The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Friday, September 23, 2005
Another Able Danger 180--and what it probably means
Captain Ed Morrissey is staying squarely on top of the Able Danger scandal. Today it was announced that the Pentagon has reversed itself--again--and that the 5 intelligence officers with knowledge of the Mohammed Atta matter will now be allowed to testify before a Senate panel after all on October 5. And my guess is that Morrissey is right in suggesting that the Clinton Administration is not the only "team" that will have some culpability here. But I say: bring it on. We need to know the truth--not because someone on our "team" (or "theirs") might get dirty, but because we need to clean up the process, period. We are at war, and the only way to win is to learn from our errors.
When this Able Danger business first came up I had just finished Ralph Peters' excellent book 'New Glory', and there is a chapter therein that is very germane to what we are likely about to learn on the 5th of October. The quotes below are not ironically taken from a chapter entitled "Bureacracy versus Intelligence". For that IS the real battle being waged in Washington, and it indeed may be where the war on terror will be won or lost. That is why we must know the truth, no matter where it leads.
The first 'New Glory' quote I will reference is from page 102, regarding Peters' experiences as an intelligence officer:
Still the greatest problem is the timidity of intelligence bureaucrats at every level. Time and again I personally encountered resistance to new ideas that threatened the standard way of doing business or prevalent beliefs [....] For the gatekeepers who decided which information would reach the executive level, the goal was not necessarily to get things right, but to avoid being dangerously wrong.
Then, this, from page 104:
The National Security Agency was determined to pretend that the Russians were coming back again, while the CIA was casting about desperately for anybody who might replace the Soviets as a huge but manageable enemy. After the Clinton administration arrived it was taboo to hint at a threat from religious extremists (unless they were domestic Christians, of course). As I personally experienced "Islamic fundamentalism" and "Muslim terrorists" were unacceptable terms in the Clinton years. Diversity was good, even when it was deadly.
Further down:
Embassies were bombed in Africa. Troop dormitories were struck in Saudi Arabia. An American warship was crippled by suicide bombers. All of those blows were "isolated events". Al Qaeda was a minor problem. All you had to do was to hurl a few cruise missiles at empty huts.
Our enemies were shouting their intentions at us, then emerging from the shadows to kill us. They lived up to their rhetoric. Nothing could have been plainer. But admitting that such threats were real would have been more than an inconvenience requiring action. It threatened to destroy the belief system the Clintonites had carted into office from Ivy League graduate seminars and debates in Oxford or Cambridge during the Vietnam War. Anyone seeking a textbook case of denial need look no further than the Clinton White House.
[....]
Yes, 9/11 was an intelligence failure to some degree. But the warnings were there that a major attack was coming. The far deeper failure was a leadership failure--for eight years under William J. Clinton and for eight months under George W. Bush. When it gently chided both administrations, that 9/11 commission report maintained its bipartisan loyalty to our Washington elite.
I hightly recommend this book, and not just because of the chapter pointing out the war between elitist bureaucrats and intelligence. But I think there is little question that Peters' words here will ring very true when the truth does come out on the Able Danger matter. Because I think the truth is that the Pentagon had the intel, and that someone there, some bureaucrat who was afraid of being "wrong", kept it--no prevented it--from getting to the White House.
The Captain's entire post below is all interesting, but for the sake of what I will call "brevity", here are the last few paragraphs in which he draws basically the same conclusion as has Peters. I pick up the discussion as Morrissey speculates why the Pentagon again reversed course on the upcoming testimony:
I wonder what happened to cause this change in attitude. It appears that the heavey-handedness of the last-minute change caused some problems even among those Senators inclined to support the White House, such as Arlen Specter. More likely, the Pentagon and White House may have underestimated the visibility that Able Danger has achieved over the past month.
We can surmise a couple of items from this reversal, especially given the hostility that Shaffer showed towards the Pentagon as a result of the initial cancellation. First, the gag order had little to do with ongoing operational security. It would take much more time than 72 hours to secure personnel and intelligence, and if the Pentagon still had those assets in operation, the witnesses would remain gagged. That means the Pentagon pulled the witnesses for some other reason.
Anyone want to guess what that reason might be? Whatever the reason, they have made clear that the Pentagon fears the truth coming out about Able Danger. Many have speculated that the program showed connections between the Clinton Administration and China, and that caused the Pentagon to hush up Able Danger. Perhaps, but that cannot explain the actions this week in pulling the witnesses off the stand at the last moment. The Clinton Administration has come and gone, and even a possible Hillary administration would come no sooner than almost four years from now.
The reason, therefore, has to involve people at the Pentagon right now. It seems to me that the Pentagon has the most to lose if speculation that it deliberately withheld cooperation from the FBI when it could have stopped 9/11 is true, and that it has to answer for the destruction of the materials if the witnesses testify as expected. Those decisions could involve high-ranking brass, such as Hugh Shelton (ret.) and Pete Schoomaker, and perhaps even Donald Rumsfeld. Or perhaps they just involve second-tier leadership - which is why the Pentagon decided to reverse itself after seeing the public reaction to the aborted hearing Wednesday.
October 5th should be pretty interesting. Expect to see three new names pop up, including Dr. Eileen Preisser, who seems to hold a central role in Able Danger and the analysis that found the terrorists a year before the attacks. If so, the 9/11 Commission will be the first casualty, but not the last. This story will not go away soon.
UPDATE: Corrected spelling of Dr. Eileen Preisser. The wrong spelling did lead me to this transcript the other day, so the mistake was not entirely unproductive.
Should be an interesting hearing, indeed
When this Able Danger business first came up I had just finished Ralph Peters' excellent book 'New Glory', and there is a chapter therein that is very germane to what we are likely about to learn on the 5th of October. The quotes below are not ironically taken from a chapter entitled "Bureacracy versus Intelligence". For that IS the real battle being waged in Washington, and it indeed may be where the war on terror will be won or lost. That is why we must know the truth, no matter where it leads.
The first 'New Glory' quote I will reference is from page 102, regarding Peters' experiences as an intelligence officer:
Still the greatest problem is the timidity of intelligence bureaucrats at every level. Time and again I personally encountered resistance to new ideas that threatened the standard way of doing business or prevalent beliefs [....] For the gatekeepers who decided which information would reach the executive level, the goal was not necessarily to get things right, but to avoid being dangerously wrong.
Then, this, from page 104:
The National Security Agency was determined to pretend that the Russians were coming back again, while the CIA was casting about desperately for anybody who might replace the Soviets as a huge but manageable enemy. After the Clinton administration arrived it was taboo to hint at a threat from religious extremists (unless they were domestic Christians, of course). As I personally experienced "Islamic fundamentalism" and "Muslim terrorists" were unacceptable terms in the Clinton years. Diversity was good, even when it was deadly.
Further down:
Embassies were bombed in Africa. Troop dormitories were struck in Saudi Arabia. An American warship was crippled by suicide bombers. All of those blows were "isolated events". Al Qaeda was a minor problem. All you had to do was to hurl a few cruise missiles at empty huts.
Our enemies were shouting their intentions at us, then emerging from the shadows to kill us. They lived up to their rhetoric. Nothing could have been plainer. But admitting that such threats were real would have been more than an inconvenience requiring action. It threatened to destroy the belief system the Clintonites had carted into office from Ivy League graduate seminars and debates in Oxford or Cambridge during the Vietnam War. Anyone seeking a textbook case of denial need look no further than the Clinton White House.
[....]
Yes, 9/11 was an intelligence failure to some degree. But the warnings were there that a major attack was coming. The far deeper failure was a leadership failure--for eight years under William J. Clinton and for eight months under George W. Bush. When it gently chided both administrations, that 9/11 commission report maintained its bipartisan loyalty to our Washington elite.
I hightly recommend this book, and not just because of the chapter pointing out the war between elitist bureaucrats and intelligence. But I think there is little question that Peters' words here will ring very true when the truth does come out on the Able Danger matter. Because I think the truth is that the Pentagon had the intel, and that someone there, some bureaucrat who was afraid of being "wrong", kept it--no prevented it--from getting to the White House.
The Captain's entire post below is all interesting, but for the sake of what I will call "brevity", here are the last few paragraphs in which he draws basically the same conclusion as has Peters. I pick up the discussion as Morrissey speculates why the Pentagon again reversed course on the upcoming testimony:
I wonder what happened to cause this change in attitude. It appears that the heavey-handedness of the last-minute change caused some problems even among those Senators inclined to support the White House, such as Arlen Specter. More likely, the Pentagon and White House may have underestimated the visibility that Able Danger has achieved over the past month.
We can surmise a couple of items from this reversal, especially given the hostility that Shaffer showed towards the Pentagon as a result of the initial cancellation. First, the gag order had little to do with ongoing operational security. It would take much more time than 72 hours to secure personnel and intelligence, and if the Pentagon still had those assets in operation, the witnesses would remain gagged. That means the Pentagon pulled the witnesses for some other reason.
Anyone want to guess what that reason might be? Whatever the reason, they have made clear that the Pentagon fears the truth coming out about Able Danger. Many have speculated that the program showed connections between the Clinton Administration and China, and that caused the Pentagon to hush up Able Danger. Perhaps, but that cannot explain the actions this week in pulling the witnesses off the stand at the last moment. The Clinton Administration has come and gone, and even a possible Hillary administration would come no sooner than almost four years from now.
The reason, therefore, has to involve people at the Pentagon right now. It seems to me that the Pentagon has the most to lose if speculation that it deliberately withheld cooperation from the FBI when it could have stopped 9/11 is true, and that it has to answer for the destruction of the materials if the witnesses testify as expected. Those decisions could involve high-ranking brass, such as Hugh Shelton (ret.) and Pete Schoomaker, and perhaps even Donald Rumsfeld. Or perhaps they just involve second-tier leadership - which is why the Pentagon decided to reverse itself after seeing the public reaction to the aborted hearing Wednesday.
October 5th should be pretty interesting. Expect to see three new names pop up, including Dr. Eileen Preisser, who seems to hold a central role in Able Danger and the analysis that found the terrorists a year before the attacks. If so, the 9/11 Commission will be the first casualty, but not the last. This story will not go away soon.
UPDATE: Corrected spelling of Dr. Eileen Preisser. The wrong spelling did lead me to this transcript the other day, so the mistake was not entirely unproductive.
Should be an interesting hearing, indeed
