Everybody Agrees, George Tenet’s A Putz
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in History, Iraq, The War On Terrorism
That’s been the buzz after the 60 Minutes interview on Sunday. And he’s getting it from all sides.
Count me in the anti-Tenet group as well. I don’t really care if he’s dropping bombshells, because they’re hollow 3 years after the fact. I don’t usually say this, but it does feel like he’s really just trying to sell books. Otherwise he would have come out much, much earlier. It doesn’t make what he’s saying not true, but it does make it craven and says a lot about the man.
In any event, some former CIA agents have put together a letter lambasting Tenet for being a willing participant for a transparently failed policy.
In a letter written Saturday to former CIA Director George Tenet, six former CIA officers described their former boss as “the Alberto Gonzales of the intelligence community,” and called his book “an admission of failed leadership.”The writers said Tenet has “a moral obligation” to return the Medal of Freedom he received from President Bush.
They also called on him to give more than half the royalties he gets from book, “At the Center of the Storm,” to U.S. soldiers wounded in Iraq and families of the dead. (Watch Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice talk about Tenet’s book)
The letter, signed by Phil Giraldi, Ray McGovern, Larry Johnson, Jim Marcinkowski, Vince Cannistraro and David MacMichael, said Tenet should have resigned in protest rather than take part in the administration’s buildup to the war.
Somewhere out there, there must be someone defending George Tenet. I’m just having trouble finding that person (or persons).Let’s see: Liberals are ticked off. Conservatives feel betrayed. Ex-CIA types are angry. White House officials are playing defense. That pretty much runs the gamut, doesn’t it?
I can’t get beyond the following: Whatever Tenet’s strengths and weaknesses as CIA director, he quit three years ago. He accepted a presidential medal of freedom and then remained silent–until now, when he’s peddling a book. If he felt so strongly about these intelligence issues, about the rush to war in Iraq, about the way he says he’s been besmirched, why didn’t he speak out before now? How does he justify having remained silent?
This will be your legacy Mr. Tenet. Hope the book deal was worth it.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 1st, 2007 and is filed under History, Iraq, The War On Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
May 1st, 2007 at 1:11 pm
To the credit of Mr Tenet, his version of pre 09/11 History seems to be confirmed by an article from the french newspaper “Le Monde” published by Guillaume Dasquié on monday 16 April 2007, titled:”"September 11, 2001: The French Knew Much About It”.
I quote: “As of January 2001, the al-Qaeda leadership nonetheless showed itself to be transparent to the eyes - and ears - of French spies. The redactors even detailed disagreements among the terrorists over the practical modalities of the planned hijacking. They never questioned their intention. Provisionally, the jihadists favored capturing an airplane between Frankfurt and the United States. They established a list of seven possible companies. Two would finally be chosen by the September 11 pirates: American Airlines and United Airlines. In his introduction, the author of the memo notes, “According to the Uzbek intelligence services, the airplane hijacking plan seems to have been discussed at the beginning of 2000 during a Kabul meeting of representatives from Osama bin Laden’s organization….” Consequently, Uzbek spies informed French agents. At the time, the opposition of Muslim fundamentalists to the pro-American regime in Tashkent united the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the MIO. A military faction of this group, led by a certain Taher Yudachev, joined the Afghanistan camps and swore allegiance to Osama bin Laden, promising him he would export his jihad to Central Asia. MIO military leaflets and correspondence discovered in al-Qaeda’s Afghan camps attest to that. Alain Chouet remembers this episode. Until October 2002, he directed the Security Intelligence Service, a DGSE subdivision charged with following terrorist movements. According to him, the credibility of the Uzbek channel devolves from the alliances formed by General Rashid Dostom, one of the main Afghan warlords, himself of Uzbek ethnicity, who was then fighting the Taliban. To please his protectors in the neighboring Uzbek security services, Dostom infiltrated some of his men into the heart of the MIO, right up to the command structures of the al-Qaeda camps. That’s how he informed his friends in Tashkent, knowing that the intelligence would then make its way to Washington, London and Paris.”
end of quote.
An other quote: ” In its memo, the DGSE finally deems that al-Qaeda’s desire to execute its act of piracy against an American airplane was absolutely certain: “During the month of October 2000, Osama bin Laden attended a meeting in Afghanistan during which the decision in principle to conduct this operation was sustained.” It’s January 5, 2001; The dice have been thrown; the French know it…. And they are not the only ones. As with all intelligence mentioning risks against American interests, the memo was passed on to the CIA by the DGSE’s service for foreign relations, responsible for cooperation between allies (since renamed liaisons service). Its first recipient is Paris CIA Station Head Bill Murray, a French speaker with a John Wayne physique, since returned to the United States. We were able to make contact, but Mr. Murray did not want to respond to our requests. Pierre-Antoine Lorenzi, whose responsibilities at the DGSE then covered questions relative to cooperation with foreign agencies, cannot conceive that the intelligence should not have been handed over to him. “That is typically the type of information that is passed along to the CIA. It would even have been a professional error not to have done so.”
end of quote.
I am very surprised that nobody in the U.S. reacted to this paper ….
May 1st, 2007 at 1:30 pm
Justin, does your feeling of “anti-Tenet” include his being more culpable for the decisions relating to “go to war in Iraq” than those who made the decision?
If the Captain’s comment - a history that I have not heard until now but which I am prepared to accept for the moment - traces the pre-9/11 events then that might well be justified.
But I really want to toss the converse to you.
Does Tenet really matter? Is his story going to have the impact of Watergate? I very much doubt that it will. There is still too much patriotism and politics driving rather than there being any rampant anti-Bush movement. What then is the reason for the book? As you have pointed out, it is his personal golden parachute.