Abdulmutallab - "...a policy failure more than an intelligence failure."

By John Ballard

Two good links to check out.

If you have half an hour to spare, Amy Goodman's interview of Spencer Ackerman at Democracy Now is worth every minute. A transcript is there if you're in a hurry, but it's worth watching just to catch Ackerman on a talking heads clip pointing out Pat Buchanan's advocacy of torture. Immediate reactions to Abdulmutallab's arrest and criminal charges included a lot of huffing and puffing that he was not instead charged as an "enemy combatant."

Otherwise, Ackerman's column in the Washington Independent is next best. In it he underscores the point that the attempted Christmas bombing illustrates a policy failure, not a security failure. 

New information may surface. But based on this, is it really fair to point the finger at the intelligence community here? Abdulmutallab�s father told embassy officials in Abuja that he didn�t know where his son was, but might be in Yemen. The CIA had that information. NSA has information that a Nigerian might be used for an attack sponsored by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. If all of this had gone into the NCTC, would someone have put two and two together � setting off the process for pulling Abdulmutallab�s visa or putting him on the no-fly? Maybe. And the rationale for the all-source, multi-agency NCTC is all about intelligence sharing. But remember: the inputs are that the guy�s dad says he�s dangerous; he�s Nigerian; he might be in Yemen; and al-Qaeda in Yemen may be looking to use a Nigerian in a forthcoming attack. Is that really enough?

The answer to that question most certainly requires a policy decision, not an intelligence decision. The intelligence community is drinking from a fire hose of data, a lot of it much more specific than what was acquired on Abdulmutallab. If policymakers decide that these thin reeds will be the standard for stopping someone from entering the United States, then they need to change the process to enshrine that in the no-fly system. But it will make it much harder for people who aren�t threatening to enter, a move that will ripple out to effect diplomacy, security relationships (good luck entering the U.S. for a military-to-military contact program if, say, you�re a member of the Sunni Awakening in Iraq, since you had contacts with known extremists), international business and trade, and so on. Are we prepared for that?

Similarly, there�s a reasonable issue to investigate about intelligence-sharing processes even in the pre-specific-threat level. But remember: that just increases the firehose of data NCTC must process. Information is supposed to filter up to NCTC in strength and specificity from the component intelligence agencies so that NCTC isn�t overwhelmed. If we want to say that there should be a lower standard for sharing with NCTC, fine. But then either NCTC needs to be given more resources, or we risk missing the next Abdulmutallab because NCTC�s analysts will be drowning in nonspecific data and trying to rope it to flotillas of additional information. It�s reasonable to ask, however, what the CIA did post-Nov. 19 to investigate Abdulmutallab specifically. But it�s also important to remember that barely a month passed between his father�s warning and Flight 253.

None of this is to excuse any complacency. It�s to provide context for evaluating whatever complacency occurred.

Two policy issues are now in the spotlight.

At the entry level this case screams for clarification of categories and rules. Between the ground level of data collection and the famous "no-fly list" is a swamp of poorly organized information. Like Will Rogers, all I know is what I read in the papers, but at a glance it appears that NCTC is charged with a mammorth task without enough resources. At the same time that agency is trapped in a political tug-o-war between those who would handle captured would-be terrorists as a criminals and others who would prefer them handed over to the military.

Which is why I say there are two policy issues, not one. This is a muddy conversation about counter-terrorism repeating the same mistake made elsewhere, confusing tactics with strategy. Fortunately, resolving one (strategy) will lead to clarification of the other. 

Like Ackerman I am encouraged that the president's instincts are toward the criminal response rather than the "enemy combatant" response. As Ackerman said in the interview...

...if there�s anything encouraging about the way Obama and the administration is handling it, it�s that his first instinct and the Justice Department�s first instinct was not to declare him an enemy combatant, was not to take him to some prison overseas, was not to say that he couldn�t be tried in the normal justice system, but to actually have FBI officials on the scene conduct an investigation of him, to question him, to extract information from him, and then to bring charges against him, when it was clear that information leading to a prosecution was in evidence. So if there�s, you know, any bright side from the immediate aftermath of the touchdown of Flight 253, it�s that.

And to see, you know, Tom Ridge, who was Homeland Security secretary when Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, in late 2001 was charged, tried and convicted in a civilian prison, suddenly saying that this is insufficient and an outrage and so on and so forth, is just too hypocritical and ridiculous to take seriously.  [From the transcript, first link above]

The contrast between this administration's response and that of the previous administration is vivid. Those who say this president is not making changes are either blind to this point or after his hide for some other reason. This is not trivial. This is huge.

And the political conflict over this larger policy issue is clear in the light of Senator DeMint's hold on the nomination of Errol Southers as head of the TSA, discussed in the interview. When you listen to the political noise banging away in the background it is easy to understand how tough it is to bring about substantive changes in Washington without overwhelming political clout. 

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An obvious footnote points to Guantanamo. The very existence of that place (and other extra-legal operations scattered all over the world) is among the most problematic of any policy challenges facing the president. It would be wonderful if all he had to do was lock the gates and send in a crew to put it in mothballs. Unfortunately that would not solve the constitutional questions that arise with the status of former inmates. There is a reason they are called "detainees" instead of inmates. That designation goes to the nub of their status as person's outside the protections of the US Constitution. And the president happens to be a scholar familiar with the complexities of constitutional law. He also knows that Guantanamo is the tip of an iceberg floating all over the world. (And in my opinion that policy iceberg includes drones and missiles that have "Made in USA" all over them.)

An army of tailors threads needles one at a time.

This end of the year/decade reflection by Tom Watson sums up my feelings as well.

...the first Obama year proves - to me at least - that we're all fools for investing so much in the person at the top of the ticket. I was talking to my friends Ben and Charles about this last night, as the clock ticked toward midnight. We talked about the sheer size of the Federal government, with two million employees, and the limits on any President's time in both decision-making and management. The most President Obama can do is set the general agenda, appoint managers, react to national emergencies, and focus on several key issues per year - in addition to running for re-election and leading his party.

So I try to temper my keen disappointment in Obama's passive-aggressive tactics on healthcare - slow out of the box, tepid use of his former grassroots army, generally empty bully pulpit, pre-compromising with big insurance, and the lack of a principled stand on public healthcare - with the knowledge that his power is limited. I was younger in the 90s for the Clinton presidency, and spent much of those eight years angry at a Democratic commander in chief. I'm not making the same mistake twice. I was never on the hope and change bandwagon - I'm old enough to know they were marketing slogans - so I don't have any sense of personal betrayal toward the President, who was, after all, my second choice for the Democratic nomination. Obama gives himself a B-plus; I give him a B-minus. Which is fine - I was hoping for a B presidency after eight years of D-minus.

His whole post is excellent. He has a lot more to say, but that much fits this post quite well.

Later...

Looks like Tom Watson and I are not alone. Check out this by Dr. Leon Hadar at CATO.

AS ONE of the most exhilarating - and yet depressing - years in the history of Washington comes to an end, many pundits are already writing the political obituary of the leading character in this chapter: Barack Obama is predicted to become a one-term president.

Indeed, some of Mr Obama's former groupies have become very melodramatic, depicting him as the Fallen Messiah or as the God that Failed, and insisting that they will not be stuffing envelopes or knocking on doors in Iowa on his behalf if Mr Obama decides to run for a second term in 2012.

It is certainly too early to start making political bets on the outcome of the next presidential race or, for that matter, on the Congressional midterm election in 2010.

But the collapse of the Cult of Obama and the recognition that he has become a 'normal' political figure and will probably not turn out to be a 'transformational' president should be regarded as a very positive development - and one more sign that reason and realism have come back in fashion in Washington this year.

[...]

While members of the elites in Washington continue to publicly express their commitment to the old meta-narrative, they are now all aware of the high political and economic costs of trying to promote this project that are obvious for all to see - whether it is a shrinking and economically depressed middle class at home or the challenges from rising economies or aggressive nation-states and movements abroad.

Mr Obama does not have the power or even the will to help draw the outlines of a new meta-narrative. That kind of intellectual transformation will take a long time and will require a collective effort.

Instead, Mr Obama is now presiding over a process of re-matching American goals with the eroding means in its disposal, of bringing Americans back to earth to face the glum realities, whether it is the jobless economy or the quagmire in Afghanistan. 

It is a cross between being a head of cleaning-crew and a group therapist, a very unromantic and thankless job as he has discovered this year. But someone has got to do it.