Fatal Errors

 

Dianne Feinstein is a Democratic senator from California.

Editor’s note: President Bush told the nation he can’t think of any mistakes he’s made during his presidency. What follows are excerpts from an April 14 speech by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., before the Silicon Valley Manufacturing Group in San Jose, Calif., offering an alternative perspective.

Last night, President Bush was asked the question whether his administration has made any mistakes with regard to Iraq.

I believe several very serious mistakes were made:

• Believing that we would be greeted as liberators;
• Thinking that this could be done with a very limited number of troops;
• Disbanding the Sunni Baathist managers responsible for Iraq’s water, electricity, sewer system and all the other critical parts of that country’s infrastructure, along with the Iraqi army and police force; and
• Failing to provide a follow-on force that could have secured the Iraqi infrastructure from looters and the take-down of virtually all the infrastructure of Iraq.

So, after the military operation was over, we were immediately behind the 8-ball and we have been trying to catch up ever since.

Additionally, the war was fought because the administration contended there was a grave, growing, and, yes, imminent threat that Iraq possessed and would use weapons of mass destruction, namely biological and chemical weapons.

For the past two and a half years, I have served on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which provides oversight to the 15 intelligence departments of the United States government.

With respect to Iraq, the Intelligence Committee received a classified version of the National Intelligence Estimate, (NIE) and an unclassified version was available to the public.

The key findings were very specific: Saddam Hussein possessed chemical and biological weapons.

I joined 76 members of the Senate to vote to give the president authorization to use force in Iraq.

To date, no biological or chemical weapons have been found in Iraq, and there is no evidence of any ongoing nuclear program"despite inspection of literally thousands of high-priority spots by the military, by a special Iraqi survey group headed by Dr. David Kay, and now by a replacement group.

It seems clear now that 1) we have a flawed intelligence system and 2) we were misled by this administration.

I don’t believe that if the mission had been just regime change there would have been 77 votes in the Senate to authorize use of force. There certainly would not have been my vote, and there may not have been a majority.

Nonetheless, we are where we are. And I believe U.S. failure in Iraq would have profound implications. It would:

• Increase the likelihood of civil war, Sunni against Shi'ite against Kurd;
• Dash any possibility for the spread of democracy and human rights in the region; and
• Embolden Al Qaeda, possibly leading to further attacks against the United States and our allies.

The question now is whether the United States should turn over authority to an interim Iraqi regime on June 30; whether we have enough troops in the country to help guarantee that Iraq does not erupt into civil war; and whether we can convince the international community to help stabilize Iraq.

The problem is that there is no plan that I know of to turn it over to the government. To whom do you turn it over?

If we are going to be successful going forward, there are a few areas where I think we need to concentrate:

First, last night the president indicated that he would provide whatever troops and resources General Abizaid, commander of the U.S. forces in the region, felt were needed. It is estimated that this is between an additional 10,000 and 20,000 troops. This is vital and necessary.

This has been made even more important because the Iraq Police Service performed so poorly. When the going got tough, they are nowhere around.

Second, the United Nations and the international community must be given a greater role in helping to develop Iraq's transition to a new constitution and government, along with oversight of the economic restoration and rebuilding of the infrastructure.

The only force that Iraq could be turned over to, which would be credible internationally, and perhaps internally, would be the United Nations.

This would bring in the care and the concern of the entire world, and not just the United States, which has the most unfortunate role right now of being intensely hated by many in the Muslim world.

It is a very serious situation that confronts our nation. A clear and comprehensive plan of action is needed, and so far, I do not believe the president has presented one to the American public.

Now, let me turn to the hearings before the 9/11 Commission.

I have been very impressed by the conduct of this Commission, the testimony it has elicited from major public officials from the past and the present administrations, and the bipartisan basis on which it has conducted its business. The members have been doing a great service for this nation.

Members of the Intelligence Committee receive intelligence reports known as senior executive intelligence briefings. They are somewhat similar to the Presidential Daily Brief you have all heard about.

You can look through these and you see similar bits of intelligence. After you read them for a while, you can pick up signals from the text that are being sent from the intelligence community.

Back in June, July and August of 2001, directly prior to 9/11, the intelligence briefs were filled with action"what they called ‘the chatter’ was extraordinary.

George Tenet, it has been reported, was going around with his hair on end, trying to warn people that something was going to happen.

And yes, he came before our committee and he shared his concerns with us as well.

It is difficult for to understand how the President’s Daily Brief of Aug. 6 could be regarded as purely historical. That brief sent out signals that were major in scope.

It suggested patterns of activity that could lead to a hijacking in the United States. It indicated that Al Qaeda supporters have easy access to this country.

And it mentioned 70 field investigations that were being carried out by the FBI.

What should have happened?

What I think should have happened is the president should have gone back to Washington and cancelled his month-long vacation in Texas.

He should have pulled together the director of the FBI, the CIA, the DIA, his cabinet, the attorney general, the secretaries of state, defense and transportation, the head of the FAA"He should have said, "I want to have a report tomorrow from each and every one of you about the extent of the danger and what we can do to secure our nation."

He should have asked for a report on each of the 70 investigations by the FBI and gone through them one by one.

Anybody who has ever run anything knows that the way to get the best out of people is by calling them together and holding them accountable and being specific about what you want.

And if you are the top person"the mayor, the governor, the president"you can cut through red tape and get it done. And that is what hands-on management is all about.

Unfortunately, things that might have rung a bell didn’t ring a bell.

For example, the arrest of Zacharias Moussaoui on August 16"he was in a flight school, but didn’t want to learn about landings and take-offs, only about steering a plane. That should have been a clue.

A memo written by an FBI agent in Phoenix"which mentioned a series of people taking flying lessons who bore further investigation"was sent as a routine memo.

It didn’t percolate up the chain of command. It never got to the top.

These are things we need to examine more closely. Not only to understand what went wrong, but how we can change things.

How do we provide an operational intelligence function in our government, which moves away from a Cold War intelligence agency"the CIA vs. KGB"and instead is able to concentrate on non-state, asymmetric terror warfare.

Our major worry today should be a radioactive bomb or a second wave of attacks, perhaps on the West Coast.

And we have to see that the intelligence operations are in place to be able to find that out before another tragedy takes place.

I do not know if "shaking the trees" would have allowed us to prevent 9/11. But I do know that if you are concerned about a threat, and if you believe that there is a systemic problem, you shake the trees. There is no evidence that this occurred, based on the testimony to the 9/11 Commission. My concern here is not primarily looking back or seeking to engage in recriminations.

My concern is looking forward: are we doing enough, now, to make sure that the United States, our citizens and our interests are protected from the threats of tomorrow.

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Published: Apr 16 2004