Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Feith on Trial (Pre-War Intelligence)
National Review ^ | February 27, 2007, 0:00 a.m. | By Mario Loyola

Posted on 02/27/2007 8:44:29 AM PST by april15Bendovr

February 27, 2007, 0:00 a.m.

Feith on Trial Facts don’t matter to Carl Levin.

By Mario Loyola

It is one of the oldest and dirtiest political tricks in Washington: Hurl scurrilous charges at someone and then call for investigations into his conduct. When the investigations clear your target of all wrongdoing, as they almost always do, just go on repeating the charges as if they were true. With any luck and enough of a media echo, you will succeed in creating an alternative reality in which your target is guilty simply because “everyone knows it.” To learn more about the art of the Beltway show-trial, observe Senator Carl Levin in action over at the Armed Services Committee.

A recently released report by the Pentagon’s inspector general has stirred an enormous controversy over a late-2002 Pentagon briefing critical of the intelligence community’s work on the links between Iraq and al Qaeda. The briefing was part of a government-wide effort, in the wake of 9/11, to reexamine terrorist networks and their possible links to state actors.

The intel community seemed to have internalized a popular theory that Saddam and al Qaeda would not cooperate, even in areas of mutual strategic interest, because of their conflicting ideologies. On that theory, the intel community had filtered older, conflicting evidence out of their intel work.

The 2002 Pentagon briefing argued that fragmentary evidence of cooperation between the two should not be excluded from the intel reports in deference to an unprovable theory. The briefing had a limited purpose: It did not present the older intel as valid or invalid, but merely aimed to show that it was in conflict with the intel community’s current theory and that that current theory might not be valid.

Rumsfeld thought the briefing was compelling and asked that it be given to CIA chief George Tenet. It was later presented to a select group at the White House. The briefing had exactly the effect its authors intended: The CIA revised its presentation of the connection between Iraq and al Qaeda, accepting several of the Pentagon’s recommended changes.

Enter Senator Levin. Late in 2005, the Pentagon’s inspector general was asked by the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee to determine whether the work of the Office of Special Plans, a tiny Pentagon group with no connection to the Iraq-al Qaeda work, had been “appropriate.” Levin later widened the scope of the review (which seemed destined to produce yet another vindication of Feith) by asking the inspector general to expand his “appropriateness” inquiry from the Office of Special Plans to the work of the policy office generally. This was a stroke of considerable cunning, because it turned a limited review into a general fishing expedition driven by a purely subjective political question. The review could now go Levin’s way even if all the facts were against him.

And so it happened. The inspector general’s report found that the policy briefing was both lawful and authorized. But he also opined that some of the work seemed “inappropriate.” Levin pounced in the committee hearings: “The inspector general’s report is a devastating condemnation of inappropriate activities by the DOD policy office that helped take this nation to war.” Obviously, that’s what he was going to say all along — regardless the conclusions of the inspector general.

Apparently the “false-but-accurate” device invented by CBS producers for the 2004 elections has a corollary within the national security establishment: “accurate-but-inappropriate.” And just what had the Pentagon’s policy office done that was so inappropriate? They had “undercut” the intel community by criticizing its work product. Absurdly, the inspector general has no opinion on whether the policy office’s critique was valid. His essential position is that it is wrong to undercut the intel community through criticism — whether or not that criticism is valid.

This is worth thinking about, because it would be enormously damaging to the government if it became any kind of precedent. Policymakers (i.e., those in the policy office of the Pentagon) make vital national-security decisions on the basis of intel. If the intel is wrong, and bad policy decisions result, policymakers are properly held accountable for the consequences. As one Senate committee report bearing Levin’s signature acknowledges, policymakers have “ultimate responsibility for making decisions based on this same fragmentary, inconclusive reporting.”

So policymakers have an obligation to examine closely and critically both the raw intel and the analysis drawn from it. But in order to skewer Feith, Levin is prepared to go so far as to say that policymakers don’t even have the right to do that. How this will play out in the future interaction between policymakers and the intel community is something to worry about.

In the meantime, on a lighter note, Levin thinks he smells a conspiracy in the fact that the Pentagon gave Tenet and the White House different versions of the brief. This is where you begin to realize how petty this entire inquisition really is. The difference between the two briefings was exactly one slide, which was slightly acerbic towards the CIA generally; this slide was presented to the White House but not to Tenet. This little tidbit has put Levin at his most ominous, threatening to make senior officials testify under oath, insinuating intentional malfeasance.

This tempest in a teapot is laughable. Policy was trying to get CIA to accommodate a critical assessment of its work. It therefore had to be diplomatic in its presentation to the CIA. It would have been stupid to include in the briefing to the CIA a slide originally prepared for the secretary of Defense by his own staff if there was any reason to believe the slide would needlessly offend CIA sensibilities — and this is true even if the criticism was entirely valid. By complaining that policy would dare to “undercut” CIA in this way, Levin is trying to turn an instance of normal bureaucratic behavior into some weird combination of petty office rivalry and dark conspiracy.

I had the honor of serving in Feith’s office towards the end of his tenure at the Pentagon. I remember his personal exhortations at senior staff meetings to be meticulous about facts, explicit about premises, and questioning of every conclusion. His criticism of one’s work product challenged everything — from points of style and diction to logical reasoning and ultimate policy. Largely as a result, the culture of the policy office was one of academic rigor and intellectual sobriety. People took their responsibilities seriously, and no one more than Feith. To give one example among many, as to the case for war, Feith’s office produced perhaps the most extensive assessment of the risks of removing Saddam in the entire national-security establishment.

What is so depressing about all of this is that Feith left office a year-and-a-half ago and is still defending himself against charges that have been found baseless by every investigation, review, and commission that has examined them. The Levin inquisition is simply character assassination of an official who was carrying out the lawful and proper instructions of his superiors.

Thankfully, the villain in this farce is now almost certain to get his comeuppance. As Feith likes to say, “An ideologue is someone for whom the facts don’t matter.” In the Levin inquisition, ideology and even personal vendetta are much easier to detect than any real concern for the facts. But the record is clear, and history will preserve it: It is Levin who has manipulated, distorted, and misled. Levin’s quest to ruin the reputation of Douglas Feith is demonstrably coming unhinged from reality, and his own reputation must suffer as a result.

Sadly, in the meantime, the Levin inquisition has caused real damage to people who do not deserve it — and he may cause more before he’s done.


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: dougfeith; feith; iraq; pentagon

1 posted on 02/27/2007 8:44:31 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: All
Do facts on any pre-war intelligence matter to Democrats if they favored our reasons for going to war?
2 posted on 02/27/2007 8:54:48 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
Sadly, in the meantime, the Levin inquisition has caused real damage to people who do not deserve it — and he may cause more before he’s done.

It would be refreshing if the Republicans stood up to seditious, terrorist-loving Democrats like Levin.

3 posted on 02/27/2007 8:55:32 AM PST by Jeff Chandler (] Tagline Under Construction [)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Jeff Chandler
The Republicans lack a certain GRAVITAS in confronting Democrats on their behavior.
4 posted on 02/27/2007 9:12:13 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
The Republicans lack a certain GRAVITAS in confronting Democrats on their behavior.

Does "Gravitas" mean balls?

5 posted on 02/27/2007 9:13:09 AM PST by Jeff Chandler (] Tagline Under Construction [)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Jeff Chandler

No, but the republicans do lack both gravitas and cajones. Shame too, ain't it?


6 posted on 02/27/2007 10:10:34 AM PST by geezerwheezer (get up boys, we're burnin' daylight!!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
"But the record is clear, and history will preserve it: It is Levin who has manipulated, distorted, and misled. Levin’s quest to ruin the reputation of Douglas Feith is demonstrably coming unhinged from reality, and his own reputation must suffer as a result."

Levin and the media both must get their comeuppance.   Chris Wallace has refuted Feith's denial that he made an "operational relationship" statement in the two Sundays since the Feith interview.

WaPo quasi-retracts page-one story about Feith Iraq/AQ intel
WaPo via Hot Air ^

WaPo Corrects Feith Scoop: Almost All the Quotes Were Wrong
NRO ^ | 2/9/07   Posted on 02/09/2007 7:14:49 PM EST by bnelson44

What a mess:

The AP Takes Dictation From Democrat Sen. Levin | Sweetness & Light      The two page executive summary of the IG’s report is here

The original pdf file can be found here.

Transcript: Former Defense Undersecretary Douglas Feith on 'FNS'
Fox News ^ | Sunday , February 11, 2007

A Glimpse Into the Sausage Factory  PowerLine  2-12-07

One of our readers has now penetrated inside the Post through an email exchange with Jeff Smith, one of the Post reporters "credited" with the story. Smith is unhappy at being associated with the debacle. This is what Smith emailed to our reader:

I agree with you that this was an egregious error. I also had nothing to do with it. All I did was obtain a copy of the unclassified summary of the IG report and write a precisely correct account, which I turned over to the other reporters. I'm not happy my name was put on that story by the editors, and I was astonished by the mistake. I blew the whistle on it internally. So don't attribute the mistake to me.

Cheers,

Jeff Smith

So someone--Pincus is an obvious candidate--had the two-page public portion of the IG report, and also had an accurate account thereof, but nevertheless managed to misrepresent the report's contents to make it look more critical of Feith's group than it actually was. Is there any possible explanation for that "egregious" and "astonish[ing]" error, other than a political agenda that trumps all else?

 


7 posted on 02/27/2007 10:11:37 AM PST by windchime (I consider the left one of the fronts on the WOT.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Jeff Chandler
Dictionary.com definition of Gravitas is "seriousness or sobriety, as of conduct or speech."

Liberals in the media frequently had used it to describe President Bush. Kind of like the movie Office Space when Jennifer Anistons character lacked pieces of flair needed to work at her chain restaurant. For liberals and the media everything is about flair. It is fitting to use it in this case sarcastically because the Republicans deserve it for being weak and spineless.

But I like your definition better "No Balls"
8 posted on 02/27/2007 10:26:30 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: windchime

Douglas Feith On The CIA, The WMD, And The Information War
hughhewitt.townhall.com ^ | February 13, 2007 | Hugh Hewitt

Posted on 02/13/2007 9:00:13 PM EST by Mo1

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1784394/posts

Douglas J. Feith: Tough questions we were right to ask
The Sacramento Bee ^ | Thursday, February 15, 2007 | By Douglas J. Feith

Posted on 02/15/2007 11:14:14 AM EST by april15Bendovr

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1785364/posts


9 posted on 02/27/2007 10:35:15 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr

Thanks!


10 posted on 02/27/2007 10:57:22 AM PST by windchime (I consider the left one of the fronts on the WOT.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: windchime; All

Do you think any of the left wing blogs are talking about the facts here on this or do they continue to play search and avoid mental hopscotch with their conscience so they can coexist peacefully with their own leftist agenda?


11 posted on 02/27/2007 10:58:52 AM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
Do facts on any pre-war intelligence matter to Democrats if they favored our reasons for going to war?

Facts of any sort are of no importance to democrats if they get in the way of their predetermined conclusions. This disconnect from the importance of facts are one primary difference between liberals and conservatives.

12 posted on 02/27/2007 11:03:26 AM PST by highlander_UW (I don't know what my future holds, but I know Who holds my future)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr

I honestly don't think the left has a conscience, only an agenda.

Google results would indicate they have a story and are stickin' to it.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Feith%2BLevin%2Bintelligence&btnG=Google+Search


13 posted on 02/27/2007 11:08:19 AM PST by windchime (I consider the left one of the fronts on the WOT.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
The Levin/Democrat position: "CIA intel on WMDs was wrong = Bush misled us into war = questioning CIA intel is wrong."

Can you imagine trying to hold any real-world job with this kind of cognitive dissonance?
This kind of thinking would make pushing a broom a virtual impossibility.

14 posted on 02/27/2007 11:28:24 AM PST by TigersEye (For Democrats; victory in Iraq is not an option!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: TigersEye

More proof that the only job they would qualify for is POLITICIAN.

Saw Doug Feith on CSpan recently. I will buy his book when it comes out.

CIA vs DIA? Somewhere in there comes the Plamegate matter.


15 posted on 02/27/2007 12:17:25 PM PST by griswold3
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
Thankfully, the villain in this farce is now almost certain to get his comeuppance. As Feith likes to say, “An ideologue is someone for whom the facts don’t matter.” In the Levin inquisition, ideology and even personal vendetta are much easier to detect than any real concern for the facts. But the record is clear, and history will preserve it: It is Levin who has manipulated, distorted, and misled. Levin’s quest to ruin the reputation of Douglas Feith is demonstrably coming unhinged from reality, and his own reputation must suffer as a result.

..Senator Levin = Vermin

16 posted on 02/27/2007 1:46:00 PM PST by Donald Rumsfeld Fan ("Fake but Accurate": NY Times)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: april15Bendovr
The intel community seemed to have internalized a popular theory that Saddam and al Qaeda would not cooperate, even in areas of mutual strategic interest, because of their conflicting ideologies. On that theory, the intel community had filtered older, conflicting evidence out of their intel work.

A common trait among all institutions that rely on evidence to support theories. I have seen this many times during my own career.

Be wary of anomolies....they have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.

17 posted on 02/27/2007 2:07:10 PM PST by Donald Rumsfeld Fan ("Fake but Accurate": NY Times)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Donald Rumsfeld Fan
Have you seen this post? Some eye-opening statements about the Docex translations from Jveritas.

Abusing Intelligence (Jveritas Alert)
Yahoo News and the Weekly Standard ^ | February 19, 2007 | Michael Tanji


Posted on 02/19/2007 10:51:52 PM EST by april15Bendovr



http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1787697/posts
18 posted on 02/27/2007 2:34:05 PM PST by april15Bendovr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson