The Ming Report

RADICAL SURGERY

July 19, 2005 - Long before anyone knew that PT-109 was skippered by a young John Fitzgerald Kennedy Hollywood had celebrated the PT squadrons in the WWII adventure film They Were Expendable with John Wayne and Donna Reed. Long before Valerie Plame signed on with the CIA Alan Ladd and Geraldine Fitzgerald starred in the WWII drama OSS giving the public a romantic glimpse of the work that America’s undercover agents performed behind the lines in Nazi occupied France. One theme that was returned to again and again was betrayal and death stalking the agents. In the film betrayal came from the enemy and collaborators – not from the highest levels of their own government.

That seems to be the difference between the OSS of sixty years ago and its successor CIA of today. Then those men and women who risked their lives for their country were supported by their government and honored for their service. Now the men and women who put their lives on the line for the Agency must keep a constant lookout over their shoulders – not to protect themselves from the enemy but to guard against betrayal should the results of their work not fit the preconceived notions of the President and Vice President. That is the lesson of Rove & Libby v. Plame. That is the result of the politicization of the intelligence services under this administration.

Never before in our history have we been engaged in a struggle in which the defense of our way of life depended so much on the accurate and effective gathering of information. Never before have we been challenged by a shadowy force operating in the shadows and without the sanction of any sovereign. Never before have we been assailed by a dedicated enemy that does not deploy its forces in brigades and divisions but numbers its personnel in fives and tens and not thousands. That is why the gathering of accurate information is our first line of defense not the primary justification of imperial adventurism.

A career agent watching what the highest levels of our government have done and continue to do to Valerie Plame will pause and think long and hard before he or she reports anything except that which the President and his political advisors want to hear.
At a time when so much of our national security depends upon the unbiased collection, dissemination, and analysis of intelligence the real threat posed by the treatment of Ms. Plame and her husband is clear and evident. That treatment is nothing less than a clear and present danger to the defense of our nation and its people

The test should not be has either Libby or Rove committed a crime, not can they avoid conviction. Rather it should be does their continued tenure in office enhance or diminish the nations security. That test demands the excision of the malignancy before it spreads further. The body politic is in dire need of radical surgery.