After C.I.A. Director, George Tenet took the blame for President Bush using fabricated information in the State of Union address that Iraq was attempting to purchase uranium from Africa to make nuclear weapons, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer told reporters that "the president has moved on. And I think, frankly, much of the country has moved on, as well." For those who believe Mr. Tenet’s mea culpa ends the speculation, I would like to call their attention to my late beloved grandmother. Whenever my grandmother was certain I was not telling the truth, she would look at me simultaneously with disbelief and compassion, saying in her Texas matter of fact way, “Baby, that dog won’t hunt!”
This was her way of letting me know that she knew there was something about my story that did not add up. Either I left out some important details, exaggerated the situation a bit, or simply lied in a desperate, 11th hour attempt to protect my backside. So as Mr. Tenet takes one for the team I once again hear my grandmother’s words reverberating in my psyche. The “It was all Mr. Tenet’s fault” alibi relies too heavily on our ignoring a myriad of facts. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice stated this week the administration did not learn until March that the documents about Iraq purchasing uranium from Africa were forged. But according to the Washington Post, Mr. Tenet successfully intervened White House officials to have a reference to Iraq seeking uranium from Niger removed from a presidential speech last October. Mr. Tenet doubted the accuracy of the documents underlying the allegation.
Secretary of State Colin Powell also weighed in last week on his reasons for not using the information in question, “Subsequently, when we looked at it more thoroughly… when I made my presentation to the United Nations and we really went through every single thing we knew about all of the various issues with respect to weapons of mass destruction, we did not believe that it was appropriate to use that example anymore.”
Given that Mr. Powell’s presentation to the United Nations was 8 days after the State of the Union address, whether it was October, February or March is secondary to the reality the administration knew something in which the best-case scenario has them confessing under pressure 3 months after the fact. The White House response, led by Mr. Powell, seeks to reduce the matter to nothing more than a “single sentence into the State of the Union address.” It is not a “single sentence,” it is the raison d’etre of the Bush Doctrine. The Bush Doctrine, which is based on preemptive war, is in question.
As conservative columnist George Will opined last month, “To govern is to choose, almost always on the basis of very imperfect information. But preemption presupposes the ability to know things -- to know about threats with a degree of certainty not requisite for decisions less momentous than those for waging war requires.”
Mr. Tenet’s confession does not address the problem. For the problem is no longer finding weapons of mass destruction, the atrocities of Saddam Hussein, or the president’s resolve to rid the world of terror.
The problem, as John Dean recently wrote, “Presidential statements,
particularly on matters of national security, are held to an expectation of the
highest standard of truthfulness.” The Bush Doctrine seems to be preemption
without reliable data, which hardly meets the criteria for “the expectation
of the highest standard.” Moreover, these decisions have caused human
casualties, more than 200 American soldiers and thousands of Iraqi men, women,
and children.
With each passing day that this administration remains in the purgatory between
George Tenet as fall guy and it is a “single sentence” theory, it
heightens the belief there was a major intelligence faux pas well beyond the scope
of Mr. Tenet’s acknowledgement or grave misconduct; neither is acceptable
for a doctrine based on preemption.
The Bush Administration’s failure to divulge the intelligence used to go to war leaves us with two choices: Buy bumper stickers that read: “Bush said it! I believe it! And that settles it! Or demand that they get another dog because this one won’t hunt the way it used to.