WND RADIO
OBAMA ADMIN 'LIED' ABOUT VETTING SYRIAN REFUGEES
'We don't know who these people are. We're lucky if we can get the names right'
Greg Corombos
The former chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence says President Obama has no coherent strategy to defeat ISIS, and he alleges one of Obama’s top advisers “lied to the American people” to perpetuate a misguided program allowing tens of thousands of refugees into the U.S.
Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes appeared on multiples Sunday morning news shows. When asked whether the news that one and possibly two of the Paris terrorists came to Europe as refugees would alter the Obama administration’s plan to accept tens of thousands of refugees, Rhodes said there would be no re-evaluation.
“No, Chuck,” Rhodes told “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd. “We have very extensive screening procedures for all Syrian refugees who would come to the United States. There’s a very careful vetting process that includes our intelligence community, our National Counterterrorism Center, the Department of Homeland Security. So we can make sure we’re carefully screening anybody who comes to the United States.”
Peter Hoekstra spent 18 years in Congress and spent much of his time focused on intelligence matters. He is now with the Investigative Project on Terrorism and is the author of “Architects of Disaster,” which outlines the failure of the Obama administration’s policy in Libya.
“I think (Rhodes) basically lied to the American people,” Hoekstra told WND and Radio America. “He said we’ve got a good vetting process in place where we can vet those that are coming from Syria into the United States.”
He continued, “No we do not. The records don’t exist in Syria, especially after you’ve had five years of civil war. We don’t have a relationship with the regime. It’s an ungoverned area. We don’t know who these people are. Ben, shame on you for even implying that we’ve got a good vetting system. We’re lucky if can get the names right.”
In fact, even before the terrorist attacks in Paris, Hoekstra said the idea of bringing in tens of thousands of refugees was a fool’s errand. As such, he said the announcements from a growing number of governors that they won’t accept refugees is a good sign.
“I think it’s a good decision,” he said. “I wasn’t quite sure why we were ever welcoming these folks in. We are a welcoming nation to refugees and to these kinds of individuals, but only after they’ve been vetted.”
Hoekstra said spreading all these refugees around the Western world does nothing to solve the real problem.
“This problem is not solved by accepting refugees into Europe and the United States,” he said. “This problem is solved by eliminating ISIS and bringing some stability back into the Middle East. You’ve got to wipe ISIS out.”
Listen to the WND/Radio America interview with Pete Hoekstra:
The issue is taking on additional scrutiny after the European Union revealed only one-fifth of the refugees it has accepted (or about 44,000 of some 213,000 total) are actually from Syria.
But the refugee issue is just one element of the Obama administration's approach to ISIS that baffles Hoekstra. On Monday, Obama told reporters at the G-20 Summit in Turkey that the Paris attacks would not alter the U.S. strategy toward ISIS. Hoekstra said the existing strategy is a proven disaster, as evidenced by Yemen and Libya turning into lawless wastelands and both Syria and Iraq getting increasingly unstable and deadly to Christians, Yazidis and others.
"I'm not sure what strategy this president is looking at that he believes it working," Hoekstra said. "When you've got at least four countries that are no longer governed and are failed nation-states and are home for the planning and training and preparation for attacks against the West, that is not my view of success."
Another statement from Obama in Turkey is getting even more attention. After announcing he was sticking with his existing strategy toward ISIS, Obama slammed those who want to America taking a more decisive role.
"What I'm not interested in doing is posing, or pursuing some notion of American leadership or America winning or whatever other slogans they come up with that has no relationship to what is actually going to work," Obama said.
Hoekstra was stunned.
"This message is clear: When the president says, 'I have no intention of following or implementing a strategy about America leading' or whatever slogan they may come up with, it is clear that this president does not have a strategy in place for America leading in Northern Africa, the Middle East or, for that matter, any other place in the world," Hoekstra said.
And he said America's credibility is taking a beating as a result.
"I hate to be that critical of this president, but America is at risk," Hoekstra said. "We are in danger, and we're in danger of losing our influence in the world. We've been a voice of stability, security, democracy and human rights. We are just losing all credibility throughout significant portions of the world."
In addition to his frustrations with the Obama administration, Hoekstra is alarmed at how unprepared the intelligence communities were for the Paris attacks.
"What I'm hearing is that there was some general awareness that there were some attacks or an attack was imminent in Europe," Hoekstra said. "That was out there, but again no tactical insight into exactly where the attack would take place or when it would take place."
He said the truth is, it's really hard to find these small plots before they happen.
"It just tells you that ISIS and these radical jihadist groups in a country of 80 million people or in a country of 300-plus million people like the United States, it's not that hard to hide and organize and prepare to carry out an attack like this," Hoekstra said.
So what can be done to improve America's odds of stopping future attacks?
"We need closer intelligence sharing between our agencies," Hoekstra said. "We need to push the technology envelope as quickly as we can, and we need to improve our human intelligence."
Intelligence experts say efforts to infiltrate ISIS have essentially "gone dark," partly due to former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden exposing tactics for tracking terrorist suspects.
Hoekstra said this confirms what everyone should have known about Snowden from the outset.
"As I said at the time, this was not an American hero protecting American liberties," he said. "This was an American traitor that was giving away some of America's secrets that would make us more vulnerable to these kinds of groups and these kinds of individuals and these kinds of attacks."
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2015/11/obama-admin-lied-about-vetting-syrian-refugees/#jdLKAlFWUfyKOqGV.99
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