November 5, 2003

MEMORANDUM TO: OPINION LEADERS

FROM: GARY SCHMITT

SUBJECT: Committee at War

Democratic staff on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence have drafted a memo which lays out a plan to use the committee's investigation of pre-Iraq War intelligence for explicitly partisan purposes. The document (which can be found at http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2003/11/4/165925.shtml) reads more like a strategy produced by the Democratic National Committee than a "select" Senate committee - particularly one in which the minority is given unique prerogatives in committee governance in exchange for keeping partisanship to a minimum.

As a former minority (democratic) staff director of the Senate committee, I can attest to the fact that keeping that pledge, while certainly difficult at times, is absolutely necessary if the committee is to carry out its larger responsibility of overseeing America's intelligence community. How can any DCI or president responsibly allow the committee to have full access to many of the nation's most important secrets if a significant portion of committee's members and/or staff believe it is fair game to use that information to score political points?

Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) has called on Vice Chairman Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and the other Democratic members of the committee "to repudiate" the strategy outlined in the memo. That should be the minimum step taken. The vice chairman should insist that the memo's author should resign, along with any other staff or members who assisted in or signed off on its preparation.

According to the NewsMax.com website, the memo reads as follows:

"We have carefully reviewed our options under the rules and believe we have identified the best approach. Our plan is as follows:

"1) Pull the majority along as far as we can on issues that may lead to major new disclosures regarding improper or questionable conduct by administration officials. We are having some success in that regard.

"For example, in addition to the President's State of the Union speech, the chairman [Sen. Pat Roberts] has agreed to look at the activities of the office of the Secretary of Defense, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, as well as Secretary Bolton's office at the State Department.

"The fact that the chairman supports our investigations into these offices and cosigns our requests for information is helpful and potentially crucial. We don't know what we will find but our prospects for getting the access we seek is far greater when we have the backing of the majority. [We can verbally mention some of the intriguing leads we are pursuing.]

"2) Assiduously prepare Democratic 'additional views' to attach to any interim or final reports the committee may release. Committee rules provide this opportunity and we intend to take full advantage of it.

"In that regard we may have already compiled all the public statements on Iraq made by senior administration officials. We will identify the most exaggerated claims. We will contrast them with the intelligence estimates that have since been declassified. Our additional views will also, among other things, castigate the majority for seeking to limit the scope of the inquiry.

"The Democrats will then be in a strong position to reopen the question of establishing an Independent Commission [i.e., the Corzine Amendment.]

"3) Prepare to launch an independent investigation when it becomes clear we have exhausted the opportunity to usefully collaborate with the majority. We can pull the trigger on an independent investigation of the administration's use of intelligence at any time. But we can only do so once.

"The best time to do so will probably be next year, either:

"A) After we have already released our additional views on an interim report, thereby providing as many as three opportunities to make our case to the public. Additional views on the interim report (1). The announcement of our independent investigation (2). And (3) additional views on the final investigation. Or:

"B) Once we identify solid leads the majority does not want to pursue, we would attract more coverage and have greater credibility in that context than one in which we simply launch an independent investigation based on principled but vague notions regarding the use of intelligence.

"In the meantime, even without a specifically authorized independent investigation, we continue to act independently when we encounter footdragging on the part of the majority. For example, the FBI Niger investigation was done solely at the request of the vice chairman. We have independently submitted written requests to the DOD and we are preparing further independent requests for information.

"SUMMARY: Intelligence issues are clearly secondary to the public's concern regarding the insurgency in Iraq. Yet we have an important role to play in revealing the misleading, if not flagrantly dishonest, methods and motives of senior administration officials who made the case for unilateral preemptive war.

"The approach outlined above seems to offer the best prospect for exposing the administration's dubious motives."

From the Office of Senator Pat Roberts

WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. Senator Pat Roberts issued the following statement regarding the discovery of a Democratic strategy memo:

“I have just learned of the existence of a Democratic strategy paper detailing how to discredit the Intelligence Committee’s inquiry of the use of pre-war intelligence. The memo outlines a series of steps to make the inquiry irrelevant and to replace the committee with an independent commission - a move that has been voted down twice on the Senate floor. The memo states the plan is to ‘castigate the majority,’ perhaps ‘pulling the trigger’ on the plan ‘probably next year.’

“While none of us is new to partisan politics, and I am not naive enough to think that we can escape some degree of partisanship, this memo exposes politics in its most raw form. The memo does not discuss efforts to strengthen our intelligence capabilities nor does it mention the need to protect our troops. Instead, it’s a purely partisan document that appears to be a road map for how the Democrats intend to politicize what should be a bipartisan, objective review of pre-war intelligence.

“Instead, we should be focusing on how to make our country safer and how to improve our intelligence capabilities. Today, I call on Vice Chairman Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and every Democratic member of the Intelligence Committee to repudiate this strategy - and to declare to their constituents, their Caucus, and their party - their willingness to put politics aside and look at the facts of the inquiry.

“The American public and the people who are on the front lines fighting the war on terrorism deserve nothing less.”