What Clinton Didn't Do . . . . . . .and when he didn't do it.
BY RICHARD MINITER Wednesday, September 27, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT
Bill Clinton's outburst on Fox News was something of a public service, launching a debate about the antiterror policies of his administration. This is important because every George W. Bush policy that arouses the ire of Democrats--the Patriot Act, extraordinary rendition, detention without trial, pre-emptive war--is a departure from his predecessor. Where policies overlap--air attacks on infrastructure, secret presidential orders to kill terrorists, intelligence sharing with allies, freezing bank accounts, using police to arrest terror suspects--there is little friction. The question, then, is whether America should return to Mr. Clinton's policies or soldier on with Mr. Bush's.
It is vital that this debate be honest, but so far this has not been the case. Both Mr. Clinton's outrage at Chris Wallace's questioning and the ABC docudrama "The Path to 9/11" are attempts to polarize the nation's memory. While this divisiveness may be good for Mr. Clinton's reputation, it is ultimately unhealthy for the country. What we need, instead, is a cold-eyed look at what works against terrorists and what does not. The policies of the Clinton and Bush administrations ought to be put to the same iron test.
With that in mind, let us examine Mr. Clinton's war on terror. Some 38 days after he was sworn in, al Qaeda attacked the World Trade Center. He did not visit the twin towers that year, even though four days after the attack he was just across the Hudson River in New Jersey, talking about job training. He made no attempt to rally the public against terrorism. His only public speech on the bombing was a few paragraphs inserted into a radio address mostly devoted an economic stimulus package. Those stray paragraphs were limited to reassuring the public and thanking the rescuers, the kinds of things governors say after hurricanes. He did not even vow to bring the bombers to justice. Instead, he turned the first terrorist attack on American soil over to the FBI. In his Fox interview, Mr. Clinton said "no one knew that al Qaeda existed" in October 1993, during the tragic events in Somalia. But his national security adviser, Tony Lake, told me that he first learned of bin Laden "sometime in 1993," when he was thought of as a terror financier. U.S. Army Capt. James Francis Yacone, a black hawk squadron commander in Somalia, later testified that radio intercepts of enemy mortar crews firing at Americans were in Arabic, not Somali, suggesting the work of bin Laden's agents (who spoke Arabic), not warlord Farah Aideed's men (who did not). CIA and DIA reports also placed al Qaeda operatives in Somalia at the time.
By the end of Mr. Clinton's first year, al Qaeda had apparently attacked twice. The attacks would continue for every one of the Clinton years.
??? In 1994, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (who would later plan the 9/11 attacks) launched "Operation Bojinka" to down 11 U.S. planes simultaneously over the Pacific. A sharp-eyed Filipina police officer foiled the plot. The sole American response: increased law-enforcement cooperation with the Philippines.
??? In 1995, al Qaeda detonated a 220-pound car bomb outside the Office of Program Manager in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, killing five Americans and wounding 60 more. The FBI was sent in.
??? In 1996, al Qaeda bombed the barracks of American pilots patrolling the "no-fly zones" over Iraq, killing 19. Again, the FBI responded.
??? In 1997, al Qaeda consolidated its position in Afghanistan and bin Laden repeatedly declared war on the U.S. In February, bin Laden told an Arab TV network: "If someone can kill an American soldier, it is better than wasting time on other matters." No response from the Clinton administration.
??? In 1998, al Qaeda simultaneously bombed U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, killing 224, including 12 U.S. diplomats. Mr. Clinton ordered cruise-missile strikes on Afghanistan and Sudan in response. Here Mr. Clinton's critics are wrong: The president was right to retaliate when America was attacked, irrespective of the Monica Lewinsky case.
Still, "Operation Infinite Reach" was weakened by Clintonian compromise. The State Department feared that Pakistan might spot the American missiles in its air space and misinterpret it as an Indian attack. So Mr. Clinton told Gen. Joe Ralston, vice chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, to notify Pakistan's army minutes before the Tomahawks passed over Pakistan. Given Pakistan's links to jihadis at the time, it is not surprising that bin Laden was tipped off, fleeing some 45 minutes before the missiles arrived.
??? In 1999, the Clinton administration disrupted al Qaeda's Millennium plots, a series of bombings stretching from Amman to Los Angeles. This shining success was mostly the work of Richard Clarke, a NSC senior director who forced agencies to work together. But the Millennium approach was shortlived. Over Mr. Clarke's objections, policy reverted to the status quo.
??? In January 2000, al Qaeda tried and failed to attack the U.S.S. The Sullivans off Yemen. (Their boat sank before they could reach their target.) But in October 2000, an al Qaeda bomb ripped a hole in the hull of the U.S.S. Cole, killing 17 sailors and wounding another 39.
When Mr. Clarke presented a plan to launch a massive cruise missile strike on al Qaeda and Taliban facilities in Afghanistan, the Clinton cabinet voted against it. After the meeting, a State Department counterterrorism official, Michael Sheehan, sought out Mr. Clarke. Both told me that they were stunned. Mr. Sheehan asked Mr. Clarke: "What's it going to take to get them to hit al Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon?"
There is much more to Mr. Clinton's record--how Predator drones, which spotted bin Laden three times in 1999 and 2000, were grounded by bureaucratic infighting; how a petty dispute with an Arizona senator stopped the CIA from hiring more Arabic translators. While it is easy to look back in hindsight and blame Bill Clinton, the full scale and nature of the terrorist threat was not widely appreciated until 9/11. Still: Bill Clinton did not fully grasp that he was at war. Nor did he intuit that war requires overcoming bureaucratic objections and a democracy's natural reluctance to use force. That is a hard lesson. But it is better to learn it from studying the Clinton years than reliving them. Mr. Miniter, a fellow at the Hudson Institute, is author of "Disinformation: 22 Media Myths that Undermine the War on Terror" (Regnery, 2005).
Regnery, 2005[/b]
You've got a lot of fucking balls complaining about someone posting a quote from Daily Kos. Regnery is the center of the Clinton-hate industry in America. Fraud, indeed....
Typical left-wing tactic, change the topic. This isn't about Miniter or Regnery, this is about how Clinton failed to address the growing threat of terrorism. Instead of trying to smear the messenger, why dont you address all the facts presented here.
Because they're not "facts" but rather ultra-right wing spin from a dubious "source".
FRAUD...
As opposed to Motown's which are completely beyond reproach:
Books
Prados, John, Hoodwinked: The Documents that Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War (New Press: New York, London, 2004)
Ricks, Thomas, Fiasco, The American Military Adventure In Iraq (Penguin Press: New York, 2006)
Government Reports
9/11 Commission, ???9/11 commission staff statement No. 15 The text as submitted to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Up
on the United States,??? MSNBC.com, 6/16/04
Senate Intelligence Committee, Report of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the U.S. Intelligence Community???s Prewar Intelligence on Iraq, July 2004
Senate Intelligence Committee, Postwar Findings About Iraq???s WMD Programs and Links to Terrorism and How They Compare to Prewar Assessments, September 2006
Articles
Leiken, Robert, ???The Truth about the Saddam ??? al Qaeda Connection,??? National Interest, November 2004
Lynch, Colum, ???Blix Downgrades Prewar Assessment of Iraqi Weapons,??? Washington Post, 6/22/03
Nordland, Rod, Masland, Tom, and Dickey, Christopher, ???Unmasking The Insurgents,??? Newsweek, 2/7/05
Pincus, Walter, ???20-year-old Iraq weapons spark debate,??? San Francisco Chronicle, 7/1/06 - ???Report Cast Doubt on Iraq-Al Qaeda Connection,??? Washington Post, 6/22/03
Pollack, Kenneth, ???Weapons of Misperception,??? Atlantic Monthly Online, 1/13/04
Ware, Michael, ???Meet The New Jihad,??? Time, 7/5/04[/b]
You guys really crack me up.
I'm pretty sure you were cracked up when you got here...
Typical left-wing tactic, change the topic. This isn't about Miniter or Regnery, this is about how Clinton failed to address the growing threat of terrorism. Instead of trying to smear the messenger, why dont you address all the facts presented here.
First off, without going through this article, paragraph by paragraph, I already see "proof" which is: a)contradicted by the 9-11 report; b) not proof that Clinton was sitting on his hands; and/or c) not compelling in light of the fact that the author is speaking on information which we know now, but had no way of knowing back then. Without making this post a thesis, I see that the author has twisted the drone argument to be Clinton's doing, even though the 9-11 report clearly shows that Bush abandoned the Predator after Clinton left office. Perhaps that is because this article was from before the report, or simply because the author didn't care about the truth.
Also, I think the author actually hits the nail on the head with this sentence: "While it is easy to look back in hindsight and blame Bill Clinton, the full scale and nature of the terrorist threat was not widely appreciated until 9/11." Exactly. The author is nitpicking about television addresses Osama made pre-9-11. Well, we know that Clinton was at least spying on Bin Laden and plotting to kill him duriing his term. We also know that Bush was not during his first 8 months in office. So where does that leave your argument. You can say Clinton didn't do enough, but not only did he do more than Bush, but in the months preceding 9-11, Bush dropped the ball completely.
Typical left-wing tactic, change the topic. This isn't about Miniter or Regnery, this is about how Clinton failed to address the growing threat of terrorism. Instead of trying to smear the messenger, why dont you address all the facts presented here.
First off, without going through this article, paragraph by paragraph, I already see "proof" which is: a)contradicted by the 9-11 report; b) not proof that Clinton was sitting on his hands; and/or c) not compelling in light of the fact that the author is speaking on information which we know now, but had no way of knowing back then. Without making this post a thesis, I see that the author has twisted the drone argument to be Clinton's doing, even though the 9-11 report clearly shows that Bush abandoned the Predator after Clinton left office. Perhaps that is because this article was from before the report, or simply because the author didn't care about the truth.
Also, I think the author actually hits the nail on the head with this sentence: "While it is easy to look back in hindsight and blame Bill Clinton, the full scale and nature of the terrorist threat was not widely appreciated until 9/11." Exactly. The author is nitpicking about television addresses Osama made pre-9-11. Well, we know that Clinton was at least spying on Bin Laden and plotting to kill him duriing his term. We also know that Bush was not during his first 8 months in office. So where does that leave your argument. You can say Clinton didn't do enough, but not only did he do more than Bush, but in the months preceding 9-11, Bush dropped the ball completely.
Your predator drone argument is a canard. Bush didn't abandon the predator, they wanted to wait until it could be armed so they wouldn't be shot down by a Talibhan MiG and "parad[ed} in front of CNN" According to the 9/11 Report, the new administration worked through the summer to iron out all the political difficulties in getting the program reinstated and the true cause of delay was technical difficulties with the planes and warheads.
I think herein lies the problem. Because of your partisanship you are trying to play the blame and defend game. That's shown in the other thread where you basically said everything good in America right now is because of Bush, and everything that's gone wrong is someone else's fault. Hence your statement that 9/11 was mostly Clinton's fault. Both can be blamed and also be excused for some of their actions.
On the Bush side, the new administration can be excused because they had a president that didn't really care about foreign affairs at first and was going through a transition as the new people in power. It's hard to get policy through and focused on issues in a short 9 months after the election, especially with new issues such as terrorism. The administration had other things on its mind, which is understandable. On the fault side, the administration had been warned even before they were elected about the threat of Al Qaeda and terrorism and basically had two responses: they didn't care, or they would deal with it later. Like all powerful organizations, after 9/11 they tried to cover their tracks by saying that they had always been fully aware of the terrorist threat and were doing everything they could to stop it, which was pretty much false.
On the Clinton side, they had become aware of Al Qaeda and the danger it posed by the end of the administration. The U.S. had been hit and home and abroad and the administration was focusing resources to deal with it. They sent missiles to Afghanistan with questionable effects, and had the CIA working on plans to attack Al Qaeda. They were at least trying to do something, and warned the incoming Bush administration about it. On the other hand, the administration tended to pussyfoot around the issue. They didn't seem to want to take the really strong actions that were necessary to take on Al Qaeda, and were afraid of legal repercussions over such issues as could they kill Al Qaeda members or was that assassination which is illegal under American law. Even though they knew of this growing danger, they also didn't really warn the American public about it.
And....we are missing the big picture again. Bush brags about how safe we have been for the past years....but what about 9-11? With all the shit he talks about national security, you would think 9-11 happened while Clinton was president. Now that the American Public has finally woken up to the ridiculousness of the Iraq War, Bush is trying to resurrect 9-11, which he views as his moment in the sun. Bush underestimated Clinton and apparently thought he was going to continue to lay low, while over 5 years after the fact, the Bush clan assigns all the defense failures to Clinton. That didn't happen. Now we have a debate that Bush does not want. Let's see Condi RIce try to out-debate the Clintons.
I think herein lies the problem. Because of your partisanship you are trying to play the blame and defend game. That's shown in the other thread where you basically said everything good in America right now is because of Bush, and everything that's gone wrong is someone else's fault. Hence your statement that 9/11 was mostly Clinton's fault. Both can be blamed and also be excused for some of their actions.
On the Bush side, the new administration can be excused because they had a president that didn't really care about foreign affairs at first and was going through a transition as the new people in power. It's hard to get policy through and focused on issues in a short 9 months after the election, especially with new issues such as terrorism. The administration had other things on its mind, which is understandable. On the fault side, the administration had been warned even before they were elected about the threat of Al Qaeda and terrorism and basically had two responses: they didn't care, or they would deal with it later. Like all powerful organizations, after 9/11 they tried to cover their tracks by saying that they had always been fully aware of the terrorist threat and were doing everything they could to stop it, which was pretty much false.
On the Clinton side, they had become aware of Al Qaeda and the danger it posed by the end of the administration. The U.S. had been hit and home and abroad and the administration was focusing resources to deal with it. They sent missiles to Afghanistan with questionable effects, and had the CIA working on plans to attack Al Qaeda. They were at least trying to do something, and warned the incoming Bush administration about it. On the other hand, the administration tended to pussyfoot around the issue. They didn't seem to want to take the really strong actions that were necessary to take on Al Qaeda, and were afraid of legal repercussions over such issues as could they kill Al Qaeda members or was that assassination which is illegal under American law. Even though they knew of this growing danger, they also didn't really warn the American public about it.
I'm comfortable with this assessment but because of Clinton's weak responses would pose the same question "They didn't care or they would deal with it later" I also agree with the fact that Bush was made aware of the problem by the outgoing administration, but I question the claim that it was presented as an urgent problem or that a full game-plan was turned over. In that light, the steps that were taken were reasonable in accordance with the threat level. I think that Bush's strategy was to be more aggressive in going after terrorism and dismantling it rather than taking a law enforcement approach and I think they were taking steps in that direction to adjust the agencies, but they probably thought they had more time.
Did you see Condi on 60 min last Sunday? What a cunt. She's the biggest lying piece of shit I've ever heard. And then she was saying the promotion of democracy around the world reminds her of the struggles she saw growing up in segregated Alabama. That's even worse than these other cumdaddies who try to mash up their political science experiment into WWII imagery.
Speaking of blame game...
"Um, I believe it says, Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States."
"President Bush himself acknowledges that, despite repeated warnings of an imminent al Qaeda attack, before 9/11 "I didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism. Similarly, Newsweek reports that Bush's attitude was reflected throughout an administration that was trying to "de-emphasize terrorism" as an overall priority. As proof, just two of the hundred national security meetings the Administration held during this period addressed the terrorist threat, and the White House refused to hold even one meeting of its highly-touted counterterrorism task force. Meanwhile, the administration was actively trying to cut funding for counterterrorism, and "vetoed a request to divert $800 million from missile defense into counterterrorism" despite a serious increase in terrorist chatter in the summer of 2001.
Comments
I'm pretty sure you were cracked up when you got here...
First off, without going through this article, paragraph by paragraph, I already see "proof" which is: a)contradicted by the 9-11 report; b) not proof that Clinton was sitting on his hands; and/or c) not compelling in light of the fact that the author is speaking on information which we know now, but had no way of knowing back then. Without making this post a thesis, I see that the author has twisted the drone argument to be Clinton's doing, even though the 9-11 report clearly shows that Bush abandoned the Predator after Clinton left office. Perhaps that is because this article was from before the report, or simply because the author didn't care about the truth.
Also, I think the author actually hits the nail on the head with this sentence: "While it is easy to look back in hindsight and blame Bill Clinton, the full scale and nature of the terrorist threat was not widely appreciated until 9/11." Exactly. The author is nitpicking about television addresses Osama made pre-9-11. Well, we know that Clinton was at least spying on Bin Laden and plotting to kill him duriing his term. We also know that Bush was not during his first 8 months in office. So where does that leave your argument. You can say Clinton didn't do enough, but not only did he do more than Bush, but in the months preceding 9-11, Bush dropped the ball completely.
Your predator drone argument is a canard. Bush didn't abandon the predator, they wanted to wait until it could be armed so they wouldn't be shot down by a Talibhan MiG and "parad[ed} in front of CNN" According to the 9/11 Report, the new administration worked through the summer to iron out all the political difficulties in getting the program reinstated and the true cause of delay was technical difficulties with the planes and warheads.
I think herein lies the problem. Because of your partisanship you are trying to play the blame and defend game. That's shown in the other thread where you basically said everything good in America right now is because of Bush, and everything that's gone wrong is someone else's fault. Hence your statement that 9/11 was mostly Clinton's fault. Both can be blamed and also be excused for some of their actions.
On the Bush side, the new administration can be excused because they had a president that didn't really care about foreign affairs at first and was going through a transition as the new people in power. It's hard to get policy through and focused on issues in a short 9 months after the election, especially with new issues such as terrorism. The administration had other things on its mind, which is understandable. On the fault side, the administration had been warned even before they were elected about the threat of Al Qaeda and terrorism and basically had two responses: they didn't care, or they would deal with it later. Like all powerful organizations, after 9/11 they tried to cover their tracks by saying that they had always been fully aware of the terrorist threat and were doing everything they could to stop it, which was pretty much false.
On the Clinton side, they had become aware of Al Qaeda and the danger it posed by the end of the administration. The U.S. had been hit and home and abroad and the administration was focusing resources to deal with it. They sent missiles to Afghanistan with questionable effects, and had the CIA working on plans to attack Al Qaeda. They were at least trying to do something, and warned the incoming Bush administration about it. On the other hand, the administration tended to pussyfoot around the issue. They didn't seem to want to take the really strong actions that were necessary to take on Al Qaeda, and were afraid of legal repercussions over such issues as could they kill Al Qaeda members or was that assassination which is illegal under American law. Even though they knew of this growing danger, they also didn't really warn the American public about it.
I'm comfortable with this assessment but because of Clinton's weak responses would pose the same question "They didn't care or they would deal with it later" I also agree with the fact that Bush was made aware of the problem by the outgoing administration, but I question the claim that it was presented as an urgent problem or that a full game-plan was turned over. In that light, the steps that were taken were reasonable in accordance with the threat level. I think that Bush's strategy was to be more aggressive in going after terrorism and dismantling it rather than taking a law enforcement approach and I think they were taking steps in that direction to adjust the agencies, but they probably thought they had more time.
Speaking of blame game...
"Um, I believe it says, Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States."
more on her 911 commission testimony: http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=44887
and bonus...
"President Bush himself acknowledges that, despite repeated warnings of an imminent al Qaeda attack, before 9/11 "I didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism. Similarly, Newsweek reports that Bush's attitude was reflected throughout an administration that was trying to "de-emphasize terrorism" as an overall priority. As proof, just two of the hundred national security meetings the Administration held during this period addressed the terrorist threat, and the White House refused to hold even one meeting of its highly-touted counterterrorism task force. Meanwhile, the administration was actively trying to cut funding for counterterrorism, and "vetoed a request to divert $800 million from missile defense into counterterrorism" despite a serious increase in terrorist chatter in the summer of 2001.
Source: "Bush At War" by Bob Woodward
Source: Newsweek & vetoed request - http://foi.missouri.edu/terrorismfoi/whatwentwrong.html
Source: Refusal to hold task force meeting - http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8734-2002Jan19?language=printer
Source: Only two meetings out of 100 - http://www.detnews.com/2002/politics/0207/01/politics-526326.htm "
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=40729