Dartblog

This movie, “The Path to 9/11,” is absolutely devastating to the Clinton Administration. To Sandy Berger’s obsession with C’ing his A, Albright’s doe-eyed statecraft, and the entire mentality of fighting terrorism as a matter of law enforcement. Utterly devastating. And very little of the plot has been left to the imagination, because these people and the decisions they made are, of course, matters of public record. The good news for the Left is that the strategic/political decisions which actually do represent “the road to September 11” take place about two hours in. The shaky camera movements and dutch angles have zombified viewers by then.

UPDATE: Evidently the most outrageous part hasn’t even aired yet. It seems that the movie presents a scene in which CIA operatives are in a position to nab bin Laden and Sandy Berger explicitly gives a ‘no’ order. To my knowledge, this never happened, although something strategically synonymous did. Clinton was offered bin Laden by the Sudan. Tried to get the Saudis to take him. They wouldn’t. Deal fell to Clinton. Said no. And the other element—CIA targeting of bin Laden—is also true. We have the tapes. So, no, it didn’t happen with the same words and pictures shown in this ABC Miniseries. But that doesn’t mean the show isn’t mostly right.