Another Obama-CIA rift as POTUS deflects blame from self, DNI and appointees

While the painstaking process of unearthing the “systematic failures” of intelligence on the “underwear bomber” continues, Obama again performs on script. Just as he’s done with virtually every past crises – and always while armed with only the bare essentials of information – the now infamous POTUS finger of blame moves away from anyone remotely connected with Obama, his decisions or performance of his appointees, and falls once again on his favorite scapegoat, the CIA.

And the CIA spy chiefs are none to happy about the accusations. It seemed especially harsh when, in an apparent moment of political expedience, Obama was hailing the seven CIA agents slain by a suicide bomber at a US base in the eastern province of Khost 24 hours later.

One day the President is pointing the finger and blaming the intelligence services, saying there is a systemic failure,’ said one agency official. ‘Now we are heroes. The fact is that we are doing everything humanly possible to stay on top of the security situation. The deaths of our operatives shows just how involved we are on the ground.’

But CIA bosses claim they were unfairly blamed at a time the covert government agency has been stretched further than ever before in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

They point to the murder of seven operatives at a remote mountain base in Afghanistan’s Khost Province as an example of how agents are putting their lives on the line at the vanguard of America’s far-flung wars.

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Some CIA officials are angry at being criticised by the White House after Abdulmutallab, 23, was allowed to slip through the security net and board a US-bound flight in Amsterdam despite evidence he was a terror threat.

The president complained that a warning from the former London engineering student’s father and information about an al Qaeda bomb plot involving a Nigerian were not handled properly by the intelligence networks.

But CIA officials say the data was sent to the US National Counterterrorism Centre in Washington, which was set up after the 9/11 attacks as a clearing house where raw data should be analysed.

Agents claim that is where the dots should have been connected to help identify Abdulmutallab as a threat.

The National Counterterrorism Center (aka NCTC) is a post 911 creation by President Bush’s EO# 13355 August 2004, subsequently codified by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (IRTPA).

The Director of NCTC is a Deputy Secretary-equivalent with a unique, dual line of reporting: (1) to the President regarding Executive branch-wide counterterrorism planning, and (2) to the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) regarding intelligence matters. NCTC follows the policy direction of the President, and National and Homeland Security Councils.

This means that the intel sharing buck now stops at the desk of retired Adm. Dennis Blair, Obama’s appointee as Director of National Intelligence, and the honcho who oversees the sharing of intel between the 16 intelligence agencies.

The interagency blame game eminates from Obama accusations that the CIA did not pass along complete information that would result in a “red flag” being raised. On Dec 29th, CNN reported what can only be construed as preliminary talking points obtained from “sources” (aka WH mouthpieces…?) insisting that CIA Langley headquarters received the information, then it “…sat there for five weeks and was not disseminated.”

However the CIA insists that a cable was sent to the NCTC in November, containing any and all information that could have put the underwear bomber on a no-fly list via interagency instructions.

According to CNN’s Jeanne Meserve, the father of the Christmas bomber Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, spoke to a CIA official with the Nigerian embassy about the concerns he had with his son’s disappearance, extremists views and ties to radicals in Yemen. The father, a former Nigerian banker, met with embassy officials at least once and also made several phone calls. A report was created on AbdulMutallab; the 23-year-old Nigerian and delivered to CIA headquarters, but the full contents of the report was not disseminated to other agencies, according to a source.

However, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly pushed back against the claim that the CIA sat on information that could have prevented the attempted bombing:

“State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said department staff did what they were supposed to have done by sending a cable to the National Counterterrorism Center in Washington about the matter. Kelly said any decision to have revoked the suspect’s visa would have been an interagency decision.”

The cable reportedly contained AbdulMutallab’s name, passport number and possible connection to extremists. “I’m not aware of a magic piece of intelligence somehow withheld that would have put AbdulMutallab on the no-fly list,” an official told CNN.

The National Counterterrorism Center claims that the CIA cable contained nothing that would have alerted officials to place AbdulMutallab on the no fly list. Out of hundreds of alerts the Counterterrorism Center receives each day, the cable on the Nigerian Christmas bomber apparently did not raise a red flag.

President Obama said on Tuesday that a red flag should have been raised. “Even without this one report, there were bits of information available within the intelligence community that could have and should have been pieced together, said Obama.

CBS News reported that as far back as August 2009, “the Central Intelligence Agency was picking up information on a person of interest dubbed “The Nigerian,” suspected of meeting with “terrorist elements” in Yemen.” CIA officials did not connect the information to the “underwear bomber” Abudulmutallab, until after the attempted bombing of Flight 253, with about 3 ounces of a powerful explosive hidde inside a pair of specially-made underwear.

Obama believes that had the full CIA report been shared with other agencies, the Nigerian bomber may have, at the very least, been given greater scrutiny that may have prevented the 23-year-old terrorist from boarding the plane in Amsterdam bound for the United States:

“Had this critical information been shared, it could been compiled with other intelligence, and a fuller, clearer picture of the suspect would have emerged. The warning signs would have triggered red flags, and the suspect would have never been allowed to board that plane for America,” said Obama in his speech delivered from his vacation in Hawaii.

While the CIA admits they did not forward on the full file of “the Nigerian”, it was not until after the attack that “the Nigerian” and the underwear bomber were positively ID’d as one and the same. This does not negate that absolute specifics of a potential terrorist… including his name, passport and key biographical information – was sent on the the NCTC more than a month before the Christmas attack.

“We learned of him in November, when his father came to the U.S. embassy in Nigeria and sought help in finding him. We did not have his name before then,” said Paul Gimigliano, a CIA spokesman. “Also in November, we worked with the embassy to ensure he was in the government’s terrorist database – including mention of his possible extremist connections in Yemen. We also forwarded key biographical information about him to the National Counterterrorism Center. This agency, like others in our government, is reviewing all data to which it had access – not just what we ourselves may have collected – to determine if more could have been done to stop Abdulmutallab.”

Obama is quick to lay blame on the CIA, despite their timely forwarding of risk specifics. The POTUS is also just as quick to ignore that the same information did not get relayed properly from his appointee to both his own office and Napolitano… the ultimate buck stop desks. This is yet another CYA moment for a naive CiC…. an obvious desperate attempt to draw focus away from his choices of appointees and the failures of his administration.

But friction between this POTUS and the CIA isn’t new… He didn’t win the hearts and minds of our own intelligence community when he declassified memos on CIA interrogation methods yet refused to release subsequent memos that noted success of thwarted attacks while simultaneously promising CIA agents immuity from prosecution.

Again, within 24 hours, the forked tongue POTUS was busy shifting blame for the false promises. In the lies about “immunity”, Obama deflected the blame to Holder.

Senior members of the Bush administration who approved the use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation measures could face prosecution, President Obama disclosed today .

He said the use of torture reflected America “losing our moral bearings”.

He said his attorney general, Eric Holder, was conducting an investigation and the decision rested with him. Obama last week ruled out prosecution of CIA agents who carried out the interrogation of suspected al-Qaida members at Guantánamo and secret prisons around the world.

But for the first time today he opened up the possibility that those in the administration who gave the go-ahead for the use of waterboarding could be prosecuted.

That was April… by September, investigations and broken promises were well underway – with Holder taking the heat instead of the POTUS. Either this President is a manipulated puppet figure, or the liar. But then… this is becoming a pattern with this President.

When it comes to accessible information, Obama is busy either releasing selective data, or locking it away… whichever proves to be more politically expedient for his image. As Wordsmith pointed out only yesterday, WH officials, pouring thru the Bush archives to find intel failures, is fair game if it helps the press focus anywhere other than his own admin’s failures. It will, however, be difficult to find Bush failures that lessen the blow to Obama’s national security credentials since events like the underwear bomber or the shootings at Ft. Hood simply didn’t happen post 911.

Obama’s assault on the CIA goes back even further… with a jr. Senator on record… Congressional Record most specifically… in putting the CIA on notice. In an ironic choice of date – Pearl Harbor Day – then Sen. Obama and professional POTUS campaigner lambasted the CIA over the destruction of videotape, and suggested that the CIA felt themselves to be above the law.

Mr. President, this incident deserves further congressional oversight and inquiry – neither the CIA nor this interrogation program is immune to our laws. This is yet another chapter in a dark period in our constitutional history. Now, it is time to turn the page. That is why I was heartened to learn that the House and Senate Intelligence Committees have reached agreement on including a requirement in the Intelligence Authorization bill that subjects CIA interrogators to the guidelines on interrogation included in the U.S. Army Field Manual. It would be a grave disappointment – though not surprising – if this important step forward were subject to a veto threat from the President. That must not deter the Congress from moving forward. We have a responsibility to act.

To make this pompous speech on a day of infamy is particularly arrogant. For I’m willing to bet that any US official and citizen would be quick to give the nod of approval to waterboard any suspect, or play loud music 24/7, if it prevented the deaths at Pearl Harbor.

From the actions and behavior of this POTUS… constantly deflecting blame to others at every avenue… we have learned two things.

First: There is nothing he is willing to take responsibility for directly. That’s why he has appointed lackeys.

Second: Obama’s choice of enemies should be harshly called into question. While he limits any sparse references of “war” with the global Islamic jihad movement to just AQ, he appears to be waging an all out war with our own intelligence agencies. This is a CiC who needs his priorities straightened out in the worst way.