Former commissioners and staff members have been working overtime to deny the charges in Philip Shenon’s work. 9/11 Commission Panelists Slam New Book On Executive DirectorBy Cliff Montgomery – Mar. 8th, 2008“Senior investigators on the 9/11 Commission believed their work was being manipulated by the executive director to minimize criticism of the Bush Administration,” states a new book discussing the 9/11 panel.”Investigative staffers at the Commission believe [Executive Director] Philip Zelikow repeatedly sought to minimize the administration’s intelligence failures in the months leading up to 9/11, which had the effect of helping to ensure President Bush’s re-election in 2004,” adds the thesis of The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation by New York Times journalist Philip Shenon.While these claims have been around for a few years, this perhaps is the first time a reporter of Shenon’s caliber has investigated them and found them at least plausible.Perhaps precisely because of that fact, a number of former commissioners and former staff members have been working overtime to deny Shenon’s charges.”The author is mistaken in his criticism of the role of Executive Director Philip Zelikow. The proper standard for judgment is the quality of the report, and there is no basis for the allegations of bias he asserts,” goes a February 8th press statement jointly released by the panelists (not including White House counsel Fred Fielding).But the commissioners’ retort employs the logical fallacy of the Circular Argument: It essentially states that the quality of the report proves the quality of the report. One must blindly accept the panel’s findings for the argument to have any apparent validity.We should stop here and remind our readers of just who is Philip Zelikow. Mr. Zelikow had worked as Director of the Miller Center of Public Affairs and as a White Burkett Miller Professor of History at the University of Virginia prior to his service as Executive Director of the famed 9/11 Commission.He also had worked for the incoming George W. Bush Administration prior to the events of 9/11.Zelikow specifically had worked on Condoleeza Rice’s National Security Council (NSC) transition crew in 2000-01. In fact, Mr. Zelikow apparently had been the “architect” who personally demoted Richard Clarke’s counter-terrorism unit within the NSC.The principal tasks of Clarke’s team were to hunt down Osama bin Laden and eliminate al-Qaeda.As Shenon succinctly writes:
- “[Zelikow] had laid the groundwork for much of went wrong at the White House in the weeks and months before September 11. Would he want people to know that?”
Probably not. That’s why this book may be so important–and why those who worked on the 9/11 Commission are so keen to downplay any perception that the actions of its executive director may have been tainted by a conflict of interest.Michael Hurley, a 9/11 panel staff member who directed the committee’s counterterrorism policy group, released his own defense of Zelikow in an email reply to the Federation of American Scientists, a government secrecy watchdog group.”The Shenon book depicts Philip Zelikow as a manager who bullied the 9/11 Commission staff. He didn’t bully the staff,” stated Hurley, a former CIA operations officer.”No piece of evidence, no matter how damning to Bush, Rice, or Richard Clarke got left on the cutting room floor,” he also claimed.We at will have to defer to those who have read Shenon’s book all the way through. But having read both large segments of the book and a number of reviews on the work, it does not immediately appear that Zelikow is ever directly portrayed as a rabid bully.To read Hurley’s email, one imagines Shenon’s work portraying Zelikow as the political equivalent of a playground bully, shaking down weaker schoolmates for their lunch money.That does not immediately appear to have been Shenon’s point.The website AntiWar.com published an article in 2004 stating the clear problem in appointing Zelikow as Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission:
- “Though he has no vote, (Zelikow) arguably has more sway than any member, including the chairman. Zelikow picks the areas of investigation, the briefing materials, the topics for hearings, the witnesses, and the lines of questioning for witnesses…In effect, he sets the agenda and runs the investigation.”
If this is true–and it certainly appears to be the central thesis of Shenon’s book–then bullying would not have been necessary. A person who controls what panelists and staff members investigate–and what they don’t–has little need of bullying anyone.Panelists and staff members indeed may have done a fine job, with what they were allowed to investigate. It’s what they may not have been allowed to investigate which appears to be the point of Shenon’s work.We at reiterate that we have not read Shenon’s entire book, The Commission. It’s therefore quite possible that the recent statements from panelists and staff members upholding the integrity of both Zelikow and the 9/11 Commission are correct.But these recent ‘defenses’ of Zelikow only deepen our suspicion of the 9/11 Commission’s much-claimed ‘independence’.Like what you’re reading so far? Then why not order a full year (52 issues) of thee-newsletter for only $15? A major article covering an story not being told in the Corporate Press will be delivered to your email every Monday morning for a full year, for less than 30 cents an issue. Order Now!
