[Enchante]

Very important commentary from an anonymous intelligence 'insider' who describes myriad ways in which the 'culture' and types of bureaucratic appointees cultivated by the Clinton administration severely harmed intel and analysis. It wasn't one wall, it was many many walls and related barriers. As the author notes, there are always various walls for both security and civil liberties protections, but Clinton made them higher, more numerous, and nearly impossible to circumvent. The anecdote about trying to include terrorist groups in a project for "threat analysis" for the DIA is just incredible for what it reveals about the blind, obstinate, bureaucratic mentality among the Clintonlites.

[thulldud]

Lack of a defined national strategy based on a coherent foreign policy -- the "Holiday from History" as it's been called -- coupled with Clinton's personal animosity towards foreign policy in general and the Intelligence Community in particular devalued intelligence.

First I've heard of the term "Holiday from History", but it sure fits the DIRTXPOTUS and his monkey circus like gold lamé on a torch singer.

Thanks for posting it, and thanks to "Big Sea" for speaking up.

[Molly Pitcher]

Just curious, but in general, how do we judge such anonymous analysis...there's the info, but it's outside most of our experiences?...There's very little biogragraphical info offered to help us assess the blogger's expertise, and so forth...

[BIGLOOK]

Head bashing Ping

[ASA Vet]

MI Ping

Welcome ASA.Ranger our newest list member.

[AliVeritas]

Just can't say it clearer than that. Thank God for CQ.

[livius]

a slathering devotion to parsing the meaning of the myriad of rules and regulations and a failure to see their overall effects.

An excellent summary.

[Congressman Billybob]

The first Able Danger member to go public is already being interviewed by staff preparatory to being a congressional witness in the fall. Obviously, this man can do a great service to his nation by coming forward and being a witness. I hope there will be several others -- so there will be no doubt this is a real problem, rather than a product of "a few disaffected former employees."

John / Billybob

[cwb]

This author is right on when he talks about this "culture." When you think about it, the Clinton Walls go all the way back to the very beginning of his administration. From the moment he stepped foot in office, Clinton was already being plagued by scandals (Flowers and Whitewater) from which he sought to protect himself.

Whether it was the DA Massacre were he fired all US Attorneys, the replacement of all the government Inspector Generals...or even the fraudulent firing of Billy Dale, everything Clinton did was predicated on protecting himself from the sins of his past...and present. While I don't have this list handy, Clinton's government purges were some of most extensive in US history.

The sad part of this story is that good career people lost their jobs because of Clinton's paranoia...and were replaced by ineffective political hacks (and lawyers) whose major objectives were protecting this administration. The fact that you had someone like Craig Livingstone working as chief of security at the WH was a good indicator that something was up.

[mercy]

I read this over on CQ earlier today.

We must not forget that this sort of mentality can be traced back to Bush I and Reagan. It isn't just Gore lick's wall. It's bureaucratic infighting. Territorial member measuring.

The poor Homeland Security dept. takes a lot of flack and is accused of doing nothing by seemingly everyone. "All they have ever come up with is a dumb color code system" is the usual refrain.

If all they ever do over there is a good job of cross checking and collating data and then get it to the right LEOs or Special Forces branch ... that alone would be a monumental improvement over business as usual in DC.

[FOXFANVOX]

"Seeing [perhaps arguing over] the trees and ignoring the forest", that is the image that comes to mind.

I think Bill [WJC] liked to build walls so he could have sex behind them. So sad to think that people thought he was a good president simply because of the accident of a good economy [which was improving when he inherited it]. He and his administration did enormous harm to the military and to the security of this country and, lest we forget, he brought dishonor to himself and to the office of President.

[txhurl]

bttt

[Not gonna take it anymore]

The bureaucracy is such that no matter how high or low the wall was, I don't think we would have prevented 9/11. If we take a look at our agencies today, right now, have we really improved? I think the answer is yes. And that is because we are actually arresting and looking for terrorist ties among those who reside in our neighborhoods.
But that will only go on for so long. Until the next time we all fall asleep into our apathy. You can see it starting now. The only reason the Patriot Act had a chance in Congress this year was because of the attacks in England. No one wants to be on the wrong side of the issue if another attack occurs here in the US.
But until those attacks all the screaming was about the loss of civil liberties because of the Patriot Act. Does that even make sense? The FBI has more options to go after mobsters than after terrorists?
This article by Debbie Schlussel makes a lot of sense to me but I've only posted part of it.

http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2005/08/fbi_would_have.html

FBI Would Have Ignored Able Danger Warnings


By Debbie Schlussel

Many people have e-mailed asking for my opinion on the emerging Operation Able Danger story--in which army intelligence personnel were barred from notifying the FBI about Mohammed Atta.

While I agree that the Pentagon lawyers who stopped the Able Danger operatives from notifying the FBI are culpable, and their behavior is an outrage, my take is different from most conservative commentators.

I really don't think the FBI would have acted on the information. Instead, today, we'd be sweeping under the rug yet more ineptitude by the, unfortunately, "lead agency" in the War on Terror.

Let's look at what the FBI has done with other similar information they received before and, even worse, AFTER 9/11. Let's look at what the agency and its sleazy allies have done to harm brave men who did what the Able Danger men did not--men like FBI Special Agent Robert Wright, who warned the FBI to do something about the Al-Qaeda funding network.

Here's the FBI record:


* Warnings about 9/11 hijackers Khalid Al-Midhar and Nawaf Al-Hazmi living in San Diego and behaving suspiciously according to their informant landlord. (Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer of Able Danger said his group had info on Al-Midhar and Al-Hazmi, too.)

THE FBI DID . . . NOTHING.

* Warnings by FBI Special Agent Wright about an extensive Al-Qaeda funding network in the U.S. (tied to HAMAS funding network). Wright told his FBI superiors that if something wasn't done to stop them, more people would die. More people did die. Still . . .

THE FBI DID . . . NOTHING. THEN, THE FBI FIRED BOB WRIGHT. (It was Customs, now ICE, that fortunately acted on Wright's info.)

* Warnings by FBI investigators about a man named Zaccarias Moussaoui who wanted to learn how to steer planes but not how to take off or land. Warnings by Canadian and French intelligence that Moussaoui was a terrorist who'd trained in Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. FBI agents, including counsel Coleen Rowley, begged to search the hard drive in Moussaoui's computer.

THE FBI DID . . . NOTHING.

The article continues at the link.