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Rockefeller angry over Bush revealing al-Qaeda's LA plot
President George W. Bush's disclosure of detailed intelligence about a thwarted al Qaeda plot to attack Los Angeles could prove damaging for U.S. national security, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee said in a letter released on Thursday.In a Feb. 17 letter to U.S. intelligence chief John Negroponte, Sen. John Rockefeller of West Virginia echoed a warning from CIA Director Porter Goss that revelations about intelligence successes or failures against al Qaeda can aid America's militant enemies. "Why then did the president and the assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism describe in great detail the information about this plot contained in a highly classified October 2004 CIA document?" Rockefeller wrote. White House officials were not immediately available for comment. The Senate Democrat was referring to a Feb. 9 presidential speech in which Bush disclosed new details of a 2002 al Qaeda plot to use shoe bombs to hijack a plane and fly it into the 1,017-foot-(310-metre) high US Bank Tower in Los Angeles. The Bush administration cited the same plan to attack West Coast targets using hijacked planes last October as being among 10 disrupted al Qaeda plots. But Bush, while facing criticism over his decision to authorize warrantless eavesdropping inside the United States, provided the public with a more detailed account in his Feb. 9 speech. He said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, al Qaeda's operational mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks, planned to use four Southeast Asian men in a second-wave attack on Los Angeles and trained the cell's leader on how to use a shoebomb. Frances Townsend, Bush's homeland security and counterterrorism adviser, also disclosed intelligence details about the plot. Rockefeller said Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other senior officials have disclosed sensitive information for political purposes on a range of issues from prewar Iraq to National Security Agency eavesdropping. The disclosures have all been potentially damaging to U.S. interests, Rockefeller said. At the same time, the administration has sought to blame lower-level officials for damage caused by unauthorized leaks. "Given the administration's continuing abuse of intelligence information for political purposes, its criticism of leaks is extraordinarily hypocritical," Rockefeller wrote. "The president and other senior members must set an example for others to follow," he added. A spokesman for Negroponte's office would confirm only that the director for national intelligence had received the letter. Rockefeller spokeswoman Wendy Morigi said the senator has not yet received a response from Negroponte. Posted by: Dan Darling 2006-02-24 |
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