The Lanny Budd Project

Cleveland Jewish News.com -- AIPAC prosecutor promoted

2005-10-27T17:05:00.000-07:00

Cleveland Jewish News.com -- News: "Thursday October 27, 2005 25 Tishri 5766

AIPAC prosecutor promoted
(JTA) - President Bush nominated the prosecutor in the AIPAC classified documents case to be deputy attorney general.

Paul McNulty, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, obtained indictments this year against a former Pentagon analyst and two former senior staffers at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The Pentagon analyst, Lawrence Franklin, pleaded guilty earlier this month and the two AIPAC staffers, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, go to trial on Jan. 2.

McNulty is also well known for handling a number of terrorism-related cases in his district."

Bush Critic Became Target of Libby, Former Aides Say - Yahoo! News

2005-10-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

Bush Critic Became Target of Libby, Former Aides Say - Yahoo! News: "Bush Critic Became Target of Libby, Former Aides Say By Peter Wallsten and Tom Hamburger Times Staff Writers
Fri Oct 21, 7:55 AM ET

WASHINGTON — Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff was so angry about the public statements of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, a Bush administration critic married to an undercover CIA officer, that he monitored all of Wilson's television appearances and urged the White House to mount an aggressive public campaign against him, former aides say.

Those efforts by the chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, began shortly after Wilson went public with his criticisms in 2003. But they continued into last year — well after the Justice Department began an investigation in September 2003, into whether administration officials had illegally disclosed the CIA operative's identity, say former White House aides.

While other administration officials were maintaining a careful distance from Wilson in 2004, Libby ordered up a compendium of information that could be used to rebut Wilson's claims that the administration had "twisted" intelligence to exaggerate the threat from Iraq before the U.S. invasion.

Libby pressed the administration to publicly counter Wilson, sparking a debate with other White House officials who thought the tactic would call more attention to the former diplomat and his criticisms. That debate ended after an April 2004 meeting in the office of White House Communications Director Daniel Bartlett, when staffers were told "don't engage" Wilson, according to notes taken during the meeting by one person present.

"Scooter had a plan to counter Wilson and a passionate desire to do so," said a second person, a former White House official familiar with the internal deliberations. Like other former White House staff, this person spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing criminal investigation.

Libby's actions and those of top White House political advisor Karl Rove are being scrutinized as special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald concludes his 22-month investigation into the exposure of Wilson's wife, covert CIA operative Valerie Plame.

Fitzgerald is examining whether Plame's name was leaked to the media by administration officials in violation of a federal law that prohibits knowingly disclosing the identity of a covert agent.

Libby's anger over Wilson's 2003 charges has been known. But new interviews and documents obtained by The Times provide a more detailed view of the depth and duration of Libby's interest in Wilson. They also show that the vice president's office closely monitored news coverage.

On one occasion, the office prohibited a reporter from traveling with Cheney aboard Air Force Two, because the vice president's daughter said Cheney was unhappy with that newspaper's coverage.

Libby "would see something had appeared in the newspaper or on television and wanted to use the White House operation to counter it," one former official said.

After Wilson published a book criticizing the administration in April 2004, during the closely fought presidential campaign, Libby became consumed by passages that he believed were inaccurate or unfair to Cheney, former aides said. He ordered up a meticulous catalog of Wilson's claims and public statements going back to early 2003.

The result was a packet that included excerpts from press clips and television transcripts of Wilson's statements that were divided into categories, such as "political ties" or "WMD."

The compendium used boldfaced type to call attention to certain comments by Wilson, such as one in the Daily Iowan, the University of Iowa student newspaper, in which Wilson was quoted as calling Cheney "a lying son of a bitch." It also highlighted Wilson's answers to questions from television journalists about his work with Sen. John F. Kerry (news, bio, voting record), the Democratic presidential nominee.

The intensity with which Libby reacted to Wilson had many senior White House staffers puzzled, and few agreed with his counterattack plan or its rationale, former aides said.

Though the White House did not respond to Wilson's claims, the Republican National Committee did strike back with a series of press releases attacking his credibility.

One prominent former Cheney aide defended Libby on Thursday, saying he was zealous and passionate about everything he worked on — not just the Wilson episode.

"Scooter is the most methodical, detail-oriented and comprehensive worker of anybody I've ever worked with in my life," said Mary Matalin, a former Cheney advisor who worked as a consultant on the 2004 campaign.

"He leaves no stone unturned, and it doesn't matter what the topic is," she said. "That's the nature of Scooter, and that's why he's such a superior intellect and why Cheney and the president and everybody over there respects him."

Wilson, reached by telephone while on a speaking tour in California, said Thursday that he was outraged by the extent of the White House effort to track and counter his statements.

"What an abuse of power," Wilson said. "What the hell are they doing using taxpayer funded employees to root around and find information on me?"

Libby's intense interest in Wilson may help explain why he has become a focus in the federal investigation into who leaked Valerie Plame's name.

The case had its origins in early 2002, when Cheney asked the CIA for information on reports that Iraq had sought to purchase uranium yellowcake from the African nation of Niger.

In response to Cheney's queries, the CIA decided to send Wilson, who had served in the region and was familiar with the uranium trade, to investigate. Wilson's wife was working undercover for the CIA on weapons issues at the time.

On his trip to Niger, Wilson found little reason to believe the Iraqis had sought the uranium, and on his return reported his findings to CIA officials.

In January 2003, President Bush in his State of the Union address cited Iraq's interest in African uranium as a sign of President Saddam Hussein's interest in acquiring nuclear weapons. In July, Wilson penned an op-ed piece for the New York Times describing his findings and suggesting that the president had distorted intelligence to justify an invasion of Iraq.

Within days, administration officials were telling reporters that Wilson had been sent to Niger as a boondoggle arranged by his wife, who worked at the CIA. Syndicated columnist Robert Novak published her name on July 14.

It can be a felony to knowingly leak the identity of a covert agent, and in late 2003 the Justice Department appointed Fitzgerald to investigate. Fitzgerald is nearing the end of his inquiry into the leak and has focused on Rove and Libby, among others.

Rove and Libby have both reportedly testified that they learned about Plame from others, did not know she had covert status and did not reveal her name to reporters. The White House and a lawyer for Libby declined to comment Thursday.

The documents and interviews portray Libby as highly attuned to detail. He dictated the format for internal memos, including that paragraphs be indented.

The documents and interviews show that, when it came to monitoring media coverage of Wilson and other issues affecting the vice president's reputation, Libby was meticulous. Staffers were instructed to use Nexis and Google to watch even the most obscure publications.

The sensitivity extended in at least one case to the vice president's daughter, Liz Cheney, who worked as a campaign advisor.

During a time of tension between the New York Times and the campaign over coverage, aides recommended that a reporter from the paper be allowed to fly aboard Cheney's plane with others in the press corps. Liz Cheney had a different idea.

Writing from her Blackberry, a mobile e-mail device, she noted that her father was upset with a story that appeared in that morning's newspaper, saying: "vp has totally had it with nytimes. This is really not the right time to ask him to charm a reporter from that paper."

The reporter was excluded from the vice president's plane."

New York Times Editor Says He Missed Miller 'Alarm Bells' - Yahoo! News

2005-10-21T21:02:00.000-07:00

Editor Says He Missed Miller 'Alarm Bells' - Yahoo! News: "Search: All News & Blogs Yahoo! News Only News Photos Video/Audio Advanced

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Editor Says He Missed Miller 'Alarm Bells' By JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writer
49 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - The New York Times' Judith Miller belatedly gave prosecutors her notes of a key meeting in the CIA leak probe only after being shown White House records of it, and her boss declared Friday she appeared to have misled the newspaper about her role.

In a dramatic e-mail, Executive Editor Bill Keller wrote Times' employees he wished he'd more carefully interviewed Miller and had "missed what should have been significant alarm bells" that she had been the recipient of leaked information about the CIA officer at the heart of the case.

"Judy seems to have misled (Times Washington bureau chief) Phil Taubman about the extent of her involvement," Keller wrote in what he described as a lessons-learned e-mail. "This alone should have been enough to make me probe deeper."

Keller said he might have been more willing to compromise with Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald "if I had known the details of Judy's entanglement" with Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

Miller's attorney, Bob Bennett, did not immediately return calls seeking her response to Keller.

Fitzgerald is investigating the disclosure of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.

In a sign the prosecutor may be preparing indictments, Fitzgerald's office erected a Web site Friday containing the record of the broad investigative mandate handed to him by the Justice Department at the outset of his investigation. Unlike some of his predecessors who operated under a law that has since expired, Fitzgerald is not required to write a final report, so he would not need a Web site for that purpose.

Meanwhile, two lawyers familiar with Fitzgerald's investigation told The Associated Press that Fitzgerald first learned from White House records that Miller had met as early as June 23, 2003, with Libby and discussed the CIA operative.

In her first grand jury appearance Sept. 30 after being freed from prison for refusing to testify, Miller did not mention the meeting and retrieved her notes about it only when prosecutors showed her visitor logs showing she had met with Libby in the Old Executive Office Building adjacent to the White House.

The lawyers spoke only on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing secrecy of the grand jury probe and the prosecutor's desire to keep his communications with lawyers and witnesses confidential.

One lawyer familiar with Miller's testimony said the reporter told prosecutors at first that she did not believe the June meeting would have involved Plame. Miller said that, because she had just returned from covering the Iraq war, she was probably giving Libby an update about her experiences there, the lawyer said.

However, Miller retrieved her notes and discovered they indicated that Libby had given her information about Plame at that meeting. Fitzgerald then arranged for her to return to the grand jury to testify about it, the lawyers said.

The evidence of that meeting has become important to the investigation because it indicates that Libby was passing information to reporters about Plame well before her husband, Joseph Wilson, went public with accusations that the Bush administration had twisted prewar intelligence on Iraq to exaggerate the threat it posed.

Libby and top presidential political adviser Karl Rove have emerged as central figures in the probe because they had contacts with reporters who learned Plame's identity or disclosed it in news stories.

Fitzgerald began his probe to determine whether presidential aides violated a law prohibiting the intentional disclosure of covert CIA officers, and had tried to out Plame to punish Wilson for his criticism, undercut the credibility of his allegations or silence similar critics.

But the investigation has also examined evidence of a possible coverup. Fitzgerald has made clear to defense lawyers that he could pursue charges such as false testimony, obstruction of justice, or mishandling of classified information. As those discussions have gotten more intense in recent days, the White House is increasingly wary of indictments.

AP reported earlier this week Rove testified Libby may have been his initial source of information inside the White House about Plame before he talked to reporters. Prosecutors have linked the vice president's top aide to contacts with at least three reporters in the affair. Libby met three times with Miller before Plame was outed, though she never wrote a story herself.

Conflicts between presidential aides' testimony and other evidence could result in criminal charges. The grand jury investigating the matter for the last two years is set to expire next Friday.

Keller's e-mail was designed to quell tensions inside a newsroom roiled by Miller's close connections to Libby, a key figure in the leak probe. Miller's reporting on possible weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before the invasion bolstered the Bush administration's arguments for action.

Later, after no such WMD weapons were found, she and the paper admitted some information she reported was flawed. The Bush administration likewise acknowledged some of it prewar intelligence was erroneous.

Keller said in his e-mail he believed the paper was too slow to correct the original reporting and to get to the bottom of the facts about Miller's involvement with Libby.

"If we had lanced the WMD boil earlier, we might have damped any suspicion that THIS time the paper was putting the defense of a reporter above the duty of its readers," he said. "

Clinton launches withering attack on Bush on Iraq, Katrina, budget - Yahoo! News

2005-09-19T14:32:00.000-07:00

Clinton launches withering attack on Bush on Iraq, Katrina, budget - Yahoo! News: "Clinton launches withering attack on Bush on Iraq, Katrina, budget Mon Sep 19, 2:32 AM ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Former US president Bill Clinton sharply criticised George W. Bush for the Iraq War and the handling of Hurricane Katrina, and voiced alarm at the swelling US budget deficit.

Breaking with tradition under which US presidents mute criticisms of their successors, Clinton said the Bush administration had decided to invade Iraq "virtually alone and before UN inspections were completed, with no real urgency, no evidence that there were weapons of mass destruction."

The Iraq war diverted US attention from the war on terrorism "and undermined the support that we might have had," Clinton said in an interview with an ABC's "This Week" programme.

Clinton said there had been a "heroic but so far unsuccessful" effort to put together an constitution that would be universally supported in Iraq.

The US strategy of trying to develop the Iraqi military and police so that they can cope without US support "I think is the best strategy. The problem is we may not have, in the short run, enough troops to do that," said Clinton.

On Hurricane Katrina, Clinton faulted the authorities' failure to evacuate New Orleans ahead of the storm's strike on August 29.

People with cars were able to heed the evacuation order, but many of those who were poor, disabled or elderly were left behind.

"If we really wanted to do it right, we would have had lots of buses lined up to take them out," Clinton.

He agreed that some responsibility for this lay with the local and state authorities, but pointed the finger, without naming him, at the former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

FEMA boss Michael Brown quit in response to criticism of his handling of the Katrina disaster. He was viewed as a political appointee with no experience of disaster management or dealing with government officials.

"When James Lee Witt ran FEMA, because he had been both a local official and a federal official, he was always there early, and we always thought about that," Clinton said, referring to FEMA's head during his 1993-2001 presidency.

"But both of us came out of environments with a disproportionate number of poor people."

On the US budget, Clinton warned that the federal deficit may be coming untenable, driven by foreign wars, the post-hurricane recovery programme and tax cuts that benefitted just the richest one percent of the US population, himself included.

"What Americans need to understand is that ... every single day of the year, our government goes into the market and borrows money from other countries to finance Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, and our tax cuts," he said.

"We have never done this before. Never in the history of our republic have we ever financed a conflict, military conflict, by borrowing money from somewhere else."

Clinton added: "We depend on Japan, China, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, and Korea primarily to basically loan us money every day of the year to cover my tax cut and these conflicts and Katrina. I don't think it makes any sense.""

U.S. Diplomat Is Named in Secrets Case - New York Times

2005-08-19T18:13:00.000-07:00

U.S. Diplomat Is Named in Secrets Case - New York Times: "U.S. Diplomat Is Named in Secrets Case

By DAVID JOHNSTON and JAMES RISEN
Published: August 18, 2005
WASHINGTON, Aug. 17 - The second-highest diplomat at the United States Embassy in Baghdad is one of the anonymous government officials cited in an Aug. 4 indictment as having provided classified information to an employee of a pro-Israel lobbying group, people who have been officially briefed on the case said Wednesday.

David M. Satterfield, deputy chief of the United States mission in Baghdad, is accused of giving classified information to a pro-Israel lobbyist.

Text: The Indictment The diplomat, David M. Satterfield, was identified in the indictment as a United States government official, "USGO-2," the people briefed on the matter said. In early 2002, USGO-2 discussed secret national security matters in two meetings with Steven J. Rosen, who has since been dismissed as a top lobbyist for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as Aipac, who has been charged in the case.

The indictment said that Mr. Rosen met USGO-2 on Jan. 18, 2002, and March 12, 2002, but provides few details about the encounters. The indictment does not describe Mr. Satterfield's activities in detail nor does it specify what classified information the diplomat discussed with the lobbyist. The meetings were also confirmed by documents, people who have been briefed said. These people asked not to be identified because many of the matters related to the case are classified.

The indictment does not accuse USGO-2 of any wrongdoing, nor does it indicate whether he might have been authorized to talk with the lobbyist. Mr. Satterfield is not believed to be the subject of a continuing investigation. He is the first higher-ranking government official to be caught up in the criminal inquiry.

Mr. Satterfield's role in the inquiry has been known within a small circle at the State Department. Before he was sent to Baghdad, officials at the State Department asked the Justice Department whether the investigation posed any impediment to his assignment in Iraq, someone who has been officially briefed said. Officials at the State Department were advised that he could take the job.

Mr. Satterfield is one of the department's rising stars. Before his assignment as deputy chief of mission in Baghdad, Mr. Satterfield, 50, held several jobs in the Clinton and Bush administrations as a Middle East expert. He was ambassador to Lebanon from 1998 to 2001, and was confirmed by the Senate as ambassador to Jordan in 2004, although he never served in that position.

Current and former colleagues say that Mr. Satterfield, who went to Iraq earlier this year, chose the Baghdad post because it posed a bigger professional challenge than Jordan. The United States ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, has strong political credentials but, colleagues said, Mr. Satterfield was brought in to provide managerial strength.

Mr. Satterfield did not respond to an e-mail message asking about his role in the case, and one State Department spokesman said that Mr. Satterfield would not discuss the matter. Sean McCormack, the spokesman for the department, referred legal questions about Mr. Satterfield to the Justice Department.

He added, "David is a fine public servant who has served the American people for many years and is continuing to do so under difficult working conditions."

The investigation is one of the more puzzling national security cases in recent years, focusing on the interactions between foreign affairs lobbyists and officials of the United States and other governments, who over the years, have routinely traded gossip and sometimes classified information. Under the Justice Department's theories of the case, it is no longer clear whether such conversations are legally permissible.

Current and former colleagues praised Mr. Satterfield as a seasoned and careful diplomat. "I've known David Satterfield for 20 years, and he is thoroughly professional, and takes his responsibilities very seriously," said Dennis Ross, the former chief Middle East negotiator for the United States and a longtime State Department official. "He has always acted solely in American interests." Martin Indyk, Mr. Satterfield's former boss in the Clinton administration, both at the National Security Council at the White House and at the State Department, said the idea that Mr. Satterfield leaked classified information is "absurd."

"The way he speaks is crafted for a public audience," Mr. Indyk said. "He has this facility for talking publicly without saying anything sensitive. So the idea that he would be leaking classified information is preposterous.

Text: The Indictment "He has an unblemished record as the consummate diplomat and as a highly effective policy maker as well. He is among the cadre of the best and the brightest in the Near East Bureau. He dealt with Aipac, because it was part of his job to deal with Aipac."

Mr. Rosen and another former lobbyist, Keith Weissman, have been charged with conspiring to communicate national defense secrets to journalists and a foreign government, which officials have identified as Israel. A third person, Lawrence A. Franklin, a former Pentagon analyst and Iran expert, has also been charged, accused of turning over information to the two lobbyists.

At an arraignment on Tuesday in Federal District Court in Alexandria, Va., all three pleaded not guilty and were released on their own recognizance. Judge T. S. Ellis III set a trial date for Jan. 3.

Only Mr. Rosen met with USGO-2, according to the indictment. At the time of the meetings, Mr. Satterfield was the deputy assistant secretary for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs, which made him the State Department's second-ranking official for the Middle East.

Their meetings are listed as overt acts in a conspiracy to illegally communicate national defense secrets to a foreign government. After Mr. Rosen's first meeting with USGO-2 on Jan. 18, 2002, the indictment said, a memorandum containing the information that Mr. Rosen had obtained was sent to other Aipac employees. The indictment did not indicate who wrote the memorandum, but said that it "contained classified information provided by USGO-2."

The two men met again on March 12, the indictment said. At their second meeting, they talked about Al Qaeda, the indictment said, without saying what aspect of the terror network was discussed. On March 14, Mr. Rosen disclosed to an unidentified foreign official, "FO-2," the information that he had heard from USGO-2, the indictment said.

Prosecutors have charged that Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman improperly obtained classified information from Mr. Franklin, Mr. Satterfield and two other American officials. The two officials whose identities remain unclear are referred to in the indictment as "USGO-1," and a Defense Department employee identified as "DOD-B." Although USGO-1 has not been publicly identified, the people who have been officially briefed said that person was no longer in the government.

As the Aipac's director of foreign policy issues, Mr. Rosen was a well-known figure in foreign policy circles related to the Middle East, inside and outside the government. He helped Aipac set its lobbying goals and maintained relationships with powerful conservatives in the Bush administration. Mr. Weissman was a senior Middle East analyst.

Several Middle East experts noted that Mr. Satterfield was never regarded as particularly supportive of Aipac's views on Israel. One analyst at an independent consulting firm recalled attending a conference Aipac held for Congressional staff members, during which Mr. Satterfield talked about United States policy toward Israel. She recalled that Mr. Satterfield was met with a mixed reception because his comments were not in line with Aipac's views."

Prince Bandar bin Sultan Out - Prince Turki al-Faisal new Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States

2005-08-17T20:48:00.000-07:00

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "18 August 2005
"Intelligence Brief: Saudi Arabia"
t the end of July, Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, handed in his resignation. During the 22 years in which he held this position, he managed to exert undisputable influence over successive U.S. administrations. However, his replacement appears equally capable: the next Saudi ambassador to Washington will be Prince Turki al-Faisal.

Born on February 15, 1945 (the very day on which King Abdul Aziz al-Saud and U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt met on board the USS Quincy and agreed on the "enduring relationship" that has linked the United States and Saudi Arabia up to the present day), at age 14 Turki was sent to boarding school in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. He subsequently enrolled at Georgetown University in the same year as future President William Clinton, but left before graduating and then completed his studies by obtaining a degree from Oxford. His father, King Faisal, had reigned over Saudi Arabia from 1964 until his murder in 1975. Prince Turki's career has been pursued mostly within the General Intelligence Directorate (G.I.D.), Riyadh's main intelligence service, which he headed from 1977 to 2001.

Background of Prince Turki

His appointment to the G.I.D., which came almost by chance due to the need to maintain a precarious balance of power among the various clans in the Saudi royal family, would make him one of the longest lasting and authoritative intelligence chiefs in the world. Under Turki's leadership, the G.I.D. transformed into a modern information service; as a member of the Safari Club (which brought together the intelligence chiefs of France, Morocco, Egypt, Arabia and Iran in an anti-Soviet effort during Washington's difficult Watergate phase), he exerted a determinant influence on Afghani events following the Soviet invasion.

From 1980 onward, Turki committed the G.I.D. to the task of providing financial support for the mujahideens' war-effort against the Soviets, channelling vast amounts of funding to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (I.S.I.), subsidizing jihadis from all over the Middle East who wanted to participate in the anti-communist crusade, and assisting the efforts that the C.I.A. was starting to make in the same direction.

The impact of Turki's influence determined who was to prevail among the Afghani leaders; his funding laid the foundations for the Islamic volunteer groups who fought in Afghanistan (giving rise to the formation of groups such as al-Qaeda) and enabled the I.S.I. to attain such importance that it became a parallel government in Pakistan. It was Turki who made a deal with the C.I.A. that Riyadh would supply I.S.I. with an amount equal to the funding provided by U.S. intelligence, thus pouring huge sums of money onto the Afghani chessboard.

Turki had known Osama bin Laden since 1978; bin Laden became one of the lynchpins of the G.I.D.'s funding policy toward the I.S.I. and anti-Soviet warfare in Afghanistan, and he met with Turki several times in Islamabad. Many years afterward, in 1998, when bin Laden had already become engaged in an anti-American crusade, Turki was responsible for requesting his extradition by Mullah Omar, but did not succeed in this task.

Turki's exit from the G.I.D. stirred the rumor mills since it occurred on August 31, 2001, less than two weeks before the September 11 attacks and just after his appointment had been confirmed for another four years. In 2002, he was appointed Saudi ambassador to London. In 2005, Turki was cleared of the accusation of having financed the terrorist groups responsible for the September 11 attacks.

Turki is an extraordinarily controversial figure. His appointment strengthens ties between Washington and Riyadh, and sends the U.S. someone whom the administration cannot help but appreciate; on the other hand, his appointment deprives King Abdullah of a precious advisor, a trusted confidant and a useful bulwark against the royal family's ultra-conservatives such as Prince Sultan, who would like to wrench Saudi Arabia free from Washington's sphere of influence.

For Turki, this appointment is certainly an important recognition of his career in general, and of his ability to liaise with Americans in particular, although in the present political and economic situation a figure of such significant capabilities might well act effectively in the domestic context by staying at home.

The Bottom Line

Turki's appointment in the U.S. appears likely to enhance U.S. effectiveness in the "war on terrorism" and to deprive al-Qaeda of an important target at home. The prince looks to be the right choice when considering the common U.S.-Saudi effort to manage the complex relations between the Bush administration and the new king.

Both the Saudi and the Middle East's general context will likely push Riyadh to take initiatives to counter internal fundamentalist drives and to increase the new sovereign's charisma and prestige. In order to reach these goals, the active support from Washington is needed. Therefore, Turki's role will become indispensable to elaborate and promote policies which can harmonize Saudi and American interests -- especially when discrepancies appear.

The new king might also try to obtain a new commitment from Washington for an independent Palestinian state -- especially if the evolving Iraq situation will allow such a move, which is expected by so many in the Arab world. Such a request would be of great help domestically to keep Saudi fundamentalists under control, but it would also provide the U.S. an opportunity to gain new credibility as a mediator in the Muslim world.

Report Drafted By:
Giuseppe Anzera

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR) is an independent organization that utilizes open source intelligence to provide conflict analysis services in the context of international relations. PINR approaches a subject based upon the powers and interests involved, leaving the moral judgments to the reader. This report may not be reproduced, reprinted or broadcast without the written permission of inquiries@pinr.com. All comments should be directed to content@pinr.com."

CNN Suspends Novak After He Walks Off Set - James Carville Strikes Again

2005-08-04T19:01:00.000-07:00

CNN Suspends Novak After He Walks Off Set - Yahoo! News: "CNN Suspends Novak After He Walks Off Set By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer
2 hours, 4 minutes ago

NEW YORK - CNN suspended commentator Robert Novak indefinitely after he swore and walked off the set Thursday during a debate with Democratic operative James Carville.

The exchange during CNN's "Inside Politics" came during a discussion of Florida's Senate campaign. CNN correspondent Ed Henry noted when it was through that he had been about to ask Novak about his role in the investigation of the leak of a CIA officer's identity.

A CNN spokeswoman, Edie Emery, called Novak's behavior "inexcusable and unacceptable." Novak had apologized to CNN, and CNN was apologizing to viewers, she said.

"We've asked Mr. Novak to take some time off," she said.

A telephone message at Novak's office was not immediately returned Thursday.

Carville and Novak were both trying to speak while they were handicapping the GOP candidacy of Katherine Harris. Novak said the opposition of the Republican establishment in Florida might not be fatal for her.

"Let me just finish, James, please," Novak continued. "I know you hate to hear me, but you have to."

Carville, addressing the camera, said: "He's got to show these right wingers that he's got a backbone, you know. It's why the Wall Street Journal editorial page is watching you. Show 'em that you're tough."

"Well, I think that's bull---- and I hate that," Novak replied. "Just let it go."

As moderator Henry stepped in to ask Carville a question, Novak walked off the set.

Only two weeks ago, CNN executives defended their decision to keep Novak on the air during the ongoing probe into the revelation of CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity. In a July 2003 newspaper column, Novak identified Plame, the wife of administration critic and former U.S. ambassador Joseph Wilson, as a CIA operative.

Wilson has said the leak of his wife's name was an attempt by the administration to discredit him. Two other reporters connected to the case openly fought the revelation of their sources, and Judith Miller of The New York Times has been jailed for refusing to cooperate with prosecutors.

Novak has repeatedly refused to comment about his role in the federal investigation.

After Novak walked off on Thursday, Henry said that Novak had been told before the segment that he was going to be asked on air about the CIA case.

"I'm hoping that we will be able to ask him about that in the future," Henry said.

Novak has been a longtime contributor to CNN, taking the conservative point of view during the just-canceled "Crossfire" show."

Understanding the Origins of Wahhabism and Salafism

2005-07-15T14:55:00.000-07:00

Understanding the Origins of Wahhabism and Salafism: "Understanding the Origins of Wahhabism and Salafism

By Trevor Stanley

The phenomenon of Islamic terrorism cannot be adequately explained as the export of Saudi Wahhabism, as many commentators claim. In fact, the ideological heritage of groups such as al-Qaeda is Salafism, a movement that began in Egypt and was imported into Saudi society during the reign of King Faisal.

The official ‘Wahhabi’ religion of Saudi Arabia has essentially merged with certain segments of Salafism. There is now intense competition between groups and individual scholars over the 'true' Salafism, with the scholars who support the Saudi regime attacking groups such as al-Qaeda as ‘Qutbists’ (following Sayyid Qutb) or takfiris (excommunicators).

The easy explanation for differences within the Salafi movement is that some aim to change society through da’wa (preaching/evangelizing) whereas others want to change it through violence. But as the Saudi example shows, all strains of Salafism, even the most revolutionary and violent, make a place for social services such as education in their strategies for the transformation of society.

Origins of Wahhabism

When Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab began preaching his revivalist brand of Islam amongst the Bedouins of the Najd [1] during the 18th century, his ideas were dismissed in the centers of Islamic learning such as al-Azhar as simplistic and erroneous to the point of heresy.

Ibn Abd al-Wahhab claimed that the decline of the Muslim world was caused by pernicious foreign innovations (bida’) - including European modernism, but also elements of traditional Islam that were simply unfamiliar to the isolated Najdi Bedouins. He counseled the purging of these influences in an Islamic Revival. Ibn Abd al-Wahhab’s creed placed an overriding emphasis on tawhid (monotheism), condemning many traditional Muslim practices as shirk (polytheism). He also gave jihad an unusual prominence in his teachings. The Wahhabis called themselves Muwahideen (monotheists) - to call themselves Wahhabis was considered shirk.

Origins of Salafism

Salafism originated in the mid to late 19th Century, as an intellectual movement at al-Azhar University, led by Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905), Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1839-1897) and Rashid Rida (1865-1935). The movement was built on a broad foundation. Al-Afghani was a political activist, whereas Abduh, an educator, sought gradual social reform (as a part of da’wa), particularly through education. Debate over the place of these respective methods of political change continues to this day in Salafi groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood.

The early Salafis admired the technological and social advancement of Europe’s Enlightenment, and tried to reconcile it with the belief that their own society was the heir to a divinely guided Golden Age of Islam that had followed the Prophet Muhammad’s Revelations.

The name Salafi comes from as-salaf as-saliheen, the ‘pious predecessors’ of the early Muslim community, although some Salafis extend the Salaf to include selected later scholars. The Salafis held that the early Muslims had understood and practiced Islam correctly, but true understanding of Islam had gradually drifted, just as the people of previous Prophets (including Moses and Jesus) had strayed and gone into decline. The Salafis set out to rationally reinterpret early Islam with the expectation of rediscovering a more ‘modern’ religion.

In terms of their respective formation, Wahhabism and Salafism were quite distinct. Wahhabism was a pared-down Islam that rejected modern influences, while Salafism sought to reconcile Islam with modernism. What they had in common is that both rejected traditional teachings on Islam in favor of direct, ‘fundamentalist’ reinterpretation.

Saudi Arabia Embraces Salafi Pan-Islamism

Although Saudi Arabia is commonly characterized as aggressively exporting Wahhabism, it has in fact imported pan-Islamic Salafism. Saudi Arabia founded and funded transnational organizations and headquartered them in the kingdom, but many of the guiding figures in these bodies were foreign Salafis. The most well known of these organizations was the World Muslim League, founded in Mecca in 1962, which distributed books and cassettes by al-Banna, Qutb and other foreign Salafi luminaries. Saudi Arabia successfully courted academics at al-Azhar University, and invited radical Salafis to teach at its own Universities.

Saudi Arabia’s decision to host Egyptian radicals hinges on three factors: the need for qualified educators, Faisal’s struggle against Egyptian-led pan-Arab radicalism, and Saudi openness under King Khaled. Between the 1920s and 1960s, Saudi Arabia was emerging as a modern state. Increased oil production required technical infrastructure and a bureaucracy, resulting in a demand for educators that outstripped the administration’s capacity. [2] The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood represented a source of qualified educators, bureaucrats and engineers, many of them anxious to leave Egypt.

During the late 1950s and the 1960s, the Middle East was gripped by a struggle between the traditional monarchies and the secular pan-Arab radicals, led by Nasser’s Egypt, with the pan-Islamist Salafis an important third force. [3] By embracing pan-Islamism, Faisal countered the idea of pan-Arab loyalty centered on Egypt with a larger transnational loyalty centered on Saudi Arabia. During the 1960s, members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and its offshoots, many of them teachers, were given sanctuary in Saudi Arabia, in a move that undermined Nasser while also relieving the Saudi education crisis. [4]

Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy concerns eased in 1970 with Nasser’s death. But in the 1970s, the Saudi education system was awash with Egyptian Muslim Brothers and other Salafis, much as Berkeley was awash with Marxists. Under King Khaled (r.1975-1982), some of the most important proponents of Qutbist terrorism, including Abdullah Azzam, Omar Abd al-Rahman and Muhammad Qutb, served as academics in the Kingdom. Qutb, an important proponent of his late brother Sayyid’s theory, wrote several texts on tawhid for the Saudi school curriculum. [5]

A generation of prominent Saudi citizens was exposed to various strains of Salafi thought during the 1970s, and although most Saudi Salafis are not Qutbist revolutionaries, the Qutbists did not miss the opportunity to awaken a revolutionary vanguard.

Wahhabi-Salafism

Although Salafism and Wahhabism began as two distinct movements, Faisal's embrace of Salafi pan-Islamism resulted in cross-pollination between ibn Abd al-Wahhab’s teachings on tawhid, shirk and bid’a and Salafi interpretations of ahadith (the sayings of Muhammad). Some Salafis nominated ibn Abd al-Wahhab as one of the Salaf (retrospectively bringing Wahhabism into the fold of Salafism), and the Muwahideen began calling themselves Salafis.

Today, a profusion of self-proclaimed Salafi groups exist, each accusing the others of deviating from 'true' Salafism. Since the 1970s, the Saudis have wisely stopped funding those Salafis that excommunicate nominally Muslim governments (or at least the Saudi government), condemning al-Qaeda as ‘the deviant sect’. The pro-Saudis correctly trace al-Qaeda’s ideological roots to Qutb and al-Banna. Less accurately, they accuse these groups of insidiously 'entering' Salafism. In fact, Salafism was imported into Saudi Arabia in its Ikhwani and Qutbist forms. This does not mean that the pro-Saudi Salafis are necessarily benign - for example, Abu Mu'aadh as-Salafee’s main criticism of Qutb and Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna is that they claim Islam teaches tolerance of Jews.[6]

Meanwhile, non-Muslims and mainstream Muslims alike use the ‘Wahhabi-Salafi’ label to denigrate Salafis and even completely unrelated groups such as the Taliban.

Conclusions

Faisal’s embrace of pan-Islamism achieved its main objective in that it helped Saudi Arabia to overcome pan-Arabism. However, it created a radicalized Salafi constituency, elements of which the regime continues to fund. It should be kept in mind, though, that this funding is now confined to more compliant Salafis.

Saudi Arabia still has some way to go. Some will say that a leopard can’t change its spots, but in fact the Saudi Government is capable of serious doctrinal change under pressure. Faisal’s broad introduction of Salafi policies involved such a shift, as did the subsequent rejection of Qutbist interpretations of Salafism by pro-Saudi Salafis.

The Middle East today is clearly in need of alternative models of political change to counter takfiri Salafism. In the West, education has been a major factor in social integration. But as the Saudi case study indicates, we need to be aware of not only the quantity, but also the nature of education. Saudi students in the 1970s learned engineering and administration alongside an ideology of xenophobic alienation. In the long run, the battle against violent Salafism will be fought not only on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq, but also in the universities of the Middle East.

Notes

1. A province in the Arabian Desert, now part of Saudi Arabia.

2. Madawi al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, Cambridge University Press, 2002, pp122-123. Rasheed observes that most teachers in Saudi Arabia at this time were Egyptians.

3. For a comprehensive account of this struggle, see Abdullah M Sindhi, King Faisal and Pan-Islamism, in Willard L Beling (ed), King Faisal and the Modernisation of Saudi Arabia, London, 1980.

4. Madawi al-Rasheed, p144.

5. Syed Muhammad al-Naquib al-Attas (ed), Aims and Objectives of Islamic Education, King Abdul Aziz University, Jeddah, 1979, p48. Introduction to Muhammad Qutb’s chapter, The Role of Religion in Education. (Proceedings of the 1977 World Conference on Islamic Education, Mecca).

6. Abu Mu'aadh as-Salafee, Exposing al-Ikhwaan al-Muflisoon: the Aqeedah of Walaa and Baraaa’, SalafiPublications.com and As-Sawaa’iq al-Mursalah ‘Alal-Afkaar al-Qutubiyyah al-Mudammirah, SalafiPublications.com, pp48, 50."

The Death of Forbes Russian Editor Paul Klebnikov

2005-05-28T14:05:00.000-07:00

The Death of Forbes Russian Editor Paul Klebnikov: "Profile
The Assassination of a Dream
Like many of the Russian-Americans he grew up among in Manhattan, the journalist Paul Klebnikov hoped to return to his ancestral land and help restore it to great ness. Unlike most of those people, he actually got there. But last summer, on a Moscow street, his life was tragically and mysteriously cut short.

By Otto Pohl
The week before last, Paul Klebnikov was memorialized by his family and friends at the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. It was a subdued service, and many of the several hundred mourners stayed behind afterward to tell stories on an open microphone. An uncle played piano; a woman sang a song in Russian. Klebnikov had died in his prime, and he was remembered as a hero. By the time he was 41, he had realized part of a lifelong dream—he had left New York and gone to Russia as a reformer, an investigative reporter committed to using the power of the press to stop a new class of oligarchs from ransacking the country under the guise of capitalism.

That dream ended on a Friday night in July. It was 10 P.M., still light out, and Klebnikov was leaving his Moscow office, where he was the editor of the fledgling Forbes Russia magazine. There had been four issues so far, one of them about the 100 richest Russians, and the future looked promising.

He crossed the street and headed toward a footpath that led to the subway. A dark Lada with tinted windows—stolen, it later turned out—pulled out of a parking lot and drove toward Klebnikov. The driver rolled down his window. Shots were fired; four hit Klebnikov. As the car backed up and then drove off, Klebnikov tried to turn around, swayed, cried for help, and fell down. He got up again, staggered back in the direction of his office about twenty yards, and then fell again, on his back, on the rucksack he was still wearing. An eyewitness flagged down an ambulance. Everyone from Forbes had gone home, but a few staff members of the Russian edition of Newsweek, which shares offices with Forbes, were still there. By the time Newsweek editor Alexander Gordeyev reached the scene, about fifteen minutes later, both police and the ambulance had arrived.

Gordeyev remembers Klebnikov looking very tired. “Do you know what happened?” he asked Klebnikov in English, thinking that it would be easier for Klebnikov to speak English at this point. “Nyet,” Klebnikov answered in Russian, “somebody was shooting.” “You don’t know who?” “No.” Gordeyev asked whether there had been any meetings, contacts, or visits that could have led to this. Again, Gordeyev claims, Klebnikov said no.

Klebnikov asked for oxygen, but the ambulance didn’t have any. Another one was called and arrived within a few minutes. Klebnikov was placed on a stretcher and given an IV while the driver radioed to find out which hospital he should take him to. It took a quarter of an hour before he received a response. As they began driving, Klebnikov was already losing consciousness. At the hospital, the elevator taking Klebnikov to the operating room got stuck between floors. A nurse, still outside, began to push the elevator call button, then stopped. “There it is,” she said. “That’s his fate.”

Friends remember the Klebnikovs’ Upper East Side apartment as a time capsule, full of gilded icons and lively Russian Orthodox celebrations. “One person would be playing Tchaikovsky, drink ing vodka, and in the next room pe ople arguing vociferously about art. Everyone was eating blini.”

Mikhail Fishman, a Newsweek reporter who had gone to the hospital in the ambulance, began running around trying to find out how to get the lift operating again. He found a group of indifferent doctors and nurses sitting in a waiting room. He tried to pry apart the elevator doors with a chair leg. Ten minutes later, a workman appeared with tools and managed to open the lift. But Klebnikov could not be saved.

Among the many distinctive subcultures of Manhattan, there is the small circle of White Russians, descendants of the czarists, landed gentry, and intelligentsia who began to flee the advancing communists in 1917. Most of them scattered across Europe, but many came to New York. While they waited for their triumphant return to Mother Russia, they taught their native language to their children and told them theatrical stories of birch forests and gallant cossacks. Eventually, they got on with the business of rebuilding life in a foreign country. Generations passed.

Born in 1963, Paul grew up in a house that echoed with myths and traditions. In the garden of the family’s weekend home in Sagaponac, he was christened in a galvanized washtub covered with a sheet and garlands of field flowers. A Russian priest, dressed in traditional vestments, threw Paul in the air and immersed him into the water three times.

As a boy, Paul learned about his great-grandfather, an admiral in the Imperial Navy, and his great-great-great-grandfather, Ivan Pouschine, a friend of Alexander Pushkin’s who was exiled to Siberia for his role in the Decembrist uprising against the czar in 1825. His father’s side, the Klebnikovs, was a family of military officers. Paul’s grandfather, Ross Nebolsine, had moved to New York and become a successful civil engineer and a leading figure in the Russian émigré community, providing jobs and support to the aristocrats fleeing the Bolsheviks. Life in New York was good, but the community kept to its Old World customs, too. The social scene revolved around a series of elaborate balls.

In many ways, Paul was a typical Manhattan kid. He went to Saint Bernard’s on 98th Street and spent vacations in Sagaponac. But he also eagerly learned the history of the czars. Friends and family remember the Klebnikovs’ Upper East Side apartment as something of a time capsule, with its gilded icons and lively Russian Orthodox celebrations. “One person would be playing Tchaikovsky on the piano, drinking vodka, and in the next room there were people arguing vociferously about art, and everyone was eating blini,” is how Ronald Bailey, a friend of Paul’s from his first years at Forbes, remembers Easter. Even to an outsider like Bailey, the strong Klebnikov-family desire, even duty, to one day return and help Russia was clear. “The family heritage had a very strong belief that it was possible to help Russia,” he said. “It was completely built into the belief system of the family. A lingering historical regret had come down through the generations that the grandfather had been chased out and that they would like to help the country repair itself.”

Paul, like his sister and two brothers, was taught by their grandparents to carry themselves with aristocratic bearing. As a young man, Paul took to smoking a pipe and loved nothing better than commandeering dinner parties and forcing everyone to state opinions on the weighty issues of the moment.

Paul was also obsessed with testing himself. After graduating in 1984 with a B.A. in political science from Berkeley, he took the unusual step of spending a summer at the Marines’ Officer Candidates School. He had no intention of a career in the military; he simply wished to subject himself to the physical and emotional demands of boot camp. Later, he ran the New York City marathon with two friends, all of them wearing T-shirts with the double-headed Russian eagle. One of the men, Serge Ossorguine, remembers Paul leading them through Russian military songs to keep them going (“We’re fighting for Mother Russia and the czar!”).

After Berkeley, Klebnikov pressed on with his studies, going to the London School of Economics, where he wrote his Russian-history dissertation on Pyotr Stolypin, a controversial figure who served as a minister under the last czar. Klebnikov worshipped Stolypin, often boring his friends with extended monologues about the minister’s early efforts at privatization. “He was fascinated by Stolypin,” recalls Tania Pouschine, a New York Russian-American formerly related to Klebnikov by marriage, “because Stolypin was one individual whose sheer competence might have changed Russian history if he had been allowed to live. He admired him on a personal level to a huge extent. To Paul, it was an example of the best Russia could produce.”

That Stolypin also led a violent suppression of political dissent, executing so many Russians that the hangman’s noose became known as a “Stolypin necktie,” did not, apparently, dampen Klebnikov’s enthusiasm.

After finishing his dissertation, Klebnikov returned to New York and found work as a researcher at Forbes. By the early nineties, he was taking regular trips to Russia on assignment for the magazine. Klebnikov’s optimism about Russia rarely wavered, but his reporting from those years chronicles his horror at what was unfolding there, the outright thievery and corruption that accompanied the transition to capitalism. “For the Russian people, the Yeltsin era was the biggest disaster,” he later wrote, “since the Nazi invasion of 1941.” Nonetheless, he was convinced he could help by exposing the insider deals and giveaways. “He had this messianic belief that he was going to be part of the transition of Russia from a gangster country to a civilized country,” said William Baldwin, one of his editors.

In 1991, he married Musa Train, whom he had known since childhood (they have the same godfather). He married well, and certainly wealthy: Musa’s father, John Train, was a major Wall Street banker. Musa and Paul moved into an apartment on the Upper West Side. At a housewarming party there, guests discussed the day’s news—Boris Yeltsin had climbed onto a tank and defied the putsch against Gorbachev—and they all toasted the occasion with vodka shots.

Eventually, Paul and Musa had three children together. Paul could have led a very comfortable life in New York, but he was never content with just that. His reporting trips to Russia became more frequent. Finally, given the chance to be the founding editor of Forbes Russia, he moved there full-time at the end of 2003, leaving his wife and family in New York. Musa didn’t want to move to Russia—“For her, going to Russia was like going to the moon to live,” said the financier Boris Jordan, a family friend—so Klebnikov had agreed to serve as editor for only a year. In the meantime, he returned to New York for a week out of every month.

As Musa wrote in an article published in the International Herald Tribune after his death, “Throughout our marriage, Russia was the other woman.”

In spite of their long-cherished dream, relatively few of the diaspora Russians ever moved back. Most of those who did went for financial gain, like Jordan, who left Wall Street in the early nineties to take advantage of what he saw as the investment bonanza of a lifetime. Jordan finagled his way into virtually every big attempt to reform the Russian economy. He helped conceive the privatization program together with Anatoly Chubais, the controversial loans-for shares program with Vladimir Potanin, and Putin’s takeover of the independent television channel NTV.

These are precisely the sort of deals that might have attracted the interest of a crusading young reporter, but Klebnikov always went easy on his friend Jordan, saving his vitriol for other self-styled Russian capitalists.

In the years leading up to his move to Moscow, Klebnikov took a particularly hard line on the car-dealer magnate Boris Berezovsky, culminating in a December 1996 Forbes cover article headlined “Godfather of the Kremlin?” (which he later turned into a book). Although the original article was published without a byline, the identity of the author was no secret. Among other things, the story suggested Berezovsky’s complicity in murder and other strong-arm tactics. Klebnikov subsequently received death threats and decided to take a break from reporting about Russia. He and his family lived in Paris, where Klebnikov wrote several articles on other topics. Meanwhile, Berezovsky sued Forbes, and Klebnikov spent much of the coming years fighting the case, which was settled in 2003, with both sides claiming victory (the magazine had to back down from the murder implications). Klebnikov eventually resumed his work in Russia, but when he went there, he began traveling with a bodyguard.

Klebnikov’s journalism wasn’t always held in the highest regard by his peers. The New York Times published a positive review of Godfather of the Kremlin, but some Russian journalists said Klebnikov compromised himself by relying too heavily on ex-KGB sources. The case that Klebnikov assembled against Berezovsky is widely assumed to have been provided in large part by Aleksandr Korzhakov, the head of security for Boris Yeltsin; Korzhakov’s first deputy, Valery Streletsky, published the Russian edition of Klebnikov’s book. “When you use information given to you by the special services, you become their hostage,” said Alexei Venediktov, a popular radio journalist. Investigative reporter Yevgenia Albats, who has also written about Berezovsky, considers Klebnikov’s book little more than a “collection of gossip.”

By 2000, Klebnikov’s reporting for Forbes began to reflect his growing confidence that Putin’s tough love—which included bullying people like Berezovsky—was just what Russia needed. Describing Putin’s reign as a fresh “Act II” to Yeltsin’s sloppy and corrupt “Act I” in an October 2001 Forbes article, Klebnikov outlined his renewed optimism for Russia. “Corruption, while still rife, is receding,” he writes. “Though Russia remains a dangerous place for investors, some of its corporations have finally decided that it is in their best interest to respect the rights of minority shareholders.”

If Klebnikov was impressed by the corporate order that Putin managed to impose, he also understood that the plundering he had witnessed was by no means finished. Russia remained the biggest storehouse of raw materials in a world of ever-increasing demand, and with the price of oil soaring after 9/11, the government was flush, creating ever more opportunities for graft, corruption, and outright theft. It was an incredible boom time, and when the chance to edit Forbes Russia came along, Klebnikov saw it as his front-row seat.

Forbes Russia is owned by the German publishing company Axel Springer, which, eager to enter the Russian magazine market, negotiated the rights to the Russian editions of both Forbes and Newsweek. The market has been booming for years, and dozens of licensed foreign titles have begun to crowd the newsstand rack. Although there are already many Russian business magazines, there were no other licensed editions of international ones; Axel Springer hoped that Klebnikov would help Forbes Russia set a new standard for independent business journalism.

Despite his sometimes militant idealism, Klebnikov did not believe in austerity, either in his own life or in his magazine. He took pride in Forbes’s coverage of exotic travel and expensive French restaurants, believing these to be the just rewards of an honest business community. “You remind me of me in the early nineties,” Boris Jordan told Klebnikov at a dinner about two weeks before his death. “I came here with such a romantic view of Russia. I’m still an optimist, but more focused on the realities.” Jordan remembers Klebnikov answering, “I’m tired of all the negative stuff being written about Russia. I want to do more of the positive stuff.”

“We were trying to reassure his wife that people now resort to courts rather than to contract killers,” says a friend who had dinner with them just days before Paul was killed. Paul had stopped using a bodyguard. He thought it seemed “over-the-top.”

Klebnikov very much wanted his magazine to be a commercial success, and worked hard to publicize it. On April 22, a day once held holy for being Lenin’s birthday, Klebnikov invited more than 300 people to the luxurious Hotel Baltschug Kempinski, near the Kremlin, to drink champagne and celebrate the magazine’s launch. “The fact that the Russian market is ready for this kind of publication,” Klebnikov wrote in the magazine he was handing out at the party, “is one of the signs that Russian business is emerging to a new, more civilized stage of development.”

By all accounts, preparing for the magazine’s launch and overseeing the magazine’s staff of twenty left Klebnikov little spare time. Although he shared an office with two editors in Moscow for months, neither of them really came to know Klebnikov personally, and they never saw him in social settings. “He had no other passions but his work,” said Kirill Vishnepolsky, a deputy editor. It is unclear whether Klebnikov was doing any investigative reporting. Forbes Russia publisher Leonid Bershidsky insists that Klebnikov was too busy editing the magazine to work as a reporter. But friends, including James Michaels, Klebnikov’s longtime editor in New York, doubt that Klebnikov was solely concentrating on being an editor. “I’m sure he was working on several things,” said Michaels. “It wouldn’t be Paul if he wasn’t.”

Present-day Moscow is a muckraker’s fantasyland. Potential conspiracies are everywhere. When the Manezh, a historic building located just outside the Kremlin walls, burned down in March, many suspected that it had been done intentionally, to clear the site for development. A few articles were published suggesting arson, and then the story vanished. Shortly after Leonid Reiman became the minister of Communications, cellular-phone companies competitive with MegaFon, which was partially owned by Reiman’s former company, suddenly began having problems with their licenses. While there has been no proof that either of these cases involved illegal activity, both have been mentioned as possible stories that Klebnikov was pursuing. Neither would seem to have put him in a life-threatening situation, but you can never be sure who’s behind what in Russia.

In one of its first issues, Forbes Russia had published a list of the richest Russians, which some observers speculate could have inspired a publicity-shy billionaire to seek revenge. But the Russian magazine Finans had published a very similar list just two months earlier, containing many of the same names; the Forbes list contained little new information. And experienced Russia observers contend that contract killings are usually more pragmatic than that, anyway. “Russian businessmen don’t kill for vengeance,” Venediktov said. “They kill to stop information.”

According to one source, Klebnikov received a file in early July that contained extremely sensitive information. He called several people for advice, describing it as “the worst thing” he had ever seen—quite a statement from someone who had spent years exploring the darkest recesses of Russian crime. What was contained in that file, or what happened to it, is unclear. The fact that he received it just days before his murder makes a link seem plausible. And yet, if this is true, why, then, did he not retain a bodyguard, as he had done in the past, and why did he not mention the file to Fishman, the Newsweek reporter, after he’d been shot? The Klebnikov family said they have no knowledge of any such file.

To some of Klebnikov’s acquaintances in Moscow, there were signs that he wasn’t entirely comfortable. On June 20, freelance journalist Alyona Dushka visited him at home to discuss turning his doctoral thesis on Stolypin into a book. They sat in the kitchen of his home, a large, modestly renovated apartment in a Stalin-era tower overlooking the Moskva River. While she sipped tea and Klebnikov smoked his pipe, they discussed the success of Forbes. With his magazine turning out so well, she asked, shouldn’t he move his family to Russia? “I don’t know if it is safe for my family,” he told her. There was a pause, and then she changed the subject. “I was afraid of asking what he meant,” she remembers.

The next day, Klebnikov spoke to a crowd of 150 at a charity fund-raiser at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. He made a speech about the necessity of restoring old village churches to help rebuild the social life in Russia’s countryside. Elisabeth Apraxine, a White Russian descendant from Belgium, remembers him as cheerful, articulate, and anything but nervous.

At the Pushkin Café, housed in a new building reconstructed to look like it had in czarist times, Sunday Times of London correspondent Mark Franchetti met Paul and Musa, who was in town visiting, for dinner on July 5, four days before Paul’s murder. Franchetti spent much of the dinner arguing with Paul’s upbeat assessment of Russia. “The only thing we had 100 percent agreement on,” Franchetti said, was trying to convince Musa that Russia had become a safe place. “We were trying to reassure his wife that people now resort to courts rather than to contract killers.” Paul had stopped using a bodyguard, because, as Musa later told Franchetti, he thought it seemed “over-the-top.”

During their final days together, Musa and Paul walked through the narrow streets of historic Moscow, discussing ways they could help save Moscow’s architectural heritage from developers. After dropping Musa off at the airport on Wednesday, Paul began work on the next issue of Forbes, which was to feature the 50 most highly paid Russian sports stars.

Two days later, he was dead.

Interior ministry investigators arrived at the Forbes office first. They performed a quick search through Klebnikov’s computer and then removed it, along with all of his files and interview tapes. His apartment was also searched. The day after the murder, police reported that they found the Lada, abandoned in a courtyard a few kilometers from the scene of the murder.

Then the investigation lapsed into months of silence. Klebnikov’s family, with the help of friends in the Russian-American community, has been trying to keep the pressure on the Russian government, but to little avail. There is no shortage of senseless violence in Russia. The war in Chechnya, together with terrorist attacks like the one in Beslan, easily push the death of one enterprising American reporter off the news pages. His death is also far from unique. About 40 journalists have been killed since the Soviet Union collapsed, including about a dozen since Putin came to power.

Still, Russian news wires came alive September 28 with dramatic news. PAUL KLEBNIKOV’S MURDER SOLVED, the Interfax headline shouted. Two Chechens had been arrested in the course of a kidnapping investigation, the article reported, and Moscow police chief Vladimir Pronin claimed a pistol found in their possession had likely been the Klebnikov murder weapon. The brief announcement left a trail of unanswered questions—what kidnapping? Why Chechens?—but Police Chief Pronin projected an air of total certainty. Those following the case, like Forbes Russia publisher Bershidsky, expressed cautious hope that investigators were onto a hot lead.

Only hours later, the story began to unravel. The office of the Russian General Prosecutor issued a blanket condemnation of Pronin for speaking out of line. Journalists investigating the kidnapping angle found that the kidnap victim, a businessman, had apparently been held not by the Chechens but by officers of the FSB, the successor to the KGB. Instead of facts about Klebnikov, the following days spilled the ugly guts of a Moscow real-estate deal gone bad. The Chechens may have been just friends trying to negotiate the businessman’s release. And the connection between the Chechens and Klebnikov? Ballistic tests proved that none of the weapons found were used in the Klebnikov murder, the newspaper Gazeta reported.

While the General Prosecutor’s office, which maintains official control of the investigation, relapsed into silence, Pronin knew he had some explaining to do. So that’s what he did: On Friday, October 1, his spokesman issued a statement denying that Pronin had ever said anything about Klebnikov in the first place.

That left observers guessing at the true state of the investigation. “I don’t think there is any progress, which is why they’re saying such stupid things,” said Oleg Panfilov, the president of the the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations, a Russian advocacy group. “They either have no idea, which seems likely, or they may know everything and are trying to distract people from their central theory.”

I visited the Forbes Russia offices a few weeks after Klebnikov’s murder to speak with Maxim Kashulinsky, the managing editor. Klebnikov’s desk had already been cleared off, and the only sign of the former editor was a small memorial on a side table by the office entrance, which consisted of a framed portrait of Klebnikov, a bouquet of wilting carnations, and a candle in a glass jar. At the end of our conversation, I asked him whether Klebnikov’s murder meant anything for Russia. He shook his head, and then, as if embarrassed that a simple gesture could sum up Klebnikov’s legacy, he addressed the frustrating opacity of Russian public life. “The murder will mean a lot for Russia,” he said, “if they solve it.” He emphasized the if.

That is a painful epitaph for a Russia optimist. “If Paul were alive today,” said Serge Ossorguine, “he would be very disheartened by his murder.”"

Paul Klebnikov - Reckless Journalism Cost Him His Life

2005-05-28T13:59:00.000-07:00

2004 International Press Freedom Awards: "Paul Klebnikov
United States/Russia
Killed in Moscow July 9, 2004

Paul Klebnikov, an American journalist of Russian descent, was shot nine times by at least one assassin in a passing car when he stepped outside his office on July 9, 2004, in Moscow. He died shortly after arriving at a hospital, becoming the 11th journalist in Russia to be murdered in a contract-style killing since President Vladimir Putin took power in 2000. To date, no one has been brought to justice in any of the cases.

Klebnikov joined Forbes magazine in 1989 and rose to the position of senior editor specializing in Russian and Eastern European politics and economics before leaving the U.S.-based magazine to assume the editorship of Forbes Russia in 2004. Klebnikov launched the magazine in April 2004, believing that reforms were propelling the country toward greater transparency in business and politics. With his fluency in Russian and doctorate from the London School of Economics, Klebnikov was uniquely qualified to investigate Russia's business world. In his first editorial, Klebnikov wrote that Russian business had arrived at a "new, more civilized stage of development" and cited the launch of Forbes' Russian edition as evidence.

Forbes Russia attracted significant attention in May, when it published a list of Russia's wealthiest people and reported that Moscow had 33 billionaires, more than any other city in the world. Publication of the list focused attention on Russia's richest people, many of whom are trying to keep a low profile. Klebnikov's book, Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia, was published in August 2001 and outlined the rise of one of the country's most powerful oligarchs."

The Killing of Paul Klebnikov - MN-FILES - MOSNEWS.COM

2005-05-28T13:57:00.000-07:00

The Killing of Paul Klebnikov - MN-FILES - MOSNEWS.COM: "The Killing of Paul Klebnikov
Born in New York in 1963 to a family of Russian immigrants, Paul Klebnikov graduated from California University, Berkley and the London School of Economics, completing his doctorate in 1991. Klebnikov started working for Forbes Magazine in 1989. Promoted to senior editor, Klebnikov was an expert on Russian and East European politics and economics. His special field of interest was conducting investigations into the origins of wealth of the so-called oligarchs and their possible ties to the Russian mafia.

In 1996 he wrote an article in Forbes calling exiled Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky the “Godfather of the Kremlin” and suggesting that the tycoon — who made his fortune during Russia’s controversial privatisation programme in the 1990s — might have been implicated in the murder of a well-known TV anchorman and had links with Chechen organized crime groups.

Berezovsky sued the magazine for defamation, after which Forbes admitted in open court that the allegations were unfounded and Berezovsky withdrew his suit. During the proceedings, however, Klebnikov published an equally controversial book, Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia in which he asserted that Berezovsky had also channelled hundreds of millions of dollars out of Russia.

Klebnikov’s second book, Conversation With a Barbarian, written in Russian and published in 2003, was based on a series of interviews with Chechen separatist leader Khozh Akhmed Nukhayev and dealt, among other subjects, with organized crime in Russia’s ongoing war in Chechnya.

Paul Klebnikov became the editor-in-chief of the Russian edition of Forbes in April 2004. In May, the magazine published a list of the 100 wealthiest people in Russia, many of whom said they were unhappy about the publication.

While in charge of the new Russian Forbes, Klebnikov was also undertaking certain independent investigations that he did not speak of, Russian online news service Gazeta.ru reported, citing the source from Forbes.

On Friday night, July 9, 2004, Paul Klebnikov was shot several times as he was leaving his office building in Moscow. He died while in an ambulance en route to the hospital."

Terorists to March May 16 in Philadelphia Under the uise of Iran Freedom Walk

2005-05-13T11:11:00.000-07:00

Gary Schroen on Meet the Press, Transcript for May 82005 The Bush Failure to Catch Osama bin Laden

2005-05-12T20:20:00.000-07:00

Transcript for May 8 - Meet the Press, online at MSNBC - MSNBC.com: "Transcript for May 8
Guests: Gary Schroen, former senior CIA agent, author; James Carville; and Mary MatalinNBC News
Updated: 11:34 a.m. ET May 8, 2005PLEASE CREDIT ANY QUOTES OR EXCERPTS FROM THIS NBC TELEVISION PROGRAM TO "NBC NEWS' MEET THE PRESS."

This is a rush transcript provided for the information and convenience of the press. Accuracy is not guaranteed. In case of doubt, please check with MEET THE PRESS - NBC NEWS at (202)885-4598, (Sundays: (202) 885-4200)

NBC News MEET THE PRESS

Sunday, May 8, 2005

Guests: Gary Schroen, former senior CIA agent, Author of “First In: How seven CIA officers opened the war on terrorism in Afghanistan;”

James Carville, political strategist;

Mary Matalin, political strategist

Moderator: Tim Russert, NBC News

MR. TIM RUSSERT: Our issues this Sunday: This man, the third ranking al-Qaeda leader, Abu Faraj Al-Libbi, is captured. Why is this man, Osama bin Laden, still on the loose?

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And will this man, North Korea's Kim Jong Il, sell nuclear weapons to al-Qaeda or use them to blackmail the world?

With us, Gary Schroen, a CIA officer for 32 years and author of "First In: An Insider's Account of How the CIA Spearheaded the War on Terror in Afghanistan."

Then: Social Security, John Bolton, Tom DeLay, the Bush second term and the field for 2008. With us for the Democrats, James Carville; for the Republicans, Mary Matalin. The political odd couple square off.

But first, the war on terrorism through the eyes of CIA veteran, now author, Gary Schroen.

Mr. Schroen, welcome to MEET THE PRESS.

MR. GARY SCHROEN: Thank you very much, sir.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me show you this photograph. Here is Abu Faraj Al-Libbi, captured, described as the number-three man in al-Qaeda. How significant was his arrest?

MR. SCHROEN: I think it's significant in two ways, Tim. He is the number-three guy. He replaced Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was a mastermind of many of the attacks. His arrest will significantly damage the al-Qaeda organization. It's important in a second way because it demonstrates that the Pakistani government and military are willing to go into tribal areas north of Peshawar, where it's most likely that bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahari are hiding.

MR. RUSSERT: Number one and two.

MR. SCHROEN: Number one and two.

MR. RUSSERT: Richard Clark, who headed up counterterrorism for the White House said on Wednesday, "I think the original al Qaeda, the people who attacked us on September 11th, really doesn't exist any more as a threat, as an organization. But there are other organizations out there related to the original al Qaeda, that pose a significant threat."

Do you agree with that?

MR. SCHROEN: To some extent. Bin Laden is isolated, but I believe that he is able to still influence and communicate with his organization. It's true that terrorism has been globalized now in a way after 9/11 that's significant. But bin Laden remains a critical figure for us to focus on and to capture.

MR. RUSSERT: And direct the operation?

MR. SCHROEN: I don't know if he is actually directing it, but his spiritual guidance and his encouragement certainly adds emphasis to attacks around the world and groups around the world operating against us.

MR. RUSSERT: On September 1, 2001, you began a 90-day phaseout retiring from the CIA. Then came the horrific day of 8:46 AM, September 11, 2001. All our lives changed. You were asked to stay on at the CIA. On September 13th, you were summoned to the office of Cofer Black, the head of counterterrorism for the CIA. What did he tell you? What was your mission?

MR. SCHROEN: The mission was to--the first part of it was to go in and link up with the Northern Alliance, formerly headed by Ahmed Al-Massoud, and to win their confidence and their agreement to cooperate militarily with us. They were the only armed force on the ground in Afghanistan opposing the Taliban. The second part of it was, once the Taliban were broken, to attack the al-Qaeda organization, find bin Laden and his senior lieutenants and kill them.

MR. RUSSERT: Kill them?

MR. SCHROEN: Kill them.

MR. RUSSERT: Wasn't it illegal for us to kill foreign leaders?

MR. SCHROEN: I don't think at that point that the--I think the administration had gotten to the point where bin Laden and his guys were fair game.

MR. RUSSERT: As part of war?

MR. SCHROEN: As part of war.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Black gave you specific instructions on what he wanted you to bring home.

MR. SCHROEN: That's true. He did ask that once we got bin Laden and killed him, that we send his head back in a cardboard box on dry ice so that he could take it down and show the president.

MR. RUSSERT: Where would you find the dry ice in Afghanistan?

MR. SCHROEN: That's what I mentioned to him. I said, "Cofer, I think that I can come up with pikes to put the heads of the lieutenants on," which is the second part of what he wanted done. "Dry ice, we'll have to improvise."

MR. RUSSERT: Why couldn't you find bin Laden?

MR. SCHROEN: Initially, when we entered Afghanistan, I don't think there was a real clear view back in Washington or in the field as to what we would face there. We were actually behind the lines. We were deep into Afghanistan about 30 miles from the Taliban front lines hosted by this armed force, and it was almost impossible for even Massoud and his organization to operate beyond the limited area that they controlled.

MR. RUSSERT: And so it's just impossible to penetrate.

MR. SCHROEN: At that point, it was and it became very clear to actually go after the al-Qaeda and to get at bin Laden we would have to defeat the Taliban militarily and take them out of the equation.

MR. RUSSERT: Now, you brought with you $3 million in American cash, 100-dollar bills.

MR. SCHROEN: That's correct.

MR. RUSSERT: How many suitcases is that for that amount of money?

MR. SCHROEN: One very big, very heavy suitcase.

MR. RUSSERT: And what did you do with the money?

MR. SCHROEN: We basically used it to assure the leadership of the Northern Alliance that we were serious, that we dispensed the money to allow them to buy equipment, materiel and other things that they needed to bring their forces up to full combat strength.

MR. RUSSERT: We had read at that time that John Walker Lindh, this young American teenager, in effect...

MR. SCHROEN: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: ...had become part of al-Qaeda.

MR. SCHROEN: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: And the question I asked then and I ask you now is how could an American teenager infiltrate al-Qaeda and not the CIA?

MR. SCHROEN: Well, that question's been asked a lot in discussions: Why don't we infiltrate? But if you actually look at what John Walker Lindh was and where he was at, he was a foot soldier. He was never going to be trusted to do anything other than carry a gun and carry out the most basic orders. He was certainly never going to sit in a council with bin Laden or his senior lieutenants. And in the end, he ended up standing in chest-deep ice cold water in the basement of Qala Jangi prison, a fort there, fighting it out with American forces.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to your book and talk about Mr. bin Laden. "Usama bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri are hiding somewhere in the tribal areas of Pakistan. They are undoubtedly being assisted by tribal leaders who dislike the Pakistani government and who enjoy the financial rewards bin Ladin brings to them. Winning full Pakistani military cooperation, refocusing military strategy by U.S. forces on the Afghan side of the border, bringing back Special Operations units, and beefing up the number of CIA teams in the border areas would allow for coordinated military operations on both sides of the border. This is the only way to locate and eliminate bin Ladin ..."

Why aren't we doing what you recommend?

MR. SCHROEN: We're--since that was written, I think we've started to pull--there are more Special Forces troops there. We are still shorthanded as far as CIA officers on the ground in those border areas. Again, the demand on personnel, both special operations and military, and CIA in Iraq are huge and it makes staffing there difficult.

We are able to operate effectively on the Afghan side of the border. The problem rests in Pakistan. The Pakistanis' military and intelligence service is very reluctant to go into the tribal areas north of Peshawar, Bashir, Derr and Momad agency. I have a long felt personally that that was where bin Laden went to after they escaped--he and Zawahiri escaped from Tora Bora.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you believe that we know where bin Laden is right now?

MR. SCHROEN: No, we don't know where he's at other than the general area.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the Pakistanis have a pretty good sense where he is?

MR. SCHROEN: I think within the military and ISID at a a certain level, they certainly do now where he is.

MR. RUSSERT: ISID being Pakistani Intelligence...

MR. SCHROEN: Pakistani Intelligence Service.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me show you the map of the border area. It's the border 1,640 miles long, the mountainous region about the size of the country of Ireland. And you think up there in the upper right hand corner?

MR. SCHROEN: Upper right hand corner, there is a little--you know, the little jot out there is where Peshawar is, and north of that is a rugged area. It's traditionally been the most hostile area to any kind of government control. The tribals there have made centuries of living smuggling and it's one of the main drug trafficking routes in and out of the country. And bin Laden is very respected and liked in that area.

MR. RUSSERT: And they're protecting him?

MR. SCHROEN: I think they're protecting him for a number of reasons. He is considered to be a Robin Hood-like figure. He has made a, you know, mockery of our efforts to catch him for all these years, and he probably has a nice checkbook that he is writing sizeable amounts of checks for these people hosting him.

MR. RUSSERT: Tom Brokaw interviewed General Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan and talked about capturing bin Laden. Let me show you part of that interview.

(Videotape, May 4, 2005):

MR. TOM BROKAW: Is there a danger for you, personally, and for your government, that if Pakistani troops take down Osama bin Laden in what would probably be a difficult struggle, it would cause an uprising in some of the cities in your country, and in the refugee camps?

GEN. PERVEZ MUSHARRAF: Well, there would be effects, but we shouldn't be so naive as to capture him and then go around telling everyone and going around with him everywhere. I mean, there is a method of dealing with the situation.

MR. BROKAW: But it would be delicate, wouldn't it?

GEN. MUSHARRAF: It would be certainly delicate, not only here but even in the Islamic world.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Musharraf: "It would be delicate here in Pakistan and the Islamic world." Is there a distinct possibility that Mr. Musharraf is afraid of capturing Osama bin Laden because he would fear that his government would be toppled?

MR. SCHROEN: In my opinion, that's a real likelihood, that the Pakistanis have cooperated pretty wholesomely in helping us capture a lot of al-Qaeda officers up to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and this-- the capture of Al-Libbi recently is a significant event but to take on bin Laden, there would be an uproar within that country and around the Islamic world that would really cause the foundations of the Pakistani government to be shaken.

MR. RUSSERT: After Al-Libbi was captured, some citizens in the town told NBC News: "If we had known it was him, we would have protected him."

MR. SCHROEN: I think that's probably very accurate. And if we were able to find bin Laden, and identify that to the Pakistanis, I would suspect that there would be a great reluctance and probably a refusal to move forward. That's my opinion.

MR. RUSSERT: In 1999, we had located bin Laden at a hunting camp where some Arab princes were also hunting with him. And there was a big discussion, debate whether or not to launch cruise missiles and take out bin Laden. Why didn't we do it?

MR. SCHROEN: The debate came down to the fact that we would be using cruise missiles and that this camp would be undoubtedly totally destroyed. There were a number of princes from the United Arab Emirates. This was a camp that was being supported by the UAE government, UAE military; C-130s were supplying these guys with the amenities that they needed. Bin Laden was there. And the debate-- we had the plan, our guys had scoped the camp out, put a beacon down so that we knew it was the exact camp. And then it got into, "Well, what tent does bin Laden sleep in? Where does he eat? Where does he go to the bathroom?" So these kinds of questions dragged on and on for two weeks. And, finally, the administration's decision was not to take the strike because of the collateral damage that would occur.

MR. RUSSERT: This is the Clinton administration?

MR. SCHROEN: Yes.

MR. RUSSERT: You're convinced we could have gotten bin Laden then?

MR. SCHROEN: Absolutely. Our guys had eyes on him. Well...

MR. RUSSERT: And the what-ifs. This was in 1999, two years before 2001.

MR. SCHROEN: Exactly. The what-ifs.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to bin Laden and the president's comments on September 17, 2001. Here's George W. Bush.

(Videotape, September 17, 2001):

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: I want him--I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, as I recall, that said "Wanted, Dead or Alive."

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: In December of 2001, the battle of Tora Bora. This is what you write. "In early 2002, in the immediate aftermath of the battle of Tora Bora and the subsequent escape of Osama bin Laden and his chief lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahari, CIA and specially trained U.S. military Special Operations units began to organize teams in the provincial areas east and south of Kabul, along Afghanistan's border with Pakistan."

You have no doubt that bin Laden escaped at Tora Bora?

MR. SCHROEN: No doubt at all. When the first film--videotape that was made--that he made afterwards shows him that he was holding his left side and was probably wounded there in the battle, but every bit of information we had at the time indicated that he had escaped and moved into the Waziristan area which is south of Peshawar.

MR. RUSSERT: How did he get away?

MR. SCHROEN: We had done--followed the same lead we had taken since September of '01 in defeating the Taliban. We were attacking with U.S. military forces against the al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, and we hired local tribal leaders to guard the escape routes into Pakistan. Unfortunately, many of those people proved to be loyal to bin Laden and sympathizers with the Taliban and they allowed the key guys to escape.

MR. RUSSERT: In the heat of the presidential campaign in 2004, John Kerry as part of his stump speech in effect would say things like this. Let's watch.

(Videotape, October 30, 2004):

SEN. JOHN KERRY, (D-MA): As I have said for two years now, when Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda were cornered in the mountains of Tora Bora, it was wrong to outsource the job of capturing them to Afghan warlords who a week earlier were fighting against us.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Should we have had more U.S. troops in Afghanistan circling Tora Bora to prevent his escape?

MR. SCHROEN: In hindsight that would have been ideal. We fought a special operations war. It was CIA and Army Green Berets on the ground directing the bombing campaign. It was only late in the campaign that U.S. ground forces came in, and the evolution, I think, simply we didn't take it far enough. If we'd have had one more battle after Tora Bora, we probably would have gotten it right.

MR. RUSSERT: Again, in October of 2004, in the presidential campaign, after John Kerry made those charges, General Tommy Franks offered this observation. "We don't know to this day whether Mr. bin Laden was at Tora Bora in December 2001. ...Mr. bin Laden was never within our grasp."

You just disagree with that?

MR. SCHROEN: I absolutely do, yes.

MR. RUSSERT: And President Bush and Vice President Cheney all quoted General Franks, saying: "We don't know if bin Laden was at Tora Bora." You have no doubt.

MR. SCHROEN: I have no doubt that he was there.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn again to your book. "The United States is continuing to pour billions of dollars and sacrifice the lives of American soldiers in order to bring peace and democracy to Iraq. This is being done at the expense of Afghanistan. ... Given the total preoccupation with Iraq, I am not confident that the U.S. government will make the policy adjustments necessary to improve conditions for the success of the democratic experiment in Afghanistan, or refocus diplomatic and military efforts back to the South Asia region in order to capture Osama bin Laden and defeat al-Qa'ida. The opportunity to make these changes exists now; if we fail in these efforts, we do so at our peril."

Are you suggesting--do you believe that Iraq is a distraction, a preoccupation, and it is really limiting our ability to capture Osama bin Laden and secure Afghanistan?

MR. SCHROEN: I absolutely do. Afghanistan gets a distant second on all aspects, whether it's going to be military or aid that's going to be given to the country. Afghanistan is--the elections were successful. There is a beginning of democracy there. It's very fragile. The--but I think the entire population wants peace. It's a matter of how they share the pie. And we could do a lot more to bring that democracy to full birth if we would focus more attention, more money on that country.

MR. RUSSERT: Which is more important, do you believe, to the war on terrorism, Afghanistan or Iraq?

MR. SCHROEN: At this point, unfortunately, the Iraqi situation has gotten so large that it's become a major issue that has to be dealt with. I think, though, that ultimately we owe it to Afghanistan and to ourselves to end this al-Qaeda threat there and defeat the Taliban completely and let that country move forward so it doesn't become a safe haven for terrorism again.

MR. RUSSERT: In October of 2003, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld wrote an internal memo where he was opining about terrorists. And he said, "Today we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?"

Let me just there. That's a pretty interesting question. What do you think?

MR. SCHROEN: I think, unfortunately, the attack on Iraq has caused, really, a sort of insurgent rebirth. I mean, there are a lot of more terrorists out there now. People are--they don't have to take their orders from bin Laden. They see this as an international jihad. And I think it is difficult to measure. I think we probably at this point are barely holding our own.

MR. RUSSERT: Can we win the war on terror without winning the hearts and minds of the Islamic world?

MR. SCHROEN: No. I don't think we can. Part of the problem is that we are not hated by these people because of who we are, but the policies that we follow in the Middle East: "occupation" of Saudi Arabia, our policies in Iraq prior to the war, our support for Israel and all. These are issues that burn deeply within the Islamic world.

MR. RUSSERT: Before you go, I want to take advantage of your expertise on another issue. The Robb- Silverman commission--the president--Chuck Robb and Lawrence Silverman, on weapons of mass destruction not being found in Iraq--added this note: "The [Robb-Silverman WMD] commission made it clear it is concerned about the quality of intelligence on nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea. `The intelligence community knows disturbingly little about the nuclear programs of many of the world's most dangerous actors,' the commission reported. `In some cases, it knows less than it did five or 10 years ago.'"

That's pretty chilling.

MR. SCHROEN: It is, especially when you look at--well, Iran is an area that I know well, and it--I think we probably do know less now than we did a few years ago.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you have any doubt that Iran would like to have nuclear weapons?

MR. SCHROEN: Oh, absolutely. They would. They're the strongest supporters for the Palestinian cause. They support the Hamas and the Hezbollah there. They would like to have a nuclear weapon very, very much.

MR. RUSSERT: If Kim Jong Il in North Korea has six nuclear bombs, what are the possibilities that he would, being starved for money, decide to sell a nuclear weapon to al-Qaeda?

MR. SCHROEN: I'm certainly not an expert on Kim Jong Il, but I think that there would be a really strong possibility that he would consider that at any time, if the offer was right.

MR. RUSSERT: And North Koreans and the Iranians, if, in fact, they begin to possess nuclear weapons that can be detonated, the possibility of blackmail against the world?

MR. SCHROEN: Exactly. It's a frightening scenario.

MR. RUSSERT: Is there anything we can do to stop it?

MR. SCHROEN: We--with the Iranians, we'd have to sort of reinvent our diplomatic approach to them and all, and I think that this administration has started that by dealing with the Europeans. But it's a long, hard road. There are no moderates in Iran, really.

MR. RUSSERT: Is there any possibility militarily for us to stop the production in Iran or North Korea?

MR. SCHROEN: I'm not an expert on that. I would think that would be the worst thing we could do, though. If we want to set back our relations with Iran and send them--the last thing we need to do is attack Iran.

MR. RUSSERT: Before you go, will we ever capture Osama bin Laden?

MR. SCHROEN: I think with the capture of Al-Libbi recently--gives some hope that the Pakistanis will cooperate if we put enough pressure on them, and maybe we end up doing it unilaterally but I think we're going to get him within the next three to four months.

MR. RUSSERT: Three to four months.

MR. SCHROEN: Well, that's my hope.

MR. RUSSERT: From your lips to God's ears. Gary Schroen, we thank you very much, and our condolences on the loss of your mom, Fern, on Friday.

MR. SCHROEN: Oh, thank you very much.

MR. RUSSERT: And coming next, in Washington, there are heated debates about practically everything. Democrat James Carville and his very Republican wife, Mary Matalin, are here on Mother's Day, coming up on MEET THE PRESS."

Iran News - Injustice, people�s main concern: Iran's Qalibaf

2005-05-11T22:45:00.000-07:00

Iran News - Injustice, people�s main concern: Iran's Qalibaf: "Injustice, people’s main concern: Iran's Qalibaf

Tuesday, May 10, 2005 - ©2005 IranMania.com

LONDON, May 10 (IranMania) - Iranian Presidential candidate, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, said social discrimination is people’s main concern at present and is disturbing them most above all other shortcomings, IRNA reported.

Speaking to a group of people in the city of Qaen on Monday, Qalibaf, also the former police chief, said meaningful and tangible equality and social justice are absent in the society.

“Issues such as administrative corruption and insecurity have disheartened the people,“ he said.

Qaliban further said the lower-income group is carrying the burden of economic problems such as inflation. He added that there is no way of escaping these problems or pretending that they do not exist.

“Neither the revolution nor Islam could be blamed for deficiencies,“ he said.

Qalibaf stressed that people do not hold these two responsible for the present situation and have expressed their for support for both by participating in national events when needed."

Congressman Tom Tancredo avoided service in Vietnam by claiming to have psychiatric conditions.

2005-05-11T22:05:00.000-07:00

Yahoo! Mail - yesterday20785@yahoo.com

I knew Tancredo supported terrorists but I did not know he claimed to be mentally Ill. It figures that he would be a draft dodger. JBOC

"Chickenhawk n. A person enthusiastic about war, provided someone
else fights it; particularly when that enthusiasm is undimmed by
personal experience with war; most emphatically when that lack of
experience came in spite of ample opportunity in that person's youth.

While I could nominate many members of Congress, Democrats and
Republicans, for your chickenhawk database, I shall give other
readers a chance and nominate only one today: Congressman Tom
Tancredo (Republican—Colorado).

If other readers do not accept your challenge, then I may return
with more nominations.

My documentation supporting this nomination to your chickenhawk
database is:

1. Congressman Tom Tancredo avoided service in Vietnam by
claiming to have psychiatric conditions.
2. Tancredo has been a leader in Congress of those who are
pursuing the neoconservative (neo-Trotskyite) goal of wars
throughout the Middle East. On January 15, 2003, shortly before
American troops invaded Iraq, supporters of the MEK (MKO, PMOI,
NCRI, or Rajavi cult) placed a full-page advertisement in the New
York Times thanking Tancredo for supporting this Marxist terrorist
cult. For details, see Kenneth Timmerman's "'Gray Lady' Runs Ad for
Terrorists".
3. In April 2003, coalition forces in Iraq attacked Camp
Ashraf, Iraq, killing and wounding many of America's Marxist
terrorist enemies, the MEK (Rajavi cult). Then, American troops
received orders to protect the MEK (Rajavi cult) at Camp Ashraf. On
April 19, 2003, reporters and photographers were permitted to visit
Camp Ashraf. Contrary to claims of the American government,
photographs show that the MEK were permitted to keep their weapons.
You may find photographs of Camp Ashraf, Iraq posted on the
Internet, including photographs of MEK fighters carrying their
weapons, damaged equipment, and of wounded female MEK fighters in a
hospital. The most revealing photograph, however, remains the
photograph taken by Associated Press (AP) photographer Kevin Frayer
of an MEK fighter with the Marxist red flag of the MEK still flying
over Camp Ashraf, Iraq while the American military protects the
MEK. American troops protected the MEK from being killed by Iraqi
Kurds and Shiites for the MEK's murders of Iraqis during the 1991
uprisings urged by President George H. W. Bush. The United States
Department of State has been unsuccessful in finding homes for
approximately 3,000 to 4,000 MEK fighters remaining at Camp Ashraf,
Iraq. Since other countries do not want to welcome terrorists,
Tancredo and the neoconservatives (neo-Trotskyites) will need to
provide our enemies with homes in America. The American government
is hiding the MEK's unelected supreme leader, Masoud Rajavi, in Iraq
and is not permitting the media to interview him. Tancredo and the
neoconservatives (neo-Trotskyites), remembering the successful
duping of Americans by calling Fidel Castro the "George Washington
of Cuba" and not a Communist, are claiming that the Rajavi cult is
the Iranian pro-democracy organization.
4. On April 14, 2005, Tancredo was one of several members of
Congress who spoke to the MEK convention at the Daughters of the
American Revolution's (DAR's) Constitution Hall in Washington, DC.
Tancredo is a leader among a large number of members of Congress who
seek to have an American or Israeli bombing attack on Iran's nuclear
facilities this year plus the installation of the Marxist
totalitarian Rajavi cult regime in Iran.
5. On April 23, 2005, the California Republican Assembly (CRA)
presented Congressman Tom Tancredo (Republican—Colorado) with the
CRA Patriot Award.

Given that D. Fowle founded The New Hampshire Gazette in 1756, I
doubt that I need to remind your readers that Benedict Arnold was
one of the bravest war heroes of the American Revolution before he
became a traitor. Unfortunately, many American voters have elected
to the current Congress a large number of chickenhawks who are also
traitors.

References

2005 National Convention for a Democratic, Secular Republic in Iran,
Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Constitution Hall,
Washington, DC, April 14, 2005
http://www.2005nationalconvention.org/

Calhoun, Patricia, "Crazy for You", Westword, December 3, 1998.
http://www.westword.com/issues/1998-12-03/news/columns_print.html

California Republican Assembly
http://www.ca-ra.org/

Camp Ashraf, Iraq Photographs, April 19, 2003.
http://www.iranian.com/PhotoDay/2003/April/base6.html

Timmerman, Kenneth R., "`Gray Lady' Runs Ad for Terrorists", World
Net Daily, January 24, 2003.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=30657

"Tancredo Statement Regarding Anti-Iran Crackdown", June 20, 2003
http://maryam-rajavi.org/m/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=167&Itemid=0

Traitors USA
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/traitorsusa/

Professor Paul Sheldon Foote

California State University, Fullerton

pfoote@fullerton.edu"

Ayatollahs Montazeri and Saanei Up To No Good - As Usual

2005-05-11T21:31:00.000-07:00

Iran News - Top clerics challenge Iran regime as vote nears: "Top clerics challenge Iran regime as vote nears

Wednesday, May 11, 2005 - ©2005 IranMania.com

LONDON, May 11 (IranMania) - Two of Iran's most senior dissident pro-reform Shiite clerics have hit out at the Islamic regime ahead of next month's presidential election, accusing hardliners of failing to deliver on revolutionary promises of fundamental freedoms.

In interviews with AFP, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri and Grand Ayatollah Yusef Saanei also voiced pessimism over the prospect for a free and fair poll on June 17.

"My point of view, and I cannot say more than this, is that things are not going in the right direction," said Montazeri, who is in his mid 80s and is one of the Islamic republic's most prominent dissidents.

"At the beginning of the revolution the late Imam (Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini) and I gave promises of liberty, and these promises have not been lived up to," he said in a rare interview at his home in Qom, Iran's clerical capital just south of Tehran.

Once tapped as the successor to revolutionary leader Khomeini, Montazeri fell from grace after he became too openly critical of political and cultural restrictions.

In January 2003 he was freed from five years of house arrest on health grounds, but his activities are still subject to tight controls.

He said disdainfully: "I have no opinion regarding the elections. I have stopped giving my opinion, because every time I have given my point of view the reverse seems to happen."

Looking frail but cheerful and dressed simply in a loose-fitting white shirt and trousers, Montazeri complained he was still the victim of tough regime controls.

"I am no longer under house arrest but the way they are treating me is not correct," he said. "My offices in Mashhad and in Isfahan have been closed by the special clerics court. I am only able to give small lectures in my home twice a week."

The entrance to his narrow, dusty street also remains under close watch.

His Qom lecture hall, situated next to his home, has also been sealed off for close to a decade. The centre sports huge portraits of Khomeini and his successor Ayatollah Ali Khamenei -- serving as a reminder of who is now in charge.

In a neighbouring street, Grand Ayatollah Yusef Saanei -- a prominent pro-reform cleric and one of around a dozen grand ayatollahs in Qom -- also had reserved harsh words for regime hardliners.

"We cannot foresee the future. We do not know if we can trust the candidates to deliver on their promises and to what extent the rights of the people will be preserved and how much choice they will have," he said.

The issue of choice has emerged as a contentious issue in Iranian elections, with the hardline-controlled Guardians Council -- an unelected political watchdog -- brandishing the power to screen all candidates for public office.

Ahead of the February 2004 parliament elections, the council disqualified thousands of candidates, most of them political moderates, handing certain victory to religious right-wingers.

"There should not be guardianship. In an election guardians are not needed, it is contrary to human liberty," declared Saanei, who is in his late 70s and was also one of the earliest followers of Khomenei.

Saanei, who shares the reservations of many clerics in Qom over the often tricky mix of religion and the micromanagement of the country, now largely keeps out of politics.

But he continues to challenge certain rules, such as issuing fatwas stating that men and women should be entitled to equal "blood money" in the event of violent death. At present, Iranian women are only valued as half a man.

He has also stated that women have the undeniable right to hold the most senior positions in the country -- including president or judge -- even though any women seeking to stand in the June 17 election are certain to be disqualified on the grounds of their sex.

Saanei said the figure Iran needed as a future president was someone "who can follow the trend of the way that Moussavi carried out politics."

Mir Hossein Moussavi served in the now-defunct post of prime minister from 1981 to 1989, and during that period enjoyed almost constant support from Khomeini -- the omnipresent founding father of the regime who died in 1989.

Reformists loyal to incumbent President Mohammad Khatami, who is at the end of his second consecutive and final term in office, have been trying to convince Moussavi -- seen as a political moderate -- to stand again.

But he has refused to pick up the torch of the struggling movement, leaving hardliners and conservatives dominating the race for the regime's number-two job."

Bob Ney Stood Tall While Richard Shelby Ran Like a Little Girl

2005-05-11T21:24:00.000-07:00

Lawmakers startled by evacuation: "Lawmakers startled by evacuation
Email to a Friend Printer Friendly Version

WASHINGTON Lawmakers say today's evacuation of the Capitol, White House and other buildings was all business.

Senator Richard Shelby was on the Senate floor when police told him to get out. Shelby says he ran because "There's no joking about this kind of stuff."

Law enforcement officials say a small Cessna aircraft breached the security zone over Washington, prompting the evacuations. A Federal Aviation Administration official says the plane veered away when it was approached by a fighter.

Congressman Bob Ney, who was on the House floor when the evacuation started, says "people were yelling" and he thought something had happened in the House gallery.

And a Capitol Hill staffer says the order to evacuate came over special pagers kept by every congressional office. She says the pager warned of "an imminent aircraft threat."

The all-clear has been sounded.

Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed."

Maryland Politics: County Pays For Jack Johnson African Vacation IN THE MIDDLE OF A MURDER CRISIS!!!

2005-04-30T09:02:00.000-07:00

Maryland Politics: County Pays For Jack Johnson African Vacation IN THE MIDDLE OF A MURDER CRISIS!!!: "County Pays For Jack Johnson African Vacation IN THE MIDDLE OF A MURDER CRISIS!!!
Local Officials Travel on Local Dimes - WTOP Radio:

"I am surprised that he would be in Africa during a murder crisis," former delegate Rushern L. Baker III, widely considered an aspirant for county executive in 2006, said at a rally last week. "Hopefully, he is there recruiting police officers."

"Local Officials Travel on Local Dimes
Updated: Thursday, Mar. 31, 2005 - 7:50 AM

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. - Prince George's County Executive Jack Johnson has joined the ranks of local officials traveling abroad on local dimes."

Smear tactics and confrontations against Middle East scholars

2005-04-29T09:55:00.000-07:00

iranian.com: Ali Banuazizi, MESA Middle East studies: "Academia
In these times...
Smear tactics and confrontations against Middle East scholars have begun to threaten the rights of free speech and inquiry

April 28, 2005
iranian.com
Message from Ali Banuazizi, President of the Middle East Studies Association of North America, an international community of scholars and educators specializing in the region.

A deep paradox besets the field of Middle Eastern studies and the pre-eminent association that represents it in North America these days. On the one hand, there is a wide recognition of the critical need for expert knowledge and deeper understanding of the Middle East and the Muslim world as the United States faces its most vexing, intractable, and high-stake challenges in this vast region, especially at a time when America's relations with the people of the region are fraught with misperceptions, distrust, and hostility.

Whether it is in the arena of human rights, democratization, political reform, religious extremism, international terrorism, nuclear proliferation; in coping with the consequences of an ill-conceived war; or helping the Palestinians and Israelis achieve a durable peace, the Middle East continues to be at center-stage of the U.S. foreign policy concerns. At the level of the public, too, one sees a surge of interest in the Middle East, particularly since the tragic events of September 11th, reflected in the much wider readership of books about the region, in the extensive mass-media coverage, and in the remarkable popularity of courses on Middle Eastern languages, cultures, and politics on our college campuses.

On the other hand, precisely at such a time of national need and public interest, the field of Middle Eastern studies and many of its practitioners are facing a barrage of criticisms, accusations of ideological bias and distortion of the truth, mediocrity, and irrelevance to the nation's foreign policy goals. There have been even accusations that scholars in the field failed to foretell threats to the nation's security by religious extremists-confusing the function of scholarship with that of intelligence gathering and analysis.

Skeptical about the academy's own ability to conduct its business of teaching and research with the requisite objectivity and independence, there have been several legislative initiatives at the state and federal levels to establish monitoring mechanisms to ensure "balance and fairness" at publicly funded programs of Middle Eastern studies and presumably similar programs focused on other world regions.

Others in this crusade, less patient, and more zealous in their cause, have seen fit to encourage academic vigilantism on campuses to watch, report, and if necessary to intimidate scholars who present "biased," "anti-American," "pro-Islamic," or "pro-Palestinian" views in their class lectures, in public statements outside their institutions, or in their writings. Often, these charges, as well as any criticism of current Israeli policies, are described as being anti-Israel and therefore, until proven otherwise, ipso facto "anti-Semitic."

Not surprisingly, such smear tactics and confrontations have begun to threaten the rights of free speech and inquiry and, if not contained, could potentially undermine the integrity of our academic institutions.

Insofar as the substantive criticisms came from those who see serious flaws and biases in the dominant paradigms or the prevailing political sentiments in our field, they can do no harm and may indeed stimulate critical debates, which in the long run could be highly beneficial. Many of our members will remember that, a generation ago, our association was criticized for being too supportive of the status quo in the Middle East, unresponsive to gender issues, and oblivious to the economic inequalities and the political oppression that characterized many Middle Eastern societies.

A decade later, MESA, like other area-studies associations, was faulted for marginalizing the study of the Middle East and thus making it less susceptible to the intellectual and methodological rigors of discipline-based inquiry. Both of these critiques seem to have given way in recent years to other concerns. The key difference between our field's former critics and those who proudly declare themselves to be MESA's nemesis today is the latter's willingness to stoop to the level of ad hominem attacks, defamation, and intimidation.

Aside from the problem of tactics, what many of MESA's current detractors have managed to do, unwittingly or deliberately, is to locate the association's mission and scholarly concerns within the very narrow confines of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, contemporary Middle Eastern politics, and, more recently, the U.S.-led war on Islamic extremism and terrorism.

While all these concerns are certainly important in their own right, they do not represent the professional or scholarly interests of many-perhaps even the majority-of our members. Indeed, any attempt to place our association in one or another ideological straitjacket is clearly a misrepresentation of the facts. Simply put, MESA has never spoken with a single voice on the Arab-Israeli conflict, on the war on terrorism, on the invasion of Iraq, or any other major American foreign policy issue. And hopefully it never will.

What MESA does, with enviable distinction and effectiveness, is to promote scholarship on the Middle East and Islam through its publication of a flagship journal and bulletin, by holding annual meetings that are attended by thousands of young and well-established scholars and students, and by recognizing genuine scholarly achievement through its various award programs. It performs a watchdog function on ethical issues. And, finally, it has steadfastly stood for and defended freedom of expression and inquiry for scholars and public intellectuals in the region and, of recent, in the United States.

As a well-established association that will be celebrating its 40th anniversary next year, we have the esprit de corps, the intellectual resources, and the organizational capacity to absorb and take to heart constructive criticisms of our ways and our scholarship, and, when needed, to rebut ill-intended accusations.

Our real strength as a mature professional association, I believe, is demonstrated by our ability to welcome and accommodate colleagues with diverse perspectives on the critical issues that we face. These are goals that MESA and those of us privileged to serve it as directors and staff members will continue to pursue-not because we have been prompted to do so by our detractors, but out of our own sense of professionalism and commitment to an open and vibrant association for all those in the field of Middle Eastern studies.

About
Professor Banuazizi has offered a course on the History of Modern Iran in the History Department at Boston College since the early 1980s. He served as Editor of the Journal of Iranian Studies, from 1968 to 1982. He is a past president of the Society for Iranian Studies, a member of the Advisory Committee of Encyclopaedia Iranica, and the Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association of North America and its Committee on Academic Freedom in the Middle East."

AIPAC Kicks Out Mossad Operatives

2005-04-21T19:35:00.000-07:00

Israeli Spies Rosen and Weissman are being FIRED FOR CAUSE: "Israeli Spies Rosen and Weissman are being FIRED FOR CAUSE
Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman have been the targets an FBI probe as part of what has become known as the AIPAC/Franklin Spy Scandal. Up until now AIPAC has stood behind the pair and proclaimed their innocence as well as that of AIPAC as an organization. Now the BBC has released that Rosen and Weissman are not only leaving AIPAC but are being FIRED FOR CAUSE. In one of the most amazing acts since the Israeli Embassy refused Israeli Spy Jonathan Pollard sanctuary AIPAC is as much as admitting that Rosen and Weissman are Israeli Spies. So rather than the one way tickets to Tel Aviv that one would expect AIPAC is turning her back on men who only were doing their jobs. Still in all I have to suggest that whether AIPAC has two spies or twenty it pales in comparison to AEI or the crew Paul Wolfowitz had at DoD.

Haaretz - AIPAC Burning Two to Save Itself - How Deep Does The Spy Scandal Really Run
BBC NEWS | AIPAC 'fires staff' Because of Their Conduct
The Epoch Times | Pro-Israel AIPAC Fires 2 Involved in Spy Probe
Forward Newspaper Online: AIPAC Dumping Suspected Spies Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman"

Bulent Aliriza of CSIS and Paul Wolfowitz on Turkish American Relations

2005-03-26T20:53:00.000-08:00

: "SLUG: 8-206 FOCUS: US-Turkish Relations DATE: NOTE NUMBER:

DATE=7-22-03

TYPE=FOCUS

NUMBER=8-206

TITLE= U.S.-Turkish Relations

BYLINE=ED WARNER

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

INTRO: U-S and Turkish generals have issued a statement expressing regret for the arrest of eleven Turkish soldiers by U-S forces in Northern Iraq. But Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, who is visiting Washington this week, calls the U-S action a huge mistake, and the issue continues to fester in Turkey. The controversy highlights the current rupture in U-S-Turkish relations, and as VOA's Ed Warner reports, it will not be easy to repair.

TEXT: Aside from Israel, the United States has had no better friend in the Middle East than Turkey, a staunch Cold War ally and a Muslim democracy that can serve as a model for its non-democratic neighbors.

Then came the war against Saddam Hussein and a dramatic change. To the anger and surprise of the U-S Government, Turkey refused to allow U-S forces to attack Iraq from its territory, forcing a last-minute shift in U-S strategy. U-S Under-Secretary of State Paul Wolfowitz said Turkey should apologize for this lapse and its military should show more leadership.

Turkey was angry in turn. There was muttering that Americans might be encouraging a military coup. Tensions were heightened when U-S troops arrested eleven Turkish soldiers said to be plotting against Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq. They were eventually released and tempers have cooled, but U-S-Turkish relations have not thawed.

The differences are quite deep, says Bulent Aliriza, director of the Turkish project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington:

///ALIRIZA ACT///

What we now have is a situation in which the Cold War certainties have disappeared. The relationship which was sustained by cooperation on Iraq during and after the last Gulf War has essentially also evaporated. And after the first of March failure of the Turkish National Assembly to sanction U-S-Turkish cooperation in the war against Iraq, we now have a situation in which the relationship clearly needs to be redefined by both sides. ///END ACT///

Turkey, above all, is concerned with postwar Iraq, says Mr. Aliriza. It fears that if the Kurds in northern Iraq achieve considerable autonomy or even independence, they could re-ignite the Kurdish rebellion in southeastern Turkey:

///ALIRIZA ACT///

For a long time, Turkish fear was that any war to overthrow Saddam Hussein would lead inevitably to the break-up of Iraq, and the break-up of Iraq would lead inevitably to the emergence of a Kurdish state in northern Iraq and that would inevitably threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey because of its Kurdish minority. ///END ACT///

Mr. Aliriza says Washington is trying to reassure Turkey that no break-up of Iraq is contemplated. But that depends on establishing a viable central government in Iraq that will hold it together. Should that fail, a Kurdish state might emerge by default.

Even so, Turkey has been barred from a role in postwar planning in Iraq, says Graham Fuller, a former top CIA analyst, who has recently returned from a trip to Turkey:

///FULLER ACT///

Turkey, in Washington's view has no place at the table, and furthermore, there is no table. The United States is presiding entirely on its own over the future disposition of Iraq. So from Washington's point of view, Turkey is nothing except a nuisance factor and potentially even more risky than that. Washington at this point finds the Kurdish region to be the least problematic of any region in the country. ///END ACT///

Mr. Fuller notes Americans are having much more trouble with the Sunnis in central Iraq and the Shiites in the south.

He says the Turkish military is especially upset with its exclusion because of its previous close relations with the United States:

///FULLER ACT///

I think the Turkish military really was far more ambitious. It hoped perhaps to have some broader occupation role in the north once the war was over. It hoped that the Kurds would be disarmed and conceivably that Turkey might be able to help in that whole disarming process. None of that is happening and none of it is going to happen. So I think Turkey feels very upset and cut out of the picture. ///END ACT///

But if Turkey needs the United States, the reverse is also true, says Mr. Fuller. In fact, Washington is now asking for Turkish troops to help in Iraq. Turkey, he says, has too much geopolitical importance to be alienated.

Mr. Fuller adds that when Turkey decided to stay out of the Iraq war, it was acting, as nations do, in its own interest. Turkish public opinion was overwhelmingly against the war. The nation also seeks to enter the European Union:

///FULLER ACT///

Saying no to America slightly strengthens Turkey's case for admission to the European Union because the European Union was always concerned that Turkey was nothing more than a stalking horse for the United States and its influence. I think that argument now is somewhat put to rest. As in Europe, we see in Turkey, too, a growing sense of independence but uncertainty as to where they stand between the U-S and the E-U in the future. ///END ACT///

Mr. Fuller says Turkey's leaders understand the continuing importance of the United States, but membership in the European Union is key to shaping Turkey's internal politics:

///FULLER ACT///

Yes, they definitely want to have ties with the United States. They would like those ties to be good. But they also now know that this has to be balanced with a future that at least economically will be tied to Western Europe. And as those ties to Western Europe strengthen, the role of the military in Turkish politics has to diminish because that is one of Europe's key demands. ///END ACT///

Mr. Fuller says Washington also wants civilian government to prevail in Turkey. At present, the military is grumbling about the Islamist government, but not overtly threatening it or considering yet another coup:

///FULLER ACT///

This government has more public support than any Turkish government has had for many, many years. Unless the Islamist government does something truly outrageous from a military point of view, I do not think the military can or will intervene. ///END ACT///

Bulent Aliriza of CSIS says Turkey's military and civilian government are now blaming each other for strained relations with Washington. But both acknowledge repairs must be made. The civilians in particular know they need U-S backing:

///ALIRIZA ACT///

Their relationship with the United States and the U-S administration is clearly an important factor in their ability to persuade the Turkish body politic, including the Turkish military, that civilian supremacy is something that is desirable and practical in the current international political establishment. ///END ACT///

Analysts say there must be give on both sides. It is rather arrogant, they note, for Washington to admonish Turkey for its friendly relations with neighboring Iran and Syria. And it does Turkey little good to harbor resentment against the U-S detention of its soldiers, an unusual event not likely to reoccur.

For Focus, this is Ed Warner"

[casi] News, 20-27/7/02 (3) Wolfowitz and Professor Bulent Aliriza

2005-03-26T20:50:00.000-08:00

[casi] News, 20-27/7/02 (3): "http://www.dailystar.com.lb/27_07_02/art30.asp

* WOLFOWITZ'S VISIT TO TURKEY SPARKS DEBATE ON IRAQ STRIKE, RELATIONS WITH
THE WEST
by Mehmet Binay
The Daily Star (Lebanon), 27th July

ANKARA: US Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz's recent visit to
Turkey precipitated a flurry of debate in the country about whether or not
the US will launch an imminent operation against Iraq and whether the
removal of the embattled Iraqi leader will benefit Turkey economically,
militarily and politically.

Professor Bulent Aliriza, an expert on Turkish-US relations at the Center
for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told The Daily Star
that he believes the US has not yet committed itself to a specific plan of
action against Iraq.

According to Aliriza, Wolfowitz's visit must be seen as an "effort by one of
the leading hawks involved in the ongoing policy implementation debate to
obtain preliminary assurances from Ankara that it would support the United
States in the event of a war to help convince the skeptics in Washington."

"The hard bargaining with the admittedly weak Turkish government will follow
the finalization of the debate in Washington," Aliriza added.

Cengiz Candar, an expert on Turkish-US relations and the wider Middle East,
said that "Wolfowitz's visit was a sign that Washington wanted Turkey to be
a member of the European Union in order to make Ankara a "better role model
for development and modernity in the wider Islamic world."

During his visit, Wolfowitz told a conference on Turkish-US relations that:
"Turkey's aspiration to join the European Union is a development that should
be welcomed by all people who share the values of freedom and democracy that
grew out of the European civilization," adding that "these are not only
Western values, but Muslim, Asian and universal values as well."

"Europe has a strategic stake to help Turkey realize its aspirations to join
the EU, to demonstrate to the 1.2 billion Muslims in the world that there is
a far better path than the one offered by the terrorists," Wolfowitz added.

For over a week Turkish columnists and analysts have been mulling over the
type of financial and political assistance the country may receive for
supporting American interests in the region.

The Turkish daily Yeni Safak claimed this week that Wolfowitz discussed a
financial package worth $36 billion during his official and private meetings
with Turkish leaders.

According to the daily, $10 billion would be in the form of direct financial
aid in a bid to buoy the Turkish economy, while some $5 billion in long-term
loans would be dispersed and $11 billion given to Turkey to help alleviate
Ankara's military debt to the United States.

Sami Kohen, a leading columnist for the Turkish daily Milliyet, believes
that Wolfowitz brought back to Washington Turkey's concerns regarding
possible damage to its economy should there be a US-led operation to topple
the Iraqi leader.

Kohen praised Wolfowitz's positive remarks about possible additional
economic help to Turkey, and asserted that the US official would lobby for
further economic assistance to Ankara.

Turkey suffered considerable economic losses due to the 1991 Gulf War.
Estimates vary from $30 billion to $60 billion in different sectors of the
economy such as tourism, bilateral trade with Iraq and reduced Turkish
investment in the Middle East.

While a military offensive against Iraq could mean a temporary suspension of
all Turkish trade activity with Baghdad and possible large-scale migration
from northern Iraq, some businessmen have expressed a keen interest in the
possibilities a post-Saddam Iraq might hold.

Nejar Kocer, president of Gaziantep Chamber of Industry, represents a
business community with strong links to the Arab world and which has
successfully entered the Syrian market.

"After Abdullah Ocalan, (jailed leader of the separatist Kurdish movement)
left Syria, relations between Damascus and Ankara improved dramatically," he
said.

"Turkey's annual trade volume with Syria increased from $60 million to $1
billion in only three years," Kocer told The Daily Star.

He asserted that a post-Saddam era would "boost economic activity" in the
Middle East.

"A new Iraqi government could work without UN embargoes and sanctions. Iraq,
with its educated population and large natural resources, could turn into a
huge, lucrative market for Turkey and other Middle Eastern countries," Kocer
said.

"This would also help Turkish companies that already know the Iraqi market
well."

[.....]"

Turkey Bombings (washingtonpost.com) - Bulent Aliriza

2005-03-26T20:37:00.000-08:00

Turkey Bombings (washingtonpost.com): "Transcript
Turkey Bombings

Bulent Aliriza
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Thursday, November 20, 2003; 2:00 PM

A series of explosions ripped through Istanbul Thursday killing at least 25 and injuring hundreds. The targets included the British consulate and a British bank. Britain is the chief U.S. ally in the war in Iraq. The blasts came during President Bush's state visit to London to meet with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The two held a press conference condemning the bombings. Video: Bush, Blair on Bombings.

Bulent Aliriza, senior associate and director of the Turkey Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was online Thursday, Nov. 20 at 2 p.m. ET, to discuss the bombings, Turkish reaction and implications for the relationship between Turkey and the U.S. and Britain.

_____Return to Afghanistan_____

• Video: Travis Fox, washingtonpost.com video journalist, spent three weeks in Afghanistan chronicling the country's transformation.

_____News From Afghanistan_____

• 4 U.S. Troops Killed by Mine In Afghanistan (The Washington Post, Mar 27, 2005)
• New State Dept. Office Aimed at Postwar Aid (The Washington Post, Mar 25, 2005)
• Detainee Helped Bin Laden Flee, Document Says (The Washington Post, Mar 23, 2005)
• More News from Afghanistan

Aliriza joined CSIS in June 1994 and established and directs the Turkey Project examining Turkey's foreign and domestic policy issues. Prior to joining CSIS, he was a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He previously served as a diplomat with posts at the United Nations and in Washington. Before entering government service, Aliriza undertook postdoctoral research on Turkish foreign policy at the Middle East Center at Oxford.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

________________________________________________

Annandale, Va.: From what you are hearing from neighbors and colleagues, how do the people of Turkey feel about continuing Turkey's alliance to the U.S. and U.K.? Is their anger more directed at the terrorists or the U.S. and U.K.?

Bulent Aliriza: There is a universal feeling of revulsion against the terrorists. Let us remember they killed more Moslems than foreigners in the holy month of Ramadan. This is likely to facilitate closer cooperation with Washington and London.

_______________________

Detroit, Mich.: One reads of frequent antisemitic incidents in countries in Europe such as France. Prior to the recent synagogue bombings, has there been any recent antisemitic incidents or outspoken antisemitic rhetoric in Turkey? How do you feel Jews fair in Turkey compared with that in much of Europe?

Bulent Aliriza: Antisemitism is virtually unknown in Turkey. Ever since the Otttoman Empire provided refuge to Sephardic Jews escaping the Spain in the 15th Century, Jews have lived and worshiped without hindrance in Turkish cities and towns. This is in great contrast to the past and present practices in East and West Europe.

_______________________

Nederland, Colo.: How can we understand the motives behind the recent bombings in Turkey? Although the "targets" in some sense were Synagogues, British Institutions etc., were there not many muslim casualties unaffiliated with the "targets"? So are the bombers not very likely to decrease their own popular support? Are the bombings not a political "gift" to hardliners in Turkey, Britain, Israel and the USA who will respond with some kind of apparently justifiable crackdown?

Bulent Aliriza: Trying to divine the motives of suicidal fanatics is difficult. However, it is possible that the "masterminds" who sent these hapless individuals to commit mass murder are counting on an indiscriminate crackdown to further galvanize anti-West sentiment in the wider Islamic world.

_______________________

Chicago, Ill.: Sorry if this question is comparatively trivial, but where exactly in Istanbul have the four bombings been? I'm familiar with the city as a tourist (and history buff), and I'd like to know where these bombings are in relation to the major landmarks, what neighborhoods are being directly targeted, etc. Thanks.

Bulent Aliriza: Beyoglu and Levent.

_______________________

Monroeville, Pa.: Turkish government so far refused to actively involve in the Iraq conflict. But, it was affected after all with these terror attacks. Do you think recent attacks would change the government's Iraq policy?

Bulent Aliriza: It offered to send troops to Iraq on October 7 but the US government demurred because of opposition in Iraq itself. I do not anticipate any impact on Turkey's policies relating to Iraq.

_______________________

Clifton, N.J.: Turkey has been reluctant to get actively involved in the coalition efforts in Iraq. Will the recent bombings serve as a catalyst to the Turkish people to more actively join in the war against terrorism?

Bulent Aliriza: They will cooperate more closely with the US and the UK on terrorism. However, I do not believe that this cooperation will extend to Turkey's full inclusion in the coalition efforts in Iraq.

_______________________

Fairfax, Va.: What can you tell us about the terrorist organization that along with al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for today's bombings?

Bulent Aliriza: IBDA-C is the domestic terrorist organization. The English name is "Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front". It was established in the 1990's and has previously been involved in relatively minor acts of terrorism. The leader of IBDA/C is Salih Izzet Erdis who goes by the name Salih Mirzabeyoglu and is currently in jail. The organization members call him the "commander". They clearly have links beyond Turkey's borders.

_______________________

Baltimore, Md.: Do you see Erdogan's government as being pushed closer to the secular, "Ataturkist" establishment by these attacks?

Bulent Aliriza: In the short run that is likely to happen. However, the way in which Erdogan conducts the inevitable crackdown may well exacerbate existing differences with the secular establishment, especially the military.

_______________________

New York, N.Y.: Hello Mr. Aliriza. I have two questions.

Some countries are almost used to seeing suicide bombings. Has Turkey ever experienced anything like this before? What is the sentiment over there right now? Are people worried that this could become another Israel?

Bulent Aliriza: There was very serious Kurdish separatist terrorism by the PKK between 1984-1999, however nothing quite like this happened before. There is genuine revulsion against the terrorists and fear of additional attacks.

_______________________

Northern Colorado: Bulent Bey,

My deepest sympathies regarding the events of the last few days. In your opinion, why has Turkey been targeted by terrorists when the government has not readily sided or participated with the United States and United Kingdom in the war in Iraq?

Bulent Aliriza: As a relatively open society in the Near East, Turkey was a convenient target. It also had local operatives ready to commit suicide and mass murder. I think the two series of bombings had an internal message to Turkey as well as an obvious external message. The terrorists clearly oppose even the limited support Turkey has given to the US and the UK.

_______________________

Annandale, Va.: Hi, do you know if al Qaeda has any support in the most radical of the Kurds? Is there anything that would preclude this type of alliance?

Bulent Aliriza: No such evidence so far. However any kind of cooperation involving Al Qaeda, domestic Islamic extremists and the Kurds would be very worrisome for the Turks.

_______________________

Quebec, Canada: Do you believe this new epidemic of attacks by islamic terrorists will politically hurt the new pro-islamic government in the next parliamentary elections?

Bulent Aliriza: The general elections are not due until 2007 so the JDP need not worry yet. However, if the security situation and as a result the economy begin to deteriorate rapidly then the JDP could find its current strong support evaporate.

_______________________

Wheaton, Md.: Is it likely that the terrorists who are responsible for the bombings in Istanbul have links to other terrorists like Arafat and Hamas?

Bulent Aliriza: No evidence so far.

_______________________

Germantown, Md.: Let me start by saying that I have travelled in over 50 countries of the world and find the Turks to be the friendliest, most hospitable people on the globe that I have encountered. My heart goes out to them. That said, I feel that the American (and European) "man on the street" does not have an appropriately favorable view of Turkey and its people. I'm curious how the Turks are viewed by the average Arab "man on the street." Are they seen as Muslim brothers, Western vassals, infidels, allies or something else?

Bulent Aliriza: Ever since the Turks and the Arabs went their separate ways after World War 1, they have become quite ignorant of each other. For a very long time the Arab "street" had an unfavorable view of Turks as "lackeys" of the West. However recently and particularly after the March 1 vote against the use of Turkish territory by the US to attack Iraq, Arab opinion began to shift somewhat.

_______________________

Dallas, Tex.: I am really concerned about the impact that these bombings will have on Turkey, as the country was just trying to come out of a political and economical downturn. Being close to the trouble region and due to internal issues, foreign investors have always been reluctant to invest in Turkey. How do you think the current events will impact this?
Thanks

Bulent Aliriza: The current government which came into power after the November 2002 elections is the first single-party Turkish government in over a decade. It has been presiding over a period of relative political stability and some degree of economic recovery.

One of the biggest dangers of the current situation is an economic downturn as investors shy away from a risky country. If that happens the US and the IMF will once again have difficult decisions.

_______________________

Lyon, France: Are these latest terrorist attacks directly linked to the amnesty granted to hundreds of terrorists by the new government of Turkey a year ago?

Bulent Aliriza: The amnesty was actually one of the last acts of the previous coalition government. All of the three parties in that coalition failed to make it into the current government but society is still suffering from the activities of criminals released prematurely back into society. However, no evidence that these terrorists benefited from the amnesty.

_______________________

Istanbul, Turkey: What do you think about future of AKP? Is this islamic root government will stop islamic fundamentalist terrorism? Or will they be reluctant to fight against it?

Bulent Aliriza: If AK fights Islamic terrorism vigorously by allowing the heavy-handed Turkish police too free a hand, it risks alienating some of its Islamist supporters; if it curbs the police it risks the ire of the Turkish secularists who never liked it. The terrorist attacks have put AK in a difficult position.

_______________________

Washington, D.C.: Please convey the American people's deep condolences to the people of Turkey, which has been a great, loyal friend to our country.

Bulent Aliriza: Thank you for your sentiments.

_______________________

Gaithersburg, Md.: After the 9/11 New York/Washington bombings, NATO declared it an act of war against a NATO member. This seemed to rally support behind the U.S. effort in Afghanistan (although it had no such effect for the Iraq invasion). Now that Turkey, a valuable NATO ally in good standing, has suffered several massive bombings in the past several weeks, do you foresee NATO making any similar proclamations or NATO member nations changing their posture in the ongoing "global war on terrorism?"

Bulent Aliriza: I am sure Turkey would welcome such a gesture but no indication of it so far.

_______________________

New York, N.Y.: Turkey is a Muslim, but secular, country that is largely influenced by its military. We can take today's and Saturday's bombings at face value -- that they were simply against Jews and Westerners and it just happened to be in Turkey. But, how much do these bombings have an effect on secularism in Turkey? I have read that in recent years, pro-Islamic candidates are getting popular. Do these suicide bombings,done by Turkish people (at least last saturday's bombing), show that Islamic fundamentalism is growing in Turkey and could pose a threat to secularism?

Thanks for taking my questions!

Bulent Aliriza: The moderate Islamists are actually in government and they demonstrate to the Islamic world that the ballot is an alternative to the bomb. If their experiment were to fail because of Islamist terrorism it would be a dangerous signal to send to extremists in the Moslem world. Turkish secularism is still there but it is having to adapt.

_______________________

Rome, Italy: Do you think that Turkey might have been chosen because it is the Muslim state closer to Europe, a U.S. ally within the Nato -- and with the added bonus of the possibility of recruiting local operatives? Could the attacks affect in any way the negotiations between Ankara and Bruxelles, not just from the point of view of the U.E. but also regarding the advisability for Turkey of sidelining with Europe?

Bulent Aliriza: The choice of Turkey was surely not an accident. Its position on the "fault line" between continents, cultures and religions may have made it an ideal candidate. Although there will be sympathy in the EU for Turkey I doubt whether the bombings will be sufficient by themselves to persuade the EU to proceed with the very difficult accession of Turkey.

_______________________

Austin, Tex.: I'm not an expert on Turkish history, but I have the impression that Attaturk's vision of a secular, westward-looking Turkey never really took hold outside the more educated urban areas of the country.

1. Is this a fair assessment?

2. Is the secular tradition in Turkey in trouble?

Bulent Aliriza: You are right that secularism was only partially successful beyond Istanbul, Ankara etc. However, it would be wrong to think that it it is in any serious danger of replacement by an Islamic state. The current government with its Islamist origins has been careful to dispel such fears and now defines itself as "conservative democrat" instead.

_______________________

Istanbul: Turkey has many experiences fighting against terrorism. NATO appointed Turkish officer (Mr. Hikmet Cetin) to Afghanistan. Though negative Arab reactions is it possible to replace Mr. Bremer with another Turkish officer?

Bulent Aliriza: Unlikely. However, Cetin's appointment is a positive signal to the Islamic world.

_______________________

Los Angeles, Calif.: Does the recent Muslim on Muslim violence in Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Algeria help "The West" against the terrorists or does it energize the Muslim population against the Western Style governments/Allies?

Bulent Aliriza: It will depend to a great extent on the way the moderate "Islamist" government in Ankara will deal with the problem. It needs to avoid the appearance of abandoning its role as a bridge between the West and the Islamic world in spite of the pressures of recent events."

Committee on International Relations, U.S. House of Representatives - DR. BULENT ALIRIZA

2005-03-26T20:32:00.000-08:00

Committee on International Relations, U.S. House of Representatives: "Committee on International Relations
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515-0128

“TURKEY’S FUTURE DIRECTION AND US-TURKEY RELATIONS”

DR. BULENT ALIRIZA
DIRECTOR, TURKEY PROJECT
THE CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
WASHINGTON DC

TESTIMONY PREPARED FOR DELIVERY TO THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, SUBCOMMITTTEE ON EUROPE

OCTOBER 1, 2003

MR. CHAIRMAN, I WOULD LIKE TO THANK YOU FOR INVITING ME TO TALK ABOUT TURKEY AND US-TURKISH RELATIONS.

I WOULD ALSO LIKE TO COMMEND YOU AND THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON EUROPE FOR FOCUSING ON THIS IMPORTANT SUBJECT AT THIS CRITICAL JUNCTURE.

MR. CHAIRMAN, THE OLD ADAGE THAT TURKEY IS AN EASTERN COUNTRY IF YOU COME TO IT FROM THE WEST AND A WESTERN COUNTRY IF YOU COME FROM THE EAST HAS NEVER BEEN MORE APT.

LITERALLY STRADDLING THE ASIAN AND EUROPEAN CONTINENTS, TURKEY HAS BEEN COMMITTED, PARTICULARLY SINCE KEMAL ATATURK CREATED THE MODERN TURKISH REPUBLIC OUT OF THE ASHES OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE 80 YEARS AGO, TO SYNTHESIZING ITS CULTURE, TRADITIONS AND RELIGION, WHICH ORIGINATE IN THE EAST, WITH A COMMITMENT TO JOIN THE WESTERN COMMUNITY OF NATIONS.

AS A SECULAR, FREE MARKET DEMOCRACY, MEMBER OF NATO AND ASPIRANT FOR EUROPEAN UNION (EU) MEMBERSHIP, WITH A MOSLEM POPULATION, TURKEY WOULD APPEAR TO BE THE IDEAL LINK OR BRIDGE BETWEEN THE WESTERN AND THE ISLAMIC WORLDS. HOWEVER, PARTICULARLY SINCE THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, RELATIONS BETWEEN TURKEY’S TWO WORLDS HAVE BECOME EVEN MORE STRAINED, MAKING TURKEY’S POSITION ON THE FAULT LINE BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS MORE IMPORTANT THAN BEFORE BUT ALSO MUCH MORE COMPLICATED.

MR.CHAIRMAN, PERHAPS THE BEST EXAMPLE OF THE COMPLEXITY OF THE NEW INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENT FOR TURKEY WAS THE VOTE IN THE TURKISH GRAND NATIONAL ASSEMBLY ON MARCH 1.

IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO SAY WITH ANY DEGREE OF ACCURACY HOW MUCH THE TURKISH PUBLIC AND THE TURKISH PARLIAMENTARIANS, PARTICULARLY THOSE FROM THE RULING JUSTICE AND DEVELOPMENT PARTY (JDP), WHICH HAS ITS ANCESTRY IN THE ISLAMIST POLITICAL MOVEMENT, WERE AFFECTED BY THE NEW GLOBAL STRAINS BEFORE THE ASSEMBLY FAILED TO MUSTER THE REQUIRED NUMBER OF VOTES TO ALLOW THE US TO OPEN A NORTHERN FRONT IN THE WAR AGAINST IRAQ.

HOWEVER, IT IS NOTEWORTHY THAT, IN LINE WITH THE REST OF THE ISLAMIC WORLD, OPINION POLLS IN TURKEY PRIOR TO THE VOTE CONSISTENTLY INDICATED STRONG OPPOSITION TO SUPPORTING THE US IN THE IMMINENT CONFLICT WITH IRAQ.

THE VOTE WAS A MAJOR REVERSAL FOR THE JDP GOVERNMENT WHICH HAD STATED RESERVATIONS ABOUT THE IMMINENT CONFLICT, BUT NEVERTHELESS FORWARDED THE MOTION IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE OVERRIDING NEED FOR COOPERATION WITH TURKEY’S MOST IMPORTANT ALLY.

THE JDP SURELY HAD EVERY REASON TO BELIEVE THAT THE OVERWHELMING MAJORITY IT ENJOYED IN THE ASSEMBLY WOULD ENSURE PASSAGE. HOWEVER, IT HAD COME INTO OFFICE ONLY A FEW MONTHS EARLIER AND THE CHAIRMAN OF THE PARTY, RECEP TAYYIP ERDOGAN, HAD STILL NOT TAKEN OVER THE PREMIERSHIP. AT THE SAME TIME, THE POWERFUL TURKISH MILITARY ESTABLISHMENT HAD REFRAINED FROM GIVING AN UNAMBIGIOUSLY CLEAR RECOMMENDATION IN FAVOR OF THE MOTION, THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC, AHMET NECDET SEZER, HAD OPENLY INDICATED HIS RESERVATIONS AND THE MAIN OPPOSITION IN THE ASSEMBLY, THE REPUBLICAN PEOPLE’S PARTY, HAD CHOSEN TO MOUNT AN ALL OUT CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE MOTION. HOWEVER, THE REALITY IS THAT ULTIMATELY THE VOTE WENT DOWN BECAUSE OF JDP DEFECTIONS.

NEEDLESS TO SAY, THE VOTE WAS ALSO A SHOCK TO THE US ADMINISTRATION, WHICH HAD INCLUDED ACCESS FOR US GROUND FORCES THROUGH TURKEY IN ITS WAR PLANS. TURKEY SUBSEQUENTLY ALLOWED THE USE OF ITS AIR SPACE AND PROVIDED IMPORTANT HELP THROUGH VARIOUS OTHER MEANS, AS ERDOGAN AND FOREIGN MINISTER ABDULLAH GUL, WHO VISITED WASHINGTON IN JULY, HAVE REPEATEDLY STRESSED. HOWEVER, WHILE THE VISIT OF SECRETARY OF STATE COLIN POWELL TO ANKARA BACK IN APRIL UNDERLINED CONTINUING US INTEREST IN TURKEY, THE BILATERAL RELATIONSHIP HAS NOT YET GOT BACK ON TRACK.

SEVEN MONTHS AFTER THE VOTE, THE TURKISH GOVERNMENT IS ONCE AGAIN MOVING CAUTIOUSLY TOWARDS ANOTHER MAJOR DECISION WITH SIGNIFICANT IMPLICATIONS FOR US-TURKISH RELATIONS. JUST AS IN MARCH, SENDING TURKISH TROOPS TO SUPPORT THE US IN STABILIZING POST WAR IRAQ IS NOT BACKED BY THE MAJORITY OF TURKISH VOTERS, AND THE JDP’S HANDLING OF THIS ISSUE WILL ALSO HAVE DOMESTIC AS WELL AS EXTERNAL REVERBERATIONS.

MR. CHAIRMAN, PARALLEL TO THE MAJOR GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS DURING THE PAST TWO YEARS, THERE HAS ALSO BEEN IMPORTANT DOMESTIC CHANGES IN TURKEY. THE GENERAL ELECTIONS OF NOVEMBER 2002, WHICH CAN RIGHTLY BE CHARACTERIZED AS A POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE, CRUSHED THE THREE POLITICAL PARTIES, WHICH HAD GONE TO THE POLLS IN COALITION GOVERNMENT, ALONG WITH THE MAIN OPPOSITION PARTY. NONE OF THESE PARTIES, WHICH HAD DOMINATED TURKISH POLITICS FOR DECADES, WERE ABLE TO GAIN PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATION.

THE JDP, WHICH HAD BEEN ESTABLISHED ONLY IN AUGUST 2001, SWEPT INTO OFFICE AS TURKEY’S FIRST SINGLE PARTY GOVERNMENT IN OVER A DECADE ON THE BACK OF A MASSIVE BACKLASH AGAINST THE CHRONIC MISMANAGEMENT OF THE ECONOMY, CRONYISM AND CORRUPTION BY GAINING ALMOST 2/3 OF THE SEATS IN THE ASSEMBLY.

MOST OF THE LEADERS OF THE JDP WERE MEMBERS OF THE NATIONAL SALVATION PARTY AND THE WELFARE PARTY WHICH SERVED IN PREVIOUS COALITION GOVERNMENTS BUT WERE SUBSEQUENTLY BANNED FOR ISLAMIST ACTIVITIES. IN FACT, PRIOR TO ITS DISSOLUTION, THE WELFARE PARTY WAS OUSTED FROM GOVERNMENT IN 1997 FOLLOWING PRESSURE FROM THE TURKISH MILITARY. COMMITTED TO THE PRESERVATION OF TURKISH SECULARISM, TURKEY’S ARMED FORCES HAVE CARRIED OUT FOUR INTERVENTIONS AS PART OF THEIR BROADLY DEFINED MISSION TO DEFEND THE REPUBLIC.

UNDERSTANDABLY, THE JDP GOVERNMENT HAS BEEN STRESSING ITS BREAK WITH THE ISLAMIST MOVEMENT AND REJECTS THE ISLAMIST LABEL, PREFERRING TO DEFINE THE JDP AS A CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRATIC PARTY. THE JDP LEADERS CLAIM THAT THE PARTY IS THE HEIR TO THE DEMOCRAT PARTY, WHICH CAME INTO POWER IN 1950 WITH THE ENTRY OF TURKEY INTO THE ERA OF GENUINE MULTIPARTY DEMOCRACY AND SERVED FOR A DECADE BEFORE THE MILITARY COUP OF 1960, AND TURGUT OZAL’S MOTHERLAND PARTY, WHICH CAME INTO OFFICE IN THE FIRST ELECTIONS AFTER THE 1980 COUP.

AT THE SAME TIME, THE JDP HAS BEEN AVOIDING THE INFLAMMATORY STATEMENTS AND ACTIONS, WHICH CHARACTERIZED THE TURKISH ISLAMIST PARTIES IN GOVERNMENT. FOR EXAMPLE, ALTHOUGH THE WIVES OF MOST OF THE JDP LEADERS WEAR ISLAMIC HEADSCARVES, THE JDP HAS NOT MADE ANY MOVES TO EASE THE EXISTING RESTRICTIONS.

HOWEVER, AS WE MOVE TOWARDS THE FIRST ANNIVERSARY OF ITS ELECTION VICTORY, IT REMAINS TO BE SEEN WHETHER THE JDP HAS TRANSFORMED THE TURKISH POLITICAL LANDSCAPE IN A LASTING MANNER. THIS WILL DEPEND TO A GREAT EXTENT ON THE SUCCESS OF THE ONGOING SUBJECTIVE REDEFINITION BY ERDOGAN AND HIS COLLEAGUES WHICH IS DIRECTED AT THE MAJORITY OF THE ELECTORATE WHO DID NOT VOTE FOR THEM AND RETAIN LINGERING SUSPICIONS ABOUT THE ULTIMATE AIMS OF THE JDP.

RECENT OPINION POLLS SUGGEST THAT THE JDP HAS BEEN ABLE TO BROADEN ITS APPEAL. HOWEVER, THIS MAY BE MORE A REFLECTION OF THE CONTINUING DISARRAY IN OPPOSITION RANKS AND THEIR FAILURE TO FASHION AN EFFECTIVE STRATEGY TO CONFRONT THE JDP THAN OF THE SUCCESS OF THE JDP ITSELF. IN ANY CASE, THE REALITY IS THAT NONE OF THE OTHER POLITICAL PARTIES ARE CURRENTLY IN A POSITION TO CHALLENGE THE JDP, AS THE LOCAL ELECTIONS SCHEDULED IN THE SPRING OF 2004 ARE LIKELY TO CONFIRM, PARTICULARLY IF THE TROUBLED TURKISH ECONOMY CONTINUES TO IMPROVE.

MR. CHAIRMAN, A VERY IMPORTANT COMPONENT OF THE JDP’S STRATEGY IN GOVERNMENT IS THE PURSUIT OF THE LINKED GOALS OF TURKISH ACCESSION TO THE EU AND POLITICAL REFORMS IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE COPENHAGEN CRITERIA FOR EU MEMBERSHIP. IN MARKED CONTRAST TO THE WELFARE PARTY-LED GOVERNMENT UNDER NECMETTIN ERBAKAN, WHO GAVE THE IMPRESSION THAT HIS MAIN GOAL IN FOREIGN AFFAIRS WAS TO STRENGTHEN LINKS WITH THE ISLAMIC WORLD, THE JDP GOVERNMENT HAS BEEN STRESSING EU MEMBERSHIP AS ITS PRIMARY OBJECTIVE.

UNLIKE ERBAKAN, ERDOGAN HAS POINTEDLY CHOSEN TO MAKE MOST OF HIS FOREIGN TRIPS TO EUROPEAN COUNTRIES.

AT THE SAME TIME, THE JDP HAS BEEN ACCELERATING THE PROCESS OF REFORMS IT INHERITED. BEFORE ITS SUMMER BREAK, THE ASSEMBLY ADOPTED A LEGISLATIVE PACKAGE DIRECTED AT KURDISH-SPEAKING CITIZENS, WHICH SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCED THE SCOPE OF THE ANTI TERROR LAWS. THIS WAS FOLLOWED BY A BILL TO GRANT CONDITIONAL AMNESTY FOR INDIVIDUALS INVOLVED IN KURDISH SEPARATISM. MORE SIGNIFICANTLY, THE JDP THEN PUSHED THROUGH A PACKAGE EFFECTIVELY REVERSING THE EXPANSION OF THE INFLUENCE OF THE TURKISH ARMED FORCES, PARTICULARLY THROUGH THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL (NSC).

DURING THE PAST TWENTY YEARS OF ITS FOUR-DECADE EXISTENCE, THE NSC, WHICH BROUGHT TOGETHER IN ITS MONTHLY MEETINGS TURKEY’S CIVILIAN AND MILITARY LEADERSHIP, HAD EXPANDED ITS POWERS FAR BEYOND ITS ORIGINAL ADVISORY ROLE. THE NSC SECRETARY GENERAL, A FOUR STAR GENERAL, HAD ACCUMULATED AND WIELDED VIRTUALLY UNSUPERVISED POWER IN A VERY WIDE SPHERE OF TURKISH LIFE. THE NEW LEGISLATION CURBED THE POWERS OF THE NSC, AUTHORIZED THE NOMINATION OF A CIVILIAN AS NSC SECRETARY GENERAL AND GAVE RESPONSIBILITY FOR MONITORING AND COORDINATING THE IMPLEMENTATION OF NSC RECOMMENDATIONS TO A DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER.

ALTHOUGH ERDOGAN APPARENTLY AGREED AT THE LAST MINUTE TO REFRAIN FROM PROCEEDING IMMEDIATELY TO THE APPOINTMENT OF A CIVILIAN AS NSC SECRETARY GENERAL, THE LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF THE CHANGES ON THE TURKISH POLITICAL SYSTEM ARE LIKELY TO BE SIGNIFICANT.

MR. CHAIRMAN, DESPITE ITS PARLIAMENTARY MAJORITY AND PUBLIC SUPPORT, THE JDP WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN ABLE TO PROCEED SMOOTHLY TO THE RESTRUCTURING OF CIVILIAN-MILITARY RELATIONS TO CONFORM TO EU NORMS WITHOUT THE SUPPORT OF THE CURRENT MILITARY LEADERSHIP, AND, IN PARTICULAR, CHIEF OF STAFF HILMI OZKOK.

AS THE INHERITOR AND DEFENDER OF THE KEMALIST COMMITMENT TO WESTERNIZATION, THE TURKISH MILITARY HAS ACKNOWLEDGED THAT ACCESSION TO THE EU WOULD PERMIT TURKEY TO FINALLY PROCEED TO FULL MEMBERSHIP OF THE WESTERN COMMUNITY. ACCORDINGLY, OZKOK HAS SIGNALLED THAT UNDER HIS LEADERSHIP THE TURKISH ARMED FORCES WOULD NOT BE AN IMPEDIMENT IN THIS IMPORTANT PROCESS.

HOWEVER, DISSENTING VOICES HAVE BEEN RAISED WITHIN THE MILITARY ESTABLISHMENT RELATING TO THE ADVISABILITY OF THE REFORMS WITHOUT THE ASSURANCE OF EU MEMBERSHIP AND THE PERCEIVED THREAT POSED BY THE JDP TO SECULARISM. WHILE A NUMBER OF THE MOST POWERFUL VOCAL CRITICS RETIRED FROM THE MILITARY IN AUGUST, THEIR SCEPTICAL VIEWS HAVE SINCE BEEN ECHOED BY A NUMBER OF THEIR FELLOW GENERALS WHO CONTINUE TO SERVE.

IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOTE THAT EACH OF THE TURKISH MILITARY INTERVENTIONS FOLLOWED MAJOR DOMESTIC FERMENT, HIGHLIGHTED BY THE INFLUENTIAL TURKISH MEDIA. THAT IS SIMPLY NOT THE CASE TODAY AND THE TURKISH BUSINESS COMMUNITY, WHICH CONTROLS MOST OF THE MEDIA, ALONG WITH THE MAJORITY OF TURKISH VOTERS, APPARENTLY WANT THE UNITERRUPTED CONTINUATION OF THE EU PROCESS AND THE REFORMS WHICH HAVE HELPED TO BOOST THE ECONOMY.

MR. CHAIRMAN, DESPITE THE RECENT STEPS, IT IS STILL NOT CLEAR WHETHER THE EU WILL ULTIMATELY PROCEED TO ACCESSION NEGOTIATIONS WITH TURKEY WHEN IT FORMALLY REVIEWS THE ISSUE IN DECEMBER 2004. IN FACT, IT IS POSSIBLE THAT TURKEY’S LONG EU JOURNEY COULD BE BROUGHT TO A HALT BY THE CYPRUS PROBLEM. ALTHOUGH THE SOLUTION OF THIS LONG-RUNNING DISPUTE IS NOT A SPECIFIED CONDITION FOR TURKISH ENTRY, THE ADMISSION OF THE ISLAND INTO THE EU IN MAY 2004 WITH OR WITHOUT A SETTLEMENT COMPLICATES TURKEY’S OWN ACCESSION PLANS.

THE LOGICAL WAY OUT OF THE PREDICAMENT IS AN AGREEMENT UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE UNITED NATIONS, AS THE EU AND THE US HAVE ALSO BEEN ADVOCATING. FOR ITS PART, THE JDP GOVERNMENT HAS STATED THAT DESPITE ITS FLAWS, THE CURRENT UN PLAN COULD PROVIDE THE BASIS FOR A SOLUTION. THE ERDOGAN GOVERNMENT RECOGNIZES THAT WHILE ACTIVE DIPLOMACY TO PROMOTE A SOLUTION BRINGS DOMESTIC DANGERS IN A CONFRONTATION WITH ITS OPPONENTS AND THE EUROSCEPTICS WHO REJECT THE UN PLAN, THESE ARE LIKELY TO BE OUTWEIGHED BY THE DIPLOMATIC DANGERS OF ALLOWING THE CURRENT STALEMATE TO CONTINUE BEYOND MAY 2004.

THE JDP GOVERNMENT ALSO KNOWS THAT ULTIMATE EU MEMBERSHIP WILL REQUIRE ADDITIONAL AND CONSIDERABLE IMPROVEMENT OF THE TURKISH ECONOMY IN ORDER TO SATISFY THE MAASTRICHT ECONOMIC CRITERIA OF THE EU. AFTER ALL, A COUNTRY OF OVER 70 MILLION WITH A PER CAPITA INCOME BELOW $3,000 IS NOT A VIABLE CANDIDATE. THE CURRENT RECOVERY IS DUE IN NO SMALL MEASURE TO THE $ 39.5 BILLION IN LOANS PROVIDED BY THE IMF AS PART OF ITS CURRENT STANDBY AGREEEMENTS. THE $1 BILLION GRANT TO BE PROVIDED BY THE US, WHICH CAN BE CONVERTED INTO AN $8.5 BILLION LOAN FOR DEBT RELIEF, IS ALSO A RELEVANT FACTOR IN THE CURRENT RECOVERY.

WHILE THE LARGE FOREIGN DEBT APPEARS MANAGEABLE, THE ALARMINGLY HIGH LEVEL OF DOMESTIC DEBT WITH HIGH INTEREST, WHICH SUCCESSIVE TURKISH GOVERNMENTS HAVE USED TO SUSTAIN BAD ECONOMIC POLICIES, IS A MATTER OF GREATER IMMEDIATE CONCERN. AT THE SAME TIME, THERE IS THE CONSTANT DANGER THAT POPULIST PRESSURES FROM ITS LOWER INCOME SUPPORTERS COULD FORCE THE JDP TO RELAX FISCAL AND FINANCIAL DISCIPLINE WITH SERIOUS NEGATIVE CONSEQUENCES.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST, THERE IS THE THORNY QUESTION OF RELIGION AND CULTURE THAT THE EU AND TURKEY ULTIMATELY HAVE TO TACKLE. FOR THE MOMENT, THE ISSUE OF WHETHER A PREDOMINANTLY MOSLEM COUNTRY WITH VERY DIFFERENT TRADITIONS CAN BE INTEGRATED IN THE EU HAS BEEN PUT ON THE BACKBURNER IN THE EU-TURKISH DIALOGUE. MEANWHILE, THE JDP LEADERS CONTINUE TO UNDERLINE TURKEY’S DIVERSITY AND POTENTIAL ROLE AS A BRIDGE BETWEEN RELIGIONS AND CULTURES IN THEIR EU CAMPAIGN. HAVING PREVIOUSLY OPPOSED THE EU AS A CHRISTIAN CLUB FROM WITHIN THE TURKISH ISLAMIST MOVEMENT, THIS REPRESENTS A MAJOR CHANGE OF HEART FOR THE JDP LEADERS. IT REMAINS TO BE SEEN WHETHER THE EU WILL RECIPROCATE THEIR GESTURE.

MR. CHAIRMAN, ERDOGAN MADE THE CASE FOR TURKEY’S POTENTIAL ROLE IN HELPING TO AVOID A CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS TO PRESIDENT BUSH WHEN HE VISITED WASHINGTON IN DECEMBER 2002. AS I SAID AT THE OUTSET, SUCH A ROLE IS DIFFICULT IN THE MIDST OF THE CURRENT GLOBAL FERMENT AND THE US-LED EFFORT TO ROOT OUT INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM, PARTICULARLY IN THE ISLAMIC WORLD. HOWEVER, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO OVEREMPHASIZE THE CONTRIBUTION TURKEY COULD MAKE IN COMPLEMENTING THE CURRENT MILITARY CAMPAIGN WITH ITS OWN UNIQUE EXAMPLE AS A COUNTRY THAT BELONGS TO BOTH THE ISLAMIC AND WESTERN WORLDS.

THIS IS NOT TO DOWNPLAY THE CONTRIBUTION TURKEY COULD MAKE IN THE MILITARY SPHERE. HAVING INDICATED ITS WILLINGNESS TO SEND SOLDIERS TO IRAQ, TURKEY HAS BEEN NEGOTIATING WITH THE US SINCE JULY THE DETAILS OF SUCH POSSIBLE SUPPORT. THE ISSUE WAS CONSIDERED AT THE NSC MEETING IN ANKARA LAST MONTH, AND WITH THE BACKING OF THE MILITARY ESTABLISHMENT, WHICH SHARES THE DESIRE OF TURKEY’S CIVILIAN LEADERS TO REPAIR THE DAMAGE DONE TO US-TURKISH RELATIONS BY THE MARCH VOTE, THE GOVERNMENT MAY PROCEED TO SEEK PARLIAMENTARY AUTHORIZATION THIS MONTH.

HOWEVER, THE JDP REALIZES THAT THIS WILL BE A DIFFICULT DECISION FRAUGHT WITH GRAVE CONSEQUENCES. TO BEGIN WITH, TURKISH SOLDIERS WOULD BE EXCLUDED FROM NORTHERN IRAQ, WHERE TURKEY HAS A STATED INTEREST IN CONFRONTING THE TWIN THREATS IT PERCEIVES FROM SEPARATIST TURKISH KURDS AND THE EXPANSION OF IRAQI KURDISH INFLUENCE AT THE EXPENSE OF THE TURKMENS. THEY WOULD INSTEAD GO INTO THE DANGEROUS SO-CALLED SUNNI TRIANGLE NEAR BAGHDAD. CONSEQUENTLY, EVEN IF THE JDP GOVERNMENT SUCCEEDS IN PERSUADING ITS OWN PARLIAMENTARIANS TO SET ASIDE THEIR VERY REAL RESERVATIONS TO PERMIT THE DISPATCH OF TROOPS, SUBSEQUENT TURKISH CASUALTIES WILL ALMOST CERTAINLY CAUSE PROBLEMS FOR THE GOVERNMENT.

THE TROOP DEPLOYMENT WOULD BE JUSTIFIED BY THE GOVERNMENT AS AN ESSENTIAL COMPONENT OF TURKEY’S MULTI-FACETED POLICY AS A REGIONAL POWER WITH RESPONSIBILITIES TOWARDS A TROUBLED NEIGHBOR. ANOTHER MAJOR ASPECT OF THE POLICY THAT WOULD BE EMPHASIZED IS TURKEY’S DESIRE TO PLAY A SIGNIFICANT ROLE IN THE ECONOMIC RECONSTRUCTION OF IRAQ. HOWEVER, THE TROOP ISSUE IS INEVITABLY AT THE FOREFRONT OF THE DECISION RELATING TO ENGAGEMENT IN IRAQ AND IT IS IMPORTANT THAT DECISIONMAKERS IN WASHINGTON AS WELL AS ANKARA RECOGNIZE THAT THE UNDERLYING PROBLEMS IN THEIR RELATIONSHIP WHICH WERE REVEALED AND ACCENTUATED BY THE MARCH VOTE CANNOT BE ERADICATED SIMPLY BY SENDING TURKISH FORCES TO IRAQ.

MR. CHAIRMAN, AS I ARGUED IN A JUNE 2003 CSIS TURKEY UPDATE I HAVE SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD, THERE IS AN URGENT NEED FOR A REDEFINITION OF THE US-TURKISH ALLIANCE. THE RELATIONSHIP WAS A PRODUCT OF VITAL MUTUAL NEEDS DURING THE COLD WAR ERA AND CONTINUED WITH AD HOC ADJUSTMENTS EVEN AFTER THE COMMON FOE, THE SOVIET UNION, DISAPPEARED OVER A DECADE AGO. WHILE THE AVOIDANCE OF THE HUGE TASK OF RESTRUCTURING A MAJOR RELATIONSHIP STRETCHING BACK THROUGH FIFTY YEARS IS UNDERSTANDABLE, IT IS A LUXURY THAT THE TWO COUNTRIES CAN NO LONGER AFFORD.

WASHINGTON AND ANKARA NOW HAVE TO DETERMINE EXACTLY WHAT EACH COULD EXPECT FROM THE OTHER IN THE NEW GEOSTRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT. THE REDEFINITION OF THE BILATERAL RELATIONSHIP WILL ALSO NEED TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT TURKEY’S EVOLVING RELATIONSHIP WITH THE EU, AS WELL AS ITS LINKS WITH THE ISLAMIC WORLD. THE US-TURKISH ALLIANCE THAT WILL EMERGE AT THE END OF THIS PROCESS WILL SURELY BE DIFFERENT BUT NO LESS VITAL."

Bulent Aliriza - Directory of Experts - Center For Strategic & International Studies

2005-03-26T20:24:00.000-08:00

Bulent Aliriza - Directory of Experts - Center For Strategic & International Studies: "Bulent Aliriza

Director
Turkey Project
Phone: (202) 457-8724
E-mail: baliriza@csis.org

Expertise: Turkish politics and foreign policy; politics and transportation of oil and gas from the Caspian region

Bulent Aliriza joined CSIS in 1994 and established and directs the Turkey Project examining Turkey's foreign and domestic policy issues. He is also codirector of the CSIS Caspian Sea Energy Project looking at the transportation of oil and gas from the Caspian region to world markets. Aliriza has lectured widely in the United States and Turkey and is a frequent commentator on Turkey and Caspian energy in print as well as on TV and radio. His articles and comments have appeared in the Washington Post, New York Times, International Herald Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Christian Science Monitor, and other major U.S. and Turkish publications. He has also made numerous appearances on CNN, C-SPAN, and BBC, as well as numerous other U.S., European, and Turkish media outlets. Prior to joining CSIS, he was a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Earlier, he served as a Turkish Cypriot diplomat in New York and Washington, D.C. Aliriza holds a B.Sc. degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a doctorate in international relations from the University of Oxford."

SLAVE REVOLT RADIO - PENTAGON ESCALATES THREAT AGAINST VENEZUELA

2005-03-26T19:51:00.000-08:00

SLAVE REVOLT RADIO: "PENTAGON ESCALATES THREAT AGAINST VENEZUELA
Echoing US rhetoric from the Cold War, Rumsfeld described Venezuela’s agreement to buy military hardware from Russia as a threat to the hemisphere. “Certainly I’m concerned,” he said, referring to the arms deal, which involves the purchase of 100,000 AK-47 rifles as well as 10 military helicopters from Moscow."

Critic of U.N. Named Envoy (washingtonpost.com)

2005-03-24T15:10:00.000-08:00

Critic of U.N. Named Envoy (washingtonpost.com): "Critic of U.N. Named Envoy
Bush's Choice of Bolton Is a Surprise; Democrats Plan to Contest Nomination

By Glenn Kessler and Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, March 8, 2005; Page A01
President Bush named Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton yesterday as the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, a surprise choice that would send an outspoken critic of the world body's effectiveness to its inner councils.

Bolton's government experience stretches through three Republican administrations, and his tough language and willingness to eschew diplomatic niceties have earned him both fans and critics overseas and in the bureaucracy. In Bush's first term, he proved to be highly effective at advancing his strong conservative views within the administration, even when he was at odds with then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and much of the State Department.

The post requires Senate confirmation, and Democrats immediately signaled they would wage a spirited confirmation battle. Forty-three Democrats voted against his nomination as undersecretary for arms control four years ago; even some Republicans privately expressed dismay at Bolton's elevation yesterday.

Some U.N. diplomats said they were surprised. European officials said they were puzzled at how the appointment meshed with the administration's recent efforts at consultative diplomacy.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who announced the nomination, alluded to Bolton's reputation when she noted that "some of our best ambassadors" to the United Nations have been those with "the strongest voices," such as Jeane J. Kirkpatrick and Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

Bolton would replace John C. Danforth, who resigned after barely six months as ambassador. An aide to Rice, calling the appointment a "Nixon goes to China" move, said the secretary recommended Bolton to Bush several weeks ago. Rice told reporters Bolton was selected "because he knows how to get things done."

Bolton acknowledged yesterday that he has written critically of the United Nations, saying one highlight of his career was his role in the successful 1991 repeal of the General Assembly 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism, "thus removing the greatest stain on the U.N.'s reputation."

He said he has consistently stressed in his writings that "American leadership is critical to the success of the U.N., an effective U.N., one that is true to the original intent of its charter's framers."

Bolton, 56, served in the administration of George H.W. Bush, father of the current president, as assistant secretary of state for international organizations, and in the Reagan administration as an assistant attorney general. He keeps a mock grenade in his office, labeled "To John Bolton -- World's Greatest Reaganite."

Throughout the current administration's first term, Bolton was often at odds with the United Nations and related institutions.

He spearheaded U.S. opposition to the International Criminal Court, declaring that the day he signed the letter withdrawing the U.S. signature on the treaty was "the happiest moment of my government service." He was the force behind Bush's Proliferation Security Initiative, a coalition designed to halt trade in nuclear materials that bypassed the United Nations. And he pressed the administration's unsuccessful campaign to deny a third term to Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

On the eve of six-nation talks over North Korea's nuclear ambitions two years ago, Bolton traveled to Seoul and denounced North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in highly personal terms. He labeled Kim a "tyrannical dictator" who had made North Korea "a hellish nightmare" -- which prompted the North Korean government to call him "human scum and bloodsucker."

Bolton also frequently riled European allies with his uncompromising stands -- and his disdain for their fledging efforts to secure an agreement with Iran to end its nuclear programs.

Bolton often had tense relations with his nominal boss, Powell, though he was viewed by Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld as a loyal supporter of the president. Bolton played a key behind-the-scenes role in the 2000 Florida recount battle that secured Bush's victory. When Rice bypassed Bolton for deputy secretary of state -- picking instead the pragmatic trade representative, Robert B. Zoellick -- and signaled that a key aide from the National Security Council would take Bolton's arms-control portfolio, it appeared uncertain whether a sufficiently prominent spot could be found for him in the second term.

Bolton was frequently mentioned as undersecretary of defense for policy, which would have kept him in the center of administration debates, frequently opposing State. In some ways, the U.N. post moves Bolton out of a direct policymaking role, though his allies predicted he would retain a prominent voice.

Kirkpatrick, calling Bolton "one of the smartest people I've ever encountered in Washington," said much of his influence would depend on the personal relations Bolton has established in Washington. She noted that she was both a Cabinet member and member of the National Security Council, while Bush downgraded the position so the ambassador reports to the secretary of state.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced the appointment of Undersecretary John R. Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations. (Shaun Heasley -- Reuters)

Asked if the United Nations had concerns about Bolton's history of sharply criticizing the world body, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the institution would welcome a tough reformer. "We do want to be held accountable," he said.

Security Council members said they expect that Bolton would have to moderate his views on the United Nations. China's U.N. ambassador, Wang Guangya, said he was not concerned by Bolton's previous promotion of an independent Taiwan. "It's mainly the big boss that makes the agenda, not the small ones," he said.

Wang, who once oversaw China's weapons-proliferation policies, said that Bolton "seemed reasonable" in negotiating sessions. "My feeling is that, of course, his chemistry is different, but I think we can we work together."

Edward Luck, a U.N. expert at Columbia University, said that Bolton has been his favorite debating partner on U.N. matters. "He is very bright, capable and articulate," Luck said. "It just seems that this is an odd place for him to be deployed. He has little patience for the give-and-take of diplomacy."

Democrats acknowledge that Bolton is highly intelligent, but they have questioned his judgment. "My problem with you over the years is that you've been too competent," Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) told Bolton four years ago. "I would rather you be stupid and not very effective."

Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) called the nomination "a disappointing choice and one that sends all the wrong signals."

Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, did not issue a statement of support. "Don't read anything into that," spokesman Andy Fisher said, though he acknowledged that Lugar had urged Rice to submit nominees who would have "wide support" and help build a "consensus on foreign policy."

Lynch reported from the United Nations."

Yahoo! News - U.S. Readies Aggressive Counterintelligence Plan

2005-03-05T16:49:00.000-08:00

Yahoo! News - U.S. Readies Aggressive Counterintelligence Plan: "U.S. Readies Aggressive Counterintelligence Plan

Sat Mar 5,11:04 AM ET Top Stories - Reuters

By David Morgan
COLLEGE STATION, Texas (Reuters) - The Bush administration has adopted a new counterintelligence strategy that calls for pre-emptive action against foreign intelligence services viewed as threats to U.S. national security, officials said on Saturday.

The first national U.S. counterintelligence strategy, which President Bush (news - web sites) approved on March 1, aims to combat intelligence services from countries hungry for U.S. military and nuclear secrets, such as China and Iran (news - web sites), both at home and abroad, counterintelligence officials said.

Officials at a counterintelligence conference at Texas A&M University described the strategy as an extension of the post-Sept. 11 foreign policy initiative known as the Bush doctrine, which calls for pre-emptive action against nations and extremist groups perceived as threats to the United States.

"The United States has become the No. 1 target for the intelligence collection of other nations," said John Quattrocki, a senior U.S. counterintelligence official.

"What we'd like to do with the counterintelligence program is what we've done with counterterrorism, which is take the fight to other guy's back yard and exploit and interdict where we can, and at home, interdict where we must."

The strategy is due to be released to the public as an unclassified document in coming days.

Officials said the plan aims to protect U.S. intelligence and information systems from foreign agents including al Qaeda by integrating counterintelligence through a recently formed agency called the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive.

Counterintelligence efforts are currently dispersed across the 15 agencies that make up the intelligence community.

"We have a great deal of bilateral cooperation between agencies. But we need strategically orchestrated operations directed against prioritized foreign intelligence threats," said National Counterintelligence Exacutive Michelle Van Cleave, who will oversee the plan.

REVITALIZE COUNTERINTELLIGENCE
Former intelligence officials described the strategy as an attempt to revitalize counterintelligence after years of neglect and demoralization following notorious espionage cases including CIA (news - web sites) agent Aldrich Ames and FBI (news - web sites) agent Robert Hanssen (news - web sites), who were both caught spying for the former Soviet Union.

"Today we are at war and the potential harm to this country from intelligence losses is far more immediate," said Van Cleave.

The strategy marks a departure from a long-standing counterintelligence practice of waiting for foreign-sponsored agents to act against intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

"Instead of being willing to take a punch and be damaged, we in fact take the skills of counterintelligence and ... impose damage on other intelligence services," explained Quattrocki, a top aide to Van Cleave.

He declined to identify countries seen as potential targets. But other officials cited China, Russia, Iran, North Korea (news - web sites), Cuba and Libya as nations that have tried to collect U.S. secrets through means including cyber espionage.

Van Cleave's office produced the new strategy with input from the CIA, the FBI, the Pentagon (news - web sites) and other agencies."

Yahoo! News - Italy probes possible CIA role in abduction

2005-02-25T11:15:00.000-08:00

Yahoo! News - Italy probes possible CIA role in abduction: "Italy probes possible CIA role in abduction

Fri Feb 25, 9:40 AM ET Top Stories - Chicago Tribune
By John Crewdson Tribune senior correspondent

An Italian prosecutor investigating the apparent kidnapping of a suspected Islamic militant in the streets of Milan served military authorities this week with a demand for records of flights into and out of a joint U.S.-Italian air base in northern Italy.

Italian newspapers have reported that the prosecutor, Armando Spataro, is investigating the possible role of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites) in the disappearance of Osama Nasr Mostafa Hassan, better known as Abu Omar, a popular figure in Milan's Islamic community who vanished Feb. 17, 2003.

Spataro, a chief prosecutor in Milan, said by phone Thursday that "I can confirm only that yesterday I went to Aviano," as the air base is known. "We have an investigation," he added, "but it's secret."

Bruno Megele, a top anti-terrorist police investigator who reportedly accompanied Spataro, declined to speak about the visit, which Italian newspapers described as unprecedented.

Spataro's warrant is believed to have sought information about the ownership and flight plans of non-military aircraft as well as records on vehicles arriving at and departing from Aviano in the hours before and after Omar's disappearance.

A passerby who claimed to have witnessed the abduction said several men grabbed Omar, a 41-year-old Egyptian national, on a Milan sidewalk and hustled him into a parked van that drove off accompanied by another car.

Since Sept. 11, 2001, several unnamed U.S. officials have been quoted by numerous media outlets discussing the U.S. practice of "rendition," in which suspected terrorists or Al Qaeda supporters captured abroad are sent for interrogation to countries where human rights are not universally respected.

The Tribune reported last month that a Gulfstream executive jet reportedly used to ferry some suspected terrorists to Egypt and other countries was owned by Bayard Foreign Marketing LLC, a Portland, Ore., company that appears to exist only on paper.

A break from practice

Most renditions in which the CIA (news - web sites) is known or suspected to have taken part involve individuals captured on the battlefield or arrested by authorities in the countries where they reside.

Neither was the case with Abu Omar, which has opened the door to the possible criminal prosecution of those involved. Spataro was quoted earlier as saying that if any Americans played a part in Omar's abduction, "it would be a serious breach of Italian law."

The newspaper La Repubblica reported last week that some targets of the investigation worked for the CIA. The leading Italian newspaper, Corriere della Sera of Milan, said Thursday that "at least 15 persons have been under investigation for months."

Another paper, Il Giorno, reported that all 15 were CIA employees. One source told the Tribune that the police are satisfied that they know the identities of those who carried out the abduction, and that Spataro is now trying to determine at what level the action was approved.

A CIA spokeswoman had no comment. Ben Duffy, a spokesman at the U.S. Embassy in Rome, said officials there were "trying to figure out what's going on." The CIA also has satellite facilities at the U.S. Consulate in Milan and at the Aviano air base.

The base's chief of public affairs, Capt. Eric Elliott, confirmed that Spataro had met with the Italian base commander on Wednesday. Although the base is owned and commanded by the Italian air force, many of the fighters and bombers based there are from the U.S. and are flown by U.S. pilots.

Elliott said U.S. authorities at the base intended to "respond appropriately to requests for information from the Italian authorities in accordance with existing agreements."

That presumably would include records of any flights by the mysterious Gulfstream jet. The first public mention of the aircraft appeared six weeks after the Sept. 11 hijacking attacks, when a Pakistani newspaper reported that Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed, a 27-year-old microbiology student at Karachi University, had been spirited aboard the plane at Karachi's airport by Pakistani security officers.

There is still no information about where Mohammed may have been taken. But Pakistani officials said later that the U.S. believed Mohammed, a Yemeni national, belonged to Al Qaeda and had information about the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole (news - web sites) while it was refueling in the Yemeni port of Aden.

Another well-documented rendition involving the same plane occurred in December 2001, when two Egyptian nationals, Ahmed Agiza and Muhammed al-Zery, were flown aboard the Gulfstream from Sweden's Bromma airport to Cairo. A Swedish television channel, TV4, reported last year that the plane's registration number was N379P, which would make it the aircraft acquired by Bayard Foreign Marketing last Nov. 16.

The Sunday Times of London, which said it had obtained the Gulfstream's flight logs, reported in November that the plane was based at Dulles International Airport outside Washington and had flown to at least 49 destinations outside the U.S., including Egypt, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Jordan, Iraq (news - web sites), Morocco, Afghanistan (news - web sites), Libya and Uzbekistan.

Stefano Dambruoso, Milan's anti-terrorist prosecutor at the time of Omar's disappearance, said he suspected from the beginning that Omar had been kidnapped, noting that he had no apparent reason to flee or to leave his wife, a teacher at a private Islamic school in Milan.

Initial suspicion focused on the Egyptian intelligence services, which are believed to have kidnapped another Egyptian militant, Talaat Fouad Kassem, under similar circumstances in Yugoslavia in 1995.

The Egyptian Embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment by voice mail and e-mail. The Egyptian foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, recently told a group of Tribune reporters and editors that he had no personal knowledge of any torture of suspected terrorists by his government.

Aboul Gheit did not deny the possibility that renditions had taken place, although he said he had no evidence of that either. "Are we to be blamed," he asked rhetorically, "if the Americans are delivering people to us, our own nationals?"

Call helps establish link

Spataro was able to link Omar's disappearance to Aviano through records of cell phone calls made by his abductors as they drove the 175 miles to the air base from Milan, Corriere della Sera reported Thursday. The calls included conversations with someone at the base, the paper said.

The newspaper reported last year that, about 14 months after his disappearance, Omar telephoned his wife from Cairo to tell her he had been released from prison by the Egyptians.

During that conversation, monitored by an Italian police wiretap, Omar reportedly told his wife that he had been kidnapped by American and Italian agents, "narcoticized," and, after several hours of questioning at Aviano, flown aboard a small plane to Egypt.

Once there, he said, he was imprisoned and tortured by the Mukhabarat, the Egyptian intelligence service. The Italian police said Omar was re-arrested by the Egyptians a few weeks after that phone call and has not been heard from since.

One person knowledgeable about Spataro's investigation said it has not turned up evidence of involvement by Italian intelligence agents in Omar's disappearance, and Italy's intelligence services do not have the power to make arrests or detain suspects in any event.

Omar, a native of Alexandria, Egypt, reportedly fought with Muslim forces in Afghanistan and Bosnia during the 1980s and 1990s, and was arrested in Albania in 1996 and charged with planning an attack on the Egyptian foreign minister.

Following his release by the Albanians, Omar was granted political asylum by Italy in 1997. He spent the next several years as an imam, or preacher, at a popular mosque in Milan.

Omar's post-Sept. 11 meetings with known Al Qaeda operators and his recruitment of militant fighters for jihadist battles--an activity that an Italian court declared earlier this month did not violate that country's laws--eventually brought Omar to the attention of police. Their listening devices reportedly picked up a conversation in which Omar talked of mounting a car bomb attack against a public bus in Milan.

The subsequent discovery that Omar had been taken to Egypt has raised questions about the fate of the former Al Qaeda chief in Italy, Abdelkader Mahmoud Es Sayed, another Egyptian Islamist who disappeared from Milan two months before Sept. 11.

Like Es Sayed, Omar was one of several Egyptian militants opposed to the government of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak (news - web sites) who were granted political asylum by the Italian government.

Es Sayed, better known as Abu Saleh, was at first believed by authorities to have made his way to Afghanistan and later to have died there in an allied bombing attack. He was convicted in absentia in Egypt for his alleged role in the killings of 58 foreign tourists at Luxor in November 1997. "

Mysterious Jet Tied to Torture Flights; Is shadowy firm front for CIA?

2005-02-25T11:12:00.000-08:00

Welcome to MichaelMoore.com!: "Mysterious Jet Tied to Torture Flights; Is shadowy firm front for CIA?

By John Crewdson / Chicago Tribune

PORTLAND, Ore. -- The first question is: Where is Leonard T. Bayard? The next question is: Who is Leonard T. Bayard? But the most important question may be: Does Leonard T. Bayard even exist?

The questions arise because the signature of a Leonard Thomas Bayard appears on the annual report of a Portland-based company, Bayard Foreign Marketing LLC, that was filed in August with the Oregon secretary of state.

According to federal records, Bayard Foreign Marketing is the newest owner of a U.S.-registered Gulfstream V executive jet reportedly used since Sept. 11, 2001, to transport suspected Al Qaeda operatives to countries such as Egypt and Syria, where some of them claim to have later been tortured.

The Central Intelligence Agency has declined to discuss the plane. But one retired CIA officer said that he understood the Gulfstream had been operated by the Joint Special Operations Command, an interagency unit that organizes counterterrorist operations in conjunction with the CIA and military special forces.

A search of commercial databases turned up no information on Leonard Thomas Bayard: no residence address, no telephone number, no Social Security number, no credit history, no automobile or property ownership records--in short, none of the information commonly associated with real people.

And yet, someone signed the name Leonard T. Bayard to Bayard Foreign Marketing's annual report.

The report, which describes the company as an "international marketing firm," lists Bayard's principal place of business as a suite in a historic downtown Portland office building known as the Pittock Block. But a visitor to the suite who asked to see Bayard was told by a receptionist only that "Mr. Bayard doesn't work here."

The telephone number on Bayard's annual report is listed to a private residence in a rundown section of northeast Portland whose doorbell went unanswered earlier this week. Calls to that number, however, appear to be answered by a bank of operators.

An initial call was answered as "Baynard Foreign Marketing" by an operator who insisted she never had heard of Leonard Bayard. A second call two minutes later was answered as "Bayard Foreign Marketing" by a different operator, who said that "Mr. Bayard is away from his desk."

A message left by a reporter went unanswered. The CIA has long had a well-known practice of "backstopping" local telephone numbers for its proprietary companies around the world, whose calls are forwarded to operators at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va.

Scott Caplan, an attorney whose offices occupy the same Portland suite as the one listed by Bayard Foreign Marketing, identified Bayard as "a client" but declined to say more. Public documents show it was Caplan who filed the incorporation papers for Bayard Foreign Marketing when the company was created in August 2003.

Ann Martens, a spokeswoman for Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, said that knowingly filing a false corporate document in Oregon is punishable by up to 6 months in prison and a $1,000 fine.

November sale

Leonard T. Bayard--whoever he may or may not be--became the sole owner of the mysterious Gulfstream jet on Nov. 16, according to public records compiled by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The records show that Bayard Foreign Marketing purchased the plane, for an undisclosed sum, from Premier Executive Transport Services, whose address is the same as that of a Dedham, Mass., law firm that incorporated Premier Executive in January 1994.

The Massachusetts law firm's address is shared by a second company, Crowell Aviation Technologies Inc., which according to Dun & Bradstreet claims to have only a single employee and $65,000 in annual revenue.

Government records show, however, that Crowell is one of only nine companies, along with Premier Executive, that has Pentagon permission to land aircraft at military bases worldwide.

The same day it transferred ownership of the Gulfstream to Bayard, Premier Executive sold an unmarked, 3-year-old Boeing 737 to Keeler and Tate Management LLC of Reno. That company's address is the same as that of the Reno law firm that incorporated it in October 2003, records show.

Like Leonard T. Bayard, the only named principal in Keeler and Tate, one Tyler Edward Tate, also appears not to exist in any public records accessible by the Tribune.

Premier Executive's only listed executive is its president, Bryan P. Dyess. A person with that name does appear in commercial databases, but his only addresses are two post office boxes in Arlington, Va., not far from CIA headquarters.

Premier Executive purchased or leased the new Gulfstream V in 1999, FAA records show. The plane's original registration number, N581GA, would later be changed by the FAA to N379P, and again to 8068V.

The first public mention of the Gulfstream appeared six weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, when a Pakistani newspaper reported that Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed, a 27-year-old microbiology student at Karachi University, had been spirited aboard the plane at Karachi's airport by Pakistani security officers in the early hours of Oct. 23, 2001.

There is no information about where Mohammed was taken. But Pakistani officials said later that Mohammed, a Yemeni national, was believed by the U.S. to belong to Al Qaeda and to have information about the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole.

Since Sept. 11, unnamed U.S. officials have been quoted in several publications discussing the U.S. practice of "rendition," which involves sending suspected terrorists or Al Qaeda supporters captured abroad for interrogation to countries where human rights are not traditionally respected.

Well-documented case

One well-documented rendition occurred in December 2001, when two Egyptian nationals, Ahmed Agiza and Muhammed al-Zery, were flown aboard the Gulfstream from Sweden's Bromma airport to Cairo. A Swedish television broadcaster, TV4, reported last year that a check of the plane's registration number, N379P, showed it belonged to Premier Executive.

The Swedish ambassador to Cairo later said Agiza and al-Zery both told him they had been tortured by Egyptian police. Al-Zery was released in October 2003 without charges. Agiza was sentenced to 25 years in prison for his alleged membership in an Egyptian terrorist group.

The Swedish government has called on Egypt to agree to an international investigation into the torture charges. The government has said it had been assured by Egypt that the two men would not be mistreated.

Another widely reported rendition to Egypt occurred in January 2002, when the Gulfstream arrived in Jakarta, Indonesia, to pick up a 24-year-old Al Qaeda suspect and dual Egyptian-Pakistani citizen, Muhammad Saad Iqbal, and transport him to Cairo.

German intelligence sources later said Indonesia refused to permit subsequent renditions to Cairo after learning that Iqbal had been tortured.

An international network of "plane spotters," hobbyists who log the comings and goings of specific aircraft around the world, have posted on the Internet photographs of the Gulfstream in various locations.

The Sunday Times of London, which claimed to have obtained the plane's flight logs, reported in November that the plane was based at Dulles International Airport outside Washington. The newspaper said it had flown to at least 49 destinations outside the U.S., including Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, other U.S. military bases, as well as airports in Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Morocco, Afghanistan, Libya and Uzbekistan.

Two days after the Sunday Times report, Premier Executive Transport sold the Gulfstream to Bayard Foreign Marketing. On Dec. 1, records show, the FAA assigned the plane yet another tail number, N44982."

CFR Meetings Negroponte's "Briefing from Baghdad: The U.S. Role in Post-Election Iraq"

2005-02-17T08:10:00.000-08:00

CFR Meetings: "General Meeting
February 15, 2005, Washington, DC

"Briefing from Baghdad: The U.S. Role in Post-Election Iraq"

Speaker: John D. Negroponte
U.S. Ambassador to Iraq
Presider: Gerald Seib
Washington Bureau Chief, The Wall Street Journal

Summary: **Please note special location"

The New York Review of Books: Honduras: An Exchange

2005-02-17T08:08:00.000-08:00

The New York Review of Books: Honduras: An Exchange: "Volume 33, Number 10 · June 12, 1986
Email to a friend

Exchange
Honduras: An Exchange
By Jane Burnett, John D. Negroponte, Richard Holbrooke, Stanley Karnow, Reply by Edward R. F. Sheehan
In response to The Country of Nada (March 27, 1986)

To the Editors:

Edward R.F. Sheehan's article about Honduras ["The Country of Nada," NYR, March 27] grossly misrepresents the role I played in Honduras as United States Ambassador from November 1981 through May 1985.

First, as to errors of fact, I am not a "counterinsurgency expert" as alleged. I am a career diplomat whose service has spanned ten different assignments on three continents, mostly in the fields of political reporting, negotiation and consular affairs. I have never served in Cambodia, as stated by Sheehan, and I was not reassigned to Washington in 1984 as Sheehan claims. It should be self-evident that inaccuracies of this kind could easily have been avoided by an effort to double-check such basic facts.

What may be less apparent are the slanderous innuendos designed to discredit my years of service in Honduras. For example, I would be interested in knowing what sampling of Honduran opinion permitted Mr. Sheehan to refer to me as "by most accounts a clever but astonishingly arrogant man." Was it the Honduran government, which conferred to me the highest decoration which can be given a foreign civilian in that country? Or was it the Honduran media which repeatedly and with notably few exceptions referred to me as an effective representative of my country and a good friend of Honduras?

The article's reference to General Alvarez as my protégé is laughable in light of the fact that he was already slated to become commander of the Honduran armed forces before I had arrived in Honduras. Also our relationship was never as chummy as Sheehan's article would suggest. My dealings with Alvarez were correct, relatively infrequent and very much on an equal footing. Anyone who personally knew both of us can attest that it would have been totally out of character for Alvarez to accept a role subordinate to the United States Ambassador.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But these personal insults apart, I am distressed by Mr. Sheehan's apparent unwillingness to concede, even grudgingly, that in today's Central American context Honduras has something to show for itself politically, socially and economically. The country has a free press and a labor movement considered a model in Central America. Discrepancies of wealth are less than those known in neighboring countries; and land reform has been in effect for more than twenty-five years. (For example, Honduras has 45,000 independent coffee growers who stand to gain substantially from recent increases in international coffee prices, thereby bringing sorely needed foreign exchange to the Honduran economy.) Despite regional instability and world recession in the early 1980s, the Honduran currency is the only one in Central America not to have been devalued even once in the past sixty years and the percentage drop in per capita standard of living has been the least of all countries in the region. Indeed, per capita income in Honduras may now be higher than that of neighboring Nicaragua or El Salvador belying Sheehan's claim that it is the second poorest country in the hemisphere.

Last but not least, Honduras' second consecutive free election in 1985 of a civilian president represents a signal accomplishment for which credit rather than ridicule is due. It is an achievement which reflects the Honduran people's rejection of military rule and the consolidation of a democratic trend which began with Constitutent Assembly elections in 1980 and a presidential contest in 1981. Personally, encouraging the consolidation of Honduras' democracy in every appropriate manner was my first priority throughout my tenure as Ambassador to that country. Under circumstances of regional turmoil, Honduras' political progress and relative social tranquility were a source of considerable satisfaction for all of us associated with US policies towards Central America.

There was a story, a very positive one, for Mr. Sheehan to glean from his visit to Honduras. I regret for your readers' sake that by apparently relying on such a narrow range of opinions, and by neglecting to verify the facts, his reportage was so egregiously off the mark. He has done a grave injustice to the good people of Honduras and to the US government policies and programs which work in support of Honduras' aspirations.

John D. Negroponte

United States Department of State

Washington, DC

To the Editors:

Though my acquaintance with Honduras is only slight, I am prepared to accept Edward Sheehan's analysis of the situation there. But I object to his characterization of John Negroponte, the former US ambassador to Honduras, which I regard to be shoddy journalism that reduces your fine publication to the level of a news magazine.

I have known Negroponte for more than twenty years, and have disagreed with him on several issues, including Vietnam and Central America. Sheehan should have stuck to the issues, rather than personalizing his criticism with cheap shots.

Sheehan writes, for example, that Negroponte "was by most accounts a clever but astonishingly arrogant man." Whose accounts? Sheehan never bothered to interview Negroponte, who far from being arrogant is easy to approach and just as easy to argue with Negroponte is further described, in somewhat sinister terms, as having been Secretary of State Haig's "personal choice" for the post of envoy. Secretaries of State, whatever one thinks of them, have been known to propose ambassadors. As for Negroponte riding around the Honduran capital "in a limousine surrounded by armed guards," Sheehan might be reminded that we live in the age of terrorism. I will admit to my own weakness by confessing that I was reassured by those guards when I rode around with Negroponte in Tegucigalpa.

Another of Sheehan's distortions is his reference to "Negroponte's plans for turning Honduras into an American military base." That Honduras has become a US base is undeniable. But Sheehan should be sophisticated enough to know that plans are conceived at higher than the ambassadorial level. Negroponte can be reproached for executing those plans. That, however, is another matter.

Once again, I am not writing to defend the Reagan administration's policies or Negroponte's role in carrying them out. Nor do I dispute Sheehan's right to question those policies, as I do. But I would prefer to see The New York Review maintain its high standards.

Stanley Karnow

Potomac, Maryland

To the Editors:

I noticed in Edward Sheehan's article on Honduras a reference to John Negroponte, our former ambassador to Honduras. Since John and I have been friends for over twenty years, and for two years he served with distinction as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs while I was Assistant Secretary, perhaps I could make a brief comment. As I read Sheehan's piece, I believe that he is recycling previous attacks on John, particularly an article written in Newsweek some years ago.

It is probably true, as Sheehan says, that Al Haig personally chose John to go to Honduras, since they had known each other during the Nixon administration, but that is hardly a major issue. John is a career foreign service officer who has served with great distinction under every Secretary of State since Dean Rusk. I know that he had the full respect of Cy Vance, and I am sure that George Shultz would not have given him the senior policy job in the Department that he now holds if he did not also consider John an outstanding career diplomat.

John is not "astonishingly arrogant," and I do not know what the basis for this ad hominem attack is since I note that Sheehan simply bases this statement on "most accounts."

Finally, Sheehan refers to John driving around "in a limousine surrounded by armed guards, seeming every inch a chief of state." I visited John while he was ambassador and saw, indeed, that he had heavy security. But this was an essential safety precaution for anyone in a position as dangerous as the one he held. His personal style seemed to me to be unassuming and friendly. He was no different in Honduras than he is in Washington, except for the added tension surrounding his assignment. He and his wife cared deeply about the problems of that sad little country, and they adopted two Honduran children while they were there.

Sheehan may have legitimate grounds for disagreement with some of the policies that the US has followed, but I do not think that the attack on John is warranted. Since I have known Ed Sheehan—indeed, I edited a magnificent article he wrote for Foreign Policy—and respect him, I am sorry that this unfortunate characterization of John crept into his article.

Richard Holbrooke

New York City

To the Editors:

What could have impelled Edward R.F. Sheehan, in the midst of a serious and apparently well-researched article about Honduras, suddenly to inject, coyly enclosed in parentheses, a libel on neighboring Nicaragua as false as it was gratuitous? I refer to his characterization of Honduras' more than 130 "unsolved 'disappearances"' as "nothing to compare with the record of El Salvador or Guatemala (or Sandinista Nicaragua, for that matter)."

As far as I can ascertain from the Americas Watch report, With Friends Like These, issued in early 1985, and the recent Americas Watch and Amnesty International reports covering the year 1985, unsolved disappearances in Nicaragua consist of 69 Miskito Indians who were arrested between July and September 1982 and have yet to be accounted for by the Nicaraguan Government. This is terrible indeed, but how is it that Honduras' 130 is "nothing to compare" with Nicaragua's 69? More important, the quoted words imply that Nicaragua is in a category with El Salvador, a country with 40,000 noncombantant civilian murders up to 1985 plus a reported 1,596 political murders in 1985, and Guatemala with its untold carnage—some estimate 100,000 victims; the word "genocide" peppers the literature on Guatemala. This is a calumny so grotesque, one is staggered to find it in a respected journal.

A possible clue to how so gross an error could have been made is provided in With Friends Like These, which tells us that the State Department, in reporting 169 disappearances in Nicaragua for the year 1983, simply added up all the disappearances reported monthly by the Permanent Commission on Human Rights (CPDH) without correcting figures to reflect the subsequent reappearance of disappeared persons. In Nicaragua, most detained persons are within a few weeks either released or formally charged with a crime. CPDH itself does make these corrections and by February 1984 had reduced its 169 figure to 28. Perhaps the State Department, unchastened, continued to report temporary disappearances as permanent, and Mr. Sheehan has swallowed this whole. If so, he displays an astonishing credulity toward State Department reports on Nicaragua, contrasting with the healthy skepticism he displays toward State Department pronouncements on Honduras. And he does so in face of the flat statement by Amnesty International in its report issued in February 1986 that it did not find a pattern of torture, disappearances, or political killings by the Nicaraguan Government. He also ignores the Americas Watch report for 1985, which found numerous arrests followed by quick release and which mentioned no disappearances. That report did find 12 murders in 1985. Perhaps these murders occurred in remote areas in the context of sweeps against contra forces, as is the case with rumored murders in past years. Nevertheless, this is a dismaying finding. But even if you add these murders to the Miskito disappearances you still have a way to go even to equal the Honduras record reported by Mr. Sheehan, much less the horrendous nightmares in El Salvador and Guatemala.

A throwaway line like the parenthetical phrase here objected to, considering the context in which it appears and the prestige of the publication in which it appears, is likely to do far more damage than the transparent fantasies of President Reagan. Considering that not only are lives at stake in the current debate over US policy toward Nicaragua, but also the possibility of the Nicaraguan Government's ever returning to the amazing progress it once was making in providing food, health care, and education to a desperately poor people, I would hope that uninformed remarks like this were not so casually made.

Jane Burnett

New Canaan, Connecticut

Edward R.F Sheehan replies:
It distresses me to have to disagree with Stanley Karnow and Richard Holbrooke, both of them old friends whose integrity and writings I respect. It is, moreover, understandable that they should hasten to the defense of their old friend, Ambassador Negroponte, whom likewise they must have reason to respect. I might say that I did not "bother" to interview Mr. Negroponte because he was in Washington and I was in Honduras. I bear no personal animus toward Mr. Negroponte. I met him once, at a dinner in Paris in 1968, when he was attached to the delegation of the late Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge during the initial Vietnam peace talks; we exchanged a few words, and he seemed reasonable and pleasant.

As for his letter, Mr. Negroponte served in Vietnam as second secretary of the US embassy from 1964 to 1968, during the presidency of Lyndon Johnson and the height of American military involvement in that country. I would be surprised if, given his long service during such a period, he did not emerge as extremely knowledgeable about counterinsurgency. I regret the minor error about the year of his return from Honduras to Washington (1985 not 1984); the reference to Cambodia was taken from the otherwise well-documented book on Honduras edited by Peckenham and Street and cited in my footnote.[*]

Regarding the remainder of Mr. Negroponte's letter, with due respect I find it a self-serving and misleading polemic, at variance with most of my direct observations in Honduras contained in the body of my article, which I firmly stand by. To cite but three examples, several international agencies still list Honduras as the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, a conclusion supported by the Kissinger Commission report on Central America. If Nicaragua has recently become poorer, this does not make Honduras a less miserable country. As for the Honduran currency, it is a known (and published) fact that for many months the US embassy in Tegucigalpa has been urging the Honduran government to devalue its currency, its overvaluation being one of the chief causes of the country's immense economic problems. Mr. Negroponte seems unaware of current embassy policy. Concerning elections, certainly the Hondurans should have them. The tragedy, as I tried to make clear, is that they have not been given choices that would bring about a serious change in the economy of the country.

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My description of Mr. Negroponte's tenure as ambassador to Honduras was not based on any news magazine article but on conversations with a cross section of opinion, Honduran and foreign, inside Honduras. These included at least half a dozen American and other Western correspondents with long experience in that country, several respected Honduran journalists, human rights activists, several academics, businessmen and lawyers, three senior Western diplomats from countries friendly to the United States, an official of an important Honduran government ministry, two former cabinet ministers, several churchmen both Honduran and American, and a number of Hondurans of more modest status. Common to these conversations were descriptions of Ambassador Negroponte as "intelligent…bright…clever…intrusive…overbearing…arrogant…the proconsul." Victor Meza, head of the Honduran Documentation Center and possibly the country's best-informed intellectual, among more positive statements about the United States, told me for the record that Ambassador Negroponte inserted himself into practically every sector of Honduran public life. Even two senior officials of the US embassy implicitly acknowledged the infelicities of Mr. Negroponte's performance by stressing that the present ambassador, John A. Ferch, is deliberately seeking to cultivate an opposite image.

Mr. Karnow is of course correct in suggesting that Ambassador Negroponte was executing higher administration policy in turning Honduras into a US base. But both the style and substance of Mr. Negroponte's performance seemed offensive to many Hondurans I talked to. Whatever his more positive accomplishments—and despite his protestations to the contrary—he is remembered in Honduras mainly for his close association with the despotic General Gustavo Alvarez Martínez, whose cruel reign under US tutelage marks one of the darkest periods of modern Honduran history.

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As for Jane Burnett's letter, my two references to human rights abuse in Nicaragua were addressed to the spectrum of repression as a whole, not simply to the number of disappearances, though even on that point I have reason to question her arithmetic.

Last December, Lino Hernández, head of the independent Permanent Commission for Human Rights in Managua, told me that there were at least 5,500 political prisoners in Nicaragua (excluding former national guardsmen), who were summarily detained without due process and often psychologically or even physically tortured. In January, Miguel Cardinal Obando y Bravo, Archbishop of Managua, told me that the number of political prisoners was probably considerably higher, and he graphically described to me the torments such prisoners endure. Pressing his palms against his temples, hurling imaginary men to the floor, he said: "They squeeze their heads like this, and beat them on the ground. They give them no food or sleep for three or four days."

According to Sr. Hernández, it is true that some political prisoners are released after ten to twenty days, their brief detention being a tactic by the state to intimidate dissenters, but he added that many other prisoners are held for longer periods or indefinitely. He went on to describe the horrible treatment they receive, and in various parts of Nicaragua I talked to several former prisoners whose personal experience confirmed his claims. Political prisoners are often shut in tiny, underground solitary cells where they can neither lie nor stand, forced to live in their own urine and excrement, beaten, suspended from iron bars, deprived of food and sleep, and subjected to terrible psychological torture such as the screams of loved ones from nearby rooms or being told that a wife, mother, child, etc., is dead.

As to the number of disappearances, they are less easy to calculate than Miss Burnett suggests. In December Virgilio Godoy, until only two years ago a minister in the Sandinista government, now a leader of an opposition party, told me that two months previously a large part of the population of a village near Estelí had been abducted by the Sandinista security forces and had not been heard from as of late December. (I had no independent confirmation of this.) Other opposition figures told me of individual disappearances elsewhere in the country, difficult to confirm because of the families' fear and the extraordinary secrecy of Interior Minister Tomás Borge's state security apparatus. "Disappearance" can be defined in many ways, without reference to State Department documents—which, incidentally, I did not use. Instant killing is the most graphic method of "disappearance." (According to evidence gathered by the International League for Human Rights, two activists of the Social Christian party were murdered in November.) If you combine all of the credible accounts above with the regime's suspension of civil liberties last October, the harassment of political parties, trade unions, and the press, and the increasingly harsh persecution of the Roman Catholic Church—you find a pattern of repression and violation of human rights that considerably exceeds the abuse of human rights in Honduras.

Tyranny, wherever it is found, must be condemned—whether on the right, as in Honduras, or on the left, as in Nicaragua. I say this as an observer who opposes the Reagan administration's military policy in Central America, including more aid to the contras, despite my sympathy for the authentic grievances of the peasant contra army, it being my belief that such aid to the contras would intensify the fratricide in Nicaragua and the insane arms race in Central America. Diplomacy, however difficult, is preferable to military solutions. But as much as I oppose the Reagan policy, I find the Sandinistas repugnant as well.

—San Salvador, El Salvador

Notes
[*] Nancy Peckenham and Annie Street, eds., Honduras: Portrait of a Captive Nation (Praeger, 1985)."

Remarks Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Ambassador John D. Negroponte November 13, 2003

2005-02-17T08:03:00.000-08:00

Remarks Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Ambassador John D. Negroponte November 13, 2003: "Remarks Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Ambassador John D. Negroponte November 13, 2003 Thank you for that kind introduction. It’s a great pleasure to be here with you this afternoon to participate in what surely must be one of the best programs assembled for a Washington convention in years. I don’t think I’ve been in the presence of so many lawyers since my brief stay at Harvard Law School some forty years ago. Fortunately for me, at least, the Foreign Service intervened with an offer I couldn’t refuse, and so I switched from studying contract law to consular training, and have been rather happy about it ever since. True, the pay isn’t as good, but the courtroom of international affairs has provided some fascinating challenges.
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None of these has been more stimulating than my current assignment at the United Nations, and that’s what I would like to talk with you about this afternoon—sovereignty, the United Nations, and US national interests. In 1945, after two World Wars and the failed experiment with the League of Nations, the international community took a new look at an old problem: how to maintain peace in a world of independent and sovereign nation states. The solution was the articulation of fundamental rules regarding the international use of force in the UN Charter and the creation of a forum and organization through which states could pursue their common interest in a strengthened peace and in achieving transnational solutions to transnational problems.
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The founders of the United Nations did not create a world government or even plant the seeds of one. Rather, they wanted to learn from the experience of the League and to engage the most powerful states in the enterprise of maintaining peace. Thus, they gave to the new institution a Security Council capable of taking decisions that all other member states, in the words of Article 25 of the UN Charter, must “accept and carry out”. Without this authority, the UN would not have any chance to be more effective than the League of Nations. You see, the founders of the United Nations recognized and accepted a fundamental truth about the nature of the world. In the words of the scholar,
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Martin Wight1: “International politics have never revealed, nor do they reveal today, a habitual recognition among states of a community of interest overriding their separate interest, comparable to that which normally binds individuals within the state.” Thus, the Security Council at the heart of the founders’ vision was designed to enlist preponderant powers in the cause of securing the peace—and to encourage coalitions of said preponderant powers to maintain a balance of forces, especially if one of their members sought hegemony. The United States was at that time and remains a preponderant power; but it did not then nor does it now seek hegemony. This feature of U.S. foreign policy makes us historically different from all other 1FYI: Martin Wight was an Oxford don in the ‘50s and ‘60s in political science. He wrote little butbrilliantly and, through his teaching, had a big influence on an entire generation of international relations experts more famous than he.
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preponderant powers in modern times and puts something of an asterisk next to realist statements about international relations. It also often confuses people and governments who assume that we must want to dominate because we have great power. Of course, the United States has global interests, and where our national security truly is in jeopardy, we cannot and will not defer to other states. This is not hegemony, however; it’s sovereignty, perfectly in line with the precepts of the UN Charter itself. Further, the threats to the United States of this nature are few, and we seek to delimit them as sharply as possible. Indeed, we have many more national interests where the cooperation of other countries is welcome, to our benefit, and essential. These include matters in the aforementioned area of national security as
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well as in the health, environmental, social, and economic areas. Such matters are given important places on member states’ agendas for the United Nations and on the agenda of the UN Organization itself. Working on them constructively—supporting good ideas and opposing bad ones—is not easy. By now it’s old news to you, I’m sure, that American foreign policy is subject to unique challenges at the United Nations. The tremendous effort required to advance positions within an institution comprising 191 nations inevitably generates undertows that threaten to sweep you where you do not necessarily want to go. But it is an analytic mistake to think of the UN as an independent entity separate and distinct from its members. The UN is not a monolithic “other” standing over and against US interests. To be sure, there are
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groupings of different kinds and characters within the UN, and at times these groupings are inimical to US interests. Yet the challenge is not to undo these affiliations any more than it is to adhere to a homogeneous multilateralism that brings us all together. The challenge is to keep advancing US national interests. In other words, American diplomacy at the UN can best succeed—and perhaps only succeed—if it remains focused, on message, and practical. We must establish and stick to priorities; and we must know when an issue is best dealt with outside the UN context altogether. Having said that, let me run through some of the major issues it has made sense to address at the UN. Terrorism: The nature of the war against terror is such that the President is pushing hard to promote
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both homeland and international security at one and the same time. This is an extremely urgent and complex task. We have long worked closely with our friends and allies to fight terrorism, and the success we have had has been based in large part on that collaboration. The United Nations now plays an important role in the effort to deny terrorists every conceivable nook and cranny of operating room. From September 11 forward, the Security Council, the General Assembly, and the Secretary-General have understood and supported the requirements for worldwide action. The UN has been an important engine for putting counter-terrorism on every country’s and every international organization’s agenda. The Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee has proved its worth so far both in bringing institutions and states into the counter-
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terrorism effort that previously had been on the side-lines and in serving as world-wide coordinator among international organizations. The Counter-Terrorism Committee also helps states in need of counter-terrorist assistance to obtain that assistance. The UN is not the only or the most important actor in the war against terror, but its contribution is real and constructive. Afghanistan: Afghanistan was a terrorist-sponsored state. The US military and our allies took the lead in changing that, but the UN very quickly became a key partner in helping the Afghans establish an interim government, raise international financial support, and move in the direction of drafting and enacting a constitution. Indeed, the Secretary General’s man in Afghanistan, Lakhdar
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Brahimi, has done a brilliant job, as I was able to witness first-hand during my visit there last week. Iraq: In many ways, Saddam made and sustained the case against his own regime himself, but in another sense, that case was made and sustained for many years at the United Nations. This was necessary and useful, but time ran out on Saddam when the President decided that the Security Council’s numerous resolutions directed at his regime must be enforced. The President did this based on US vital interests, but not alone, and not without regard to the interests of the Iraqi people, or the people of the Middle East. Both before and after the liberation of Iraq, the debates and votes we engaged in at the UN have helped advance peace, reconstruction, and the eventual reintegration into the community of nations for 25 million Iraqis.
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The Coalition and citizens of Iraq continue to face difficult challenges. There’s no question about that. But Security Council Resolution 1511 strengthened the international framework for bolstering Iraq’s future, and the UN-supported donors conference in Madrid generated more international resources for rebuilding Iraq on an entirely new political foundation than ever before committed to a single country. Middle East: When the President’s vision of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security is achieved, three key UN resolutions—242, 338 and 1397—will have been the agreed framework for peace. Indeed, they are the only framework accepted by Arabs and Israelis. In this sense, the UN contribution to eventual Middle East peace has been substantial. Regrettably, one-
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sided denunciations of Israel distract the Security Council from the real business of advancing peace and limit the degree to which the UN can usefully contribute to resolving a critical challenge. Africa: The UN has devoted enormous amounts of time and money to the conflicts and humanitarian crises in Africa. Whether it is peacekeeping in Sierra Leone, seeking to bring an end to the fighting in Liberia, combating famine, or building and sustaining an international response to the AIDS pandemic, we have found useful partners within the UN framework. To dwell on the question of humanitarian assistance for a moment, let me just point out that the United States is the world’s largest provider of humanitarian food supplies, bar none, but we are able to deliver more food assistance at lower cost through the UN’s World Food Program (WFP) than we
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could do on our own. Last spring, a burgeoning food crisis in southern Africa convinced us that we had to act quickly. WFP clearly was the humanitarian organization most capable of helping us prevent a famine by delivering 566,000 metric tons of food aid to enormous populations in peril. Similarly, WFP laudably played a major role in averting potential humanitarian need in Iraq by ensuring the continuity of the food pipeline and distribution. So, we are WFP’s major donor for good reason—it’s in our interest, and it’s in the world’s interest as well. I could go on at some length enumerating problems and challenges that the United States seeks to address but cannot do so alone. Two weeks ago the General Assembly approved the new UN convention against corruption, for instance, with strong US support. This improves prospects for the
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effective use of our foreign aid abroad; it also improves prospects for American business abroad. As some of you may know through bitter experience, bribes were still tax deductible in certain countries ten years ago; and no international anticorruption treaties existed. The new UN convention is a milestone achievement in the global effort to ensure transparency, fairness, and justice in public affairs. This is vitally important, not only to the rule of law, but also to the fundamental confidence citizens must have for representative government and private enterprise to succeed. In summary, ladies and gentlemen, we have no illusions about the limitations and weaknesses of the UN as an organization and as a forum. We were there at the beginning. It was not then nor should it ever become a substitute for member states.
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Nonetheless, at the outset of the 21stcentury, we live in a world of interdependent economies, terror networks, migratory health crises, environmental challenges, and conflicts that too readily spill from one state and region to the next. Our democratic values as well as our global interests require that we do our part to address these problems. The United States therefore engages vigorously at the UN and supports it generously as its largest contributor because there are so many ways in which the UN enables us to express our sovereign views and to advance our national interests. Our responsibility to ourselves and the world is to be the rule of law’s relentless advocate and democracy’s best friend. This, if anything, is the overarching task we confront each day at the UN—it is what holds our efforts together, and it provides a
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great shield against those who would be our enemies and a great support to those who would be our friends. Thank you very much."

Statement by Ambassador John D Negroponte

2005-02-17T07:58:00.000-08:00

Statement by Ambassador John D: "Statement by Ambassador John D. Negroponte Before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations April 27, 2004Mr. Chairman, Senator Biden, distinguished Members of the Committee, I am pleased to appear before you today as the President’s nominee to be the first United States Ambassador to a liberated Iraq. I am honored by the confidence shown in me by President Bush and Secretary Powell. I support the fine work that this committee has done to shape, guide, and inform U.S. policy on this most crucial of foreign policy issues, and, if confirmed, I look forward to our continued close consultation in the weeks and months ahead. I know that members of this committee share my conviction that we must get Iraq right. I look forward to our discussion today and to sharing my thoughts on the mission of our soon-to-be opened Embassy. Mr. Chairman, in your hearings on Iraq, the committee clearly demonstrated its concerns about the gravity of the situation and the complexity of the challenges we face. My colleagues have addressed many of the important questions you raised and shared with you some of the successes achieved thus far in Iraq - 1
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holding dozens of free local elections, drafting the Transitional Administrative Law, and setting the date for direct nationwide balloting early next year. In addition there have been dramatic improvements in the provision of healthcare, infrastructure projects, and the spread of free media to name but a few examples. But these successes will be for naught if Iraqis cannot weave them into the permanent fabric of their society, building on these successes to produce a stable, peaceful and democratic Iraq -- our core strategic goal. The sober reality is that destructive and divisive forces are working to undermine progress in Iraq. Coalition forces and Iraqi and international civilians are targeted by disparate elements fanatically opposed to a democratic Iraq. These elements are exploiting and seeking to deepen divisions among Iraq’s ethnic, religious and tribal communities, exacerbated by many years of manipulation by Saddam’s despotic regime, in order to destabilize Iraq. Our challenge is toestablish the conditions by which the Iraqi people can pursue their interests -- as well as celebrate their differences -- through legitimate political channels, rather than through violence and retribution. In short, we must support Iraqis as they build the institutions necessary to do away with Saddam’s criminal political system and the winner-take-all attitude that has ruled Iraq for decades. 2
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The courage shown by all Americans working on the ground in Iraq, in dangerous and uncertain conditions, to support the principles we and our Coalition partners share with Iraqis, is humbling. The men and women of our armed forces, of our diplomatic service and from all walks of American life who have comeforward to serve our nation in Iraq have made great – and too often the ultimate – sacrifices. We owe it to them to proceed with the utmost in forethought, resolve and prudence as we enter the next phase. THE VISION A prosperous, stable and democratic Iraq is central to our national interest and to the successful campaign against global terror. With the overthrow of Saddam Hussein we eliminated a major threat to international peace and security. In the last two decades he invaded his neighbors twice, used WMD against his neighbors and his own people, undertook clandestine nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons programs, and massacred hundreds of thousands of Iraqi citizens. Ending the Saddam regime was the first step. All of our efforts over the past year have sought to ensure that the new Iraq will be a constructive presence in the region, and that its government be at peace with its neighbors and with its own citizens. When confronted with complex and dangerous challenges as we push 3
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toward that strategic goal, we must recall that our extraordinary efforts in Iraq are not only for the Iraqi people -- but also for our own. DEMOCRATIZATION AND THE RULE OF LAW In partnership with the people of Iraq, the U.S. Mission will support democratization and rule of law, promote economic development and support efforts to restore security and eliminate terrorism. Visionary and courageous Iraqis developed a timetable and program for getting to democracy in the November 15 agreement, which they subsequentlyreaffirmed in the Transitional Administrative Law. The Mission will fullysupport, in cooperation with the United Nations, the international community, and independent Iraqi electoral authorities, all aspects of election preparation.Such support is critical if there are to be elections for a Transitional NationalAssembly no later than the end of January 2005. In this regard, the expertise of the United Nations will be particularly valuable; it is already helping the Iraqis andthe Coalition Provisional Authority establish an independent Electoral Commission, an electoral law and a political parties' law. If confirmed, I willwork with the Iraqis to facilitate the United Nations’ active engagement as Iraq prepares voter rolls, trains election workers, designates polling stations, and distributes ballots. 4
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In parallel with our support for elections, we will continue to encourageIraqis as they establish effective governing institutions in Baghdad and the provinces. They will also be supported by a number of provincial branch offices, as well as by Foreign Service Officers working in support of Coalition military units and in cooperation with local communities. At the same time, U.S.-funded education programs will help Iraqis recognize and exercise their rights and responsibilities in a democratic system. ECONOMIC RECONSTRUCTION The United States is providing unprecedented funding and technical assistance to help Iraq achieve a level of prosperity commensurate with its natural and human resources and proud history. Working with the Iraqi authorities, who best know the needs of their people, the Mission will oversee the vast array of reconstruction projects underway in Iraq. We will ensure that these projects, financed with taxpayers’ funds, serve our policy goals and the priority needs validated by the Iraqis themselves, and we will hold these projects to the highest standards of financial accountability. 5
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We will encourage Iraq’s new leaders to choose sound economic policies and to enforce high standards of integrity in public administration in order to stimulate growth and to create jobs. As the security situation improves and Iraq’s oil production capacity increases, we expect that Iraq’s share of reconstruction expenses will gradually increase, and that private investment will flow into a country once again rich in opportunity for its people. SECURITY AND COUNTERTERRORISM The key to achieving lasting security in Iraq is building and strengthening the capacity of Iraq’s security services to deal with both domestic extremists and foreign terrorists. I can think of no more important task. We must do everything within our power to help the government and courageous people of Iraq develop the capacity to defend themselves and maintain the kind of peace and tranquility that will permit their nation to go about its legitimate civilian pursuits. While the theater commander will implement these training responsibilities at this time, I can assure him of my full and complete support. 6
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A robust multinational force presence will be critical, and I will work hard in my current capacity to obtain continued Security Council authorization for such a force. THE NEXT SIXTY DAYS There are still unanswered questions about the structure, composition and powers of the Iraqi Interim Government to which I will present my credentials. The process over the next sixty days will have broad implications. In concert with Iraqi political figures and representatives of our Government, Ambassador Lakhdar Brahimi has been developing plans for the new government, its structure, selection process, and its ultimate composition. Later today, in my capacity as our Permanent Representative to the United Nations, I plan to attend Ambassador Brahimi’s briefing to the Security Council about his proposals, which will be followed by a discussion within the Security Council. I would simply note that over the past two and a half years, I have had the opportunity to work with Ambassador Brahimi on the post-conflict situation in Afghanistan. I have a great deal of respect for his ability to engage disparate, even warring, groups and move them toward productive dialogue, consensus and the 7
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establishment of viable political institutions. We will remain engaged with Ambassador Brahimi in the critical weeks ahead. The prospect of legitimacy that the United Nations can bring to the process of political reconciliation is a point of crucial interest in both the region and the broader international community. With an expanded United Nations role in the political arena, I believe that it will be easier to generate the international support that the successful rehabilitation of Iraq requires. Secretary General Annan’s and Ambassador Brahimi’s contributions may well open the door to creative thinking about ways in which the international community, as well as the Coalition, can further contribute to the process of rehabilitating Iraq, both politically and economically. I want to be clear that a vital United Nations role does not come at the expense of the United States’ influence or interests. Our efforts can be well coordinated and complementary; there is ample evidence across a broad range of situations that a strong partnership with the international community, including the United Nations organization is in our strategic interest. 8
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TRANSITION FROM CPA TO EMBASSY Mr. Chairman, I am impressed with the work of the Interagency Transition Planning Team, led by Ambassador Ricciardone and Lt. General Kicklighter, to structure our U.S. Mission in Iraq so that it will be prepared to pursue these objectives and carry forward the valuable work of the CPA. We anticipate about 1000 direct-hire Americans serving under the Ambassador’s authority. Drawingon the resources and skills of all USG agencies present in Iraq, we will represent U.S. interests and offer support to the people and government of Iraq as theyrenew their country.Mr. Chairman, I have the greatest respect and admiration for Ambassador Bremer’s accomplishments in Iraq under the most difficult circumstances. He is a personal friend as well as a colleague and I value highly his historic contribution to our efforts in Iraq. However, my role in Iraq will be fundamentally different from that of Ambassador Bremer. Whereas the CPA is the ultimate political authority inIraq, the Embassy will be in a supportive, as opposed to a commanding role. Also, the Mission will be distinctly American, in contrast to the multinational character of the CPA. Nevertheless, we will continue our close relationship with 9
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our coalition partners, multilateral organizations, and NGOs, who are all vital to the advancement of our common interests. In regular consultation with the Secretary of State, I will provide policy direction and coordination for all USG activities in Iraq, with the exception of operations by U.S. forces under the area military commander. First among theduties of the Ambassador is to provide a safe environment for our Mission personnel. I recognize that we are deploying civilians to Iraq in a wartimeenvironment - circumstances from which we normally evacuate our people. I willwork closely with the U.S. area military commander to ensure the security of our personnel.CONCLUSION As momentous as the transition to sovereignty for an Interim Government of Iraq will be, we should bear in mind that we are still in the early phase of Iraq’s reconstruction and rehabilitation. The conclusion of the Coalition Provisional Authority on June 30 will mark a vital step towards realizing an independent, democratic and stable Iraq, at peace with its neighbors. I see my mission as working to assist the people and the government of Iraq to achieve these noble goals, while at the same time seeking to ensure that the resources of 10
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the American people, voted by our Congress to support our efforts, are wisely and efficiently utilized. With our help, the people of Iraq can overcome the trauma of Saddam’s brutality and the intimidation of violent extremists seeking to derail the progress they have made so far. But for these policies to succeed, we will need to proceed with resolve, constancy and unity of purpose. If confirmed, I will do my utmost to serve the Administration and the American people to these ends I look forward to working closely with the Congress in that effort. Thank you. 11"

Ghali Hassan: Who is John Negroponte?

2005-02-17T07:55:00.000-08:00

Ghali Hassan: Who is John Negroponte?: "Ambassador to Death Squads
Who is John Negroponte?
By GHALI HASSAN

The White House has appointed Mr. John Dimitris Negroponte to be United States ambassador to Iraq. He will preside over the largest embassy in the world, and housed in the Republic Palace (misleadingly named Saddam's Palace by the U.S. occupation). He will be protected by high concrete walls, barbed wires and more than 150,000 occupation force, including several thousands of foreign mercenaries armed to the teeth with the most violent tools. Mr. Negroponte is Greek-American diplomat. He is currently leading the diplomatic war against the people of Iraq as the U.S. envoy at the United Nations (UN) in New York. Negroponte is Jewish. A friend in Spain expressed his deep concern to me recently: " to appoint a Jew as ambassador to the Arab country that has been devastated because of the will of a cabal of Jewish neocons headed by Wolfowitz Bush is just an accessory -, is like trying to put off a fire using buckets of gasoline".

Mr. Negroponte has served as U.S. Ambassador to Honduras from 1981-1985; a period during which the U.S. military aid to Honduras grew from $5 million to nearly $100 million, and more than $200 million in economic aid, making Honduras the largest aid recipient in the region. Honduras was the launching pad from which the Reagan administration runs its violent "war on terror" in Central American. The U.S-backed atrocities and terror were condemned by the International World Court in the Hague (1). Like most of his colleagues in the Bush administration, Mr. Negroponte is a "recycled reaganites".

At the time Mr. Negroponte was in Honduras, Honduras was a military dictatorship. Kidnapping, rape, torture and executions of dissidents was rampant. The military top and middle ranks were U.S-trained at the School of the Americas (SOA), the Harvard version of the CIA, based in Fort Benning, Georgia. According to Human Rights Watch, graduates of the SOA are responsible for the worst human rights abuses and torture of dissidents in Latin America. Some of its 60,000 graduates are notorious Manuel Noriega and Omar Torrijos of Panama, Leopoldo Galtieri and Roberto Viola of Argentina, Juan Velasco Alvarado of Peru, Guillermo Rodriguez of Ecuador, Hugo Banzer Suarez of Bolivia and Gustavo Álvarez Martínez, Honduras security police chief and later Honduran top military commander.

In Honduras the army intelligence unit, Battalion 3-16, which was involved in kidnappings, rape, torture and killing of suspected dissidents. In 1995 Gary Cohn and Ginger Thompson of The Baltimore Sun unearthed massive and substantiated evidence from various sources pointing the finger at Mr. Negroponte knowledge of the crimes. The reporters also found that hundreds of Hondurans "were kidnapped, tortured and killed in the 1980s by a secret army unit trained and supported by the CIA"(2). Reliable evidence from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Honduras alleged that Negroponte oversaw the expansion of U.S training camp and military base on Honduran territory, where US-trained Contras terrorists, and where the military secretly detained, tortured and executed Honduran suspected dissidents.

During his years in Honduras, Negroponte acquired a reputation, justified, as an old-fashioned imperialist, and devoted to Realpolitik (3). Mr. Negroponte will bring to Iraq his version of "democracy" à la Latin America, where the people vote for one of two candidates every half decade, in which civilian leaders have to obey U.S-controlled militaries or face dismissal by military force. Mr. Negroponte will find the Iraqi soil fertile for his version of democracy and human rights. The U.S. administration turn blind eye to violations of human rights by their own troops and mercenaries. Nazi's methods of torture, sexual abuses and murder of Iraqi prisoners by the racist soldiers of the occupying forces are in use immediately after the invasion and occupation of the Iraq.

The occupying powers also ignores the criminal activities of four militia thugs, which according to exile Iraqis have murdered many Iraqi academics and intellectuals. The Iraqi-born novelist and artist Haifa Zangana wrote in the Guardian of London: "the peshmergas of the two Kurdish parties; the Badr brigade of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq; Ahmed Chalabi's troops; and the ex-Ba'athist Mukhabarats under Iyad Alawi's national accord. These militias are run by members of the IGC and no one can touch them"(4). The occupying powers have not put an end to these violent crimes.

Recently, Mr. Negroponte talked about: "real dialogue between our military commanders, the new Iraqi government and, I think, the United States mission as well". He said: "the American military is going to have the freedom to act in their self-defence, and they are going to be free to operate in Iraq as they best see fit". Negroponte stint at the UN was to shield Israel crimes against the Palestinians, and to coerce smaller nations at the Security Council exercising the threat of U.S. power.

Negroponte diplomatic responsibilities were appalling. Democracy and human rights are not on Negroponte preferred menu. Negroponte will be serving the interests of U.S. tyranny and U.S. Corporations in Iraq. Negroponte will bring to Iraq the economic disasters inflicted on the people of Latin America by the U.S. and U.S-backed corporations. Negroponte is not suitable to serve in the current political environment of Iraq.

[1]. Noam Chomsky, Terror and Just Response, www.chomsky.info/articles/20020702.

[2]. Gary Cohn & Ginger Thompson, Former envoy to Honduras says he did what he could, The Baltimore Sun, December 15, 1995.

[3]. Stephen Kinzer, Our Man in Honduras, The New York Review of Books, 48(14), September 2001.

[4]. Haifa Zangana, The Enemy within, The Guardian, 10 April 2004.

Ghali Hassan is in the Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia. Hassan@exchange.curtin.edu.au"

Stop Human Rights Obstructer John Negroponte

2005-02-17T07:53:00.000-08:00

Stop Human Rights Obstructer John Negroponte: "Stop Human Rights Obstructer John Negroponte
Act immediately to prevent Senate approval of
Negroponte for Ambassador to the UN

This alert is circulated by the:
Nicaragua Network
Witness for Peace
Quest for Peace
Please contact the Nicaragua Network for more information at 202-544-9355 or nicanet@afgj.org.

Alert Includes:

1. Introduction
2. Background on John Negroponte, nominee for Ambassador to UN
3. Suggested actions (mailing or calling your senator)

1) Introduction
George W. Bush’s presidency has begun with a return to the Reagan-era agenda. Of concern to those of us in the Latin American solidarity community has been his unapologetic attempt to revive Cold War diplomacy through the nomination of former Iran Contra criminals to key diplomatic posts. Reagan-era Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams has been selected as the National Security Council’s senior director for democracy, human rights and international operations (a post which does not require Senate approval). Some might remember that Abrams pled guilty to two misdemeanor counts of lying to Congress during the Iran Contra hearings and was subsequently pardoned by George Bush, Sr.

Though we cannot prevent Abrams’ return to prominence, we can keep out former U.S. Ambassador to Honduras John Negroponte who played a significant role in the CIA-sponsored terrorism of Hondurans during the Nicaraguan Contra War. The Bush administration has officially nominated Negroponte to be U.S. Ambassador to the UN, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is preparing to hold nomination hearings before the close of July.

This nomination is particularly egregious now that the international community has issued a vote of no confidence in U.S. human rights promotion by dropping our country from the UN Human Rights Commission. John Negroponte deliberately falsified State Department human rights reports throughout his time in Honduras. U.S. missionaries and many people of faith and conscience were murdered by the CIA-trained Honduran Battalion 3-16, which Negroponte at best overlooked and at worst oversaw. His nomination is an outrage, but sadly, it will pass through with minimal resistance unless constituents do something about it.

2) Background of John Negroponte
The New York Times credits John Negroponte with "carrying out the covert strategy of the Reagan administration to crush the Sandinista government in Nicaragua" during his tenure as U.S. Ambassador to Honduras from 1981 and 1985. He oversaw the growth of military aid to Honduras from $4 million to $77.4 million a year. In early 1984, two U.S. mercenaries, Thomas Posey and Dana Parker, contacted Negroponte, stating they wanted to supply arms to the Contra army after the U.S. Congress had banned governmental add. Documents show that Negroponte connected the two with a contact in the Honduran military. The operation was exposed nine months later, at which point the Reagan administration denied any U.S. government involvement, despite Negroponte’s contact earlier that year. Other documents uncovered a scheme of Negroponte and then-Vice President George Bush to funnel Contra aid money through the Honduran government.

In addition to his work with the Nicaraguan Contra army, Negroponte helped conceal from Congress the murder, kidnapping and torture abuses of a CIA-equipped and -trained Honduran military unit, Battalion 3-16. No mention of these human rights violations ever appeared in State Department Human Rights reports for Honduras. The Baltimore Sun reports that Efrain Diaz Arrivillaga, then a delegate in the Honduran Congress and a voice of dissent, told the Sun that he complained to Negroponte on numerous occasions about the Honduran military’s human rights abuses. Rick Chidester, a junior embassy official under Negroponte, reported to the Sun that he was forced to omit an exhaustive gathering of human rights violations from his 1982 State Department report. Sister Laetitia Bordes went on a fact-finding delegation to Honduras in May 1982 to investigate the whereabouts of 32 Salvadoran nuns and women of faith who fled to Honduras in 1981 after Archbishop Oscar Romero’s assassination. Negroponte claimed the embassy knew nothing, but in 1996, Negroponte’s predecessor Jack Binns reported that the women had been captured, tortured, and then crammed into helicopters from which they were tossed to their deaths.

According to the Los Angeles Times, shortly after Negroponte’s nomination was decided, the U.S. government revoked the visa of General Luis Alonso Discua Elvir, who was Honduras’ deputy ambassador to the UN. General Discua was the commander of the Battalion during Negroponte’s tenure as ambassador. He has publicly claimed to have information linking Negroponte with the battalion’s activities. His testimony would be invaluable in illuminating Negroponte’s collusion with Honduran opponents on Capitol Hill. In 1994, the Honduran Human Rights Commission charged Negroponte personally with several human rights abuses.

On August 27, 1997, CIA Inspector General Frederick P. Hitz released a 211-page classified report entitled "Selected Issues Relating to CIA Activities in Honduras in the 1980s." This report was partly declassified on October 22, 1998, in response to persistent demands by the Honduran human rights ombudsman. You can read parts of the document on the National Security Archives website. Only senators and their staff who have security clearance can read the report in its entirety. It is absolutely critical that every senator read and consider the entire report before approving Negroponte’s nomination. Negroponte is highly respected in diplomatic circles as "a man who speaks five languages but knows when to keep silent." Due to his urbane temperament and broad support in the professional diplomatic field, it will be very tempting for senators to whisk his nomination through.

3) Suggested Actions
In order to effectively oppose Negroponte’s nomination and its tremendous repercussions, grassroots activists must be vigilant in persistently communicating their opposition with their senators. At this moment, staffers for senators on the Foreign Relations Committee are gathering materials and issuing subpoenas for the hearing on Negroponte’s nomination. Due to their placement on the Foreign Relations Committee, the following senators’ support is particularly important:

Joseph Biden (D), DE, Chair 202-224-5042, senator@biden.senate.gov"
Barbara Boxer (D), CA 202-224-3553, senator@boxer.senate.gov
Christopher Dodd (D), CT 202-224-2823, senator@dodd.senate.gov
Richard Lugar (R), IN 202-224-4814, senator_lugar@lugar.senate.gov
Sam Brownback (R), KS 202-224-6521 senator@brownback.senate.gov
Paul Sarbanes (D), MD 202-224-4524, senator@sarbanes.senate.gov
John Kerry (D), MA 202-224-2742, senator@kerry.senate.gov
Paul Wellstone (D), MN 202- 224-5641, senator@wellstone.senate.gov
Charles Hagel (R), NE 202-224-4224, senator@hagel.senate.gov
Robert Torricelli (D), NJ 202-224-3224, senator@torricelli.senate.gov
Gordon Smith (R), OR 202-224-3753, senator@smith.senate.gov
Lincoln Chafee (R), RI 202-224-2921, senator@chafee.senate.gov
Bill Frist (R), TN 202-224-3344, senator@frist.senate.gov
Russell Feingold (D), WI 202-224-5323, senator@feingold.senate.gov
Craig Thomas (R), WY 202-224-6441, senator@thomas.senate.gov

If you don’t live in one of these states, please still call your senator as the nomination will go to the Senate floor for debate and vote if it is approved in the Foreign Relations Committee."

John Dimitri Negroponte

2005-02-17T07:50:00.000-08:00

John Dimitri Negroponte: "John Dimitri Negroponte

No Frames | Español

John Negroponte was ambassador to Honduras from 1981-1985. As such he supported and carried out a US-sponsored policy of violations to human rights and international law. Among other things he supervised the creation of the El Aguacate air base, where the US trained Nicaraguan Contras during the 1980's. The base was used as a secret detention and torture center, in August 2001 excavations at the base discovered the first of the corpses of the 185 people, including two Americans, who are thought to have been killed and buried at this base.

During his ambassadorship, human rights violations in Honduras became systematic. The infamous Battalion 316, trained by the CIA and Argentine military, kidnaped, tortured and killed hundreds of people. Negroponte knew about these human rights violations and yet continued to collaborate with them, while lying to Congress.

President George W. Bush has nominated Negroponte to be US ambassador before the UN. Human Rights organizations in the US and Latin America have joined their voices in asking the US Senate to not ratify his nomination. Please join us!

Actions

Stop Human Rights Obstructer John Negroponte
Please contact the US senate to oppose his nomination!

Online Petition Against Negroponte Nomination

Information

CIA & Argentina Military Activities in Honduras
Honduras Documentation Project
National Security Archives
In Search of Hidden Truth
An Interim Report on Declassification by the National Commissioner for Human Rights in Honduras

Negroponte Profile
by Foreign Policy In Focus

Interview with John Negroponte
National Security Archive
Baltimore Sun 1995 Series About US activities in Honduras

When a wave of torture and murder staggered a small U.S. ally, truth was a casualty.
Glimpses of the 'disappeared'
Torturers' confessions
A survivor tells her story
How a journalist was silenced
A carefully crafted deception
Former envoy to Honduras says he did what he could."

Background: John D. Negroponte

2005-02-17T07:48:00.000-08:00

Background: John D. Negroponte: "Background: John D. Negroponte

By The Associated Press
NAME -- John Dimitri Negroponte.

AGE; BIRTH DATE -- 65; born July 21, 1939, in London.

EDUCATION -- B.A., Yale University, 1960.

EXPERIENCE -- Ambassador to Iraq, 2004-present; ambassador to the United Nations, 2001-2004; executive vice president, McGraw-Hill Cos., 1997-2001; ambassador to the Philippines, 1993-96; ambassador to Mexico, 1989-93; deputy national security adviser, 1987-89; assistant secretary of state, oceans, international environmental, scientific affairs, 1985-1987; ambassador to Honduras, 1981-85; deputy assistant secretary of state, East Asian and Pacific affairs, 1980-81; deputy assistant secretary of state, oceans and fisheries, 1977-79.

FAMILY -- Wife, Diana; five children."

AP Wire | 02/17/2005 | Bush Nominates Negroponte As Intel Chief

2005-02-17T07:47:00.000-08:00

AP Wire | 02/17/2005 | Bush Nominates Negroponte As Intel Chief: "Bush Nominates Negroponte As Intel Chief

KATHERINE SHRADER

Associated Press

WASHINGTON - President Bush on Thursday named John Negroponte, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and currently the administration's top representative in Iraq, to be America's first national intelligence director.

Announcing the move, Bush said that Negroponte understands global intelligence needs because he's had a long career in the foreign service. Bush said Negroponte will be his primary briefer on intelligence matters and will make decisions on the budget.

"John will make sure that those whose duty it is to defend America have the information we need to make the right decisions," the president said. "We're going to stop the terrorists before they strike."

Negroponte said he plans to "reform of the intelligence community in ways designed to best meet the intelligence needs of the 21st century."

He called the new job "the most challenging assignment I have undertaken in more than 40 years of government service." Said Bush: "He understands the power centers in Washington."

Bush named Lt. Gen. Mike Hayden, who has served as director of the National Security Agency since March 1999, as Negroponte's deputy. He is the longest serving director of the secretive codebreaking agency and has pushed for changes, such as asking longtime agency veterans to retire and increasing reliance on technology contractors.

"If we're going to stop the terrorists before they strike," Bush said, "we must ensure that our intelligence agencies work as a single, unified enterprise."

Negroponte, 65, was at the United Nations when he was tapped to take on the delicate job of transforming the U.S. presence in Iraq from that of an occupier to that of an adviser. Bush chose him for the job last April and he went to Baghdad hours after the handover of sovereignty to Iraq's interim government.

Negroponte has also been ambassador to the Philippines, Mexico and Honduras.

Even before the name was revealed, White House press secretary Scott McClellan defended the lengthy period of time it took to find a nominee.

"This is a position of critical importance and the president wanted to make sure he gets it right," Bush's spokesman said. "This individual will have the full authority to do the job that needs to be done and will have the full confidence of the president of the United States."

The Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks on New York and Washington were the impetus for legislation passed by Congress and signed by Bush, creating the new position. The bill represented the most sweeping intelligence legislation in over 50 years.

The director of national intelligence will hold a pre-eminent role in U.S. national security affairs and coordinate the work of all 15 U.S. intelligence agencies.

In a statement, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican Pat Roberts of Kansas, said he was pleased by the selection of Negroponte and Hayden.

"Both have significant national security and intelligence backgrounds. When the ambassador called me this morning, he told me he looks forward to appearing before the committee for his confirmation hearing and seeking our advice as we move forward with the new intelligence reform legislation," Roberts said. "We will hold the ambassadors' confirmation hearing as soon as his duties in Iraq are completed."

Roberts spokeswoman Sarah Little said Negroponte told the senator he would need to return to Iraq to tie up issues there. Little said that Roberts believes the confirmation may be weeks away.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said he was pleased that Bush was filling the positions and said that Negroponte's post "will fill an important role in the transition of our intelligence gathering community, making our country even safer at a time when the terrorist threat is still very real."

As ambassador to the United Nations, Negroponte helped win unanimous approval of a Security Council resolution that demanded Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein comply with U.N. mandates to disarm. Negroponte worked to expand the role for international security forces in Afghanistan after the overthrow of the Taliban government.

Negroponte's confirmation to the United Nations post was delayed a half-year mostly because of criticism of his record as the U.S. ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985. In Honduras, he played a prominent role in assisting the Contras in Nicaragua in their war with the left-wing Sandinista government.

Human rights groups alleged that Negroponte acquiesced in human rights abuses by Honduran death squads funded and partly trained by the CIA. Negroponte testified during the hearings for the U.N. post that he did not believe death squads were operating in Honduras.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., reacting to the news, said, "The number one problem that has plagued our domestic war on terror is that the individual agencies responsible for intelligence gathering still don't share. It is my hope that the president will give the resources and authority to Ambassador Negroponte to turn things around in our disconnected intelligence community."

In the past year, the intelligence community has been faced with a series of negative reports, including the work of the Sept. 11 commission and the Senate Intelligence Committee's inquiry on the flawed Iraq intelligence. And next month, Bush's commission to investigate the intelligence community's capabilities on weapons of mass destruction is also expected to submit its findings.

Associated Press writer Lara Jakes Jordan contributed to this story."

About the Ambassador - U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq

2005-02-17T07:44:00.000-08:00

About the Ambassador - U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq: "Ambassador
Biography of Ambassador John D. Negroponte
United States Ambassador to Iraq

Ambassador of the United States to Iraq John D. Negroponte

On May 6, 2004, Ambassador John D. Negroponte was confirmed by the United States Senate to serve as the United States Ambassador to Iraq. Ambassador Negroponte presented his credentials to the Iraqi Interim Government on June 29, 2004.

From September 18, 2001, until his appointment to Iraq, Ambassador Negroponte served as the United States Representative to the United Nations.

From 1997 to 2001, Ambassador Negroponte was employed in the private sector and served as Executive Vice President for Global Markets of The McGraw-Hill Companies.

From 1960 to 1997, Ambassador Negroponte was a member of the Career Foreign Service. He served at eight different Foreign Service posts in Asia, Europe and Latin America; and he also held important positions at the State Department and the White House.

Among his more recent assignments, Ambassador Negroponte was Ambassador to Honduras (1981-1985); Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs (1985-1987); Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (1987-1989); Ambassador to Mexico (1989-1993); and Ambassador to the Philippines (1993-96).

Mr. Negroponte is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the American Academy of Diplomacy. He is a former Chairman of the French-American Foundation.

Ambassador Negroponte is a graduate of Yale University. He and his wife, Diana, have five children."

Break-In At SAIC Compromises 10,000 Past and Present Employees (washingtonpost.com)

2005-02-15T09:25:00.000-08:00

Break-In At SAIC Risks ID Theft (washingtonpost.com) " Break-In At SAIC Risks ID Theft
Computers Held Personal Data on Employee-Owners

By Griff Witte
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 12, 2005; Page E01

Some of the nation's most influential former military and intelligence officials have been informed in recent days that they are at risk of identity theft after a break-in at a major government contractor netted computers containing the Social Security numbers and other personal information about tens of thousands of past and present company employees.

The contractor, employee-owned Science Applications International Corp. of San Diego, handles sensitive government contracts, including many in information security. It has a reputation for hiring Washington's most powerful figures when they leave the government, and its payroll has been studded with former secretaries of defense, CIA directors and White House counterterrorism advisers.

Those former officials -- along with the rest of a 45,000-person workforce in which a significant percentage of employees hold government security clearances -- were informed last week that their private information may have been breached and they need to take steps to protect themselves from fraud.

David Kay, who was chief weapons inspector in Iraq after nearly a decade as an executive at SAIC, said he has devoted more than a dozen hours to shutting down accounts and safeguarding his finances. He said the successful theft of personal data, by thieves who smashed windows to gain access, does not speak well of a company that is devoted to keeping the government's secrets secure.

"I just find it unexplainable how anyone could be so casual with such vital information. It's not like we're just now learning that identity theft is a problem," said Kay, who lives in Northern Virginia.

About 16,000 SAIC employees work in the Washington area.

Bobby Ray Inman, former deputy director of the CIA and a former director at SAIC, agreed. "It's worrisome," said Inman, who also received notification of the theft last week. "If the security is sloppy, it raises questions."

Ben Haddad, an SAIC spokesman, said yesterday that the Jan. 25 theft, which the company announced last week, occurred in an administrative building where no sensitive contracting work is performed. Haddad said the company does not know whether the thieves targeted specific computers containing employee information or if they were simply after hardware to sell for cash. In either case, the company is taking no chances.

"We're taking this extremely seriously," Haddad said. "It's certainly not something that would reflect well on any company, let alone a company that's involved in information security. But what can I say? We're doing everything we can to get to the bottom of it."

Gary Hassen of the San Diego Police Department said there were "no leads."

Haddad said surveillance cameras are in the building where the theft took place, but he did not know whether they caught the perpetrators on tape. He also did not know whether the information that was on the pilfered computers had been encrypted.

The stolen information included names, Social Security numbers, addresses, telephone numbers and records of financial transactions. It was stored in a database of past and present SAIC stockholders. SAIC is one of the nation's largest employee-owned companies, with workers each receiving the option to buy SAIC stock through an internal brokerage division known as Bull Inc.

Haddad said the company has been trying through letters and e-mails to get in touch with everyone who has held company stock within the past decade, though he acknowledged that hasn't been easy since many have since left the company.

He said the company would take steps to ensure stockholder information is better protected in the future, but he declined to be specific.

The theft comes at a time when the company, which depends on the federal government for more than 80 percent of its $7 billion annual revenue, is already under scrutiny for its handling of several contracts.

Last week on Capitol Hill, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III testified that the company had botched an attempt to build software for the bureau's new Virtual Case File system. The $170 million upgrade was supposed to allow agents to sift through different cases electronically, but the FBI has said the new system is so outdated that it will probably be scrapped.

In San Antonio, SAIC is fighting the government over charges that the company padded its cost estimates on a $24 million Air Force contract. The case prompted the Air Force to issue an unusual alert to its contracting officials late last year, warning them that "the Department of Justice believes that SAIC is continuing to submit defective cost or pricing data in support of its pricing proposals."

SAIC has defended its work for the FBI and the Air Force. Haddad said that criticisms are inevitable for a such a large company and that there is no pattern of poor performance.

"I know people will try to jump to that kind of conclusion, but it's not an accurate reflection of how well this company is doing," he said. "This company has always prided itself on strong ethics."

The company's alumni list reads like a roll call of the nation's highest-profile former officials, including former defense secretaries William J. Perry and Melvin R. Laird and former CIA director John Deutch. Current directors of the company include former chief counterterrorism adviser Gen. Wayne A. Downing.

Founded by a group of scientists in 1969, SAIC has been growing in recent years at a rapid clip, right along with the government's appetite for high-tech services in information technology and national defense. The company named a new chief executive, Kenneth C. Dahlberg, in 2003, and he has set a goal of doubling the company's value within three to five years, Haddad said.

Philip Finnegan, director of corporate analysis with Teal Group Corp., said SAIC is trying to push into the top tier of contractors -- a rarefied club that includes Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp. -- and that there are bound to be bumps along the way.

"It's inevitable that they'll face problems," he said.

Others are less sure that the company's recent difficulties don't add up to something more. "Is [the break-in] saying something about the quality of the company?" Kay said. "It's hard to say that. It's probably just random luck. But multiple occurrences of bad luck are often more than bad luck.""

Controversial Pentagon Espionage Unit Loses Its Leader (washingtonpost.com)

2005-02-15T08:38:00.000-08:00

Controversial Pentagon Espionage Unit Loses Its Leader (washingtonpost.com): "Controversial Pentagon Espionage Unit Loses Its Leader
Rumsfeld Reportedly Moving Ahead With Plans to Expand Team's Intelligence Work Worldwide

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 13, 2005; Page A08

The leader of a new Pentagon espionage unit has resigned his position, shortly after public disclosure that the Defense Department is expanding into clandestine operations traditionally undertaken by the CIA.

The Strategic Support Branch and its departing leader are controversial among the elite special operations forces assigned to work with them on high-risk intelligence missions overseas, some of whom aired complaints in a Jan. 23 Washington Post story about deficits in the training and performance of the unit's officers. Defense officials with firsthand knowledge said the unit's leader, reserve Army Col. George Waldroup, surprised his staff in the first week of February with an announcement that he was stepping down immediately.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, subordinates said, is pressing ahead with plans for independent Pentagon intelligence operations around the world. The Post disclosed last month that Rumsfeld has reinterpreted U.S. law to grant him broad authority to dispatch clandestine teams into friendly and unfriendly nations, whether or not conventional war is in prospect. Designed to help cure what Rumsfeld described as his "near total dependence on CIA," the Strategic Support Branch gathers intelligence alongside newly empowered forces from the military's Joint Special Operations Command.

In Congress, the House and Senate intelligence committees have held closed briefings in the past two weeks with senior defense officials, including Undersecretary for Intelligence Stephen A. Cambone. In sometimes heated exchanges, witnesses said, members of both parties complained to Cambone about learning from a newspaper account that the Pentagon created a new espionage team more than two years ago, using funds "reprogrammed" from congressional appropriations. Members of Congress also asked about Pentagon legal theories under which defense personnel could conduct "routine" and "traditional" operations without notifying Congress.

Republicans, in public, have said Cambone's answers reassured them, and chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services committees have expressed support for the program.

"I asked very direct questions and got answers to those questions that are satisfactory to me," said Rep. Heather A. Wilson (R-N.M.), a former Air Force officer who chairs the subcommittee on technical and tactical intelligence.

On the condition of anonymity, two Republicans said Cambone did not adequately answer some of the questions about the plans, legal basis and operations of the Pentagon's new intelligence arm. One Republican committee member said Rumsfeld is rushing to create independent capabilities before the arrival of a director of national intelligence, a position created by Congress in December to oversee the 15 U.S. intelligence departments and agencies. Democratic colleagues echoed that sentiment.

"We have just passed a law reorganizing our intelligence capability, and standing up what may be a new operation at DoD, under the radar, could not only undermine the legal requirements to inform Congress but also the new architecture we set up under the intelligence reform bill," said Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the intelligence committee. "I start with the fact that the combination of special operations forces and human intelligence specialists are useful capabilities. However, there's an enormous potential for misuse, especially if Congress is cut out."

In news briefings late last month, defense officials stressed that funding for the unit in its current form was approved by Congress in the 2005 budget, and said they had no intention to evade congressional oversight.

They said confusion had arisen about the program because the name of the effort had changed over time. They also emphasized that the Pentagon was working cooperatively with the CIA in developing the program, not trying to bypass it. After Rumsfeld's initiative was publicized, Vice Adm. Lowell E. Jacoby, the Defense Intelligence Agency director, advised employees in an internal memorandum on Jan. 27 to ignore "innuendos and disparaging remarks" about the agency's new clandestine intelligence branch from critics who "don't know our mission." Jacoby's "Message to the Workforce," a copy of which has been obtained by The Post, acknowledged that after recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, "we recognized that DIA needed to improve HUMINT [human intelligence] support to combatant commanders." It will take time, he said, for the Strategic Support Branch to "increase our ability" to conduct those missions.

During the same week, defense officials said, Jacoby began asking subordinates to account for reported deficiencies in the new organization. Waldroup announced his departure a few days later.

One colleague said Waldroup, who had held the job since summer, blamed enemies in Congress and in what was then known as the Immigration and Naturalization Service, where he spent most of his civilian career. "He was told he needed to hand over his duties," the colleague said.

Waldroup did not reply to messages left by telephone and e-mail.

Don Black, a spokesman for the DIA, said Waldroup, an Army reservist, returned to civilian life last weekend after an initial period of active duty expired. He acknowledged that Waldroup's status was renewable.

"I would not say that it was at anyone's initiative," Black said. "His . . . activation was over, so he was allowed to depart."

Meanwhile, the DIA has stepped up a recruiting campaign for candidates with "outstanding foreign language skills" and "a background in hard science or special operations."

"You are the unseen and hear the unspoken," said one advertisement placed in the Army Times and other newspapers with large military readerships. "You could be anybody, anywhere. You are Intelligence. Be DIA." The accompanying illustration depicts two men in silhouette, conversing at a darkened table with a cityscape featuring an Abrams tank out the window. The job being advertised is "DIA field HUMINT collector," requiring willingness "to fulfill short-term deployments and worldwide assignment."

On the DIA's Web site, an "open continuous" announcement of the same vacancies -- posted Jan. 26 -- called for graduates of the CIA's Field Tradecraft Course or the military's "special mission units," the clandestine squadrons reporting to the U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa.

Leaders of those units -- including the squadrons formerly known as Delta Force -- are escalating their complaints about DIA plans to base the Strategic Support Branch at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. The special operations teams are based at four locations including Norfolk and the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, about 1,500 miles away."

Yahoo! News - President Bush Implicated In Drug Scandal

2005-02-07T19:25:00.000-08:00

Yahoo! News - White House: Bush Unaware of Steroid Abuse: "White House: Bush Unaware of Steroid Abuse

Mon Feb 7, 6:32 PM ET
WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) was not aware of any steroid use by Texas Rangers (news) players while he was a team executive, the White House said Monday.

In his upcoming book, Jose Canseco said he introduced Rafael Palmeiro, Ivan Rodriguez and Juan Gonzalez to steroids after being traded to Texas in 1992, the New York Daily News reported. Canseco said Bush, the Rangers' managing partner at the time, must have known about the drugs.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said he spoke to Bush about alleged steroid use.

"If there was, he was not aware of it at the time," McClellan said.

"He has recognized, for some time now, that steroids is a growing problem in professional sports, particularly Major League Baseball," he said. "That's why the president has made addressing the issue a priority in his administration."

Canseco's book, "Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big," is scheduled for release by Regan Books on Feb. 21. A company spokesman has said the date might be moved up.

Palmeiro, now playing for Baltimore, disputed Canseco's claim.

"I categorically deny any assertion made by Jose Canseco that I used steroids," Palmeiro said in a statement. "At no point in my career have I ever used steroids, let alone any substance banned by Major League Baseball.

"As I have never had a personal relationship with Canseco, any suggestion that he taught me anything, about steroid use or otherwise, is ludicrous. We were teammates and that was the extent of our relationship. I am saddened that he felt it necessary to attempt to tarnish my image and that of the game I love."

Gonzalez's agent, Alan Nero, said, "Our immediate reaction is we feel sorry for Jose, that he felt he had to do this for whatever reason. And we feel badly for everyone he implicated in this."

"We have not seen the book, and will wait until we see it to comment further," Nero said.

Rodriguez signed with Detroit last season. Tigers president Dave Dombrowski said the team had no comment on the report.

Canseco also claims he injected former Oakland teammate Mark McGwire with steroids. McGwire has denied using steroids.

"I have always told the truth and I am saddened I continue to face this line of questioning," McGwire told the Daily News."

The New York Times > Senate Intelligence Institutes "Anti-Stovepiping" Panel

2005-02-05T19:42:00.000-08:00

The New York Times > Washington > Panel Directs New Scrutiny of Intelligence Aimed at Iran: "Panel Directs New Scrutiny of Intelligence Aimed at Iran
By DOUGLAS JEHL

Published: February 6, 2005

ASHINGTON, Feb. 5 - The Senate Intelligence Committee is directing new critical attention at American intelligence on Iran and other hot spots, as part of an attempt to pre-empt any recurrence of the problems that marred prewar reporting on Iraq, Congressional officials said Saturday.

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The officials said the effort would include scrutiny of sources being used by intelligence agencies as the basis for their conclusions about Iran, including whether it is trying to develop nuclear arms. The Central Intelligence Agency believes that Iran may be within one to three years of having all the ingredients necessary to make a nuclear bomb.

In a report last summer, the Senate committee was scathing in its conclusions about American intelligence on Iraq, saying that prewar assertions that Baghdad possessed chemical and biological weapons had not been supported by information available at the time. The Congressional officials said the effort now under way reflected some skepticism about intelligence on Iran.

Both Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas, the Republican chairman of the panel, and Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia, the panel's top Democrat, have approved the new approach, the officials said. They described the scrutiny as part of an attempt to focus the committee's oversight efforts on high-priority threats, including terrorism, weapons proliferation and North Korea, as well as Iran.

The effort was reported Saturday by The Los Angeles Times. The newspaper quoted Mr. Roberts as having said in an interview that "we have to be more pre-emptive on this committee to try to look ahead and determine our capabilities so that you don't get stuck with a situation like you did with Iraq."

In recent interviews, current and former intelligence officials have acknowledged that American knowledge of Iran is limited, despite the fact that the C.I.A. and other agencies have devoted an immense amount of resources to learning about the country in the quarter-century since a pro-American government there was toppled.

Aides to Mr. Roberts and Mr. Rockefeller said Saturday that it would be inaccurate to characterize the oversight effort as a formal review. In a statement relayed by a spokeswoman, Mr. Rockefeller said: "One of the lessons we learned from Iraq was not to take all information at face value and to ask more questions in the beginning rather than in the end. Now is the time for us to be looking at the quality of the information we are getting and making sure that we have enough resources, and the right resources, focused on the problem." The statement also said, "We can't make the same mistakes we made before."

The committee effort appears to run parallel with a formal inquiry being carried out by a presidential commission that is due to report by the end of March on the state of intelligence about the proliferation of illicit weapons. That inquiry, led by Laurence H. Silberman, a federal judge, and Charles S. Robb, the former Democratic senator and governor from Virginia, has been carried out in private but is believed to focus on case studies including Iraq, Iran, North Korea and Libya.

In his State of the Union address on Wednesday, President Bush described Iran as "the world's primary state sponsor of terror, pursuing nuclear weapons while depriving its people of the freedom they seek and deserve." Iran has said that its nuclear program is intended entirely for civilian use, but American intelligence agencies have said that it is vigorously pursuing programs to produce nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Congressional officials said the Senate panel would seek to identify any weaknesses in American intelligence on Iran so that any gaps could be filled. The officials declined to speak for the record, saying that they did not want to overshadow the comments made by Mr. Roberts and Mr. Rockefeller."

Viseon Names Christopher Mellon to Advisory Board

2005-01-28T10:57:00.000-08:00

Interactive Video Communication Broadband Videophone by Viseon : News: "Viseon Names Christopher Mellon to Advisory Board
5/11/2004

Tuesday May 11, 11:17 am ET

DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 11, 2004--Viseon, Inc. (OTCBB:VSNI - News), a global developer of broadband personal video communications solutions, today announced that Christopher Mellon, former United States Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, has joined the Viseon Advisory Board. Mr. Mellon is also an adjunct Professor of Security Studies at Georgetown University in Washington.
"One of the most pressing challenges facing our government is to promote collaboration among the numerous federal agencies that have security functions, and between the Federal government and State and local municipalities. The VisiFone brings people together, reliably and at low-cost, regardless of where they sit physically or bureaucratically. It has enormous potential to help fix the communications and coordination problems that were revealed after the tragic events of 9/11," commented Mellon.

John Harris, Viseon´s president and CEO, welcomed Mr. Mellon to the Advisory Board, "Washington is a complex place, but certainly one in which we hope to make further inroads in the coming year. We expect that Mr. Mellon´s guidance will be instrumental in achieving long-term revenues within this large market for visual communications systems."

Mr. Mellon is the recipient of a number of prestigious awards including the Secretary of Defense Meritorious Public Service Award, the Secretary of Defense Outstanding Public Service Medal and the Defense Intelligence Agency Director´s Medal. Mr. Mellon served on Capitol Hill, including 10 years as a staff member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and within the Defense Department for almost five years until April 2004.

About The VisiFone

The VisiFone(TM) is a low-cost broadband videophone. It is a self-contained system that does not require a PC or any external equipment. The VisiFone operates on any broadband connection and home or office network including high-speed Internet connections via DSL or cable modem. The VisiFone is H.323 or SIP compliant and delivers up to 30 frames per second video and quality audio utilizing 128k to 512k of bandwidth. It is compatible with corporate video conferencing systems and the VisiFone can be used by the over 25 million broadband connected U.S. homes. The suggested retail price for the VisiFone is $599.

About Viseon

Viseon has been developing, manufacturing and patenting video communication technologies for use by corporations, universities and government agencies since 1994. Its products have been sold under various brand names around the world including Philips and VTEL. Viseon recently announced a strategy to deliver TV-quality broadband videophones to consumers and businesses directly and through relationships with broadband providers. Viseon currently owns U.S. patent numbers 5,802,281, 6,073,192, 6,397,275, 6,519,662 and number 6,654,825. Viseon also has additional patents in Europe and Asia.

Forward-Looking Information
Information in this news release includes forward-looking statements made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties including, without limitation, adverse business or market conditions, the ability to secure and satisfy customers, the availability and cost of materials from suppliers, adverse competitive developments, change in or cancellation of customer requirements, and other risks detailed from time to time as set forth in applicable SEC filings."

Neocon Hatchet Job on SSCI's Christopher Mellon

2005-01-28T10:51:00.000-08:00

Investigative Report
Democrats Subvert War Intelligence - Insight on the News - National: "Investigative Report
Democrats Subvert War Intelligence
Posted Dec. 22, 2003
By J. Michael Waller

Mellon, above, is using his position as Democrat staff chief on the Senate intelligence panel to undermine the leadership of Rumsfeld, Feith and Bolton.

It's one of the unsolved political mysteries of 2003: Exactly who drew up the plan for Democrats to abuse the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) as a stealth weapon to undermine and discredit President George W. Bush and the U.S. war effort in Iraq?

The plot, authored by aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), vice chairman of the committee, has poisoned the working atmosphere of a crucial legislative panel in a time of war, Senate sources say. It centered on duping the panel's Republican chairman, Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, into approving probes that in actuality would be fishing expeditions inside the State Department and Pentagon. The authors hoped to dig up and hype "improper or questionable conduct by administration officials." According to a staff memo, the committee then would release the information during the course of the "investigation," with Democrats providing their "additional views" that would, "among other things, castigate the majority [Republicans] for seeking to limit the scope of the inquiry."

In other words, they would manufacture and denounce a cover-up where none existed. The Democrats then would drag the issue through the 2004 presidential campaign by creating an independent commission to investigate, according to the memo.

The plan, made public by Fox News on Nov. 6, went like this: "Prepare to launch an independent investigation when it becomes clear we have exhausted the opportunity to usefully collaborate with the majority. We can pull the trigger on an independent investigation at any time - but we can only do so once. The best time to do so will probably be [in 2004]."

Even before the memo was written, Rockefeller's staff already was off on its own, well outside the traditional bipartisan channels. According to the memo, the "FBI Niger investigation" of reports that Saddam Hussein's regime had tried to buy uranium from West Africa "was done solely at the request of the vice chairman."

The plan wrecked more than two-and-a-half decades of unique bipartisanship on the SSCI, whose job is to oversee the CIA and the rest of the nation's intelligence services. In fact the SSCI, according to the Wall Street Journal after the revelation, was "one of the last redoubts of peaceful coexistence in Congress." But that bipartisanship ended last year when Democrats demanded that the committee staff be split. Instead of reporting directly to the chairman, it now was bifurcated, with Republicans answering to the GOP chairman and Democrats working for the Democratic vice chairman. Roberts didn't like the change, warning at the time that the Democrats wanted to divide the committee into "partisan camps." But the Republicans caved and the staff director of the Democrats, Christopher Mellon, built his own autonomous apparatus.

Insight has pieced together how the Democrats' fishing expedition worked. According to insiders, Mellon, a former Clinton administration official, is part of a network of liberal operatives within the Pentagon and CIA who reportedly are seeking to discredit and politically disable some of the nation's most important architects of the war on terrorism and their efforts to keep weapons of mass destruction from falling into terrorist hands. Mellon already was a SSCI staffer when the Clinton administration tapped him to work as a deputy to the assistant secretary of defense for C3I (command, control, communications and intelligence), where he was responsible for security and information operations. In the C3I office, where he held a civilian rank equivalent to a three-star general, Mellon worked on intelligence-policy issues, or in the words of a former colleague, Cheryl J. Roby, "things like personnel, training and recruiting for intelligence." The office is under the purview of the undersecretary of defense for policy, a post now held by conservative Douglas J. Feith.

Clinton-era personnel reforms allowed officials of his administration to burrow into vital Pentagon posts as careerists, administration officials say, where they have been maneuvering to keep Bush loyalists out of key positions and/or undermine their authority while pushing their own political agendas that run contrary to those of the president. This network, Insight has discovered, extends to the Pentagon's outer reaches such as the National Defense University and far-flung academic and influential policy think tanks, or "CINC tanks," serving the commanders ("CINCs") of the U.S. military theaters around the world [see "Clinton Undead Haunting Pentagon," June 17, 2002].

Senate and Department of Defense (DoD) colleagues say Mellon has a beef against Feith and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, under whom he served briefly until the new Bush administration made its full transition into office. Intelligence sources say he tried to keep conservatives out of key Pentagon posts and to undermine tough antiterrorism policies after 9/11. Back at the SSCI, Mellon's chief targets for criticism have been Feith and his like-minded State Department colleague, Undersecretary of State John Bolton, who holds the nonproliferation portfolio. Both Feith and Bolton are strong supporters of President Bush's advocacy of "regime change" for rogue states and are considered to be among the most faithful advocates in the administration of his personal policy positions.

DoD civilians loyal to the president have complained for more than two years about Mellon, both while he was at the Pentagon and at his new perch in the Senate. Upon his return to the SSCI, bipartisan staff cooperation broke down almost completely. "The parties aren't talking to one another," according to a committee source. After the memo became public, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) ordered an end to cooperation with the Democrats on the Iraq investigations.

Mellon's public record doesn't indicate any hard-core partisan leanings, showing instead a bipartisanship as a sometime floater on the liberal Republican side. Federal Election Commission records show he donated $1,000 to the George H.W. Bush re-election campaign in 1993 and $1,000 to the Republican National Committee in 1992. In his first tour on the Senate intelligence committee, he served as an appointee of the late liberal Sen. John Chafee (R-R.I.) when George Tenet, a Democrat who now is director of the CIA, was committee staff director. Mellon then took the C3I post at the Pentagon when William Cohen, the liberal Republican senator from Maine, became secretary of defense for Clinton.

So what might have motivated Mellon to become involved in the memo scandal to politicize the intelligence committee against the current president? Mellon did not return Insight calls for comment.

Asked whether Mellon wrote the plan, Rockefeller's spokeswoman Wendy Morigi did not attempt to exonerate the staff director. "The senator has not stated who the author of that memo is," Morigi said, "and I don't think he intends to." She spoke with Rockefeller and then called Insight again to say Sen. Rockefeller would not comment.

In any case Rockefeller, a strong liberal who had enjoyed a reputation of bipartisanship on committee matters, surprised colleagues when he allowed the Democrats on the committee staff

to use the supersecret body as a political weapon. Sources with firsthand knowledge say that Rockefeller broke the committee's bipartisan custom of requesting information from government agencies over the signatures of the chairman, representing the majority party, and the vice chairman, representing the minority.

"Rockefeller sent out his own request for information - the first time a request to the administration for information was not signed by both the chairman and vice chairman of the committee," according to a source involved with the requests. The source says the requests were worded in ways designed to elicit specific answers of a sensitive nature. When the senior Pentagon and State Department officials answered the requests, Democrats on the intelligence committee "leaked it, though some of it was top secret," the source said without citing examples.

When the targeted officials caught on to the game, Senate Democrats led by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), a scrappy SSCI member, denounced them for failure to provide Democrat senators with information about the war. They publicly acted outraged at what they alleged was a certain deception and demanded even more information, telling the press that top Bush officials were forcing the CIA and other intelligence agencies to skew intelligence analysis to fit a preconceived conclusion.

Some Democrats see through this political warfare and are troubled by it. Keeping the SSCI and its House counterpart nonpartisan, wrote former senator Robert Kerrey (D-Neb.) in the New York Post in the midst of the memo controversy, "is vital for the nation's security because much of what is done to collect, process and disseminate intelligence needed by civilian and military leaders is done under conditions of rigorously regulated secrecy." Kerrey is a former vice chairman of the committee.

"Of all the committees, this is the one single committee that should unquestionably be above partisan politics," said an angry Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.). "The information it deals with should never, never be distorted, compromised or politicized in any shape, form or fashion. For it involves the lives of our soldiers and our citizens. Its actions should always be above reproach; its words never politicized."

Rockefeller defended his staff and the outrageous document itself, calling it a "private memo that nobody saw except me and the staff people that wrote it for me." He rebuffed calls from Frist, Miller and others that the staffers responsible be exposed, let alone fired, and instead accused Republicans of stealing the document from his aides' computers. "Mr. Rockefeller refuses to denounce the memo, which he says was unauthorized and written by staffers. If that's the case, at the very least some heads ought to roll," declared the Wall Street Journal in an editorial. Firing Mellon as the staff director for the culprits, the Journal said, would be "a good place to start."

Miller went even further: "I have often said that the process in Washington is so politicized and polarized that it can't even be put aside when we're at war. Never has that been proved more true than the highly partisan and perhaps treasonous memo prepared for the Democrats on the intelligence committee."

The Georgia Democrat measured his words, continuing: "If what has happened here is not treason, it is its first cousin. The ones responsible - be they staff or elected or both - should be dealt with quickly and severely, sending a lesson to all that this kind of action will not be tolerated, ignored or excused."

Chairman Roberts sees a danger to the nation through such politics: "If we give in to the temptation to exploit our good offices for political gain, we cannot expect our intelligence professionals to entrust us with our nation's most sensitive information. You can be sure that foreign intelligence services will stop cooperating with our intelligence agencies the first time they see their secrets appear in our media."

Kerrey, once a shining star among Senate Democrats, wrote, "The production of a memo by an employee of a Democratic member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is an example of the destructive side of partisan politics. That it probably emerged as a consequence of an increasingly partisan environment in Washington and may have been provoked by equally destructive Republican acts is neither a comfort nor a defensible rationalization."

Senate Majority Leader Frist called for the culprits to come forward and apologize, angrily announcing he would suspend cooperation on the Iraq investigation. That wasn't enough for Sen. Miller, who demanded, "Heads should roll!"

J. Michael Waller is a senior writer for Insight magazine."

FT.com / Rice's team - Meghan O'Sullivan

2005-01-18T15:15:00.000-08:00

FT.com / Home UK - Hawks and pragmatists to mix on Rice's team: "Hawks and pragmatists to mix on Rice's team
By Guy Dinmore in Washington
Published: January 16 2005 21:23 | Last updated: January 16 2005 21:23

A shake-up of the US foreign policy team under Condoleezza Rice will see the emergence of younger rising stars as well as seasoned negotiators, bringing together a combination of pragmatists and "hawks".

While analysts and diplomats are focusing on whether the second Bush administration will see a loss of influence for the ideologically driven neoconservatives, Ms Rice appears to be choosing a mix of career professionals and experts noted primarily for their loyalty and commitment, as well as a willingness to challenge conventional wisdoms.

Ms Rice, nominated by President George W. Bush as secretary of state, will have her Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday. Before leaving the National Security Council she has led for the past four years, Ms Rice is ensuring that trusted aides remain or are promoted under the new leadership of Stephen Hadley, her present deputy.

One of the young climbers cultivated by Ms Rice in the council is Meghan O'Sullivan, senior director for strategic planning with responsibility for Iraq and Iran. "She is rising quickly through the ranks," said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Ms O'Sullivan, who is in her 30s, in effect replaces Robert Blackwill, a veteran diplomat who ran the Iraq Stabilisation Group as deputy national security adviser. He has joined a lobbying firm after resigning last year following colourful press reports about his personal life and an altercation with a State Department employee.

Formerly on the staff of the State Department policy planning unit before a stint in Baghdad, Ms O'Sullivan raised the ire of neoconservatives early in the first Bush administration for advocating a softer line towards Iran and Cuba while supporting continued, but modified, sanctions against Iraq.

Her ideological rivals sought to undermine the credibility of her research at the Brookings Institution think-tank, where she wrote the book Shrewd Sanctions before entering the State Department, contending that she had been sponsored by US oil companies seeking to do business with "rogue" states.

There had been speculation that Elliott Abrams, one of the most controversial neoconservatives in the administration, would fill Mr Blackwill's shoes. But an official said it appeared he would stick to his current job focused on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, where he has developed a close working relationship with the government of Ariel Sharon.

Mr Abrams is one of several seasoned officials in the administration who had been embroiled in the Iran-Contra scandal of the mid 1980s. He admitted to withholding information from Congress - what commentators have described as a polite term for lying - but was pardoned by Mr Bush's father, then president, in 1992.

Sweeping changes are under way at the State Department, where Ms Rice has already won plaudits from Europeans by appointing Robert Zoellick, the trade representative known as a tough but pragmatic internationalist, as her deputy.

Stephen Krasner, a professor of international relations at Stanford University, where Ms Rice was previously provost, is tipped as the new head of policy planning. In 2001 he spent a year in the State Department, working on the Millennium Challenge Account, an aid programme for developing nations that meet criteria of good governance.

At a time when the future of the United Nations is under scrutiny, it is interesting that Ms Rice is believed to have chosen a specialist on the shape of future institutional forums. Mr Krasner has challenged conventional notions of sovereignty. He is also strongly opposed to the International Criminal Court as lacking in democratic accountability.

In an interview a week after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Mr Krasner said prudence was what counted in international relations. "The notion that you can create an ideal world is what walked us into Mao's China, Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia. If you want a decent life, what you need is a political system which is prudent and limited. I think that the United States has actually done pretty well in that regard."

Ms Rice is replacing seasoned diplomats with the same. James Kelly, assistant secretary for Asia and chief negotiator with North Korea, is expected to be replaced by Christopher Hill, a veteran negotiator during various Balkan conflicts who was appointed as ambassador to South Korea just last July.

The State Department is also losing one notable hawk - John Bolton, undersecretary for arms control - to be replaced with another - Bob Joseph, a trusted aide to Ms Rice at the National Security Council."

Ambassador Zalmai Khalilzad's on Drugs, U.S. Embassy Kabul

2005-01-14T08:30:00.000-08:00

Ambassador Zalmai Khalilzad's Speech, U.S. Embassy Kabul: "Remarks by U.S. Ambassador and Special Presidential Envoy Zalmay Khalilzad at National Council on Counter-Narcotics

Kabul, Afghanistan

Thursday – December 9, 2004
Your Excellency President Karzai, ministers, governors, elders, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for inviting me here today.

I am honored to be among you, and especially grateful to address the National Council on Counter-Narcotics.

The outcome of this gathering will have momentous impact on Afghanistan’s fortunes, and you will play leading roles in shaping the character of Afghan society.

Afghanistan has achieved much in a short period of time. But there is a grave threat that looms large across the land, a dark specter that has the potential to undermine all that has been achieved thus far. That threat is the illegal narcotics production and trade: Illegal drugs pose a mortal threat to Afghanistan’s future.

Afghans have suffered grievously in recent decades, and they have been the victims of drought, war, and the systematic destruction of orchards, farmlands, and irrigation systems carried out by the Soviets, the Taliban, and other enemies of Afghanistan.

Many poor farmers turned to the cultivation of poppy out of desperation. The country is mending, and addressing its many problems.

But the drug problem now threatens the very health of the nation.

First, narcotics are a threat to Afghanistan’s political future.

Corruption is everywhere the enemy of the public good, and corruption follows illegal drug money as surely as night follows day.

Ruthless and immoral druglords use their illegal gains to corrupt politicians, suborn judges, and crush the intersts of ordinary citizens who stand in their way.

Second, narcotics pose a threat to the environment of Afghanistan.

The process of extracting and refining opium gum into finished heroin damages the environment at every step in the process.

Third, narcotics pose a threat to Afghan children. No Afghan family wants their child to grow up addicted to dangerous, illegal drugs. Chemical dependence robs children of their dignity, their freedom, and their future.

Fourth, drug money funds terrorists and extremists. Profits from the heroin trade are a major source of income for terrorists and other extremist groups.

Their deadly campaigns to kill innocents are financed by illegal substances and methods that are condemned by religious authorities as contrary to Islam.

Lastly, narcotics pose a threat to Afghanistan’s partnership with the free world. The prospects of such a long-term partnership with the internatinoal community can be threatened if Afghanistan becomes a narco-state.

We will work with the Afghan government under the leadership of President Karzai and other nations to help Afghanistan defeat this menace.

The United States Congress plans to provide $780 million to assist Afghanistan in this effort over the course of the next few months.

Our strategy is based on six pillars: a public information campaign, alternative livelihoods, reform of the judicial system, interdiction, eradication, and regional cooperation.

I would like to emphasize that we understand the critical importance of the alternative livelihoods program.

The replacement of legitimate crops with poppy was the result of war, the destruction of farmers’ livelihoods, and the deliberate policies of criminal drug lords.

Our alternative livelihoods initiative consists of two major programs, an immediate needs program that is already underway, and a more long-term economic development program that encourages investment, includes public works, and strengthens credit and financing institutions.

The immediate needs program will provide cash for work for approximately 125,000 people in three provinces, and will respond to the needs identified by local leaders.

Such immediate needs will include, for example, initial public works, seeds and fertilizer, and projects agreed upon by local and provincial authorities.

The aim is to reward legitimate activity and encourage the cultivation of legitimate crops.

Afghanistan is emerging from an abnormal period of war and upheaval.

The country was in a desperate situation and illegal drugs were a by-product of that situation.

As the nation mends, and Afghanistan addresses the problems that led to the explosion of poppy cultivation, roads are being built, canals are being restored, and security is being improved.

As the country returns to normal conditions, now it is time to reverse the trend that promoted the illegal drug trade.

This is Afghanistan’s moment to act against narcotics, and the stakes are enormous. I believe—as they have done in the past—the Afghan people will make the right choice.

Thank you, and may God bless the people of Afghanistan."

State Department Bio: Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan

2005-01-14T08:20:00.000-08:00

Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan: "Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad
U. S. Ambassador to Afghanistan

Biography
Speeches

Former Ambassador

Home Page

Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad was nominated Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to Afghanistan by President
Bush on September 22, sworn on Monday, November 24, 2003 in Washington and presented this credentials to President Karzai on November 27, 2003.
Dr. Khalilzad served as Special Presidential Envoy to Afghanistan, a role he will retain after his assignment to Ambassador to

Afghanistan ends. Dr. Khalilzad served as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Islamic Outreach and Southwest Asia Initiatives at the National Security Council, and prior to that Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Southwest Asia, Near East, and North African Affairs at the National Security Council. He also has been a Special Presidential Envoy and Ambassador at Large for the Free Iraqis. Dr. Khalilzad headed the Bush-Cheney transition team for the Department of Defense and has been a Counselor to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld.

Between 1993 and 1999, Dr. Khalilzad was Director of the Strategy, Doctrine and Force Structure program for RAND's Project Air Force. While with RAND, he founded the Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Between 1991 and 1992, Dr. Khalilzad served as Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Planning. Secretary Cheney awarded Dr. Khalilzad's the Department of Defense medal for outstanding public service. He also served as a senior political scientist at RAND and an associate professor at the University of California at San Diego in 1989 and 1991. From 1985 to 1989 at the Department of State, Dr. Khalilzad served as Special Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs working policy issues, advising on the Iran-Iraq war and the Soviet War in Afghanistan. From 1979 to 1986, Dr. Khalilzad was an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University.

Dr. Khalilzad received his bachelor's and master's degree from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon. He went on to earn a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Dr. Khalilzad is the author of more than 200 books, articles, studies and reports. His work has been translated in many languages including Arabic, Chinese, German, Japanese and Turkish."

t r u t h o u t - ISSUES - Zalmay Khalilzad and the Bush Agenda

2005-01-14T08:14:00.000-08:00

t r u t h o u t - ISSUES - Zalmay Khalilzad and the Bush Agenda: "Zalmay Khalilzad and the Bush Agenda
by Jennifer Van Bergen

t r u t h o u t | January 13, 2001 - The appointment by the Bush Administration of Zalmay Khalilzad as special envoy to Afghanistan which was announced on December 31, 2001, only nine days after the U.S.-backed interim government of Hamid Karzai took office in Kabul, seems timely and logical. Khalilzad, a U.S. citizen born in Afghanistan with extensive knowledge of the region and experience, appears to be the right person for the job.

Khalilzad's presence, however, is the fruit of an older agenda, one that reaches back at least to the Reagan era, and Khalilzad has more connections to that agenda than meets the eye.

Simply put, Khalilzad's appointment means oil. Oil for the United States. Oil for Unocal, a U.S. company long criticized for doing business in countries with repressive governments and rumored to have close ties to the Department of State and the intelligence community.

Zalmay Khalilzad was an advisor for Unocal. In the mid 1990s, while working for the Cambridge Energy Research Associates, Khalilzad conducted risk analyses for Unocal at the time it had signed letters of approval from the Taliban. The analyses were for a proposed 890-mile, $2-billion, 1.9-billion-cubic-feet-per-day natural gas pipeline project which would have extended from Turkmenistan to Pakistan. In December 1997, Khalilzad joined Unocal officials at a reception for an invited Taliban delegation to Texas.

UNOCAL LONG CRITICIZED FOR BUSINESS PRACTICES

Unocal, the world's ninth largest oil company according to the National Center for Policy Research, but according to the Los Angeles Times, smaller than America's "most powerful energy companies," has long been criticized for doing business with repressive foreign governments. Legal action was brought against Unocal in 1997 by Burmese refugees for human rights abuses which the refugees claimed were committed by the Burmese military hired by Unocal to protect their operations.

Unocal has also been criticized for its business dealings in this country. A 1998 petition signed by Environmental, Human Rights and Women's Groups, asked California Attorney General to revoke Unocal's Charter, citing Unocal's record as a "repeat offender" of environmental, labor and deceptive practices laws. The petition claimed that Unocal was principally responsible for the notorious 1969 oil blowout in the Santa Barbara Channel and has since then polluted multiple sites from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Petitioners claimed that Unocal committed hundreds of violations of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, treated U.S. workers unethically and unfairly, engaged in a pattern of illegal deceptions of the courts, stockholders and the public, and "usurped political power," undermining U.S. foreign policy.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Exxon filed a report in August 2001 with antitrust regulators which states that Unocal "subverted the standard-setting process" of the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) "to obtain unlawful monopoly profits." The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is investigating a questionable patent Unocal obtained behind the backs of CARB and oil competitors after Unocal sat in on official meetings to establish cleaner-burning gasoline. FTC investigators say that the patent may have contributed to last summer's Midwest gasoline crisis.

Other reports cite Unocal's open support of "the most brutal dictatorship" in Asia, General Suharto of Indonesia, where Unocal is one of the largest oil companies, a $5.5 million legal settlement of a citizens suit filed by the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund against Unocal for pouring poisonous wastewater into the San Francisco Bay, and Unocal's attempts to intimidate two native tribes in Montana into renewing its pipeline lease without basic environmental protections.

There have been some claims that Unocal was getting briefings from the Department of State. Unocal denied any connection beyond that which a company doing business overseas would obtain from the DOS. However, a look at some of Unocal's CEOs and board members shows strong government ties. Charles Larson, former Commander in Chief of the U.S. Navy's Pacific Command sits on the board. So does Donald Rice, a former colleague of Khalilzad's at RAND Corp., who was Secretary of the Air force under Bush I. And Robert Oakley, U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan during the time the CIA was funneling money and weapons through the Pakistani intelligence service (ISI) to Afghan muhajeeden in the 1980s, later the U.S. special envoy to Somalia, worked subsequently for Unocal.

CENTGAS - THE AFGHAN OIL CONNECTION

Unocal was the "Development Manager" of the Centgas consortium. The purpose of Centgas was to build an 890-mile-long pipeline from Turkmenistan through Aghanistan to Pakistan.

Centgas, or the Central Asia Gas and Pipeline Consortium, was a group formed in the mid-1990s which was made up of the government of Turkmenistan and six international companies: Delta Oil Company (Saudi Arabia), Indonesia Petroleum, ITOCHU Oil Exploration Co. (Japan), Hyandai Engineering & Construction Co. (South Korea), Crescent Group (Pakistan) and Gazprom (Russia). Unocal owned nearly half of the shares of Centgas.

As Centgas' Development Manager, Unocal opened talks with the Taliban and the Northern Alliance. To show its good will, Unocal donated money to CARE projects in Afghanistan and provided support for earthquake relief efforts. (According to the CIA World Factbook, damaging earthquakes are known to occur in the Hindu Kush mountains, which run across the center of the country.)

According to L.A. Weekly, Unocal also gave nearly a million dollars to the University of Nebraska's Center for Afghan Studies, which Unocal stated was not used to "provide pipeline constructions skills training." Unocal said the money was used to provide "basic job skills training and education" for Afghans and elementary schooling for their children. However, according to the Asia Times, the Center for Afghan Studies also at one time produced a study of oil and gas reserves in Central Asia, placing their total worth at around US$3 trillion. Thus, the Center was not only interested in helping Afghans obtain basic education and job skills.

Thomas E. Gouttierre, the director of the Center for Aghan Studies, is an old friend of Zalmay Khalilzad. In fact, Gouttierre coached Khalilzad on a high school basketball team when "Zal" first visited America as an exchange student.

The Clinton administration offered backing for Unocal's Centgas project, but after the U.S. bombed Aghanistan in 1998 in retaliation for the Embassy bombings, Unocal withdrew from the consortium, citing "sharply deteriorating political conditions."

Unocal stated that it would only participate in a Centgas pipeline project "when and if" Aghanistan achieved the "peace and stability necessary to obtain financing from international agencies and a government that is recognized by the United States and the United Nations." In February 1999, Unocal denied reports published in Pakistan that it was considering rejoining Centgas, and Unocal continues to state on its Homepage that it has no plans to return to the consortium. Unocal spokesman, Mike Thatcher, stated last October that "We're not going to do it, but sooner or later, someone will."

However, it is clear that the December 5, 2001 "Bonn Agreement," which establishes an interim Aghani government overseen by the United Nations, will fulfill Unocal's prerequisite of an "internationally recognized government." One representative of the Turkmenistan embassy told L.A. Weekly, "So we are hoping that once peace is restored in Afghanistan, building these pipeliness will again become a priority."

ENTER KHALILZAD

Khalilzad's appointment as special envoy to Afghanistan raises suspicions about the priorities of the Bush administration. Long-standing political and business ties connect Khalilzad to an oil agenda. The United States has been bombing Afghanistan in retaliation for terrorist attacks on this country. But Khalilzad's appointment makes it clear that oil is now -- and perhaps has been since before 9/11 -- behind U.S. Afghan policy.

Zalmay Khalilzad was born about 50 years ago in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif, 70 miles south of the Soviet border. While he was still young, his family moved to Kabul, where his Pashtun father worked in the government, which was then a monarchy, and Zalmay attended English-language schools.

According to Thomas E. Gouttierre, the director for the Unocal-funded Center for Afghan Studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, the Khalilzad family "certainly would have been people among the intellectual elite of the time."

Gouttierre met Zalmay when the young Afghani first visited the United States as an exchange student through the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker charitable organization. Gouttierre coached him in basketball.

He returned to Afghanistan to complete his high school, but earned his undergraduate degree from the American University in Beirut. At that time, Beirut was still the "Paris of the Middle East."

Khalilzad obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1979 (the same year the Soviets invaded his homeland), where, according to the New York Times News Service, "he became the protege of a famous hard-line strategic thinker." There he also met an Austrain woman, Cheryl Benard, whom he married. Benard writes novels and co-wrote a book about revolutionary Iran with Zalmay

In the early 1980s, Zalmay taught political science at Columbia University in New York, where he worked with Zbigniew Brzezinski. He was also executive director of the Friends of Afghanistan, a support group for the mujaheddins fighting the Soviets -- the same mujuaheddins later known to have spawned bin Laden.

In 1984, Khalilzad became an American citizen and joined the State Department on a one-year fellowship. Khalilzad's background and language skills earned him a permanent position on the State Department's Policy Planning Council during the Reagen era. There he worked under Paul Wolfowitz, then Reagan's director of policy planning, now the No. 2 man at the Pentagon. In 1998, the two, having retained close ties, joined others in signing an open letter to Clinton that argued for the overthrow of Saddam.

From 1985 to 1989, Zalmay served as special adviser to the undersecretary of state. He belonged to a small group of policymakers who advocated providing arms to the "resistance" fighters in Afghanistan.

Khalilzad then consulted for the Rand Corp., a conservative think tank, on defense issues and returned to Washington when Bush I took office, taking up the post of assistant deputy under-secretary of defense for policy planning. Again he worked closely with Wolfowitz, then the Pentagon's No. 3 official.

He also got to know Dick Cheney at the Defense Department during the Gulf War.

During the Clinton years, Khalilzad returned to Rand and spent his time writing books and articles. After Bush II was elected, Cheney selected himm to head the transition team for defense. In May 2001, Bush appointed him the National Security Council official in charge of the Persian Gulf and Central Asia. His direct superior was Condoleeza Rice, the national security adviser, who herself had served as an oil consultant for Chevron.

ZALMAY, THE SOOTHSAYER

Khalilzad's critics point out that Zalmay, who gave a speech upon his arrival in Kabul condemning the Taliban, had at one time, as a paid adviser to oil multinational Unocal, courted and defended them. Indeed, Khalilzad has changed his tune so often that one analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, Anatol Lieven, said, "If he was in private business rather than government, he would have been sacked long ago."

But Khalilzad has long and consistently argued that America ignored Afghanistan at its peril. In an article that appeared in the winter 2000 issue of the Washington Quarterly, co-authored by Rand colleague Daniel Byman, Khalilzad and Byman issued a stern warning about Afghanistan being "a haven for some of the world's most lethal anti-U.S. terrorists" who "pose a threat to U.S. soliders and civilians at home and abroad, to the Middle East peace process, and to the stability of our allies in the region." The two recommended taking measures to weaken the Taliban and support the Northern Alliance.

As Jacob Weisberg pointed out in a recent article on Slate News, "What's remarkable about Khalilzad's recommendations ...... isn't just how tragically prophetic they look in the light of Sept. 11. It's how closely they track the Bush administration's emerging Afghan policy."

Another writer points out how "little has been said in the media about the promiment role being played in Afghan policy by officials who advised the oil industry on Central Asia."

According to an article on an Islamic website, the December 5th "Bonn Agreement," which formed the U.N.-supervised interim government in Afghanistan, "consolidates American control over Afghanistan and lays the basis for uprooting Islam from it." The author claims that "America was not content with achieving the five aims announced by Bush to the masses before Congress shortly before the declaration of war against Afghanistan. Instead she went much further than this. The American government has begun to impose its actual mandate over Afghanistan under the cover of the United Nations and works to create a new Afghanistan, infuse it with western culture, [and] strengthen its chains to the hated wheel of American colonialism."

"America has disregarded the leaders of the tribes, the people of influence, position and standing in Afghanistan and replaced them with a handful of traitorous agents, the majority of which are westerners infatuated by the western culture," the Islamic writer states.

If the purpose of the bombing of Afghanistan, the purpose of the Bonn Agreement, the purpose of Khalilzad's appointment, is oil, should Americans be advised of our government's intentions? If this is the writing in the sand, and if our troops risk their lives for this, and thousands if not millions of Afghanis suffer and die, and millions of Muslims become even more alienated and angry, all for oil, where is the ballot box for us to place our vote in, where is Congress?"

Fathom :: Zalmay M. Khalilzad

2005-01-14T08:12:00.000-08:00

Fathom :: The Source for Online Learning: "Zalmay M. Khalilzad

Zalmay Khalilzad serves as the Corporate Chair on International Security at RAND. Formerly, he served as the director of RAND's Project Air Force Security and Doctrine Program and as Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Planning. He is the editor of Strategic Appraisal, an ongoing RAND series examining national security issues, and co-editor of Sources of Conflict in the 21st Century: Regional Futures and U.S. Strategy. He is co-author of, among other titles, The United States and a Rising China: Strategic and Military Implications; The Future of Turkish-Western Relations: Toward a Strategic Plan; and The Implications of the Possible End of the Arab-Israeli Conflict for Gulf Security. As Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Planning, he was responsible for the Department of Defense's long-range planning and advised the Secretary of Defense, the Under Secretary for Policy and other senior defense officials on the full range of issues affecting US defense policy and strategy. He helped shape the Bush administration's regional defense strategy for the post-Cold War era and guided the drafting of the Defense Department's report "Conduct of the Persian Gulf War.""

Haaretz - Israel News - Grand jury query of AIPAC officials postponed until new year

2004-12-22T05:51:00.000-08:00

Haaretz - Israel News - Grand jury query of AIPAC officials postponed until new year: "Grand jury query of AIPAC officials postponed until new year

By Nathan Guttman
WASHINGTON - The interrogation of four American Israel Public Affairs Committee senior officials, which was to take place this week, has been postponed until after the New Year holiday.

The four are slated to testify before a grand jury investigation into the Pentagon mole affair, and to answer questions that will focus, according to sources following the case, on AIPAC's modus operandi and the type of ties it maintains with U.S. and Israeli government officials. The four AIPAC officials are executive director Howard Kohr, managing director Richard Fishman, research director Rafi Danziger, and communications director Renee Rothstein.

At the outset of the investigation this summer, American officials stressed that the four officials are viewed as witnesses, not targets of a probe of AIPAC officials suspected of conveying classified information to Israeli embassy officials. The targets, as far as the lobby's activities are concerned, are Steve Rosen and Keith Weisman, who handle foreign policy issues for the committee.

The investigation, which is being overseen by a grand jury in Arlington, Virginia, is taking place in secrecy. The U.S. Justice Department has provided no information regarding its progress. But since a raid at the beginning of this month on AIPAC offices in Washington, two major directions have emerged in the case - one that AIPAC officials, not Pentagon official Larry Franklin, are at the center of the investigation, and the other, which has only been hinted, concerns the American Jewish community's stance on the case. The community came to AIPAC's defense when the story broke, and officially remains solidly behind the lobby. However, in recent informal conversations, there have been signs of discomfort and concern among community representatives. This discomfort erupted largely after AIPAC offices were raided for a second time and subpoenas were issued to the four officials to testify before the grand jury. AIPAC insisted to Jewish leaders that the charges were false and an attempt to frame the lobby, but community leaders began questioning whether they were getting the full picture. The use of a grand jury indicates the seriousness of the case, and increases the chances of indictments.

"If something comes out of this, indictments or anything else, for sure there will be those who will want to distance themselves from AIPAC," one Jewish source in Washington said yesterday. "No one wants AIPAC hurt, but no one wants to get into trouble for something that might go wrong," he said.

Another Jewish source disagreed, saying that although the raid and subpoenas had raised a lot of eyebrows among community leaders, as far as the Jews are concerned, "the burden of proof is still more on the FBI than on AIPAC.""

Democracy Now! | CIA Agent Says Bosses Ordered Him To Falsify WMD Reports

2004-12-16T09:28:00.000-08:00

Democracy Now! | CIA Agent Says Bosses Ordered Him To Falsify WMD Reports: "CIA Agent Says Bosses Ordered Him To Falsify WMD Reports

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An undercover intelligence officer, who is suing the CIA, says his managers asked him to falsify his reporting on weapons of mass destruction and retaliated against him when he refused. We speak with his attorney.
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We turn now to the story of how a senior intelligence officer was targeted by the CIA after he refused orders from his superiors to falsify his reports on weapons of mass destruction.
The senior CIA operative charges in a lawsuit made public last week that a co-worker warned him three years ago that "CIA management planned to 'get him' for his role in reporting intelligence contrary to official CIA dogma."

Although the word "Iraq" does not appear in the heavily redacted version of the suit, the Washington Post reports that "the remaining language and context make clear that the officer's work related to prewar intelligence on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction."

Accusations of intelligence officers being pressured on their Iraq findings in the lead-up to the war has long been alleged, but no CIA official has come public before with such claims.

According to the undercover agent, the CIA management retaliated against him by launching investigations of allegations that he had a sexual affair with a female asset and that he stole money meant to be pay off for sources.

Roy Krieger, DC-based lawyer representing the undercover CIA operative filing the lawsuit. He specializes in national security cases and has represented scores of people in the CIA.
To purchase an audio or video copy of this entire program, click here for our new online ordering or call 1 (800) 881-2359."

Yahoo! News - The "Cranks" at the CIA

2004-12-16T09:26:00.000-08:00

Yahoo! News - The "Cranks" at the CIA: "The "Cranks" at the CIA

Mon Dec 6,12:12 PM ET

Matthew Continetti

Washington (The Daily Standard) - ON THE FRIDAY BEFORE THANKSGIVING, Michael Scheuer, the former head of the CIA (news - web sites)'s bin Laden unit, said CIA officials had given him "carte blanche" to attack President Bush (news - web sites) anonymously last summer in publicity interviews for his book Imperial Hubris. Specifically, Scheuer said, former CIA spokesman Bill Harlow had told him "We're giving you carte blanche" to do whatever interviews he wanted, as long as the criticism in those interviews was directed toward Bush, not the CIA. Scheuer didn't follow the rules. He took on senior CIA officials in his publicity interviews. As a result, he said, he was "muzzled."

Last week Harlow stepped forward to challenge Scheuer's claim. "His assertion that I gave him 'carte blanche' to attack the president is absurd," Harlow told me in an email. And he continued:

Even [Scheuer] seems to have recognized that, since he was subsequently quoted in the Washington Post on November 2[5] as saying I told him in July to stop his incessant media commentary saying, "This is affecting the president, you're getting involved in the election. The agency is being interpreted as not being evenhanded" and also saying (quite accurately for once) that I told him some of his comments quoted in the media were "inappropriate for a currently serving intelligence officer."

Harlow is right to say that Scheuer has changed his story. Read Dana Priest's article, "Bringing Change, Not by the Book; CIA Officials Let Critic Publish," and you find a different version of events than that which Scheuer told reporters on November 19. Here's the key paragraph:

But two former CIA officials and the author himself said four top managers at the agency, not including Tenet, made the decision to let "Anonymous" publish and give interviews. The officials said they did so only because they feared that the author would resign, earning even more attention for a work they viewed as partly ludicrous. They said the agency underestimated how the book would play in the presidential campaign.

"Underestimated"?

Harlow, who, in all likelihood, is one of the "former CIA officials" quoted on background in Priest's story, repeated this version of events in his email. "His supervisors (not I) reluctantly permitted him to publish his book anonymously," he wrote. "In part because Agency regulations which [are] clear on preventing unauthorized disclosure of classified information . . . are not so clear on preventing expression of opinion."

"As the case in his first book," Harlow continued, "Scheuer was allowed to do interviews about his book. But when it became clear that he had gone well beyond that" and "had begun pontificating on areas that are clearly inappropriate for currently serving intelligence officers" Scheuer "was told he should not do that." But remember: The book that Scheuer was allowed to do interviews about was . . . well, a harsh indictment of American foreign policy and the current president. If Harlow is right, then CIA management still knew exactly what it was doing when it "reluctantly permitted" the publication of Imperial Hubris.

Little about this story makes sense. Here, for example, is what one former senior CIA official told THE WEEKLY STANDARD several weeks ago:

No one I know of at the Agency was happy about what [Scheuer] was saying and doing. His seniors tried and failed to manage him. It was believed that perhaps he could anonymously blow off steam without being turned into a celebrity whistle-blower. Some believed, naively, that the media would actually read some of Scheuer's wacky rantings (e.g. "American soldiers are paid to die" or his laudatory comments about [Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)]) and dismiss him as a crank.

But such an explanation only raises more questions. For one: Why would the CIA have a "crank" on its payroll? For another: How did a "crank" who was prone to "wacky rantings" and needed to "blow off steam" become the head of the CIA bin Laden unit, and then maintain that position from 1996 until 1999? And finally: Why must the CIA rely on media outlets to "dismiss" its own employees?

Matthew Continetti is a reporter at The Weekly Standard. "

Dual Loyalties: Wolfowitz in earlier AIPAC Spy Scandal

2004-12-16T03:24:00.000-08:00

Dual Loyalties: FBI probes DOD office - (United Press International): "Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who an administration official described as having played a 'large role in getting Feith' his current job, was working for the Arms Control and Disarmament agency in 1978 and was the subject of an investigation that alleged he had provided 'a classified document on the proposed sale of U.S. weapons to an Arab government to an Israeli government official' via 'an AIPAC intermediary,' according to Green. The probe was eventually dropped.

In 1981, Wolfowitz, who was working as head of the State Department Policy Planning Staff, hired Ledeen as a Special Advisor, Green said"

PETE DORN'S RETIREMENT FROM SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE

2004-12-14T09:45:00.000-08:00

: "Congressional Record –– Remarks from Senator Pat Roberts
PETE DORN'S RETIREMENT FROM SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE -- (Senate - October 23, 2003)
Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, it is a personal privilege for me to rise today to recognize the contributions and many accomplishments of Mr. Peter Dorn, a valued and long time professional staff member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Pete will be leaving our staff this month after 33 years of dedicated service to our Nation.
Pete Dorn is the epitome of the professional staffer and he has served the Senate and the Intelligence Committee in an outstanding exemplary manner since he joined the committee's staff in 1991. From advising, if not educating Members, as their professional liaison to drafting legislation or conducting special investigations and projects to implementing and improving the intelligence budget, he and his work will be sorely missed.
Pete Dorn's service to our country is quite a pedigree. In 1971, following his graduation from the State University of New York, Pete began serving his country as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps. He spent 6 years in the infantry and special operations arena before transferring to Marine Corps Intelligence. It was a perfect military occupational and operational fit. For the rest of his Marine career, he honed his skills as an intelligence analyst and staff officer serving the Pacific Joint Intelligence Center, the Overseas Military Air Groups, the Commander of the Pacific Fleet, Headquarters, Marine Corps and the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Program staff.
He could not have been better prepared to continue his service in intelligence work and he did so as he continued his career in the White House as a budget and legislative analyst at the Office of National Drug Control Policy. He then served as program and budget analyst at the Director of Central Intelligence's Crime and Counter-narcotics Center.

In 1991, Pete's budgeting, intelligence and military experience made him a prime candidate for a professional staff position on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. He has served us as a budget monitor and as a staff liaison to Senator RICHARD SHELBY and to myself and currently, Senator SAXBY CHAMBLISS. Pete also serves the committee as staff director for research and analysis.

As in the case of many staff members and for that matter, Senators and Members of Congress as well, the laundry list of positions and titles does not tell the real story. The real story regarding Pete Dorn is that he is truly a patriot, has made a real difference in intelligence work, budgeting and legislation and as a consequence helped make our country a safer Nation. After 9/11, it was Pete Dorn who helped me to realize that although the Intelligence Community possessed great collection assets, we had a long way to go in terms of our analytical capability. It is our analytical product that is then turned over to the decision makers that contained mixed and delayed reporting. It has been my goal as chairman to see that this is changed. In this regard Pete Dorn has been my adviser.
Personally, he has made a difference in my life and how I look at public service. He believes the role of intelligence is absolutely crucial to our national security, and when he sees things that should be corrected or a miscarriage of justice or something awry in his family--i.e., the intelligence community--he will not stop until he does everything possible to set things right.

The case of our ``captured and whereabouts unknown'' gulf war Navy pilot, CAPT Scott Speicher, is a classic example. We will not rest until the fate of this pilot is known. The person who did not rest and who pressed for better intelligence and honest answers was Pete Dorn--not only for Scott Speicher and his family but for every warfighter who wears the uniform.

We now have legislation that changes the way we handle our prisoners of war and those missing in action. The credit for that legislation goes to Pete Dorn.
There are many other examples I could outline, some classified and some not. Simply said, Pete Dorn's perseverance and commitment to our country and fellowman has been remarkable. Thank you, Pete, for putting up with and educating me, from a new member of the Senate Intelligence Committee to my current position as chairman. Thank you for your friendship and advice.
Vice Chairman Rockefeller and the members of the Intelligence Committee, both past and present, who have enjoyed and benefited from their association with Pete extend their personal thanks for his exceptional dedication, his loyalty, his integrity, and his distinguished service. We wish all the best to Pete and his wife Kathleen, and to the entire Dorn family.
So, thanks again, Pete. And, from one marine to another, well done, and Semper Fi. "

ADM Watkins, Rick Spinrad and Terry Schaff met with Peter Dorn

2004-12-14T08:19:00.000-08:00

: "* ADM Watkins, Rick Spinrad and Terry Schaff met with Peter Dorn, staff to the Senate Intelligence Committee this week to discuss the Oceanographic Partnership Initiative. The Intelligence Committee is interested in the role the intelligence community can play in the partnership and the possibility of using the Partnership program as a model for cooperative efforts in the intelligence world."

Kathleen M. Dorn Profile

2004-12-14T08:17:00.000-08:00

Consultant's Profiles: "Kathleen M. Dorn

Kathleen Dorn has served for 26 years on the hill. Three of those years was as a member of the professional staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation. As an administrative specialist, Kathleen had broad access to activities across the spectrum of the Congress. In this capacity, Kathleen had broad access to activities across the spectrum of the Congress. Kathleen served as Executive Assistant to Senator John Warner (R-VA), Office Manager for the Majority Leader Senator Bob Dole (R-KS), and Administrative Director for the Senate Budget Committee under Senator Domenici (R-NM). She also served as Administrative Assistant to the Joint Committee on Taxation under Chairman Senator Grassley (R-IA) and Congressman Thomas (R-CA). In 2001, Kathleen took a one year sabbatical from the hill during which time she was White House Liaison for the Department of Veterans Affairs."

Pete Dorn Profile

2004-12-14T08:16:00.000-08:00

Consultant's Profiles: "Peter R. Dorn

Pete Dorn has served for 33 years in Government service, the last 12 years as a member of the professional staff of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). In this capacity he had broad access to activities across the spectrum of Intelligence Community activities. He was involved in drafting legislation and conducting special investigations and projects to improve US intelligence capabilities. Pete retired as a Lieutenant Colonel after serving 20 years in the United States Marine Corps. He was an intelligence analyst and staff officer serving with the Joint Intelligence Center in the Pacific, the Overseas Military Air Groups, the Commander of the Pacific Fleet, Headquarters, Marine Corps and the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Program staff. He also served in the White House as a budget and legislative analyst at the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Pete also served as program and budget analyst at the Director of Central Intelligence’s Crime and Counter-narcotics Center."

A Devil Theory of Islam, A Review of Judith Miller's "God Has Ninety-Nine Names: Reporting From a Militant Middle East"

2004-12-13T18:33:00.000-08:00

A Devil Theory of Islam, A Review of Judith Miller's "God Has Ninety-Nine Names: Reporting From a Militant Middle East": "A Devil Theory of Islam, A Review of Judith Miller's "God Has Ninety-Nine Names: Reporting From a Militant Middle East"

Edward Said
The Nation, August 12/19, 1996

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Judith Miller is a New York Times reporter much in evidence on talk shows and seminars on the Middle East. She trades in "the Islamic threat" -- her particular mission has been to advance the millennial thesis that militant Islam is a danger to the West. The search for a post-Soviet foreign devil has come to rest, as it did beginning in the eighth century for European Christendom, on Islam, a religion whose physical proximity and unstilled challenge to the West seem as diabolical and violent now as they did then. Never mind that most Islamic countries today are too poverty-stricken, tyrannical and hopelessly inept militarily as well as scientifically to be much of a threat to anyone except their own citizens; and never mind that the most powerful of them -- like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Pakistan -- are totally within the U.S. orbit. What matters to "experts" like Miller, Samuel Huntington, Martin Kramer, Bernard Lewis, Daniel Pipes, Steven Emerson and Barry Rubin, plus a whole battery of Israeli academics, is to make sure that the "threat" is kept before our eyes, the better to excoriate Islam for terror, despotism and violence, while assuring themselves profitable consultancies, frequent TV appearances and book contracts. The Islamic threat is made to seem disproportionately fearsome, lending support to the thesis (which is an interesting parallel to anti-Semitic paranoia) that there is a worldwide conspiracy behind every explosion.

Political Islam has generally been a failure wherever it has tried to take state power. Iran is a possible exception, but neither Sudan, already an Islamic state, nor Algeria, riven by the contest between Islamic groups and a brutal soldiery, has done anything but make itself poorer and more marginal on the world stage. Lurking beneath the discourse of Islamic peril in the West is, however, some measure of truth, which is that appeals to Islam among Muslims have fueled resistance (in the style of what Eric Hobsbawm has called primitive, pre-industrial rebellion) to the Pax Americana-Israelica throughout the Middle East. Yet neither Hezbollah nor Hamas has presented a serious obstacle to the ongoing steamroller of the anything-but-peace process. Most Arab Muslims today are too discouraged and humiliated, and also too anesthetized by uncertainty and their incompetent and crude dictatorships, to support anything like a vast Islamic campaign against the West. Besides, the elites are for the most part in cahoots with the regimes, supporting martial law and other extralegal measures against "extremists." So why, then, the accents of alarm and fear in most discussions of Islam? Of course there have been suicide bombings and outrageous acts of terrorism, but have they accomplished anything except to strengthen the hand of Israel and the United States and their client regimes in the Muslim world?

The answer, I think, is that books like Miller's are symptomatic because they are weapons in the contest to subordinate, beat down, compel and defeat any Arab or Muslim resistance to U.S.-Israeli dominance. Moreover, by surreptitiously justifying a policy of single-minded obduracy that links Islamism to a strategically important, oil-rich part of the world, the anti-Islam campaign virtually eliminates the possibility of equal dialogue between Islam and the Arabs, and the West or Israel. To demonize and dehumanize a whole culture on the ground that it is (in Lewis's sneering phrase) enraged at modernity is to turn Muslims into the objects of a therapeutic, punitive attention. I do not want to be misunderstood here: The manipulation of Islam, or for that matter Christianity or Judaism, for retrograde political purposes is catastrophically bad and must be opposed, not just in Saudi Arabia, the West Bank and Gaza, Pakistan, Sudan, Algeria and Tunisia but also in Israel, among the right-wing Christians in Lebanon (for whom Miller shows an unseemly sympathy) and wherever theocratic tendencies appear. And I do not at all believe that all the ills of Muslim countries are due to Zionism and imperialism. But this is very far from saying that Israel and the United States, and their intellectual flacks, have not played a combative, even incendiary role in stigmatizing and heaping invidious abuse on an abstraction called "Islam," deliberately in order to stir up feelings of anger and fear about Islam among Americans and Europeans, who are also enjoined to see in Israel a secular, liberal alternative. Miller says unctuously at the beginning of her book that right-wing Judaism in Israel is "the subject of another book." It is actually very much part of the book that she has written, except that she has willfully suppressed it in order to go after "Islam."

Writing about any other part of the world, Miller would be considered woefully unqualified. She tells us that she has been involved with the Middle East for twenty-five years, yet she has little knowledge of either Arabic or Persian. It would be impossible to be taken seriously as a reporter or expert on Russia, France, Germany or Latin America, perhaps even China or Japan, without knowing the requisite languages, but for "Islam," linguistic knowledge is unnecessary since what one is dealing with is considered to be a psychological deformation, not a "real" culture or religion.

What of her political and historical information? Each of the ten country chapters (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Sudan) begins with an anecdote and moves immediately to a potted history that reflects not much more than the work of a name-dropping college sophomore. Cobbled up out of various, not always reliable authorities (her pages of footnotes are tainted by her ignorance, whether because she can only cite the sources she already knows she wants in English, or because she quotes only authorities whose views correspond to hers, thereby closing out an entire library by Muslims, Arabs and non-Orientalist scholars), these histories are meant principally to display her command of the material, but actually expose her lamentable prejudices and failures of comprehension. In the Saudi Arabia chapter, for instance, she informs us in a note that her "favorite" source on the Prophet Mohammed is the French Orientalist Maxime Rodinson, a redoubtable Marxist scholar whose biography of the Prophet is written with a bracing combination of anti-clerical irony and enormous erudition. What Miller gets from this in her short summary of Mohammed's life and ideas is that there is something inherently risible, if not contemptible, about the man whom Rodinson says was a combination of Charlemagne and Jesus Christ; for whereas Rodinson understands what that means, Miller tells us (irrelevantly) that she is not convinced. For her, Mohammed is the begetter of an anti-Jewish religion, one laced with violence and paranoia. She does not directly quote one Muslim source on Mohammed; just imagine a book published in the United States on Jesus or Moses that makes no use of a single Christian or Judaic authority.

Most of Miller's book is made up not of argument and ideas but of endless interviews with what seems to be a slew of pathetic, unconvincing, self-serving scoundrels and their occasional critics. Once past her little histories we are adrift in boring, unstructured meanderings. Here's a typical sentence of insubstantial generalization: "And Syrians, mindful of their country's chaotic history" (of what country on earth is this not also true?) "found the prospect of a return to anarchy or yet another prolonged, bloody power struggle -- " (is this uniquely true of Syria as a postcolonial state, or is it true of a hundred others in Asia, Africa, Latin America?) "and perhaps even the triumph of militant Islam in the most secular" (with what thermometer did she get that reading?) "of all Arab states -- alarming." Leave aside the abominable diction and jaw-shattering jargon of the writing. What you have is not an idea at all but a series of clichés mixed with unverifiable assertions that reflect the "thought" of "Syrians" much less than they do Miller's.

Miller gilds her paper-thin descriptions with the phrase "my friend," which she uses to convince her reader that she really knows the people and consequently what she is talking about. I counted 247 uses of the phrase before I stopped about halfway through the book. This technique produces extraordinary distortions in the form of long digressions that testify to an Islamic mindset, even as they obscure or ignore more or at least equally relevant material like local politics, the functioning of secular institutions and the active intellectual contest taking place between Islamists and nationalist opponents. She seems never to have heard of Arkoun, or Jabri, or Tarabishi, or Adonis, or Hanafi or Djeit, whose theses are hotly debated all over the Islamic world.

This appalling failure of analysis is especially true in the chapter on Israel (mistitled, since it is all about Palestine), where she ignores the changes caused by the intifada and the prolonged effect of the three-decade Israeli occupation, and conveys no sense of the abominations wrought on the lives of ordinary Palestinians by the Oslo accords and Yasir Arafat's one-man rule. Although Miller is obsessed with Hamas, she is clearly unable to connect it with the sorry state of affairs in territories run brutally by Israel for all these years. She never mentions, for instance, that the only Palestinian university not established with Palestinian funds is Gaza's Islamic (Hamas) University, started by Israel to undermine the P.L.O. during the intifada. She records Mohammed's depredations against the Jews but has little to say about Israeli beliefs, statements and laws against "non-Jews," often rabbinically sanctioned practices of deportation, killing, house demolition, land confiscation, annexation and what Sara Roy has called systematic economic de-development. If in her breathlessly excitable way Miller sprinkles around a few of these facts, nowhere does she accord them the weight and influence as causes of Islamist passion that they undoubtedly have.

Maddeningly, she informs us of everyone's religion -- such and so is Christian, or Muslim Sunni, Muslim Shiite, etc. Even so, she is not always accurate, managing to produce some howlers. She speaks of Hisham Sharabi as a friend but misidentifies him as a Christian; he is Sunni Muslim. Badr el Haj is described as Muslim whereas he is Maronite Christian. These lapses wouldn't be so bad were she not bent on revealing her intimacy with so many people. And then there is her bad faith in not identifying her own religious background or political predilections. Are we meant to assume that her religion (which I don't think is Islam or Hinduism) is irrelevant?

She is embarrassingly forthcoming, however, about her reactions to people and power and certain events. She is "grief-stricken" when King Hussein of Jordan is diagnosed with cancer, although she scarcely seems to mind that he runs a police state whose many victims have been tortured, unfairly imprisoned, done away with. One realizes of course that what counts here is her hobnobbing with the little King, but some accurate sense of the "modern" kingdom he rules would have been in order. Her eyes "filled with tears -- of rage" as she espies evidence of desecration of a Lebanese Christian mosaic, but she doesn't bother to mention other desecrations in Israel -- for example, of Muslim graveyards -- and hundreds of exterminated villages in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine. Her real contempt and disdain come out in passages like the following, in which she imputes thoughts and wishes to a middle-class Syrian woman whose daughter has just become an Islamist:

She would never have any of the things a middle-class Syrian mother yearned for: no grand wedding party and traditional white dress with diamond tiara for her daughter, no silver-framed photos of the happy wedding couple in tuxedo and bridal gown on the coffee table and fireplace mantel, no belly dancers wriggling on a stage and champagne that flowed till dawn. Perhaps Nadine's friends, too, had daughters or sons who had rejected them, who secretly despised them for the compromises they had made to win the favor of Assad's cruel and soulless regime. For if the daughter of such pillars of the Damascene bourgeoisie could succumb to the power of Islam, who was immune?

Such snide accounts trivialize and cheapen the people whose houses and privacy she has invaded.

Given her willingness to undercut even her friendly sources, the most interesting question about Miller's book is why she wrote it at all. Certainly not out of affection. Consider, for instance, that she admits she fears and dislikes Lebanon, hates Syria, laughs at Libya, dismisses Sudan, feels sorry for and a little alarmed by Egypt and is repulsed by Saudi Arabia. She is relentlessly concerned only with the dangers of organized Islamic militancy, which I would hazard a guess accounts for less than 5 percent of the billion-strong Islamic world. She supports the violent suppression of Islamists (but not torture and other "illegal means" used in that suppression; she misses the contradiction in her position), has no qualms about the absence of democratic practices or legal procedures in Palestine, Egypt or Jordan so long as Islamists are the target and, in one especially nauseating scene, she actually participates in the prison interrogation of an alleged Muslim terrorist by Israeli policemen, whose systematic use of torture and other questionable procedures (undercover assassinations, middle-of-the-night arrests, house demolitions) she politely overlooks as she gets to ask the handcuffed man a few questions of her own.

Perhaps Miller's most consistent failing as a journalist is that she only makes connections and offers analyses of matters that suit her thesis about the militant, hateful quality of the Arab world. I have little quarrel with the general view that the Arab world is in a dreadful state, and have said so repeatedly for the past three decades. But she barely registers the existence of a determined anti-Arab and anti-Islamic U.S. policy. She plays fast and loose with fact. Take Lebanon: She refers to Bashir Gemayel's assassination in 1982 and gives the impression that he was elected by a popular landslide. She does not even allude to the fact that he was brought to power while the Israeli army was in West Beirut, just before the Sabra and Shatila camp massacres, and that for years, according to Israeli sources like Uri Lubrani, Gemayel was the Mossad's man in Lebanon. That he was a self-proclaimed killer and a thug is also finessed, as is the fact that Lebanon's current power structure is chock-full of people like Elie Hobeika, who was charged directly for the camp massacres. Miller cites instances of Arab anti-Semitism but doesn't even touch on the matter of Israeli leaders like Begin, Shamir, Eitan and, more recently, Ehud Barak (idolized by Amy Wilentz in The New Yorker) referring to Palestinians as two-legged beasts, grasshoppers, cockroaches and mosquitoes. These leaders have used planes and tanks to treat Palestinians accordingly. As for the facts of Israel's wars against civilians -- the protracted, consistent and systematic campaign against prisoners of war and refugee camp dwellers, the village destructions and bombings of hospitals and schools, the deliberate creation of hundreds of thousands of refugees -- all these are buried in reams of prattle. Miller disdains facts; she prefers quoting interminable talk as a way of turning Arabs into deserving victims of Israeli terror and U.S. support of it. She perfectly exemplifies The New York Times's current Middle East coverage, now at its lowest ebb.

In her lame conclusion Miller admits that her scolding may have been a little too harsh. She then puts it all down to her "love" of the region and its people. I cannot honestly think of a thing that she loves: not the conformism of Arab society she talks about, or the ostentatious culinary display she says that the Arabs confuse with hospitality, or the languages she hasn't learned, or the people she makes fun of or the history and culture of a place that to her is one long tale of unintelligible sound and fury. She cannot enter into the life of the place, listen to its conversations directly, read its novels and plays on her own (as opposed to making friends with their authors), enjoy the energy and refinements of its social life or see its landscapes. But this is the price of being a Times reporter in an age of sullen "expertise" and instant position-taking. You wouldn't know from Miller's book that there is any inter-Arab conflict in interpretations and representations of the Middle East and Islam and that, given her choice of sources, she is deeply partisan: an enemy of Arab nationalism, which she declares dead numerous times in the book; a supporter of U.S. policy; and a committed foe of any Palestinian nationalism that doesn't conform to the bantustans being set up according to the Oslo accords. Miller, in short, is a shallow, opinionated journalist whose gigantic book is too long for what it ends up saying, and far too short on reflection, considered analysis, structure and facts. Poor Muslims and Arabs who may have trusted her; they should have known better than to mistake an insinuated guest for a friend."

The New York Times owes readers an explanation for Judith Miller's faulty WMD reporting.

2004-12-13T16:29:00.000-08:00

"Miller Time (Again)
The New York Times owes readers an explanation for Judith Miller's faulty WMD reporting.
By Jack Shafer
Posted Thursday, Feb. 12, 2004, at 2:53 PM PT

Judy's turn to cry
Michael Massing flushes New York Times reporter Judith Miller out of her spider hole this week with "Now They Tell Us," a 7,000-word analysis in the New York Review of Books about the press corps' failure to see through the Bush administration's weapons of mass destruction hype. Writes Massing:

In the period before the war, US journalists were far too reliant on sources sympathetic to the administration. Those with dissenting views—and there were more than a few—were shut out. Reflecting this, the coverage was highly deferential to the White House. This was especially apparent on the issue of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction—the heart of the President's case for war. Despite abundant evidence of the administration's brazen misuse of intelligence in this matter, the press repeatedly let officials get away with it.

Massing levels special scorn at Miller, whose WMD journalism published before the Iraq war, as he footnotes, elicited critical reviews in the Nation, Editor & Publisher Online, AJR, and CJR, and by me in Slate. Responding to Massing's criticism that she channeled the administration's spotty WMD case, Miller blames U.S. intelligence for the discrepancies between what she reported about Iraqi WMD before the war and the latest findings of the weapons hunters. "The fact that the United States so far hasn't found WMD in Iraq is deeply disturbing," she tells Massing. "It raises real questions about how good our intelligence was. To beat up on the messenger is to miss the point."

How's that missing the point? If a messenger persists in delivering inflated and deceptive information—information that benefits her government sources—doesn't she deserve a good public flogging?

But back to our subject: Massing singles out the prewar reporting of the Knight Ridder Washington bureau for praise because its journalists eschewed the high-level sources, assistant secretaries and above, who "really closed ranks" behind the administration's message. Instead, they relied on "blue collar" agency employees—analysts and former analysts—to produce more skeptical findings than other newspapers.

Miller, who is quoted extensively in Massing's piece, faced him again on Feb. 3 on WBUR-FM's The Connection, where she disputed both the conclusions of his New York Review piece and his competence. In one hilarious segment about one-quarter of the way through the show, Miller claims Massing fails to "tell the reader how investigative journalism works," presumably because he doesn't understand it. According to Miller, this is how the investigative process works:

Basically you get a fact, you try and put it in context, you check that alleged fact with as many different sources as you can, and then if that fact turns out to be controversial or—within the government—or not believed by some as you go along you collect more information and you write again. And it's just too easy especially in an area where everything is classified and where people can go to jail for talking to you, it's just too easy to stand back and say why didn't you report this, that, and everything else. … [Click here for Miller Clip 1 from WBUR-FM's The Connection, distributed by NPR.]

The piece that he wrote and his criticisms unfortunately reflects a lack of understanding of about one, how hard information is to get in the national security area and two, how newspapers really go about doing this. Believe me, I tried to vet information in every way that I could before it was published. We never published—not once—an administration allegation without checking it against alleged experts, independent experts, it's just very very hard when this information is this tightly compartmentalized and classified. [Click here for Miller Clip 2.]

Ordinarily, I don't unfurl credentials to defend somebody's reputation, but let me make this exception. As this 2001 biographical note indicates, Massing is the former executive editor of the Columbia Journalism Review and has written for the New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, the Atlantic Monthly, the Washington Post, the Nation, the New Republic, the American Prospect, and Rolling Stone, among others. He helped found the Committee To Protect Journalists, scored a MacArthur fellowship in 1992, and in 1998 authored The Fix, a widely praised book about drug policy. It's absurd to imagine Massing doesn't understand the mechanics of investigative journalism or doesn't appreciate how difficult national security information can be to obtain.

Indeed, it's Miller who seems clueless about how investigative reporting works. Earlier in the program, she describes her role as the conveyor of official news rather than a skeptical reporter:

My job was not to collect information and analyze it independently as an intelligence agency; my job was to tell readers of the New York Times as best as I could figure out, what people inside the governments who had very high security clearances, who were not supposed to talk to me, were saying to one another about what they thought Iraq had and did not have in the area of weapons of mass destruction. [Click here for Miller Clip 3.]

Where did Miller learn the art of journalism? The job of a good reporter—investigative or otherwise—is more like that of an intelligence analyst than a stenographer. A good reporter is supposed to dig for the truth, no matter what "people inside the governments" with "very high security clearances" might say. The very point of Massing's objections about the prewar WMD coverage is that Knight Ridder folks got closer to the truth with blue collar sources than did Miller with all of her "inside" sources.

On the radio show, Miller conflates Massing's very specific criticisms of her work into a generalized attack on the New York Times, which his piece is not. She says:

The idea that the New York Times is just acting as a lackey for the administration—at any single day you can find reporters dissecting and analyzing and working on projects that challenge the administration's assertions and wisdom, that's what we do. And this notion that we were a pack all moving in one direction is, I'm sorry, it just doesn't bear any understanding of how a newsroom works. We love discomforting our readers. We love challenging the administration, saying, "Hey, what you've just heard may not be true." [Click here for Miller Clip 4.]

But Massing doesn't claim the New York Times is anybody's lackey; his detailed story is about Miller's unreliable and gullible reporting in the 18-month run-up to the Iraq war. Massing agrees with the thrust of my July 25, 2003, Slate piece, "The Times Scoops That Melted," where I speculated that Miller misled readers by relying too uncritically on Iraqi dissidents and defectors as sources.

But Miller says she bears no responsibility for having foisted inaccurate information upon the public because, she claims, other Times reporters mopped up after her, making the paper institutionally clean. From the same interview, she says:

Just because I don't write it doesn't mean that the New York Times doesn't write it. I mean, I love to think I can write it all. But even I can't. … So this is a constant, collective effort, and to just look at my work, and say, well, she wrote this and then she didn't get back to it, that doesn't mean the paper didn't. [Click here for Miller Clip 5.]

Once again, Massing's point isn't that the Times never revisited some of the topics Miller botched. But as long as we're on the subject of the Times revisiting her journalistic flops, I don't think anybody at the paper has ever revisited several of Miller's still-controversial prewar stories, including her piece about Russia's "Madame Small Pox," who was allegedly helping the Iraqis weaponize the disease; defector allegations about WMD caches in Iraq ("All of Iraq is one large storage facility" for WMD, the pseudonymous Ahmed al-Shemri told Miller in the Sept. 8, 2002, Times); or above all Miller's breathless April 21, 2003, dispatch about the Iraqi scientist in a baseball cap whom she described as pointing out the locations of buried WMD precursors to weapons hunters ("Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, An Iraqi Scientist Is Said To Assert"). And that's just for starters. Several months after the war, Miller was citing the military's poor methodology for the failure to locate WMD in Iraq.

Rather than come clean on The Connection about her stories and simply admit that she was taken, Miller speculates that her stories generate so much "anger" because her critics are all antiwar or they're still furious about the 2000 election, and they've made her the scapegoat. Seriously! She states:

I think the reason … is that people are genuinely angry and upset and deeply polarized about the war. And I think they're genuinely upset and angry about the election of an administration that some people feel, you know an election itself that was, quote, stolen, and that all of this anger has kind of come to the fore in the debate over WMD in Iraq.

Give me a break! I'm one voluble Miller critic who can state unequivocally 1) that the 2000 election wasn't stolen and 2) the Iraq invasion was justified. To pretend that her critics have merely misplaced their anger is psychobabble of the most inane sort.

If Miller—and the New York Times—think her WMD work was so exemplary, why isn't she covering the subject for the paper? Since late last summer, she's been effectively back-benched by the Times on the WMD story. The words "David Kay" haven't appeared in a Miller piece since an Oct. 3, 2003, story she co-wrote with James Risen.

Miller's dissembling continued this week when she told Women's Wear Daily on Feb. 10 that Massing's piece "misquoted and misrepresented" her. If Massing really misquoted and misrepresented her, don't you think she should have brought the subject up during The Connection's 45-minute broadcast? Massing responded to Miller's allegation in a letter to Romenesko, writing, "Per our agreement, I checked every quote with her prior to publication. She approved each and every one."

Meanwhile, Miller is said to have sent a letter to the New York Review about the piece, but the publication's co-editor Robert Silvers says he hasn't received it. "I wonder by what method she sent it," Silvers says. He adds that Massing will defend any misquoting charges. [See the Addendum below for Miller's letter and Massing's response.]

There is much humiliation but no eternal shame in getting a story wrong—everybody who reports for a living makes mistakes from time to time. The only way to right the wrong is to correct the record and eat some crow, both remedies Miller rejects.

The Times published most of Miller's controversial pieces before Bill Keller took over as Times executive editor, so he's not directly responsible for her failings. Likewise, the stories all predate the appointment of Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent, so one could argue that it's not his immediate obligation to straighten out the Miller mess. But Times readers are owed something in the way of an explanation, and the newspaper could do worse than follow the standards of accountability set down on its own editorial page on May 26, 2003. When it appeared that the United States wouldn't find WMD in Iraq, the Times editorialized in "Reviewing the Intelligence on Iraq" that:

Numerous questions need to be explored. Some are narrow issues, like how the administration came to rely on forged documents to make the case that Iraq was trying to import uranium for its presumed nuclear weapons program. Others are broader, like the role played by a new special office in the Pentagon that applied its own interpretations to the information and analyses generated by the traditional intelligence agencies. A critical question is what information was presented to the president in the run-up to war.

If you substitute "the Times" for "the administration" and "the president," you catch my drift of my analogy. Perhaps Keller and Okrent don't owe Times readers a Miller rehashing, but the Times as an institution does. If Massing's analysis is right—and I think it is—something went dreadfully wrong at West 43rd Street. Especially given Miller's public proclamation that her WMD work met the highest standards of her profession, readers have a right to know: What went wrong at the Times?

Addendum: Feb. 13, 2003 Daniel Okrent, public editor of the New York Times, provided me with a copy of Judith Miller's letter to the New York Review of Books that disputes the accuracy of Michael Massing's article. Okrent says Miller's letter to the New York Review was sent via postal mail. This probably explains why the Review has not yet received it.

Miller's letter states:

Michael Massing misquoted me in his biased, selective account on how the press allegedly covered Iraq before the war. Though I asked him to read me back my quotes for accuracy and he reluctantly did, there is one that he missed. I did not say that as an investigative reporter, I was not an "independent intelligence analyst." I am both an analyst and very independent. What I said was that as an investigative reporter, I could not be an independent intelligence agency.*

Massing responds:

I spent several hours interviewing Judith Miller for my article, and another hour patiently reading back to her all of her comments for approval, as I had agreed. Whenever she requested, I amended her quotes. I particularly remember reading back the quote in question. If Ms. Miller felt it was inaccurate or misleading in any way, she could have asked that it be changed, and it would have been. But she approved it.

******

And if the Times acts quickly, I'll even buy the beer for the special-projects team investigating Miller's work. Send me a drink at pressbox@hotmail.com. (E-mail may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

Correction, Feb. 13, 2004: A one-sentence comment by Daniel Okrent that was mistaken by Jack Shafer as part of Miller's letter was removed two hours after posting. Return to the corrected passage.

Jack Shafer is Slate's editor at large."