9/11: Internal Government Documents Show How the Bush Administration Reduc

[RamboLiberal]

Podesta's Center for American Progress has links to the actual documents. Go to work DU'ers with the time.

http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=39039

Since September 11, President Bush and his supporters have repeatedly intimated that many of the President's political opponents are soft on terrorism. In his State of the Union address, the President declared: "We can go forward with confidence and resolve, or we can turn back to the dangerous illusion that terrorists are not plotting and outlaw regimes are no threat to us." In comments aimed at those who seek changes in the Patriot Act, Attorney General John Ashcroft said: "Your tactics only aid terrorists." One recent ad asserts, "Some call for us to retreat, putting our national security in the hands of others."

But the real story is far different, as the following internal Department of Justice (DoJ) documents obtained by the Center for American Progress demonstrate. The Bush Administration actually reversed the Clinton Administration's strong emphasis on counterterrorism and counterintelligence. Attorney General John Ashcroft not only moved aggressively to reduce DoJ's anti-terrorist budget but also shift DoJ's mission in spirit to emphasize its role as a domestic police force and anti-drug force. These changes in mission were just as critical as the budget changes, with Ashcroft, in effect, guiding the day to day decisions made by field officers and agents. And all of this while the Administration was receiving repeated warnings about potential terrorist attacks.

PRE-SEPTEMBER 11 - Reno Makes Counterterrorism DoJ's Top Priority

5/8/98 – FBI Strategic Plan: Mission statement from internal FBI Strategic Plan dated 5/8/1998 in which the Tier One priority is counterterrorism. This document clearly proves that the FBI under the previous Administration was making counterterrorism its highest priority. As the document states "Foreign intelligence, terrorist, and criminal activities that directly threaten the national or economic security...To succeed we must develop and implement a proactive, nationally directed program."

<snip>

Late August 2001 – Internal FBI FY2003 Budget Request to Ashcroft: Internal FBI FY03 budget request to DoJ dated roughly late August 2002 (FBI submits its request to DoJ, DoJ adjusts and sends a request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) which then puts it into the final budget). This is not FBI's total request - but only the areas where FBI is specifically requesting increases over the previous year's baseline. In this request, FBI specifically asks for, among other things, 54 translators to translate backlog of intelligence gathered (line 3 under Foreign Language Services, cost of $5.1 million), 248 counterterrorism agents and support staff (line 14 entitled CT field investigations, cost of $28 million), and 200 professional intelligence researchers (line 16, entitled Intelligence Production, at a cost of $20.8 million). FBI has repeatedly stated that it has a serious backlog of intelligence data it has gathered but simply does not have the staff to analyze or translate it into usable information.

[DoYouEverWonder]

1. Ashcroft was more interested in busting

sick elderly women in Santa Cruz for using medical marijuana, then he was in dealing with the increasing terrorist threat that the US was facing. Especially since the Bu$h administration was doing everything in their power, from tearing up the Kyoto and ABM treaties, to giving Sharon carte blanche to do whatever he wants, to pissing off the terrorists even more. You would think protecting American citizens would have been a major concern?

[enough]

2. lots of good info here

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PRE-SEPTEMBER 11 – Ashcroft Shifts Direction Away From Counterterrorism

5/10/01 – Ashcroft New DoJ Budget Goals Memo: Official annual budget goals memo from Attorney General Ashcroft dated 5/10/2001 (directly compares to the 4/6/2000 Reno memo). Out of 7 strategic goals described, not one mentions counterterrorism, a serious departure from Reno.

8/9/01 – Internal Draft of New Ashcroft DoJ Strategic Plan: Internal draft dated 8/9/2001 of DoJ's plans to revamp the official DoJ Strategic Plan strategic in which Attorney General Ashcroft's new priorities for DoJ were highlighted in yellow (because of color constraints with PDF, the items with black boxes were the ones actually highlighted). As it says, highlighted items equal the specific goals of the new Attorney General. Specifically highlighted by Ashcroft are domestic violent crime and drug trafficking prevention. Item 1.3 entitled "Combat terrorist activities by developing maximum intelligence and investigative capability" is passed over. After September 11, Ashcroft quickly amended his plans for DoJ's reorganization. The final strategic mission, which was released in November looks starkly different than Ashcroft's pre-September 11 draft. (to see this reversal, you can compare "stragicplan.pdf" attached to this email with the final strategic mission that is found on the web at http://www.usdoj.gov/jmd/mps/strategic2001-2006/chapter2.pdf).

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[Sliverofhope]

3. kick

I was just on my way to posting this. This is worthy of urgent attention.

[RamboLiberal]

4. Giving this a kick

:kick: