Find, Fix, Finish (4 page)
Authors: Aki Peritz,Eric Rosenbach
Although the world had changed, the US government hadn’t. Congress did not reorganize its national security functions, and congressional committees did not change the way they handled foreign policy, defense, and intelligence. Emerging issues like international terrorism, which fell under the jurisdiction of fourteen different committees, fell between the cracks. Later, the 9/11 Commission concluded that terrorism was a “second- or third-order priority within the committees of Congress responsibility for national security,” including the Senate and House Armed Services, Foreign Relations, and Intelligence Committees.
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One month after the Clinton administration took office, however, an event occurred that proved a harbinger of the changing nature of threats to the US. On February 26, 1993, a bomb placed beneath the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City ripped a hole through four stories, killing six people and injuring over a thousand. The damage, however, was not as great as the attackers intended. The leader of the attack, Ramzi Yousef, would later state he had hoped to collapse the towers into each other and kill some 500,000 people.
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FBI agents quickly deduced that a vehicle-borne explosive had caused the explosion. In fact, a truck containing over 1,300 pounds of explosive material detonated in the public parking garage. Sifting carefully through the debris, they discovered parts from the truck that had carried the bomb and traced the vehicle to a Ryder rental facility, where records indicated that Mohammad Salameh had rented the truck. Salameh, a cost-conscious international terrorist, attempted to reclaim the security deposit for the truck eight days later. Authorities quickly arrested him, and the FBI took three other conspirators into custody and, two years later, would catch up with Ramzi Yousef in Pakistan.
In hindsight, a speedy end to the 1993 WTC bombing had its disadvantages. Because the FBI quickly located and arrested the conspirators, and because the bombs killed relatively few people, many officials assumed that existing counterterrorism systems would effectively protect Americans. “It seemed like the counterterrorism machinery was working well,” wrote Richard Clarke. “It wasn’t. The FBI and CIA should have been able to answer my questions, ‘Who
are
these guys?’ but they still could not.”
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Because the IC did not fully identify the threat, neither the public nor the policy community could galvanize to counter it.
are
these guys?’ but they still could not.”
13
Because the IC did not fully identify the threat, neither the public nor the policy community could galvanize to counter it.
In the aftermath of the attack, the White House made no distinguishable policy shift regarding terrorism. “Clinton was aware of the threat and sometimes he would mention it,” said Leon Panetta, Clinton’s first-term chief of staff, who would lead the CIA and the Pentagon under Obama. But the big issues at the time were “Russia, Eastern bloc, Middle East peace, human rights, rogue nations and then terrorism.”
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Complicating the issues, the White House maintained some distance from its intelligence bureaucracy, preferring to focus on domestic programs. Few major counterterrorism initiatives were proposed, and those that were—such as the FBI counterterrorism center—were not thoroughly implemented. President Clinton infamously avoided contact with CIA for almost two years after the bombing, not once meeting privately with CIA director James Woolsey. Woolsey later recalled that in 1994, when a two-seater Cessna aircraft crashed onto the White House lawn, administration staffers joked, “That must be Woolsey still trying to get an appointment.”
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PICKING UP THE PACE15
President Clinton announced in January 1995 that he would introduce “comprehensive legislation to strengthen our hand in combating terrorists, whether they strike at home or abroad.” In February, he worked with Congress to introduce legislation targeting terrorist financing and easing restrictions on deporting terrorists.
A bitter wind arrived later that year when two separate incidents vaulted terrorism into the public view and onto the list of US government priorities. In March, members of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo released sarin gas into three different lines of the Tokyo subway system, killing twelve and injuring over a thousand. Japanese authorities later discovered that the cult was capable of producing enough sarin to kill over 4 million people.
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For the US government, the event demonstrated that a small group—with limited means and without backing from any nation—could develop its own chemical or biological weaponry and pose a significant threat.
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For the US government, the event demonstrated that a small group—with limited means and without backing from any nation—could develop its own chemical or biological weaponry and pose a significant threat.
In April, Timothy McVeigh, assisted by Terry Nichols, detonated a truck bomb in the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in downtown Oklahoma City and killed 168 people. It was the worst attack on American soil to date, and made a strong impact on the American psyche. One month later, the Clinton White House strengthened the proposed legislation, adding provisions boosting FBI surveillance authority and providing new money to the IC.
June 1995 brought the most significant change yet. That month, President Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive (PDD) 39—“US Policy on Counterterrorism.” The directive delineated the responsibilities of the various government agencies in deterring and responding to terrorism and stipulated that they give “the highest priority to developing effective capabilities to detect, prevent, defeat and manage the consequences of nuclear, biological, or chemical materials or weapons use by terrorists.” PDD 39 also specified that terrorism should be viewed as a “threat to national security as well as a criminal act,”
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a declaration that assigned the counterterrorism portfolio to the NSC, Department of Defense, and the CIA as well as specific law enforcement agencies.
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a declaration that assigned the counterterrorism portfolio to the NSC, Department of Defense, and the CIA as well as specific law enforcement agencies.
The directive also led to the expansion of the CIA’s rendition program, which empowered the agency to remove suspects from foreign countries without the benefit of the formal extradition process and bring them outside the country, even if that country did not officially approve of the transfer. “If we do not receive adequate cooperation from a state that harbors a terrorist whose extradition we are seeking, we shall take appropriate measures to induce cooperation,” read the PDD. “Return of suspects by force may be effected without the cooperation of the host government.”
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CIA Director John Deutch’s 1996 speech “Worldwide Threat Assessment Brief” recognized a shift in the general nature of threats facing the US. “The potential for surprise is greater than it was in the days when we could focus our energies on the well-recognized instruments of Soviet power.”
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However, Deutch mentioned terrorism as a threat to US security only after he concluded his remarks on India-Pakistan, China, North Korea, Russia, Iraq, Iran, Bosnia, Libya, Sudan, Mexico, Haiti, Cuba, and WMD proliferation. Accordingly, by 1996, President Clinton sought assurances from other countries that they would not provide safe haven to terrorists and directed the IC to target al-Qaeda specifically, despite neither the CIA nor the administration considering the organization the biggest terrorist threat to the US at the time. According to the worldwide threat assessment, Iran was still the main terror threat to the US.
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However, Deutch mentioned terrorism as a threat to US security only after he concluded his remarks on India-Pakistan, China, North Korea, Russia, Iraq, Iran, Bosnia, Libya, Sudan, Mexico, Haiti, Cuba, and WMD proliferation. Accordingly, by 1996, President Clinton sought assurances from other countries that they would not provide safe haven to terrorists and directed the IC to target al-Qaeda specifically, despite neither the CIA nor the administration considering the organization the biggest terrorist threat to the US at the time. According to the worldwide threat assessment, Iran was still the main terror threat to the US.
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These changes would spur Congress to stabilize the CIA budget and increase the FBI’s starting in 1996. Also that year, Congress passed some of Clinton’s proposals as the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act. This legislation banned fund-raising by groups that supported terrorists or terrorist activities. It required all plastic explosives to contain chemical markers that indicate the presence of a bomb, expanded federal jurisdiction to prosecute and deport terrorist suspects, and strengthened penalties for terrorism. The bill, however, lacked a number of provisions requested by President Clinton, including increased wiretap and surveillance authority for the FBI.
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Most of the act’s provisions once again treated counterterrorism as a law enforcement activity, strengthening investigations that would occur
after
an attack.
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Most of the act’s provisions once again treated counterterrorism as a law enforcement activity, strengthening investigations that would occur
after
an attack.
In 1998, President Clinton signed PDD 62 and PDD 63, which reaffirmed the provisions set out in PDD 39. These two PDDs attempted to further define the role of governmental agencies in preventing and responding to terrorist attacks, sketched out recommendations regarding critical infrastructure protection, and promoted Clarke to national coordinator for security, infrastructure protection, and counterterrorism.
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Although Clarke would become a major advocate of find-fix-finish operations against terrorists, particularly bin Laden, his new position only allowed him to “provide advice regarding budgets for counterterrorism programs and lead in the development of guidelines that might be needed for crisis management.”
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TRIAL AND ERROR22
Although Clarke would become a major advocate of find-fix-finish operations against terrorists, particularly bin Laden, his new position only allowed him to “provide advice regarding budgets for counterterrorism programs and lead in the development of guidelines that might be needed for crisis management.”
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The new presidential directives would soon be tested in real life. On August 7, 1998, less than three months after the signing of PDD 62 and 63, al-Qaeda struck American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania with simultaneous suicide bombings, events that together proved a watershed for all organizations working in the area of counterterrorism. While the US first assumed that it was the work of Iran-backed Lebanese terror group Hizbollah—Iran was implicated in the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia two years before—and sent CIA experts on Hizbollah to inspect the bomb sites,
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US intelligence eventually linked the bombings to al-Qaeda and bin Laden, and, almost as quickly, received information that several hundred terrorist leaders, including bin Laden, might be meeting at a training camp near Khost, Afghanistan.
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US intelligence eventually linked the bombings to al-Qaeda and bin Laden, and, almost as quickly, received information that several hundred terrorist leaders, including bin Laden, might be meeting at a training camp near Khost, Afghanistan.
In the months before the bombings, the Pentagon was asked to prepare a potential plan of attack on bin Laden and the al-Qaeda network. At the time, officials had suggested firing Tomahawk cruise missiles to destroy a series of targets. After the embassy bombings, that plan would become the NSC’s main retaliatory option. On August 20, cruise missiles launched from US vessels in the Arabian Sea struck the terrorist camp near Khost, several other terrorist training camps, and one target in Sudan: al-Shifa, a pharmaceutical plant US intelligence suspected was producing chemical weapons materials.
Although most missiles hit their intended targets, the strike failed to injure bin Laden and was almost immediately criticized both domestically and internationally as an overly aggressive move by the White House. Ahmad Kamal, Pakistan’s UN ambassador, warned that “such action, if condoned, acts as a precedent which can encourage other countries to pursue aggressive designs against their neighbors on flimsy or unsubstantiated pretexts.”
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The media scrutinized the motivations and evidentiary support for the decision, particularly after it was discovered that the intelligence on which the strikes had been based was “less than ironclad” by then CIA director George Tenet’s own admission—a category into which almost all intelligence falls.
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The
Economist
argued that “if it resorts to punishment raids without the best of reasons, and without the best of evidence, America risks finding itself increasingly friendless in truly important disputes.”
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Many alleged that President Clinton had attempted to use the strikes to distract attention from his dalliance with intern Monica Lewinsky.
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The media scrutinized the motivations and evidentiary support for the decision, particularly after it was discovered that the intelligence on which the strikes had been based was “less than ironclad” by then CIA director George Tenet’s own admission—a category into which almost all intelligence falls.
26
The
Economist
argued that “if it resorts to punishment raids without the best of reasons, and without the best of evidence, America risks finding itself increasingly friendless in truly important disputes.”
27
Many alleged that President Clinton had attempted to use the strikes to distract attention from his dalliance with intern Monica Lewinsky.
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Following the initial strikes, the military developed plans for another round of missile attacks, code-named Operation Infinite Resolve. Other members of the NSC rejected all options for an ongoing campaign, pointing to the lack of political popularity of the strikes, worrying that such attacks would create increased Islamic extremism, and invoking a common argument of this era: that the targets were not worth the price of the expensive missiles needed to destroy them.
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The lack of sustained cruise missile strikes, however, did not indicate a lack of concern on the part of the government or of the IC. Fear of future terrorist attacks rose exponentially with the embassy bombings, and the analysis of the identity of the enemy shifted to more accurately reflect the threat from nonstate sponsors of terrorism, primarily al-Qaeda. The NSC called for other options for dealing with terrorism from both the IC and the military.
The Clinton administration ended with an event that illuminated the government’s inability to neutralize the emerging threat. In October 2000 an al-Qaeda attack in Yemen killed seventeen Americans aboard the naval destroyer USS
Cole
. The NSC rejected a plan to strike al-Qaeda assets in Afghanistan in retaliation. Michael Sheehan, the State Department’s counterterrorism coordinator, then made the now infamous remark: “What’s it going to take to get them to hit al-Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al-Qaeda have to hit the Pentagon?”
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Cole
. The NSC rejected a plan to strike al-Qaeda assets in Afghanistan in retaliation. Michael Sheehan, the State Department’s counterterrorism coordinator, then made the now infamous remark: “What’s it going to take to get them to hit al-Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al-Qaeda have to hit the Pentagon?”
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President George W. Bush took control of national security concerns after a month of intense legal wrangling over his election results; the thirty-six days it had taken for the Supreme Court to decide to halt the recount of Florida ballots and declare Bush the winner cut the traditional presidential transition period in half. Already falling behind in hiring staff, his administration delayed establishing a terrorism policy, particularly as it related to Afghanistan, until regional policies could be established. Bush, like Clinton at the beginning of his term, had other concerns upon entering office. No al-Qaeda-focused NSC meeting would occur until September 4, 2001. Out of one hundred NSC meetings held by the NSC prior to 9/11, only two dealt with terrorism.
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Bush’s national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, wrote an article for the Jan/Feb 2000 issue of
Foreign Affairs
, “Promoting the National Interest.” It foreshadowed the NSC focus on strategic relationships with the world’s major state actors, including China and Russia.
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“American policies must [maintain] a disciplined and consistent foreign policy that separates the important from the trivial,” wrote Rice; terrorism, mentioned only briefly in the article, seems to have belonged to the latter in her opinion. Likewise, for the first months of the administration’s tenure, substate actors attracted attention only from the members of the foreign policy team, which, in the words of General Don Kerrick, had the “same strategic perspective as the folks in the eighties” in how they thwarted “rogue state” actors.
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Foreign Affairs
, “Promoting the National Interest.” It foreshadowed the NSC focus on strategic relationships with the world’s major state actors, including China and Russia.
32
“American policies must [maintain] a disciplined and consistent foreign policy that separates the important from the trivial,” wrote Rice; terrorism, mentioned only briefly in the article, seems to have belonged to the latter in her opinion. Likewise, for the first months of the administration’s tenure, substate actors attracted attention only from the members of the foreign policy team, which, in the words of General Don Kerrick, had the “same strategic perspective as the folks in the eighties” in how they thwarted “rogue state” actors.
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