I thought the Catering Cart Caper was reasonable. It worked. It showed cooperation between CIA, Secret Service and the military. And they kept it under wraps. As for innocent diplomats exposed to danger in the bait plane,...diplomats go into this knowing the dangers. They are often tight with CIA. A good way to get yourself killed. Best of all for the administration, this kerfuffle has been a great diversion from an investigation into the rape of children.
It's the plane full of unwitting American officials, military personnel, journalists and others serving as bait for the reported threat that the security people allowed to proceed—that's what bothers me. Of course security's job is to protect the president. But I can think of more than one scenario they could have used that wouldn't have endangered a plane load of people.
They could have held Air Force One on the tarmac until the president had flown in the C-32A to Ramstein and dramatically and angrily and publicly called out the threat from the tarmac there. In cluding flying time, that could have been done in about two hours forty-five minutes. I can't think of an operational necessity that required putting a plane load of people at risk when time separation could have done the same thing.
For that matter, why even board Air Force One at all? Perhaps the president could have been secretly spirited away while publicly, he was supposedly being held up in meetings that ran long back at the site of the summit.
You have considered this more thoroughly than I.
I thought the Catering Cart Caper was reasonable. It worked. It showed cooperation between CIA, Secret Service and the military. And they kept it under wraps. As for innocent diplomats exposed to danger in the bait plane,...diplomats go into this knowing the dangers. They are often tight with CIA. A good way to get yourself killed. Best of all for the administration, this kerfuffle has been a great diversion from an investigation into the rape of children.
It's the plane full of unwitting American officials, military personnel, journalists and others serving as bait for the reported threat that the security people allowed to proceed—that's what bothers me. Of course security's job is to protect the president. But I can think of more than one scenario they could have used that wouldn't have endangered a plane load of people.
They could have held Air Force One on the tarmac until the president had flown in the C-32A to Ramstein and dramatically and angrily and publicly called out the threat from the tarmac there. In cluding flying time, that could have been done in about two hours forty-five minutes. I can't think of an operational necessity that required putting a plane load of people at risk when time separation could have done the same thing.
For that matter, why even board Air Force One at all? Perhaps the president could have been secretly spirited away while publicly, he was supposedly being held up in meetings that ran long back at the site of the summit.