E-mail a friendRon Suskind
airdate May 8, 2007
Journalist Ron Suskind attracted national attention with his groundbreaking articles on the Bush White House. He writes for various magazines and is also a best-selling author, whose books include the critically acclaimed The Price of Loyalty and The One Percent Doctrine. The New York native has worked for several newspapers, including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, where he won the Pulitzer for feature writing. Suskind is a graduate of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.
Ron Suskind
Tavis: Ron Suskind is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist bestselling author whose previous books include "The Price of Loyalty" and "A Hope in the Unseen." His most recent book is out in paperback May 15th. It's called "The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of its Enemies Since 9/11." He joins us tonight, as usual, from Washington. Ron, nice to have you back on the program.
Ron Suskind: Nice to be here, Tavis.
Tavis: Speaking of inside of Washington, I want to come back to the book here in a moment. Did you see or hear about all the references to you on "Meet the Press" this past Sunday?
Suskind: Oh, the references have been flying all week, Tavis, ever since George's book launched from the stall.
Tavis: For those who have not been hearing or seeing your name and the reference to this book, "The One Percent Doctrine," flying everywhere, tell me why your name has been coming up and what this mini-debate is about.
Suskind: Well, the fact is "One Percent Doctrine" came out last year, last summer, and there was cooperation from a group that I call, loosely, "Team Tenet." Folks around Tenet. Tenet was cooperative, as well. Lots of people through the government were cooperate to create, I think, a kind of definitive piece of nonfiction about the war on terror.
Since 2001 - 2001 to 2005 is essentially the span of that book - and more than 100 key sources cooperated with the project, and frankly, much of the news in George's book was in "The One Percent Doctrine," so I guess that makes it not news this week.
Tavis: But specifically with regard to the reference on "Meet the Press" this week about this slam-dunk comment, take it a little further.
Suskind: Yeah, well, there's a lot of push and shove that's gone on for years on whether Tenet said slam-dunk or not. My reporting was such that Tenet didn't remember saying it, and John McLaughlin, his number two, his alter-ego, in the meeting as well, that December 2002, he didn't remember Tenet saying it either.
McLaughlin and others characterize it, just as George does in his book, mostly a marketing meeting, it's about presentation - which in a way is kind of damning itself, that the CIA director and his deputy are there talking about kind of posturing and spin and presentation like guys in the marketing department.
But in any event, that representation, in my book, is similar to the one in George's book this week, so there's a lot of talk about the two of them together. Does Tenet hedge a little more here? Now he's sort of saying, “Well, maybe I did say it. I've talked to other people who remember me saying it.” But he's quite firm that it wasn't about evidence. That famous meeting wasn't about evidence; it was about essentially presentation and polish.
And what's interesting about this, Tavis, is that those two words, slam dunk, really are quite important for the president. It creates a firewall against, really, maybe the toughest sanction which history might level at him, which is taking us to war under false pretenses. Tenet provides protection with those two words, and that's why it was so valuable to everyone in the White House.
And frankly, George often talks about who dropped the dime on me - virtually everybody in the room dropped the dime on George Tenet, in terms of calling Bob Woodward and laying it out.
Tavis: Finally, at least with regard to this Tenet matter, then we'll move on to some other stuff I want to talk about, what do you make of Mr. Tenet, the former CIA director, coming out in the way that he's come out now to defend himself, to cast aspersion, to point fingers at others? What do you make of him all of a sudden, after all these years and opportunities to have set the record straight or to express himself similarly in this book on the media circuit, what do you make of why he's doing that now?
Suskind: Well, it's quite a spectacle. Think about this historically. The director of Central Intelligence is out doing a book tour and a rondelet of talk shows during the operational time of the president he serves. It's extraordinary. And interestingly, I think Tenet and his gang, the folks around him, are surprised at the vitriol of some of the reactions, especially from folks inside of the intelligence community, CIA specifically.
Several who've written a letter which was quite devastating about Tenet and his responsibilities. He's getting shot at from many directions that I don't think they expected. That's why George is looking a little banged-up and beleaguered as the week went on - certainly last week, and probably into next week.
Tavis: For those who have not read "The One Percent Doctrine," again, out in paperback in just a few days from now, "The One Percent Doctrine" refers to what, specifically?
Suskind: "The One Percent Doctrine" is a moment; it's from November 2001 in the White House. The vice president's being briefed about intelligence that the Pakistani nuclear scientists sat with Bin Laden and Zawahiri, his deputy, two weeks before 9/11 to talk about feasibility issues in and around nuclear weapons. This was also in Tenet's book, obviously.
And what's interesting about this moment is the vice president sort of stops to think. He says, "We need to think about these low-probability, high-impact events in a different way," and then he says it. "If there's a one percent chance that WMD are given to terrorists, we need to treat that as a certainty. Not in our analysis of the preponderance of evidence, but in our response."
The fact is, this becomes a core, a centerpiece, of the action model for the United States government. It doesn't impact so directly in the collection of intelligence - that still goes about as it has been. But in terms of all the parts of the government that are guided toward action, action becomes the mantra. Even if it's only a one percent chance, or the evidence may be slim - and this applies to not only Afghanistan but Iraq and much of the war on terror. It's quite a startling change in terms of what's guided the ship of state up to now.
Tavis: When you say -
Suskind: But Cheney says, "We have no choice," and those in the government, well, of course they sign on and agree.
Tavis: You used the word startling. There are others - Afghanistan and Iraq, in their rearview mirror - who would go much farther than startling and say something like stuck on stupid. How ridiculous is that nation, given, again, that we now have Iraq, Afghanistan, in the rearview mirror, particular Iraq, where we never found WMDs?
Suskind: Well, it's so interesting, because the lack of evidence, not finding the WMD in Iraq, has become such a signature event in modern U.S. history that it's clouding many other let's just say key dialogues or debates that we really should be having at this point. What we are doing at this juncture is still responding in a way to the searing event of 9/11.
To an altered global landscape, or at least one we can now see clearly. And the fear that small groups, structures, individuals, networks, so to speak, can get their hands on WMD. And if that occurs, we could have another searing event in the United States. The government is still trying to figure out, how do I respond to this as a superpower?
Right now, the problem which Tenet talks about in his book and I talk about a lot in my book is that intelligence capabilities, assets, are diminished, especially in terms of human intelligence, which is the thing that tells us what we need to know in time. That's really a problem now, and it's been declining since the Iraq invasion.
We're not having people who are signing on in the shadows to help the United States. We're not getting jihadists who may be having doubts or some sense that maybe this is not my Islam. They're not approaching anybody at this point, or being approached by anyone who is either from the United States or one of our representatives. That's a huge problem.
Tavis: Okay, that's a legitimate issue, and I hear you on that. In the meantime, though - see, I personally don't see this as an either-or proposition. It's gotta be both, and. So I take the point that you're making now. In the meantime, though, back to this one percent doctrine, this Bush doctrine of invading first, asking later, firing first, ask later, where does that leave us? That doesn't put us where you want to be, either.
Suskind: No, no, it leaves us running around like a giant, headless chicken.
Tavis: Exactly.
Suskind: In much of the world. And in the - look, look, let's step back a little bit from George Tenet's week under the lights. Let's be very clear. The minute that this administration adopts the policy of preemption - that we may go to war based on intelligence, which is really the concept here, or even beyond that, prevention - as soon as that occurs, you know that CIA's going to be in big trouble.
I think George should have known that. He may not have; he was out hunting terrorists at that point. But what it means is that extraordinary, unnatural, and insupportable weight will be placed on this sort of vaporous thing called intel. This is what Tenet is saying on "60 Minutes" when he's arguing with Scott Pelley, saying, "Well, you gotta understand intelligence is often supposition and guesswork."
Well, exactly. That's why you don't go to war based on intelligence. It's not sufficient for the awesome act of a nation declaring war and sending in its troops. That's why we haven't done it up to now, but that's the new age as it has been structured by this administration. And the fact is, right now, the questions that should be out there on the campaign trail, is this the way we want to go forward? I'm not hearing much in the way of alternatives.
Tavis: In a minute and 30 seconds, let me ask you right quick about - relative to another one of your texts that came out a few years ago, "The Price of Loyalty." I thought I would use this occasion to ask you right quick what you make of that book in retrospect, given that since that book came out, Bush again continues to show his loyalty to Karl Rove, to Alberto Gonzalez, to Paul Wolfowitz. It just doesn't end.
Suskind: Well, that book, Paul O'Neill, the former Treasury secretary, was the main character. Lots of folks cooperated with that project. The fact is, we're seeing every day the price of loyalty. Blind loyalty, loyalty not seasoned by inquiry, and in a way, by honesty, either.
And the fact is, right now you've got an ever-diminishing circle, smaller than ever, of folks who are there based on this loyalty bond of George Bush, which is, well, a fierce one, but in some ways, not as productive as some of the traditional loyalty that many of us sign on to. Loyalty that's earned, loyalty that's constantly reviewed. And I think what you're now seeing is exactly that: the price of loyalty.
Tavis: We've discussed a couple of his texts in this conversation tonight. The one that will be out in paperback May 15th, a few days from now, is called "The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of its Enemies Since 9/11." Ron Suskind, of course, the author. Ron, as always, nice to talk to you, thanks for your insight.
Suskind: Nice to talk to you, Tavis.
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