Bush at War: Bob Woodward as a Fiction Writer

Dr. M D Nalapat
Professor of Geopolitics, the Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India

History is never what happens, but what those who write about events claim took place. Just as the United States has forgotten the role of Zbigniew Brezezinski and Willam Casey in arming and financing the fanatics who later mutated into Al Qaeda (rejecting pleas to instead help nationalist Pashtuns, Uzbeks and Tajiks, as such elements were hostile to ally Pakistan), now it is in danger of glossing over the chain of mistakes that led to 9/11. The reliance on Pakistan to keep the Taliban and its guest Osama bin Laden in line. The refusal to help the Northern Alliance till the tragedy of the WTC occurred, and even then only weeks after beginning the war in Afghanistan. Above all, the unwillingness to adopt unconventional methods to deal with Bin Laden before he could strike.

In Bob Woodward's book 'Bush at War' (Simon & Schuster 2002), what emerges is a public relations exercise designed to whitewash those within the Homeland who were guilty of neglect & severe errors of judgement. This reaches beyond the shores of the US, to those labelled as 'allies' by the CIA and the Department of State. For example (page 5), Woodward writes that an operation to nab Bin Laden had to be aborted "because of a military coup in Pakistan." Not mentioned is the fact that the coup brought General Pervez Musharraf to power, and that he was therefore responsible for protecting the Al Qaeda mascot. CIA Director George Tenet is a hero to Woodward, yet even he could not avoid mentioning that the CIA chief had "never requested a change in the rules, had never asked Clinton for an intelligence order (to) ambush Bin Laden." Following precedent, the CIA station chief in Pakistan too was against any such action, on the grounds that it would "violate US law".

There were warnings aplenty that Osama bin Laden was planning a major attack on the US. Among them was one from the author of this review, who met State Department officials and Congressional staffers in Washington DC in May 2001 to point out that close relatives of the Taliban governors of Kandahar and Jalalabad had relocated to India, and that they were claiming that their influential kin were ready to hand over both Mullah Omar and Bin Laden, "after negotiations". The offer to introduce US officials to these relatives was refused, as was a request - made by a close associate of the Afghan leader who was then in New Delhi - to arm Karim Khalili with weaponry that would enable him to take on Al Qaeda. Later, this same Afghan played a key role in liberating his country from Bin Laden. But that was after 9/11, when US officials were not as unwilling to help.

Woodward would have us believe that George Bush welcomed the 'opportunity' that the WTC attacks provided, as it gave him "a chance to improve relations with Russia and China." This on page 32, when on page 35 the CIA Director specifies that the People's Republic of China was among "the three top threats facing the US." As for the Northern Alliance, Woodward faithfully follows the CIA-State Pakistan-centric demonology on this group, rubbishing especially its military head, Mohammed Fahim. He buries his mistakes under a canopy of statistics, such as that the statement of the President after the tacks had 219 words, or that notes of "more than 50 National Security Council and other meetings" were taken, and "more than 100 people involved in the decision-making and execution of the war" were interviewed by him. Small wonder that there is analytical chaos in the book. As any statistician can tell you, in exit polls for example, often a bigger sample leads to less accurate results.

Woodward's weakness is one that he shares with many journalists, that of puffing up those who give him access, while damping down descriptions of those less forthcoming. Clearly, Colin Powell was able to spare a considerable amount of time for Woodward, as the Secretary of State comes off as Hero Number One in the book. This despite the reality that he was the architect of the failed strategy of relying on Pakistan to capture the key Al Qaeda members, and of refusing to back full throttle the Northern Alliance till the approach of winter created a panic within the planners of the war. Powell promised President Bush that Musharraf had promised to stop Al Qaeda operatives at the border, give immediate intelligence information and - crucially - cut off fuel supplies and manpower to the Taliban. The reality is that the overwhelming majority of the Al Qaeda fighters escaped into Pakistan, which continued to smuggle both men and materiel across its northern border to the Taliban.

Clearly, Donald Rumsfeld was not as liberal with his time as Powell and his acolytes. The Defense Secretary comes off as a low-wattage, petulant pal intent on safeguarding his own turf, and guilty of severe micromanagement. "He's got a weakness in wanting to have his hands around everything." (page 24) The contrast between Powell and Rumsfeld creeps in everywhere. On page 81, Woodward has the Secretary of State ruminating that "Going it alone was precisely what he wanted to avoid...The President's formulation was not realistic. Without partners the United States could not launch an effective war. He believed the President made such statements knowing they might not withstand a second analysis." Hardly a vote of confidence in the Commander-in-Chief, who - as it turned out - was right about the US having the ability to ensure the collapse of the Taliban on its own. It was Rumsfeld, not Powell, who had the better insight, as when he warned against elevating Bin Laden to cult status, or when he pointed out that the problem was not just a few Al Qaeda leaders, but terrorism. Contrast this with Powell who, after embracing Musharraf, now turned to the Al Sauds to flush out the Taliban. Clearly, the Secretary of State was unaware of Wahabbism and its pernicious effect on international security. Logically for one who relied on Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, Powell was against an ultimatum to the Taliban (page 98).

Woodward's basic lack of knowledge of the subjects he is writing becomes evident whenever he ventures into Afghan history. According to him, "Warring between the Southern Pashtuns and the northern Tajiks and Uzbeks (had created the vacuum) that had allowed the Taliban to take over the country ". The role of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia has been forgotten in this assertion that the Taliban was the product simply of intra-Afghan differences. Equally wrong is the lumping together of the Pashtuns into a single homogenous mass. Within this vibrant people, there exists a strong nationalist strand that was opposed to religious fanaticism, but which - even today - is being ignored by the West in favour of the zealots who are close to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Even the CIA Chief saw Pashtuns as a non-differentiated mass (page 230).

The bias against the Northern Alliance - which fought the fanatics even during 1994-97, when the US backed them - is consistent. Woodward quotes George Tenet as saying that "the US action would not succeed if the Northern Alliance took over or even seemed to take over the country". Why? Those monolithic Pashtuns would get upset. "We want to hold off on the Taliban so as not to destabilize Pakistan" (page 123). It was this folly that nearly lost the war by almost giving the Taliban the time needed to await the onset of winter. Naturally, Powell - and even Cheney - shared Tenet's vision, with the Secretary of State saying that going after the Taliban "was not uppermost in our minds" (pages 127, 149). Powell had promised that Pakistan would provide the US with all the intelligence that country had on the Taliban, which was practically everything of value. On page 157, Condolezza Rice admits that "getting intelligence was a problem" and that because of this deficit, they could not identify targets "effectively and precisely". Naturally, Woodward omits to mention the source of the disappointing flow of intelligence, Musharraf.

After first trying to choke off adequate help to the Northern Alliance till the eleventh hour, in the hope that Musharraf would deliver the mythical 'moderate Taliban' to the US side, Powell repeatedly tries to block the advancing Northern Alliance from demolishing the Taliban. An example was Kabul ("We don't want to take Kabul"), the securing of which was blocked by the US till General Fahim (the slowpoke, according to Woodward) decided enough was enough, and ordered his forces to march in. In place of the Pashtun anger forecast by the CIA, there was rejoicing as the "Tajik and Uzbek" Northern Alliance troops occupied the Afghan capital. Even the US bombing campaign was opposed by Powell, who worried that it was "bombing for bombing's sake, unconnected to a military objective" (page 275). In reality, the air campaign proved invaluable in sapping the will of the Taliban to do battle.

Sadly for Woodward, occasionally the truth peeps out, even in his brilliantly-written work of fiction. For example, the 'nervous' General Fahim is shown (page 238) pleading for the US to bomb the front lines so that he could attack. And where was Donald Rumsfeld in all this? According to Woodward, the Secretary who liked to be in on everything was unaware that the Northern Alliance wanted the US to bomb the Taliban front lines (page 243). This despite daily pleas to do so on CNN. It is these nuggets of truth that need to be extracted from Woodward's PR offensive. Despite all the hype about Musharraf by Powell, the CIA was forced to admit that it "did not have its best contacts in the south, and it was hard to get them from Pakistan. There was no Southern Alliance" (page 245). Even George Tenet, the stickler for rules and precedents, had to concede that "We don't have anything working in the south, and we have nothing to put on the table" (page 297). He then went on to make a statement that is incredible to those aware of Shia-Sunni differences, and of the history of persecution of the Shias by the Taliban, "The Iranians may have switched sides and gone to side with the Taliban." Small wonder that 9/11 was allowed to happen. Incomprehensible that Tenet is still DCIA.

Almost as incomprehensible as the retention of Colin Powell, who has thus far succeeded in hitching only the captive Tony Blair to the Bush chariot in the cause of a war against Saddam Hussein. The hapless Secretary of State even believed that - claims made before CNN and BBC to the contrary - the Northern Alliance did not wish to liberate Kabul as they realized that "the southern tribes would go bonkers seeing their rivals in the capital." Definitely the stuff of which Pulitzers get made. The reality is that it was the last-minute reversal of the anti-Northern Alliance strategy, followed by bombing of the Taliban front lines, that gave the US victory over Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. The truth is that General Musharraf has not delivered on any of his promises to Good Friend Colin Powell, and that the Al Qaeda are regrouping in Pakistan. For example, the Lashkar-i-Toiba and the Jaish-i-Muhammed (both of which are units of Al Qaeda) are even today receiving help from the Pakistan army in their operations in Kashmir. Sadly, just as the role of Brezezinski-Casey has been obliterated in the creation of Al Qaeda, so too have been the mistakes that led to 9/11, errors that even today are exercising a malign grip over US policy. Not all the Woodwards can change that.