Bush's Shrinking Safety Zone

[tw]

60 Minutes interviews a retired CIA officer who provided the White House with its intelligence.

A Spy Speaks Out
A CIA official who had a top role during the run-up to the Iraqi war charges the White House with ignoring intelligence that said there were no weapons of mass destruction or an active nuclear program in Iraq.

The former highest ranking CIA officer in Europe, Tyler Drumheller, also says that while the intelligence community did give the White House some bad intelligence, it also gave the White House good intelligence — which the administration chose to ignore.

Of course, most are finally acknowledging what should have been obvious years ago. However that personal speculation is not sufficient. Supporting facts of even obvious conclusions must be learned. Even things obvious need detailed supportig facts.

A top CIA officer is speaking publicly about the obvious - how incompetently the White House handled intelligence. Just knowing that they did so is not sufficient. Informed Americans need these testimonies.

George Jr insisted intelligence agencies got it all wrong - an outright lie - blame others. What does an MBA then do? Create more layers of bureaucracy. George Jr's solution to stifling Federal Investigations that could have uncovered 11 Sept was Fatherland Security - more bureaucracy. To promote his myths that intelligence was flawed, he created a Director of National Intelligence - as if the CIA did not do that job. The New York Times of 19 April 2006 demonstrates what that bureaucracy has done:

In New Job, Spymaster Draws Bipartisan Criticism
The top Republican and the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee have disagreed publicly about many things, but on one issue they have recently come together. Both are disquieted by the first-year performance of John D. Negroponte, the director of national intelligence. ...

In an April 6 report, the Intelligence Committee warned that Mr. Negroponte's office could end up not as a streamlined coordinator but as "another layer of large, unintended and unnecessary bureaucracy." The committee went so far as to withhold part of Mr. Negroponte's budget request until he convinced members he had a workable plan.

Of course this is what MBAs do when they don't have grasp of how the work gets done - hire more subordinates - create more layers of bureaucracy.

Meanwhile other problems are being created by these bureacracy layers - a problem that would not exist under the previous and less bureaucratic system:

Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, who played a central role in devising the intelligence overhaul, said she was worried about what she said was Mr. Negroponte's failure to confront the Defense Department over an aggressive grab for turf over the past year. ...

In particular, she said she believed that Mr. Negroponte should have responded more assertively to a Pentagon directive last November that appeared to assert control over the National Security Agency, which does electronic eavesdropping; the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which takes satellite and aerial photos; and the National Reconnaissance Office, which launches and operates spy satellites. All are part of the Defense Department.

"While those agencies are hosted in the Pentagon, they report to the D.N.I.," Ms. Collins said. "I think the directive confused the relationship and weakened the D.N.I."

Which comes to another thread - the agenda of Rumsfeld - his "my way or the highway" attitude. No mystery that Rumsfeld wants intelligence functions moved into Pentagon's control. But that's another story.

These reports are about a White House that distorts intelligence for political agenda, then blames others, and then builds bureaucratic structures. As if bureaucracy will solve a competence problem; a president who lies for a political agenda. There was no intelligence failure. That intelligence failure is a mental midget who would even out a CIA agent to maintain his myths.