an answer.

George Tenet, October 2002 on the Mohammed Atta meeting:

As you may have read in the press, Atta allegedly traveled outside the US in early April 2001 to meet with an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague, we are still working to confirm or deny this allegation.

So again, what you say is not supported by the facts. This has always been about defending the CIA for you Larry, you cannot deny that. Only after beating you over the head with the October 2002 NIE a few million times, you've finally come to accept some responsibility on the part of the CIA for that.

I never said that Feith was simply seeking truth. I asked you a question, several of them in fact, and you still have not answered them. Are they really so hard to answer? You're allowed to say you don't know. That's perfectly acceptable.

Dick Cheney is no more my hero than Vince Cannistraro is yours. 

Here's the answer that matters--Feith was way more wrong than right about anything substantive. He shares responsibility for promoting the most excruciating embarrassment I have witnessed for this country. Finding no weapons or AQ links makes the Bay of Pigs look like a speeding ticket.

But of course he was simply providing what the White House wanted, so I place essentially all blame there. Is it criminal to be stupid and obsessed? Maybe not, but it sure is grounds for replacement through impeachment.

Right now I don't give a damn who was saying what. It is a matter of record that Bush intended to invade Iraq well before election, that AQ was not on the radar although Iraq was until 9/11, that immediately after 9/11 (only hours) guys like James Woolsey were talking up Iraq as culpable, that Rumsfeld wanted excuses to attack Iraq, and so on.

So I know who is responsible, and it's not the CIA, or even Feith. It's the White House. The excuse "Everybody was saying the same thing about Saddam" even if true is irrelevant. Only one set of actors acted.

Actually, it was Cheney who was pressuring Bush on what to do and Bush was too dumb to understand the issues involved.

Tom

All you need to know about Feith is here. He is a rightwing Likudnik and has never demonstrated any interest whatsoever in any issue other than securing "Judea and Samaria" for the settlers. The rest of his views is just frosting.

A Dangerous Appointment
By James Zogby, iViews, 16 April 2001

Douglas J. Feith has been appointed Undersecretary of Policy at the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). This is one of the Pentagon's four senior posts, charged with "all matters concerning the formulation of national security and defense policy and the integration and oversight of DOD policy and plans." Additionally, among his many areas of responsibility according to the DOD, the undersecretary of policy has the responsibility to:

"Develop policy on the conduct of alliances and defense relationships with foreign governments, their military establishments and international organizations;

"Develop, coordinate, and oversee the implementation of international security strategy and policy... on issues...that relate to foreign governments and their defense establishments; and

"Provide oversight of all DOD activities related to international technology transfer." This is a powerful position with great influence. Feith's appointment to this post is a matter of great concern.

Feith has had a long career in both government service and the private sector. During the Reagan Administration he served as the White House National Security Staff and in the Defense Department as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Negotiations Policy. He also served as Special Counsel to Richard Perle, then Assistant Secretary of Defense.

Feith is an attorney with the Washington firm of Feith and Zell. His own biography says that he specializes in "technology transfer, joint ventures and foreign investment in the defense and aerospace industries."

On the political front, Feith has been associated with the Cold War "neo-conservative" school of thought. What is of concern here is the extent to which Feith has transposed the neo-conservative worldview onto the Middle East. As his fellow cold warriors defined the world in ideological dualistic terms--the forces of absolute good confronting the forces of absolute evil--Feith defines the Arab-Israeli conflict in similar terms.

A prolific writer, Feith has left a long paper trail of anti-Arab tracts and diatribes against those who challenge or seek to compromise Israel's strength and as he defines it, "moral superiority" over the Arabs.

As was the case in the Cold War battle against Communism, in Feith's view, there can be no place for compromise between Israel and the Arabs. Since he defines the Middle East conflict in absolute terms, the only option for Israel is to confront its Arab enemies until they are defeated, which, in his worldview, means when they submit and accept Israel's legitimacy and sovereignty over all of mandatory Palestine.

Since Israel represents the "good" and "our values," in Feith's view, it is necessary for the United States to identify with Israel in its struggle against the forces of "darkness," the Arabs. This means providing Israel with superior military strength and political support. It also means that the United States should never pressure Israel either to surrender land or to compromise its hegemonic position in the region.

Throughout his career, Feith has articulated views such as these.

In the late 1970s, for example, he criticized then President Jimmy Carter's Camp David effort to bring about a "comprehensive peace"--a concept he decried as false since it required Israel to weaken itself by surrendering "Judea and Samaria" to the Arabs. Feith's logic was that:

Arabs have no legal rights in Palestine; Palestinians are not a "national group as such" and, therefore, have no special claim to Judea and Samaria; Jordan is the Palestinian state for the Arabs; and No pressure should be brought against Israel for building settlements in Judea and Samaria, since it is their right to do so.

Operating from this framework, Feith argues that the notion that "the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict is the issue of the stateless Palestinians" is a clever Arab trap designed solely to weaken Israel by threatening its relationship with the United States and its hold over Judea and Samaria.

He, therefore, condemned the Carter Administration for its opposition to Israel's settlement policy since, in his view, this "only encouraged Arabs to believe that they could win benefits from the United States by refusing to make concessions to Israel."

For Feith, Arab objections to Zionism were at the core of the conflict. Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories would not solve the conflict, only Arab acceptance of and submission to Israel would end it. Summarizing his recommendations to the Carter Administration, Feith suggested in a 1979 article that they, "

(1) abandon the view that Judea-Samaria is the crux of the Arab-Israeli conflict,

(2) acknowledge that the crux is really the Arab refusal to accept a Jewish state in Palestine,

(3) renounce quarreling over Israel's rights in Judea-Samaria, which encourages Arab inflexibility and damages valuable U.S.-Israeli ties,

(4) confine itself to the role of mediator, rather than party, to the Arab-Israeli conflict, and thus

(5) inform Damascus, Amman, the Palestinian Arabs, and Riyadh that if they want an alteration in Jerusalem's policies they had best start negotiating with Jerusalem, as Sadat has done, and quit relying on Washington to 'deliver' the Israelis."

In the 1980s and 90s, Feith continued his criticism of any U.S. policy that deviated from his view. He criticized the Bush Administration for denying Israel loan guarantees and for pressuring the Shamir government to come to the Madrid peace conference.

His advice to the Bush Administration in 1991 echoed his earlier recommendations to the Carter White House. The U.S. governmentshould, he suggested, require the Arabs to:

"Drop the slogan of 'land for peace,' which skeptical Israelis must suspect is a program for dismantling Israel in stages, and simply offer peace. That is, they could put forward an open, unqualified, non-grudging and sincere acknowledgement that the Jewish people are entitled to a state in a Jewish homeland;" and

"Aba,ndon the name game by which they apply the label 'Palestine' only to the 20 percent of the British Mandate Palestine that lies west of the Jordan Rive,r. So long as one's goal is the elimination of Israel, one does well to pretend that the Kingdom of Jordan, which occupies the other 80 percent of Mandate Palestine, is not a Palestinian state. That makes it possible to propagandize that the Jews control all the land and the Arabs of Palestine are 'stateless.'"

During the Clinton years, Feith continued to oppose any agreement negotiated between the Israelis and Palestinians: Oslo, Hebron and Wye.

At one point he defined Oslo as, "one-sided Israeli concessions, inflated Palestinian expectations, broken Palestinian solemn understandings, Palestinian violence...and American rewards for Palestinian recalcitrance."

His objection to the Hebron and Wye understandings, however, is more interesting because it was his ideological soul mate, then Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had agreed to them.

In 1996, Feith, together with Richard Perle wrote an advisory paper for the newly elected Likud Prime Minister. In that piece, entitled "A Clean Break: a New Strategy for Securing the Realm," they advised Netanyahu to: "make a clean break from the peace process;" reassert Israel's claim to its land by rejecting "land for peace" as the basis of peace; strengthen Israel's defenses to better confront Syria and Iraq; and forge a new and stronger relationship with the United States based on self-reliance and mutual interest.

Feith was, therefore, deeply disappointed when Netanyahu appeared to accept the basis of Oslo and sign two additional agreements with the Palestinians that turned more land over to them. In a lengthy piece written in 1997 "A Strategy for Israel," Feith returned to his neo-conservative roots arguing that "land for peace" was a fabrication designed to weaken Israel. Peace would only come when Arab and specifically Palestinian society was transformed into a democratic, law-abiding and peaceful one. Since Oslo had created unrealistic expectations and rewarded bad Palestinian behavior, the only solution for Israel was to repudiate Oslo and "reestablish an effective security and intelligence policy in the areas under Palestinian Authority control" (i.e. reoccupy the West Bank and Gaza). He went on to note that "the price in blood would be high," but would be, a necessary form of "detoxification--the only way out of Oslo's web."

Despite his apparent obsession with the Arab-Israel conflict, Feith has written about a number of other Middle East-related topics. In all cases, inspired by the same pro-Israel, anti-Arab Manichean worldview.

He has written condemning U.S. politicians for estranging themselves from Israel in order to accommodate Arab oil states. He has associated himself with a controversial strategy paper that suggested, among other options, that the U.S. might lead a Kuwait-style invasion and war of liberation to oust Syria from Lebanon. And he has been one of Washington's strongest advocates supporting the Iraq Liberation Act.

As disturbing as Feith's views may be, his political associations cause even greater concern. In recent years, Feith has frequently been featured in the activities of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA). Known for its virulent anti-Arab incitem,ent, the ZOA regularly attacks all Arab American political activity and demonizes politicians who hire Arab Americans or even associate with community organizations. The ZOA also frequently attacks American Jews whom they feel are not in line, with their extremist pro-Likud philosophy.

In just the past few years, Feith was the Guest of Honor at ZOA's
100th Anniversary Gala Banquet. He served as Master of Ceremony at
two other major ZOA functions and has been a frequent participant at ZOA sponsored policy briefings on Capitol Hill supporting that organization's anti-Palestinian legislative initiatives.

Feith's law practice in Washington sheds further light on the one-sided nature of his work. His small law firm has one international affiliate, in Israel. Over two-thirds of all their reported casework involves representing Israeli interests. And, in light of Feith's new appointment, one of these cases deserves some attention. As described on the firm's website, Feith "represented a leading Israeli armaments manufacturer in establishing joint ventures with leading U.S. aerospace manufacturers for manufacture and sale of missile systems, to the U.S. Department of Defense and worldwide."

Feith has long been a strong advocate for Israeli military technology. In a 1992 article, he wrote that the U.S. should deepen its military cooperation with Israel noting that, "Israel has a number of unique military technologies that it behooves the U.S. armed forces to acquire, such as unmanned aircraft and air-to ground missiles. With shrinking U.S. defense budgets, it is less expensive for the Defense Department to acquire these technologies from the Israelis than to pay to have them reinvented."

He also observed in the same piece that, "It is in the interest of the U.S. and Israel to remove needless impediments to technological cooperation between them. Technologies in the hands of responsible, friendly countries facing military threats, countries like Israel, serve to deter aggression, enhance regional stability and perhaps also promote peace thereby."

In the private sector, Feith is free to hold whatever views he wishes to hold, associate with whomever he wishes to associate, and do whatever legitimate business comes his way. But serious questions must be asked whether or not someone with his views and associations can fairly serve in a critical post at the Department of Defense. I, for one, am terrified at the prospect. He is ideologue with an extreme anti-Arab bias, and his role in the sensitive position of chief architect of U.S. defense policy can, I believe, have grave consequences for the United States and its relations with the entire Arab world.

Seixon, whatever your problem with Larry is, there is apparently nothing he could ever say that will satisfy your need to nitpick every little detail. In the meantime, your need to be right is becoming a major pain for the rest of us to wade through on these threads. As your motive does not include engagement in civil political discussion, can you just declare yourself the winner and move on with your life?

Thank you.

We are the people who run this country. We are the deciders. And every single day, every single one of us needs to step outside and take some action to help stop this war. Molly Ivins (1944-2007)

Yet Clinton was not accused of warping intelligence, but Bush has been. Explain.

Asking questions is part of both analysis and policy making. Unfortunately from everything I have read, and despite his protests to the contrary, Feith's shop went way beyond asking questions. He was in the business of cherry picking information, regardless of reliability, to be used to under gird arguments for decisions that had been or would eventually be made about the war in Iraq. He was giving Cheney ammunition for his arguments.

What we don't yet know for sure is whether he was cherry picking to give Cheney "evidence" to convince the the President to go to war, or was he cherry picking to give Cheney something to say on Meet the Press. A lot of us suspect the answer, but we are hoping we are wrong.

If you read the material, Feith's shop wasn't doing any real analysis. Real analysis is done very carefully. It is a weighing and sifting, a search for the truth. Mostly it consists of questioning assumptions as to what particular data points might mean. It knits together reliable data into a coherent whole. It is detective work.

Can anybody say Feith was doing "detective" work?

Ron Byers

Results speak. Clinton was going after AQ, failed, but tried. Bush et al didn't want to hear about AQ when it would have helped.

I remember the GOP hounding Clinton over that and the camp attack. Explain.

I remember Condi saying "No one would have thought of airplanes flying into buildings." Explain. 

I remember Bush saying he would go to the UN for Iraq authorization, but didn't. Explain.

I remember Rumsfeld saying "You go to war with the army you have, not the one you would like" in spite of having complete control over the attack schedule. Explain.

I remember Cheney saying the insurgency was "in its last throes." Explain.

On second thought, don't bother. I've heard it before.

I wish you would actually provide support for what you're saying, but I know you won't.

Why don't you support anything you say. You always seem to retreat into saying the other side hasn't given you a citation anytime you are confronted with an uncomfortable truth. You have done it to Larry Johnson all the way through this thread.

You tell me. What makes you think Clinton should have been charged with warping intelligence?

Ron Byers

You might want to amend this para:

The Bush administration drew up plans to attack Afghanistan in October 2001 before 9/11 even happened, using the Northern Alliance and getting help from the Russians.

October follows September.

John O'Neill worried about airplanes hitting WTC, Tom Clancy had suggested it years ago, it was just a dumb thing for Rice to say.

Bush said he would not act without UN authorization which 1441 is not, unless "serious consequences" means invasion.

There was no hurry, period. The punch was already telegraphed. In any case, since war planning began in 2002 there was no excuse for sub-par equipment. And since State and CIA had both suggested the likelihood of an insurgency, armored humvees were indicated.

Results speak. Count the dead. Enjoy the Libby trial. Watch Bush go down in history as an incredible boob.

For that matter, Clinton sent cruise missiles into Sudan. Reasonable analysis shows that the pharmaceutical factory targeted did not, as suspected, make chemical weapons.

That factory was attacked by a mistake of interpretation, rather than cherry-picking. Soil samples obtained outside the factory did contain a chemical that is an intermediate in the synthesis of a nerve gas. It is also, however, an intermediate in the synthesis of veterinary drugs.

I suppose I'm a bit confused about the urgency or case of the Taliban giving up bin Laden during the Clinton Administration.

Could you be more specific as to how Saddam would have prepared himself better for the attack? One of the fundamental problems of the Iraqi military was their overly centralized direction by Saddam and his inner circle. Was Saddam going to delegate?

What weapons systems would he have deployed that were not deployed? How would said systems have seriously inconvenienced US forces? Please be specific. Of course, not invading Iraq would have resulted in even fewer US deaths.
--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

You're confused about the urgency for getting bin Laden from the Taliban? So while he was planning 9/11, you don't see why the US should hurry up and apprehend him? Seriously?

As for Saddam preparing, have you seriously not read any of the UN reports about what was going on Iraq in 2001 and 2002? The Duelfer report? Come on, do some reading and then get back to me.

Iraq was engaged in a crash program to build illegal missiles. They imported 380 Volga(?) missile engines illegally. They rebuilt missile test stands that the UN had previously destroyed and made them larger than before. They were vigorously procuring parts for their missile program and testing new rocket fuels to make their missiles fly farther.

Obviously allowing Saddam more time doing this would have allowed him to develop the missiles more, in addition to all the other military equipment he was continuously managing to get imported to Iraq illegally.

So, short and sweet, your question about what weapons systems would have been deployed would have been improved missiles, in both technology and number.

Very interesting conclusions. Larry, pissed his pants last week and accused me of being Seixon in disguise. I've been looking forward to seeing your posts.

If Wild Bill Donovan and Bill Casey wer alive today they would be impeached just like the rest of the criminals in Bush's adminstration will be if we are to save this country from future adminstrations willing to ignore the Constitution and put themselves above the law.

Impeachment, criminal prosecution, and no Presidential pardons.

Demand the Truth for America

Paul R. Pilar, former NIO for the Near East and South Asia and who has apologized for his role in the "now-infamous October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq's unconventional weapons programs," writes that "the first request I received from any administration policymaker for any such assessment was not until a year into the war."

That claim implies that the Administration did not rely on the CIA's analyses -- whether right or wrong.

While I have no sympathy for the feckless careerists occupying plush offices and leather covered executive chairs at the CIA, it seems to me that Administration apologists for the neocon "cabal" cannot point to so-called CIA agreement with them when the Administration didn't rely upon or employ CIA expertise.

Let's stick with what Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith and Rumsfeld said and did, because it was they who wanted to go to war and weren't going to hear a word against it.

Democrat Lee Hamilton, recently reiterated that the Atta Prague story has not been disproven yet. We've heard the story about an ATM used the week before the meeting and his cell phone being used stateside, but come on, people here are saying it has been proven false. Has it?

Hamilton still says that the 911 report does not contradict Administration statements regarding an Iraq/AQ relationship.

Maybe we should thrust him into the comfy chair. That will show him.

No one expects the spanish inquisition! Fear and surprise...and...

Read The Looming Tower to see how upset O'Neill was about AQ.

Tom

I'm afraid thats just not so. Regarding military events during Clinton's debilitating scandals, the Republican leadership was very disciplined about its support of the President. There was quiet criticism of the failure in the Sudan, because the response was so limited and what was done turned out to be botched on all accounts. Much of the criticism was directed at the CIA not Clinton.

It was worse than if we had done nothing. Please provide quotes of the Republican leadership saying wag the dog and for every one you come up with I can provide numerous republican words of solidarity. Even Bush said he supported Clinton's attacks. You might have seen the media say that.

And the hilarious fiction that Saddam had operational links with Al Quaida have been thoroughly debunked again and again. We had Saddam, and does anyone here imagine that if the fascist in the Bush government could verify any of these stupidly pathetic conjuring, - that they would not have had the gospel according to Fox parrots regurgitating the news day and night for years on end.

Saddam slaughtered and buried in the deserts anyone who threatened his regime. The fanaticus wingnustia partisans and Bush government apologists expose their gross ignorance of Islam and the complex relations of the various sectarian factions in Iraq. Prior to the Iraqi horrorshow the fascist disinformation warriors, warmongers and profiteers in the Bush government conflated Saddam-terrorirst-al Quaida- into one singly slurry they childishly termed "evildoers"

Al Quaida and Saddam held to diametrically opposed interpretations of islam. They were enemies. Did emissaries of al Quaida exchange missives over the years with elements of Saddams tyrannical regime? - maybe - but anyone who is stupid enough to believe the OSP/OSI/WHIG?Chalabi concocted LIE that Saddam and Al Quaida had any cperational links need only look to the hundreds of thousands of bodies buried in the Iraqi deserts for proof of what relationship Saddam had with anyone who opposed or threatened his power.

There is absolutely ZERO proof, not one single fact, and NO TRUTH to this deceptive Bush government claim.

I'm not following you, try me again.

May I suggest you familiarize yourself with the Constitutional requirements for impeachment, for coming up with specific legal violations on which there can be indictments, and how you propose to do away with the power of pardon?

As GWB has forgotten, if he ever understood, this is a government of laws subordinate to a Constitution, not a government of men. Officials may have done utterly reprehensible things, but, if there is no clear criminal violation, clear as violating a specific part of US code, you cannot indict, unless you want to be as extraconstitutional as Bush.

Only once has the impeachment power been used against an appointed official of the Executive Branch. It probably is inapplicable to officials that have not been confirmed by the Senate. Indeed, as with the Tenure of Office Act of 1867, the issue may be more when a President dismisses someone the Senate wants kept. A variant would be the Saturday Night Massacre during Watergate.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Oh? In the history of the nation, two presidents, one cabinet officer, one associate justice and twelve judges have been impeached. This is your idea of "when needed"? I'd call it "act of desperation".
--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Howard, I have seen your comments on many of my comments and dairies.

In fact you seem to be a regular fan of me.

Please take this as an attack on you. It is just tthat such of what is posted is more hot air (not the kind you exhale) than substance, and are more of an effort to hide the relevance of that which you post to.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Okeydokey.

Intelligence on Saddam's "WMDs" was passed around between our agencies, the Brits and the Israelis. The quote I gave you is from a 2003 critique of Israel's "exaggerated assessment" and is the Israeli analyst's reason for refuting the notion that their intel was manipulated due to political pressures.

Well, OK.

I still don't think it solves the myetery how the CIA could claim linkage in 1998 and then a few years later claim there has never been a link. The two concepts can not coexist.

I am not sure if you are not aware of the tradition I mentioned or you consider it out of date and obsolete, but its called, "politics ends at the waters edge".

The oath is that you will obey the orders of the President, obviously in his capacity as commander in chief.

I believe you are trying to imply that my statement was a call to blindly follow Clinton or any other leader in war as a cult of personality that we worship the man rather than respect the office, like camelot or something

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Ah. I think I see. I believe that's the oath of enlistment. I was quoting the oath for commissioning as officers, which assumes more autonomy than simple obedience.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

[duplicate]

Howard, not everyone is as patient as you.  The rest of us know we are not going to convince King of anything.  We appreciate that you keep him busy typing away so that he isn't going out into the analog world doing any real damage.

You remind me of the guy whose checkbook is out of balance by $1000.02, and he spends all of his time and efforts looking for the .02.

If you don't believe Larry, then don't come here to read him and annoy the rest of us with your missing .02. If you know so much more than he does, alert the CIA, apply for a job at the White House, post it (once), take it to the bank, whatever. Just give it a break.

An expert is a person who avoids small error as he sweeps on to the grand fallacy. Benjamin Stolberg

I thought Doug Feith's stand-out LOL claim came in his CNN interview last week when he claimed the OSP was involved not in analyzing intelligence, but in critiquing analysis of the intelligence agencies, and in particular, the CIA.

This is evidently at variance with what the intelligence agencies claimed - see the video here of hearings in June last year, where the likes of Paul Pilar set out what they saw what Feith's outfit was up to. In short, their job was to ensure that all raw intelligence of Saddam-AQ connections was funnelled to the executive, under the headline "What the CIA/DIA/INR analysts have dismissed". Which is technically accurate, of course, but also - depending how it is framed - potentially misleading.

This, however, does not make Feith, any more than Steven Hayes or Bill Kristol responsible for the fact we went to war in Iraq in 2003. They basically ran interference for the Cheney-Rumsfeld clique that evidently wanted this war from the get-go (from Paul O'Neill's account in the Price of Loyalty).

I think the best understanding of the OSP was doing is to compare it to the first Neocon foray into the intelligence business. Back under Gerald Ford, George Bush Snr (then head of the CIA) set up "Team B" - their job: to comb through the CIA's raw intelligence and to present alternative analysis. Paul Wolfowitz was part of Team B (Richard Pipes, father of Daniel, was its chair), and Don Rumsfeld was one of its biggest cheerleaders.

The OSP was to Iraq as Team B was to the Soviet Union. They were staffed by people who were neither military experts nor skilled intelligence analysts. They were a bunch of tunnel-visioned ideologues, trying to prove the worst case scenario. In the case of Team B, they wanted confrontation with Moscow; their arguments hinged on the Soviets having the most advanced nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The OSP wanted confrontation with Baghdad; their arguments hinged on Saddam having WMD and ties to the most dangerous terrorists.

And to conclude the symmetry, the conclusions of both Team B and the OSP were laughable in the eyes of the intelligence community.

The difference between the Team B and the OSP was that the former were treated carefully by those in power. Indeed, those who Reagan referred to as "the crazies" were the remnants of Team B and their friends. Regrettably, when the OSP was put into action, those in power were pre-diposed to a course of action that the OSP wanted to justify.

Doug Feith might frequently be referred to as the f*cking stupidest guy on the planet, but he was ultimately only in a job because the f*cking craziest administration in our history planted him there. His attempt to rewrite history is pretty much the equivalent of touching up the undercoat before the whitewashers get started. Feith's whoppers, his ducking and weaving, is just more interference that might allow Smirk and Cheney to distance themselves from their responsibilities.

Doug Feith's stupidity basically extends to the fact he doesn't recognize he is Bushco's favorite patsy. I'd prefer it if he were treated as such by the media, rather than some sort of serial dissembler, because it's quite likely Feith, without an intelligence background, had little clue that this was what he was doing.

Seixon if you don't know by now that Saddam's regime didn't train al Qaeda in poisons and gases you haven't been paying attention. All you need to do is google responses to the Stephen Hayes
articles based on the information leaked to him by Feith cited by Larry above to get direct quotes from analysts dismissing those allegations.

But if you still believe the disinformation I have thousands of pounds of Iraqi WMDs to sell ya. You just have to go to the Bekaa Valley to pick them up.

Howard,
You are right I missed a word *don't.

Plrase don't take this as attack...

But you are also right in that I am not Churchill.

Thanks for pointing that out, seriously.

Demand the Truth for America

I will have to check with some active friends, especially if I can reach one drill instructor now in Iraq. IIRC, the enlistment oath will be taken by candidates for commissions, and the commissioning oath is taken later and is considered to supecede it.

A certain amount is tradition. There are, however, legal differences among enlistments, warrants, and commissions and the authority implied. As an example, an extremely experienced E-9 (top pay grade) sergeant major can be a NCOIC (non-commissioned officer in charge), and be treated as a local god. A just-commissioned ensign in the Navy can command, although for most situations, the junior officer is paired with an experienced NCO.

In the example of the new officer, the NCO is expected to guide him in what it means to be an officer, and a wise junior officer listens very carefully. Again assuming wisdom, the NCO will advise the officer privately and help him not just appear to be the commander in public, but to give the troops the right feeling about their leadership.

Why is it done this way? Fundamentally, because it works. Militaries that have essentially dual career tracks for NCOs and officers, and who recognize their NCOs are professionals in a different way than their officers, tend to do very well. When the Soviets simply took a recruit and sent him to "sergeants school", they tended to get someone fairly marginal, as did the US when it created "shake and bake" sergeants during Vietnam.

The principal job of NCOs of all levels is to be responsible for individual soldier/sailor/airman/marine training and performance. The principal job of officers of all levels is to be responsible for unit training and performance, which includes planning for the unit as appropriate for the level -- Eisenhower's letter of instructions basically said "invade Europe and defeat the Nazis", while a company commander's instruction to a platoon leader might be "deploy your men to defend that little group of trees."

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

From my own detailed studies of Sudan, and, for that matter the 9/11 report, there was financial support, for bin Laden, in that country. It was more a transfer center for funds than a place that generated it. For a time, al-Qaeda ran physical training centers in Sudan, but, for assorted reasons, the al-Bashir government kicked them out roughly between 1996 and 1998. This correlates fairly well with al-Turabi falling from power.

Whether or not the plant contributed to al-Qaeda, it was a very legitimate source of human and veterinary pharmaceuticals, and to some extent, a humanitarian target. I believe Coll to be wrong, or at least seriously mistaken about the plant's significance to al-Qaeda. In any event, the intelligence that caused it to be attacked was based on chemical analysis and misinterpretation of the results.

After the attacks the Sudanese already angry ginned up a propaganda campaign claiming a benign use for the buidling. While it might be hot and heavy on the internet to buy into the Sudan's story Clinton and those who worked for him would not agree with you that it was a mistake, except that it did not cripple Al Qaeda.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

They might not teach tensegrity (maybe they do now) but they still teach celestial navigation at Annapolis.

Great stuff, H. One of the underlying themes of the Ambrose book and HBO special, "band of brothers" was the premise that Sargents won the conquest of Europe.

You may discount whatever you like. Coll is very clear that the Clinton Administration had been tracking Bin Laden's activities for years. They believe him to be heavily involved in terrorism and they desired to capture him but expected him to be killed in the attempt.

Berger, Clinton and others believed even after the eruption of the anti-American denounciations of the U.S. attack that it was a legitimate target. Richard Clarke wanted to launch additional cruise missile attacks. Berger was unwilling because of the political problems created by the Lewinsky and impeachment messes. Therefore they wanted confirmed sightings of Bin Laden before launching a strike to capture Bin Laden.

Thus Lewinsky I regret to say had much to do with it as did the inability to the CIA to get a real fix on Bin Laden. There was the additional problem of the Pakstanis and the Saudis lying to American reprentatives.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

So let me see if I have this right. You have no patience to debate anyone unless your goal of convincing them of your perfect consciousness. Sounds like a typical grazer of a liberal echo box.

Howard and I disagree on most things, but we both learn a great deal about the foundations of theses issues, because we are not engaged in narcissistic navel gazing. You rarely make an effort to defend your position, because you are here to have like minded peers reinforce your weak positions. You pursue affirmation and comfort more than truth.

Enjoy your echo box, but your positions will remain weak as long as you fear the need to defend them.

What did they pass on that was used by the White House that was not supported by the other intelligence agencies?

Just about all the Chalabisms, for starters. (with the exception that Bolton was pushing Chalabi in the INR - but the intel community there wasn't buying much of it.)

Neoboho

You have not responded to one point I made about Sudan. Instead, you went off again on Lewinsky.

You are now going of on capturing or killing bin Laden. Again, you are evading specifics.

Sudan. Attack on plant. Reasons therefore.

Why are you to be believed on Berger and Clinton's motivations?
--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Interesting aside, Tom: Woolsey's first theory was that the perp of 9/11 was Imad Mugniyeh (and I think that Daniel Pipes made this argument also.)  The argument was that Mugniyeh was the only one with the savvy to pull-off such a sophistated operation, hardly something that cavemen in Afghanistan could manage.

Neoboho

Ellen, very well laid out, but I have to disagree with some of your characterizations.

First yes, Larry is not very productive and he spends most of his time trying to backfill the CIAs mistakes and fingerpointing as to why if the world would have just let the CIA do what they want the world would be a Utopia. The Feith issue is just one more display of how bad the stovepipes and backbiting amongst the various agencies was before and after 911. It still is bad and Larry is trying to keep the war going. There has been bloody turf battles inside the intelligence community in the last few years and leaks and sex scandals are flying off the walls. Larry and his group are the ones arguing for status quo and zero oversight of the politically biased cabal in the agency. Bolton and Porter Goss and the President wants reform to allow for agencies to work together, more oversight and less partisanship so we can defend this country.

This IG did not break anything new. He didn't uncover anything other than set up a phony event to fill their marketing campaign. As Feith said, the IGs circular logic is that Feith is wrong in casting a critical eye on intelligence because his analysis disagreed with the intelligence agencies he is criticizing. That's nuts.

This whole marketing campaign by the left that Bush is infinitely clever in the fact that he was able to singlehandedly deceive nearly every intelligent Democrat in our government as well as the entire liberal side of the American media. Come on. We all had the same intel. Arguing now that Hillary or Obama or Kerry would have acted differently if Bush would have shard some other intel with him is just insincere. If somone points at a piece of intel that has been proven to be false is like having someone arguing to double down on two tens in a game of black jack and then saying i told you so when you lose to a dealers 21.

20/20 hindsight does not prove that these Democrats would have done anything different, and they are very reluctant to admit that they made a mistake in analysis.

Bush did not bamboozle Hillary or Kerry or Levin with a marketing campaign. The news was plastered with stories about how we might lose not just tens of thousands, but hundreds of thousands of lives, and the American people agreed to go anyway. Do you remember the embeds during the invasion all wearing gas masks and the vehicles that sense biochem? No one in the media said we would conquer the whole country and lose 3000. It was always 50,000 or 100,000. If the Democrat leadership, for whatever the reason, were willing to lose more than 100,000 and now we have lost 2500 in combat, how did they get duped into taking a risk they wouldn't have otherwise taken if they had the same access to the same intel.

What has changed? Dean was able to make money on the war and the rats all scattered. It is a marketing campaign by the left, not the right. Watching the same media that you are claiming joined in with the selling of the war, as they squirm on the witness stand right now is revealing.

They are used to throwing meat into the pit and watching the two sides fight about it. Seeing Andrea Mitchell, Tim Russert, Judith Miller, David Gregory and the gang getting caught in lies exposes that they hadn't intended to fall into the pit and now they are getting roughed up. They have lied and pulled strings and got sucked up into it. When Armitage surfaced and it didn't turn out as they hoped, they knocked it off the front pages and dropped it.

The left can't play dumb and that they got tricked and then claim for us to follow them and then refuse to say where to follow them to. I guess some people eat it up, but not forever.

Thanks for your well written post.

"...He's the sort of person with whom I might enjoy both sharing a meal and conversation, and then attending his execution. Weird world, innit?..."

I'm laughing my head off. That's good.

It is no surprise that the wahhabis would be offended by his ideas. The wahhabis long ago became offended by the accesorization of Islam, with burial sites worshipped as saints and fancy ceremonies that they believed was equivelent to polytheistic.

When Turabi told OBL some of his ideas, to integrate dancing and music into the mainstream of worship and to allow women to uncover their faces apparently made Osama pee in his panties.

His argument in favor of womens rights unveils even more sexism. He says a woman doesn't need to stay home now, because housework is so easy with modern appliances....ha,ha,ha. He needs to go to a Palm Springs rehab center. and then we attend his execution.

Seixon,

Oh ye who "merely asks timid questions." Please let me point out that it was the DOD, in Congressional testimony who claimed that Doug Feith had behaved irresponsibly.

Did he get his intelligence from outside sources and "merely pass it on." Yes, but that is not a point that means anything. First, because many of those sources, such as curveball, were providing misleading information in order to get the U.S. to invade. Have you ever heard of "disinformation?"

That's why the intelligence community has to vet raw intelligence and place it in context. In this case, the bulk of the most reliable information failed to indicate any link between Saddam and Osama. In fact, there was significant intelligence indicating that Saddam hated the Islamic fundamentalists and wished to be rid of them.

But the truly stupid (or evil) action of Doug Feith was that he failed to pass on the majority view of the intelligence community or to qualify the claims made in his kangaroo report.

Sexion, the question you need to be asking is why did George Tenet, who oversaw the two biggest intelligence failures in a generation, recieve the medal of freedom? That question and your question about why he continused to use the flawed intel into 2002 have the same answer. He got rewarded for playing ball, going along, and taking the fall.

What many don't realize about bureaucracys like the Pentagon and CIA is that there are two cultures under their roof: the career staffers and the political appointees. Sure Tenet was a Clinton appointee, but he was to the liking of the Republican congress who ununanimously confirmed him following the withdrawal of Anthony Lake, whose nomination had been blocked by Republicans in Congress. He was a GOP team player on the political appointee side, but the professionals in the CIA, the ones who do the work, had their own views, based on intelligence gathering, not agenda. The conflict between the professionals and appointees whithin the govermnent agencies has been strained (in large part from Cheney's heavy hand), and the resulting battle plays out in venues like the Plame case.

There's your answer. Why did Tenet recieve the medal of freedom?