The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Regarding that NIE "Leak"
It repeats like a broken or scratched record: meetings are held between the President and members of the Intelligence community. Secret minutes are kept and a consensus summary is reached about the findings of that meeting. This results in a document called the National Intelligence Estimate. The particular meeting we have been talking about since Sunday occurred over 6 months ago. Now it is 6 months later, in the middle of a critical election cycle. Among the topics being debated in that election cycle is the War in Iraq. Suddenly (surprise!) cherry-picked portions of this NIE which was allegedly written up 6 months ago, appear in the New York Times and Washington Post, having been leaked by hypocrites posing as "public servants". The reports of course are damning of the entire War effort, purporting to blame President Bush with the fact that Iraq seems to have drawn some Islamist terrorists to try and stop the US from creating a stable democracy there.
If it sounds familiar, it is exactly the same thing that occurred before the last election; that time the leaker was a disgruntled State Department employee named Armitage: do the names Plame and Wilson might ring a bell? Clarice Feldman reminds us:
As in the Plame case, selective leaks of the NIE appear long after the distribution of the document—in this case almost 6 months afterward—with a clear intent of helping the Democrats in the upcoming election. As in that case, a complete refutation would require declassifying the report and making secrets public-a process which takes time and gives the lie time to spread. And to make the analogy complete, the cherry-picked portions of the report leaked to the Washington Post and New York Times make no more sense than did Ambassador Munchausen’s tale of his Mission to Niger.
But this new leak of National Security information isn't about yellowcake, it is about (surprise!) the Iraq War. Robert Kagan of the Washington Post thought that...well, that it was a bit incomplete:
It's too bad we won't get to see the full National Intelligence Estimate on "Trends in Global Terrorism" selectively leaked to The Post and the New York Times last week. The Times headline read "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terrorism Threat." But there were no quotations from the NIE itself, so all we have are journalists' characterizations of anonymous comments by government officials, whose motives and reliability we can't judge, about intelligence assessments whose logic and argument, as well as factual basis, we have no way of knowing or gauging. Based on the press coverage alone, the NIE's judgment seems both impressionistic and imprecise. On such an important topic, it would be nice to have answers to a few questions.
For instance, what specifically does it mean to say that the Iraq war has worsened the "terrorism threat"? Presumably, the NIE's authors would admit that this is speculation rather than a statement of fact, since the facts suggest otherwise. Before the Iraq war, the United States suffered a series of terrorist attacks: the bombing and destruction of two American embassies in East Africa in 1998, the terrorist attack on the USS Cole in 2000, and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Since the Iraq war started, there have not been any successful terrorist attacks against the United States. That doesn't mean the threat has diminished because of the Iraq war, but it does place the burden of proof on those who argue that it has increased.
There is much more to Kagan's piece that bears reading, but let's move on. Today the President--in order to try and add actual context to the horribly slanted leaked material--authorized the de-classification of the summary portions of the NIE in question. John Hindraker of Power Line (with an assist from Paul Johnson) reports on this, and his post includes a link to the newly released NIE "plus context":
President Bush lost no time in agreeing with suggestions from Senator Cornyn and others that the National Intelligence Estimate that was the basis for stories in the New York Times and Washington Post, claiming that the Iraq war has hurt our efforts in the war on terror, be declassified so the American people can judge for themselves:
Bemoaning an election-year leak, President George W. Bush on Tuesday said he would declassify a secret terrorism document that included a judgment the Iraq war had spread Islamic extremism.
At a news conference with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Bush said political opponents had disclosed only select parts of the National Intelligence Estimate, a U.S. global report on terrorism, and he decided to make the document public so "you read it for yourself."
"Somebody has taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," Bush said.
I think that's great. Last night, we provided a preview of what else the NIE may contain.
Via Power Line News.
UPDATE: Earlier this morning, Democrats tried to force the House of Representatives into a secret session to talk about the NIE report. This grandstanding would have generated more leaks and more headlines, but it was voted down. Now, with the report itself being declassified, the Democrats won't be able to pull this kind of stunt.
UPDATE by PAUL: I don't have time to review it now, but here's the NIE report.
Be sure and read the actual report that Paul links to.
Tonight I would like to end our little saga by adding probably the best commentary I have read thus far today on the NIE matter. Today is not to go into a rant against media traitors leaking national secrets to try and cripple a Presidency--there will be other days for that. No, today is for understanding how utterly stupid the whole gist of the NY Times and Washington Post exposes about these "leaks" are. And for this, if there is anyone better at cutting to the chase than Froggy--in that way that only Froggy can--I would like to know who it is. This is masterful:
Is it just me, or do you find it puzzling how people are unable to make the simplest of logical assumptions when it comes to just about anything in this country? It seems that every day on the news we are treated to the results of some brilliant scientist's research study that states the obvious after spending millions in grant money. Did you know that children who live in homes with alcoholic crack addicts who own guns are 10 times as likely to shoot themselves accidentally as children that go to northeastern college prep schools? Really, you don't say?
Should it come as any surprise then that after decades of cowering after terrorist attacks that when the US decides to fight back and take the battle to their home turf that more of them would get involved in the fight? Just taking a wild stab in the dark here, but I would imagine that recruiting for the US military might have ticked up a bit after the 9/11 attacks. I seem to remember a guy, Pat somebody, who blew off an NFL career to join the Army around that time.
My question for these brilliant political scientists in the Congress and elsewhere would be, "What policy do you advocate that both reduces terrorism and recruitment of terrorists?" Or how about, "Which priority is more vital to the security of the US, fighting terrorism or reducing recruitment of terrorists? Because as I recall, the terrorists had no trouble recruiting when we were pulling out of Beirut or Somalia. It seems that showing weakness in the face of enemy aggression is pretty good for recruiting too. We could have continued this response to our enemy in perpetuity if they hadn't gone and killed 3000 of our people... but they did.
The way I see it, we can concern ourselves with only one of these problems at the present time. Until democracy breaks out in the middle east, theocratic nutburger regimes liberalize, and islam goes through a reformation we can either worry that more terrorists are being recruited or thank God that more American soldiers are joining up to kill those recruits. I think I'll go with door number two.
Me too, Froggy. And while we are at it--isn't it about time we got serious about these leakers of State secrets who have set about trying to destroy our Democratic Republic?
If it sounds familiar, it is exactly the same thing that occurred before the last election; that time the leaker was a disgruntled State Department employee named Armitage: do the names Plame and Wilson might ring a bell? Clarice Feldman reminds us:
As in the Plame case, selective leaks of the NIE appear long after the distribution of the document—in this case almost 6 months afterward—with a clear intent of helping the Democrats in the upcoming election. As in that case, a complete refutation would require declassifying the report and making secrets public-a process which takes time and gives the lie time to spread. And to make the analogy complete, the cherry-picked portions of the report leaked to the Washington Post and New York Times make no more sense than did Ambassador Munchausen’s tale of his Mission to Niger.
But this new leak of National Security information isn't about yellowcake, it is about (surprise!) the Iraq War. Robert Kagan of the Washington Post thought that...well, that it was a bit incomplete:
It's too bad we won't get to see the full National Intelligence Estimate on "Trends in Global Terrorism" selectively leaked to The Post and the New York Times last week. The Times headline read "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terrorism Threat." But there were no quotations from the NIE itself, so all we have are journalists' characterizations of anonymous comments by government officials, whose motives and reliability we can't judge, about intelligence assessments whose logic and argument, as well as factual basis, we have no way of knowing or gauging. Based on the press coverage alone, the NIE's judgment seems both impressionistic and imprecise. On such an important topic, it would be nice to have answers to a few questions.
For instance, what specifically does it mean to say that the Iraq war has worsened the "terrorism threat"? Presumably, the NIE's authors would admit that this is speculation rather than a statement of fact, since the facts suggest otherwise. Before the Iraq war, the United States suffered a series of terrorist attacks: the bombing and destruction of two American embassies in East Africa in 1998, the terrorist attack on the USS Cole in 2000, and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Since the Iraq war started, there have not been any successful terrorist attacks against the United States. That doesn't mean the threat has diminished because of the Iraq war, but it does place the burden of proof on those who argue that it has increased.
There is much more to Kagan's piece that bears reading, but let's move on. Today the President--in order to try and add actual context to the horribly slanted leaked material--authorized the de-classification of the summary portions of the NIE in question. John Hindraker of Power Line (with an assist from Paul Johnson) reports on this, and his post includes a link to the newly released NIE "plus context":
President Bush lost no time in agreeing with suggestions from Senator Cornyn and others that the National Intelligence Estimate that was the basis for stories in the New York Times and Washington Post, claiming that the Iraq war has hurt our efforts in the war on terror, be declassified so the American people can judge for themselves:
Bemoaning an election-year leak, President George W. Bush on Tuesday said he would declassify a secret terrorism document that included a judgment the Iraq war had spread Islamic extremism.
At a news conference with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Bush said political opponents had disclosed only select parts of the National Intelligence Estimate, a U.S. global report on terrorism, and he decided to make the document public so "you read it for yourself."
"Somebody has taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," Bush said.
I think that's great. Last night, we provided a preview of what else the NIE may contain.
Via Power Line News.
UPDATE: Earlier this morning, Democrats tried to force the House of Representatives into a secret session to talk about the NIE report. This grandstanding would have generated more leaks and more headlines, but it was voted down. Now, with the report itself being declassified, the Democrats won't be able to pull this kind of stunt.
UPDATE by PAUL: I don't have time to review it now, but here's the NIE report.
Be sure and read the actual report that Paul links to.
Tonight I would like to end our little saga by adding probably the best commentary I have read thus far today on the NIE matter. Today is not to go into a rant against media traitors leaking national secrets to try and cripple a Presidency--there will be other days for that. No, today is for understanding how utterly stupid the whole gist of the NY Times and Washington Post exposes about these "leaks" are. And for this, if there is anyone better at cutting to the chase than Froggy--in that way that only Froggy can--I would like to know who it is. This is masterful:
Is it just me, or do you find it puzzling how people are unable to make the simplest of logical assumptions when it comes to just about anything in this country? It seems that every day on the news we are treated to the results of some brilliant scientist's research study that states the obvious after spending millions in grant money. Did you know that children who live in homes with alcoholic crack addicts who own guns are 10 times as likely to shoot themselves accidentally as children that go to northeastern college prep schools? Really, you don't say?
Should it come as any surprise then that after decades of cowering after terrorist attacks that when the US decides to fight back and take the battle to their home turf that more of them would get involved in the fight? Just taking a wild stab in the dark here, but I would imagine that recruiting for the US military might have ticked up a bit after the 9/11 attacks. I seem to remember a guy, Pat somebody, who blew off an NFL career to join the Army around that time.
My question for these brilliant political scientists in the Congress and elsewhere would be, "What policy do you advocate that both reduces terrorism and recruitment of terrorists?" Or how about, "Which priority is more vital to the security of the US, fighting terrorism or reducing recruitment of terrorists? Because as I recall, the terrorists had no trouble recruiting when we were pulling out of Beirut or Somalia. It seems that showing weakness in the face of enemy aggression is pretty good for recruiting too. We could have continued this response to our enemy in perpetuity if they hadn't gone and killed 3000 of our people... but they did.
The way I see it, we can concern ourselves with only one of these problems at the present time. Until democracy breaks out in the middle east, theocratic nutburger regimes liberalize, and islam goes through a reformation we can either worry that more terrorists are being recruited or thank God that more American soldiers are joining up to kill those recruits. I think I'll go with door number two.
Me too, Froggy. And while we are at it--isn't it about time we got serious about these leakers of State secrets who have set about trying to destroy our Democratic Republic?
