Time for a Checkmate

October 08, 2004

The pieces are arranged on the board in precise position for a checkmate tonight. Kerry is studying the board. Can he see the moves in time?

Let’s start with “fictionalized.” Yesterday, after the CIA report saying that Iraq had no WMDs and no plans to make WMDs, Kerry accused Bush of having “aggrandized and fictionalized” the Iraqi threat. Now, in my book, “fictionalized” means that Bush made it up. That goes to the heart of my work, and that of many others, on the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans, the Feith-based intelligence unit that “fictionalized” intelligence about Iraq.

Then Bush said: “He accused me of deception. He’s claiming I misled America about weapons, when he himself cited the very same intelligence.”

That leaves Kerry no option but make his only countermove: Yes, I looked at the very same intelligence. The intelligence you faked. Fictionalized. Manufactured. Mr. President, you lied to the American people about why we needed to invade Iraq.

I don’t see any other move for Kerry. Bush is right that Kerry blathered on about Iraqi WMD in 2002-2003, even though cooler heads—from UN inspectors, to former U.S. intelligence people, to writers like me—had repeatedly pooh-poohed the charges. Kerry has to follow through on the meaning of the word “fictionalized.” By using it, he’s crossed a bridge that he hasn’t crossed before. It isn’t that Bush’s “judgment” was wrong. It isn’t that Bush didn’t “plan” well for Iraq. It is that Bush lied.

Before the first presidential debate, I wrote that the one thing we wouldn’t hear about was the OSP, the lies and the manufactured, phony intelligence. Now I’m not so sure. Kerry has a chance to make a breathtaking, slam-dunk accusation against Bush that could change the entire debate overnight. Time for a checkmate.

NOTE TO READERS: Thanks to everyone who’s written in with comments. I can’t answer them personally, but I read every one, and I use them for ideas. I like getting the feedback, so please keep it coming. Meanwhile, from one “mystified” reader, DFG, comes this missive:

“I'm finally relieved to hear someone else mystified as to why Kerry won't go for the Clarke & O'Neill history of Bush/Cheney having their minds made up beforehand about the Iraq war … I'm also mystified as to why Kerry won't criticize Bush for 9/11.  He doesn't have to argue that he, or Gore, could have absolutely prevented 9/11.  But he can, and should argue that under the Democratic watch Bin Laden was under constant scrutiny, and because of that the 2000 scares never came off.  Clinton did prevent mayhem.  But, as is amply demonstrated, Bush deliberately took his national security eye off Bin Laden for the old cold war pipe dream of the Star Wars shield.”

Both of DFG’s ideas are part of how Kerry needs to checkmate Bush tonight. He lied about intelligence on Iraq. But he also had his mind made up before 9/11 (Clarke and O’Neill) and he bungled the hunt for Osama bin Laden, missed the warnings and failed to stop the attack. Why don’t we hear more about that early August 2001, intelligence briefing to Bush: “Bin Laden determined to strike in United States”? Inquiring voters want to know.