[Zeppo]

I don't agree with that assessment - rather, it appears that both CIA and State were unwilling to confirm the White House view that the base was used to train terrorists:

. . . failed to persuade the CIA and the State Department, which continued to question their credibility.

The State Department, in particular, worked strenuously to block publication of the two White House reports, describing the Salman Pak hijack drills, Knight Ridder said.

[Destro]

All I wrote was that this article said it was the CIA that took that position - it does not go much into detail about the State Dept.

I am one of those conservatives who has always been anti-CIA - I think the CIA should be shut down and its staff fired or assigned to other intel gathering services like the Navy's ONI. But whenever I bring this up statists and others go into flame mode. The CIA is an abomination of a failure. We need intel and spys no doubt but we don't need the CIA to do it for us.