It didn't take long for the ephemeral nature of Carter's promise to be manifested. His successor Ronald Reagan was first an actor, who understood that what is conveyed to the public may be nothing like reality. This was natural for his first profession, and certainly not rare at high levels of political power, where to mislead or lie, such he did with ease about Iran-Contra, are part of the practice of statecraft. To deflect any sense of this being partisan, Democrats such as Bill Clinton, blatantly looked America in the eye and proclaimed, "I never had sex with that woman, Ms. Lewinski." Even if not of geopolitical importance, it put our country through his impeachment and trial in the Senate, that may have started a poisoned partisanship that lasts to this day. The message for future leaders however was clear, but in a perverse way - as this lie actually raised his public approval; and from all surveys, he could well have been elected to a third term in office.
Before I bring in the first two Presidents of this century, which as much as I will try to avoid, may throw this essay into the chasm of inter-partisan vilification, let me go back in history to President Franklin Roosevelt. A Google search of his conspiring to bring the U.S. into WWII has hundreds of current hits, with his claimed foreknowledge of Pearl Harbor being only one element. In a way, the deceit of President Obama in creating his narrative of the events around bin Laden's death lends support to those who claim that FDR was complicit in allowing the surprise attack that brought America to WWII -- a mentality that assumes that only the naive believe what is said by our Government, especially the person at the top.
Jimmy Carter, while widely considered a failed President, has never been accused of breaking his promise of honesty. When his mission to liberate the American captives by Special Forces from our Iran embassy failed, he described exactly what happened with no embellishment even considered that may have mitigated his personal responsibility. I will pass over the period between 9-11 and America's invasion of Iraq, as the various distortions by the Bush administration to gain support have been explored extensively, and go directly to the issue of the day, the publication of an alternative version of the events around the killing of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011 reported by the respected investigative reporter Seymour M. Hersh
"Jimmy Carter's Promise" which I'll put in quotes as it was both statement and a practice, is not fully appreciated by our country, in fact has been relegated as something only for naive idealists, and perhaps losers such as its promulgator. Bill Clinton is known for, "I feel your pain." and George W. Bush for - let others fill that one in - and of course Barack Obama for "hope and change." "Honesty" to the American people as being central to the very concept of democracy is not high on anyone's agenda anymore.
The aphorism, "Can't see the forest for the trees" has now been updated with, "getting down into the weeds" -- both meaning details masking the principles. So, I'll be brief in paraphrasing the two irreconcilable stories of Obama Bin Ladin's being killed. Both agree on that contingent of US Navy Seals in two helicopters raided his compound in Abottabad Pakistan and not a heck of a lot more. This Wikipedia article provides a comprehensive "weed eye view" of the the event from official reports and otherwise, including Hersh's.
Seymour Hersh does not have the power to subpoena witnesses or evidence so depends on what others tell him, which worked to break the story of Mai Lai and Abu Grave that shed light on American brutality, perhaps otherwise never to be known in two different wars. The parties in power were different, so he avoids any accusation of partisanship motivation. Therefore his current story is not to be ridiculed or dismissed out of hand.
From my taking the time to read Hersh's full report, along with criticisms of it (all available in Wikipeida article linked) I personally conclude that both his story and the official one by President Obama are improbable, flawed and incomplete at best. This does not result in a draw, but is a condemnation of not only President Obama, but the culture that has evolved that allowed him to weave the tale that he announced on that evening of May 2, 2011.
Our killing of Bin Laden was appropriate, yet to have done what Obama claimed to be the operational plan, which was to take him alive if possible, would have made no sense. Were he to be given due process, allowed to mount a defense, his relationship with his home country Saudi Arabia would have been disclosed to the the detriment of a U.S. alliance with them for decades. Bin Laden would have been able to rally the Muslim world for our "desecration" of its holy cities and whatever else he chose to bring in. Hersh claims that the goal was to assassinate Bin Laden, which is not as good a story of his only being killed because he was wielding a weapon.
Personally, I go beyond rejecting "conspiracy theories," to abhorring those that promote them. I remember going to the Library of Congress as a youngster, where I read the actual newspapers with reports of racism and pro-Nazi sentiments that were available on request. This country did not rewrite history, even if it took some effort to garner documents that described unpleasant truths. This makes the Obama administration responding to Hersh's expose by ridiculing him personally that much more repugnant. Rather than create a Hollywood version of bravery and justice in the face of evil, one that Obama rode for his own electoral advantage, he could have done something different.
From the White House:
Yesterday, special forces of the United States killed the leader of the Al Qaeda organization, Osama Bin Laden, at his compound in Abottabad Pakistan. This brings to an end this country's quest to track down and kill the individual who orchestrated the attacks on this country of September 11, 2001.
This was achieved with the cooperation of individuals who have conflicting ongoing relationships, which was only obtained by a guarantee of confidentiality, which limits the release of details of this operation. The United States strives to be an open society, yet this is one of the times when actions taken must be couched in secrecy during the lives of those, without whose cooperation, success could not be achieved.
The above would have been released at a news conference without the President in attendance, with any request for more details simply deflected for the reasons announced. President Obama would not have gotten the approval ratings bump, and after the indignant demands for more details , it would have soon been overshadowed by other news.
There would have been no need for the conflation by the U.S. of legitimate public health efforts with tracking down a national enemy, described below by Doctors Without Borders, who were criticized for this statement with the some scorn used against Hersh.
"It is challenging enough for health agencies and humanitarian aid workers to gain access to, and the trust of, communities, especially populations already skeptical of the motives of any outside assistance," said MSF. "Deceptive use of medical care also endangers those who provide legitimate and essential health services."
Had this simple press release replaced the media event orchestrated by the White House, Hersh still may have written the exact article that he did. Only, it would not have impugned the honesty of the President, and more importantly, the Presidency.
Seymour M. Hersh, whether or not he got this story mostly right or even completely wrong, is a national hero for a career tackling the type of willful misinformation that is the antithesis of a free democratic society. If Hersh's story has errors, he got the wrong information, yet was ethically correct in publishing it. If the President's story is mostly accurate, his variations from truth are not errors, but something very different. He knew the means of discovery of bin Laden's location, what actually happened that night in Abottabad, the rules of engagement and what occurred afterwards. Any variation between this and what was presented to the public are serous breaches of faith, and of a different nature than errors in Hersh's reporting.
President Harry Truman never claimed that he personally orchestrated the killing of Hitler, and he left the heroics to those such as Douglas MacArthur; yet his native honesty is now appreciated by leaders of both parties. He is admired for the kind of integrity that befitted his office, ironically, most avidly by those who lack the values that made Truman, and even Carter, what they were. Both, left office with the lowest of approval ratings, which should be a badge of courage that they candidly exposed their mistakes to the glare of public scrutiny.
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Addendum: The tide of criticism of Hersh may be changing, as reflected in this article just published in the Columbia Journalism Review.
This article is from Fall, 2015 from an unusual publication, "N+1." It looks at Sy Hersh's career from a perspective I've never read. It doesn't just look at whether Hersh gets the facts right, but what he is fighting. Let's call it Government-Military-CIA-NSA-N.Y. Times --- Hersh and now a few others, but this one is about Sy Hersh, and what they face when they are fearless against this aggregation.
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