Monday, April 24, 2006
WHISTLEBLOWING PAST THE GRAVEYARD
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Friday, April 21, 2006
GETTING CLOSER TO THE TOP?
By William Fisher
In less than a month, we may finally get to hear from the army general who ordered commanders at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison to "get dogs".
Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who ran the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and then was sent to Iraq to "Gitmo-ize" that prison, has been silent on his role in introducing cruel and degrading interrogation techniques to Abu Ghraib.
Originally, Gen. Miller invoked his military rights not to incriminate himself. But last week, a military judge ordered prosecutors to produce him on May 17 as a witness for the defense in the trial of a military dog handler accused of abusing detainees at the Abu Ghraib.
Defense lawyers have said it was Miller who first told intelligence officers at Abu Ghraib to "get dogs" to exploit Arab fears of the animals.
As reported by The Washington Post, Miller's appearance "will give defense attorneys a chance to question Miller about the use of dogs in security and interrogation operations at Guantanamo and in Iraq. It also means lawyers could use Miller's testimony to attempt to draw connections between the alleged abuse and the policies developed by top Pentagon officials, who had regular contact with Miller when he was the commander at Guantanamo."
Witnesses in other cases have testified that Miller went to Iraq at the request of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who wanted to "Gitmo-ize" Abu Ghraib. Tactics used on detainees in Iraq -- including dogs, a dog leash and placing women's underwear on their heads - were the same as those used on one Guantanamo Bay detainee in 2002.
So, it seems, we inch closer to the top - to the White House and Pentagon policy makers who sliced and diced the Geneva Conventions to redefine torture, and left the grunts who followed orders to pay the price.
Miller would be the first general and the highest-ranking officer to testify in any case connected to the now infamous abuses at Abu Ghraib. Lawyers for Sgt. Santos A. Cardona, 31, are the first to be successful in persuading a judge that his involvement could shed light on how dogs came to be used to threaten high-value detainees during interrogations in Iraq in late 2003.
One of Cardona's lawyers said he plans to question Miller about the Rumsfeld-inspired trip he made to Iraq to advise U.S. officials on how to get better intelligence.
Prosecutors contend that Miller was not actively involved in the operations in Iraq until he was transferred to the country to work full-time in April 2004.
But shortly after Miller was ordered to go to Iraq on temporary duty in September 2003, military working dogs were shipped to Abu Ghraib and approved for use in interrogations.
Col. Thomas M. Pappas, formerly the senior military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib, has testified that Miller and his team recommended using dogs. As a result, Pappas said, he approved the use of dogs for interrogations of one
high-value detainee after Miller's visit.
But shortly after the now infamous photos of abuse were turned over to Army investigators, Pappas urged an end to the use of dogs and recommended that charges not be brought against the dog handlers. Pappas has made a deal with military lawyers granting him immunity from prosecution.
Last year, a team of military investigators looked into allegations by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who said they witnessed abusive interrogation techniques at Guantanamo. The FBI allegations were contained in documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
The chief investigator into Guantanamo practices, Air Force Lt. Gen. Randall M. Schmidt, told a Senate panel of the interrogation techniques used on Mohamed al-Qahtani, a Saudi who was captured in December 2001 along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Al-Qahtani was thought to be involved in the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Schmidt said interrogators told him his mother and sisters were whores, forced him to wear a bra and wear a thong on his head, told him he was a homosexual and said that other prisoners knew it. They also forced him to dance with a male interrogator and subjected him to strip searches with no security value, threatened him with dogs, forced him to stand naked in front of women, and to wear a leash and act like a dog.
These techniques were reportedly approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for use on al-Qahtani -- the alleged "20th hijacker" in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks - and were used at Guantanamo in late 2002 as part of a special interrogation plan aimed at breaking him down.
Members of the team that conducted the three-month investigation told the Senate Armed Services Committee they recommended that Gen. Miller be reprimanded, but their recommendation was overruled by his superior, Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, commander of U.S. Southern Command.
The Miller inquiry appears to strongly support the contention that Gen. Miller was the constant in the prisoner treatment equation, first at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and later at military prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, where similar interrogation techniques were employed.
Gen. Craddock said that Gen. Miller had used "creative" and "aggressive" tactics, but did not practice torture or violate law or Pentagon policy. He concluded that Miller's techniques did not rise to the level of torture, and referred the matter to the Army's Inspector General.
Whether Miller will actually testify remains to be seen. If he does, his testimony will be limited to the dog issue, the judge has ruled. If he can't find a way out of testifying altogether, will his testimony link any prisoner abuse to policies promulgated by the Secretary of Defense, the Justice Department or the While House?
It would be, to say the least, unexpected. The Bush Administration has endlessly proclaimed prisoner abuses to be the work of "a few bad apples", most of who have already been punished. And, more than most organizations, the military has a long tradition of taking care of (and sometimes overlooking) its own mistakes and not hanging its dirty laundry in public.
But in light of the ongoing "revolt of the generals," who can really predict how all this will end? Stay tuned.
In less than a month, we may finally get to hear from the army general who ordered commanders at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison to "get dogs".
Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who ran the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and then was sent to Iraq to "Gitmo-ize" that prison, has been silent on his role in introducing cruel and degrading interrogation techniques to Abu Ghraib.
Originally, Gen. Miller invoked his military rights not to incriminate himself. But last week, a military judge ordered prosecutors to produce him on May 17 as a witness for the defense in the trial of a military dog handler accused of abusing detainees at the Abu Ghraib.
Defense lawyers have said it was Miller who first told intelligence officers at Abu Ghraib to "get dogs" to exploit Arab fears of the animals.
As reported by The Washington Post, Miller's appearance "will give defense attorneys a chance to question Miller about the use of dogs in security and interrogation operations at Guantanamo and in Iraq. It also means lawyers could use Miller's testimony to attempt to draw connections between the alleged abuse and the policies developed by top Pentagon officials, who had regular contact with Miller when he was the commander at Guantanamo."
Witnesses in other cases have testified that Miller went to Iraq at the request of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who wanted to "Gitmo-ize" Abu Ghraib. Tactics used on detainees in Iraq -- including dogs, a dog leash and placing women's underwear on their heads - were the same as those used on one Guantanamo Bay detainee in 2002.
So, it seems, we inch closer to the top - to the White House and Pentagon policy makers who sliced and diced the Geneva Conventions to redefine torture, and left the grunts who followed orders to pay the price.
Miller would be the first general and the highest-ranking officer to testify in any case connected to the now infamous abuses at Abu Ghraib. Lawyers for Sgt. Santos A. Cardona, 31, are the first to be successful in persuading a judge that his involvement could shed light on how dogs came to be used to threaten high-value detainees during interrogations in Iraq in late 2003.
One of Cardona's lawyers said he plans to question Miller about the Rumsfeld-inspired trip he made to Iraq to advise U.S. officials on how to get better intelligence.
Prosecutors contend that Miller was not actively involved in the operations in Iraq until he was transferred to the country to work full-time in April 2004.
But shortly after Miller was ordered to go to Iraq on temporary duty in September 2003, military working dogs were shipped to Abu Ghraib and approved for use in interrogations.
Col. Thomas M. Pappas, formerly the senior military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib, has testified that Miller and his team recommended using dogs. As a result, Pappas said, he approved the use of dogs for interrogations of one
high-value detainee after Miller's visit.
But shortly after the now infamous photos of abuse were turned over to Army investigators, Pappas urged an end to the use of dogs and recommended that charges not be brought against the dog handlers. Pappas has made a deal with military lawyers granting him immunity from prosecution.
Last year, a team of military investigators looked into allegations by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who said they witnessed abusive interrogation techniques at Guantanamo. The FBI allegations were contained in documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
The chief investigator into Guantanamo practices, Air Force Lt. Gen. Randall M. Schmidt, told a Senate panel of the interrogation techniques used on Mohamed al-Qahtani, a Saudi who was captured in December 2001 along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Al-Qahtani was thought to be involved in the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Schmidt said interrogators told him his mother and sisters were whores, forced him to wear a bra and wear a thong on his head, told him he was a homosexual and said that other prisoners knew it. They also forced him to dance with a male interrogator and subjected him to strip searches with no security value, threatened him with dogs, forced him to stand naked in front of women, and to wear a leash and act like a dog.
These techniques were reportedly approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for use on al-Qahtani -- the alleged "20th hijacker" in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks - and were used at Guantanamo in late 2002 as part of a special interrogation plan aimed at breaking him down.
Members of the team that conducted the three-month investigation told the Senate Armed Services Committee they recommended that Gen. Miller be reprimanded, but their recommendation was overruled by his superior, Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, commander of U.S. Southern Command.
The Miller inquiry appears to strongly support the contention that Gen. Miller was the constant in the prisoner treatment equation, first at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and later at military prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, where similar interrogation techniques were employed.
Gen. Craddock said that Gen. Miller had used "creative" and "aggressive" tactics, but did not practice torture or violate law or Pentagon policy. He concluded that Miller's techniques did not rise to the level of torture, and referred the matter to the Army's Inspector General.
Whether Miller will actually testify remains to be seen. If he does, his testimony will be limited to the dog issue, the judge has ruled. If he can't find a way out of testifying altogether, will his testimony link any prisoner abuse to policies promulgated by the Secretary of Defense, the Justice Department or the While House?
It would be, to say the least, unexpected. The Bush Administration has endlessly proclaimed prisoner abuses to be the work of "a few bad apples", most of who have already been punished. And, more than most organizations, the military has a long tradition of taking care of (and sometimes overlooking) its own mistakes and not hanging its dirty laundry in public.
But in light of the ongoing "revolt of the generals," who can really predict how all this will end? Stay tuned.
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
ANTI-TERRORISM FINANCING LAWS
By William Fisher
A major government watchdog organization is charging that Muslim charities are being summarily shut down for supporting terrorist causes while giant firms such as Halliburton are receiving the full protections of American law for allegedly breaking U.S. government sanctions against doing business with Iran – a country designated as a sponsor of terrorism.
“There is unequal enforcement of anti-terrorist financing laws,” says OMB Watch.
The organization says the USA Patriot Act gives the government “largely unchecked power to designate any group as a terrorist organization”. Once a charitable organization is so designated, all of its materials and property may be seized and its assets frozen. The charity is unable to see the government’s evidence and thus understand the basis for the charges. Since its assets are frozen, it lacks resources to mount a defense. And it has only limited right of appeal to the courts. So the government can target a charity, seize its assets, shut it down, obtain indictments against its leaders, but then delay a trial almost indefinitely.
Thus far, OMB Watch says, the effort has resulted in the government shutting down five charities that support humanitarian aid in Muslim areas without disclosing any official finding that they were aiding terrorist organizations. But there has only been one indictment, no trials, and no convictions. “Only one official criminal charge has been brought against a Muslim organization for support of terrorism, and that case has not yet made it to trial.”
According to OMB Watch, dozens of charitable groups have been investigated since 2001. The organizations shut down were not on any government watch list before their assets were frozen, the group adds.
The organization says the result is that Muslims have no way of knowing which groups the government suspects of ties to terrorism. “Organizations and individuals suspected of supporting terrorism are guilty until proven innocent,” it says.
To support its claim that the government is applying the law unevenly and targeting Muslim-American groups, OMB Watch cites the government’s “velvet glove” treatment of the Halliburton Corporation, a giant defense contractor.
Halliburton has been under investigation by the Treasury Department – which oversees the terror-financing campaign – and the Department of Justice since 2001 for doing business with Iran, which is listed as a sponsor of terrorism.
But, says OMB Watch, rather than seizing and freezing assets “pending an investigation,” Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the Justice Department sent an inquiry to Halliburton requesting “information with regard to compliance.”
Halliburton sent a written response explaining why they felt they were in compliance with the law. Halliburton’s defense seemed to rest on the fact that its dealings with Iran were done through a Cayman Islands subsidiary,not its U.S.-based entity.
Over two years later, in January 2004, OFAC sent a follow-up letter requesting additional information, to which Halliburton responded that March. In July of that year, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas sent a grand jury
subpoena requesting documents and the case was referred to the Justice Department.
On Sept. 22, 2005, the Progressive Caucus in the House of Representatives
wrote to President George W. Bush, asking that Halliburton be suspended from hurricane relief contracts for a host of reasons, including “dealing with nations that sponsor terrorism.”
The White House took no action and Halliburton received no-bid contracts valued currently at $61.3 million, and growing, to provide clean-up, rebuilding and logistical assistance to victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Last year, an organization called Halliburton-Watch charged that the handling of the case against the company raises serious legal questions: For example, “if Halliburton were a charity would its assets have been frozen like the U.S.-based Muslim charities; even though little is known about the evidence OFAC relied on to freeze and seize assets of Muslim charities, it appears there is much stronger evidence against Halliburton -- what legal distinction is OFAC making; if U.S. charities formed Cayman Island subsidiaries could they avoid the USA PATRIOT Act, IEEPA, and Executive Order restrictions on dealings with groups or countries linked to terrorism?”
Halliburton has also become the poster child for waste, fraud and abuse among U.S. contractors in Iraq. To date, it has received more than $12 billion in contracts there, many of them on a no-bid basis. According to Pentagon reports, the company failed to account for 43 percent of its Middle East expenses, with $1 billion of those being considered "unreasonable" and another nearly half-billion in the "unsupported" category, according to Defense Department auditors.
Critics of the government say the government’s anti-terror financing campaign is a product of the paranoid Islamophobia that has gripped the U.S. since 9/11. They also say is has had its desired effect: to scare Muslim-Americans into abandoning one of the premier tenets of Islam -- giving to those in need.
The government denies these charges; it says it is merely trying to cut off funding to a wide variety of so-called charitable organizations that funnel it to groups that practice terrorist tactics. The Treasury Department cites President Bush’s pledge to ensure “that Arab Americans and American Muslims feel comfortable maintaining their tradition of charitable giving”.
Meanwhile, Muslim charities report a precipitous decline in contributions. Contributions that do arrive come increasingly in cash from anonymous givers. And donors who happen to be Muslim are increasingly turning to the large household names like Oxfam and Save the Children, which may conduct programs in predominantly Muslim areas abroad.
Kay Guinane, OMB Watch’s Director of Nonprofit Speech Rights, told IPS, "The real tragedy behind closure of Muslim charities is the fate of people in need of humanitarian assistance, who are doing without because the funds have been frozen by the U.S. and sit in the bank, benefiting no one”. She suggested, “The U.S. government could demonstrate its good faith by releasing these funds to other charities or aid agencies."
Leaders of the Muslim charitable community in the U.S. have had numerous meetings with officials at the Treasury Department, and together developed a set of “guidelines” for charitable organizations and their donors. But these guidelines lack any specificity regarding Muslim philanthropy and could be applied to any charitable organization. They also provide no safe harbor from being shut down. OMB Watch told IPS, “A group could comply 100% and still be shut down ‘pending an investigation’."
Leaders of the Muslim philanthropic community in New Jersey asked the Treasury Department at the start of Ramadan in 2004 to issue a “white list” of “approved” charities. But the request was denied. The government claimed it was impossible to fulfill. “Our role is to prosecute violations of criminal law,” a spokesman said, adding, “We’re not in a position to put out lists of any kind, particularly of any organizations that are good or bad”
But government critics also claim that Treasury’s campaign is reminiscent of the activities of John Ashcroft’s Justice Department in the months following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The government then launched its “Global War on Terror” by rounding up thousands of “Middle Eastern-looking” men and women, sending them to jail without charges or access to lawyers, holding many in solitary confinement, but accusing none of them with terror-related crimes, convicting no one, and ending up deporting some for non-criminal immigration violations.
A major government watchdog organization is charging that Muslim charities are being summarily shut down for supporting terrorist causes while giant firms such as Halliburton are receiving the full protections of American law for allegedly breaking U.S. government sanctions against doing business with Iran – a country designated as a sponsor of terrorism.
“There is unequal enforcement of anti-terrorist financing laws,” says OMB Watch.
The organization says the USA Patriot Act gives the government “largely unchecked power to designate any group as a terrorist organization”. Once a charitable organization is so designated, all of its materials and property may be seized and its assets frozen. The charity is unable to see the government’s evidence and thus understand the basis for the charges. Since its assets are frozen, it lacks resources to mount a defense. And it has only limited right of appeal to the courts. So the government can target a charity, seize its assets, shut it down, obtain indictments against its leaders, but then delay a trial almost indefinitely.
Thus far, OMB Watch says, the effort has resulted in the government shutting down five charities that support humanitarian aid in Muslim areas without disclosing any official finding that they were aiding terrorist organizations. But there has only been one indictment, no trials, and no convictions. “Only one official criminal charge has been brought against a Muslim organization for support of terrorism, and that case has not yet made it to trial.”
According to OMB Watch, dozens of charitable groups have been investigated since 2001. The organizations shut down were not on any government watch list before their assets were frozen, the group adds.
The organization says the result is that Muslims have no way of knowing which groups the government suspects of ties to terrorism. “Organizations and individuals suspected of supporting terrorism are guilty until proven innocent,” it says.
To support its claim that the government is applying the law unevenly and targeting Muslim-American groups, OMB Watch cites the government’s “velvet glove” treatment of the Halliburton Corporation, a giant defense contractor.
Halliburton has been under investigation by the Treasury Department – which oversees the terror-financing campaign – and the Department of Justice since 2001 for doing business with Iran, which is listed as a sponsor of terrorism.
But, says OMB Watch, rather than seizing and freezing assets “pending an investigation,” Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the Justice Department sent an inquiry to Halliburton requesting “information with regard to compliance.”
Halliburton sent a written response explaining why they felt they were in compliance with the law. Halliburton’s defense seemed to rest on the fact that its dealings with Iran were done through a Cayman Islands subsidiary,not its U.S.-based entity.
Over two years later, in January 2004, OFAC sent a follow-up letter requesting additional information, to which Halliburton responded that March. In July of that year, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas sent a grand jury
subpoena requesting documents and the case was referred to the Justice Department.
On Sept. 22, 2005, the Progressive Caucus in the House of Representatives
wrote to President George W. Bush, asking that Halliburton be suspended from hurricane relief contracts for a host of reasons, including “dealing with nations that sponsor terrorism.”
The White House took no action and Halliburton received no-bid contracts valued currently at $61.3 million, and growing, to provide clean-up, rebuilding and logistical assistance to victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Last year, an organization called Halliburton-Watch charged that the handling of the case against the company raises serious legal questions: For example, “if Halliburton were a charity would its assets have been frozen like the U.S.-based Muslim charities; even though little is known about the evidence OFAC relied on to freeze and seize assets of Muslim charities, it appears there is much stronger evidence against Halliburton -- what legal distinction is OFAC making; if U.S. charities formed Cayman Island subsidiaries could they avoid the USA PATRIOT Act, IEEPA, and Executive Order restrictions on dealings with groups or countries linked to terrorism?”
Halliburton has also become the poster child for waste, fraud and abuse among U.S. contractors in Iraq. To date, it has received more than $12 billion in contracts there, many of them on a no-bid basis. According to Pentagon reports, the company failed to account for 43 percent of its Middle East expenses, with $1 billion of those being considered "unreasonable" and another nearly half-billion in the "unsupported" category, according to Defense Department auditors.
Critics of the government say the government’s anti-terror financing campaign is a product of the paranoid Islamophobia that has gripped the U.S. since 9/11. They also say is has had its desired effect: to scare Muslim-Americans into abandoning one of the premier tenets of Islam -- giving to those in need.
The government denies these charges; it says it is merely trying to cut off funding to a wide variety of so-called charitable organizations that funnel it to groups that practice terrorist tactics. The Treasury Department cites President Bush’s pledge to ensure “that Arab Americans and American Muslims feel comfortable maintaining their tradition of charitable giving”.
Meanwhile, Muslim charities report a precipitous decline in contributions. Contributions that do arrive come increasingly in cash from anonymous givers. And donors who happen to be Muslim are increasingly turning to the large household names like Oxfam and Save the Children, which may conduct programs in predominantly Muslim areas abroad.
Kay Guinane, OMB Watch’s Director of Nonprofit Speech Rights, told IPS, "The real tragedy behind closure of Muslim charities is the fate of people in need of humanitarian assistance, who are doing without because the funds have been frozen by the U.S. and sit in the bank, benefiting no one”. She suggested, “The U.S. government could demonstrate its good faith by releasing these funds to other charities or aid agencies."
Leaders of the Muslim charitable community in the U.S. have had numerous meetings with officials at the Treasury Department, and together developed a set of “guidelines” for charitable organizations and their donors. But these guidelines lack any specificity regarding Muslim philanthropy and could be applied to any charitable organization. They also provide no safe harbor from being shut down. OMB Watch told IPS, “A group could comply 100% and still be shut down ‘pending an investigation’."
Leaders of the Muslim philanthropic community in New Jersey asked the Treasury Department at the start of Ramadan in 2004 to issue a “white list” of “approved” charities. But the request was denied. The government claimed it was impossible to fulfill. “Our role is to prosecute violations of criminal law,” a spokesman said, adding, “We’re not in a position to put out lists of any kind, particularly of any organizations that are good or bad”
But government critics also claim that Treasury’s campaign is reminiscent of the activities of John Ashcroft’s Justice Department in the months following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The government then launched its “Global War on Terror” by rounding up thousands of “Middle Eastern-looking” men and women, sending them to jail without charges or access to lawyers, holding many in solitary confinement, but accusing none of them with terror-related crimes, convicting no one, and ending up deporting some for non-criminal immigration violations.
WORDS TO PONDER
By William Fisher
I recently e-mailed Neil Hicks, the director of international programs for Human Rights First, seeking his thoughts on a new poll of the U.S. public that shows rapidly declining support for President Bush's pledge to spread democracy throughout the world.
His response was more eloquent than any words of mine. Here it is:
"It is not surprising that there is growing skepticism among Americans about the goal of actively promoting democracy in other countries through U.S. policy. There are several reasons for this, in my view:
"First: the administration's democracy promotion strategy has been very broadly defined and yet invoked inconsistently from country to country. While the headline principles of freedom, women's empowerment and elections are proclaimed frequently, there is no consistent benchmark for implementation of democracy at the specific country level, which is the only place where the practical impact of the policy can be discerned. This leaves the actual content of the policy somewhat amorphous, and makes it easy for its critics to accuse the U.S. government of engaging in double standards and pursuing these goals selectively in its own interests.
"Second: the U.S. has undermined its credibility as a promoter of democracy and human rights by its own practices in the Global War on Terrorism, including, as the U.S. public is increasingly aware, torture, deaths in custody and arbitrary detention.
"Third: the initial results of the policy have been complicated and troubling. While I am concerned that current difficulties -- in Iraq, where what is now portrayed as a war to bring democracy appears to be leading to a civil war, or the Palestinian territories, where a relatively free election produced a government that is opposed to U.S. policies, and whose commitment to democracy is questionable - should not result in the abandonment of a global U.S. posture that actively promotes democracy and human rights, such complications will inevitably sap public support.
"We are at a precarious moment where some are willing to jettison the Bush administration's championing of democracy promotion as an instrument of national security policy. This would be a shame. In my view the proper response is not to revert to the discredited old practices of accommodating dictatorships and authoritarian regimes in the Middle East.
"I welcome the emphasis that President Bush and other senior administration officials have placed on the link between oppression and the absence of basic freedoms on the one hand and instability and global insecurity in the other. This diagnosis requires a sustained, results oriented approach to promoting human rights and democracy that applies consistent principles and standards to all countries, and is responsive to the varied particular contexts of each country situation."
There are many things I like about this statement. But high among them is that this is not your garden-variety Bush-bashing polemic. It credits the president with the right vision but suggests that we need a more thoughtful strategy for its implementation.
Development experts have disagreed with one another for years about whether "nation building" is a legitimate concept. But there are two parts of that discussion about which there is virtually no disagreement. First, democracy grows from within; it can not be imposed from outside. And, second, no democracy will ever emerge at the point of a spear.
Despite our flawed strategy and our many tactical mistakes over the past six years, the U.S. still has lots of lots of non-military carrots and sticks to apply. As Neil Hicks points out, we don't have to revert to supporting repressive and authoritarian dictatorships in the Middle East (or anywhere else). And we don't have to reward those regimes just because they're such good partners in the "Global War on Terror". After all, getting rid of terrorists protects them as well as us.
What we ought to be spending our time thinking about is how to use our leverage and our aid dollars to help countries to build democratic institutions - civil societies, independent judiciaries, respect for the rule of law, law enforcement authorities who honor human rights and enforce penalties for corruption.
Because it is only such institutions that can give birth to transparency, good governance and, ultimately, democracy.
Just don't expect any overnight transformations. This kind of nation building is generational.
I recently e-mailed Neil Hicks, the director of international programs for Human Rights First, seeking his thoughts on a new poll of the U.S. public that shows rapidly declining support for President Bush's pledge to spread democracy throughout the world.
His response was more eloquent than any words of mine. Here it is:
"It is not surprising that there is growing skepticism among Americans about the goal of actively promoting democracy in other countries through U.S. policy. There are several reasons for this, in my view:
"First: the administration's democracy promotion strategy has been very broadly defined and yet invoked inconsistently from country to country. While the headline principles of freedom, women's empowerment and elections are proclaimed frequently, there is no consistent benchmark for implementation of democracy at the specific country level, which is the only place where the practical impact of the policy can be discerned. This leaves the actual content of the policy somewhat amorphous, and makes it easy for its critics to accuse the U.S. government of engaging in double standards and pursuing these goals selectively in its own interests.
"Second: the U.S. has undermined its credibility as a promoter of democracy and human rights by its own practices in the Global War on Terrorism, including, as the U.S. public is increasingly aware, torture, deaths in custody and arbitrary detention.
"Third: the initial results of the policy have been complicated and troubling. While I am concerned that current difficulties -- in Iraq, where what is now portrayed as a war to bring democracy appears to be leading to a civil war, or the Palestinian territories, where a relatively free election produced a government that is opposed to U.S. policies, and whose commitment to democracy is questionable - should not result in the abandonment of a global U.S. posture that actively promotes democracy and human rights, such complications will inevitably sap public support.
"We are at a precarious moment where some are willing to jettison the Bush administration's championing of democracy promotion as an instrument of national security policy. This would be a shame. In my view the proper response is not to revert to the discredited old practices of accommodating dictatorships and authoritarian regimes in the Middle East.
"I welcome the emphasis that President Bush and other senior administration officials have placed on the link between oppression and the absence of basic freedoms on the one hand and instability and global insecurity in the other. This diagnosis requires a sustained, results oriented approach to promoting human rights and democracy that applies consistent principles and standards to all countries, and is responsive to the varied particular contexts of each country situation."
There are many things I like about this statement. But high among them is that this is not your garden-variety Bush-bashing polemic. It credits the president with the right vision but suggests that we need a more thoughtful strategy for its implementation.
Development experts have disagreed with one another for years about whether "nation building" is a legitimate concept. But there are two parts of that discussion about which there is virtually no disagreement. First, democracy grows from within; it can not be imposed from outside. And, second, no democracy will ever emerge at the point of a spear.
Despite our flawed strategy and our many tactical mistakes over the past six years, the U.S. still has lots of lots of non-military carrots and sticks to apply. As Neil Hicks points out, we don't have to revert to supporting repressive and authoritarian dictatorships in the Middle East (or anywhere else). And we don't have to reward those regimes just because they're such good partners in the "Global War on Terror". After all, getting rid of terrorists protects them as well as us.
What we ought to be spending our time thinking about is how to use our leverage and our aid dollars to help countries to build democratic institutions - civil societies, independent judiciaries, respect for the rule of law, law enforcement authorities who honor human rights and enforce penalties for corruption.
Because it is only such institutions that can give birth to transparency, good governance and, ultimately, democracy.
Just don't expect any overnight transformations. This kind of nation building is generational.
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
AMERICAN SUPPORT FOR "SPREADING DEMOCRACY"
By William Fisher
Only 20 per cent of Americans thinks President George W. Bush's goal of spreading democracy to other countries is "very important". And even among Republicans, only three out of ten favor pursuing this goal "strongly", with most of the erosion in Republican confidence occurring in the more religious wing of the party.
These are some of the highlights of the second in a continuing series of
surveys monitoring Americans' confidence in U.S. foreign policy conducted by the nonprofit research organization Public Agenda. The survey results were described in an article in the journal "Foreign Affairs" by the organization's chairman, opinion research guru Daniel Yankelovich.
The first survey, conducted in June of last year, found that the war in Iraq had reached a "tipping point" - which the survey defines as the moment at which a large portion of the public begins to demand that the government address its concerns.
The 2006 survey found that public confidence in U.S. foreign policy has declined
since then. The public has become less confident in Washington's
ability to achieve its goals in Iraq and Afghanistan and hunt down terrorists.
Fifty-nine percent of those surveyed said they think that U.S. relations with the rest of the world are on the wrong track (compared to 37 percent who think the opposite), and 51 percent said they are disappointed by the country's relations with other countries (compared to 42 percent who are proud of them), the survey reported.
Yankelovich reported that the war in Iraq continues to be the foreign policy issue foremost in the public's mind, and respondents consistently say that the war, along with the threat of terrorism, are the most important problems facing the U.S. in its dealings with the rest of the world.
Concern about mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq is particularly widespread -- 82 percent of respondents to the June 2005 survey said they cared deeply about the issue; in January 2006, 83 percent said they did.
Although the level and intensity of concern about Iraq has remained fairly stable, the public's appraisal of how well the United States is meeting its objectives there has eroded slightly. Last summer, 39 percent of respondents gave the government high marks on this issue; 33 percent did in January.
The erosion, moreover, comes almost entirely from Republicans: 61 percent gave the government an A or a B on Iraq in the first survey, but only 53 percent did in the second. Confidence in U.S. policy on Iraq is also down significantly among those who regularly attend religious services, who also show rising levels of concern about casualties.
Yankelovich says one reason for the downward trend is skepticism about how truthful Washington has been about the reasons for invading Iraq. He notes that 50 percent of respondents said they feel they were misled -- the highest level of mistrust measured in the survey.
Another source of skepticism may be more troublesome for the government: only 22 percent of Americans surveyed said they feel that their government has the ability to create a democracy in Iraq.
Foreign policy observers we contacted found few surprises in the survey.
Brian J. Foley, a professor at Florida Coastal School of Law, told us, "The American public is, finally, coming around to realizing that the so-called mission of spreading democracy abroad requires the destruction of democracy here at home. War results in increased secrecy, growth of big government and its control, and an erosion of civil liberties. Here we're getting that, and an enormous government budget deficit, and a reduction in public services, to boot."
Samer Shehata, Professor of Arab Politics at Georgetown University, worries that the survey results indicate that the U.S. will be pressured to "withdraw from Iraq quickly and - most likely - without sufficient planning and preparation for the consequences." He told us,"Rather than working early to 'internationalize' the occupation and rebuilding, the Bush administration has been unwilling to let other countries - including the UN, the EU, NATO and neighboring Arab and Muslim countries - play a part in Iraq and therefore become vested in Iraq's stability and reconstruction. The US now faces no good options. Withdrawing quickly will likely lead to the worsening of the situation while the US continued presence does not seem to be - even gradually - producing stability."
And Patricia Kushlis, a veteran of the U.S. Information Service, said she finds it "particularly interesting to see that 70 percent of the administration's stalwart supporters - and especially the religious right - now realize that exporting democracy is an impracticable objective". She told us, "This sea change in U.S. public opinion could well impact the outcome of the November midterm elections and send the Republican-majority Congress packing".
But Edward Herman, professor emeritus of the University of Pennsylvania, questioned not the survey's findings, but its basic premise. He told us "One problem with all these opinion surveys is that they never question that the goal of the Bush Administration is democracy -- which I believe to be a complete fraud."
"In some cases the Bushies, like earlier leaders, would like to see a democratic façade, but never real democracy, which, in say Iraq, would see the U.S. and its military bases thrown out on their ear," he said.
On the issue of U.S. relations with the rest of the world, only about a third of Americans surveyed (35 percent) said they think the U.S. government could do a lot to establish good relations with moderate Muslims -- but almost two-thirds (64 percent) nevertheless gave the government poor marks because of its failure to do so.
Nearly a third of respondents said they "worry a lot" about the rise of Islamic extremism around the world (31 percent) and the possibility that U.S. actions in the Middle East have aided the recruitment of terrorists (33 percent).
Almost half (45 percent) said they believe that Islam encourages violence, and survey respondents estimated that about half or more of all Muslims in the world are anti-American. But a clear majority (56 percent) continued to have confidence that improved communications with the Muslim world would reduce hatred of the United States.
But Yankelovich reports that Americans may also be getting used to the notion that they are not well loved abroad. A majority of respondents (65 percent) realize that the rest of the world sees the United States in a negative light.
While the Americans surveyed have fairly clear ideas about U.S. foreign policy priorities, U.S. political parties differ on the desirability of promoting democracy in other countries (30 percent of Republicans surveyed supported this goal, compared to only 16 percent of Democrats). But even a majority of Republicans have little stomach for this priority of the Bush administration, the survey found.
A majority of the U.S. public supports the ideal of spreading democracy (53 percent of respondents said they believe that "when more countries become democratic there will be less conflict"), but Americans remain skeptical that an "activist" U.S. policy can contribute much to this outcome. A majority of those surveyed (58 percent) said they feel "democracy is something that countries only come to on their own."
The survey results bear an eerie similarity to those that were reported during the mid to later stages of the Vietnam War. It was the gathering antiwar mood of the American public that finally made that adventure unsustainable. And many are predicting that U.S. intervention in Iraq will suffer a similar ignominious end.
Only 20 per cent of Americans thinks President George W. Bush's goal of spreading democracy to other countries is "very important". And even among Republicans, only three out of ten favor pursuing this goal "strongly", with most of the erosion in Republican confidence occurring in the more religious wing of the party.
These are some of the highlights of the second in a continuing series of
surveys monitoring Americans' confidence in U.S. foreign policy conducted by the nonprofit research organization Public Agenda. The survey results were described in an article in the journal "Foreign Affairs" by the organization's chairman, opinion research guru Daniel Yankelovich.
The first survey, conducted in June of last year, found that the war in Iraq had reached a "tipping point" - which the survey defines as the moment at which a large portion of the public begins to demand that the government address its concerns.
The 2006 survey found that public confidence in U.S. foreign policy has declined
since then. The public has become less confident in Washington's
ability to achieve its goals in Iraq and Afghanistan and hunt down terrorists.
Fifty-nine percent of those surveyed said they think that U.S. relations with the rest of the world are on the wrong track (compared to 37 percent who think the opposite), and 51 percent said they are disappointed by the country's relations with other countries (compared to 42 percent who are proud of them), the survey reported.
Yankelovich reported that the war in Iraq continues to be the foreign policy issue foremost in the public's mind, and respondents consistently say that the war, along with the threat of terrorism, are the most important problems facing the U.S. in its dealings with the rest of the world.
Concern about mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq is particularly widespread -- 82 percent of respondents to the June 2005 survey said they cared deeply about the issue; in January 2006, 83 percent said they did.
Although the level and intensity of concern about Iraq has remained fairly stable, the public's appraisal of how well the United States is meeting its objectives there has eroded slightly. Last summer, 39 percent of respondents gave the government high marks on this issue; 33 percent did in January.
The erosion, moreover, comes almost entirely from Republicans: 61 percent gave the government an A or a B on Iraq in the first survey, but only 53 percent did in the second. Confidence in U.S. policy on Iraq is also down significantly among those who regularly attend religious services, who also show rising levels of concern about casualties.
Yankelovich says one reason for the downward trend is skepticism about how truthful Washington has been about the reasons for invading Iraq. He notes that 50 percent of respondents said they feel they were misled -- the highest level of mistrust measured in the survey.
Another source of skepticism may be more troublesome for the government: only 22 percent of Americans surveyed said they feel that their government has the ability to create a democracy in Iraq.
Foreign policy observers we contacted found few surprises in the survey.
Brian J. Foley, a professor at Florida Coastal School of Law, told us, "The American public is, finally, coming around to realizing that the so-called mission of spreading democracy abroad requires the destruction of democracy here at home. War results in increased secrecy, growth of big government and its control, and an erosion of civil liberties. Here we're getting that, and an enormous government budget deficit, and a reduction in public services, to boot."
Samer Shehata, Professor of Arab Politics at Georgetown University, worries that the survey results indicate that the U.S. will be pressured to "withdraw from Iraq quickly and - most likely - without sufficient planning and preparation for the consequences." He told us,"Rather than working early to 'internationalize' the occupation and rebuilding, the Bush administration has been unwilling to let other countries - including the UN, the EU, NATO and neighboring Arab and Muslim countries - play a part in Iraq and therefore become vested in Iraq's stability and reconstruction. The US now faces no good options. Withdrawing quickly will likely lead to the worsening of the situation while the US continued presence does not seem to be - even gradually - producing stability."
And Patricia Kushlis, a veteran of the U.S. Information Service, said she finds it "particularly interesting to see that 70 percent of the administration's stalwart supporters - and especially the religious right - now realize that exporting democracy is an impracticable objective". She told us, "This sea change in U.S. public opinion could well impact the outcome of the November midterm elections and send the Republican-majority Congress packing".
But Edward Herman, professor emeritus of the University of Pennsylvania, questioned not the survey's findings, but its basic premise. He told us "One problem with all these opinion surveys is that they never question that the goal of the Bush Administration is democracy -- which I believe to be a complete fraud."
"In some cases the Bushies, like earlier leaders, would like to see a democratic façade, but never real democracy, which, in say Iraq, would see the U.S. and its military bases thrown out on their ear," he said.
On the issue of U.S. relations with the rest of the world, only about a third of Americans surveyed (35 percent) said they think the U.S. government could do a lot to establish good relations with moderate Muslims -- but almost two-thirds (64 percent) nevertheless gave the government poor marks because of its failure to do so.
Nearly a third of respondents said they "worry a lot" about the rise of Islamic extremism around the world (31 percent) and the possibility that U.S. actions in the Middle East have aided the recruitment of terrorists (33 percent).
Almost half (45 percent) said they believe that Islam encourages violence, and survey respondents estimated that about half or more of all Muslims in the world are anti-American. But a clear majority (56 percent) continued to have confidence that improved communications with the Muslim world would reduce hatred of the United States.
But Yankelovich reports that Americans may also be getting used to the notion that they are not well loved abroad. A majority of respondents (65 percent) realize that the rest of the world sees the United States in a negative light.
While the Americans surveyed have fairly clear ideas about U.S. foreign policy priorities, U.S. political parties differ on the desirability of promoting democracy in other countries (30 percent of Republicans surveyed supported this goal, compared to only 16 percent of Democrats). But even a majority of Republicans have little stomach for this priority of the Bush administration, the survey found.
A majority of the U.S. public supports the ideal of spreading democracy (53 percent of respondents said they believe that "when more countries become democratic there will be less conflict"), but Americans remain skeptical that an "activist" U.S. policy can contribute much to this outcome. A majority of those surveyed (58 percent) said they feel "democracy is something that countries only come to on their own."
The survey results bear an eerie similarity to those that were reported during the mid to later stages of the Vietnam War. It was the gathering antiwar mood of the American public that finally made that adventure unsustainable. And many are predicting that U.S. intervention in Iraq will suffer a similar ignominious end.
Thursday, April 13, 2006
A DILEMMA IN SEARCH OF A POLICY (AGAIN)
By William Fisher
Going to war is always a last resort -- only when all avenues of diplomacy have failed.
Sound familiar?
It should. Because that was the mantra of the Bush Administration for well over a year before we invaded Iraq. But we now know that the White House and its minions cherry-picked intelligence, hoodwinked the Congress and spooked the American people with tales of WMDs and mushroom clouds and Iraq's Al Qaida/9/11 connection, and conducted pretend diplomacy while our generals were busily planning their "shock and awe" campaign.
Now we are hearing similar rhetoric concerning Iran. Except that there's one difference: There hasn't been any U.S. diplomacy with Iran at all, pretend or otherwise.
For the past couple of years, America has outsourced its Iran diplomacy to the folks Donald Rumsfeld famously derided as "old Europe". And resisted their many efforts to get us to join the talks directly.
But outsourcing is not a policy. It's a cop-out.
The truth is that the United States has no Iran policy. And we are about to witness the consequences.
Unlike the period of the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, when we alternately ignored or misinformed the United Nations, we are now fully engaged on Iran with the Security Council. But to what end?
There are no additional sanctions the U.S. alone can impose on Iran that would make any difference at all. And it is unlikely that expect Russia and China to go much further. Too much business for them there. And too much oil.
And even if they did agree, it seems clear that Iran would rather risk being isolated from the world and branded a pariah than be seen to be caving to the West. Moreover, Iran's risk may be exaggerated. Pariah or not, there will always be countries in the world prepared to sell Iran what it needs - and buy its oil.
Moreover, while it's possible that the "military option" our generals are now busily planning for may have its intended effect - terrifying the Iranians into believing they are about to become the next Iraq - it's equally possible they will see it as a faux option. The Iranian leadership may be stubborn and bigoted, but we can be sure it's under no illusions about the state of the U.S. military. They know the devastating effects our Iraq adventure has had on our war-fighting and war-financing capability. They are also fully aware of how pivotal their influence might be in helping to put the wheels back on the Iraq project.
The Iranians probably also know the American people are probably not in any mood to support another invasion of anybody any time soon. Especially when they come to understand just how large - and how relatively powerful - Iran is. Not even Dick Cheney would have the chutzpah to claim Iran was going to be another Iraqi cakewalk.
Consider another perspective. Put yourself inside the head of an average Iranian. Notwithstanding U.S. government spin, every bit of reliable reporting from inside Iran tells us that the Iranian people want their nuclear program to go forward. That they are proud of it. That, because they are surrounded by nuclear powers, they believe they are entitled to it to protect their own national security.
And it is not only the mullahs who feel this way - though they are of course driving President Ahmadinejad to front this latest chapter in the "clash of civilizations" for purely domestic political purposes. Most of what is left of the "reform movement" in Iran, though it opposes the mullahs, is reliably reported to feel the same way.
Paradoxically, current U.S. "policy" is having the unintended consequence of uniting Iran. It is fuelling Persian Pride. Given the intensity of Iranian nationalism, the millions of dollars Congress recently gave the State Department to "promote freedom" in Iran might better have been spent helping Katrina victims.
So how realistic is the way the Bush Administration is framing U.S. options - give up your nuclear ambitions, or else? (Or else what?)
This seems to many observers to be a phony option. Even our former Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage - no dove he - is urging the Administration to start serious and comprehensive talks with Iran. No proxies. Face-to-face. It is in furtherance of that objective that our "old Europe" allies, plus China and Russia, might well play their most valuable role.
Can the U.S. talk to a country whose leader denies the Holocaust and vows to throw all the Israelis into the sea? Well, in the world of realpolitik, yes. We talk with oppressive and authoritarian regimes every day - and send hundreds of millions in aid to many of them. If you think the Iranians are the only ones who want to erase Israel, have a look at some of the newspapers that come out of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, or the Palestinian territories.
OK, so let's say we talk to Iran, offer all the carrots we can think of to win abandonment of their nuclear weapons ambitions, and still the talk gets us nowhere, what then? Can we live with a nuclear Iran? Well, in a weapons context, Iran isn't yet nuclear and appears to be some years from being there. Meanwhile, we are living with a nuclear Pakistan, a state far more unstable than Iran. And with a nuclear India, on whose future benign intent we have just bet the ranch. And with a nuclear North Korea, a charter member of the axis of evil, with whom the so-called six-party talks have thus far yielded little - except no war. And with a nuclear Russia, whose dysfunctional guardianship of "surplus" nukes should give the world a global heart attack.
Israel will disagree. Not unreasonably, it sees an Iran with weaponized nukes as an existential threat. Also not unreasonably, Iran sees Israel in the same way.
The bottom line is that it's clearly in the world's interest to get Iran to back off. But the Bush Administration needs to understand that merely rattling its sabers has real limits. It is now being obliged to confront those limits, and it is from that reality -- not from generals talking about deploying tactical nuclear bunker-busters -- that we ought to be developing an achievable Iran policy.
Going to war is always a last resort -- only when all avenues of diplomacy have failed.
Sound familiar?
It should. Because that was the mantra of the Bush Administration for well over a year before we invaded Iraq. But we now know that the White House and its minions cherry-picked intelligence, hoodwinked the Congress and spooked the American people with tales of WMDs and mushroom clouds and Iraq's Al Qaida/9/11 connection, and conducted pretend diplomacy while our generals were busily planning their "shock and awe" campaign.
Now we are hearing similar rhetoric concerning Iran. Except that there's one difference: There hasn't been any U.S. diplomacy with Iran at all, pretend or otherwise.
For the past couple of years, America has outsourced its Iran diplomacy to the folks Donald Rumsfeld famously derided as "old Europe". And resisted their many efforts to get us to join the talks directly.
But outsourcing is not a policy. It's a cop-out.
The truth is that the United States has no Iran policy. And we are about to witness the consequences.
Unlike the period of the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, when we alternately ignored or misinformed the United Nations, we are now fully engaged on Iran with the Security Council. But to what end?
There are no additional sanctions the U.S. alone can impose on Iran that would make any difference at all. And it is unlikely that expect Russia and China to go much further. Too much business for them there. And too much oil.
And even if they did agree, it seems clear that Iran would rather risk being isolated from the world and branded a pariah than be seen to be caving to the West. Moreover, Iran's risk may be exaggerated. Pariah or not, there will always be countries in the world prepared to sell Iran what it needs - and buy its oil.
Moreover, while it's possible that the "military option" our generals are now busily planning for may have its intended effect - terrifying the Iranians into believing they are about to become the next Iraq - it's equally possible they will see it as a faux option. The Iranian leadership may be stubborn and bigoted, but we can be sure it's under no illusions about the state of the U.S. military. They know the devastating effects our Iraq adventure has had on our war-fighting and war-financing capability. They are also fully aware of how pivotal their influence might be in helping to put the wheels back on the Iraq project.
The Iranians probably also know the American people are probably not in any mood to support another invasion of anybody any time soon. Especially when they come to understand just how large - and how relatively powerful - Iran is. Not even Dick Cheney would have the chutzpah to claim Iran was going to be another Iraqi cakewalk.
Consider another perspective. Put yourself inside the head of an average Iranian. Notwithstanding U.S. government spin, every bit of reliable reporting from inside Iran tells us that the Iranian people want their nuclear program to go forward. That they are proud of it. That, because they are surrounded by nuclear powers, they believe they are entitled to it to protect their own national security.
And it is not only the mullahs who feel this way - though they are of course driving President Ahmadinejad to front this latest chapter in the "clash of civilizations" for purely domestic political purposes. Most of what is left of the "reform movement" in Iran, though it opposes the mullahs, is reliably reported to feel the same way.
Paradoxically, current U.S. "policy" is having the unintended consequence of uniting Iran. It is fuelling Persian Pride. Given the intensity of Iranian nationalism, the millions of dollars Congress recently gave the State Department to "promote freedom" in Iran might better have been spent helping Katrina victims.
So how realistic is the way the Bush Administration is framing U.S. options - give up your nuclear ambitions, or else? (Or else what?)
This seems to many observers to be a phony option. Even our former Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage - no dove he - is urging the Administration to start serious and comprehensive talks with Iran. No proxies. Face-to-face. It is in furtherance of that objective that our "old Europe" allies, plus China and Russia, might well play their most valuable role.
Can the U.S. talk to a country whose leader denies the Holocaust and vows to throw all the Israelis into the sea? Well, in the world of realpolitik, yes. We talk with oppressive and authoritarian regimes every day - and send hundreds of millions in aid to many of them. If you think the Iranians are the only ones who want to erase Israel, have a look at some of the newspapers that come out of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, or the Palestinian territories.
OK, so let's say we talk to Iran, offer all the carrots we can think of to win abandonment of their nuclear weapons ambitions, and still the talk gets us nowhere, what then? Can we live with a nuclear Iran? Well, in a weapons context, Iran isn't yet nuclear and appears to be some years from being there. Meanwhile, we are living with a nuclear Pakistan, a state far more unstable than Iran. And with a nuclear India, on whose future benign intent we have just bet the ranch. And with a nuclear North Korea, a charter member of the axis of evil, with whom the so-called six-party talks have thus far yielded little - except no war. And with a nuclear Russia, whose dysfunctional guardianship of "surplus" nukes should give the world a global heart attack.
Israel will disagree. Not unreasonably, it sees an Iran with weaponized nukes as an existential threat. Also not unreasonably, Iran sees Israel in the same way.
The bottom line is that it's clearly in the world's interest to get Iran to back off. But the Bush Administration needs to understand that merely rattling its sabers has real limits. It is now being obliged to confront those limits, and it is from that reality -- not from generals talking about deploying tactical nuclear bunker-busters -- that we ought to be developing an achievable Iran policy.
ALAS, POOR SCOTT
By William Fisher
Poor Scott McClellan. He has what must be the least satisfying job in Washington.
Members of the White House press corps report that McClellan is generally a decent guy and no villain. But, like most presidential press secretaries before him, he is kept out of the loop on many key issues so that his "plausible deniability" is not compromised.
The result is that it often appears his job is defending the indefensible.
The latest evidence of that condition of employment came last week, when Scottie angrily denied a newspaper report suggesting that in 2003 President George W. Bush declared the existence of biological weapons laboratories in Iraq while knowing it was not true.
You may recall that on May 29, 2003, the president was crowing about two trailers captured in Iraq, which he asserted were mobile biological laboratories. He declared triumphantly, "We have found the weapons of mass
destruction."
But The Washington Post reported last week that a Pentagon-sponsored fact-finding mission unanimously concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons and sent its findings to the Pentagon two days before the president's statement.
The Post asserted that the mission's field report and a 122-page final report three weeks later were classified and shelved, but that for nearly a year after that, the Bush administration continued to publicly assert that the trailers were biological weapons factories.
McClellan called the account "reckless reporting" and said Bush made his statement based on the intelligence assessment of the CIA and the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency.
He said the Post story was "nothing more than rehashing an old issue that
was resolved long ago."
Maybe so, maybe no. And we may never know which.
But let me offer the blasphemous possibility that maybe there was no cover-up here. Let me suggest that this latest dust-up with the media may have been more about inefficiency than about conspiracy.
Katrina and other disasters have by now made us all too familiar with the shameful inefficiency of this government. But, to greater or lesser degrees, all governments tend to be inefficient.
So maybe the folks who sent the Pentagon report to the White House weren't exactly the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency or the Secretary of Defense. And maybe the folks who actually received the report weren't the president's chief of staff or his national security advisor. Maybe they were mid-level staffers. And, just maybe, they tried to get their superiors' attention, but failed.
Having worked inside the government bubble, I know a bit about what concentrates the minds of senior officials and what ends up in the bottom of the inbox. It's often all about whose name is shown as the sender of stuff to the White House and the seniority of the person who receives it.
In fact, given the government's daily tsunami of paper, I find it near-miraculous that this report made it from the DIA to the White House in two days. In government, two days is a millisecond. For that kind of speed, you could end up with the Medal of Honor (except, of course, if you're transmitting bad news).
But, you ask, how about the classified version of the 122-page final report that got to the White House three weeks after the initial three-page field report? Surely, the president was briefed on that, so knew his claims about the mobile labs was bogus, though he went right on pitching their significance.
OK, you got me. I don't know for an absolute fact that anyone ever had the chutzpah to tell the president these inconvenient facts, but I have to assume that sometime during the year he was busy selling the mobile lab fairytale, someone must have given him the facts.
And that he chose to ignore them.
And then neglected to tell poor Scott McClellan.
Giving him "plausible deniability".
Poor Scott McClellan. He has what must be the least satisfying job in Washington.
Members of the White House press corps report that McClellan is generally a decent guy and no villain. But, like most presidential press secretaries before him, he is kept out of the loop on many key issues so that his "plausible deniability" is not compromised.
The result is that it often appears his job is defending the indefensible.
The latest evidence of that condition of employment came last week, when Scottie angrily denied a newspaper report suggesting that in 2003 President George W. Bush declared the existence of biological weapons laboratories in Iraq while knowing it was not true.
You may recall that on May 29, 2003, the president was crowing about two trailers captured in Iraq, which he asserted were mobile biological laboratories. He declared triumphantly, "We have found the weapons of mass
destruction."
But The Washington Post reported last week that a Pentagon-sponsored fact-finding mission unanimously concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons and sent its findings to the Pentagon two days before the president's statement.
The Post asserted that the mission's field report and a 122-page final report three weeks later were classified and shelved, but that for nearly a year after that, the Bush administration continued to publicly assert that the trailers were biological weapons factories.
McClellan called the account "reckless reporting" and said Bush made his statement based on the intelligence assessment of the CIA and the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency.
He said the Post story was "nothing more than rehashing an old issue that
was resolved long ago."
Maybe so, maybe no. And we may never know which.
But let me offer the blasphemous possibility that maybe there was no cover-up here. Let me suggest that this latest dust-up with the media may have been more about inefficiency than about conspiracy.
Katrina and other disasters have by now made us all too familiar with the shameful inefficiency of this government. But, to greater or lesser degrees, all governments tend to be inefficient.
So maybe the folks who sent the Pentagon report to the White House weren't exactly the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency or the Secretary of Defense. And maybe the folks who actually received the report weren't the president's chief of staff or his national security advisor. Maybe they were mid-level staffers. And, just maybe, they tried to get their superiors' attention, but failed.
Having worked inside the government bubble, I know a bit about what concentrates the minds of senior officials and what ends up in the bottom of the inbox. It's often all about whose name is shown as the sender of stuff to the White House and the seniority of the person who receives it.
In fact, given the government's daily tsunami of paper, I find it near-miraculous that this report made it from the DIA to the White House in two days. In government, two days is a millisecond. For that kind of speed, you could end up with the Medal of Honor (except, of course, if you're transmitting bad news).
But, you ask, how about the classified version of the 122-page final report that got to the White House three weeks after the initial three-page field report? Surely, the president was briefed on that, so knew his claims about the mobile labs was bogus, though he went right on pitching their significance.
OK, you got me. I don't know for an absolute fact that anyone ever had the chutzpah to tell the president these inconvenient facts, but I have to assume that sometime during the year he was busy selling the mobile lab fairytale, someone must have given him the facts.
And that he chose to ignore them.
And then neglected to tell poor Scott McClellan.
Giving him "plausible deniability".
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