fran townsend

I asked Fran Townsend if the Bush administration she worked for has to take responsibility for allowing the Pakistani tribal areas to become a new safe haven. She didn’t directly answer, but she sort of hinted that the answer is yes.

Francis Fragos Townsend was the White House counterterrorism czar from 2004 to 2007 — a much denuded job since Richard Clarke and Rand Beers held it in the Clinton and first George W. Bush administrations — and now she’s here at the New America Foundation conference. What does she think of Al Qaeda’s fortunes today?