A Hiccup At The CIA?

I'm still not convinced that any prosecutor who remains under the chain of command of George Bush's Justice Department is going to be able to carry out a legitimate investigation, no matter how tough and nonpartisan John Durham is. In addition, the fact that the sole focus of the investigation is the destruction of the torture tapes, and not what was on them, seems to be to presage something less than a legitimate probe. But that's not the way it's being received at Langley:

“A lot of people are worried,” says one former CIA official, who asked not to be identified talking about sensitive matters. “Whenever you have the bureau running around the building, it’s going to turn up some heads. This could turn into a witch hunt.” Justice officials say Durham was assigned to investigate the 2005 decision to destroy the tapes—not the activities recorded on them, including the use of waterboarding on Al Qaeda suspects. But at this point, Durham has no formal mandate on the probe's scope, giving him the freedom to expand it if he chooses. "We're going to follow this wherever it leads," says one Justice official, who asked not to be identified discussing an ongoing probe.

One key figure, Jose Rodriguez, the former CIA chief of clandestine services who gave the order to destroy the videotapes, has retained Robert Bennett, a renowned defense lawyer who represented Bill Clinton in the Paula Jones lawsuit. Another potential witness, George Tenet, who was CIA director when the tapes were made, will be represented by former FBI general counsel Howard Shapiro. Roy Krieger, a Washington lawyer who has represented about 100 CIA employees, says that two agency officers have approached him about representation, though neither has retained him yet.

I think the CIA is worried for a different reason. The Bushies have been all too ready to lay all of their problems at the feet of the intelligence community. They twisted the intel on Iraq, and when it turned out to be wrong, blamed the CIA for bad intel. In addition there have been the evidence that CIA agents are at war with Cheney because they aren't willing to go into the abyss toward endless war around the globe. As long as this inquiry is limited to the destruction of the tapes, the DoJ, under the firm gaze of Cheney, can use this investigation to get back at a lot of political enemies at Langley, while also shielding Fourthbranch from his ultimate role in the entire mess:

But with anything related to torture, it's pretty clear the CIA took its orders from Cheney -- via Addington. And how plausible is it that, in his exchanges with the CIA, Addington advised against the tapes' destruction? Or that the CIA would have done it if he had told them not to? Isn't it more likely that he supported the idea, either overtly or with a nod and a wink?

So one has to wonder what will happen if Addington is hauled in front of a grand jury to testify not just about his relevant conversations with the CIA, but about his conversations with Cheney.

"Did you, Mr. Addington, indicate in any way to the CIA that destroying the tapes would be acceptable, or even preferable? Did you do so based on instructions from your boss, the vice president?"

Wouldn't it be interesting to hear Addington answer those questions under oath?

Not likely to happen as long as anyone under the thumb of the executive branch is doing the investigating. But the intelligence agents have reason to be worried. Just ask Mary McCarthy.