DOD Responds to the Hersh Article!

[clem_c_rock]

http://www.dod.gov/releases/2005/nr20050117-1987.html

<snippit>
The Iranian regime’s apparent nuclear ambitions and its demonstrated support for terrorist organizations is a global challenge that deserves much more serious treatment than Seymour Hersh provides in the New Yorker article titled “The Coming Wars.”


Mr. Hersh’s article is so riddled with errors of fundamental fact that the credibility of his entire piece is destroyed.


Mr. Hersh’s source(s) feed him with rumor, innuendo, and assertions about meetings that never happened, programs that do not exist, and statements by officials that were never made.


A sampling from this article alone includes:


• The post-election meeting he describes between the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff did not happen.


• The only civilians in the chain-of-command are the President and the Secretary of Defense, despite Mr. Hersh’s confident assertion that the chain of command now includes two Department policy officials. His assertion is outrageous, and constitutionally specious.


• Arrangements Mr. Hersh alleges between Under Secretary Douglas Feith and Israel, government or non-government, do not exist. Here, Mr. Hersh is building on links created by the soft bigotry of some conspiracy theorists. This reflects poorly on Mr. Hersh and the New Yorker.


• Mr. Hersh cannot even keep track of his own wanderings. At one point in his article, he makes the outlandish assertion that the military operations he describes are so secret that the operations are being kept secret even from U.S. military Combatant Commanders. Mr. Hersh later states, though, that the locus of this super-secret activity is at the U.S. Central Command headquarters, evidently without the knowledge of the commander if Mr. Hersh is to be believed.


By his own admission, Mr. Hersh evidently is working on an “alternative history” novel. He is well along in that work, given the high quality of “alternative present” that he has developed in several recent articles.


Mr. Hersh’s preference for single, anonymous, unofficial sources for his most fantastic claims makes it difficult to parse his discussion of Defense Department operations.


Finally, the views and policies Mr. Hersh ascribes to Secretary Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz, Under Secretary Feith, and other Department of Defense officials do not reflect their public or private comments or administration policy.

</snippit>

[Moderator]

1. Your subject line is not the same

as the article and does not relate at all to what the article states.
Will move rather than lock.

[JohnLocke]

5. Uhh...that's wrong.

It does relate to what the press release states. Obviously.

[JNelson6563]

2. Translation:

Hersh's article is all lies and he's a stinky poopy-head!

:eyes:

Julie

[Pam-Moby]

3. OMG Mr. Hersh has hit a nerve in the DOD-it must be true n/t

[ginnyinWI]

8. Mr. Hersh is the same man who

first reported on the Mei Lai Massacre. I believe him over the DOD.

[Julius Civitatus]

19. So, DiRita is basically confirming Seymour's article

This master neocon DiRita is basically replying to Seymour Hersh by confirming his thesis, and resorting to trashing his personality and credibility. Furthermore, DiRita tries to prepare us for a face-off with Iran.

[Occulus]

4. I don't believe them, they are the DOD

Let's see a source that can't declare things secret on a whim.

Not that I'm flaming you... but these people... I just don't trust 'em.

[Supersedeas]

6. to assume that the factual allegations that are not specifically denied

are specifically admitted...would also be 'alternative' in the eyes of the DOD.

[libertypirate]

7. It's like watching a looney toon cartoon....

seeing these people work...

Next will see Bush flaming out the top of the Whitehouse screaming his biscuit is burning.

[Kimber Scott]

9. These people need to get some new buzz words,

the old ones are getting to be so boring. "Soft-bigotry." "Alternative history." (Well, I guess that one's been spruced up. They used to say "rewrite history.")

I am so missing my country.

[annabanana]

10. so it's all true!

(The more vociferously they deny..the closer to truth we are...if the past is any indication)

[Fovea]

11. Man, you don't see these sorts

of weazely denials much anymore. On most stuff
the DoD just lies to your face.

I thought I felt the ghost of Ron Ziegler glide past my chair.

[riverwalker]

12. "constitutionally specious"

just like our prez

[Nothing Without Hope]

13. "Yeah, and like we told you, he was all wrong about Abu Ghraib, too!!!"

Seymour Hersch has a proven track record of getting the truth out there. The current DOD has the OPPOSITE track record - they have been proven to lie and do everything they can to distort and conceal the truth.

This was so graphically demonstrated during Hersch's exposure of the Abu Ghraib scandal. "It's all lies!" They screamed. "The administration and DOD didn't know about it! It was only a few local bad apples acting on their own!" Remember?

And we are supposed to believe THEM instead of Hersch? SUUURRRE. The sad (and scary) thing is, many Americans still believe the totally false DOD version of the torture scandal.

As in the Abu Ghraib scandal, I believe more confirmation will come for Hersch's new story. I do worry about his survival -- these people are capable of anything, certainly including murder. By their deranged reasoning, he is a traitor after all.

There is ANOTHER huge part in the Hersch story, if its original text is read in its entirety - see here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2962328
That is the way the CIA is being systematically "hollowed out" so that all intelligence-gathering -- and thus oversight of what B*'s handlers are doing -- is directed and kept hidden within B*'s circle. No experts allowed! Only ideologues who have the same no-holds-barred empire-building ambitions. This is just as horrible as the Iran invasion plans, because it is literally global and, as they see it, permanent. Under the cover of secrecy -- until they have such total power that they no longer bother with it -- this administration means to pursue wider war and suppression of all oversight and dissent.

These power-mad ideologues must be stopped. The obviously unconstitutional law that cravenly gave b* the "right" to declare war without Congressional assent MUST be opposed via repeal and legal challenge IMMEDIATELY. Don't just contact Dem members of Congress, write them ALL.

[Tinoire]

14. The DOD really needs better writers.

Their denial really makes me blush for them. Bush is really scraping the bottom of the barrel these days; I guess all the educated, literate ones left.

Jeez. Who is this Spokesman Lawrence DiRita?

the views and policies Mr. Hersh ascribes to Secretary Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz, Under Secretary Feith, and other Department of Defense officials do not reflect their public or private comments or administration policy.

Bwahahahaha! My God. Piss on my leg and tell me it's raining.

[louis-t]

17. Lawrence DiRita?

Curly Joe's boy.

[BrotherBuzz]

15. Gary Webb had some thoughts on this sort of thing...

"The one thing that I’ve learned from this whole experience is, first of all, you can’t believe the government--on anything. And you especially can’t believe them when they’re talking about important stuff, like this stuff. The other thing is that the media will believe the government before they believe anything." - Gary Webb

[seasidelib]

16. CNN wants to know

Wolf ran the story right behind the lead (which was the kidnapping of the arch bishop in Mosul).. his poll question today:

QUESTION OF THE DAY
Would you support the U.S. conducting secret reconnaissance missions in Iran?


Right now it's, 56% yes 44% no

[Swamp Rat]

18. The "views and policies Mr. Hersh ascribes" to these lizards is spot on.