Text 2734, 99 rader
Skriven 2006-09-27 02:33:00 av ROSS SAUER (1:123/140)
Ärende: Rice is a liar
======================
Can Condi Rice *EVER* tell the truth?
Guess not...

2001 memo to Rice contradicts statements about Clinton, Pakistan

09/26/2006 @ 12:59 pm

Filed by Larry Womack 

A memo received by United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice 
shortly after becoming National Security Advisor in 2001 directly 
contradicts statements she made to reporters yesterday, RAW STORY has 
learned.

"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice told 
a reporter for the New York Post on Monday. "Big pieces were missing," 
Rice added, "like an approach to Pakistan that might work, because 
without Pakistan you weren't going to get Afghanistan."

Rice made the comments in response to claims made Sunday by former 
President Bill Clinton, who argued that his administration had done more 
than the current one to address the al Qaeda problem before the 
September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. She stopped short of calling the 
former president a liar.

However, RAW STORY has found that just five days after President George 
W. Bush was sworn into office, a memo from counter-terrorism expert 
Richard A. Clarke to Rice included the 2000 document, "Strategy for 
Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al-Qida: Status and 
Prospects." This document devotes over 2 of its 13 pages of material to 
specifically addressing strategies for securing Pakistan's cooperation 
in airstrikes against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. 

The Pakistan obstacle

The strategy document includes "three levers" that the United States had 
started applying to Pakistan as far back as 1990. Sanctions, political 
and economic methods of persuasion are all offered as having been 
somewhat successful.

Other portions of the passages relating to Pakistan, marked as 
"operational details" have been redacted from the declassified memo at 
the CIA's request. 

The document also explores broader strategic approaches, such as a "need 
to keep in mind that Pakistan has been most willing to cooperate with us 
on terrorism when its role is invisible or at least plausibly deniable 
to the powerful Islamist right wing."

But Clarke also made it clear that the Clinton Administration recognized 
the problem that Pakistan posed in mounting a more sweeping campaign 
against bin Laden: "Overt action against bin Laden, who is a hero 
especially in the Pushtun-ethnic border areas near Afghanistan," Clarke 
speculated in late 2000, "would be so unpopular as to threaten 
Musharraf's government." The plan notes that, after the attack on the 
USS Cole, Pakistan had forbidden the United States from again violating 
its airspace to attack bin Laden in Afghanistan.

The memo sent by Clarke to Rice, to which the Clinton-era document was 
attached, also urges action on Pakistan relating to al Qaeda. "First [to 
be addressed,]" wrote Clarke in a list of pending issues relating to al 
Qaeda, is "what the administration says to the Taliban and Pakistan 
about ending al Qida sanctuary in Afghanistan. We are separately 
proposing early, strong messages on both."

A disputed history

The documents have been a source of controversy before. Rice contended 
in a March 22, 2004 Washington Post piece that "no al Qaeda plan was 
turned over to the new administration." 

Two days later, Clarke insisted to the 9/11 Commission that the plan had 
in fact been turned over. "There's a lot of debate about whether it's a 
plan or a strategy or a series of options, but all of the things we 
recommended back in January," he told the commission, "were done after 
September 11th."

The memo was declassified on April 7, 2004, one day before Rice herself 
testified before the 9/11 Commission.

Excerpts from documents relating to the situation follow:

#
Pages 11-13 of the Clinton-era document sent to Rice from Clarke, 
detailing Pakistan's role in the al Qaeda problem. The plan was referred 
to by Clarke, and later by Rice in public statements:

#
Page 2 of memo from Clarke to Rice, urging "early, strong messages" to 
Pakistan on the al Qaeda problem. The Clinton "plan" was attached to 
this memo:

http://www.rawstory.com/printstory.php?story=3376

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