
Seymour Hersh on spies, state secrets, and the stories he doesn’t tell - daddy_drank
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/seymour-hersh-monday-interview.php/
======
tptacek
Seymour Hersh's reputation has declined precipitously in the years since he
was rightly hailed as a hero for breaking the Abu Ghraib story. He was
pummeled for publishing, in the LRB, an all-but-refuted story claiming that
the entire story about the assassination of Osama Bin Laden was a lie (he
relied on the secondhand story of a retired, anonymous defense department
employee for his sourcing; his home publication, The New Yorker, refused to
run it).

He's promoted a number of other stories that, to put it gently, an unusual
quotient of support-among- journalists over impact-if-true. Among them, he
believes that USSOCOM is run by a secret cabal of Opus Dei Catholics, and that
the Syrian chemical attacks aren't just false, but actually a false flag
operation run by Turkey. He believes that the US actively supports Islamist
terrorists in Iran and in Lebanon, and that the US trained Iranian terrorists
(the anti-regime MEK) on US soil.

This isn't a new wrinkle in Hersh's career. Early on, he made outlandish
claims about the Kennedy administration, including that the Chicago Outfit
fixed the result of the Presidential election.

Two tricky things about Hersh are first, and most obviously, that he
occasionally breaks a story of immense national importance, and secondly, that
he tends to orient his reporting in directions that are both largely valid and
under-reported. Kennedy was almost surely one of our more crooked presidents.
The Bush administration probably did play some kind of footsie with the MEK.
But that doesn't make any particular story he reports actually true; in
journalism, you can't just end up in the broad vicinity of right.

~~~
notveryrational
Note that the former head of Pakistani intelligence, Asad Durrani, whose
country housed Bin Laden when Seal Team Six did the dispatch - has the same
story that Hersh does.

None of these things seem particularly unbelievable. Having researched a
number of National Security issues intensely (eg Syria) this all fairly
believable. That's just his "lowlights". His publication record thus far has
been nothing short of impressive. And, really, you can't imbue anybody with
too much faith that they only report absolute objective truths. I don't think
even Hersh would recommend that. Certainly this interview he suggests that he
doesn't report on a lot of stuff because he isn't sure if it's CIA smoke and
mirrors.

Compare this to cable television, which gets the narrative wrong almost
constantly, and dumbs everything down so that it lacks substance.

~~~
tptacek
Asad Durrani is Hersh's one named source.

~~~
notveryrational
An incredibly good source, isn't it? That on top of the consistent details
provided by his unnamed sources, and the corroboration that's surfaced since.

~~~
tptacek
The director of ISI in 1992, retired for decades (plural) at the time the
story ran? No, not an especially good source. Also, he appears to have changed
his story since Hersh reported it.

------
farseer
_You write that you knew about atrocities during the Iraq War, including
Americans destroying with acid the bodies of detainees who had died during
torture. But you didn’t report it because Cheney would have destroyed your
sources._

Wow! That is information I have never heard before.

~~~
boreas
I wouldn't take it for granted that he's telling the truth on that. He has
been riding on My Lai credibility for so long, but some of his recent stuff
such as his piece on how the OBL assassination went down is completely wack.

~~~
cup
> is completely wack.

Truth is stranger than fiction and a journalist only lives by their
credibility. He wouldn't publish it if he didnt think it was solid.

~~~
tptacek
There are reputable journalists of statute besides Seymour Hersh, and I think
you'll have a hard time finding one that believes Hersh's claims about UBL.
That people on message boards find him convincing doesn't tell us much; there
were people on HN who believed PizzaGate.

~~~
wallace_f
Also had a harm time finding a scientist at NASA willling to support the foam
strike hypothesis. Semmelweis showed hard evidence of the efficacy of hygiene
in saving lives, but was an absolute pariah, literally driven into a mental
hospital by his critics. There was a Nobel given to a physician for the
lobotomy procedure.

Point is if you just trust the methodology of using groupthink to determine
righteousness you will get some things wrong. And it gets really bad once we
venture away from scientific fields. You can see in history people's psyches
sometimes coalescing around acceptableness of some pretty horrendous ideas
like inquisitions, holocausts, abu ghraibs, etc.

~~~
tptacek
This seems like an argument that comes pretty close to saying we should
disregard all expertise and stature, except for your preferred sources.

~~~
pvg
You are being offered the chance to claim the titles of NSA _and_ NASA shill
here.

------
mcguire
" _I was told within two months not to put anything in the computer by
somebody who was still inside working for Cheney. And I said, “Oh, god.” I
said, “Don’t worry about it. I’m not going to connect it to the internet.” He
says, “You’re not listening to me.” I said, “No. Fucking. Kidding.” The guy
said I couldn’t protect him._ "

What?

This interview is not well written.

~~~
rmason
No it explains why Putin's top staff has gone back to using typewriters.

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/russia-
reverts...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/russia-reverts-
paper-nsa-leaks)

Course if NSA can decode speech from just the vibrations of a window how much
longer will it take for them to know which key you just pressed on a
typewriter?

[https://www.theverge.com/2014/8/4/5968243/mit-turns-
recorded...](https://www.theverge.com/2014/8/4/5968243/mit-turns-recorded-
vibrations-back-into-speech-and-music)

~~~
ummm32
I though that tech was actually quite older, like that it was born just after
masers got well powered and mobile

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maser#Uses](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maser#Uses)

------
throw2016
Matt Taibbi had a well written piece on Seymour Hersh in the Rolling Stones.
[1]

The world is a worse place if values are shown to be hollow and lacking
substance. There will always be some real politik but between surveillance,
dubious wars and neoliberalism the democracy project is in tatters.

Jingoists will defend everything but there is a great responsibility on the
the general public to hold their governments to account. If not there will be
no credibility and no moral high ground from which to operate, and that's a
serious loss that cannot be regained. It's already significantly diminished.

[1] [https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/seymour-
hersh...](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/seymour-hersh-
reporter-w520927)

------
technotarek
Another interesting story broken by Hersh: Vietnam's My Lai Massacre. Video
interview at [https://investigatingpower.org/vietnam-
war/](https://investigatingpower.org/vietnam-war/)

------
creaghpatr
Great interview, really excited for the book.

------
AnimalMuppet
> In the book I’m writing, I can segue into this stuff; I’m writing a lot
> about what was going on in the FBI. There was a lot going on that was
> counter-Trump, I will tell you that. I’m telling you, it’s the missed story
> of all time.

Any idea (or even guess) about what he's talking about here?

~~~
deiznof
He would have to be referring to anti-Trump people within the FBI (not
necessarily the entire FBI working together).

I don't really know what else it would mean.

------
tootie
As much as he was terrible for the country, I find it hard to believe Dick
Cheney would have sources whacked.

~~~
jweir
But getting imprisoned, certainly
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/may/30/cia-
whistleblo...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/may/30/cia-
whistleblower-john-kiriakou-open-letter-prison)

~~~
tptacek
Kiriakou was not imprisoned for ratting out Dick Cheney and his status as a
"whistleblower" is contestable.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796162](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5796162)

------
varjag
Good old Hersh has been in war crime denial business lately. In particular
denying Khan Sheikhoun chemical massacre, which was attributed to Assad by UN
JIT/OPCW.

~~~
epicureanideal
I suspect I'll get downvoted for this by people who believe our media, but I
think with some critical thinking it's possible to at least realize the
possibility that the UN JIT/OPCW may be influenced to the point of bias by the
US and its allies.

Many smart people around me have asked, what would have been Assad's
motivation to bring down the wrath of the US on himself at a point when he's
winning the war? What is the US doing in Syria without an invitation by the
Syrian government, supposedly "fighting terrorists" but against the
government? Why does the US have the right to constantly invade other
governments it doesn't like because "they're not legitimate"?

Assuming the US was the size of Connecticut and had no nuclear weapons, it
would be easy for a power like China to take the domestic unrest after the
Bush, Trump, or any of several other elections to claim that the US has become
a dictatorship and they need to occupy large parts of our territory to ensure
freedom. Then assume that somehow that tiny US manages to start winning
against the China-supported "insurgents". Then suddenly, out of nowhere, with
the war turning in favor of the US, the US uses some chemical weapons on
civilians and brings down international condemnation on itself. Who wouldn't
be skeptical?

But our government has done a great job of making every other country in the
world and its government seem suspicious, so it's easy for many of us to think
it's perfectly reasonable that Assad is a crazy person who doesn't want to
live past next week, and so is perfectly happy to use unnecessary chemical
weapons in a war he's already winning, with a major global power backing him.

Some of the people who were even in the video showing the "chemical attack"
have said that they were not attacked with chemical weapons. Those witnesses
have been dismissed as "Russian propaganda". See for yourself, the "Russian
propaganda" and a US-friendly media source denouncing the Russian propaganda.

[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-27/russia-presents-
allege...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-27/russia-presents-alleged-
syrian-witnesses-to-opcw/9702128)

[https://www.rt.com/op-ed/428514-douma-civilians-chemical-
hoa...](https://www.rt.com/op-ed/428514-douma-civilians-chemical-hoax/)

By the way, there are plenty of people in the US who have criticized this
overall US strategy for a long time.

[https://www.amazon.com/New-Military-Humanism-Lessons-
Kosovo/...](https://www.amazon.com/New-Military-Humanism-Lessons-
Kosovo/dp/0745316336)

But I suppose people on both sides of this debate will think that the other
side is just believing the "obviously wrong" propaganda of the other side.

~~~
zeth___
This type of thing is always presented as 'if you don't believe us, you must
believe the evil doers!'. Anyone with half a brain will not believe our side
and the other side.

~~~
JackCh
Thinking in terms of "our side" and "other side" is part of the problem I
think. I may pay taxes to one of the involved parties, but that's not a
rational reason to root for that side like it was my preferred sports team.
It's "my" side only in a very abstract and indirect sense, through some sort
of democratic system and accident of geography, but I shouldn't let either of
those bias my analysis.

