WP, page 1: 9/11 Panel Critical of Clinton, Bush

[DeepModem Mom]

9/11 Panel Critical of Clinton, Bush
Officials From Both Administrations Defend Response to Al Qaeda Threat
By Dan Eggen and John Mintz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, March 24, 2004; Page A01


The commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks issued a stinging condemnation yesterday of the U.S. government's failed hunt for Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda terrorist network, finding that both the Clinton and Bush administrations focused too heavily on diplomacy that did not work and were reluctant to consider aggressive military action....

***

....new reports by the commission's investigative staff portray the Bush administration as giving terrorism scant attention during its first eight months, noting that officials did not draw up concrete plans to confront al Qaeda and its Afghan protectors until just days before the Sept. 11 attacks.

The reports suggest that many of the Clinton administration's policies also were ineffectual, revealing significant new details about as many as four missed opportunities to kill or capture bin Laden in 1998 and 1999.

The reports also appear to confirm some of the key criticisms made by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism coordinator for Clinton and Bush, in a book released Monday that has revived the bitter debate over the government's war on terror. Clarke set off a political firestorm with allegations that the current administration neglected the al Qaeda threat in part because senior officials were obsessed with attacking Iraq, and accused both administrations of failing to act aggressively enough. He is scheduled to testify before the commission today, along with CIA Director George J. Tenet, Clinton national security adviser Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger and Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage....

(Much more from Commission reports released yesterday --)


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18972-2004Mar23.html

[tabasco]

1. It only took ten months of letting our guard down.

The republicans on the panel are trying to give diplomacy a bad name. This will be the rallying cry of the Idiot Chimp defenders - "it was Clinton's fault for using all that diplomacy and not dropping enough bombs!" Note to republicans: 9-11 happened when Chimp was in office for almost a year. Bush dropped our guard at the time we needed it most.

[bacchant]

2. Could be

A hard sell with Rummy excusing their own lack of pre-911 engagement with terms like "Stale" (The Cole bombing) and "Not cost effective" (Dropping bombs on training camps). But given the Repukes are always playing every angle-even if they're contradictory-someone will probably try.

[tjwash]

8. Another note to republicans...

Smirk stole the white house. He campaigned furiously to get there, and he had the supreme court install his fraudulent butt. How he has the chutzpa to even TRY to blame Bill Clinton for anything, is infuriating enough, without the repugs being in lockstep. The bottom line is, he got exactly what he wanted, and is finding out he is not man enough for the job.

[ze_dscherman]

3. Reuters report: Bush Briefed on Al Qaeda Threat Before Taking Offfice

SNIP
During the summer of 2001 the volume of intelligence about threats grew alarming. "By late July, there were indications of multiple, possibly catastrophic, terrorist attacks being planned against American interests overseas," the national commission's staff report said.

The CIA's Counterterrorist Center identified 30 possible overseas targets and launched operations to disrupt any attacks.

During this period, some CIA officials expressed frustration at the pace of policymaking, the report said. Tenet's deputy, John McLaughlin, "told us he felt a great tension -- especially in June and July 2001 -- between the new administration's need to understand these issues and his sense that this was a matter of great urgency," the report said.

Two veteran CIA counterterrorism officers who were deeply involved in bin Laden issues "were so worried about an impending disaster that one of them told us that they considered resigning and going public with their concerns," the report by the commission's staff said. The report did not identify them.

SNIP

http://news.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=4646224

[DeepModem Mom]

10. Thanks for posting this additional article, ze_dscherman --

[papau]

4. Fact Clinton exonerated hidden as Bush cover up continues

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGA0O9GI7SD.html

In the AP article "Confusion Hampered CIA Efforts to Stop Bin Laden Before 9/11" by Ken Guggenheim, Mar 24, 2004, as the AP quotes from the commission report released today and yesterday, we learn that

1.on the Bush/CIA/Tenet cover-up side that CIA officers at all levels of the agency questioned the effectiveness of the most active strategy that policy-makers were employing to defeat the terrorist enemy,

but that no one could tell the commission why the CIA did not suggest a change to that strategy, or indeed why the strategy remained largely unchanged throughout the period leading up to 9/11.


2. Since Bush was given a talk by the CIA's deputy director of operations, Jim Pavitt, shortly after he was elected that bin Laden was one of the gravest threats to the country, and since the August 2001 CIA secretive assessment on whether terrorists might attack the United States given to Bush included no "specific, credible information about any threatened attacks in the United States," according to a second report released by the commission Wednesday,

I Guess we are to include that those talks included either non-specific, credible information, or specific non-credible information on the attack that was coming.


3. And while the Bush crowd, on their way to Iraq, questioned the intelligence from our intelligence agencies that said they had began to see strong indications in June and July 2001 that a terrorist attack was likely, Tenet in his daily briefings to Bush and staff had a sense that officials at the White House had grasped the sense of urgency he was communicating to them.


4. And while the poor CIA is told Clinton that they are authorized to kill bin Laden, Tenet claims he understood that to mean capture bin Laden, or kill during a capture attempt - but of course while the CIA now complains about what they thought the orders were, Clinton's former national security adviser, Samuel Berger said the CIA never complained about the restrictions to the White House, per the report.

5. And indeed those restrictions against unnecessary collateral damage meant that local mercenary forces who considered attacking bin Laden convoys about six times before Sept. 11, were told to abort when bin Laden took a different route, or they reported security was too tight, or they reported women and children were believed to be in the convoy they thought might contain bin Laden.

6. And those missed opportunity for Clinton missile attacks on bin Laden after we received intelligence on his whereabouts didn't proceed because the intelligence came from a single, uncorroborated source and there was a risk of innocents being killed. Seems after the Pakistani ISI screwed Clinton in the first missile strike by telling bin Laden to get out of town, we really did not develop local intel on our own.

Why are Bush and Tenet still employed?

[DeepModem Mom]

11. Thanks for posting this article, papau --

[Mithras61]

5. Do you suppose that "Penisgate" had anything top do...

with WJC's response being ineffectual? Can you recall the "wag the dog" claims that were shouted from the rooftops when WJC tried to do more than just use diplomatic channels? Do you suppose that Congress' refusal to allow more military engagement could possibly have had any effect on WJC's attempts to capture/kill OBL?


I thought so, too.

[lancdem]

7. That's s good point

But I can handle the criticism of Clinton because Bush is getting it, too.

[proud patriot]

6. Front page in my paper too

:hi:

[dArKeR]

9. Bush was more concerned about who took the 'W' from the keyboards,

who split coffee on the White House carpeting, whether a Clinton gift belonged in thw WH or in Clinton's home, who's desks scratched the walls, who's chocolate finger prints were on the light switches...

What gets me is America is supposed to have the greatest minds and thinkers of current day. So why do so many top Government officials and Media Whores forget so easily? Are they in fact really stupid and we've been bamboozled? Lucky for taped media. Why doesn't MoveOn make a commercial about these facts.

[colonel odis]

12. it's nice to see the truth getting out yesterday and this morning

especially without the filter of the right-wing media machine and the r.n.c.

they can try to spin it any way they want to, but the truth shall set you free. perhaps our country, too.

bastards.