Investor's Business Daily, August 22nd, 2007
Intelligence: A highly critical CIA report details the spy agency's failings during the 1990s in preventing the 9/11 attacks. But as the report makes clear, the Clinton administration also deserves a big piece of the blame.
The scathing look into the CIA's many failures before 9/11 makes for some depressing reading. The CIA at various times knew information that it didn't pass along to others, or ignored things it should have paid closer attention to.
The headlines tell it all. "CIA missed chances to tackle al-Qaida." "Head of CIA 'failed to stop' al-Qaida's 9/11 attacks on America." "C.I.A. Lays Out Errors It Made Before Sept. 11." Pretty grim.
The report by the CIA's own inspector general, written two years ago but only released to the public this week, outlines a list of CIA missteps. It's not encouraging. Among other things, the report:
Faults former CIA Director George Tenet for failing to come up with a comprehensive strategy to combat al-Qaida, despite having made the threat from al-Qaida one of the agency's top priorities;
Brings to light a CIA cable that raised questions about two of the hijackers, Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar, more than a year before the 9/11 attacks. That cable was read by as many as 60 people, and it referred to the two suspects as bin Laden "associates," the report said. Yet, none of this "information was shared in any manner with the FBI." Nor with anyone else, for that matter.
Notes the CIA failed to create a comprehensive report after 1993 on Osama bin Laden's threat, despite the fact Tenet bluntly wrote in a 1998 memo -- rightly, we believe -- "We are at war."
Found "persistent strains" between the CIA and National Security Agency that "impeded collaboration" in dealing with al-Qaida. The report recommended a review of Tenet "for failing to act personally to resolve the differences" in a timely manner. No review was ever made.
Criticizes Tenet for failing to "use all his authorities in leading the IC's (intelligence community's) strategic effort to halt bin Laden and al-Qaida." Even as the CIA complained of lack of funding, the report notes, the spy agency's top leaders moved money away from counterterrorism efforts to other, less pressing activities.
That's just a sampling. It goes on and on, a devastating critique -- and not just of the CIA, but of the entire period leading up to 9/11.
True, former Director of Intelligence George Tenet dropped the ball, but President Clinton, in office for eight years before 9/11, did next to nothing. This has now been confirmed by both the CIA report and the 9/11 Commission report, released in 2004.
As for claims later made by both President Clinton and his Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, that a comprehensive plan for dealing with al-Qaida was given to President Bush, that now appears to be an outright lie.
As the CIA report concluded, "before 9/11, neither the U.S. Government nor the IC (Intelligence Community) had a comprehensive strategy for combating al-Qaida."
The media and the Democrats used the 9/11 Commission report, released three years ago, to relentlessly bash President Bush for his "failures" in stopping the 9/11 attacks, even though he had been in office for just eight months when they occurred.
But long before he was Bush's director of intelligence, George Tenet had been picked by Clinton as his top spy. His tenure from July 1997 to July 2004 was the second-longest ever for any spy master. You can fault Bush for sticking by Tenet, especially after his agency's shortcomings became obvious. But you can't fault Bush for the original choice. That was Clinton's.
Given all this, we wonder now whether the Democrats' criticisms, reliably transmitted by the mainstream media, will be a bit more even-handed now that it's clear President Clinton did next to nothing to stop repeated terrorist attacks on the U.S. for eight years.
It's unfortunate that most of America -- including our elected officials, intelligence agencies and national media --were asleep at the switch during the 1990s. There were at least six major terrorist attacks, starting with the World Trade Center bombing in 1993 and culminating in the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, that should have been ample warning to us.
All of these terrorist acts leading to 9/11 were plotted, financed and facilitated by al-Qaida. President Clinton knew it. The CIA knew it. Today, the threats remain.
Yet, as the CIA report underscores, we remain a nation divided on defending ourselves, often working at cross purposes when it comes to the war on terror. Have we learned nothing?
