[Peace-discuss] Major spook and war criminal

[C. G. Estabrook]

["...in the Bush administration ... he worked on some of the interrogation
policies..." -- i.e., the guy's a torturer. If there's any justice in this
world, these people (including my school friend and Beers) will have to face a
future Nuremberg tribunal.  --CGE]

	Brennan steps out of the shadows
	By: Josh Gerstein
	January 9, 2010 06:47 PM EST

Nearly every public statement by President Barack Obama these days contains a
reference or two to "my counterterrorism and homeland security adviser, John
Brennan." Once a rare TV guest, he did four Sunday shows back-to-back. White
House briefings and releases are peppered with mentions of the newly ubiquitous
adviser – sometimes referred to simply as "John" by Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.

Some of Brennan’s associates even think the White House is maneuvering him to
become Director of National Intelligence or CIA director in time.

Taken together, it's an abrupt step into the public eye by an intelligence
veteran who has spent most of his 25-year career in the shadows. Brennan has had
some stumbles in these early outings, but the steely persona conveyed by the
square-jawed CIA veteran could be just what Obama needs to help beat back GOP
claims that the president is soft on terrorism.

"He's a very intellectual, well-read, bright guy," said Fran Townsend, who
worked with Brennan while serving as President George W. Bush's homeland
security adviser. "But there's something of the North Jersey, tough-Irish-cop
demeanor that comes across."

Even Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), a prominent critic of the Obama Administration's
approach to counterterrorism, says, “He looks like a tough guy.”

In reality, Brennan is more front office than hard-bitten field agent, a Fordham
University graduate who speaks Arabic and spent two decades working at the CIA.
Said one Brennan associate, "Brennan is no street guy. He's been an analyst his
entire career...save for one tour [in Saudi Arabia]."

Some Democrats remain uneasy about Brennan's time in the Bush administration,
where he worked on some of the interrogation policies Obama vowed to change.
Liberal opposition helped scuttle Brennan's chances at one of the top intel jobs
when Obama took office.

But that experience under both Bush and Bill Clinton also made him unique in an
administration that lacked a stand-out national security persona, no Colin
Powell or Donald Rumsfeld (the post 9/11 version, that is) that instantly
reassured the American public: we know what we're doing here.

National Security Council Chief of Staff Denis McDonough said turning to Brennan
only made sense, given the nature of the crisis. "John is obviously the
president's most trusted adviser on this matter and has been working, in a
classic 'no drama Obama' way through these issues throughout most of the year,"
McDonough told POLITICO.

Brennan also won his stripes with some Democrats with his comeback to Vice
President Dick Cheney last Sunday, after Cheney questioned whether Obama
understands the nation is at war. "Either the vice president is willfully
mischaracterizing this president's position . . . or he's ignorant of the
facts," Brennan said.

McDonough said there was "nobody better" to deliver the rejoinder to Cheney.
"Like all great analysts at the CIA,...[Brennan] deals in facts and can analyze
the facts, and in the case of the vice president, the discordant facts. I think
John was perfectly prepared to respond to the charge."

Many observers view Brennan's suddenly public role as something of a battlefield
promotion. His Sunday show star-turn last week, they argue, was prompted in
large part by the unavailability or undesirability of other players.

Putting forward Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano would have only led
to more battles over her initial claim that "the system worked." CIA Director
Leon Panetta and Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair have been locked
in turf battles. Picking either might have seemed to favor one over the other --
or to pin one agency with the blame for the intelligence breakdown in the
Christmas Day plot. National Security Adviser Jim Jones could have been tapped,
but his strengths are more in the foreign policy area, and he's nearly as much
of a TV novice as Brennan.

So Brennan got the nod.

"The guy has a phenomenal personal history at the most senior levels of
intelligence work," said Rand Beers, a senior Homeland Security official who
worked on counterterrorism in the Clinton White House. "He is the most logical
person to do it. He carries tremendous expertise, knowledge and background on
this around it his head. He did not have to be briefed. He did not have to be
prepared to walk out on that stage. He knows that stuff cold."

Still, reviews of Brennan's on-air performance have been mixed. While he calmly
parried the questions and displayed a depth of knowledge few other officials
could match, on a couple of occasions he provided fodder for attacks on the
administration.

Some jumped on his statement that there was "no smoking gun" in the intelligence
that could have predicted the Christmas Day attack.

"Janet Napolitano, Part 2," King scoffed about Brennan's comment. "He basically
said there was no smoking gun. Now, everybody says there was....I didn't think
it was such a great debut at all."

"I like [Brennan] and I respect him, but I cringed when he said that," Townsend
said. "You knew the media and the punditocracy were going to say, 'Well, what
about these two facts?' ...Somebody who had more media experience would have
tried to avoid that."

Another infelicitous moment came when Brennan explicitly discussed plea
bargaining with the suspect in order to get intelligence -- a prospect that
sounds more like negotiating with Al Qaeda than taking the fight to them, as
Obama has promised.

Even the Cheney retort led the intelligence veteran into the line of fire, with
some Republicans crying foul.

"It's clear from his performance on the talk shows that he's become very
political," said John Lehman, a former Navy Secretary who served on the 9/11
Commission and advised Republican John McCain's presidential campaign. "He
sounds totally different than when he headed up the counterterrorism center. He
sounds like a politician...He's a 30-year intelligence professional so obviously
they trot him out just the way Clinton trotted out various generals who ended up
running for office."

However, one Democratic strategist said Brennan's nonpartisan pedigree takes the
edge off the GOP salvos. "In some ways, he's the Robert Gates of the
intelligence community. He's the guy who's not ideological," said Heather
Hurlburt of the National Security Network, referring to the Pentagon chief, a
Bush holdover.

A crack in the tough-cop image appeared only once in public in recent weeks, on
Thursday, when Brennan seemed to choke up during a press briefing as he
expressed regret for the government failures that allowed the Christmas Day
bombing to nearly succeed.

"I told the President today I let him down," Brennan said with a tremble in his
voice. "I am the President's assistant for homeland security and
counterterrorism. And I told him that I will do better and we will do better as
a team."

Before the Christmas Day bombing attempt, Brennan made few appearances on TV and
kept a relatively low public profile. In August, he gave a broad speech on
counterterrorism policy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
And just four days before the attack, he spoke at Arlington National Cemetery to
family members of victims of the Pan Am 103 bombing.

The White House notes that Brennan has occasionally briefed on other issues,
like H1N1 flu or the threat posed by drug-related violence in Mexico.

As for whether Brennan was eager to be dispatched to the Sunday shows, McDonough
said: "I think John is very comfortable doing whatever assignment he feels is
necessary to advance the national interests...Given that he was running the
[intelligence] review, I think he very much agreed with the importance of
getting out there and explaining it to the American people."

Other counterterrorism advisers have sometimes struggled to get face time in the
Oval Office. Just before the Christmas plot, Brennan said that he meets with
Obama in the Oval Office on "most days." During the transition, Brennan was
considered for CIA director, but took himself out of the running after liberal
critics charged he was too closely tied to Bush-era interrogation and
surveillance policies.

Brennan has said he objected, albeit privately, to water-boarding, but he
acknowledges approving of other aspects of the "enhanced interrogation" program.
He's suggested reports about his involvement in other controversial policies
were inaccurate, but has declined to be more specific because the programs
remain classified.

Brennan's shots at Cheney have won plaudits from some liberal bloggers, but some
remain convinced that Obama is making a grave mistake by relying on figures with
history in the Bush administration, like Brennan and former Deputy CIA Director
John McLaughlin, tapped on Friday by Blair to review potential intelligence
weaknesses.

"It's the same crowd. It's appalling," said Melvyn Goodman, a former CIA analyst
who spoke out during the transition against giving the CIA director post to
Brennan. "I've seen nothing in the last few days to change my mind....The whole
Brennan emergence has just been very curious to me."

However, Beers said any concern that Brennan is pulling punches to cover for
himself or others in the intelligence establishment is unwarranted.

"I think it is totally misplaced," Beers said. Beers, who was at Tuesday's
Situation Room meeting with top administration officials, said Brennan was
specific and unforgiving about the errors. "I heard him tell the president in
the Cabinet meeting the truth. It was unvarnished," Beers said. "It really was a
truth-telling that the Cabinet members all sat through and listened to....It was
not uncivil, but boy, was it candid."

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/31308.html


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