Technically Obama might be correct, in that no “foreign terrorist organization has successfully planned and executed an attack on our homeland”. There have been terrorist attacks, though. At Little Rock, Ft. Hood, Chattanooga, the Boston Bombing, the San Bernadino massacre, the Orlando “Pulse” attack. There was the Detroit underwear bomber whose bomb misfired, and the Time Square bomber whose bomb also failed to detonate properly. But there was no “foreign terrorist organization” involved in those attacks.
Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden
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Obama says he can’t pardon Snowden
David sends us a link from ArsTechnica which reports on an Obama statement to the German Newspaper Der Spiegel which questioned him about the chances of Edward Snowden getting a presidential pardon;
Obama replied: “I can’t pardon somebody who hasn’t gone before a court and presented themselves, so that’s not something that I would comment on at this point.” He continued:
I think that Mr. Snowden raised some legitimate concerns. How he did it was something that did not follow the procedures and practices of our intelligence community. If everybody took the approach that I make my own decisions about these issues, then it would be very hard to have an organized government or any kind of national security system.
At the point at which Mr. Snowden wants to present himself before the legal authorities and make his arguments or have his lawyers make his arguments, then I think those issues come into play. Until that time, what I’ve tried to suggest — both to the American people, but also to the world — is that we do have to balance this issue of privacy and security.
I agree that Snowden doesn’t deserve a pardon but the president isn’t being entirely truthful here. Richard Nixon was never charged before President Ford pardoned him. Most of the draft dodgers of the Vietnam War hadn’t been to court when Jimmy Carter pardoned them all, by crime, not by name, on his first day in office.
And as part of the Iran nuclear deal he negotiated, Obama himself pardoned three Iranian-American men who had been indicted but had not stood trial.
While it appears that the president has arrived at the correct decision, he’s not being truthful about the reasons that he arrived at the decision.
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John Kerry and smart diplomacy
The New York Times writes about how John Kerry and the Obama Administration were being played like a cheap fiddle by the Syrians, the Russians and the Iranians at the latest talks about ending the Syrian civil war.
Mr. Kerry has been hamstrung by Russia’s military operations in Syria and by his inability to persuade Washington to intervene more forcefully. He has also been unable to sell Syrian opponents of Mr. Assad, like the ones in that room, on a policy he does not wholeheartedly believe in.
His frustrations and dissent within the Obama administration have hardly been a secret, but in the recorded conversation, Mr. Kerry lamented being outmaneuvered by the Russians, expressed disagreement with some of Mr. Obama’s policy decisions and said Congress would never agree to use force.
[…]
Several of the Syrian participants said afterward that they had left the meeting demoralized, convinced that no further help would come from the Obama administration. One, a civil engineer named Mustafa Alsyofi, said Mr. Kerry had effectively told the Syrian opposition, “You have to fight for us, but we will not fight for you.”
“How can this be accepted by anyone?” Mr. Alsyofi asked. “It’s unbelievable.”
In the meeting, he and the others pressed Mr. Kerry politely but relentlessly on what they saw as contradictions in American policy. Their comments crystallized the widespread sense of betrayal even among the Syrians most attractive to Washington as potential partners, civilians pushing for pluralistic democracy.
One woman, Marcell Shehwaro, demanded “the bottom line,” asking “how many Syrians” had to be killed to prompt serious action.
The Obama Administration still thinks that there is a viable political solution to the Syrian civil war like a coalition government.
At one point, Mr. Kerry astonished the Syrians at the table when he suggested that they should participate in elections that include President Bashar al-Assad, five years after President Obama demanded that he step down.
Mr. Kerry described the election saying it would be set up by Western and regional powers, and the United Nations, “under the strictest standards.” He said that the millions of Syrians who have fled since the war began in 2011 would be able to participate.
After five years of slaughter, there is only war. There are only feelings of hatred and plans for revenge You know, it’s as if they haven’t been paying attention for the last five years.
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The orphaned rescue failure
President Kennedy said of the Bay of Pigs “victory has 100 fathers and defeat is an orphan”. That describes the recent failure of a rescue attempt in Afghanistan last month which we wrote about last week recounting the story from our buddy Susan Katz Keating in AMI Newswire. Today she writes that blame for the failure is lost in the finger pointing between the White House and the Pentagon.
The rescue at issue is the attempt to save two English language instructors from the American University of Kabul, American Kevin King and Australian Kevin Weeks, who were captured at gunpoint on August 7th outside of the Afghanistan capital.
A U.S. special operations team was flown into position to mount a rescue on Aug. 10, but President Barack Obama did not give his final approval. Twenty-four hours later, Obama reviewed the “decision documents” and authorized the raid.
Descending via high-altitude parachute drop, the American commandos landed on the night of Aug, 11 near their objective: a makeshift prison compound guarded by armed men. Under the cover of darkness, the commandos breached the outer walls.
“We raised hell in that compound,” one person with direct knowledge of the raid said. “We knocked down walls and killed bad guys.”
As they climbed through the openings in the walls, U.S. forces traded shots with hostile fighters, leaving seven defenders dead and one wounded, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed. Among its many duties, CENTCOM is the Pentagon’s Unified Combatant Command in charge of operations in Afghanistan.
“No civilians were killed or harmed,” said Col. John J. Thomas, the CENTCOM Director of Public Affairs. “No U.S. forces were killed or hurt.”
Nor were the teachers rescued – they were gone just four hours before the operators dropped on the target.
The disagreement comes in the events of August 10th leading up to the cancelled mission – when the teachers were at the target. The Pentagon claims that they gave all of the information that the president would need to approve the mission in a timely manner, but the National Security Council staff disagrees.
“On the first night in question, the decision never reached the President to make a decision,” a senior Pentagon official wrote in an email. “The fact of the matter is the President was never presented with a decision document that day.”
However, U.S. sources with knowledge of the mission said they heard a radio message that contained words to this effect: “The President can’t make time on his schedule to give the go-ahead.”
So when the operators jumped off on the 11th, King and Weeks had been moved from the target compound just four hours earlier. According to Keating, the president’s schedule included a round of golf on the 10th, although it’s not clear what exactly he was doing when the mission briefing arrived at the Martha’s Vineyard compound.
I can’t help but think of Lyndon Johnson picking targets for B-52 strikes in North Vietnam from the basement of the White House. If the President wants to win this war, he’s going to have to get his hands out of the planning.
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Hostage rescue was aborted while Obama vacationed
Our buddy, Susan Katz Keating wrote an article yesterday entitled “Hostage rescue was aborted while Obama vacationed“. Apparently, she’s getting some backlash from the Pentagon on it this morning, so you’d better read it before it’s gone.
The story is that folks were in route to a target where they were expecting to rescue some hostages, but because the President was on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard, he hadn’t had time to consider the operation, so they were called back. By the time they finally got approval, the hostages were gone.
“We raised hell in that compound,” said a security staffer with knowledge of the mission. “We knocked down walls and killed bad guys.”
Seven hostile combatants were killed and one injured, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed to American Media Institute. Among its many duties, CENTCOM is the Pentagon’s Unified Combatant Command in charge of operations in Afghanistan.
“No civilians were killed or harmed,” said Col. John J. Thomas, the CENTCOM director of public affairs. “No U.S. forces were killed or hurt.”
The missions took place Aug. 10 and 11, in Afghanistan, Thomas confirmed. He did not address operational details of the rescue missions; but AMI spoke to sources who provided details, some of which CENTCOM confirmed.
We’re not surprised, because that’s how this president has been fighting this war against terror – when he has the time and he’s fully considered the political implications. Unfortunately, wars fought like that aren’t all that effective.
But, like I said, go read SKK’s article while you still can.
ADDED: The “main stream media” is pushing back against SKK’s version of events in deference to the Pentagon.