Group with military ties campaigns against Obama
By Bill Bartel
The Virginian-Pilot
© August 17, 2012 A group of military veterans and ex-intelligence officers, led by a former Navy SEAL in Virginia Beach, launched a campaign against President Barack Obama this week for what they consider careless leaks of sensitive military information and the president's taking too much credit for the killing of Osama bin Laden.
Scott Taylor, president of the Special Operations OPSEC Education Fund, which was set up as a nonprofit "social welfare organization," said the group isn't taking sides in the presidential race but is raising the issue in an election year to draw attention to it.
"We're educating the public," said Taylor, an unsuccessful candidate in the 2nd Congressional District Republican primary two years ago. "We're out here in the political season because it's the only time that politicians pay attention."
The OPSEC group, which has almost $1 million in undisclosed financial support, initially centered its campaign on a 22-minute video titled "Dishonorable Disclosures" that is offered on the Web, Taylor said. It also will pay for television ads in several states, he said.
Taylor, a SEAL from 1998 to 2005, said OPSEC's members include former SEALs, other former members of U.S. special operations forces, and retired Marines and Central Intelligence Agency officials who say that leaks are endangering troops and weakening national security.
Representatives of Obama's re-election effort sought to discredit the campaign, comparing it to the Swift Boat ads generated by GOP activists in 2004 to undermine the Vietnam War combat record of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.
"The Republicans are resorting to Swift Boat tactics because when it comes to foreign policy and national security, Mitt Romney has offered nothing but reckless rhetoric," said Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt.
The OPSEC video, which included commentary from several veterans, including Taylor, as well as news clips and snippets of Obama's comments, criticized the president for moving too quickly to publicize the raid and disclose details after Navy SEALs killed bin Laden in Pakistan in May 2011.
The video also blamed the administration for leaking information about a U.S.-Israeli computer virus used to attack Iran's nuclear program and disclosures about the use of unmanned American drones to kill enemy targets in other countries.
Some members of Congress, including California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, have raised concerns about national security leaks in recent months. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has directed two U.S. attorneys to investigate leaks discussed in the OPSEC video.
Taylor, who contends that most members of the SEAL community in Virginia Beach share his group's concerns, said he wants an independent investigation.
Angie Morgan, a leader of Virginia Veterans and Military Families for Obama, said worries about the issues cited in the video are not widespread.
"I have never - until this video came across - met anyone in the military community, even those who I know in special forces, who raise this issue," said Morgan, a Virginia Beach resident and wife of a Marine officer.
"I think from my experiences in the military, it is an inherently conservative organization," Morgan said. "I would assume that the majority of members would see a video like that and perhaps agree with it. Those people who are independent and perhaps a little bit more progressive, they see a video like this, and they're intelligent enough to see where it fits in the grand scheme of political campaigning. It's an agenda-driven piece."
The OPSEC video, at times, takes direct aim at Obama, implying he was taking sole credit for bin Laden's death. It includes a sharply edited portion of a May 2011 news conference that omitted all of the president's comments praising the military and intelligence community for the successful bin Laden raid.
Former SEAL Ben Smith said on the video: "Mr. President, you did not kill Osama bin Laden. America did. The work that the American military has done killed Osama bin Laden. You did not."
Another video speaker, Brian Gould, formerly with U.S. special operations forces, said Obama was in a "support position" and "had nothing to do with it."
Taylor acknowledged that as the country's commander in chief, Obama deserves some credit for the death of the man who masterminded the 9/11 attacks.
"I think that any president would take credit for this," he said. "However, to the extent, if you look at his own words... yeah, he did give credit to the military folks, but it was overshadowed by him trying to take his own credit."
The OPSEC group shares an office suite in Alexandria with a Republican consulting firm, the Trailblazer Group. Christian Ferry, a partner in the firm, said he sublet space to OPSEC because it included "people I know," but that Trailblazer had no role in the project.
The New York Times contributed to this report.
Bill Bartel, 757-446-2398, bill.bartel@pilotonline.com
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