History in the United States seems to be repeating itself: a heated CIA file has just seriously caused the American president to stumble. As he celebrates the hundred days since his arrival in the White House this week with a high approval rating – 64% favorable opinions – only surpassed by Ronald Reagan at the start of his term (67%), Barack Obama has probably made his first real misstep in politics: under pressure from influential Democratic members of Congress and human rights organizations, he agreed to make public a series of three confidential memos detailing CIA torture methods authorized by his predecessor. Whether he was guided by a concern for transparency inherent to his personality or by pure political considerations, the American president could, in the long run, come to regret a decision whose consequences he clearly underestimated, and that led him to a remarkable retreat in less than forty-eight hours: while he did not dismiss the idea of an investigation and legal proceedings against former Bush Administration officials on April 22, just two days later, he announced, jointly with the Senate presidency, the blocking of any such initiative! A retreat compounded by an embarrassing display of divisions within his own camp, including within his presidential team.
Barack Obama was mistaken to believe that he could simply ignore pressures from the intelligence world. General Michael Hayden, who served during the last two years of the previous Administration, had already “condemned” this publication by explaining that it “would limit the Agency’s future abilities to pursue terrorists”. Yet appointed by the new occupant of the Oval Office, the current CIA chief, Leon Panetta also believed that these revelations created a dangerous precedent, additionally harmful to the protection of Langley Central’s sources and methods. The former American Vice President Dick Cheney then invited Barack Obama to publish other documents to show the “interest” of these interrogations in a spirit of “honest debate”. An “interest” confirmed by comments from Dennis Blair, the current president’s Director of National Intelligence, on the “added value” of the information obtained by these practices during the Bush era. This makes it easier to understand the visit soon after by the American president to the CIA headquarters, where he tried to defend his decision while multiplying gestures of support to the indispensable, courageous, and remarkable shadow personnel. But the damage was done.
After the “concerned” officials, it was the turn of the Democratic camp to widely display its divisions: the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, felt obligated to justify her knowledge of these memos, while the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Democrat Patrick J. Leahy, proposed the establishment of a “Truth Commission”, an idea supported by other Democratic representatives including Senator Dianne Feinstein, chairwoman of the powerful Senate Intelligence Committee. She formally requested the American president not to “exclude the principle of prosecution as long as the investigations of her Commission continued”. With the works of this Commission expected to last another six to eight months, the affair is far from over. Finally, within the White House itself, the file highlighted significant oppositions between lawyers and politicians, which will undoubtedly leave some resentments.
Armed with 16 different institutions and a colossal budget – equivalent to the French defense budget – the American intelligence community will not fail to draw all the consequences. And this, at a time when American diplomacy – apart from Hillary Clinton’s trips abroad – still seems inconsistent on many sensitive issues: Iranian nuclear issues, advances of the Taliban in Pakistan, ballistic intimidations from North Korea, military concerns in Afghanistan, and strategic rivalries with Russia. Not to mention the uncertainties in case of a Hezbollah victory in the upcoming Lebanese elections, the mere prospect of which seems to scare Washington enough to postpone delivery of sophisticated and costly military equipment to the country’s authorities until after June 7. All of these issues show the essential capabilities of the “Intelligence”. All the more so when the American president wishes to “open discussions” on all these subjects.
