Revenge of the CIA chief

Tomorrow, James Tenet's book “At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA” will be available at Amazon.com. Only the happy few, who were lucky to get hold of an advance copy, are entitled to comment, and I am not one of them. I'll order the book tomorrow and hopefully be able to read it in a fortnight or so. Even so, in the past few days, stories have been turning up all over the media web about Tenet's disgust of Bush's spin to invade Iraq.

(The Times: Washington awaits a CIA chief's revenge) (The Independent: Ex-head of CIA accuses Bush over rush to war) (The New York Times: Ex-C.I.A. Chief, in Book, Assails Cheney on Iraq, Former C.I.A. Chief’s Memoir Irritates Some High-Ranking Readers) (The Washington Post: Tenet Details Efforts to Justify Invading Iraq)

Tenet's critique came too late, but better late than never. He should have attacked Bush's lies while still director of the CIA and thereafter promptly have submitted resignation. He didn't do that. Publishing a book exactly four years after “Mission Accomplished” is a bit tardy. Everybody with a few brain cells left knows by now that Bush is a liar and a war criminal. Who needs Tenet to tells us? Now he tells us there was no “slam dunk” evidence that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Why didn't he pull Colin Powell's sleeve at the U.N. Security Council meeting in 2003?

Tenet waited to say the obvious till the obvious was obvious to anybody, with a few exceptions such as Bush and Blair. Still, let's read what he has to say. If it can damage Bush, Tenet may only end up in the first stage of Hell.