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Hersh's story is not well sourced, contradictory, and mostly wrong. From a simple verification perspective, it is difficult to keep track of how many anonymous

Hersh's story is not well sourced, contradictory, and mostly wrong. From a simple verification perspective, it is difficult to keep track of how many anonymous sources he has, and which has made which claim. However, the chance that they are well placed enough to know all of the details they claim to is highly unlikely, especially with the compartmentalization of information. While ad hominem attacks are certainly not the correct approach, he has stated the information he heard from his sources with an excess of confidence, assuming that they have no agenda. He then places it in a narrative which I only have direct experience with slices of the information about the events in the story, but it directly contradicts the narrative. The question is not what you think about Seymour Hersh, the question is what you think about the motives of his supposed sources, and what that might indicate about their veracity.

xyzzy123 11y ago
From the article: > Yet most of this criticism, over the thousands of words written about Hersh’s piece in the last week, has amounted to “That doesn’t make sense to me,” or “That’s not what government officials told me before,” or “How are we to believe his anonymous sources?” Your post pretty much echoes the hit pieces this article is complaining about, and adds nothing new to the discussion.
- foxhedgehog 11y ago
  No, he is making different points. Similarly, this is where I stopped reading the article: > Barrels of ink have been spilled ripping apart Hersh’s character, while barely any follow-up reporting has been done to corroborate or refute his claims The original poster's point isn't "this doesn't make sense to me." It's that the facts do not comport with reality. One of the things that those who defend this kind of reporting love to trot out is the idea that any criticism is fallacious, and is "ad hominem." Of course, there is plenty of ad hominem response out there, but cherry-picking these responses as representative, rather than engaging with substantive refutation, and then claiming that there is no such refutation is argument in bad faith. In fact, there is a name for that particular kind of argument: a straw man.
  - xyzzy123 11y ago
    What point is the poster making? That the anonymous sources have their own agendas? - “How are we to believe his anonymous sources?”. Can you tell me what other points there are to be found in there? > It's that the facts do not comport with reality. Which facts, specifically? There are certainly none mentioned in that post.
    - foxhedgehog 11y ago
      I count a few points: 1. The article is not well-sourced. a. There are many anonymous sources, which is generally a bad practice; SH consequently may over-represent confidence in his material. b. It is difficult to track how many anonymous sources there are. c. It is unlikely that these sources would have access to the information that they claim. 2. The article has internal contradictions. I'm sure that we can flesh these out more if you would like, but none of these are ad hominem. Wrapping "exclusively anonymous sources are bad" as a criticism in with "Sy Hersh is an unreliable jerk" is also an argument in bad faith. The two are not equivalent, and the former is a sincere issue with this piece. Including it in with the latter has the effect of encouraging dismissal of both just because the latter is obviously fallacial.
      - xyzzy123 11y ago
        1. It's a pity you stopped reading the article, because addressing the criticism of anonymous sources is about 1/3 of it. 2. A discussion of specific internal contradictions in the article would be interesting and valuable, unlike the original post. [Might make sense to make a new post for it, so it doesn't get buried though]. As to the "facts not comporting with reality", should I assume you have abandoned that claim? That would also be an interesting discussion. This is the whole point of the CJR article - that the media response so far has been largely fact-free.
        anonsource 11y ago
        No...it's not the criticism of anonymous sources, it's the lack of consideration given to the possibility that the anonymous source is lying. If you bring out an anonymous source that is making these kind of assertions, you need more than a claim that it's a retired intel officer to achieve credibility.
- anonsource 11y ago
  I think it is important to consider the motivation of anonymous sources. This new story, which seeks to elevate the role of the ISI, or perhaps just diminish the role of others, appears to have sources with interesting motivations. In particular, Hersh's description of the primary source for this information does not indicate that they would have had access to all of the information described (both the intel process and the raid details, as well as individual negotiation points in the coverup). The amount of love for the ISI in the description almost suggests that he was put up to it by the Pakistanis. For example: The suggestion that an ISI liaison traveling on the helicopter with the Americans "guided them into the darkened house and up a staircase to bin Laden’s quarters" is ludicrous. SEALs typically don't need someone to lead them up a staircase. "Aside from those that hit bin Laden, no other shots were fired." This is to support the story that ISI was keeping UBL under house arrest there, and had left him to his own devices, so there were no weapons there. However, outside observers directly after the event showed that the place showed evidence of fighting on all floors. "Saudi Arabia, which had been financing bin Laden’s upkeep since his seizure by the Pakistanis" The overthrow of the Saudi govt was one of UBL's objectives. This is nonsense. Given the level of infiltration of the ISI, the idea that they could have kept bin Laden prisoner for six years, without a leak from their side even now, needs a lot more explanation. If that many people in Pakistan knew, we would have known, and we would not have had to rely on a walk-in. Overall, the sense here is that someone wants to make Pakistan look better. The ISI does work with the US when needs align, but this doesn't make sense. Hersh clearly misrepresents Sec. Gates comments at one point. He says that Gates wanted to delay the announcement of the raid per agreement with Pakistan so that we could lie about it being a drone attack. He then quotes Gates saying that we didn't want release "operational details". Gates says nothing about a delay. This is not supporting evidence at all. In addition, the anonymous source had previously claimed that a drone attack would not work, as there would be no way to verify the identity. So the whole supposed agreement about a fake drone attack is contradictory with the rest of the piece. I am not sure that everything the anonymous source said is false, but the one fact that I do have hands on experience with contradicts another element of the story. As such, I know the anonymous source is wrong on that item. So what's my motivation? It just annoys me to see smart people believe something like this... The point is, this is not a criticism of Hersh per se, except in that he gives this one anonymous source too much credit. It's a story of non-existent coverup; a story that tells us there was supposed to be big coverup wherein Obama would tell us that bin Laden was killed in a drone strike a week after the fact, but a helicopter crashed and we had to make the Pakistanis look incompetent.

xyzzy123 11y ago

From the article: > Yet most of this criticism, over the thousands of words written about Hersh’s piece in the last week, has amounted to “That doesn’t make sense to me,” or “That’s not what government officials told me before,” or “How are we to believe his anonymous sources?” Your post pretty much echoes the hit pieces this article is complaining about, and adds nothing new to the discussion.

foxhedgehog 11y ago
No, he is making different points. Similarly, this is where I stopped reading the article: > Barrels of ink have been spilled ripping apart Hersh’s character, while barely any follow-up reporting has been done to corroborate or refute his claims The original poster's point isn't "this doesn't make sense to me." It's that the facts do not comport with reality. One of the things that those who defend this kind of reporting love to trot out is the idea that any criticism is fallacious, and is "ad hominem." Of course, there is plenty of ad hominem response out there, but cherry-picking these responses as representative, rather than engaging with substantive refutation, and then claiming that there is no such refutation is argument in bad faith. In fact, there is a name for that particular kind of argument: a straw man.
- xyzzy123 11y ago
  What point is the poster making? That the anonymous sources have their own agendas? - “How are we to believe his anonymous sources?”. Can you tell me what other points there are to be found in there? > It's that the facts do not comport with reality. Which facts, specifically? There are certainly none mentioned in that post.
  - foxhedgehog 11y ago
    I count a few points: 1. The article is not well-sourced. a. There are many anonymous sources, which is generally a bad practice; SH consequently may over-represent confidence in his material. b. It is difficult to track how many anonymous sources there are. c. It is unlikely that these sources would have access to the information that they claim. 2. The article has internal contradictions. I'm sure that we can flesh these out more if you would like, but none of these are ad hominem. Wrapping "exclusively anonymous sources are bad" as a criticism in with "Sy Hersh is an unreliable jerk" is also an argument in bad faith. The two are not equivalent, and the former is a sincere issue with this piece. Including it in with the latter has the effect of encouraging dismissal of both just because the latter is obviously fallacial.
    - xyzzy123 11y ago
      1. It's a pity you stopped reading the article, because addressing the criticism of anonymous sources is about 1/3 of it. 2. A discussion of specific internal contradictions in the article would be interesting and valuable, unlike the original post. [Might make sense to make a new post for it, so it doesn't get buried though]. As to the "facts not comporting with reality", should I assume you have abandoned that claim? That would also be an interesting discussion. This is the whole point of the CJR article - that the media response so far has been largely fact-free.
      - anonsource 11y ago
        No...it's not the criticism of anonymous sources, it's the lack of consideration given to the possibility that the anonymous source is lying. If you bring out an anonymous source that is making these kind of assertions, you need more than a claim that it's a retired intel officer to achieve credibility.
anonsource 11y ago
I think it is important to consider the motivation of anonymous sources. This new story, which seeks to elevate the role of the ISI, or perhaps just diminish the role of others, appears to have sources with interesting motivations. In particular, Hersh's description of the primary source for this information does not indicate that they would have had access to all of the information described (both the intel process and the raid details, as well as individual negotiation points in the coverup). The amount of love for the ISI in the description almost suggests that he was put up to it by the Pakistanis. For example: The suggestion that an ISI liaison traveling on the helicopter with the Americans "guided them into the darkened house and up a staircase to bin Laden’s quarters" is ludicrous. SEALs typically don't need someone to lead them up a staircase. "Aside from those that hit bin Laden, no other shots were fired." This is to support the story that ISI was keeping UBL under house arrest there, and had left him to his own devices, so there were no weapons there. However, outside observers directly after the event showed that the place showed evidence of fighting on all floors. "Saudi Arabia, which had been financing bin Laden’s upkeep since his seizure by the Pakistanis" The overthrow of the Saudi govt was one of UBL's objectives. This is nonsense. Given the level of infiltration of the ISI, the idea that they could have kept bin Laden prisoner for six years, without a leak from their side even now, needs a lot more explanation. If that many people in Pakistan knew, we would have known, and we would not have had to rely on a walk-in. Overall, the sense here is that someone wants to make Pakistan look better. The ISI does work with the US when needs align, but this doesn't make sense. Hersh clearly misrepresents Sec. Gates comments at one point. He says that Gates wanted to delay the announcement of the raid per agreement with Pakistan so that we could lie about it being a drone attack. He then quotes Gates saying that we didn't want release "operational details". Gates says nothing about a delay. This is not supporting evidence at all. In addition, the anonymous source had previously claimed that a drone attack would not work, as there would be no way to verify the identity. So the whole supposed agreement about a fake drone attack is contradictory with the rest of the piece. I am not sure that everything the anonymous source said is false, but the one fact that I do have hands on experience with contradicts another element of the story. As such, I know the anonymous source is wrong on that item. So what's my motivation? It just annoys me to see smart people believe something like this... The point is, this is not a criticism of Hersh per se, except in that he gives this one anonymous source too much credit. It's a story of non-existent coverup; a story that tells us there was supposed to be big coverup wherein Obama would tell us that bin Laden was killed in a drone strike a week after the fact, but a helicopter crashed and we had to make the Pakistanis look incompetent.