TESTIMONY TO TAKE PLACE ON THE TRANSITION

I'll be honest with you, this story, that Clinton aides are about to testify to the 9/11 Commission about what they told the Bushies during the transition just sets me off the deep end. And I'll tell you why: I was a huge, I mean a huge Clinton supporter. The place I really jumped off the bandwagon was after 9/11 when I started doing really serious, in=depth research on how that adminstration had handled al Queda.

First of all, if this Commission limits themselves to questioning these guys about the transition, that's an enormous abdication of their role. If the point is to find out how 9/11 happened, well, part of how it happened is through the mishandling of al Queda through the '90s. So to merely ask what the Clintonistas said to the Bushies in the month of December sets this report up as a partisan hatchet job and ensures that the Commission will not get at the truth.

I mean, please:

One official scheduled to testify, Richard A. Clarke, who was President Bill Clinton's counterterrorism coordinator, said in an interview that the warning about the Qaeda threat could not have been made more bluntly to the incoming Bush officials in intelligence briefings that he led.

At the time of the briefings, there was extensive evidence tying Al Qaeda to the bombing in Yemen two months earlier of an American warship, the Cole, in which 17 sailors were killed.

At the time of the briefings there was evidence? How about within days, weeks at the most, there was evidence? How long, exactly, do you think it took the FBI to figure out? But, of course, that was one of the benefits of making the FBI the lead agency. They investigate with the idea of putting someone on trial. So as long as they didn't have their case nailed down, Clinton could continue to say the case was "open" even though it was known that al Queda was responsible, and as long as he could say the case was open he could pretend he didn't have a responsible party to retaliate against.

And when the Ambassador to Yemen, by the way, did everything possible to slow the FBI down, siding at every possible hurdle, with the Yemis, against the Bureau agents, who were busting their asses and putting their lives in danger to do so, Clinton sides with the Ambassador.

So if the Clinton people had a story to tell the in-coming Bush people about how dangerous al Queda was based on the attack on the Cole having never been responded to, lets get that entire story on the table for the Commission.

Because, really, I'd like to know exactly how a new administration was supposed to explain an out of the blue attack to anyone. You know that rhetorically there is a statute of limations on these things. If you can establish responsibility within a certain amount of time and respond, you can persuade people you are acting, if not responsibly, as a harmed party with a case. After a certain amount of time has gone by it becomes very, very difficult.

So, really, time for another thought experiment. After the Cole was attacked in October, what was the new (Republican) administration supposed to do in January, February, March?

It is well known by now that the plan to take on al Queda was on the President's desk on September 10, 2001. So it wasn't as if they didn't take the threat seriously. You can argue that they should have moved more quickly. But any administration wants its own review. And they sure moved more quickly than the Clinton people did.

Comments

[Media Hound]

The whole concept that the Clinton White House
stated to the incoming Bush team "Hey, this
islamic terrorist group is a huge threat, but we
decided to do nothing, and instead we're going to
let you handle it," is a joke.

The media focuses on this alleged handoff
information (Time Magazine ran a cover story on
it), while not asking the most fundamental
question:

"If you thought this was such a threat, why did
you leave the problem for another administration
to deal with it?"

[dauber]

I remember that Time story. It had Sandy Berger's finger print's all over it and came out just as the Clinton people were going into full "not our fault" mode. The line wasn't just that they told them there was a threat but, more, that they'd left them an off the shelf plan. And that makes your comment even more true: if so, why didn't YOU use it?

[Eli Brennan]

The critic of Clinton is additive... not competitive with a critic of Bush et al.
Clarke crafted a plan to kill Osama... which Clinton rejected. It's a bitter indict of the Clinton folks... but it adds to the seriousness of Clarke's story now. He's not a hack. He tried under 2 administraations to stop it and failed... then has to see Bush wrapped in the flag... running on how great he has been on terrorism... hiding behind the charred bodies of NY firefighters. He's giving it to both sides... but Bush is the one running 9/11 images (in which Clarke lost friends) in his campaign... And Clarke is in the place to call buillshit.