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The Path to 9/11

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The Path to 9/11 is a controversial two-part miniseries scheduled to be aired in the United States on ABC television on September 10, 2006 at 8 p.m. EDT and September 11, 2006 at 8 p.m. EDT, as well as on the Seven Network in Australia, TVNZ in New Zealand, and BBC Two in the UK on the same dates. The film dramatizes the 1993 terrorist attack upon the World Trade Center in New York City and the events leading up to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

The film was written by Cyrus Nowrasteh, directed by David L. Cunningham and stars Harvey Keitel and Donnie Wahlberg[1].


Cast

Broadcasting

United States

Australia

New Zealand

United Kingdom


Controversy

Criticisms

According to the official statement released by ABC on September 7, 2006, the film is "a dramatization, not a documentary, drawn from a variety of sources, including The 9/11 Commission Report, other published materials, and from personal interviews [2]." Additionally, a book by Thomas Kean, the 9/11 Commission chairman who worked as an advisor to the film, is also included as a published material[3]. Kean supports the film saying, "People in both parties didn't particularly like the commission report, and I think people in both parties aren't going to love this one." Kean also remarked on ABC's Good Morning America "It's something the American people should see because you understand how these people wanted to do us harm, developed this plot, and how the machinations of the American government under two administrations not only failed to stop them, but even failed to slow them down [4]."

Before the film has aired, screeners have claimed that certain scenes do not match the real-life events on which they are based. Liberal figures (many of which have yet to see the movie) have picked up on this and accused ABC of being unfair in its portrayal of the Clinton Administration's attitudes and actions regarding terrorism. There are also claims that some individuals portrayed in the film were not given special DVD preview copies before it is aired publicly. A review in the New York Times calls the mini-series "evenhanded" and makes the point that if there is a shooting at the beginning of a school year, you do not look only back to the homeroom teacher assigned at the beginning of the year [5].

ABC insists their movie is non-partisan and has responded to critics by explaining that, "No one has seen the final version of the film, because the editing process is not yet complete, so criticisms of film specifics are premature and irresponsible[6]."

The film's writer/producer, Cyrus Nowrasteh, has been accused of letting his conservative political beliefs influence the screenplay. He has described himself as "probably more of a libertarian than a strict conservative." Rush Limbaugh added to the controversy when he said Nowrasteh was a friend and described his work on The Rush Limbaugh Show[7] [8]. For his part, the filmmaker has said that he doesn't "want to just be a conservative version of Michael Moore [9]."

James Bamford revealed on an interview on MSNBC that an FBI agent who worked as a consultant to “The Path to 9/11.” quit halfway through production of the mini-series because he believed the writers and producers were “making things up [10]. ”

The main source of the controversy stems from supposed inaccuracy in the portion of the film concerned with the Clinton administration in the 1990s. Critics say the screenplay makes it appear as though blame for the events that took place on September 11, 2001 should be placed on Clinton and his cabinet. One example cited is a scene in which then National Security Advisor, Sandy Berger, does not approve of the order to take out a surrounded Osama bin Laden and tells the squad in Afghanistan that they will have to do the job without official authorization and then hangs up the phone. According to Sandy Berger and others—including conservative author and Clinton critic Richard Miniter—this never happened [11]. Nowasteh has admitted that the abrupt hang-up was not in the script and was improvised [12].

According to the 9/11 Commission Report, it was Clinton-appointed CIA director George Tenet not Berger, who called off the supposed "operation to assassinate UBL [Osama bin Laden]." Berger claims, and his claims are noted in the Report, the operation was never in the execution stage in the first place because it was not feasible for local tribes and warlords to assist in his capture and delivery to the United States[13].

One of the 11 panel members of the 9/11 Commission, Richard Ben-Veniste [14], and Clinton-appointed former counter-terrorism advisor Richard Clarke (previously an appointee of George H. W. Bush, and the author of several books critiquing the George W. Bush Administration [15]) have also come forward to claim that the Berger scene is fiction based on their claim:

  1. Contrary to the movie, no US military or CIA personnel were on the ground in Afghanistan and saw bin Laden.
  2. Contrary to the movie, the head of the Northern Alliance, Masood, was nowhere near the alleged bin Laden camp and did not see Osama bin Laden.
  3. Contrary to the movie, the CIA Director actually said that he could not recommend a strike on the camp because the information was single sourced and we would have no way to know if bin Laden was in the target area by the time a cruise missile hit it [16].

Another scene in question allegedly portrays Madeline Albright refusing to shoot missles at Osama Bin Laden without authority from Pakistan and eventually getting "permission" from them against the military's wishes. Albright insists that this is a falsity and highly inaccurate.

ABC, which is offering the movie to schools, critics, some blogs, radio personalities such as Rush Limbaugh and movie critic Michael Medved, and offered a special screening with Democrats such as Richard Ben-Veneste in attendance. According to Jay Carson, a spokesman for Bill Clinton, Clinton's office requested a copy of the movie so that they could view it before it aired, but the request was denied. Carson has also stated that Madeline Albright and Sandy Berger have also requested a copy and are also not receiving copies [17].

This prompted Madeline Albright and Sandy Berger to write letters [18] [19] to ABC, asking why they had not received copies and also asking why ABC has chosen to run a movie whose accuracy is highly in question.

Albright, aside from demanding an answer, also stated the reason for wanting a copy:

For example, one scene apparently portrays me as refusing to support a missile strike against bin Laden without first alerting the Pakistanis; it further asserts that I notified the Pakistanis of the strike over the objections of our military. Neither of these assertions is true. In fact, The 9/11 Commission Report states (page 117), "Since the missiles headed for Afghanistan had had to cross Pakistan, the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs was sent to meet with Pakistan’s army chief of staff to assure him the missiles were not coming from India. Officials in Washington speculated that one or another Pakistani official might have sent a warning to the Taliban or Bin Ladin[20]."

Scholastic, which had a deal with ABC to distribute "educational materials" based on the movie, has now pulled the materials in question from their website, substituting them with materials focusing on "critical thinking and media literacy skills [21]."

Dick Robinson, Chairman, President and CEO of Scholastic had this to say on the matter:

“After a thorough review of the original guide that we offered online to about 25,000 high school teachers, we determined that the materials did not meet our high standards for dealing with controversial issues...at the same time, we believe that developing critical thinking and media literacy skills is crucial for students in today’s society in order to participate fully in our democracy and that a program such as ‘The Path to 9/11’ provides a very ‘teachable moment’ for developing these skills at the high school level. We encourage teachers not to shy away from the controversy surrounding the program, but rather to engage their students in meaningful, in-depth discussion [21].”

Harvey Keitel, who plays the lead role in the film, criticized the end result saying that "it turned out not all the facts were correct" and "you cannot cross the line from a conflation of events to a distortion of the event[22] ."

Responses

Commentators have responded to the controversy by suggesting that "the deep anger of the Clinton political machine" amounts to "self-serving complaints" and to quibbling about details in what Hugh Hewitt presents as "a very accurate docudrama" whose main message, according to Brent Bozell, is that "America's intelligence apparatus was woefully unprepared for 9-11, and remains dangerously inadequate today."[23] Bozell points out that both "Clinton and Bush officials come under fire, and if it seems more anti-Clinton, that's only because they were in office a lot longer than Team Bush before 9-11. Indeed, the film drives home the point that from our enemies' perspective, it's irrelevant who is in the White House. They simply want to kill Americans and destroy America. The film doesn't play favorites, and the Bush administration takes its lumps as well."[24] Hewitt adds that the "program is not primarily about the Clinton stewardship—or lack thereof—of the national security. It is not even secondarily about that. Rather the mini-series is the first attempt—very successful—to convey to American television viewers what we are up against: The fanaticism, the maniacal evil, the energy and the genius for mayhem of the enemy."[25] Limbaugh claimed that Democratic efforts to stop the film from being shown were similar to Stalinist tactics.[26]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0473404/
  2. ^ http://www.wzzm13.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=60898
  3. ^ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/07/AR2006090701055.html
  4. ^ http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/09/08/D8K0POC81.html
  5. ^ http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003118768
  6. ^ http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=%22The_Path_to_9/11%22_%282006_Docudrama%29
  7. ^ http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_090106/content/truth_detector.member.html (Reference requires membership)
  8. ^ http://ken_ashford.typepad.com/blog/2006/09/abc_docudrama_b.html
  9. ^ http://www.libertyfilmfestival.com/libertas/index.php?p=462
  10. ^ http://thinkprogress.org/2006/09/07/fbi-agent-quit/
  11. ^ http://thinkprogress.org/2006/09/07/miniter-911/
  12. ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/07/washington/07path.html?hp&ex=1157688000&en=83f7ae6acba5dd2f&ei=5094&partner=homepage
  13. ^ http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Ch4.htm
  14. ^ http://public.cq.com/public/20060905_homeland.html
  15. ^ http://amazon.com/s/ref=sr_kk_2/002-3856354-2388061?ie=UTF8&search-alias=aps&field-keywords=richard%20clark
  16. ^ http://thinkprogress.org/2006/09/05/clarke-blasts-abc/
  17. ^ http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/electioncentral/2006/sep/06/bill_clinton_breaks_silence_on_9_11_docudrama
  18. ^ http://websrvr80il.audiovideoweb.com/il80web20037/ThinkProgress/2006/albright%20letter.doc
  19. ^ http://websrvr80il.audiovideoweb.com/il80web20037/ThinkProgress/2006/Berger%20letter.pdf
  20. ^ http://websrvr80il.audiovideoweb.com/il80web20037/ThinkProgress/2006/albright%20letter.doc
  21. ^ a b http://www.scholastic.com/aboutscholastic/news/press_09072006_CP.htm
  22. ^ http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/09/07/harvey-keitel-speaks-out-on-path-to-911-it-turned-out-not-all-the-facts-were-correct/
  23. ^ http://www.townhall.com/columnists/HughHewitt/2006/09/07/why_does_the_left_hate_the_path_to_911
  24. ^ http://www.townhall.com/columnists/BrentBozellIII/2006/09/07/a_compelling_path_to_9-11
  25. ^ http://www.townhall.com/columnists/HughHewitt/2006/09/07/why_does_the_left_hate_the_path_to_911
  26. ^ The Rush Limbaugh Show, September 8, 2006
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