Responding to partisanship in the 9/11 Commission, the White House has declassified the Presidential Daily Briefing (PDB) from August 6, 2001. Democrats have latched on to this memorandum as though it were proof of any number of theories: from the tame- that President Bush should have recognized the urgent need for immediate action against al Qaeda; to the absurd- that the President and his advisers might have pieced together the 9/11 plot; to the insulting- that the President and his advisors knew exactly what was coming and did nothing.
The 9/11 Commission is a marvelous example of why America is great. In so many countries round the world, a catastrophe like the terrorist destruction of the World Trade Center would result in a cover-up. In the United States we have a commission sponsored by both parties in the government with a charter for rigorous, and to the extent possible, transparent inquiry. America will benefit through greater security resulting from the exercise of opening files and searching memories.
The Commission is also an example of the partisan sickness that pervades the public square in America today. Rather than focusing on why terrorists were able to penetrate airport security, overcome flight crews and destroy so much that we held dear, partisans on the Commission use their positions to blame the current administration. Rather than focusing on what might be done to prevent future attacks, certain Commission members think only of what might be done to foster an outcome they favor in the November elections.
Neither the Clinton nor the Bush administration could reasonably be expected to have anticipated the 9/11 attacks. To suggest otherwise is to deflect blame for terrorism away from Bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the Islamists where it properly belongs.
Both administrations, but especially the Clinton administration passed on opportunities to strike forcefully against terrorism. Bill Clinton had eight years, during which time al Qaeda was operative and growing, to act forcefully against bin Laden. The strongest action he took was a missile launch timed, coincidentally we are we told, to disrupt his impeachment trial.
The PDB that was highlighted by the Commission is used by partisans and the media to question President Bush’s stewardship of national security during his first eight months in office. They point to the PDB as proof of negligence on the part of the President in failing to secure domestic and international security. But consider the evidentiary points made in the PDB:
- The millennium bombing plot of 1999 is suggested to be the work of al Queda
- A Bin Laden television interview in 1998 is mentioned.
- A clandestine source claimed in 1998 that a Bin Ladin cell operated in New York.
- A foreign intelligence service sourced quotation paraphrases Bin Ladin as threatening the U.S. in 1998.
- Abu Zubaydah, a bin Ladin lieutenant, is said to have been planning terrorist attacks in 1998.
- The attack on the U.S. embassy in Kenya in 1998 is mentioned.
- The attack on the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania in 1998 is mentioned.
- A Bin Ladin television interview in 1997 is mentioned.
- The arrest and deportation of terrorists in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1997 for planning attacks are mentioned..
- A senior terrorist liviong in California in the mid-1990s is mentioned.
- Terrorists were surveilling U.S. Embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1993.
All of this presumably corroborated evidence dates from between 1993 and 1999. Not only does the so-called “smoking gun” evidence predate the Bush administration, it was between 2 and 8 years old at the time President Bush read the PDB. None of the evidence cited is substantial enough to have warranted putting the nation on military footing before 9/11, let alone creating a Homeland Security Administration, developing a preemptive defense doctrine, invading Afghanistan and massively disrupting the air transport industry.
The PDB mentions an uncorroborated report of planning by bin Laden to hijack an airplane for the purpose of ransom: “We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a ... (redacted portion) ... service in 1998 saying that Bin Ladin wanted to hijack a US aircraft to gain the release of "Blind Shaykh" 'Umar 'Abd al-Rahman and other US-held extremists.”
It continues, “… FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.”
Finally, the PDB closes by mentioning that, “The FBI is conducting approximately 70 full field investigations throughout the US that it considers Bin Ladin-related. CIA and the FBI are investigating a call to our Embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group of Bin Ladin supporters was in the US planning attacks with explosives.”
With one uncorroborated report of planning for a conventional hijacking and possible attacks on government buildings, and the reassurance that some 70 FBI field investigations were underway, had President Bush on the basis of the PDB called for the tangible steps taken after 9/11- creation of a Homeland Security Administration, development of a preemptive defense doctrine, invasion of Afghanistan and massive disruption of the air transport industry- his two-faced critics (without benefit of hindsight) would not have joined him in defending America, rather, they would have sought his impeachment.
Posted by publius at April 13, 2004 10:11 PM