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| CIA director downplayed threat from Islamic caliphate as 'absurd' |
| 2014-08-14 |
| [WASHINGTONTIMES] The White House is facing new questions about underestimating the threat from Islamic State forces of Evil in Iraq with the surfacing of a speech in 2011 by John Brennan, then President B.O.'s counter-terrorism chief and now CIA director, in which he dismissed the danger of an Islamic caliphate as "absurd." "Our strategy is ⦠shaped by a deeper understanding of al Qaeda's goals, strategy, and tactics," Mr. Brennan said on June 29, 2011. "I'm not talking about al Qaeda's grandiose vision of global domination through a violent Islamic caliphate. That vision is absurd, and we are not going to organize our counterterrorism policies against a feckless delusion that is never going to happen. We are not going to elevate these thugs and their murderous aspirations into something larger than they are." Two years later, the Islamic State declared a caliphate in a territory covering northern Syria and northwestern Iraq. And while the forces of Evil don't meet Mr. Brennan's definition of "global domination," they are enough of a growing threat to Iraq and the West that Mr. Obama last week ordered air strikes and a humanitarian mission to blunt the terrorist group's swift progress. Mr. Brennan's remarks are similar in their dismissive tone to an interview that Mr. Obama gave in January to the New Yorker magazine. The president described the Islamic State as amateurs. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #7 Let's see, epic failure of job, spying on Congress, lying about it... And still has his job? CIA needs to be destroyed and rebuilt from the ground up. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2014-08-14 19:16 |
| #6 Our strategy is � shaped by a deeper understanding of al Qaeda's goals, strategy, and tactics I'd like an S, Pat. Schlieffen keeps popping into my head. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2014-08-14 16:46 |
| #5 If you don't think the Islamists are worth considering as a lifelong enemy, read Col. Tom Kratman's "Caliphate". I think it's still free on either Baen or Amazon. Good book, and all too realistic. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2014-08-14 16:07 |
| #4 "The Nazi party was a feckless bunch of artists and socialists" History is full of fools underestimating their enemies. Brennan is and was always a strategic fool. They have a complete and deep understanding of AQ, sure, but then they only do because they underestimated them at WTC bombing 1, Kobar towers, USS Cole, 911, etc... Now he is saying the same about the more radical islamic threat. I guess he never read Sun Tzu or understands Clausewitz. He knows neither the US or the threat. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2014-08-14 11:46 |
| #3 Brennan downplayed the threat? I don't think so. The guy seems to be a whuslim--a white muslim. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2014-08-14 10:12 |
| #2 Strange, very strange: Obama’s “administration” now suddenly refers to the jihadists invading Iraq as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant [or Islamic Caliphate], rather than the common translation of the abbreviation ISIS that includes Syria. [my comment in brackets] Link |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2014-08-14 09:05 |
| #1 These people also downplayed OBL and crew, until the morning of 9/11 when they couldn't ignore it anymore. One of Bush's mistakes was not to make public examples of those who contributed to the failure of the security of the nation, pour encourager les autres! |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2014-08-14 08:55 |