Heed former CIA directors

Seven former CIA directors recently urged President Barack Obama to prevent serious damage to our nation's intelligence capabilities. He should heed their expert warning and stop a misguided re-examination of old allegations that the CIA abused terror detainees.

The CIA is a familiar target for the American left. Activists who think President George W. Bush violated the Constitution by authorizing improper interrogation methods have been pushing for legal reprisals. Demonizing the CIA is a reflexive position for some powerful Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has accused the agency of lying.

That puts a political taint on Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to pursue this matter. So does his professional history.

As deputy attorney general under President Bill Clinton, Mr. Holder played a prominent role in two controversial decisions that went outside regular Justice Department channels. He advised Mr. Clinton in 1999 to give clemency to 16 Puerto Rican nationalists jailed for armed robbery. Widely suspected as a move designed to help Hillary Clinton's Senate bid in New York, that clemency was not supported by the U.S. Pardon Attorney and was opposed by the FBI.

Mr. Holder also gave President Clinton legal cover to pardon fugitive financier Marc Rich, whose wife had been a particularly generous donor to the president and his library project. In a conversation with the president, Mr. Holder, then No. 2 at Justice, said he was "neutral, leaning towards favorable" on the Rich pardon, which was opposed by federal prosecutors because he was still on their top 10 list of most wanted fugitives.

Though President Obama, to the dismay of the left, ruled out prosecuting the Bush-era officials who created the rules for detainee interrogations, he left open the possibility that Justice might go after some interrogators. Mr. Holder then asked a special prosecutor to determine whether some cases closed by other federal prosecutors should be re-opened.

This has left a small number of CIA officials in professional limbo, and alarmed others. After the CIA referred their cases to Justice in 2004, professional federal prosecutors wrote detailed notes to the Justice Department explaining why there were no grounds for prosecution. According to The Washington Post, Mr. Holder had not read those notes when he asked that the cases be re-opened.

This background helps explain why the seven former CIA directors wrote President Obama on Sept. 18 to urge that the new Justice probe be shut down. Their letter pointed out:

"Those men and women who undertake difficult intelligence assignments in the aftermath of an attack such as September 11 must believe there is permanence in the legal rules that govern their actions."

The signers included William H. Webster, who as a former federal judge and FBI director, as well as head of the CIA, is exceptionally qualified to speak to the legal policies involved.

President Obama should avert a dangerous miscarriage of justice by ordering the attorney general to call off the special prosecutor.