1 Boring Old Man

The new Pentagon papers by Karen Kwiatkowski ^1,2,3,4 was published in Salon in March, 2004 – almost exactly one year after the invasion of Iraq, so we can’t say we weren’t warned about what was happening in the Department of Defense. Her accounting of the formation and internal workings of the Office of Special Plans remains the most detailed version to date, and the most scathing.

Whistle Blowers haven’t fared very well in the Bush/Cheney era – Paul O’neill, Richard Clarke, Karen Kwiatkowski, Joseph Wilson. While the Administration has actively undermined them and their reports, we must place the blame where it belongs. We, the people, just haven’t listened. O’neill and Clarke were marginalized as disgruntled former employees. Karen Kwiatkowski has been ignored [Libertarian? Female? who knows?]. And we all know about Joseph Wilson and the "outing" of his wife. But taken as a group, they are solid citizens with long records of patriotic service – the kind of people we should have listened to from the start.

The primo Whisle Blower, Daniel Ellsberg, was a similar kind of guy. He was a loyal, patriot who spent his time in the military and the government service. Like the modern versions mentioned above, he tried to go through regular channels, but got nowhere.

Ellsberg, the son of Jewish parents with a passion for Christian Science, grew up in Detroit and attended Cranbrook Kingswood School, then attended Harvard University, graduating with a Ph.D. in Economics in 1959 in which he described a paradox in decision theory now known as the Ellsberg paradox. He served as a company commander in the Marine Corps for two years, and then became an analyst at the RAND Corporation. A committed Cold Warrior, he served in the Pentagon in 1964 under Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. He then served for two years in Vietnam as a civilian in the State Department, and became convinced that the Vietnam War was unwinnable…

As a Vietnam expert, Ellsberg was invited to contribute to the assemblage of classified papers regarding the execution of the Vietnam war. These documents later became collectively known as the Pentagon Papers. They revealed the knowledge, early on, that the war would not likely be won and that continuing the war would lead to many times more casualties than was admitted publicly. Further, the papers showed a deep cynicism towards the public and a disregard for the loss of life and injury suffered by soldiers and civilians.

Ellsberg knew that releasing these papers would most likely result in a conviction and sentence of many years in prison. Throughout 1970, Ellsberg covertly attempted to convince a few sympathetic Senators (among them J. William Fulbright) to release the Pentagon Papers on the Senate floor, because a Senator cannot be prosecuted for anything he says on record before the Senate.

When these efforts failed, Ellsberg, with the assistance of Anthony Russo, copied them and finally leaked the Pentagon Papers to Neil Sheehan at The New York Times. On June 13, 1971, the Times began publishing the first installment of the 7,000 page document. For 15 days, the Times was prevented from publishing its articles on the orders of the Nixon administration. However, the Supreme Court soon ordered publication to resume freely. Although the Times did not reveal Ellsberg as their source, he knew that the FBI would soon determine that he was the source of the leak. Ellsberg went underground, living secretly among like-minded people. He was not caught by the FBI, even though they were under enormous pressure from the Nixon Administration to find him.

But there was a difference. People listened to Daniel Ellsberg, or, at least, listened to the Pentagon Papers which had a huge impact on the country and the public opinion about the Viet Nam War [at least, that’s how I remember things]. O’neill, Clarke, and Kwiatkowski have been largely ignored. Were it not for the Administration’s retaliation against Joseph Wilson, he might have suffered the same fate.

I’ve wondered why these revelations by such reasonable people haven’t had more impact. A number of ideas come to mind. I’d like to say that it’s because the country has been so polarized by the Republicans [and Religious Right] that their support transcends any information to the contrary, but that’s just my bias. It’s impossible to mount an argument that we are more polarized now than then – then was as bad as it gets. The 911 attack surely has something to do with things – a personal tragedy for all of us. I think it’s hard for us to swallow that our response, the War on Terror, was a ruse from the start [which it was!]. And the Iraq War hasn’t been so obviously expensive – we sort of won for a while; the casualties are less; and there’s no military draft. Maybe it’s timing. Perhaps Ellsberg’s Pentagon Papers were the straw that broke the camel’s back of the Viet Nam War because they came at the just-right time. But most of all, we don’t have a Watergate Break-In.

While that may seem like a silly thing to bring up, I think it’s the biggest problem of all. The Bush Administration knew they were going to be opposed. They planned their defenses from the very start. They’ve enforced a rigid secrecy – no White House Tapes or Pentagon Papers this time. They’ve undermined oversight from the very start. They’ve used legal counsel at every step of the way being careful to evade rather than break laws – no Watergate. They’ve controlled the enforcement arm of government – Ashcroft, Gonzales. Even the Inspector General’s report about Feith’s OSP says "inappropriate" but not "unlawful" just as the Plame leak slid between the cracks in the wording of the law. They learned their lesson well from Nixon’s mistakes.

So, without an obvious, prosecutable crime, they can use their enormous power, amplified by their careful planning over the years, to stay out of trouble when they’re out of favor. Even today, with the majority of the country against them, with even our soldiers against them, with the rest of the world against them, and no longer in control of the Congress – they’re still at it.

Somewhere, they screwed up. Somewhere there’s an unblown whistle.

Joshua, blow your horn!