Asymmetrical Information

I thought this was Clintonian policy. Agents on the ground can get caught in embarrassing ways, or caught and tortured to death with videotape shown on CNN. Considering that deep-cover agents are necessarily professional liars, it's also fairly difficult to keep control of them in the field. So, get rid of the HUMINT and you get rid of all these problems. You just get blindsided by any group savvy enough to keep their telephone conversations and e-mail innocent-sounding...

And once you've pulled out all your agents, it is very, very hard to re-establish a HUMINT capability. Your local contacts won't trust you anymore, and you've got no one on the inside to help new agents get established. In a few years, your people have lost their edge, too.

Heres my big problem with this administration and the CIA. Bush pointed his finger at the CIA for 911. I agree with the independent 911 commission headed by rep Governor Means that 911 could have been prevented. But for the sake of avoiding argument, I'll give the administration the benefit of the doubt on 911. How do you make the same mistake twice, and not be held responsible? If the bad intell was the reason 911 happened, how did the administration not put the Iraq intell under the microscope? For example, we have learned the whole 'mobile bio/chem weapons lab' assertion was based on the word of one alcoholic Iraqi informant named 'curveball'. Or how do you trust Chalibi on anything, when you know hes already given bad intell to the UN inspectors, and was responsible for the Niger-Uranium forgeries? How can you plead ignorance to the quality of the intell, when the administration set up a special intell unit, solely for the Iraqi intelligence headed by Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld? How do you explain Rumsfelds 'wrong answer' comments on Clarkes report that stated Iraq had nothing to do with 911? What was the purpose of Cheneys visits to and complaints about the intell he was recieving from the CIA?

Well said, Ms. Galt.

Heres a 911 question. From the UBL videotape released just after 911 in which he states he didnt expect to bring the WTC down, he also states that the only hijackers that knew they were going to be 'martyrs' were the pilots. Its likely that fewer than 10 members of Al Qaeda knew the exact plan as to 911. They would be UBL, KS Muhammed, the 4 pilots, and maybe Massouwi. Even if we had human intell within Al Qaeda its very unlikely we would have gained intelligence beyond what was gathered anyway. Al Qaeda is divided into cells that dont know what the other cells are doing so a single informer cant rat out the entire organization. I just dont see what good infiltration would have done.

On the other hand, if Bush would have been in Wash DC to coordinate the intell agencies meeting and exchange of information, at a time when the entire US intelligence community had their 'hair on fire' from all the terrorist chatter, 911 may have been stopped. In fact, Bob Kerry suggested that had the CIA and FBI intell crossed paths, something as simple as putting the photos of the SD terrorists living with an FBI informer, on Americas Most Wanted could have stopped or delayed the attacks.

Drunk or sober, anyone with high school chemistry could tell that mobile chemical lab was for a damn sight more than generating hydrogen for weather balloons. That has to have been the stupidest rationalization ever. The democrat goalpost movers have been working overtime lately.
The Saddamocrats are getting tiresome with their wanting to reopen the rape rooms, put the kids back in prison and crank up the plastic shredder again and reinstitute Sharia. Shut up and let the grownups clean up the mess your stupidity made.

Since the days of the Church Report, the Congress has enjoyed castrating the CIA. HUMINT, how can there be HUMINT when the CIA was restricted to relationships with certified 'virgins' only! Where in the Sadaam regime or with UBL people would you expect to find one of those?

Does the Senate Report mention the restrictions imposed upon intelligency agencies by the Congress? When they own up to their contributions to the intelligence gap, I'll grant some credence to their reports.

Now we know exactly who is responsible for 9/11. Here are the list of culprits:

The FAA screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The INS screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The CIA screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The FBI screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The NSA screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The State Department screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.
The Department of Energy screwed up, is dysfunctional and needs reform.

Here’s how you cure it. Fire 5000 unneeded middle managers in each department. The only function of these middle managers is to stop information found in the field from reaching the decision makers and to stop the decisions for change from reaching the people in the field.

Jake,

Good point. What disturbs me is the appearance that little serious reform of any of these organizations has taken place or is even being attempted.

http://www.studentsfororwell.org/ wow a real site with thinking people

Begbee,

After 11-September the prudent thing was to expect the worst. Iraq had WMD, they had used them in the past and they acted like they were concealing them. Furthermore, how do you rank the honesty of informers? Some said Iraq had WMD, others said they had destroyed the WMD. How do you tell who is right and who is wrong?

That is the problem with the lack of HUMINT on the ground. We had no HUMINT resources in Iraq and therefore no data of our own.

Begbee,

Absent any iron clad data to the contrary the prudent action was to assume Iraq still had WMD. If you are wrong and go to war because of WMD that did not actually exist you still accomplish the following. The Iraqi's are free of a dictator, democracy has a toe hold in the mid east, we can pull our troops out of Saudi Arabia, we have stabilized the world oil supply, and we now have military bases under our control in one of the most dangerous parts of the globe. Best of all the sight of a government being destroyed because they appeared to have WMD will tend to discourage others from trying to develop WMD.

On the other hand if we decided Iraq did not have WMD and they did have WMD our first notice might be when subway passengers started falling over from nerve gas exposure, or a bio engineered disease causes havoc in the nation's hospitals or a major city disappears in a nuclear explosion. To me the risk benefit profile made invading Iraq an absolute necessity.

Notice how you hardly ever hear any politician talking about "the peace dividend" any more?

Its hilarious to read all these lists of who to blame for 911 and Iraq, the only constant of these lists is that none of the people, who we the people have 'hired' and have a say in removing, are ever held culpable for anything.

TJIT Saddam was no threat to anyone but his own people. And guess what? They deserved him. You cant force democracy on people who dont want it, the sanctions and no fly zones were expected to topple Saddam, but as we are now learning, Saddam wasnt nearly as hated by the Iraqi people as we were led to believe. Iraq is now on the verge of civil war, we have suicide bombers, foreign fighters and other radical Islamic fundalmentalists forming coallitions with the secular Baathists, and Iraqi military that never surrendered. In a sense we accomplished what Saddam never could in Iraq, we have brought the polarized ends of the secular and fundamentalist movements of the Iraqi people together against a common enemy, us.

We already had military bases in Yeman, Quatar, Saudi Arabia, etc and the only thing that they accomplished was to make us a target of the radical Islamic terrorists. They sure didnt stop 911. We havent discouraged other Islamic nations from possessing wmd, Iran has accelerated their nuke program, and some believe Syria now has the Iraqi wmd. We were much better off knowing the wmd were in the hands of a dictator that was so afraid of the US he sent them to Syria, rather than using them on the US as we marched on Bahgdad, than not knowing where the wmd are. By losing the wmd, we have made it much more likely they will be used against us in the future.

TJIT Saddam was no threat to anyone but his own people. And guess what? They deserved him. You cant force democracy on people who dont want it, the sanctions and no fly zones were expected to topple Saddam, but as we are now learning, Saddam wasnt nearly as hated by the Iraqi people as we were led to believe.

According to what is described as the first truly representative survey of Iraqi opinion, people in Iraq believe that the best thing that happened in the past 12 months was the demise of Saddam Hussein's regime.

The thing they want most over the next year is peace and stability, and the preferred form of government is an Iraqi democracy.

You also describe a regime that sheltered the 93 WTC bomb maker and plotted to kill an ex-president "a threat to [nobody] but his own people". But then again 'they deserved him'.

Interesting to see you suggest the WMDs do exist and are in Syria, a country that is definitely afraid of us right now.

I have no idea if the wmd exist, if they are in Syria, if Al Zaharweii(sp) has them, etc.. The war was sold mostly on wmd, and we have failed miserably in securing them.

I dont believe any polling data from Iraq. Who surveyed Falajah, Najef, or several other 'unsafe' Iraqi cities? I have heard that 46% of Iraq wants to behead Saddam, while 41% wants to pardon him. What we do know for sure is that the Iraqis want us gone more than they ever wanted Saddam removed. Otherwise they wouldnt be trying to kill us.

The 93 WTC bombmaker never did anything to any Iraqis, so I dont know what crime Saddam committed on his people if thats what your implying. But since we're mixing issues together, how far into his term was Clinton when the first WTC bombing took place? When exactly was Bin Laden deemed culpable by the US for the USS Cole bombing? Iraqis closest neighbors said they were not threatened by Saddam, and the senates report on the CIA intell concluded that Saddams military was never rebuilt after Desert Storm, and was in ongoing decline from the sanctions.

Sanctions may have degraded Saddam's military and WMD capability. However, those same sanctions, along with other containment operations, were used as a justification for terrorist attacks. So while the containment of Saddam made surrounding countries safer, it did not make us safer because it resulted in a the opening up of a 2nd front against us. And we paid dearly both in terms of lives lost and economic damage as a result.

It is as difficult to make logical progress with someone who won't accept available evidence (polls), constantly shifts the foundation of the argument (the 93 WTC bomber is a threat to US, of course, which refutes the idea that Saddam was a threat to his own people exclusively; clinton's term?) and "can't be bothered with hyperlinks" as it is to address the idea put forth in another thread that sexual proclivities are changed by "some quantum force we don't understand".

I am starting to believe that this brand of obtuseness is a form of trolling and I'm falling for it.

Ive been called much worse than a troll. The Poll you suggest is evidence has numerous problems. First, as I suggested previously there are many cities in Iraq that the Western media has no access to. Also consider that the BBC is an arm of the British government, and as such has an obvious agenda in reguard to Iraq. We were told we were going to be greeted by parades, not decaptations, its not flawed logic to distrust what the Coallition tells us. In light of the Senates report on the CIA, No WMD, etc its extremely naieve to accept anything we are told about Iraq that is supported by alot more evidence than one poll.

As to hyperlinks, Im not much of a typist, and the URLs are slow and frustrating for me. In any case, this isnt academic writing, think what you will of me, but I would never intentionally mislead or be incorrect. If you doubt something I write, when you let me know I'll either provide a source, a clarification, or an apology.

I dont know what your talking about as to 'quantum force sexuality dont understand.' I didnt get to deeply into my beliefs of sexuality but I'll check the other thread, and comment there or return.

Mindles:

Wait a sec. I think he's a troll, too, but he is on point. Iraq was not a threat to the US (I am assuming this is what he means), and there was no reason to believe it was.

You seem to regard the following as the evidence that Saddam was a threat to the US: (a) he tried to have GHWB killed, and (b) he assisted in some way with the 1993 WTC attack.

Killing GHWB would be harmful to him, but not to us. At most, killing GHWB would have been insulting to the country. And if he'd killed GHWB, we could have legitimately rolled him, and we would have had all the help in the world. Absent actual death, the assasination plan amounts to some idle dictator's fantasy.

As for Iraq helping in the 1993 WTC attack - what evidence is there of this? To the best of my knowledge, only Mylroie claims this, and there is some question about her sanity on matters Iraqi.

Mindles D you mistake me for another poster as to the quantum sexuality theory. Quickly, I believe in two main causes for human homosexuality. First, some notable Biologists have recently claimed that 10% of all species are what they call 'hypersexual', they seek out as many sexual expieriences as possible reguardless of sex. They also believe the reason that some human males are exclusively homosexual is because of the near universal condemnation of male homosexuality by human females. This theory fits nicely with most of the genetic basis claims on sexuality. The second factor I believe plays a role in human sexuality are enviromental factors, primarily a cultures acceptance or disdain for homosexuality, which also fits nicely with the fact that humans are the only species that has exclusively homosexual members.

Keep in mind trolls eat dumb people.

How is it that you are so boring?

It takes a village?

Gosh. Even Hillary was able to think that one up.

We want more Jane. She is bright.

Whoa...wait a minute. Hillary Clinton said that? Gosh, I had no idea.

Whatever you want, Tarzan.

Tim, I suspect it would harm GHWB too. Last time I checked, he was an American. That is an attach on Americans and American interests.

As for sheltering Abdul Rahman Yasin, who mixed the chemicals for the 1993 WTC bombing, many more than Mylroie make that claim, including the U.S. government.

On another subject, comparing two people or ideas with a common construction such as "it is as difficult to address X as it is to deal with Y" is not suggesting that X and Y are one and the same (IHBT. IHL. HAND.).

If Iraq "deserved" Saddam, doesn't that mean that the U.S. "deserves" Bush? After all, we chose the government that put the Supreme Court in place.

Let me clarify what I mean by the phrase the Iraqis deserve Saddam. First, it doesnt have to be Saddam, any military despot would suffice. When you look at Iraq you see a messy division of radical Muslims, more secular Muslims, and Kurds. The Kurds want their own country, and are supported in that pursuit by Iran. The radical Muslims want a theocracy by any means nescassary. The secular Muslims want complete power and control of Iraq. As we are seeing, they are all willing to kill anyone that stands in their way, and none of them are willing to compromise. This is why the elder Bush said Saddam was the lesser of two evils. Its better for everyone involved to have a brutal totalitarian regime than the anarchy that exists in Iraq today. This is not to say there are no good people in Iraq, and it isnt fair for them to suffer due to the different factions violence. But life isnt fair.

We do deserve Bush. The dems are way to willing to build concensus and compromise. If Clinton was the President at the time of 911 the same reps that are making excuses for Bush would be saying it happened on Clintons watch, its his responsibility. If Kerry loses the upcoming election its because dems as a whole didnt challange this administration hard enough on the facts, because they dont have the stomach for confrontation.

Sure, the lack of HUMINT in Iraq is a black mark on the CIA. BUT, a good HUMINT source would have been someone that: could talk to US agents (requiring foreign travel, since we had no humint in Iraq); had knowledge of the programs of interest; had a way to get the info to us; and had a motivation to pass info on (usual reasons: money, sex, idealism). This points to a fairly senior official being needed to get the data you want. Given that the Baath party was a clan/tribe/family driven organization that used punishment methods much more cruel than the Soviets did, it's not beyond the realm of possibility that it would be hard to get any sources. Add in the requirement that any source be free of criminal and human rights baggage and you might not have much of a pool to draw from.

Mindles:

Killing an American might be an attack on American interests, but it isn't any part of a justification for a preemptive war. Otherwise, given our present standing in many parts of the world, we might as well tell our military personel to forget their families, because they're going to be busy for a long, long time.

Second, sheltering the man who mixed the chemicals for the bomb is hardly helping in the attack, unless the shelter was payment for the bomb. I don't there is significant evidence of that. I'm sure we've let any number of rogues into the US, but I wouldn't charge us with their evil acts.

Killing GHWB would be harmful to him, but not to us. At most, killing GHWB would have been insulting to the country. And if he'd killed GHWB, we could have legitimately rolled him, and we would have had all the help in the world. Absent actual death, the assasination plan amounts to some idle dictator's fantasy.

Killing an American might be an attack on American interests, but it isn't any part of a justification for a preemptive war.

SCMTim, either you're contradicting yourself in the above two posts, or you're using "pre-emptive" in a bizarre way.

I took your first post to say that, if Saddam had assasinated GHWB, the US would have been justified in going to the UN and lots of countries would have helped topple Saddam. Personally, I think you're living in a fantasy world (I can hear the French press pointing out that US evidence wouldn't stand up in court, yada yada), but you're certainly entitled to your opinion.

But apparently I misunderstood, because your second post says killing an American is not justification for a war. How do you feel about killing 3000 Americans? Only 1200 Americans were killed at Pearl Harbor; are you saying there was no justification for our declaring war on Japan?

PJ:

Fair point. I was sloppy. I meant the following:

(1) No preemptive war for a plan to kill an ex-president (or, I'd say, even the president).
(2) If he kills an ex-president as a political matter, definitely we go to war, but it's not preemptive.
(3) If he kills an ex-president for sleeping with his daughter (picture Clinton), we get him back, but probably not overt war.
(4) If he kills an US citizen for a non-political matter, we get him back, but not overt war and not too much invested in it.
(5) It's hard to imagine a dictator killing a non-important American (say me) for political reasons - I'm not sure what the point would be. In that case, I'd probably look at it on a case by case basis.

I guess at base I'm saying that (a) we definitely go to war for acts of war (killing an ex-president for political reasons, 9/11, etc.), but (b) they need to be pretty clear acts of war (if someone were to attack Clinton, would it be because he slept with someone's daughter or because of something he did?), and (c) the case for preemptive war has to be overwhelmingly strong, and mere plans to kill a president or ex-president are insufficient.

I don't know if that clarifies anything.

Democrats hate the CIA, and the FBI, and the NSA, and the Army, and the....

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