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That NIE assessed with high confidence that Iran had ceased working on the warhead-related part of its nuclear program in the fall of 2003--a judgment that holds to this day, however unpopular and unwelcome it may be among those who would have the President give Israel carte blanche to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.
That is the capability Truman wanted--the baby that must be rescued and reared. But the baby is still in danger.
With Tom Fingar now retired, the absence of an NIE on Afghanistan/Pakistan speaks volumes about the timidity that persists within the hierarchy of the CIA and the intelligence community. It boggles the mind that, amid all the assessment and reassessment prior to the President's decision to escalate by sending 30,000 more troops, no policy maker or congressional leader wanted to know what the 16 agencies of the intelligence community were thinking. Or did the White House make it clear to those interested that it would be better not to ask?
Gloom Avoidance
Gen. Petraeus and Gen. McChrystal are not interested in CIA analysis, just CIA drones (the aircraft). Sources inside the intelligence community tell us that they assess the prospects for success of the generals' approach as very low, but that this word does not seem to be getting to the President.
It is not entirely clear whether it is a case of Panetta being reluctant to relay to Obama the kind of "unpleasant facts" or "bad news" that Truman wanted the CIA to give him in a straightforward way, or that Obama himself has discouraged such truth seeking/telling lest the abysmal prognosis of the analysts leak and complicate his Faustian bargain with the top brass--and cause even more political damage in his dissatisfied Democratic "base."
As things get still worse in "Af-Pak"--and they will--it will be important for Obama to have a group of analysts able to give him an objective read on the quagmire into which his benighted policies have led, and how he might attempt to pull himself and U.S. troops out. Perhaps then he will ask.
So save that baby. Throw out the other one with the bathwater.
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