The Suicide Ethos
Regulations were not the reason Able Danger intelligence was purged.
After the worst domestic attack in the history of the United States, the constant refrain was that “9/11 changed everything.” All “walls” were taken down. Intelligence agents and criminal investigators–until then hindered from cooperating–were now to work hand-in-hand. National security was in. Obsession over imaginary civil-rights violations was out. The message was clear: Gather all the information, get it into the right hands, and connect all the dots.
Well it looks like the memo never made its way over to the Pentagon.
In mid-2000, the Department of Defense (DoD) intentionally purged a gargantuan amount of intelligence about al Qaeda — the enemy that had just blown up our embassies in east
Regardless of the ultimate resolution of the controversy over whether Mohamed Atta and three other hijackers were identified by Able Danger long before the attacks, there is no defending the destruction of valuable data. Nonetheless, that's just what DoD is trying to do. And central to this dismaying effort, four years out from 9/11, is the revival — as if it ever really went away — of the spirit (or, better, dispirit) that pervaded the Justice Department in the bad old days of "the wall."
Specifically, to justify what happened in 2000, DoD is today reading regulations that readily permit effective intelligence analysis as if acquiring information and, God forbid, sharing it, are the gravest of sins. I use "reading" with hesitation. For it's hard to understand how anyone literate in the English language could read the governing regulations to say what the Pentagon is reading them to say.
The Able Danger team members who claim to have identified terrorists and to have been thwarted in their efforts to share their information with the FBI are generally well-respected. Yet, top Defense officials publicly cast doubt on their credibility for weeks, insisting that no corroborating documentation had been found despite what was described as an "aggressive" internal investigation.
Finally on September 1, after the number of Able Danger participants supporting the Atta allegation had grown to five, the Pentagon called a news conference, at which a handful of mid-level officials were given the uncomfy task of confessing that much of the documentation generated by the program had actually been destroyed. Intentionally. Over five years ago.
Understand what this entailed. Erik Kleinsmith, a retired army major who was directed to carry out the purge in mid-2000, told the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing last Wednesday that he and a colleague "were forced to destroy all the data, charts, and other analytical products that we had not already passed on to [the Special Operations Command] related to Able Danger." Congressman Curt Weldon, who has been the prime mover behind the startling Able Danger revelations, elaborated that the breadth of deleted data was 2.5 terabytes — a staggering amount that would fill several rooms.
Why? Purportedly because of regulations. Here's how the matter was put by Pat Downs, a senior policy analyst who was among those dispatched to take the media heat at the press conference (emphasis is mine):
There are regulations. At the time how they were interpreted, very strictly pre-9/11, for destruction of information which is embedded, I guess is the way I would say it, that would contain any information on
This is abject nonsense. The Pentagon is allowed to collect information on
Moreover, contrary to this gibberish, when language is "interpreted very strictly," that means you limit yourself to doing exactly what it says — no rhythm, no wiggle room, no going the extra mile. A "strict interpretation" does not mean something which says "you may do this" is somehow read as if it said "you may not do this." Unless of course, we are back to the antinomian heyday of Clintonism (when the purge at issue, not coincidentally, took place) — talking points in hand as we ask what the definition of "is" is.
DoD refused to permit any of the Able Danger witnesses to testify before the Judiciary Committee (although it has now asked for a second chance, and Chairman Arlen Specter has agreed to hold a second hearing on October 5). The Pentagon did, however, send to last Wednesday's hearing William Dugan, Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's Acting Assistant for Intelligence Oversight.
Though not in a position to weigh in on Able Danger, Dugan is well-versed in the intelligence oversight regulations and the spirit in which they have been enforced lo these many years. His testimony proved to be an alarming eye-opener.
First, Dugan made clear that, under the law, the term "
Let that sink in for a second. The rules that the Pentagon keeps talking about are aimed at regulating what information DoD may collect on
But let's play along for a moment. Let's pretend that al Qaeda and Atta were somehow
As Dugan acknowledged, there is no component of military intelligence that has a mission to spy on
In the Information Era, the world is increasingly small. Thus, in the course of carrying out those missions, it frequently happens that DoD intelligence services will incidentally capture information about
Of course not. The whole point of the governing regulations is to allow the military to keep intelligence that might save American lives. Thus, Dugan conceded that the rules set forth 13 broad reasons for retaining information about
1. Information obtained with consent.
2. Publicly available information.
3. Foreign intelligence.
4. Counterintelligence.
5. Potential sources of assistance to intelligence activities.
6. Protection of intelligence sources and methods.
7. Physical security. [with a foreign nexus/connection]
8. Personnel security.
9. Communications security.
10. Narcotics. [international narcotics activity]
11. Threats to safety. [with a foreign nexus/connection — such as international terrorist organizations]
12. Overhead reconnaissance.
13. Administrative purposes. [training records — a narrowly drawn category].
There are few of these categories that would not provide, by themselves, a justification to maintain intelligence gathered on
So, al Qaeda and Atta did not even trigger
The answer has nothing to do with the regulations. It's all about mindset. The suicide ethos. Here's Dugan again:
Investigations … revealed the misuse of intelligence assets, both DoD and non-DoD, to collect information on civil rights protestors, anti-Vietnam war demonstrators, as well as community and religious leaders and labor leaders during the 1960's and early 1970's. What began as a force protection mission for DoD organizations, evolved, through mission creep, lack of clear rules, and the lack of meaningful oversight, into an abuse of the Constitutional rights of
Dugan went on to note that "[w]e place special emphasis on the protection of information on
The culture, the message to our forces, could not be more patent: protecting American lives is secondary to not being vexed by the ACLU and its fellow travelers. Even if proving our hearts are pure means gratuitously and utterly unnecessarily expunging goo-gobs of critical intelligence about our enemies in the middle of a war in which we know they are trying to kill us (and, mind you, al Qaeda regarded this as a war long before 9/11, even if our government didn't).
This all led to a worthy grilling of Dugan by Senator Specter:
SEN. SPECTER: Mr. Dugan, Mohammed Atta was not a
MR. DUGAN: Based on what I read in the press, I don't think so. Based on what I read in the press since
SEN. SPECTER: Mr. Dugan, you are the acting assistant secretary of defense for intelligence oversight. Can't you give us some more definitive answer to a very direct and fundamental and simple question like, "was Mohammed Atta a
MR. DUGAN: No, he was not.
SEN. SPECTER: ... Mr. Dugan, I know you were sent here by your superiors to do the best you could. I think the Department of Defense owes the American people an explanation as to what went on here.
It sure does.
— Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
