No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for January 30th, 2010

Weekend Hot Read – Michael V. Hayden’s “Obama administration takes several wrong paths in dealing with terrorism”

by @ 15:21. Filed under Politics - National, War on Terror.

(H/T – Stephen Hayes)

Michael Hayden, the immeidate previous director of the CIA, wrote a scathing critique of the Obama administration’s handling of terrorism. The part dealing with the administration’s handling Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Fruit of the Boom bomber, is telling:

In the 50 minutes the FBI had to question him, agents reportedly got actionable intelligence. Good. But were there any experts on al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in the room (other than Abdulmutallab)? Was there anyone intimately familiar with any National Security Agency raw traffic to, from or about the captured terrorist? Did they have a list or photos of suspected recruits?

When questioning its detainees, the CIA routinely turns the information provided over to its experts for verification and recommendations for follow-up. The responses of these experts — “Press him more on this, he knows the details” or “First time we’ve heard that” — helps set up more detailed questioning.

None of that happened in Detroit. In fact, we ensured that it wouldn’t. After the first session, the FBI Mirandized Abdulmutallab and — to preserve a potential prosecution — sent in a “clean team” of agents who could have no knowledge of what Abdulmutallab had provided before he was given his constitutional warnings. As has been widely reported, Abdulmutallab then exercised his right to remain silent.

Hayden then goes on to list a host of other missteps. The takeaway is equally shocking, unless you consider that the ObamiNation’s main class enemy is not Al Qaeda:

There’s a final oddity. In August, the government unveiled the HIG for questioning al-Qaeda and announced that the FBI would begin questioning CIA officers about the alleged abuses in the 2004 inspector general’s report. They are apparently still getting organized for the al-Qaeda interrogations. But the interrogations of CIA personnel are well underway.

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