Edward Epstein Blog -
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Question:
Richard A. Clarke makes assertions in his book Against All Enemies that can be easily checked against external and unambiguous sources. Is Clarke truthful in verifiable assertions he makes?
Answer:
No, in at least one instance Clarke totally fabricates a position he attributes to another author's book, and then use his fabrication to discredit that author's position.
On p.95 of his Against All Enemies, Clarke states that author Laurie Mylroie had asserted "Ramzi Yousef was not in the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in Manhattan but lounging at the right hand of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad." He then debunks this "thesis" by stating that, in fact, Ramzi Yousef "had been in a U.S. jail for years," which was true.
Obviously, if Yousef had been in prison in America, he could not be in Baghdad at the right hand of Saddam, and Mylroie's theory was demonstratively untrue-- a discreditation he considers important enough to feature on the back dust jacket of his book.
The problem here is that the straw man Clarke demolishes is an invention entirely of his own creation. Mylroie did not write anything remotely like it. On the contrary, she explicitly states on p. 212 of her book Study Of Revenge, "Ramzi Yousef was arrested and returned to the U.S. on February 7, 1995." While she questions the provenance of documents he used prior to his capture in 1995, she does not claim in her book that Yousef resides anywhere but a maximum security federal prison.
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Clarke simply himself makes up the absurd assertion Yousef
was in Baghdad with Saddam, falsely attributes it to
Mylroie, then uses it to discredit Mylroie.
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Collateral question:
Why Did Clarke go to such extreme lengths-- including a blatant fabrication-- to discredit Mylroie's book?
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