Re: Shocking discovery: President determined to defend U.S.
- From: Chief <Chief@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 23:44:21 GMT
"jose" <josefsoplar@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in news:1136569321.878992.231840
@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:
Gee, he is? Then he's going to close the borders? Is he going to find
Osama? What's his plan? Maybe he'll finish his guard tour.
> Shocking discovery: President determined to defend U.S.
>
> Paul Greenberg
>
> http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | Dana Priest of The Washington Post
> sounds shocked - shocked! - to discover that George W. Bush ordered
> a complete remobilization and reinvigoration of the CIA immediately
> after September 11th:
>
>
> "The effort President Bush authorized shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, to
> fight al-Qaida has grown into the largest CIA covert-action program
> since the height of the Cold War, expanding in size and ambition
> despite a growing outcry at home and abroad over clandestine tactics .
> . . ."
>
>
> This is news? Isn't this just what W. told the country he would do in
> the aftermath of September 11th?
>
>
> "Ours will be a broad campaign, fought on many fronts. It's a campaign
> that will be waged by day and by night, in the light and in the shadow,
> in battles that you will see and battles you won't see. It's a campaign
> waged by soldiers and sailors, marines and airmen; and also by FBI
> agents and law-enforcement officials and diplomats and intelligence
> officers. . . . Our campaign will be difficult, and it will take time.
> But I can promise you this: It will be waged with determination, and it
> will be waged until we win. We will do whatever it takes to protect our
> country." - George W. Bush, Oct. 17, 2001.
>
>
> Apparently W. meant it. According to the Post's Ms. Priest, the
> president signed an order six days after September 11th empowering
> American intelligence agencies in a way not seen since the Second World
> War.
>
>
> Gosh, just as if we had suffered a surprise attack and thousands of our
> people had been killed in a second Pearl Harbor.
>
>
> Do you think maybe the president decided to fight this like a world war
> because, far ahead of his critics, he realized we were in one? The
> result: A moribund CIA was suddenly brought to life, just as the FBI
> and OSS were during the last great world war.
>
>
> To quote Ms. Priest: "The CIA faced the day after the attacks with few
> al-Qaida informants, a tiny paramilitary division and no interrogators,
> much less a system for transporting suspected terrorists and keeping
> them hidden for interrogation."
>
>
> A lot has changed since then. The CIA proved instrumental, if not
> decisive, in winning a war in Afghanistan. It is helping to win another
> in Iraq. It has made covert alliances with foreign intelligence
> services across the globe, has been given billions of dollars to set up
> counter-terrorism operations in two dozen countries, and is reported to
> have set up secret prisons - excuse me, ahem, detainment centers -
> in at least eight other friendly countries. And inevitably, to borrow a
> phrase Ronald Reagan used a couple of decades ago, Mistakes Were Made.
> Just as they are in every war.
>
>
> And yet this president has persisted even as his critics at home and
> abroad profess to be shocked at his having carried out his promise to
> the American people.
>
>
> Other presidents have been careful to arrange political cover when they
> authorize a covert war; this one proclaimed his. What ever happened to
> deniability, a phrase that grew familiar during the Nixon presidency
> and debacle?
>
>
> This president not only gave the order to launch this campaign but has
> taken responsibility for it. What's more, he apparently wants to know
> just how his orders are being carried out. As if he were
> commander-in-chief. Goodness. Some of us thought they'd stopped making
> presidents like that after Harry Truman.
>
>
> John Radsan, a former counsel with the CIA, seems unhappy with the
> president's insistence on knowing just what's going on: "In the past,
> presidents set up buffers to distance themselves from covert action.
> But this president, who's breaking down the boundaries between covert
> action and conventional war, seems to relish the secret findings and
> the dirty details of the operations."
>
>
> Gosh, just as if we were engaged in a new, unconventional world war
> that needs to be fought in a new, unconventional way. It's called
> asymmetrical warfare, one in which an aggressor without a national base
> can use a worldwide network of terrorists to wreak havoc on an
> unprepared country.
>
>
> In this new kind of warfare, an ever-surprised, ever-vulnerable
> America, was supposed to be easy pickings for these new kamikazes. This
> country was going to be reduced to cowering behind defenses full of
> holes.
>
>
> Instead, this president and this country have taken the offensive -
> "in battles that you will see and battles you won't see." And at home
> and abroad, those unhappy with the results are joining in a single
> chorus: Unfair!
>
>
> And the unfairest thing of all is the way the CIA has been conducting
> this secret war - well, mostly secret till The New York Times reveals
> still another classified document.
>
>
> Naturally the new, reborn CIA would rile our enemies most; it has been
> the most successful of American agencies in this war on al-Qaida. To
> quote Ms. Priest, "The CIA, working with foreign counterparts, has been
> responsible for virtually all of the success the United States has had
> in capturing or killing al-Qaida leaders since Sept. 11, 2001."
>
>
> What's more, the CIA apparently intends to continue tracking down every
> one of these killers. It seems to feel it's engaged in defending the
> country, as when it uses predator drones to dispatch al-Qaida leaders
> with the help of a Hellfire missile or two. Instead of first reading
> the suspect his rights.
>
>
> To quote the deputy director of national intelligence, a general named
> Michael Hayden: "We're going to live on the edge. My spikes will have
> chalk on them. . . . We're pretty aggressive within the law. As a
> professional, I'm troubled if I'm not using the full authority allowed
> by the law."
>
>
> Yes, shocking. Some of us had no idea they made American intelligence
> agents that way anymore. And we're much assured they still do.
>
>
> Why not treat the attacks on this country as a problem in civil law
> enforcement and escape all the criticism now being directed at this
> administration?
>
>
> Because, to quote a former CIA agent named Dewey Clarridge, "You have a
> spy agency because the spy agency is going to break laws overseas. If
> you don't want it to do those dastardly things, don't have it. You can
> have the State Department." Yes, just leave national security to the
> State Department. Now that's frightening.
>
>
> But what, in the end, do we have to show for these tactics that have
> raised eyebrows in every law school in the country? Only that Americans
> haven't experienced a terrorist attack on our shores since September
> 11, 2001.
>
>
> I know the folks responsible for the CIA's secret successes aren't
> interested in public recognition. Quite the contrary. But let's hope
> they all get medals. In a secret ceremony.
>
>
.
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