WP: Rumors Rife on Tenet's Tenure

[kskiska]

Criticism of CIA, Director Intensifies

By Walter Pincus and Dana Priest
Sunday, October 5, 2003; Page A01


CIA Director George J. Tenet is under fire as never before. With efforts unsuccessful so far to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, some conservative lawmakers and pundits are blaming the agency for inadequate intelligence on Saddam Hussein. Democrats are accusing Tenet of bending the intelligence to support President Bush's policy of preemption in Iraq.

The focus on Tenet has sharpened in the past week with the revelation that the Justice Department has opened an investigation into the unauthorized leak of the name of a CIA operative -- part of an apparent effort to discredit a former diplomat who raised questions about the Bush administration's case against Iraq.

Sources close to Tenet say the director himself was not responsible for initiating the leak investigation. They say lawyers in the agency's general counsel's office referred the matter to the Justice Department in July -- without consulting the CIA director -- as part of the routine way of responding to the disclosure of classified information.

Still, the controversy comes as Tenet's CIA finds itself increasingly on the defensive over the intelligence used by the administration to make its case for invading Iraq. Senior administration officials, some of whom were never fans of the CIA's work on Iraq, have begun to blame the intelligence community for the mismatch between prewar claims and postwar findings. This week, even some Republicans traditionally supportive of the intelligence community began to question the CIA's Iraq effort.

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45143-2003Oct4.html

[Cush]

1. and the war escalates

Can't blame the intell on the CIA Georgie, try looking at the OSP

[w13rd0]

2. It's unfortunate that there are Democrats...

...that are falling for this. The CIA isn't the problem in this case. Cheney, Rove, Rumsfeld, PNAC, OSP...therein lies the cancer. Tenet is Tenet, who gives a flip, how many swords can the guy fall on anyway?

[rucky]

9. The Democrats need to squeeze the CIA a bit...

...so more agents will come forward. Their only defense will be to disclose what they have on the administration - which they're not quite ready to do yet.

[Snellius]

15. Tenet will tell anyone what they want to hear

There is no doubt that Tenet, always eager to please, enabled the neo-cons to justify whatever they wanted to claim. He helped politicize his own agency and now, with a clever but completely duplicitous turn, he is being blamed for the failure of intelligence in Iraq. He does deserve a lot of it. He betrayed his own men. But you can bet that the neo-cons will spin this to sound like the president was misled.

[Resistance Is Futile]

3. And the spin cycle begins again

Lest we forget, the questionable 'intelligence' that justified the Iraq war came from Rumpsfeld's Yes Men in the Office of Special Projects. In contrast, the CIA was one of the agencies that was trying to tell the warmongers to put the brakes on.

[scarletwoman]

4. Oh man, this just keeps getting uglier and uglier!

I'm no fan of the CIA (to put it mildly), but in THIS fight, I've gotta root for the CIA over the bush* junta -- whom I consider to be FAR more dangerous to all of us than the "Company".

sw

[Dan]

5. Bushie should be careful

Who is to say that the CIA won't resort to the traits of the 1950's when they practiced regime change. I mean, there is precedence..isn't there?

[maggrwaggr]

8. good point. Bush could be on a rocky slope

to which I say: GREAT.

I hope the CIA deals with him as harshly as possible.

We need the house cleaned, and badly.

I'm sure Bush will be shouting like a six-year-old "MY DADDY WILL GET YOU FIRED!" as he's sinking under water with the cement shoes on his feet.

[Guaranteed]

12. 40 year anniversary of "precedence" coming up.....n/t

[peacetalksforall]

6. I detest the killing and the traitorous acts against leaders and

citizens of other countries and all the hate of American generated by the CIA (among others), but a law is a law and this one appears to have common sense behind it.

Remember - the KEY to everything is that the cabal wants their own IA - Intelligence Agency - and though they already have one (call it the RA for Rumsfeld Agency), it appears they 'vant to ve alone' and with their own rules - their own version of the constitution and rule of law.

As Republican as the CIA is, the cabal does not appear to to be in total control - or there is another joke on us in the cellars.

[goforit]

7. We know you're squirming,Bush....You can'y hide anymore!!!!

Hmmmm.....the war is on!!!

[evworldeditor]

10. These are people you don't want to mess with...

and Bushco, LLC is treading on very thin ice with a bureaucracy that has survived scandals for more than 50 years.

[goforit]

18. As Jefferson once said......

A gov't should have a revolution every 20 years. It is healthy to
cleanse the views and path when corruption has overtaken the country's soul.

[Unknown Known]

11. "Outing someone like this is a "holy grail" issue for the CIA,'"

'Lives are at stake. Outing someone like this is a "holy grail" issue for the CIA,' said Mel Goodman, a former senior CIA analyst.

Relations between the administration and the intelligence community are at a low ebb. 'It is bad. There were already so many other tensions before this week,' said Richard Betts, a consultant to the National Security Council. {snip}

It was also members of Cheney's staff, including top aide Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, who pushed the Niger uranium story long after Wilson had investigated the matter. Cheney and Libby are both said to have been furious with Wilson's decision to go public. 'I think the signal could have come from the Vice-President to go after Wilson, to make sure that no one else speaks out,' Mel Goodman said.

But whoever was responsible for the leak, it certainly came from somewhere near the top. In an operation as tightly controlled as the Bush administration, it is unthinkable that this was a junior staff member working 'freelance'.'This is not a normal leak, this is scorched-earth politics,' said Larry Haas, a White House communications aide under Bill Clinton. 'This kind of strategic decision is taken at a very senior level.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1056349,00.html

[Trajan]

13. Another telling excerpt ....

Some close to the agency see an emerging rift between the CIA and the White House. "I can feel among the seniors angst with the White House now," said a former high-ranking CIA officer who maintains contacts in the building. "It went from a year ago when they thought great, to things I haven't heard before, criticisms. It's quite understandable you're going to have this tension."

Another former intelligence official said the grumbling "comes because the president and others exaggerated the intelligence, and Tenet did not or could not control that."

-snip-


Pincus has been reporting the sentiments of disgruntled CIA/DIA agents for nearly a year now ..... This story is consistent with his previous narrative .....

Angst ......

I think we all understand their angst against this vicious administration ....

[Zhade]

14. Um - thanks, idiots!

Democrats are accusing Tenet of bending the intelligence to support President Bush's policy of preemption in Iraq.

Gee, that's sure a good move - piss off the CIA, especially when they're trying to nail BushCo on comitting treason.

I swear, these guys fucking WANT to be the losers!

[goforit]

21. You mean the Pro-Bush Dems......This is a time to watch it all

fall to into place.

Their will be plenty of time to condem Tennent.
Wait and watch the facts roll in.

I wish Daschle would get his troops in order and show some
leadership at a extrmely dire time!!!!

[are_we_united_yet]

16. It's the OSP stupid! eom

[snippy]

17. Bush wanted to bow to the Reich wing and replace Tenet when he took office

It was Poppy who defended Tenet in December of 2000 and convinced Whistle Ass to keep him. In April of 1999, Poppy said this about Tenet:

And when it comes to the mission of CIA and the Intelligence Community, George Tenet has it exactly right. Give the President and the policymakers the best possible intelligence product and stay out of the policymaking or policy implementing except as specifically decreed in the law.

http://www.cia.gov/cia/public_affairs/speeches/1999/bush_speech_042699.html

Prior to the invasion, the CIA tried to give Whistle Ass good intel on Iraq and WMD (that it was likely but uncertain whether Saddam still had them) and the likely resistance by the fedayeen Saddam and other groups both during and following the invasion, but Cheney and Scooter Libby kept going to the CIA and pressuring the analysts for the results they wanted. And, of course, Whistle Add had Weasel Ass (Rummy) create his own intelligence gathering operation at Defense to fabricate perfect PNAC Bushshit.

All of the Iraq intel Bushshit blame doesn't even address the most egregious attempt by Whistle Ass to blame the CIA for the fact that Whistle Ass and his administration are monumental fuck ups of an unimaginable magnitude. That is the successful attempt to blame the CIA for an intel failure concerning 9/11, despite the August 6, 2001 briefing the CIA gave Whistle Ass in Crawford, Texas warning of a soon to occur, huge terrorist attack on the US involving high profile targets and possibly involving hijacked airplanes. Whistle Ass and his vile minions claim that someone from the CIA traveled to Crawford that day to give Whistle Ass a face-to-face 15 minute briefing on the past historical tactics of al Qaeda.

[leftchick]

19. spill George, SPILL!!

I believe now is the time for Mr. Tenet to spill the beans on MIHOP...

[gulliver]

20. The buck stops at the CIA

Bushies and their supporters have no guts whatsoever. They blame anyone but Bush. Bush is (technically) president. Bush started the war based on forged documents and false implications of 9/11 connections.

But no, the "cons" have to blame the CIA, I guess. What other choice is there?

Maybe a "president" who takes responsibility for a change.

Kennedy took responsibility for the Bay of Pigs disaster. Bush refuses responsibility for the Iraq invasion debacle even though it actually was his fault.

Contemptible.

[lovedems]

22. When are people going to come to terms with the fact that Bush lied?

Months before his SOTU speech, Tenet wanted the yellowcake reference removed from the speech. 3 months later (according to condi) administration officials "forgot" that it was supposed to be removed and used it. Yeah right! This administration will blame ANYBODY and ruin careers all for their own gain. I hope the CIA chews them up and spits them out. I hope beyond hope this is the scandal the rips Georgie, Cheney, Rummy, Rove and clan new assholes...They will have to big ones because these guys are soooooooo full of shit.

I think there alot of high ranking democrats who need to cover their ass regarding pre-war intelligence. They after all, voted for the stupid war.