Anthrax Suspect's Suicide Recalls Ambiguities In Lead Up To Invasion Of Iraq: Glenn Greenwald
August 1, 2008
The New York Times' blog, The Lede, asks what might happen if the case were to be closed following this death, especially since the FBI has already been successfully sued for false accusation in this case by another suspect, Dr. Steven Hatfill.
The echoes between Dr. Hatfill and Dr. Ivins seem to resonate, leading some to wonder whether the government was once again jumping to conclusions in the case. "Is this going to be Hatfill-2?," Brad Garrett, a former F.B.I. agent who worked the anthrax case, asked ABC News.
With the Justice Department officially mum for the moment, the questions will only grow louder. It falls to the department to say whether that question at the top of this post ought to be repunctuated into a statement -- but an unnamed official told The Associated Press today that the department had not yet decided whether to declare "Case Closed."
If it does so without further explanation, at least one detail will be gleanable from the outcome. "If the case is closed soon," an official told the A.P., "that will indicate that Ivins was the lone suspect."
Prompted by the apparent suicide of Bruce Ivins, the FBI's lead suspect in the anthrax mailings that followed 9/11, Salon's Glenn Greenwald extensively reexamines the case today, and how the attacks were used by lead the American people to support the invasion of Iraq.
The 2001 anthrax attacks remain one of the great mysteries of the post-9/11 era. After 9/11 itself, the anthrax attacks were probably the most consequential event of the Bush presidency. One could make a persuasive case that they were actually more consequential. The 9/11 attacks were obviously traumatic for the country, but in the absence of the anthrax attacks, 9/11 could easily have been perceived as a single, isolated event. It was really the anthrax letters -- with the first one sent on September 18, just one week after 9/11 -- that severely ratcheted up the fear levels and created the climate that would dominate in this country for the next several years after. It was anthrax -- sent directly into the heart of the country's elite political and media institutions, to then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD), Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt), NBC News anchor Tom Brokow, and other leading media outlets -- that created the impression that social order itself was genuinely threatened by Islamic radicalism.
On a related note, John McCain was among the first politicians to link the anthrax letters to Iraq, as a clip from the October 18, 2001 Late Show with David Letterman, where McCain appeared as a guest, reveals.
ThinkProgress has the story.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/08/01/mccain-anthrax-iraq/
Video Transcript:
LETTERMAN: How are things going in Afghanistan now?
MCCAIN: I think we're doing fine .... I think we'll do fine. The second phase -- if I could just make one, very quickly -- the second phase is Iraq. There is some indication, and I don't have the conclusions, but some of this anthrax may -- and I emphasize may -- have come from Iraq.
LETTERMAN: Oh is that right?
MCCAIN: If that should be the case, that's when some tough decisions are gonna have to be made.
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