Full Text – Leon Panetta Letter to CIA Employees – Re: Pelosi
(Source: Central Intelligence Agency)
There is a long tradition in Washington of making political hay out of our business. It predates my service with this great institution, and it will be around long after I’m gone. But the political debates about interrogation reached a new decibel level yesterday when the CIA was accused of misleading Congress.
Let me be clear: It is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress. That is against our laws and our values. As the Agency indicated previously in response to Congressional inquiries, our contemporaneous records from September 2002 indicate that CIA officers briefed truthfully on the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, describing “the enhanced techniques that had been employed.” Ultimately, it is up to Congress to evaluate all the evidence and reach its own conclusions about what happened.
Panetta Visit Hopeful Sign Obama’s Administration Won’t Turn Blind Eye to Israel Further Destabilizing Middle East
America’s spy chief was sent on a secret mission to Israel to warn its leaders not to launch a surprise attack on Iran without notifying the US Administration.
As Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, prepares to visit Washington, it emerged yesterday that Leon Panetta, the head of the CIA, went to Israel two weeks ago. He sought assurances from Mr Netanyahu and Ehud Barak, the Defence Minister, that their hawkish new Government would not attack Iran without alerting Washington.
If Israel is going to continue to nurse at the teat of U.S. aid, it would be nice if a U.S. presidential administration would demand some accountability from them. The Iranian question won’t be solved by a half-baked scheme to destroy Iranian nuclear sites. I don’t believe the world can even imagine what the blowback would be from such a move and for how long it would damage any efforts at diplomacy in the entire Middle East.
As long as Israel continues to enforce an apartheid-like control over the Palestinian territories and trample the human rights of Israeli Arabs and Palestinians alike, we’ve got plenty of “optics” issues with her Arab neighbors.
Obama needs to be given half a chance to talk some sense into the idiots running Iran.
