Weapons of Mass Discussion

Crispy Rice Treats - Part III

From the Kean Segment of the Rice Testimony:

As we understand it, when you first came into office, you just been through a very difficult campaign. In that campaign, neither the president nor the opponent, to the best of my knowledge, ever mentioned al-Qaida. There had been almost no congressional action or hearings about al-Qaida, very little bit in the newspapers.

And yet, you walk in and Dick Clarke is talking about al-Qaida should be our number-one priority. Sandy Berger tells you you'll be spending more time on that than anything else.

What did you think, and what did you tell the president, as you get that kind of, I suppose, new information for you?

RICE: Well, in fact, Mr. Chairman, it was not new information. I think we all knew about the 1998 bombings. We knew that there was speculation that the 2000 Cole attack was al-Qaida. There had been, I think, documentaries about Osama bin Laden.

I, myself, had written for an introduction to a volume on bioterrorism done at Stanford that I thought that we wanted not to wake up one day and find that Osama bin Laden had succeeded on our soil.

It was on the radar screen of any person who studied or worked in the international security field.

This is a direct refutation of Clarke's testimony. Clarke would like to play the hero with his amazing power to read people by facial expressions, but the reality is that Dr. Rice knew about al Qaeda and bin Laden.

I won't say that Clarke perjured himself because we don't know that Clarke didn't believe that Rice didn't know or if he was just trying to make himself sound like The Man (tm). Rice clearly was educated on the subject and spoke about bin Laden and his organization in a radio interview before the election.

KEAN: I've got a question now I'd like to ask you. It was given to me by a number of members of the families.

Did you ever see or hear from the FBI, from the CIA, from any other intelligence agency, any memos or discussions or anything else between the time you got into office and 9-11 that talked about using planes as bombs?

RICE: Let me address this question because it has been on the table.

I think that concern about what I might have known or we might have known was provoked by some statements that I made in a press conference. I was in a press conference to try and describe the August 6th memo, which I've talked about here in my opening remarks and which I talked about with you in the private session.

And I said, at one point, that this was a historical memo, that it was _ it was not based on new threat information. And I said, No one could have imagined them taking a plane, slamming it into the Pentagon _ I'm paraphrasing now _ into the World Trade Center, using planes as a missile.

As I said to you in the private session, I probably should have said, I could not have imagined, because within two days, people started to come to me and say, Oh, but there were these reports in 1998 and 1999. The intelligence community did look at information about this.

To the best of my knowledge, Mr. Chairman, this kind of analysis about the use of airplanes as weapons actually was never briefed to us.

I cannot tell you that there might not have been a report here or a report there that reached somebody in our midst.

This bit of testimony goes to establish what Rice believes was the central problem: structure.

Rice did misspeak when she said "nobody" could have imagined airplanes could have been used as missiles; the clarification of that quote was long overdue in a public forum. I would have said that the "average American" couldn't have imagined that airplanes would be crashed in to the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Because that is true, and I think that was the sentiment of her statement and only those who engage in "Gotcha Politics" would think otherwise. That being said, government officials have to be very careful with their language; this was a rookie mistake that should never have happened.

Ultimately, the answer to the direct question is no, Rice did not see any documents about terrorists using airplanes as bombs or missile. Her testimony on this point is clear and consistent.

Next, Kean asks about the preoccupation with Iraq, to which Rice responds:

But by the time that we got to Camp David and began to plan for what we would do in response, what was rolled out on the table was Afghanistan _ a map of Afghanistan.

And I will tell you, that was a daunting enough task to figure out how to avoid some of the pitfalls that great powers had in Afghanistan, mostly recently the Soviet Union and, of course, the British before that.

There was a discussion of Iraq. I think it was raised by Don Rumsfeld. It was pressed a bit by Paul Wolfowitz. Given that this was a global war on terror, should we look not just at Afghanistan but should we look at doing something against Iraq? There was a discussion of that.

The president listened to all of his advisers. I can tell you that when he went around the table and asked his advisers what he should do, not a single one of his principal advisers advised doing anything against Iraq. It was all to Afghanistan.

It is perfectly natural to suspect Iraq had some involvement and to ask the question. Remember Iraq's history with the United States. Remember who we saw cheering the fall of the towers on television. Saddam was certainly capable of carrying out such an attack, so it isn't beyond reason to suspect him.

In the end though, the evidence was pointed at al Qaeda in Afghanistan, so that was the first target, the most important target, in the emerging war on terror. While Iraq wasn't involved in the execution of the 9/11 attacks, Iraq certainly was involved in the terrorism business. Saddam was a legitimate target in the war on terror, but not the prime target. Hence, the target was Afghanistan in the first phase of the war.

Mark's Remarks

1. More Dick Clarke Duplicity Revealed--Contrary to Mr. Clarke's own beliefs about his godlike powers of observations, Dr. Rice was aware of the al Queda and terrorism, as evidenced by her background information given in the first segment of this line of questioning.

2. Rice was not trying to equivocate, she was in crisis mode, and obviously could not think of nuances to change her statements on the fly....this makes her a bad liberal, but it does not make her negligent or criminal.....The structure and set up of the intel community was such that documents raising the issue of plane bombs never reacher her or Sandy and Co. never briefed her on it.....nuff said...


3. WHAT!?!? You mean Bush did not have out a pocket map of Iraq at Camp David, saying let's get that Saddam guy, cause I'm out for vengeance! No way! You mean Clarke was full of it again?!?

Seriously, this shows you that this President was not out on a witch hunt to get Saddam, unlike some of the Commissioners on the panel who seem determined to hang Bush. Bush was focused on his task, going after the Terrorists who did this and their direct sponsors....however, libs probably will not let this myth die, either.....