Obama Playing Politics With National Security Regarding Release Of Interrogation Memos And Threat To Bring Charges Against Attorneys Who Wrote Them

The Washington Post reports that "a source familiar with White House views said Obama’s advisers are further convinced that letting the public know exactly what the past administration sanctioned will undermine what they see as former vice president Richard B. Cheney’s effort to 'box Obama in' by claiming that the executive order heightened the risk of a terrorist attack." In other words, pure politics took a higher place than national security. The New York Times explained the political motives behind releasing the memos and threatening to bring the lawyers who wrote them up on criminal charges when it wrote that "Mr. Obama and his allies need to discredit the techniques he has banned. Otherwise, in the event of a future terrorist attack, critics may blame his decision to rein in C.I.A. interrogators." This is what not allowing Cheney to "box-in" the White House actually means. Obama is putting future political considerations ahead of national security.

In fact, the Washington Post reports that "five CIA directors -- including Leon E. Panetta and his four immediate predecessors -- and Obama's top counterterrorism adviser had expressed firm opposition to the release of interrogation details in four top secret memos in which Bush administration lawyers sanctioned" enhanced interrogation techniques. George Tenet, who served as CIA director under Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, told CBS's "60 Minutes" in April 2007: "I know this program alone is worth more than the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together have been able to tell us." Yet Obama ignored them all so that Cheney could not "box-in" the administration.

President Obama's national intelligence director Adm. Dennis C. Blair told colleagues in a private memo last week that “high value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country." It appears that the White House tried to suppress this key part of Blair's memo. The New York Times reports that "Admiral Blair’s assessment that the interrogation methods did produce important information was deleted from a condensed version of his memo released to the media last Thursday. Also deleted was a line in which he empathized with his predecessors who originally approved some of the harsh tactics after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001." In other words, the Obama White House appears to have attempted to cover up their own intelligence director's assessment that the techniques used allowed for high value information to be gathered.

Cheney has objected to Obama's only releasing legal memos. The fact that Obama only released the legal memos justifying the techniques used by CIA interrogaters and not any showing the successes of the interrogations is evidence itself of Obama's political calculating. Cheney first said on "Hannity" that the White House should declassify documents that show the success of the techinques used in thwarting terrorist attacks. Hillary Clinton then responded by saying that Cheney was not a "reliable source of information." Cheney has hit back by showing that he is indeed a reputable source. He has now formally requested the Obama administration declassify two specific documents on intelligence obtained from the enhanced interrogation program that Obama has decried as torture, according to a copy of Cheney's request obtained by POLITICO. POLITICO reports that "the form filed with the National Archives' Presidential Libraries section on March 31 of this year shows that Cheney asked for declassification review of the two items from a folder called 'detainees' within 'OVP Cheney immediate office files.' The titles of the memoranda or reports were blacked out for classification reasons, however, one memo sought was dated July 13, 2004, and totaled eight pages, and another dated June 1, 2005, totals 13 pages. Cheney filled out the request himself--it's in his handwriting... National Archives officials said earlier this week that the request has been routed to the CIA for action. POLITICO obtained Cheney's request under the Freedom of Information Act."

The CIA has openly stated that the methods used helped stave off a monumental terrorist attack in the United States. CNSNews.com reports "that the Central Intelligence Agency said that it stands by the assertion made in a May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo that the use of enhanced techniques' of interrogation on al Qaeda leader Khalid Sheik Mohammed (KSM) — including the use of waterboarding — caused KSM to reveal information that allowed the U.S. government to thwart a planned attack on Los Angeles. Before he was waterboarded, when KSM was asked about planned attacks on the United States, he ominously told his CIA interrogators, 'Soon, you will know.' According to the previously classified May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo that was released by President Barack Obama last week, the thwarted attack — which KSM called the 'Second Wave'– planned ‘to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner into’ a building in Los Angeles."

Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI), the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, wrote a piece in the Wall Street Journal saying he has asked Adm. Blair "to provide me with a list of the dates, locations and names of all members of Congress who attended briefings on enhanced interrogation techniques. Any investigation must include this information as part of a review of those in Congress and the Bush administration who reviewed and supported this program. To get a complete picture of the enhanced interrogation program, a fair investigation will also require that the Obama administration release the memos requested by former Vice President Dick Cheney on the successes of this program. An honest and thorough review of the enhanced interrogation program must also assess the likely damage done to U.S. national security by Mr. Obama's decision to release the memos over the objections of Mr. Panetta and four of his predecessors. Such a review should assess what this decision communicated to our enemies, and also whether it will discourage intelligence professionals from offering their frank opinions in sensitive counterterrorist cases for fear that they will be prosecuted by a future administration."

John McCain has described Obama's actions as a "witch hunt." McCain rightly said during an interview with CBS's "Early Show" that "if you criminalize legal advice, which is basically what they’re going to do, then it has a terribly chilling effect on any kind of advice and counsel that the president might receive." He compared the potential prosecutions with the actions of “banana republics” that “prosecute people for actions they didn’t agree with under previous administrations. To go back on a witch hunt that could last for a year or so, frankly, is going to be bad for the country, bad for future presidents — precedents that may be set by this, and certainly nonproductive in trying to pursue the challenges we face.”
Tweet