Reporter defends release of NSA spy program

Mitchell: You are very, very tough on the CIA and the administration in general in both the war on terror and the run up to the war and the war itself — the post-war operation. Let's talk about the war on terror. Why do you think they missed so many signals and what do you think caused the CIA to have this sort of break down as you describe it?

Risen: I think that, you know, to me, the greater break down was really on Iraq. It's very difficult to have known ahead of time about these 19 hijackers. They were, you know, probably lucky that they got through and they did something that no one really assumed anybody would ever do. And I think that made 9/11 a lot like Pearl Harbor. That even when you see all the clues in front of you that it's very difficult to put it together.

I think I'm harder on the book on the CIA for their failures on Iraq and WMD, because I think that was an issue that was sitting in front of them for a decade and they knew for many years this was a top priority of the government. And they never really did much about it and they never really developed the spies or the agents or the information they needed to sort out what was really happening in Iraq. They just kind of developed an assumption within the CIA that Iraq has WMD without really doing much intellectual challenging their own assumptions in a serious way.

Mitchell: What happened to CIA officers or analysts who doubted the presence of weapons of mass destruction? What kind of reception did they receive?

Risen: Well, you have to get back into that time period and remember, I think, that one of the things that was different from what people realize — not many people doubted that there was WMD, they assumed there was WMD. What they knew or what they were troubled by was that there wasn't much the intelligence on that wasn't very strong. And they didn't have many people in the CIA who were troubled by the lack of strong conclusive intelligence. That doesn't mean they didn't think there was WMD, but they just didn't think the intelligence was as strong as the administration was saying. And the people who had those doubts tended to get pushed aside for whatever reason. And I think that's one of the real troubling issues.

Mitchell: Among the players whom you describe, you say that the Secretary of State got rolled, really, by the Secretary of Defense, and so did the National Security Advisor.

Risen: The power in this administration was Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld and that Cheney and Rumsfeld really set the national security agenda for the administration. And Secretary Powell kind of went into the administration, I think, thinking that he was going to be the major player and everyone was surprised by the way in which Rumsfeld kind of worked around him. And I think Condoleezza Rice found herself constantly having to catch up with Rumsfeld and Cheney from what people have told me.

Mitchell: What about the role of George Tenet? How do you describe him?

Risen: I think during the Clinton administration he was a good peace time CIA director. Someone who had rebuilt the budgets and morale, but I think when it came time to working with the Bush administration and 9/11 and the war in Iraq, I think he was kind of overmatched by people like Rumsfeld and Cheney as well. And as a result the CIA kind of got swept up in a kind of war fever.

Mitchell: How did that affect decisions that were made about WMD?

Risen: Well, I think it tended to make it so that there was a sense that intelligence that seemed to prove that there was WMD in Iraq went forward and got the White House and any doubts about that were kind of pushed aside. Now whether that was directly because of any decisions or policies that were made is difficult to tell. I compare it to like workplace harassment. It's always hard to tell what or why something happens in a workplace. But I think in this case it was an atmosphere that was created for whatever reason that a lot of people felt.

Mitchell: Did the president create the atmosphere, or was it Cheney and Rumsfeld? You seem to describe it more as the cabinet and the vice president, the war council, operating, rather than the president himself. He's strangely absent.

Risen: Yeah, I think that's probably right. I mean, it's difficult to tell at that level who is saying what to whom. I think that, in many ways, that it was this atmosphere created by this alternative national security apparatus, created by Rumsfeld and Cheney that kind of forced the CIA back on its heels and forced the State Department back on its heels, and let the more pro-war caucus step forward.

Mitchell: You describe kind of a "Hail Mary" pass, sending as many as 30 Iraq ex-patriots, Iraqi Americans, back to talk to their relatives who were scientists, possibly involved in weapons, and you describe a woman, a doctor, from the Cleveland Clinic. Tell me that story.

Risen: Yes, she was an Iraqi American. She and her husband had escaped from Iraq in the 70s and her brother had stayed behind in Iraq and was a scientist. And he got caught up in the nuclear weapons program in Iraq in the early 80s, and stayed in it until it ended in about '91, at the end of the Gulf War. In 2002, the CIA asked her to go to Iraq, to talk to her brother about what was going on with WMD in Iraq. And she went and talked to her brother, and he said there is no WMD, we don't have a nuclear program, we haven't had one in 10 years, it ended at the end of the Gulf War. And she came back and told that to the CIA, and nothing happened.

Mitchell: Didn't they assume that the brother was just lying to her?

Risen: Yeah, I think the CIA assumed that all these relatives were being lied to, because they were under pressure from Saddam, and that it was just disinformation. Unfortunately, it was truth.

Mitchell: The truth was sitting right there in front of them?

Risen: Right, right, which is one of the great tragedies.

Mitchell: Why do you think that the warnings were ignored, from all these people who came back, this doctor from Cleveland, this woman, who rather courageously went back to Iraq? So this doctor comes back, she tells the CIA that her brother told her that there are no nuclear weapons, there was no program, it was all shut down, and they ignore her. Why?

Risen: Well, because I think, as I said earlier, it wasn't what they expected to hear or what they wanted to hear. They were looking for confirmation that there was WMD because they believed there was WMD, and they believed anybody who told them there wasn't any WMD had to be lying. And I think that's different from saying they were lying. I don't think the president was lying. I don't think the CIA was lying. I think they just had a group think that took hold, and they came to so strongly believe that there was WMD, that they tended to ignore any evidence to the contrary.

Mitchell: Why do you think that a significant warning from the head of the European Bureau that a particular source was dead wrong, curve ball. Why did that warning not get to Colin Powell. How did he give false testimony, basically, to the United Nations when the CIA knew better?

Risen: I think that's for the same reason that this was a story that should be included in the speech, and that it was something that confirmed what they already believed about biological weapons. And I just think there was kind of a go fever on WMD and Iraq, and if you talk to people in the CIA, they felt that there was people like Tyler Drumheller, who raised that issue, were being ignored. And there were people who thought that the management of the CIA was kind of saying, you know, we'll find the WMD when we get there. And that that was the attitude.

MORE FROM NIGHTLY NEWS

Nightly News Section Front

Dow loses 128 points, ending disastrous week   What's no good for the country is no good for GM   What's a worried American to do?   Candidates push plans for saving spiraling economy   Connecticut to allow gay marriage   Amtrak cruises into record sales   Peace Corps: Not just for kids anymore Nightly News Section Front   Add Nightly News headlines to your news reader: