In early January, former U.S. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill told “60 Minutes” viewers that George W. Bush, who fired him in 2002, had come into office spoiling to oust the dictator of Iraq. “From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go,” said O’Neill. He had provided documents, accounts of meetings and his own views of the president to an author who had written a new book critical of Bush.
The White House’s response to O’Neill essentially was to depict him as having been out of the loop when he worked for the administration, and disgruntled after he got the boot.
O’Neill is now past tense, but another former official appeared on “60 Minutes” Sunday to voice similar accusations (and, not incidentally, promote his new book). Richard Clarke, a counterterrorism specialist whom Bush held over from the Clinton administration until February 2003, said during the broadcast that the president has “done a terrible job on the war against terrorism” by not capturing Osama bin Laden or focusing more singularly on Al Qaeda.
In his book, Clarke says Bush told him and others on Sept. 12, 2001: “Go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam did this.” Clarke says he answered, “But Mr. President, Al Qaeda did this,” to which Bush is said to have responded, “I know, I know, but … see if Saddam was involved. Just look. I want to know any shred.”
The White House’s essential response is that Clarke was out of the loop, and disgruntled because he didn’t get a promotion. On Monday the White House press office issued eight pages of detailed denials to Clarke’s accusations.
Two examples among many: To the assertion that Clarke wasn’t allowed to brief Bush before Sept. 11 on the threat posed by Al Qaeda, the White House retorts: He never asked to. And to the assertion that Bush was obsessed by Iraq after Sept. 11, the White House says: “Given Iraq’s past support of terror, including an attempt by Iraqi intelligence to kill a former president, it would have been irresponsible not to ask if Iraq had any involvement in the attack.” In an essay, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice adds: “Once advised that there was no evidence that Iraq was responsible for Sept. 11, the president told his National Security Council on Sept. 17 that Iraq was not on the agenda and that the initial U.S. response to Sept. 11 would be to target Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.”
That sentence hints at the case Bush’s aides should be making. It’s hard to see what they gain by playing point-counterpoint with critics such as O’Neill and Clarke. Here’s a better retort:
After Bill Clinton’s eight years of inaction toward Al Qaeda, Bush had to react to a major terrorist attack within eight months of taking office. Don’t focus on what he said then, focus on what he did. In less than a month, and with the world’s approval, he and his national security team isolated Al Qaeda benefactors and began bombing Afghanistan. That campaign didn’t exactly become the quagmire critics predicted. Bush’s military and Afghan fighters rapidly accomplished what Russian soldiers never could: the ousting of Al Qaeda’s hosts, the Taliban.
In the wake of Sept. 11, America was a nation unhinged. The roots of the attacks were a mystery, the citizenry gripped with fear. Regardless of whether they like or loathe Bush, fair-minded Americans know that in the darkest yet best moments of his presidency, he acted with caution and decisiveness in answering the assault. Debating Paul O’Neill or Richard Clarke point by point may seem necessary. But if Bush’s defenders make that their only tack, they’re squandering their man’s most remarkable success.
