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#11
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![]() Quote:
Richard Clarke produced a strategy paper, presented to Clinton, Sandy Berger and other national security principals on December 20th, 2000, which laid out the following: Break up al-Qaeda cells and arrest their personnel; systematically attack financial support for terrorist activities; freeze its assets; stop its funding through fake charities; give aid to governments having trouble with al-Qaeda ; scale up covert action in Afghanistan to eliminate the training camps and kill bin Laden himself; build support for the Northern Alliance and put Special Forces on the ground in Afghanistan. This plan was not implemented, as a senior Cinton aide told Time Magazine, because if it were, Clinton would basically be handing the Bush administration a war when they took office one month later. Instead, they gave the plan to the Bush administration, with Sandy Berger arranging no less than ten full briefings to Condi Rice. The plan was not picked up until post September 11th, 2001, at which point pretty much all of it became national strategy, along with the foundation of the Department of Homeland Security, as per legislation authored by Democratic Senators Lieberman and Cleland some nine months earlier. Of course, Cleland didn't vote for the new Homeland Security department when it was tabled because it came with the provision that the new department's employees were to be stripped of civil service protection. This meant that when he ran against Saxby Chambliss in 2002, Chambliss ran ads claiming Cleland didn't care about national security and promptly beat him. .................................................. .................................................. .. **** like that is why I have little faith in our government. They talk a big game, but halfass everything. |