Reading news accounts of this week’s terrorism alerts, replete with details about the intelligence sources behind them, I couldn’t help wondering, Why are we telling our enemies that we know this? One needn’t be a James Jesus Angleton to realize that it is crucial, in any covert conflict, not to give the other side a clear or complete picture of what data one has or how it was acquired. The Islamofascists can now rest assured that our list of their high priority New York City targets came from a captured computer in Pakistan, not from, for instance, an upper-level mole in their ranks. They also can figure out what other secrets we may have uncovered. It would have been far better for the government to issue warnings without leaking information back.
Why couldn’t we follow that sensible course? The answer is that Democrats and media figures (if the two can usefully be distinguished any more) would have howled that the Bush Administration was inventing threats for political purposes, and enough people would have believed them to undercut the alert’s usefulness. Hence, Tom Ridge had to present evidence that the danger was real and had to let the media pore over it looking for weaknesses in the case.
As was predictable, the case wasn’t good enough for some. The bad faith of the New York Times reaction was particularly stunning, and Byron York pretty well shredded the argument that the announcement ought not to have been made. Still, the true problem was not that Howard Dean and the Times were able to quibble but that security compromises were deemed necessary in order to try to preempt skepticism.
This unfortunate incident is the product of months of “Bush lied” slanders. Never supported by anything beyond innuendo and speculation, the Left’s paranoid ravings are beginning to place us all in danger. To connect these dots starkly: Because John Kerry and his ilk routinely brand government officials as liars, the government has given al-Qa’eda important information about the extent of our knowledge of its operations. Because al-Qa’eda has that information, it can plan more effective attacks in the future. Because it can plan more effective attacks, some Americans may die. The guilt for their deaths will rest, of course, on the murderers, but a degree of responsibility will belong to those who made the murders easier to commit.
Addendum: Yes, I am aware of the liberal comeback: “People would believe the Administration if it always told the truth. It just suffers a Credibility Gap, like Nixon.” But how can anyone avoid a “credibility gap” if the standard is never to be mistaken, never to be caught off guard and never to be the victim of falsifications by undisclosed sources? Or when, as in the Joe Wilson affair, accusations are trumpeted in headlines and their refutations reported sotto voce?
We are in the middle of a war. Our fellow citizens are being targeted by murderers. Would it not be prudent to avoid flinging about the epithet of “liar” upon the least provocation? The life thus saved could be your own.
Update (8/8/04): If this Reuters story is accurate (no guarantees that it is), the allegation that terror alerts are politically motivated has led to the exposure of a “turned” al-Qa’eda operative, as officials struggle to counter accusations that they were just making up threats. It would be easy to say – and I’m sure that left-wing commentators will say it – that the authorities should have kept their sources secret and allowed Howard Dean, the New York Times and other Kerry campaign surrogates continue punching them without response, but that is more forbearance than it’s reasonable to expect in a democracy. The blame here lies squarely with the “Bush Lied” crowd, and any blood spilled as a consequence stains their hands. N.B.: Instapundit has lots of links and further comments on this story, discussing how damaging the disclosure may or may not be. The key point remains, IMHO, that there ought to have been no motive for making it.
Comments