When Richard Clarke was Funky

Authored by Michael Pate on April 1st, 2004 at 6:12 PM

If we had more people in public service like Richard Clarke, this country would be a better place. - Oliver Willis

Clarke did suffer one setback in his 30-year career in high office, though he doesn’t mention it in his book. James Baker, the first President Bush’s secretary of state, fired Clarke from his position as director of the department’s politico-military bureau. (Bush’s NSC director, Brent Scowcroft, hired him almost instantly.) I doubt we’ll be hearing from Baker on this episode: He fired Clarke for being too close to Israe—not a point the Bush family’s political savior is likely to make in an election season. - Fred Kaplan

Funk said he recommended disciplinary action against “the responsible official,” Assistant Secretary for Politico Military Affairs Richard Clarke. Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger rejected the recommendation, however. Officials have said previously that Clarke is being transferred. Clarke, in a memo published along with the report, vigorously disputed the charges that he failed to take action on violations by Israel. Clarke said many of the intelligence reports of violations by Israel were “specious on their face” and other reports were investigated “without smoking guns ever being shown to us.” Clarke also claimed there was no system in place to share reliable intelligence with him on possible violations. But Funk responded that the “relevant intelligence information” is provided “on a daily basis” to the top officials in the politico-military bureau and Clarke was the “only” official cleared to receive some categories of information. - Washington Post News Service

I would like to know more about how a doubly disgraced State Department Official was able to make such a smooth move to the National Security Council. An uncharitable person might give him partial credit for Lockerbie. And is his new job, he set the policy for Somalia which led to Black Hawk Down.

I actually don’t doubt that Bill Clinton was committed against terrorism. He just chose a lot of the wrong people to go about it. And Clarke topped the list.