Timing of leak in Berger probe questioned
Opinions on charges fall along party lines
WASHINGTON -- The revelation that Samuel R. Berger is under investigation for mishandling secret materials related to the 9/11 Commission investigation drew charges yesterday from top Republicans that the former national security adviser may have been trying to cover up Clinton administration failures in the fight against terrorism.
Sept. 11 panel's report focuses on Clinton, Bush missteps. A16
But even as Berger was forced to quit his post as an adviser to presumptive Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry, Berger's allies rallied behind him, questioning whether the Bush administration leaked news of the 10-month-old probe to deflect attention just days before the commission is set to publish its findings from its inquiry into the suicide jet attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
''The timing is very curious, given this has been underway now for this long," said Senate minority leader Tom Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota. ''Somebody leaked it, obviously, with an intent, I think, to do damage to Mr. Berger."
For Republicans, Berger's actions raised questions about whether there was something more sinister at work. ''What could those documents have said that drove Mr. Berger to remove them without authorization from a secure reading room for classified documents," House Speaker Dennis Hastert said in a statement. ''Was this a bungled attempt to rewrite history and keep critical information from the 9/11 Commission and potentially put their report under a cloud?"
Berger's handling of the documents -- stamped ''codeword," the highest classification -- first came into question in October 2003 after he spent a series of eight- to 10-hour sessions poring over Clinton-era documents in the National Archives.
Berger was designated as the official from the Clinton administration to review documents relevant to 9/11 commission inquiries. He also was a witness at commission hearings and reviewed records to prepare for his personal testimony.
One Berger confidant said the former national security adviser took home both his own written notes from the sessions as well as copies of three of the highly classified documents -- against both archive regulations and secrecy laws. Berger quickly returned two of the documents last fall when staff at the National Archives questioned him about missing documents, they said.
A third document -- a review written by then-White House terrorism chief Richard Clarke of the Clinton White House's handling of terrorism threats around the time of the 2000 millennium celebrations -- remains unaccounted for. After a search of Berger's home earlier this year, the FBI could not locate it and Berger contends that he inadvertently destroyed it.
The Berger confidant acknowledged that he knew he was violating archive procedures by taking home his written notes without prior approval, but denied allegations from unnamed government officials that he purposely stole the classified documents by hiding them in his clothing. Berger claims that the secret documents became intermingled with his notes and that he may have carried some of those notes in his pockets. But two of the three documents and the notes were quickly returned to the archives.
GOP officials said the missing document raised questions about whether Berger was trying to keep information from the 9/11 commission. That was flatly denied by both Berger and one of the commission members, who called the charge ''ridiculous."
''None of our work is affected in any way," said the panel member, who spoke on condition of anonymity. ''We have many copies of it. He did not have access to anything that wasn't in duplicate. It can't have been to deprive us of information."
Justice Department officials, meanwhile, declined to comment on the probe, only to say that it is still underway and no decision has been made on the whether to prosecute Berger.
Until yesterday Berger had been an unpaid adviser to Kerry on foreign policy and national security issues, helping him formulate positions on the Iraq war, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and other central issues.
''Sandy Berger is my friend, and he has tirelessly served this nation with honor and distinction. I respect his decision to step aside as an adviser to the campaign until this matter is resolved objectively and fairly," Kerry said in a statement released yesterday. 