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September 13, 2006
The Path to 9/11 -- A Postmortem
By Victor Davis Hanson
Links: Seraphic Secret
Americans who watched ABC's The Path to 9/11 saw a well-crafted dramatic interpretation of what rendered the United States, both under the Clinton and Bush administrations, vulnerable to terrorist attack. Perhaps the producers were conservative, but no more so than most of their Hollywood counterparts are liberal--and not to the degree that their politics slanted the presentation of the narrative.
But why, then, the hysteria?
It's hard to believe that Bill Clinton or the film's numerous critics were objecting on any basis of principle--on anything other than furor at pre-election time because some Clintonites, like many others, were portrayed as either distracted or hopelessly naïve about the nature of Islamic fascism.
First, consider the ignorance about the genre of the "docudrama," which is simply the video version of what journalism has been doing for decades--and even centuries. To read Bob Woodward's "meta-histories" is to intrude into the inner thoughts, mental musings, and private conversations of those few Washington insiders who are willing to talk with him, and thereby ensure that their own whitewashed take on events is privileged and becomes the dominant narrative.
Very few of Woodward's characters' cobbled-together reflections can possibly be verbatim transcripts of recorded interviews. Rather in the purest Thucydidean sense, Woodward apparently attempts to "make the speakers say what was in [his] opinion demanded of them by the various occasions, of course adhering as closely as possible to the general sense of what they really said."
Whether the result is factual goes back to the age-old Greek debate over subjective and objective truth. Always controversial is establishing the murky point at which an artist's attempts to portray what "actually happened" so drifts from, or contradicts, what is known from other evidence that it leaves the realm of history and enters that of propaganda or fiction.
Recent tell-all books about Iraq, such as Cobra II, hedge as well, using footnotes that appear to reflect scholarly rigor, but, in fact, sometimes simply cite "unnamed" officials or "senior" officers. There is no chance to establish the veracity of these informants, but some reason to doubt the credibility of an apparently angry source that refuses to be identified. In any case, scholars do not write histories of the Peloponnesian War with footnotes such as "unpublished manuscript of Herodotus" or "unnamed Greek inscription," whose contents are known only to the author and cannot be checked by his peers.
But more importantly, there were various disclaimers in "The Path to 9/11" that repeatedly reminded the viewer of the "fictionalized" nature of the docudrama, that it was impressionistic entertainment drawn from various 9/11 sources. Given that warning, objecting to The Path to 9/11 is not that much different from lamenting that Steven Pressfield's fine Gates of Fire, both for the sake of entertainment, and because of the paucity of information, deviated from the text of Herodotus concerning Thermopylae--although he could have hardly made the Greeks win or King Leonidas and his Spartans survive.
Then there is the second issue of hypocrisy. Few of the present critics worried that a recent fictionizalized film of Ronald Reagan sought to create dialogue that the screenwriter apparently "thought" might best represent what Reagan "might" or "should" or "could" have said--in light of the nature of the evidence and the author's own predispositions. That all such dialogue proved negative to the former president was not so surprising given the political leanings of Hollywood, but still should not have earned such anger from the Right to the point of demanding a cancellation. And such clear bias was not true of "The Path of 9/11," in which Clinton's successors often fared little better in confronting the terrorist challenge.
What are we to say about throat-clearing historians who damned the docudrama (often without seeing it) on grounds of the lack of historical integrity, this from a discipline where postmodernism--there is no objective truth, just rival discourses and narratives constructed on class, race, and gender--was not only appeased, but nearly destroyed the profession.
And what are we to think of Bill Clinton lamenting the movie's supposed deviation from the "truth", or Sandy Berger's concern about protocols, or Madeline Albright's apparent charge of partisanship, this from a former Secretary of State who has traveled the globe plugging her book by faulting her successors to foreign media in a time of war. Although I'm not a fan of docudramas, I found "The Path to 9/11", with its disclaimers, far closer to the "truth" about the saga of bin Laden than what turned up in Bill Clinton's "factual" autobiography.
When ABC cut portions of the most controversial segments before airing the film, there was no outcry from the American Civil Liberties Union that has so often and so loudly lectured us on the dangers not merely of government censorship, but of insidious self-censorship as a result of public pressures.
Nor did the New York Times or the law faculty of Harvard University rush to the producers' defense, despite the long-held and self-acclaimed commitments of both to free speech and the First Amendment at nearly all costs. And, of course, we heard none of the current furor when Oliver Stone produced his wacko conspiracies on the Kennedy assassination and the life of Richard Nixon.
Third, a far greater problem, contrary to the current noise, is not with the docudrama per se--especially when the viewer is clearly and often apprised of this new genre's nature and limitations--but rather with documentaries that do not list any such disclaimers and yet distort truth through clever editing of film clips. A great deal of Michael Moore's documentaries was composed of drive-by interviews of the surprised, senile, or bushwhacked. Many interviews encouraged false impressions, and, unknown to the viewer, were not natural or impromptu, but propped or staged, and so taken out context as to imply the very opposite as intended by the speaker.
Note again, for all this, Mr. Moore was not condemned by historians or lawyers, but rather rewarded with a prominent seat at the Democratic National Convention. Even Bill Clinton would confess that "Fahrenheit 911" was intended to do far more damage to George Bush than "The Path to 9/11" was to himself.
In this regard, concern could be far better voiced about onslaughts against other traditional and trusted genres--Dan Rather's presentation of the news based on forged documents, or Reuters' publishing photo-shopped pictures. And these are neither isolated lapses, nor in the mainstream media do they cut both ways equally against liberals and conservatives. Rather these distortions are concrete manifestations of a long-standing effort on the part of the more theoretical Left to subordinate the means to the ends, as if progressive spirits are to be granted some exemption from bothersome scrutiny and archaic protocols given their purportedly superior moral mission.
There is a final consideration. We are at war. Unlike "Fahrenheit 9/11" that is referenced ad nauseam by the jihadists and still a favorite among al Qaedists, or the current film portraying the imagined assassination of President Bush that played to recent applause in Canada, but gained little condemnation here in America, "The Path to 9/11" won't be popular with our enemies. And that might tell us something. If we know one thing about bin laden and Al Qaeda, they hate the truth and love the lie.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.
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Hat Tip: Seraphic Friend, David Paulin
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at September 13, 2006 08:06 AM
Comments
Seraphic Secret is private property, that's right, it's an extension of our home, and as such, Karen and I have instituted two Seraphic Rules and we ask commentors to act respectfully.
1. No profanity.2. No Israel bashing. We debate, we discuss, we are respectful. You know what Israel bashing is. The world is full of it. Seraphic Secret is one of the few places in the world that will not tolerate this form of anti-Semitism. That's it. Break either of these rules and you will be banned.
Personally, I don't think either Administration came off looking good in the movie.
Posted by: cruisin-mom at September 13, 2006 09:53 AM
Randi:
Thanks so much for writing.
You are correct. There is quite enough blame to go around. The major difference is that Clinton was in power for 8 years, whereas Bush for just 5 months.
And yet the film was objective and bipartisan. In fact, the end-crawl was a devastating indictment of the Bush administration!
Notice that it was only the Democrats who tried to censor the film with "prior restraint" a tactic used by fascists.
It was only the Democrats who insisted on editorial changes to make themselves look better -- an infringement of free speech.
It was the Democrats who threatened to pull ABC's broadcast license.
Finally, and in a way, most telling, it was Clinton and his loyalists who saw the film as being about, well, Clinton and his people.
It was not about "The Path to 9/11."
It was not about all the good and brave people who tried to sound the alarm.
It was not about the courageous Northern Alliance who battled and defeated the Soviets and then were let down by the US.
It was not about the innocent victims who were slaughtered all over the world pre-9-11 by terrorists.
It was not about the 3,000 Americans who were slaughtered on 9-11.
No, for Clinton, Albright, Berger and all the other loyalists and the Democrats in Congress it was only about... them.
This is just loathsome narcissism.
In this matter, the Democrats, and not just the hard-core left, have truly dishonored themselves. And yet they have revealed much about their core ideology.
I am not surprised. I have said it dozens of times, but I will say it again for it bears repitition, especially within this specific context.
1) The Democrats are the party who claim to believe in free speech--but when they become the targets of criticism, free speech comes under vigorous attack.
2) The Democrats are the party who decry censorship--but only if they are the censors.
3) The Democrats are the party who claim to value truth--but G-d help you if you deviate from their version of the truth.
In brief, the Democrats are the party with vigorous and habitual totalitarian impulses -- skillfully labeled: progressive ideas.
Posted by: Robert J. Avrech ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.seraphicpress.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at September 13, 2006 10:42 AM
Robert, I think both parties, simply put, are full of it...sorry. I will not try to go head to head with you, since you are much more knowlegdable and well read, and, quite frankly, a much better shot than I am.
Posted by: cruisin-mom at September 13, 2006 11:06 AM
Robert,
Bill Clinton obviously must bear more responsibility than George Bush for 9/11 because of his time in office. However, I also agree that this has to be put into a larger context -- perhaps even larger, however, than has been previously noted here. And that larger context was provided by Norman Podhoretz's Commentary article, "World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win." He convincingly argued: "(M)uch the same methods for dealing with terrorism were employed by the administrations of both parties, stretching as far back as Richard Nixon in 1970 and proceeding through Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan (yes, Ronald Reagan), George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and right up to the pre-9/11 George W. Bush."
Yes, there is lots of blame to go around pre-9/11. But what happened post 9/11? As we all know, Republicans saw the enemy -- Islamofacism --for the existential threat and evil that it is. For Democrats, however, the existential threat and evil was George Bush. Pre-9/11 stupidity is perhaps understandable. Post-9/11 stupidity is not.
Posted by: David at September 13, 2006 12:56 PM
I think David is on to something here. In football, you always know a team is losing when the players run around and look at each other rather than the opposing players they're supposed to be covering/attacking. I realize there's a concern about weakness at home, and for schmoes like us who are civilians there is nothing much to do but attack our peers, but we need to stop this exercise in in-fighting and get on the ball. We know who the bad guys are, a huge majority of Americans know who the bad guys are... so let's stop wasting too much time pointing fingers at each other.
Posted by: Jake at September 13, 2006 01:22 PM