The Two Critical Questions On Benghazi

There are a plethora of questions raised by the Benghazi slaughter, but the two most critical were those the President didn't answer at the Town Hall debate - who denied repeated requests for security and why. The Romney camp should be smelling the blood in the water.

As I pointed out on this blog the day before the Town Hall Debate, the only reason "security professionals" at the State Dept. would refuse requests for increased security in Benghazi, even as evidence mounted that the security situation was seriously deteriorating, would be because of a policy decision approved, if not made, at the Clinton and / or Obama level. So it was no surprise that when an undecided voter explicitly asked Obama "who" refused numerous requests for increase security and "why," Obama spent his two minutes of response time doing everything but addressing those two simple questions.

Someone with much better youtube skills than I has put out a great video highlighting this issue.



This really goes to the heart of not only the Benghazi failure, but the entire failure of the Obama foreign policy. To deny security in Benghazi is prima facie proof of a foreign policy disconnected from reality. So the answer to "who" denied requests for increased security and "why" need to be asked again at the foreign policy debate - and this time, America deserves real answers.

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Clinton Takes Responsibility For Benghazi, But Leaves All Critical Questions Unanswered

Sec. of State Clinton said this last night about the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans in Benghazi:



What she said is insufficient. If she was truly taking responsibility, she would have accompanied her mea culpa with a letter of resignation, or the heads of the "security professionals" who, she would tell us, made criminally reckless decisions. Instead, what Clinton gave us yesterday was a whimsical "my bad, sorry." Or to use the vernacular of Whoopi Goldberg, it wasn't 'taking responsibility taking responsibility.' It states the obvious, leaving all of the important questions regarding security, intelligence and foreign policy unanswered, and holding no one accountable.

Yes, as Clinton stated, the specific manning decisions for security in Benghazi would be made at the State Dept. and would never reach the White House. That said, if the decision to underman security in Benghazi irrespective of the actual threat was made in consideration of a policy, then we need to know where that policy originated. who approved it and why. That is either Clinton and or Obama. Bob Woodward highlighted this exact point several days ago on Fox News:



And then, of course, there is the now the well publicized testimony of LTC Wood, commander of a security detachment in Benghazi who begged the State Dept. for more security months in advance of the attack - "[f]or me, the Taliban was on the inside of the building. . ."



Moreover, there is the claim that "fog of war" lasted for near two weeks, during which time Susan Rice, Obama, Clinton and others in the administration claimed that this was a 'spontaneous' protest over a video that got out of hand. State Dept. officials who were in Benghazi on 9-11-12 have given a first hand account of what occurred on that day. To say that our intelligence agencies were mystified for weeks, let alone 24 hours, by the "fog of war" is utterly beyond belief. Charles Krauthammer highlighted that on a Fox News panel:



So that raises the next series of questions, regarding our intelligence capabilities. Who in our intelligence community briefed the White House and what was the sum of that briefing? Either our intelligence community has degraded to the level of the keystone kops or someone is lying to America. And further, we have been told again and again that our nation had no "actionable intelligence" regarding the Benghazi attack. Why not? Are we seeing degraded intelligence capabilities because of the President's decision to deal with al Qaeda almost solely through drone strikes and not through capture and interrogation?

Then there is the elephant in the room. If Obama was trying to deceive America about the nature of the Benghazi attack, why was he doing it? Others have answered that. Charles Krauthammer, in his column The Collapse of the Cairo Doctrine, points out that Salafism is resurgent in the Middle East, that Obama's "doctrinal premises were supremely naive" and that his policies have been "deeply corrosive to American influence." Laura Logan noted that Obama's deception runs deeper than just al Qaeda and the Benghazi attacks:

[O]ur government is downplaying the strength of our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as a rationale of getting us out of the longest war. We have been lulled into believing that the perils are in the past: “You’re not listening to what the people who are fighting you say about this fight. In your arrogance, you think you write the script.”

And indeed, twelve hours before the attacks on 9-11-12, I penned the following:

{The US. is experiencing] a false sense of security for no, we are not safer today. For the past eleven years, our soldiers and intelligence services have performed brilliantly. They have done all that we have asked of them. And yet, the future in the Middle East and, more particularly, as regards the radical Islamists, looks far more threatening today than it did on September 10, 2001.

I followed that prescient observation by noting that we have failed to engage in the war of ideas, and thus al Qaeda will be constantly regenerating in some form or another. This is not a 'war' that will end in 2014 as we turn off the lights in Afghanistan. Because we are not engaging in the war of ideas, this will be a conflict that will last for decades.

At any rate, the answers to all of the questions raised above were not answered by Hillary Clinton's whimsical acceptance of responsibility with no consequences. This is not a "political" diversion; it goes to the heart of our national security and the wages of four years of policy decisions by the Obama administration. It so happens that they are all encapsulated in the answers to why the Benghazi attack happened, why it succeeded, and why the Obama administration lied about it to America. Those are questions the Obama administration wants to avoid like the plague until after the first Tuesday in November. Those are questions America deserves answers to today.

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Romney's Foreign Policy Speech At VMI

Here is the video followed by the transcript. It is a good speech. As Romney memorably notes:

I know the President hopes for a safer, freer, and a more prosperous Middle East allied with the United States. I share this hope. But hope is not a strategy.

Perhaps the only thing that I would have added is that Obama has not captured a single high value intelligence target, preferring to kill them from afar with drones. We are not getting human intelligence like we did in the years before Obama. Did we see the wages of this intelligence failure in Benghazi, where the Obama administration failed to see a growing al Qaeda threat, resulting in the catastrophic slaughter of our Ambassador and others?

[Opening remarks not included] General Marshall once said, “The only way human beings can win a war is to prevent it.” Those words were true in his time—and they still echo in ours.

Last month, our nation was attacked again. A U.S. Ambassador and three of our fellow Americans are dead—murdered in Benghazi, Libya. Among the dead were three veterans. All of them were fine men, on a mission of peace and friendship to a nation that dearly longs for both. President Obama has said that Ambassador Chris Stevens and his colleagues represented the best of America. And he is right. We all mourn their loss.

The attacks against us in Libya were not an isolated incident. They were accompanied by anti-American riots in nearly two dozen other countries,mostly in the Middle East, but also in Africa and Asia. Our embassies have been attacked. Our flag has been burned. Many of our citizens have been threatened and driven from their overseas homes by vicious mobs, shouting “Death to America.” These mobs hoisted the black banner of Islamic extremism over American embassies on the anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

As the dust settles, as the murdered are buried, Americans are asking how this happened, how the threats we face have grown so much worse, and what this calls on America to do. These are the right questions. And I have come here today to offer a larger perspective on these tragic recent events—and to share with you, and all Americans, my vision for a freer, more prosperous, and more peaceful world.

The attacks on America last month should not be seen as random acts. They are expressions of a larger struggle that is playing out across the broader Middle East—a region that is now in the midst of the most profound upheaval in a century. And the fault lines of this struggle can be seen clearly in Benghazi itself.

The attack on our Consulate in Benghazi on September 11th, 2012 was likely the work of forces affiliated with those that attacked our homeland on September 11th, 2001. This latest assault cannot be blamed on a reprehensible video insulting Islam, despite the Administration’s attempts to convince us of that for so long. No, as the Administration has finally conceded, these attacks were the deliberate work of terrorists who use violence to impose their dark ideology on others, especially women and girls; who are fighting to control much of the Middle East today; and who seek to wage perpetual war on the West.

We saw all of this in Benghazi last month—but we also saw something else, something hopeful. After the attack on our Consulate, tens of thousands of Libyans, most of them young people, held a massive protest in Benghazi against the very extremists who murdered our people. They waved signs that read, “The Ambassador was Libya’s friend” and “Libya is sorry.” They chanted “No to militias.” They marched, unarmed, to the terrorist compound. Then they burned it to the ground. As one Libyan woman said, “We are not going to go from darkness to darkness.”

This is the struggle that is now shaking the entire Middle East to its foundation. It is the struggle of millions and millions of people—men and women, young and old, Muslims, Christians and non-believers—all of whom have had enough of the darkness. It is a struggle for the dignity that comes with freedom, and opportunity, and the right to live under laws of our own making. It is a struggle that has unfolded under green banners in the streets of Iran, in the public squares of Tunisia and Egypt and Yemen, and in the fights for liberty in Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Libya, and now Syria. In short, it is a struggle between liberty and tyranny, justice and oppression, hope and despair.

We have seen this struggle before. It would be familiar to George Marshall. In his time, in the ashes of world war, another critical part of the world was torn between democracy and despotism. Fortunately, we had leaders of courage and vision, both Republicans and Democrats, who knew that America had to support friends who shared our values, and prevent today’s crises from becoming tomorrow’s conflicts.

Statesmen like Marshall rallied our nation to rise to its responsibilities as the leader of the free world. We helped our friends to build and sustain free societies and free markets. We defended our friends, and ourselves, from our common enemies. We led. And though the path was long and uncertain, the thought of war in Europe is as inconceivable today as it seemed inevitable in the last century.

This is what makes America exceptional: It is not just the character of our country—it is the record of our accomplishments. America has a proud history of strong, confident, principled global leadership—a history that has been written by patriots of both parties. That is America at its best. And it is the standard by which we measure every President, as well as anyone who wishes to be President. Unfortunately, this President’s policies have not been equal to our best examples of world leadership. And nowhere is this more evident than in the Middle East.

I want to be very clear: The blame for the murder of our people in Libya, and the attacks on our embassies in so many other countries, lies solely with those who carried them out—no one else. But it is the responsibility of our President to use America’s great power to shape history—not to lead from behind, leaving our destiny at the mercy of events. Unfortunately, that is exactly where we find ourselves in the Middle East under President Obama.

The relationship between the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of Israel, our closest ally in the region, has suffered great strains. The President explicitly stated that his goal was to put “daylight” between the United States and Israel. And he has succeeded. This is a dangerous situation that has set back the hope of peace in the Middle East and emboldened our mutual adversaries, especially Iran.

Iran today has never been closer to a nuclear weapons capability. It has never posed a greater danger to our friends, our allies, and to us. And it has never acted less deterred by America, as was made clear last year when Iranian agents plotted to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador in our nation’s capital. And yet, when millions of Iranians took to the streets in June of 2009, when they demanded freedom from a cruel regime that threatens the world, when they cried out, “Are you with us, or are you with them?”—the American President was silent.

Across the greater Middle East, as the joy born from the downfall of dictators has given way to the painstaking work of building capable security forces, and growing economies, and developing democratic institutions, the President has failed to offer the tangible support that our partners want and need.

In Iraq, the costly gains made by our troops are being eroded by rising violence, a resurgent Al-Qaeda, the weakening of democracy in Baghdad, and the rising influence of Iran. And yet, America’s ability to influence events for the better in Iraq has been undermined by the abrupt withdrawal of our entire troop presence. The President tried—and failed—to secure a responsible and gradual drawdown that would have better secured our gains.

The President has failed to lead in Syria, where more than 30,000 men, women, and children have been massacred by the Assad regime over the past 20 months. Violent extremists are flowing into the fight. Our ally Turkey has been attacked. And the conflict threatens stability in the region.

America can take pride in the blows that our military and intelligence professionals have inflicted on Al-Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, including the killing of Osama bin Laden. These are real achievements won at a high cost. But Al-Qaeda remains a strong force in Yemen and Somalia, in Libya and other parts of North Africa, in Iraq, and now in Syria. And other extremists have gained ground across the region. Drones and the modern instruments of war are important tools in our fight, but they are no substitute for a national security strategy for the Middle East.

The President is fond of saying that “The tide of war is receding.” And I want to believe him as much as anyone. But when we look at the Middle East today—with Iran closer than ever to nuclear weapons capability, with the conflict in Syria threating to destabilize the region, with violent extremists on the march, and with an American Ambassador and three others dead likely at the hands of Al-Qaeda affiliates— it is clear that the risk of conflict in the region is higher now than when the President took office.

I know the President hopes for a safer, freer, and a more prosperous Middle East allied with the United States. I share this hope. But hope is not a strategy. We cannot support our friends and defeat our enemies in the Middle East when our words are not backed up by deeds, when our defense spending is being arbitrarily and deeply cut, when we have no trade agenda to speak of, and the perception of our strategy is not one of partnership, but of passivity.

The greater tragedy of it all is that we are missing an historic opportunity to win new friends who share our values in the Middle East—friends who are fighting for their own futures against the very same violent extremists, and evil tyrants, and angry mobs who seek to harm us. Unfortunately, so many of these people who could be our friends feel that our President is indifferent to their quest for freedom and dignity. As one Syrian woman put it, “We will not forget that you forgot about us.”

It is time to change course in the Middle East. That course should be organized around these bedrock principles: America must have confidence in our cause, clarity in our purpose and resolve in our might. No friend of America will question our commitment to support them… no enemy that attacks America will question our resolve to defeat them… and no one anywhere, friend or foe, will doubt America’s capability to back up our words.

I will put the leaders of Iran on notice that the United States and our friends and allies will prevent them from acquiring nuclear weapons capability. I will not hesitate to impose new sanctions on Iran, and will tighten the sanctions we currently have. I will restore the permanent presence of aircraft carrier task forces in both the Eastern Mediterranean and the Gulf region—and work with Israel to increase our military assistance and coordination. For the sake of peace, we must make clear to Iran through actions—not just words—that their nuclear pursuit will not be tolerated.

I will reaffirm our historic ties to Israel and our abiding commitment to its security—the world must never see any daylight between our two nations.

I will deepen our critical cooperation with our partners in the Gulf.

And I will roll back President Obama’s deep and arbitrary cuts to our national defense that would devastate our military. I will make the critical defense investments that we need to remain secure. The decisions we make today will determine our ability to protect America tomorrow. The first purpose of a strong military is to prevent war.

The size of our Navy is at levels not seen since 1916. I will restore our Navy to the size needed to fulfill our missions by building 15 ships per year, including three submarines. I will implement effective missile defenses to protect against threats. And on this, there will be no flexibility with Vladimir Putin. And I will call on our NATO allies to keep

the greatest military alliance in history strong by honoring their commitment to each devote 2 percent of their GDP to security spending. Today, only 3 of the 28 NATO nations meet this benchmark.

I will make further reforms to our foreign assistance to create incentives for good governance, free enterprise, and greater trade, in the Middle East and beyond. I will organize all assistance efforts in the greater Middle East under one official with responsibility and accountability to prioritize efforts and produce results. I will rally our friends and allies to match our generosity with theirs. And I will make it clear to the recipients of our aid that, in return for our material support, they must meet the responsibilities of every decent modern government—to respect the rights of all of their citizens, including women and minorities… to ensure space for civil society, a free media, political parties, and an independent judiciary… and to abide by their international commitments to protect our diplomats and our property.

I will champion free trade and restore it as a critical element of our strategy, both in the Middle East and across the world. The President has not signed one new free trade agreement in the past four years. I will reverse that failure. I will work with nations around the world that are committed to the principles of free enterprise, expanding existing relationships and establishing new ones.

I will support friends across the Middle East who share our values, but need help defending them and their sovereignty against our common enemies.

In Libya, I will support the Libyan people’s efforts to forge a lasting government that represents all of them, and I will vigorously pursue the terrorists who attacked our consulate in Benghazi and killed Americans.

In Egypt, I will use our influence—including clear conditions on our aid—to urge the new government to represent all Egyptians, to build democratic institutions, and to maintain its peace treaty with Israel. And we must persuade our friends and allies to place similar stipulations on their aid.

In Syria, I will work with our partners to identify and organize those members of the opposition who share our values and ensure they obtain the arms they need to defeat Assad’s tanks, helicopters, and fighter jets. Iran is sending arms to Assad because they know his downfall would be a strategic defeat for them. We should be working no less vigorously with our international partners to support the many Syrians who would deliver that defeat to Iran—rather than sitting on the sidelines. It is essential that we develop influence with those forces in Syria that will one day lead a country that sits at the heart of the Middle East.

And in Afghanistan, I will pursue a real and successful transition to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014. President Obama would have you believe that anyone who disagrees with his decisions in Afghanistan is arguing for endless war. But the route to more war – and to potential attacks here at home – is a politically timed retreat that abandons the Afghan people to the same extremists who ravaged their country and used it to launch the attacks of 9/11. I will evaluate conditions on the ground and weigh the best advice of our military commanders. And I will affirm that my duty is not to my political prospects, but to the security of the nation.

Finally, I will recommit America to the goal of a democratic, prosperous Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with the Jewish state of Israel. On this vital issue, the President has failed, and what should be a negotiation process has devolved into a series of heated disputes at the United Nations. In this old conflict, as in every challenge we face in the Middle East, only a new President will bring the chance to begin anew.

There is a longing for American leadership in the Middle East—and it is not unique to that region. It is broadly felt by America’s friends and allies in other parts of the world as well— in Europe, where Putin’s Russia casts a long shadow over young democracies, and where our oldest allies have been told we are “pivoting” away from them … in Asia and across the Pacific, where China’s recent assertiveness is sending chills through the region … and here in our own hemisphere, where our neighbors in Latin America want to resist the failed ideology of Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers and deepen ties with the United States on trade, energy, and security. But in all of these places, just as in the Middle East, the question is asked: “Where does America stand?”

I know many Americans are asking a different question: “Why us?” I know many Americans are asking whether our country today—with our ailing economy, and our massive debt, and after 11 years at war—is still capable of leading.

I believe that if America does not lead, others will—others who do not share our interests and our values—and the world will grow darker, for our friends and for us. America’s security and the cause of freedom cannot afford four more years like the last four years. I am running for President because I believe the leader of the free world has a duty, to our citizens, and to our friends everywhere, to use America’s great influence—wisely, with solemnity and without false pride, but also firmly and actively—to shape events in ways that secure our interests, further our values, prevent conflict, and make the world better—not perfect, but better.

Our friends and allies across the globe do not want less American leadership. They want more—more of our moral support, more of our security cooperation, more of our trade, and more of our assistance in building free societies and thriving economies. So many people across the world still look to America as the best hope of humankind. So many people still have faith in America. We must show them that we still have faith in ourselves—that we have the will and the wisdom to revive our stagnant economy, to roll back our unsustainable debt, to reform our government, to reverse the catastrophic cuts now threatening our national defense, to renew the sources of our great power, and to lead the course of human events.

Sir Winston Churchill once said of George Marshall: “He … always fought victoriously against defeatism, discouragement, and disillusion.” That is the role our friends want America to play again. And it is the role we must play.

The 21st century can and must be an American century. It began with terror, war, and economic calamity. It is our duty to steer it onto the path of freedom, peace, and prosperity.

The torch America carries is one of decency and hope. It is not America’s torch alone. But it is America’s duty – and honor – to hold it high enough that all the world can see its light.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Obama's Failed Iran Policy & The Need To Set A Red Line

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a dramatic speech to the United Nations, employed a simple diagram to hammer home his plea that the international community set a "clear red line" over Iran's nuclear program -- warning that a nuclear-armed Iran would be tantamount to a nuclear-armed Al Qaeda.

Netanyahu: 'Clear red line' needed to stop Iran's nuclear program, Fox News, 27 Sep. 2012

__________________________________________

. . . But what Obama hasn't done is effectively address the single greatest overarching foreign policy issue facing the U.S. since day one of his Administration - the continued viability of Iran's theocracy and that theocracy's drive for a nuclear weapon. This is a regime every bit as dipped in blood as that of Pol Pot's and, as they draw ever closer to having a nuclear arsenal, every bit as threatening to the world as that of Hitler. To repeat the assessment of Iran by then Defense Secretatry Robert Gates in 2008:

Everywhere you turn, it is the policy of Iran to foment instability and chaos, no matter the strategic value or cost in the blood of innocents - Christians, Jews and Muslims alike. . . . There can be little doubt that their destabilizing foreign policies are a threat to the interests of the United States, to the interests of every country in the Middle East, and to the interests of all countries within the range of the ballistic missiles Iran is developing.

Iran, Nukes & Obama's Scales, 5 Dec. 2011

__________________________________________

On the day Obama was inagurated into office, stopping Iran's drive towards a nuclear arsenal was by far his most important foreign policy challenge. Yet here we sit, four years later, with Iran's centrifuges spinning ever faster. As Mitt Romney noted this past week

:

U.S. President Barack Obama's policy on Iran represents his single worst foreign policy failure, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said in an interview on Sunday, saying that Iran was closer to having "nuclear capability" than when Obama took office in 2008.

Obama's response - "If Gov. Romney is suggesting that we should start another war, he should say so." Clement Attlee couldn't have said it better.



Without doubt the most important lesson of WWII is that the delay of Attlee and his French counterpart in standing up to Hitler - to draw a red line if you will - ended up embroiling the world in the costliest and deadliest war in the history of man. It wasn't the beligirence of the French and British that led to WWII, it was their desire for peace at all costs, and thus their refusal to threaten force against Nazi Germany all the way up until the date Germany attacked Poland in September, 1939. According to a post-war debriefing of Nazi generals, WWII could been avoided had Britain and France stood up to Hitler in 1936-37, before Hitler's war machine was built up in strength.

Today, Obama claims, for domestic consumption, that the use of force is on the table as an option against Iran. But he is trying to have it both ways, criticizing Romney for even wanting to threaten Iran with force, while to Iran, he is silent.

Israeli PM Netanyahu has been publicly begging Obama to make a credible threat for the use of force against Iran for months as Iran moves ever closer to a nuclear arsenal. At the UN yesterday, Netanyahu gave a crystal clear warning to the world of the threat Iran poses and repeated his plea to Obama to act decisively with a threat of force before it is too late. Do watch this whole speech. It is worth a half hour of your time:



Do note that not only has Obama refused to meet with Netanyahu this past week, our U.N. Ambassador, Susan Rice, did not attend Netanyahu's speech at the UN. She wsa off having lunch with Hillary.

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Libya: When The Sheep Attack The Islamist Predators

Long ago, a fine history prof. explained to me that it takes about 10% of a committed population to dominate the rest. I believe that to be the case in Iran, and I believe it to be the case in most nations of the Middle East where radical Islam dominates the government or is close to control. The 90% are sheep, some complicit, most fearful and ultimately ruled by the sword. I did not think that I would see the sheep strike back - but it is happening today in, of all places, Benghazi, Libya. This via Michael Totten's blog from a BBC report:

Hundreds of Libyan protesters have stormed the Benghazi headquarters of Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia in a backlash against last week's attack on the US consulate.

Witnesses say militiamen opened fire as the crowd overran the base, but it is not clear if there are casualties.

Buildings and a car were set alight and fighters evicted following a day of anti-militia protests in the city.

US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others died in the 11 September attack.

Earlier, some 30,000 protesters had marched through the eastern Libyan city calling for an end to the armed groups that have sprung up in the country since last year's ousting of Col Gaddafi.

Several thousand supporters of Ansar al-Sharia lined up outside its headquarters, in front of the crowd, waving black and white banners, AP news agency reported.

They fired into the air to try to disperse the protesters, but fled with their weapons after the base was surrounded by waves of people shouting "no to militias", the report added.

This is a glimmer of hope in what is now a blackhole of despair in the Islamic world. Amazing. Now let's see if this is the first step in a move to limit the power of the Salafists in the first permanent government of Libya. If that happens, then it really will be a major event.

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Victory in Iraq

Yesterday, the last of our combat troops left Iraq. They left Iraq having achieved victory. It was a hard won victory that went unremarked by Obama and the far left.

The road to our war in Iraq was long and convoluted. Iraq under the rule of Saddam Hussein was violent, unpredictable, and threatening to the world. Internally, Hussein ruled his country with all the violence and brutality shown by Stalin during his years leading the Soviet Union. Externally, Iraq was the major source of instability in the Middle East. In 1980, Hussein launched a war against Iran that would last for eight years and involve the deaths of millions in the two countries. American was drawn into the war when Iran mined the Straits of Hormuz in 1988. That same year, Hussein ordered an attack using chemical weapons against a rebellious Kurdish in northern Iraq. And it was in the 1980's that Hussein began a very public quest for a nuclear arsenal.

With his country near bankruptcy by 1990, Hussein invaded Kuwait to capture its rich oil fields. That led to First Gulf War and a permanent U.S. military presence in the region.

When Hussein was driven out of Kuwait by an American led coalition, he was forced to sign a treaty providing that he would dismantle his chemical and nuclear programs and that he would allow verification of the dismantling. But soon after, he stopped cooperating with the verification regime. In 1998, Clinton, with virtually unanimous support from Congress, attacked Iraq from the air in operation Desert Fox. It did little good. By 2000, virtually every major intelligence agency across the globe believed that Hussein was actively involved in reconstituting his WMD program. Then in the aftermath of 9-11, concern with what was believed to be the continuing push for a nuclear weapon led a bipartisan majority in Congress to pass the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq. As an aside, it should be noted that, at the time, America had yet to learn about the Iranian nuclear weapons program.

On March 23, 2003, the war to depose Saddam Hussein began. Our air force flooded the skies, attacking command and control positions, air defenses, and lines of communication. Soon after, our ground troops poured in, fixing and bypassing Iraqi defenses while moving at a breakneck pace towards strategic objectives. It was a combined arms campaign reminiscent of the blitzkrieg. The relatively open terrain of Iraq was well suited for our tanks, mechanized infantry and attack helicopters. Few who understood the capabilities of our armed forces were surprised when the million man Iraqi Army, 4th largest in the world, utterly crumbled under the onslaught. By April 9, just a little over two weeks into the war, Baghdad fell to coalition forces. And by April 30, the coalition announced the invasion phase over, organized resistance to the invasion having disappeared. It was a sophisticated war plan executed with skill, violence and speed by troops with superior training, weapons, leadership and morale. It was a thing of terrible beauty.

And with the victory, all of the ills of Iraq were exposed. In a world where religious sects and tribes were natural fault lines, and in a land where a Sunni minority had brutalized the Shia majority and the Kurdish minority, conflicts soon boiled over. Iraqi Shia militias, trained and harbored by Iran, flooded back into Iraq. On the Sunni side, al Qaeda saw an opportunity to do to America what it had done to the Russians in Afghanistan. Ayman al Zawhahiri announced that Iraq would be the main focus of al Qaeda's efforts. In an effort to mobilize the Sunni population in war against the Shia and the Americans, al Qaeda began a campaign of suicide bombings, culminating in the 2006 bombing of Iraq's most holy of Shia Shrines, the al-Askara Mosque in Sammara. American forces, ill prepared for this guerrilla warfare, searched for new strategies as Iraq descended into a violent, low grade civil war.

The far left in America saw an opportunity for taking political power. A search for WMD in Iraq in the aftermath of the invasion had failed to turn up anything. With the war going bad, the far left seized on the WMD issue, claiming that they only voted for the war because Bush had "lied." Further, they refused to acknowledge that al Qaeda was even in Iraq, let alone that it was the main focus of al Qaeda efforts. The far left went on a full scale offensive - against America. They attacked Bush daily and demanded that we leave Iraq, irrespective of the horrendous consequences such a move would have had for our national security and the disastrous, perhaps existential impact that a perception of victory for al Qaeda in Iraq would have had on the radical Islamist movement world wide. It was treachery of the most loathsome sort.

The left's push to legislate what neither al Qaeda nor Iran could win on the battlefield - a defeat for American forces in Iraq - reached a fevered pitch in 2007 when President Bush announced a "surge" of troops and a new strategy of counterinsurgency. The left did all they could to stop the surge and made a show of their disdain for Gen. Petraeus. And indeed, only two months into the surge, Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid surrendered on behalf of America after a series of three bombings by al Qaeda.



Thankfully President Bush, Gen. Petraeus, and our forces in Iraq didn't agree. Taking the war to al Qaeda, our troops rooted them out. In November, 2007, a depressed Osama bin Laden admitted to the utter route of al Qaeda taking place in Iraq. By March 2008, that route was complete.

Then turning to the South, our forces prepared to take on the Shia militias supported by Iran. And it was during this effort that President Maliki and the Iraqi forces, still as of yet unprepared, nonetheless took the bold move of attacking Iranian supported militias controlling Basra. The Iraqi government emerged victorious and, for all intents and purposes, that marked the true beginning of the end of the Iraq war. By July 17, 2008, with both al Qaeda and Shia militias dispersed and, in large measure destroyed, it was safer to be a U.S. combat soldier on duty in Iraq than it was to live in Detroit or Chicago. A second victory had been achieved in Iraq.

Thereafter, some of our combat forces stayed in place while the majority drew down. It wasn't until just yesterday that the final combat unit in Iraq, 4th Bde., 2nd Inf. Div., left Iraq and headed into Kuwait. Fifty thousand U.S. troops will remain in Iraq for an indefinite period in support roles.

By any measure, we achieved victory in Iraq. We deposed the evil regime of Saddam Hussein and put in its place a nascent democracy. That democracy was one of a kind - an Arab democracy in an Arab world almost uniformly ruled by autocrats and strong-men. We defeated al Qaeda on its chosen battlefield and dealt them a serious setback. And as importantly, we defeated Iran's push to turn Iraq into another Lebanon.

Unable to legislate defeat in Iraq, the far left has nonetheless remained bound and determined that Iraq should never be portrayed as a victory. The fact that our last combat unit left Iraq yesterday should have been a day of national celebration for all that we have accomplished. It should have been a day when our politicians trumpeted our victory over al Qaeda and used that victory as propaganda to belittle al Qaeda and their murderous Wahhabi ideology throughout the Muslim world. It should have been a day when our politicians trumpeted the Shia philosophy of quietism led by Grand Ayatollah Sistani and piped into Iran the message of how that has led to democracy in neighboring Iraq.

And yet from Obama and the left, silence. Four thousand American dead, tens of thousands injured in battle, all in a victorious effort, and there is silence. The word "victory" never passes Obama's lips. Our soldiers have received no thanks for their efforts from our left beyond bare lip service. Moreover, the far left knowingly declines to use the fruit of our victory in Iraq to further America's efforts against al Qaeda, Wahhabism and Iran. It is a travesty and a tragedy for our nation. But it is still a triumph for our military. They did everything asked of them. They achieved victory.

Update: In the concluding paragraph, I failed to note that Obama, in his rush to erase Iraq from the mind of America, is also jeopardizing Iraq's future. America should be intimately involved in insuring the emplacement of a new government following the last election and America should be exerting the single greatest influence on Iraq's future. Obama has failed at the former and is squandering our years of effort as to the latter. This from Charles Krauthammer several days ago:

Read More...

Summary only...

The NYT Reporting On Islam, Salafi Dogma & The Muslim Occupation of Cordoba Cathedral

According to Islam, and most prominently Salafi Islam, it is dogma that if any land was once ruled by Muslims, then it must be returned to Islamic rule. Al Qaeda justifies their terror in large part on this dogma, citing, for example, the centuries old Reconquesta of Spain as a wrong that must be righted. Less ridgid is a Muslim philosophy that buildings of worship once used for Islamic worship than must remain - or be made into - mosques. For example, Caliph Omar, after capturing Jerusalem in the 7th century, is reputed to have refused an invitation to prayer in Christendom's holiest site, the Church of the Holy Sephulchre, lest his followers use that to justify turning the Church into a mosque.

The relevant background for this post is that Muslims conquered much of Christian Spain in 712 A.D. When they occupied Cordoba, they destroyed the Basilica of St. Vincent and erected over top of it the Great Mosque. Once King Ferdinand III reconquered Cordoba in 1236, he reconverted the mosque to a Church. It has remained a church for the 800 years since.

On 2 April, during Easter holy week, 120 Muslims occupied the Cordoba Cathedral and interrupted church services to loudly pray to Allah. When asked to leave, they became violent, sending two security personnel to a hospital. The NYT covered this story, leaving out the background as well as ignoring the underlying motivations of the Muslims and the dogma upon which they acted. The blogger at Winds of Jihad has written a far reaching critique of the NYT coverage as well as the NYT's entire coverage of Islam, all in addition to an exceptional analysis of the event. Read it here.

Read More...

Summary only...

You've Got To Be Kidding Deux

I am searching my mind to think of any aircraft related incident of terrorism not committed by Muslim terrorists over the past two decades. I am not coming up with any, though I am sure there has been the occasional outlier.

At any rate, we have gone from very lax procedures at airports on Sept. 10, 2001, to the point where we now have to use full body scans to detect some of the more egregious attempts by radical Islamists to hide explosives and weapons about their body, including their "private parts." Except . . .

A group of Muslim scholars says it supports airline safety, but it is "deeply concerned" about the use of airport scanners that show nude images of the human body.

“The Fiqh Council of North America (FCNA) emphasizes that a general and public use of such scanners is against the teachings of Islam, natural law and all religions and cultures that stand for decency and modesty,” the group said in a Feb. 10 statement posted at Islam Online.

"It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women," FCNA explained. The group noted that Islam emphasizes modesty, considering it part of the faith. "The Qur'an has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts" and to be modest in their dress.

While exceptions can be made in cases of "extreme necessity," FCNA indicated that passenger body scans do not rise to that level . . .

FCNA is asking for changes in scanner software so the machines will produce only body outlines. In the meantime, the group says Muslim travelers should choose pat-down searches over scanner images – in cases where searches are necessary.

Does the Koran say anything about hiding explosives in one's "private parts?" If not, then you my Fiqh Council friend can go fiqh off (hah - hat tip to Dafydd at Big Lizards for that one).

Muslims bear full responsibility for the need to have full body scans that will invade the privacy of each and every one of us. And this Muslim Council has the gall to complain on behalf of Muslims. This is mind numbing - but hardly unexpected. As to pat downs, if the Fiqh Council considers showing "private parts" a violation of privacy, they surely dont expect to have those private parts touched as a part of a pat down. Yet anything less would not find a bomber packing PETN next to their privates. Sorry about that, but for my money, if Muslims refuse to go through a full body scan, nothing less than a strip and cavity search would suffice.

At this point in the game, my concern for Muslim sensibilities on issues relating to security is well into negative numbers. The Koran may command that Muslims be modest, it does not command that they have a right to board an airplane. If you are Muslim and do not want to be scanned, fine, don't fly. That sounds like a perfectly reasonable accommodation to me.

By the way, lest there be any doubt about who it is that is complaining in this instance, the Fiqh Council of North America is an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood is an organization dedicated to the overthrow of our government and the implementation of Sharia law throughout the world. Al Qaeda grew out of the Brotherhood, as have countless other radical offshoots. The only difference between al Qaeda and the Brotherhood is in the means by which the same ends are sought. So, go pound sand indeed.

Read More...

Summary only...

Terrorists & The Attack On The West

A bit of late blogging on this one. It is without doubt al Qaeda's most insidious plot to date. Apparently the next itteration of suicide bombs in the sky will not be exploding underwear. In order to defeat full body scans rapidly being put in place after the Undiebomber, al Qaeda is planning to implant PETN into . . . breast implants. The implants would be detonated when the bomber uses "a hypodermic syringe to inject TATP (Triacetone Triperoxide) through their skin into the explosives sachet."

It is one thing for these most amoral of al Qaeda terrorists to seek to use our Western freedoms against us. It is an order of magnitude greater when al Qaeda seeks to corrupt one of the most benign, trusted and beloved symbols of our society - a really primo rack. Anyone who thinks our service men - and at least a few of the service women - are out on freedom's fronteir fighting for just mom and apple pie is missing two of the prime motivators. Oh the humanity . . .

Read More...

Summary only...

The Three Stooges Meet Al Qaeda In Undiegate (Updated & Bumped)

The situation surrounding our government's handling of Abdulmutallab, the Christmas Undiebomber trained and armed by al Qaeda, has gone from bad to scandalous with the recent revelations regarding the inner workings of those agencies charged with counterterrorism. As a result of these revelations, we now know that:

Nine years after 9-11, Obama has, for all practical purposes, reduced our ability to interrogate al Qaeda operatives for actionable intelligence, to something approaching zero.

Nyuck-Nyuck-Nyuck.

As a threshold matter, intelligence gleaned from captured enemy combatants has been far and away our most important source of actionable intelligence in the war on terror. Yet a recent AP article recounts that the FBI questioned the Undiebomber for less then two hours in toto before reading him his rights. [Update: Former CIA Chief Michael Hayden expands on this in a WaPo op-ed:

. . . In the 50 minutes the FBI had to question him, agents reportedly got actionable intelligence. Good. But were there any experts on al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in the room (other than Abdulmutallab)? Was there anyone intimately familiar with any National Security Agency raw traffic to, from or about the captured terrorist? Did they have a list or photos of suspected recruits?

When questioning its detainees, the CIA routinely turns the information provided over to its experts for verification and recommendations for follow-up. The responses of these experts -- "Press him more on this, he knows the details" or "First time we've heard that" -- helps set up more detailed questioning.

None of that happened in Detroit. In fact, we ensured that it wouldn't. After the first session, the FBI Mirandized Abdulmutallab and -- to preserve a potential prosecution -- sent in a "clean team" of agents who could have no knowledge of what Abdulmutallab had provided before he was given his constitutional warnings. As has been widely reported, Abdulmutallab then exercised his right to remain silent.

In retrospect, the inadvisability of this approach seems self-evident.]

That revelation comes in the aftermath of Congressional hearings on how it was that Abdulmutallab, the undibomber went, in about twenty-four hours, from roasting his own chestnuts on an open fire during a Christmas Day flight to Detroit, then to a jail cell, complete with a lawyer, a Constitutional right not to anwwer questions, and presumably the mother of all ice packs. This from Stephen Hayes at the Weekly Standard:

. . . Four top counterterrorism officials testified before a congressional committee that they were not consulted about how to handle the interrogation of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the al Qaeda operative who attempted to blow up Flight 253 on December 25, 2008.

That group included all three senior Obama administration officials who testified before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday: Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security; Michael Leiter, chairman of the National Counterterrorism Center; and Dennis Blair, the Director of National Intelligence. It also included FBI Director Robert Mueller.

With surprising candor, Blair, the nation's top intelligence official, explained that these officials were not deliberately excluded from the decisionmaking process in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Rather, he told the Senate Homeland Security Committee, there was no process at all.

"I've been a part of the discussions which established this high-value interrogation unit, [HIG] which we started as part of the executive order after the decision to close Guantanamo. That unit was created for exactly this purpose -- to make a decision on whether a certain person who's detained should be treated as a case for federal prosecution or for some of the other means. We did not invoke the HIG in this case," he said. "We should have."

We learn from NewsWeek that the White House responded with anger to Blair's admissions, calling his testimony incorrect:

[O]fficials who have worked on the issue said Blair was wrong on almost every count. Abdulmutallab couldn't possibly have been questioned by the HIG because the unit doesn't exist yet. The task force had recommended it be created to handle the questioning of "high value" Qaeda leaders who might be captured overseas—a criterion that clearly doesn't apply in Abdulmutallab's case. But the proposal is still being reviewed by the National Security Council, and the actual unit has not yet been created.

The specific recommendation, one source said, was to have a collection of intelligence officers and FBI agents who are knowledgeable about the background of the Qaeda leaders and deploy them—along with language and regional experts—as soon as a Qaeda leader was captured. But since Abdulmutallab was not a Qaeda leader, and was captured in Detroit, not overseas, the HIG wouldn't apply in any case, said the source, who worked closely on the proposal. . . .

Administration officials said the comments by Blair were especially galling because they seemed to vindicate the chief Republican criticism of the handling of the Detroit incident. . . .

Galling?!?!?!? Our Moralizer In Chief has utterly emasculated our ability to gain timely and actionable intelligence from people who have nightly wet dreams about setting off nuclear explosions in every city in our country. Yet the Obama administration shows far more concern about being publicly criticized by Republicans. All emphasis is on the political, none on the substance. The Obama administration has their priorities completely upside down.

To restate the revelations from the hearing and the NewsWeek article, this is the position in which Obama has placed our national security: There is no specific procedure for our government to deal with captured enemy combatants, nor are the tools in place to be able to conduct interrogations coordinated across those agencies charged with countering terrorism. By Executive Order, the CIA cannot interrogate high value detainees and, for the past year through today, the designated replacement for the CIA interrogators, the HIG, a task force under FBI leadership and direct White House oversight, is still on the drawing board. For al Qaeda leaders or operatives captured in the U.S., it is Obama's de facto policy that they would go into the criminal justice system.

The national security imperative of gathering intelligence is no longer the top priority. It is trumped in the Obama administration by the political imperative of giving substance to the far left's calls to treat terrorism as a criminal matter and terrorists as people with constitutional rights. Given Obama's ostentatious grandstanding on terrorism and in particular the issue of interrogating enemy combatants, given Obama's many rhetorical efforts to establish himself as our Moralizer in Chief on this issue, and yet given the reality of his horrid national security effort, it is apparent that while Obama has more than talked the talk, he has stumbled, fallen, stubbed a toe, pulled a hammy and broken both legs on the walk.

To continue from Mr. Hayes:

That's quite an admission. Blair wasn't finished (see the 51:00 mark of this video). "Frankly, we were thinking more of overseas people and, duh!, we didn't put it then. That's what we will do now. And so we need to make those decisions more carefully. I was not consulted and the decision was made on the scene. It seemed logical to the people there but it should have been taken using this HIG format at a higher level." . . .

Blair admitted that Abdulmutallab was not interrogated for intelligence purposes because the Obama administration had not considered using the newly-created elite interrogation unit on terrorist in the United States.

If Blair considered the handling of Abdulmutallab a mistake, FBI Director Robert Mueller, testifying at the same time before the Senate Judiciary Committee, did not. Mueller, like Blair, acknowledged that the crucial decision about how to treat Abdulmutallab was made by local FBI agents.

Now think about that for a second. It's not merely that the Director of the FBI, the DNI, and the DNCC were not contacted and that this was a systemic failure arising out of the lack of any procedure for a very forseeable contingeny. I think (hope and pray) that it is safe to assume these three stellar civil servants had heard about the attempted bombing in real time. But the fact is that after the undiebomber was captured, none of these individuals lifted so much as a finger to insinuate themselves into the situation to ensure that the undiebomber was interrogated for every bit of actionable intelligence that he possessed. Not a one of them made so much as a phone call. They sat with their thumbs up their collective asses in blissful ignorance while the Undiebomber was questioned by local FBI - who may or may not have the slightest background in counterterroism and the specifics of our intel on Abdulmutallab - and shortly thereafter, read his rights and given a lawyer. Lacking a procedure for this eventuality in year nine of the war on terror is unfathomable. Displaying this degree of placidity and lack of proactivity even in the abscence of a procedure is utterly unforgivable.

As an aside, it is not clear what role the DOJ directly played in that decision and, if they played any such role, whether Eric Holder was directly involved. That said, inquiring minds really, really want to know. The administration has refused to answer that question.

It should be noted that the White House, which, as previously noted, publicly trumpeted in August of 2009 that they had assumed a direct oversight role in high value interrogations, equally did nothing to intercede in this case. And let's not forget that the director of the National Counterterrorism Center was on vacation while all of this going on and that he, like Obama himself, saw no reason to cut his vacation short. All of this adds up to incompetence on a cosmic scale, a Three Stooges scale. And our national security is in their hands? Nyuck-Nyuck-Nyuck indeed.

. . . Mueller testified that those FBI agents interviewed Abdulmutallab about "ongoing and other threats." What the FBI director did not mention was that his agents interviewed the terrorist without any input from the National Counterterrorism Center — the institution we now know was sitting on top of a small mountain of not-yet-correlated information about the bomber.

So whatever information Abdulmutallab provided, he gave up in response to general questions about his activities, not in response to specific questions based on the intelligence the U.S. government had already collected on him. And within 24 hours — according to Senator Jeff Sessions, whose tough questioning left Mueller stuttering — Abdulmutallab was Mirandized and he stopped talking. (It would be nice to learn, from Mueller or someone else in a position to know, precisely when Abdulmutallab was read his rights.) . . .

Just unbelievable. If heads don't roll now for this level of ineptitude, we can rest assured that heads will roll in the future. It will be the heads of Americans who have placed their trust in Obama to protect our nation. Soaring rhetoric will stop neither bullets nor blast waves. Nor will Obama's moralizing be sufficient to keep a crippled jet in the sky. It seems inevitable that American blood will be spilled as a direct result of an Obama national security apparatus not merely in disaray, but Three Stooges-esque in its degree of incompetence.

Given that the Obama administration has already found criticism of their performance to be "galling," it is clear that the Obama administration is not going to do anything to correct this situation, Understand that there is no reason the Obama administration cannot, at this very moment, pull the Undiebomber out of our federal justice system, treat him as an enemy combatant, and interrogate him his every waking minute without the presence of a lawyer. Instead, Obama is refusing to pull the undiebombler out of the District Court docket now because it would be a tacit acknowledgement of the the glaring holes in - and gross incompetence of - his national security apparatus.

I documented in detail two weeks ago how Obama had weakened our national security during his first year in office. I was far, far too easy on Obama. I had assumed that our national security apparatus was, nine years on from 9-11, still a well oiled machine, but that Obama had made a command decision to move Abdulmutallab to federal Court. I had no idea that the reality is that Obama had made sufficient changes to the procedures and tone of our national security apparatus that it stands today as uncoordinated, incompetent, operating on autopilot without appropriate procedures in place and unfathomably lacking in proactiveness at the very highest levels. After Obama has had a full year in office, and after he had inherited a functioning system from the Bush administration, this is truly scandalous - not to mention incredibly dangerous for America. Call it Undiegate.

Update: The Washington Post Editorial Board arrives (a bit late) at some of the same conclusions:

. . . The Obama administration had three options: It could charge [the undiebomber] in federal court. It could detain him as an enemy belligerent. Or it could hold him for prolonged questioning and later indict him, ensuring that nothing Mr. Abdulmutallab said during questioning was used against him in court.

It is now clear that the administration did not give serious thought to anything but Door No. 1. This was myopic, irresponsible and potentially dangerous. . . .

According to sources with knowledge of the discussions, no one questioned the approach or raised the possibility of taking more time to question the suspect. This makes the administration's approach even more worrisome than it would have been had intelligence personnel been cut out of the process altogether.

Update: Charles Krauthammer is on precisely the same sheet of music this week.

Update: Maine's Susan Collins - of all people - goes nuclear on the Obama administration over this.



As Hot Air points out:

. . . when a moderate like Collins calls the handling of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab “irresponsible,” “dangerous,” and “inconceivable,” that has a broader political impact. When Collins says that “Foreign terrorists are enemy combatants and they must be treated as such,” and calls the current Obama policies a “charade,” that will make it more difficult for people to write it off as knee-jerk, right-wing contempt for Obama instead of his policies:

While Collins is on the money, she does not go quite far enough. Few people, Collins included, seem to be catching on to the degree to which Obama has deconstructed what was once a highly functional national security apparatus, not to mention the equally scandalous degree of institutional passivity at the top of that apparatus now.

Read More...

Summary only...

SOTU - The Gulf Between Word And Deed, Fact and Fiction

On most things of consequence, the gulf between Obama's words and his deeds is large indeed. But few are so obvious and blatant as listening to Obama demonize lobbyists in the State of the Union Speech only to see his administration on the next day inviting the lobbyists to a private meeting to "discuss issues raised in Obama's speech." This from the Hill:

A day after bashing lobbyists, President Barack Obama’s administration has invited K Street insiders to join private briefings on a range of topics addressed in Wednesday’s State of the Union.

The Treasury Department on Thursday morning invited selected individuals to “a series of conference calls with senior Obama administration officials to discuss key aspects of the State of the Union address.” . . .

This is getting comical.

On a related note, the AP fact checked Obama's speech, finding several questionable Presidential claims. They include

- Obama seeks a freeze on certain items of discretionary spending as a means to lower out out of control deficits. The AP notes that, while Obama made this the centerpiece of his new pose as a fiscal hawk, Obama neglected to mention that, even if fully enacted, his plan will only cut the budget deficit by 1% in ten years. AP doesn't go far enough, though. The reality is that Obama and the Dems already raised discretionary spending by 25% last year, so freezing such spending at current levels is kind of like cutting off the alcohol only after the patrons are already drunk.

- The AP opines that Obama's call for a "bi-partisan" commission to recommend changes to the economy will be "toothless." That said, the AP ignores that this was always about politics rather than fixing the economy. The left wants to tax us so that they can continue to spend. Congress is required by the Constitution to make all binding decisions on taxing and spending. The only reason to toss up a "bi-partisan commission" to duplicate this function is to protect Congressional Democrats - to give them some cover for their decisions. It is not exactly a portrait in moral courage.

- As to Obama's health care claim that "[o]ur approach would preserve the right of Americans who have insurance to keep their doctor and their plan," AP gives a post speech shout out of "you lie."

- As to Obama's claims regarding two million jobs saved by the stimulus, the AP notes that there is reason for cynicism. What the AP does not note is that even of the jobs claimed, they are virtually all in the public sector, with a few in heavily subsidised "green jobs" that could not exist in the private sector without government largess. They will fade away the moment the government tit drys up. Update: Gateway Pundit runs to ground Obama's claim of the Phoenix "small business" that is tripling its work force thanks to the stimulus. It is Ecotality, owned by a Democratic donor whose company received $100 million in stimulus funds - for which it added 27 jobs in 2009 and is planning on adding another 15 in 2010. That is well over a $2 million per job. So do you feel stimulated yet?

- Obama shamelessly repeated his calls for "transparency" in government - after giving us a year of the least transparent government in decades. Even hard core Obamiacs had to be doing the face-palm on that one.

- As the AP lastly notes, Obama claimed to have killed far more al Qaeda members than the Bushies did in 2008. But, AP points out, this is a claim that is impossible to verify. They also note that drone attacks, which are likely the basis for the claim, "increased dramatically in the last 18 months." Hmmmm, let's see, eighteen minus twelve . . . . what do you know - the increase started on Bush's watch. So Obama's claim to being superior to Bush in the war on terror is predicated on . . . carrying on a Bush policy.

There were a lot of false or unverifiable claims made by Obama last night that the AP missed. Hot Air notes that Obama's blame of Bush for the deficits is one. Another is Obama claiming credit for "ending" the war in Iraq. It mystifies me that any commander of U.S. troops could sit stone-faced listening to that one. And then there was Obama's claim that the recent Supreme Court decision in Citizen's United would open up the flood gates for foreign influence in our elections when the reality is that the laws pertaining to foreign money in campaigns were explicitly left untouched by the Supreme Court in the Citizens United decision.

Read More...

Summary only...

The Three Stooges Meet Al Qaeda In "UNDIEGATE"

The situation surrounding our government's handling of Abdulmutallab, the Christmas Undiebomber trained and armed by al Qaeda, has gone from bad to scandalous with the recent revelations regarding the inner workings of those agencies charged with counterterrorism. As a threshold matter, intelligence gleaned from captured enemy combatants has been far and away our most important source of actionable intelligence in the war on terror. Yet we now know that nine years on from 9-11 and with one year in office, the Obama administration has not constituted an entity to interrogate high value targets. We now know that nine years on and with one year in office, Obama does not have any system in place to interrogate for intelligence an al Qaeda leader or operative caught in the U.S. . Obama took the CIA completely out of the interrogation business for all high level targets in August. He has not patched that gaping hole in our counterterrorism capabilities. Thus when Abdulmutallab, the Christmas undiebomber, was captured, he was by default sent into the criminal justice system and given a lawyer.

Let me restate that.

Nine years after 9-11, Obama has, for all practical purposes, reduced our ability to interrogate al Qaeda operatives for actionable intelligence, to something approaching zero.

Nyuck-Nyuck-Nyuck.

We were treated yesterday to Congressional hearings on how it was that Abdulmutallab, the undibomber went, in about twenty-four hours, from roasting his own chestnuts on a Christmas Day flight to a jail cell in Detroit, complete with a lawyer, a Constitutional right not to anwwer questions, and presumably the mother of all ice packs. This from Stephen Hayes at the Weekly Standard:

. . . Four top counterterrorism officials testified before a congressional committee that they were not consulted about how to handle the interrogation of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the al Qaeda operative who attempted to blow up Flight 253 on December 25, 2008.

That group included all three senior Obama administration officials who testified before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday: Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security; Michael Leiter, chairman of the National Counterterrorism Center; and Dennis Blair, the Director of National Intelligence. It also included FBI Director Robert Mueller.

With surprising candor, Blair, the nation's top intelligence official, explained that these officials were not deliberately excluded from the decisionmaking process in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Rather, he told the Senate Homeland Security Committee, there was no process at all.

"I've been a part of the discussions which established this high-value interrogation unit, [HIG] which we started as part of the executive order after the decision to close Guantanamo. That unit was created for exactly this purpose -- to make a decision on whether a certain person who's detained should be treated as a case for federal prosecution or for some of the other means. We did not invoke the HIG in this case," he said. "We should have."

We learn from NewsWeek that the White House responded with anger to Blair's admissions, calling his testimony incorrect:

[O]fficials who have worked on the issue said Blair was wrong on almost every count. Abdulmutallab couldn't possibly have been questioned by the HIG because the unit doesn't exist yet. The task force had recommended it be created to handle the questioning of "high value" Qaeda leaders who might be captured overseas—a criterion that clearly doesn't apply in Abdulmutallab's case. But the proposal is still being reviewed by the National Security Council, and the actual unit has not yet been created.

The specific recommendation, one source said, was to have a collection of intelligence officers and FBI agents who are knowledgeable about the background of the Qaeda leaders and deploy them—along with language and regional experts—as soon as a Qaeda leader was captured. But since Abdulmutallab was not a Qaeda leader, and was captured in Detroit, not overseas, the HIG wouldn't apply in any case, said the source, who worked closely on the proposal. . . .

Administration officials said the comments by Blair were especially galling because they seemed to vindicate the chief Republican criticism of the handling of the Detroit incident. . . .

Galling? GALLING? Our Moralizer In Chief has utterly emasculated our ability to gain timely and actionable intelligence from people who have nightly wet dreams about setting off nuclear explosions in every city in our country. The Obama administration though shows far more concern about being publicly criticized by Republicans. All emphasis is on the political, none on the substance. The Obama administration has their priorities completely skewed. And correct me if I am wrong, but do those conditions on the HIG as to whom they might interrogate sound like Obama is recreating something akin to the infamous Goerlickian wall?

To restate the revelations from the hearing and the NewsWeek article, this is the position in which Obama has placed our national security: There is no specific procedure for our government to deal with captured enemy combatants, nor are the tools in place to be able to conduct fully coordinated interrogations. By Executive Order, the CIA cannot interrogate high value detainees and, for the past year through today, the designated replacement for the CIA, the HIG, a task force under FBI leadership and direct White House oversight, is still on the drawing board. For al Qaeda leaders or operatives captured in the U.S., it is Obama's de facto policy that they would go into the criminal justice system. This is completely gratuitous - and wholly screwed. Given Obama's ostentatious grandstanding on the issue of interrogating enemy combatants, given his many rhetorical efforts to establish himself as our Moralizer in Chief on this issue, and yet given the reality of his horrid national security effort, it is apparent that while Obama has talked the talk, he has stumbled, fallen, stubbed a toe, pulled a hammy and broken both legs on the walk.

To continue from Mr. Hayes:

That's quite an admission. Blair wasn't finished (see the 51:00 mark of this video). "Frankly, we were thinking more of overseas people and, duh!, we didn't put it then. That's what we will do now. And so we need to make those decisions more carefully. I was not consulted and the decision was made on the scene. It seemed logical to the people there but it should have been taken using this HIG format at a higher level." . . .

Blair admitted that Abdulmutallab was not interrogated for intelligence purposes because the Obama administration had not considered using the newly-created elite interrogation unit on terrorist in the United States.

If Blair considered the handling of Abdulmutallab a mistake, FBI Director Robert Mueller, testifying at the same time before the Senate Judiciary Committee, did not. Mueller, like Blair, acknowledged that the crucial decision about how to treat Abdulmutallab was made by local FBI agents.

Now think about that for a second. It's not merely that the Director of the FBI, the DNI, and the DNCC were not contacted and that this was a systemic failure arising out of the lack of any procedure for a very forseeable contingeny. I think (hope and pray) that it is safe to assume these three stellar civil servants had heard about the attempted bombing in real time. But the fact is that after the undiebomber was captured, none of these individuals lifted so much as a finger to insinuate themselves into the situation to ensure that the undiebomber was interrogated for every bit of actionable intelligence that he possessed. Not a one of them made so much as a phone call. They sat with their thumbs up their collective asses in blissful ignorance while the Undiebomber was questioned by local FBI - who may or may not have the slightest background in counterterroism and the specifics of our intel on Abdulmutallab - and shortly thereafter, read his rights and given a lawyer. Lacking a procedure for this eventuality in year nine of the war on terror is unfathomable. Displaying this degree of placidity and lack of proactivity even in the abscence of a procedure is utterly unforgivable.

As an aside, it is not clear what role the DOJ directly played in that decision and, if they played any such role, whether Eric Holder was directly involved. That said, inquiring minds really, really want to know.

It should be noted that the White House, which, as previously noted, publicly trumpeted in August of 2009 that they had assumed a direct oversight role in high value interrogations, equally did nothing to intercede in this case. And let's not forget that the director of the National Counterterrorism Center was on vacation while all of this going on and that he, like Obama himself, saw no reason to cut his vacation short. All of this adds up to incompetence on a cosmic scale, a Three Stooges scale. And our national security is in their hands? Nyuck-Nyuck-Nyuck indeed.

. . . Mueller testified that those FBI agents interviewed Abdulmutallab about "ongoing and other threats." What the FBI director did not mention was that his agents interviewed the terrorist without any input from the National Counterterrorism Center — the institution we now know was sitting on top of a small mountain of not-yet-correlated information about the bomber.

So whatever information Abdulmutallab provided, he gave up in response to general questions about his activities, not in response to specific questions based on the intelligence the U.S. government had already collected on him. And within 24 hours — according to Senator Jeff Sessions, whose tough questioning left Mueller stuttering — Abdulmutallab was Mirandized and he stopped talking. (It would be nice to learn, from Mueller or someone else in a position to know, precisely when Abdulmutallab was read his rights.) . . .

Just unbelievable. If heads don't roll now for this level of ineptitude, we can rest assured that heads will roll in the future. It will be the heads of Americans who have placed their trust in Obama to protect our nation. Soaring rhetoric will stop neither bullets nor blast waves. Nor will Obama's moralizing be sufficient to keep a crippled jet in the sky. It seems inevitable that American blood will be spilled as a direct result of an Obama national security apparatus not merely in disaray, but Three Stooges-esque in its degree of incompetence.

Given that the Obama administration has already found criticism of their performance to be "galling," it is clear that the Obama administration is not going to do anything to correct this situation, Understand that there is no reason the Obama administration cannot, at this very moment, pull the Undiebomber out of our federal justice system, treat him as an enemy combatant, and interrogate him his every waking minute without the presence of a lawyer. Instead, Obama is refusing to pull the undiebombler out of the District Court docket now because it would be a tacit acknowledgement of the the glaring holes in and gross incompetence of his national security apparatus.

The second threat to our national security from Obama's decision to put terrorists in our civilian justice system comes from all the negative ramifications of a trial in our federal courts - as pointed out on numerous occasions by Andrew McCarthy. That brings us to the case of Aafia Siddiqui, once known as the most wanted woman in America for her al Qaeda ties. She is today on trial in NY District Court. You can read about her background here. Siddiqui is a Pakistani national who attended MIT. She was arrested in Pakistan with documents in her possession related to al Qaeda and that dealt with proposed mass casualty attacks. During questioning, she attempted to shoot her U.S. interrogators. Instead of leaving her in the military commission system, she is now being tried soley for the attempted shooting. As an aside, I have no idea whether she was ever interrogated before being given a lawyer and placed in the judicial docket for trial. Regardless, as to be expected, her trial on day 1 is turning into a circus. No Oil for Pacifists has the story. Among other things, she is loudly demanding that Jews be kept off the jury and the Judge, amazingly, has ruled that her ties to al Qaeda cannot be raised in the trial because it would be overly prejudicial. Let that sink in. This is a relatively easy trial. I can't wait to see the judicial rulings in KSM's trial.

I documented in detail two weeks ago how Obama had weakened our national security during his first year in office. I was far, far too easy on Obama. I had assumed that our national security apparatus was, nine years on from 9-11, a well oiled machine, but that Obama had made a command decision to move Abdulmutallab to federal Court. I had no idea that the reality is that our national security team is uncoordinated, incompetent, operating on autopilot without appropriate procedures in place and unfathomably lacking in proactiveness at the very highest levels. After Obama has had a full year in office, and after he had inherited a functioning system from the Bush administration, this is truly scandalous - not to mention incredibly dangerous for America. Call it Undiegate.

Update: The Washington Post Editorial Board arrives (a bit late) at the same conclusions:

. . . The Obama administration had three options: It could charge [the undiebomber] in federal court. It could detain him as an enemy belligerent. Or it could hold him for prolonged questioning and later indict him, ensuring that nothing Mr. Abdulmutallab said during questioning was used against him in court.

It is now clear that the administration did not give serious thought to anything but Door No. 1. This was myopic, irresponsible and potentially dangerous. . . .

According to sources with knowledge of the discussions, no one questioned the approach or raised the possibility of taking more time to question the suspect. This makes the administration's approach even more worrisome than it would have been had intelligence personnel been cut out of the process altogether.

Update 2 - It gets even worse. According to an AP report, the total amount of time the undiebomber was subject to questioning before being read his rights amounted to about two hours divided between two local FBI units, with the second interrogation being done by a unit that was, because of concerns with admissibility, not even briefed on the results of the initial fifty minutes of questioning.

Update 3: Charles Krauthammer is on precisely the same sheet of music this week.

Update 4: Maine's Susan Collins - of all people - goes nuclear on the Obama administration over this.



As Hot Air points out:

. . . when a moderate like Collins calls the handling of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab “irresponsible,” “dangerous,” and “inconceivable,” that has a broader political impact. When Collins says that “Foreign terrorists are enemy combatants and they must be treated as such,” and calls the current Obama policies a “charade,” that will make it more difficult for people to write it off as knee-jerk, right-wing contempt for Obama instead of his policies:

While Collins is on the money, she does not go quite far enough. Few people, Collins included, seem to be catching on to the degree to which Obama has deconstructed what was once a highly functional national security apparatus, not to mention the equally scandalous degree of institutional passivity at the top of that apparatus now.

Read More...

Summary only...