If you thought American neoconservatism was dead, think again. Yes, it was encouraging to see Donald Rumsfeld, John Bolton and Scooter Libby marched to the guillotine, but guess what: there's more where they came from.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has chosen Eliot Cohen to serve as her "counselor." It might be more accurate to say that Rice has tapped Cohen to become her neo-consigliore.
Neo-connecting the Dots
Cohen's job as State Department counselor, according to a Johns Hopkins University press release, will be as "a principal officer who serves the Secretary as a special advisor and consultant on major problems of foreign policy and who provides guidance to the appropriate bureaus with respect to such matters. The Counselor conducts special international negotiations and consultations, and also undertakes special assignments from time to time, as directed by the Secretary."
The same press release quotes Cohen as saying "It is an honor to be asked to serve one's country at any time, but particularly during wartime."
Well, well, it's nice of old Eliot to be honored to be consulted on major problems of foreign policy during wartime, especially considering that he's one of the chief culprits who created the problems and the war.
Cohen, along with Rumsfeld, Bolton, Libby and others, were charter members of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the neoconservative think tank founded by Bill Kristol that forged young Mr. Bush's foreign policy--most notably, the part of that foreign policy that involved regime change in Iraq through armed invasion. Like Condi, who was a professor of political science at Stanford, Cohen is an academic.
To take the State Department job, he'll have to be on leave of absence from his regular gig as director of John Hopkins' Strategic Studies Program. That's a good news/bad news thing. The good news is we're getting a neocon out of academia. The bad news is, we're putting another one into the government. The worse news is that when Condi and Cohen leave the government, they'll both go back to academia, where they'll be key players in growing follow-on generations of neocons.
The Neo-Swarm
Douglas Feith, another PNACer, was the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy who his fingers in every Rumsfeld era scandal from the Office of Special Plans (OSP) intelligence cooking on Iraq to the Abu Ghraib scandal. Feith is now a visiting professor in national security studies at Georgetown University.
Feith's successor as Undersecretary of Defense for Policy is Eric S. Edelman. Edelman was a recess appointment in August 2005. Edelman has a long history of ties with Vice President Dick Cheney, another PNAC charter member. Edelman is in charge of the Iranian Directorate (ID), an intelligence cherry picking group that does much the same thing with Iranian intelligence that Feith's OSP did with the intelligence on Iran. Like the OSP, the ID gives direct briefings to Dick Cheney, most notably in the person of Abram Shulsky, who was director of the OSP under Doug Feith and who was also a member of the PNAC.
John Bolton's successor as Ambassador to the UN is expected to be current Ambassador to Iran Zalmay Khalilzad. Khalilzad was also an original member of the PNAC. Bolton is now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, as is Fred Kagan. Kagan is also a PNACer and was the primary author of the Iraq "surge" plan. Kagan taught military history for a decade at the West Point Military Academy.
In the wake of the Libby verdict, many have speculated that Dick Cheney will use his recently diagnosed case of economy class leg lump as an excuse to step down and make way for an heir apparent to the 2008 GOP presidential nomination. One name that looms large in the speculation is Little Brother Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida and, oh by the way, also a charter member of the PNAC.
Irish journalist Andrew Cockburn tells a pretty good story about a conversation between Bush 41 and Bush 43 that took place during the 2004 election campaign. Big Brother turned to Big Daddy and asked, "What's a neocon?"
Cockburn won't reveal his source, but he swears the story is true.
Big Daddy's supposed reply was "I'll give it to you in one word: Israel." But he might as well have simply said, "They're everywhere."
At this juncture in the American experiment, the neoconservatives have infiltrated nearly every nook and cranny of the country's political, economic, intellectual and religious life. It virtually owns a significant portion of our information media (A.M. talk radio, the Weekly Standard, National Review, Fox News, etc.), and has infected all of it. And they're reproducing like rabbits. For every Libby who bites the poison turnip, a dozen more young neocons spring out from the shrubbery.
George W. Bush isn't the only cement head who doesn't understand the scope of the neocons' influence and activity. Last October, on CNN's Late Edition, former Secretary of State Al Haig told Wolf Blitzer that the Iraq war "…was driven by the so-called neocons that hijacked my party, the Republican Party."
When Blitzer pressed Haig to name some names, Haig flummoxed and fussed. He eventually threw out names like Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz. When Blitzer asked him point blank whether Donald Rumsfeld was a neocon, Haig replied, "I wouldn't say he was." When Blitzer asked if Cheney was a neocon, Haig said, "I think so."
I wouldn't say? I think so? Yeah, Al. Cheney and Rumsfeld are as neo-connected as they come, and you don't know that?
It will be a very long time before the GOP manages to purge the neocons from its ranks, which means it will be a cold day in Cuba before I vote for a Republican again.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Libby Guilty on Four of Five Counts
We'll see what, if anything, this leads to.
Maybe Cheney will step down because of that darn old blood clot in his leg.
Maybe Cheney will step down because of that darn old blood clot in his leg.
Empires and Anthills
Also at DKos.
I've been saying for some time that America's military superiority has become an increasingly ineffective tool of national power. Now, it appears that a pair of political scientists has accumulated sufficient data to back that assertion. Shankar Vedantam of the Washington Post reports on studies conducted by Jason Lyall at Princeton University and Lieutenant Colonel Isaiah Wilson III at the U.S. Military Academy in an excellent article titled "Don't Send a Lion to Catch a Mouse." (A colleague informs me that Colonel Wilson served with David Petraeus, who is currently the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and who supervised the Army's new field manual on counter insurgency operations.)
According to Vedantam, the studies show that…
Asymmetrical Warfare
"Asymmetrical warfare" is a term often both misused and abused. Historically, opposing forces in armed conflicts have seldom been identical in terms of size or capability. The Peloponnesian War of the 4th century (B.C.) pitted a maritime power (Athens) against a land power (Sparta). The 20th century Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union had a similar aspect, the U.S. being the maritime power and the Soviets being the land power.
But over time, "asymmetrical warfare" has come to describe armed conflicts between greater and lesser powers, and as the research by Lyall and Wilson points out, the record shows that the greater powers haven't fared well in this type of warfare.
Lyall and Wilson studied 250 asymmetrical wars, starting with Napoleon's Peninsular War with Spain (1808-1814). Success rates for great powers in these types of wars went from 85 percent from 1800 to 1850, but dropped to 21 percent between 1950 and 2003.
Reportedly, General David Petraeus, the new U.S. commander in Iraq, gives the "surge" strategy a 25 percent chance of succeeding.
In an article titled "Wars and Empires," I wrote that almost without exception, empires that ended badly failed to understand that the military power that established them was not, in itself, sufficient to sustain them. Today, America spends as much as the rest of the world combined on defense, yet our military languishes in seemingly hopeless conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan against adversaries whose technology and logistics are vastly inferior.
It may be that Petraeus can beat his own odds and salvage something from the Iraq situation. I sincerely hope so. But even if he does, we have already revealed our Achilles heel: our primary instrument of power has proven ineffective at defending our shores and borders, achieving our aims overseas, and decisively winning the kinds of wars it fights.
Whether you step on an anthill with a sandal or roll over it with a tank, the result is pretty much the same. You still have a colony of ants.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
I've been saying for some time that America's military superiority has become an increasingly ineffective tool of national power. Now, it appears that a pair of political scientists has accumulated sufficient data to back that assertion. Shankar Vedantam of the Washington Post reports on studies conducted by Jason Lyall at Princeton University and Lieutenant Colonel Isaiah Wilson III at the U.S. Military Academy in an excellent article titled "Don't Send a Lion to Catch a Mouse." (A colleague informs me that Colonel Wilson served with David Petraeus, who is currently the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and who supervised the Army's new field manual on counter insurgency operations.)
According to Vedantam, the studies show that…
Although great powers are vastly more powerful today than in the 19th century, the analysis showed they have become far less likely to win asymmetrical wars. More surprising, the analysis showed that the odds of a powerful nation winning an asymmetrical war decrease as that nation becomes more powerful.
Asymmetrical Warfare
"Asymmetrical warfare" is a term often both misused and abused. Historically, opposing forces in armed conflicts have seldom been identical in terms of size or capability. The Peloponnesian War of the 4th century (B.C.) pitted a maritime power (Athens) against a land power (Sparta). The 20th century Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union had a similar aspect, the U.S. being the maritime power and the Soviets being the land power.
But over time, "asymmetrical warfare" has come to describe armed conflicts between greater and lesser powers, and as the research by Lyall and Wilson points out, the record shows that the greater powers haven't fared well in this type of warfare.
Lyall and Wilson studied 250 asymmetrical wars, starting with Napoleon's Peninsular War with Spain (1808-1814). Success rates for great powers in these types of wars went from 85 percent from 1800 to 1850, but dropped to 21 percent between 1950 and 2003.
Reportedly, General David Petraeus, the new U.S. commander in Iraq, gives the "surge" strategy a 25 percent chance of succeeding.
In an article titled "Wars and Empires," I wrote that almost without exception, empires that ended badly failed to understand that the military power that established them was not, in itself, sufficient to sustain them. Today, America spends as much as the rest of the world combined on defense, yet our military languishes in seemingly hopeless conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan against adversaries whose technology and logistics are vastly inferior.
It may be that Petraeus can beat his own odds and salvage something from the Iraq situation. I sincerely hope so. But even if he does, we have already revealed our Achilles heel: our primary instrument of power has proven ineffective at defending our shores and borders, achieving our aims overseas, and decisively winning the kinds of wars it fights.
Whether you step on an anthill with a sandal or roll over it with a tank, the result is pretty much the same. You still have a colony of ants.
#
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Monday, March 05, 2007
Iraq: The Perpetual Disaster Machine
Also at DKos.
Politicians, pundits and senior military officers alike have characterized the so-called Iraq surge strategy with words like "the last best chance for success." So what if it doesn't work?
According to Karen DeYoung and Thomas E. Ricks of the Washington Post, a group of governors asked that question of Mr. Bush and Joint Chiefs chairman Peter Pace in a meeting at the White House last week. Pace's answer: "I'm a Marine, and Marines don't talk about failure. They talk about victory."
Shades of Doctor Strangelove!
There Is No Plan B, Mandrake
Governor Phil Bredesen (D-Tenn.) told DeYoung and Ricks that Pace's Plan B was "to make Plan A work."
Apparently, some within the government are thinking about a worst-case scenario. Last month, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told Congress "I would be irresponsible if I weren't thinking about what the alternatives might be."
The problem is that there is no "good" Plan B. The "best" Plan B would likely be something akin to Congressman Jack Murtha's (D-Penn.) proposal to redeploy to the periphery, but the Bush administration is unlikely to throw up its hands after Plan A fails and say "Murtha was right all along."
So even though nobody has a heck of a lot of faith in Plan A, it will succeed because it has to.
Bush supporters may call this being "resolute." I call it "faith based war fighting."
If At First You Don't Succeed…
I don't have a lot of faith at this point that the Democratically controlled Congress can stop Plan A from proceeding. The Battle of Baghdad has already commenced, and the legislature is unlikely to cut funding for troops already engaged in the field, or to provide reinforcements to an ongoing operation.
Prepare to hear a lot of talk about how "progress" in being made with the new "strategy"--more "corners turned" and "last throes" jabber.
Barring an unexpected breakthrough in the Congressional maneuvering, Plan A is here to stay.
Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, is leading an effort to rewrite the 2002 authorization to invade Iraq. The new bill would not repeal the authorization, but would limit the U.S. mission in Iraq to training, counterterrorism efforts, border control and logistics support of Iraqi forces.
I like this idea in theory, but practically speaking, I doubt it could actually work. Iraq is a complex quagmire in which all the parts are interconnected. What good would it do to drive al-Qaeda out of Anbar province only to have the Mahdi Army or some other militia take over Baghdad? I'm also leery about Congress micromanaging the actions of commanders in the field. (Yes, I know that sounds like a Joe Lieberman argument, but it's a valid one.)
Operational considerations aside, though, it's not likely that Levin can craft a bill of this nature that will pass the Senate's 60 vote yardstick.
Iraq has turned into a perpetual disaster machine. Everything we do makes the situation worse, and the worse the situation gets, the more we do that worsens the situation even further.
Terms like "success" and "failure" no longer apply to the Iraq situation. We accomplished the "mission" of regime change more than three years ago, but we'll never transform Iraq into a democratic Shangri-la. Mr. Bush insists on pressing for a "victory" he can't define beyond the level of abstract platitudes, and will not tolerate a situation he considers to be a "defeat."
What is "defeat" in Iraq? The enemy (or enemies) cannot physically drive us out of Iraq. But is staying in Iraq to prove "they" can't drive us out a sane strategy or policy? It appears that Mr. Bush thinks it is. But then, to Mr. Bush, everything is a manhood measuring contest. Too bad he keeps coming up short.
Maybe that's why he's doing everything in his power to ensure we stay engaged militarily in Iraq for a very long time.
#
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Politicians, pundits and senior military officers alike have characterized the so-called Iraq surge strategy with words like "the last best chance for success." So what if it doesn't work?
According to Karen DeYoung and Thomas E. Ricks of the Washington Post, a group of governors asked that question of Mr. Bush and Joint Chiefs chairman Peter Pace in a meeting at the White House last week. Pace's answer: "I'm a Marine, and Marines don't talk about failure. They talk about victory."
Shades of Doctor Strangelove!
There Is No Plan B, Mandrake
Governor Phil Bredesen (D-Tenn.) told DeYoung and Ricks that Pace's Plan B was "to make Plan A work."
Apparently, some within the government are thinking about a worst-case scenario. Last month, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told Congress "I would be irresponsible if I weren't thinking about what the alternatives might be."
The problem is that there is no "good" Plan B. The "best" Plan B would likely be something akin to Congressman Jack Murtha's (D-Penn.) proposal to redeploy to the periphery, but the Bush administration is unlikely to throw up its hands after Plan A fails and say "Murtha was right all along."
So even though nobody has a heck of a lot of faith in Plan A, it will succeed because it has to.
Bush supporters may call this being "resolute." I call it "faith based war fighting."
If At First You Don't Succeed…
I don't have a lot of faith at this point that the Democratically controlled Congress can stop Plan A from proceeding. The Battle of Baghdad has already commenced, and the legislature is unlikely to cut funding for troops already engaged in the field, or to provide reinforcements to an ongoing operation.
Prepare to hear a lot of talk about how "progress" in being made with the new "strategy"--more "corners turned" and "last throes" jabber.
Barring an unexpected breakthrough in the Congressional maneuvering, Plan A is here to stay.
Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, is leading an effort to rewrite the 2002 authorization to invade Iraq. The new bill would not repeal the authorization, but would limit the U.S. mission in Iraq to training, counterterrorism efforts, border control and logistics support of Iraqi forces.
I like this idea in theory, but practically speaking, I doubt it could actually work. Iraq is a complex quagmire in which all the parts are interconnected. What good would it do to drive al-Qaeda out of Anbar province only to have the Mahdi Army or some other militia take over Baghdad? I'm also leery about Congress micromanaging the actions of commanders in the field. (Yes, I know that sounds like a Joe Lieberman argument, but it's a valid one.)
Operational considerations aside, though, it's not likely that Levin can craft a bill of this nature that will pass the Senate's 60 vote yardstick.
Iraq has turned into a perpetual disaster machine. Everything we do makes the situation worse, and the worse the situation gets, the more we do that worsens the situation even further.
Terms like "success" and "failure" no longer apply to the Iraq situation. We accomplished the "mission" of regime change more than three years ago, but we'll never transform Iraq into a democratic Shangri-la. Mr. Bush insists on pressing for a "victory" he can't define beyond the level of abstract platitudes, and will not tolerate a situation he considers to be a "defeat."
What is "defeat" in Iraq? The enemy (or enemies) cannot physically drive us out of Iraq. But is staying in Iraq to prove "they" can't drive us out a sane strategy or policy? It appears that Mr. Bush thinks it is. But then, to Mr. Bush, everything is a manhood measuring contest. Too bad he keeps coming up short.
Maybe that's why he's doing everything in his power to ensure we stay engaged militarily in Iraq for a very long time.
#
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
War Powers: James Baker's Next "Non-binding" Commission
Big bad Baker's back.
According to a press release from University of Virginia's Miller Center of Public Affairs, former Secretaries of State James A. Baker III and Warren Christopher will head up the National War Powers Commission. The commission will be a "private bipartisan panel" that will "examine how the Constitution allocates the powers of beginning, conducting, and ending war." This panel promises to have as much impact on government policy as Baker's Iraq Study Group had.
None.
A Thousand Days Late and Hundreds of Billions Short
Young Mr. Bush treated the Iraq Study Group's report on Iraq like a disposable hygiene product, even though that report was intended as a stern admonition to correct his administration's failed Iraq policy. The National War Powers Commission doesn't even aspire to have any influence on current policies. From the Miller Center press release:
Separation of war powers among the executive, legislative and judicial branches is the central issue of today's American political environment, and the obvious reason that the War Powers Commission was convened in the first place. So why bother to establish a commission to make "recommendations" that aren't applicable to the present situation?
And why bother to throw (presumably) six-figure plus stipends at yet another group of political have-beens and "other experts" to tell us what the Constitution says about war powers? We can all read the constitution for ourselves and it don't cost nothin'. It's posted online, and you don't need a member name or password to read it.
We the People
Article II, section 2 of the Constitution makes the president commander in chief of the military. It makes no distinction of his authority in that role between wartime and peacetime, nor does it make any distinctions between declared and undeclared wars.
Article I grants all other war making powers--including the authority to declare war and grant letters of marque and reprisal--to the legislature.
Nowhere does the Constitution overtly grant a president "unitary," "plenary," or "extraordinary" powers to act outside what Article III describes as "…this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority."
Constitutionally, when making claims of extraordinary war powers, Mr. Bush doesn't really have a pot to go potty in. But that doesn't keep him and his neocon puppet masters from treating the Constitution like a public restroom.
There is no codified set of "war powers" that give a president extra-constitutional or extra-legal powers in a time of armed conflict. The War Powers Resolution of 1973 does not give the executive expanded authority in time of war. It limits his authority to commit U.S forces to combat without a declaration of war, "specific statutory authorization" from Congress, or a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.
In the course of more than a year and a half of researching the history of U.S. presidential powers, I found one--I repeat one--instance of a law passed by Congress that gives the executive branch a special privilege in wartime is this blurb at the very end of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
In December of 2005, we discovered that Mr. Bush had authorized warrantless electronic surveillance for several calendar years.
By summer of 2006, a federal district judge (Anna Diggs Taylor) had declared the warrantless wiretapping program to be unconstitutional, stating in her decision that "There are no hereditary kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution.'' But Bush's legal mastiff Alberto Gonzales insisted on the executive right to continue the program until the case could be appealed at the federal circuit level. In January, Mr. Bush bowed to the decision of the district court and placed the surveillance program back under control of the special Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Throughout America's history, presidents have exercised, or attempted to exercise, extraordinary powers in times of armed conflict. Sometimes they've gotten away with it, sometimes they haven't. Congress has not declared war, per se, since World War II, but presidents have committed troops to combat many times since Harry Truman sent U.S. forces to Korea in the 1950s. Arguably, young Mr. Bush has exceeded all other presidents in practicing the concept of executive privilege
Today, Democrats (and some Republicans) in Congress are seeking ways to limit young Mr. Bush's authority to conduct war in Iraq, but have so far been unsuccessful. He has, as we noted earlier, acceded to pressure to place the domestic surveillance program back under supervision of the FISA Court, but we don't know the details of that arrangement because they're secret. He blinked in the Jose Padilla affair, opting to levy charges against Padilla in federal court rather than face a showdown with the Supreme Court over whether or not he could hold a U.S. citizen as an illegal combatant,
We have yet to see if Bush will attack Iran without the legislature's approval. In early February, U.S. forces conducted air strikes in Somalia. I have yet to discover under what auspices those strikes were conducted, and have yet to hear anyone in the mainstream media or Congress even ask that question.
As to the proper division of war powers among the three branches of the federal government, I seriously doubt whether Mr. Baker's new commission will provide any meaningful answers to that question. And even if they do, I doubt anyone will pay any attention.
The time for Baker's new commission was four or five years ago. Now, as Mr. Bush might say, it will be a mere semicolon in the history of American tyranny.
#
Related article: "Smoke, Mirrors and War Powers"
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
According to a press release from University of Virginia's Miller Center of Public Affairs, former Secretaries of State James A. Baker III and Warren Christopher will head up the National War Powers Commission. The commission will be a "private bipartisan panel" that will "examine how the Constitution allocates the powers of beginning, conducting, and ending war." This panel promises to have as much impact on government policy as Baker's Iraq Study Group had.
None.
A Thousand Days Late and Hundreds of Billions Short
Young Mr. Bush treated the Iraq Study Group's report on Iraq like a disposable hygiene product, even though that report was intended as a stern admonition to correct his administration's failed Iraq policy. The National War Powers Commission doesn't even aspire to have any influence on current policies. From the Miller Center press release:
The Commission intends to produce a report making recommendations to assist Presidents, Congresses, Courts, and other policymakers in addressing war powers issues. When they are issued, the Commission’s recommendations will be entirely prospective in nature and not applicable to the present presidential Administration or present Congress.
Separation of war powers among the executive, legislative and judicial branches is the central issue of today's American political environment, and the obvious reason that the War Powers Commission was convened in the first place. So why bother to establish a commission to make "recommendations" that aren't applicable to the present situation?
And why bother to throw (presumably) six-figure plus stipends at yet another group of political have-beens and "other experts" to tell us what the Constitution says about war powers? We can all read the constitution for ourselves and it don't cost nothin'. It's posted online, and you don't need a member name or password to read it.
We the People
Article II, section 2 of the Constitution makes the president commander in chief of the military. It makes no distinction of his authority in that role between wartime and peacetime, nor does it make any distinctions between declared and undeclared wars.
Article I grants all other war making powers--including the authority to declare war and grant letters of marque and reprisal--to the legislature.
Nowhere does the Constitution overtly grant a president "unitary," "plenary," or "extraordinary" powers to act outside what Article III describes as "…this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority."
Constitutionally, when making claims of extraordinary war powers, Mr. Bush doesn't really have a pot to go potty in. But that doesn't keep him and his neocon puppet masters from treating the Constitution like a public restroom.
There is no codified set of "war powers" that give a president extra-constitutional or extra-legal powers in a time of armed conflict. The War Powers Resolution of 1973 does not give the executive expanded authority in time of war. It limits his authority to commit U.S forces to combat without a declaration of war, "specific statutory authorization" from Congress, or a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.
In the course of more than a year and a half of researching the history of U.S. presidential powers, I found one--I repeat one--instance of a law passed by Congress that gives the executive branch a special privilege in wartime is this blurb at the very end of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for a period not to exceed fifteen calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress.
In December of 2005, we discovered that Mr. Bush had authorized warrantless electronic surveillance for several calendar years.
By summer of 2006, a federal district judge (Anna Diggs Taylor) had declared the warrantless wiretapping program to be unconstitutional, stating in her decision that "There are no hereditary kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution.'' But Bush's legal mastiff Alberto Gonzales insisted on the executive right to continue the program until the case could be appealed at the federal circuit level. In January, Mr. Bush bowed to the decision of the district court and placed the surveillance program back under control of the special Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Throughout America's history, presidents have exercised, or attempted to exercise, extraordinary powers in times of armed conflict. Sometimes they've gotten away with it, sometimes they haven't. Congress has not declared war, per se, since World War II, but presidents have committed troops to combat many times since Harry Truman sent U.S. forces to Korea in the 1950s. Arguably, young Mr. Bush has exceeded all other presidents in practicing the concept of executive privilege
Today, Democrats (and some Republicans) in Congress are seeking ways to limit young Mr. Bush's authority to conduct war in Iraq, but have so far been unsuccessful. He has, as we noted earlier, acceded to pressure to place the domestic surveillance program back under supervision of the FISA Court, but we don't know the details of that arrangement because they're secret. He blinked in the Jose Padilla affair, opting to levy charges against Padilla in federal court rather than face a showdown with the Supreme Court over whether or not he could hold a U.S. citizen as an illegal combatant,
We have yet to see if Bush will attack Iran without the legislature's approval. In early February, U.S. forces conducted air strikes in Somalia. I have yet to discover under what auspices those strikes were conducted, and have yet to hear anyone in the mainstream media or Congress even ask that question.
As to the proper division of war powers among the three branches of the federal government, I seriously doubt whether Mr. Baker's new commission will provide any meaningful answers to that question. And even if they do, I doubt anyone will pay any attention.
The time for Baker's new commission was four or five years ago. Now, as Mr. Bush might say, it will be a mere semicolon in the history of American tyranny.
#
Related article: "Smoke, Mirrors and War Powers"
#
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Friday, March 02, 2007
The Senior Administration Official Formerly Known As Dick Cheney
Also at DKos.
By now, you've probably heard of Dick Cheney's latest bout of buffoonery. On his way home from his "try and kill me" tour through Asia on Air Force 2, Cheney agreed to be interviewed by reporters, but only if the reporters referred to him as "a senior administration official."
He blew his "cover" when he started making statements like "I would describe my sessions both in Pakistan and Afghanistan as very productive."
But even though any of my three dogs could see through this "anonymity" stratagem, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow plowed ahead with the company policy. On Wednesday, he told reporters " "I have spoken with the vice president's office, and the ground rules that were laid out are going to remain in effect."
Isn't that special?
The New Orwellians
It appears that even the Bush inner-circle is getting a glimmer that anything old "Last Throes" says will be automatically disregarded by the discerning public. And it's a sad state of affairs when the administration spinsters understand that if "Cheney says" his sessions in Pakistan and Afghanistan were very productive, that constitutes de facto evidence that those sessions were a total flop.
And for that blithering jackdaw Tony Snow to cover up the cover up with "ground rules are going to remain in effect" bull pluck illustrates just how insane the nature of discourse in our once might republic has become.
Voltaire, author of the immortal novella Candide, famously wrote, "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."
Lamentably, too many Americans exist who still believe the Bush administration's absurdities. They remind me of the "outer Party members" that George Orwell described in his seminal novel 1984.
In other words, Orwell tells us, it important in a totalitarian society for the citizenry to maintain a mentality appropriate to a state of war.
Does this sound at all familiar to you? It should.
Another Orwellian concept that should resonate is the Two Minutes Hate.
If you're at all aware of what goes on at A.M. talk radio, Fox News and the rest of the Big Brother Broadcast, you realize that Orwell's Two Minutes Hate has evolved into a 24/7/52 phenomenon.
I don't know how we're going to turn our country around, but I know that we must. We're at a tipping point. Our cherished republic continues to slide toward a state of Orwellian dystopia, and if we let this situation continue much longer, there will be no turning back.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
By now, you've probably heard of Dick Cheney's latest bout of buffoonery. On his way home from his "try and kill me" tour through Asia on Air Force 2, Cheney agreed to be interviewed by reporters, but only if the reporters referred to him as "a senior administration official."
He blew his "cover" when he started making statements like "I would describe my sessions both in Pakistan and Afghanistan as very productive."
But even though any of my three dogs could see through this "anonymity" stratagem, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow plowed ahead with the company policy. On Wednesday, he told reporters " "I have spoken with the vice president's office, and the ground rules that were laid out are going to remain in effect."
Isn't that special?
The New Orwellians
It appears that even the Bush inner-circle is getting a glimmer that anything old "Last Throes" says will be automatically disregarded by the discerning public. And it's a sad state of affairs when the administration spinsters understand that if "Cheney says" his sessions in Pakistan and Afghanistan were very productive, that constitutes de facto evidence that those sessions were a total flop.
And for that blithering jackdaw Tony Snow to cover up the cover up with "ground rules are going to remain in effect" bull pluck illustrates just how insane the nature of discourse in our once might republic has become.
Voltaire, author of the immortal novella Candide, famously wrote, "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."
Lamentably, too many Americans exist who still believe the Bush administration's absurdities. They remind me of the "outer Party members" that George Orwell described in his seminal novel 1984.
Even the humblest Party member is expected to be competent, industrious, and even intelligent within narrow limits, but it is also necessary that he should be a credulous and ignorant fanatic whose prevailing moods are fear, hatred, adulation, and orgiastic triumph.
In other words, Orwell tells us, it important in a totalitarian society for the citizenry to maintain a mentality appropriate to a state of war.
It does not matter whether the war is actually happening, and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going well or badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist.
Does this sound at all familiar to you? It should.
Another Orwellian concept that should resonate is the Two Minutes Hate.
The programmes of the Two Minutes Hate varied from day to day, but there was none in which Goldstein was not the principal figure. He was the primal traitor, the earliest defiler of the Party's purity. All subsequent crimes against the Party, all treacheries, acts of sabotage, heresies, deviations, sprang directly out of his teaching…
…Goldstein was hated and despised by everybody, although every day and a thousand times a day, on platforms, on the telescreen, in newspapers, in books, his theories were refuted, smashed, ridiculed, held up to the general gaze for the pitiful rubbish that they were in spite of all this, his influence never seemed to grow less…
… Before the Hate had proceeded for thirty seconds, uncontrollable exclamations of rage were breaking out from half the people in the room…
… In its second minute the Hate rose to a frenzy…
…The Hate rose to its climax. The voice of Goldstein had become an actual sheep's bleat, and for an instant the face changed into that of a sheep. Then the sheep-face melted into the figure of a Eurasian soldier who seemed to be advancing, huge and terrible, his sub-machine gun roaring, and seeming to spring out of the surface of the screen, so that some of the people in the front row actually flinched backwards in their seats. But in the same moment, drawing a deep sigh of relief from everybody, the hostile figure melted into the face of Big Brother, black-haired, black-moustachio'd, full of power and mysterious calm, and so vast that it almost filled up the screen. Nobody heard what Big Brother was saying. It was merely a few words of encouragement, the sort of words that are uttered in the din of battle, not distinguishable individually but restoring confidence by the fact of being spoken. Then the face of Big Brother faded away again, and instead the three slogans of the Party stood out in bold capitals:
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
If you're at all aware of what goes on at A.M. talk radio, Fox News and the rest of the Big Brother Broadcast, you realize that Orwell's Two Minutes Hate has evolved into a 24/7/52 phenomenon.
I don't know how we're going to turn our country around, but I know that we must. We're at a tipping point. Our cherished republic continues to slide toward a state of Orwellian dystopia, and if we let this situation continue much longer, there will be no turning back.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Iran: More Persian Fire Drill
Also at DKos.
The flip flop on Iran continues.
Over the weekend, Vice President Dick Cheney made boo noise about the possibility of military strikes on Iran by saying that "all options are still on the table."
But on Tuesday, Joint Chiefs chairman Peter Pace declared "categorically" before the U.S. Senate that the U.S. is not planning air strikes in Iran. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has repeatedly said much the same thing.
And yet, as Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker and Larisa Alexandrovna of Raw Story have been telling us for quite some time, Pentagon plans for an Iran strike are well into their advanced stages, and continue to be reevaluated and updated.
Certain outlets in the international press, quite plausibly influenced by propaganda cells within the Bush administration, continue to run headlines like "American Armada Prepares To Take On Iran."
So who's zooming whom here?
Iran Contra-diction
Despite the Bush administration's long-standing claims that Iran seeks the capability to develop nuclear weapons, it has failed to produce one stick of credible evidence to prove it. And the only "senior official" making claims that Iran is providing weapons to Iraqi militant groups who's willing to be identified in the press is some Army major who is a "weapons expert." Please note that being a weapons expert is not step on the fast track to becoming a U.S. Army general. But playing ball with the neocon agenda, well hell; that can land you a pretty cushy retirement job at a place like the American Enterprise Institute.
It's relatively clear that the rift between Dick Cheney's hapless hooligans and the competent professionals in the administration is about to come to an OK Corral-class showdown.
There's some indication that General Pace, the U.S. military's top officer, has undergone a second puberty. He slapped down claims by "senior defense officials" in Baghdad that the Iranian government was behind arming Shiite militants in Iraq. Some observers have suggested that Pace might be one of the generals who would resign if Mr. Bush launches an attack on Iran, but at present that's all "inside baseball" speculation.
Nonetheless, as I've said before, if Mr. Bush really wants to go big on Iran, Congress and the courts won't be able to stop him because they can't move as fast as the executive department can, especially when, as Sy Hersh warns, elements within the Pentagon (which I guess to be an Air Force planning cell) are putting together an Iran air strike package that can be popped off within 24 hours of Bush's say so.
So it just might be that the only thing staying Mr. Bush's hand is the possibility that if he decides to get froggy with Iran, his top military officer will pull a Pontius Pilate on him.
And it's a profoundly sad commentary on the state of our cherished constitutional process that the only person who can exercise checks on the powers of our commander in chief may turn out to be our top general.
Condi Candy
The New York Times tells us that the diplomatic impasse between the U.S. and Iran and Syria may be at an end. Here's the good news:
Here's the bad news:
Throwing Dubya's office wife Condi at negotiations with Iran and Syrian is the equivalent of putting a pedophile priest in charge of Boys' Town. If young Mr. Bush is the Alfred E. Neuman of U.S. presidencies (and he is), Condi Rice is the Britney Spears of American diplomacy.
Ms. Rice hasn't announced any plans to hold separate one-on-one talks with her Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki--which is probably good news. I'd hate to see what little good this "diplomatic" effort might produce get side railed by direct participation on Condi's part.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
The flip flop on Iran continues.
Over the weekend, Vice President Dick Cheney made boo noise about the possibility of military strikes on Iran by saying that "all options are still on the table."
But on Tuesday, Joint Chiefs chairman Peter Pace declared "categorically" before the U.S. Senate that the U.S. is not planning air strikes in Iran. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has repeatedly said much the same thing.
And yet, as Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker and Larisa Alexandrovna of Raw Story have been telling us for quite some time, Pentagon plans for an Iran strike are well into their advanced stages, and continue to be reevaluated and updated.
Certain outlets in the international press, quite plausibly influenced by propaganda cells within the Bush administration, continue to run headlines like "American Armada Prepares To Take On Iran."
So who's zooming whom here?
Iran Contra-diction
Despite the Bush administration's long-standing claims that Iran seeks the capability to develop nuclear weapons, it has failed to produce one stick of credible evidence to prove it. And the only "senior official" making claims that Iran is providing weapons to Iraqi militant groups who's willing to be identified in the press is some Army major who is a "weapons expert." Please note that being a weapons expert is not step on the fast track to becoming a U.S. Army general. But playing ball with the neocon agenda, well hell; that can land you a pretty cushy retirement job at a place like the American Enterprise Institute.
It's relatively clear that the rift between Dick Cheney's hapless hooligans and the competent professionals in the administration is about to come to an OK Corral-class showdown.
There's some indication that General Pace, the U.S. military's top officer, has undergone a second puberty. He slapped down claims by "senior defense officials" in Baghdad that the Iranian government was behind arming Shiite militants in Iraq. Some observers have suggested that Pace might be one of the generals who would resign if Mr. Bush launches an attack on Iran, but at present that's all "inside baseball" speculation.
Nonetheless, as I've said before, if Mr. Bush really wants to go big on Iran, Congress and the courts won't be able to stop him because they can't move as fast as the executive department can, especially when, as Sy Hersh warns, elements within the Pentagon (which I guess to be an Air Force planning cell) are putting together an Iran air strike package that can be popped off within 24 hours of Bush's say so.
So it just might be that the only thing staying Mr. Bush's hand is the possibility that if he decides to get froggy with Iran, his top military officer will pull a Pontius Pilate on him.
And it's a profoundly sad commentary on the state of our cherished constitutional process that the only person who can exercise checks on the powers of our commander in chief may turn out to be our top general.
The New York Times tells us that the diplomatic impasse between the U.S. and Iran and Syria may be at an end. Here's the good news:
American officials said Tuesday that they had agreed to hold the highest-level contact with the Iranian authorities in more than two years as part of an international meeting on Iraq.
Here's the bad news:
The discussions, scheduled for the next two months, are expected to include Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her Iranian and Syrian counterparts.
Throwing Dubya's office wife Condi at negotiations with Iran and Syrian is the equivalent of putting a pedophile priest in charge of Boys' Town. If young Mr. Bush is the Alfred E. Neuman of U.S. presidencies (and he is), Condi Rice is the Britney Spears of American diplomacy.
Ms. Rice hasn't announced any plans to hold separate one-on-one talks with her Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki--which is probably good news. I'd hate to see what little good this "diplomatic" effort might produce get side railed by direct participation on Condi's part.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
More Fuzzy Evidence On Iran
Also at DKos.
The military is trying to recover from the embarrassment of the secret briefing two weeks ago in which unnamed senior military officials in Baghdad tried to "prove" Iran was providing weapons to militant Shiite groups in Iraq. From Monday's New York Times:
"Circumstantial and inferential" indeed. It sounds to me like the spinsters are still trying to blow bull feathers up our collective skirt.
The "new evidence," according to the Times, "includes infrared sensors, electronic triggering devices and information about plastic explosives used in bombs that the Americans say lead back to Iran." But it's closer to the truth to say that these sensors, devices and explosives could have come from anywhere. As the Times notes…
Ashtray hardware and Radio Shack electronics. Yeah. This stuff had to come from Iran, all right.
In apparent reaction to the skepticism expressed by darn near everyone about the fact that the original "proof" of Iran's involvement with supplying weapons to Iraqi militants was presented by anonymous sources, the military has now allowed the press to publish a real name--Major Marty Weber, an "explosives expert." I’m halfway surprised Major Weber agreed to go along with being set up as the fall guy in this. It's the sort of thing Private Pyle would have enough sense to walk away from.
According to the Times the military promises that there's more "proof" to come "about materials found in a raid in Diyala Province, the mixed Sunni-Shiite battleground north of Baghdad, that, according to one military official, included enough components to make more than 100 E.F.P.s. The official asked not to be identified because the matter is so sensitive."
If the matter is so damn sensitive, why is yet another "unidentified official" talking about it at all? What, they couldn't find a Gomer dumb enough to attach his name to the to the latest wild assertion?
Higher and Deeper
As the Los Angeles Times reported a few days ago, four years and change of U.S. attempts to back up its claims of Iran's intention to produce a nuclear weapon have run into a dead end.
Hence the administration's shift from mushroom cloud rhetoric to accusations that Iran is providing Iraqi militants with weapons to use against U.S. troops. If such a connection could be made convincingly, it could be used as a justification for war under provisions of the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
Proof that Iran's government is directly involved in attacks of U.S. armed forces in Iraq could give Mr. Bush all the ammunition he needs to seek war authorization from Congress--if, that is, he bothers to consult Congress. The Resolution also states:
If Mr. Bush had evidence--compelling, manufactured or otherwise--that the Quds force had participated in an attack on U.S. troops, would he then claim that he had no time to confer with Congress before ordering a counterattack?
Given this administration's track record for playing fast and loose with the law, he just might.
What if there's an incident at sea between U.S. and Iranian naval forces? Would Bush bother with Congress before he struck back?
And along comes the March 5 issue of Newsweek with a tale of concerns that Iran may have already targeted New York City for a series of terror attacks. What timely news. These attacks would supposedly be aimed at bridges, tunnels, Jewish organizations and Wall Street. That would constitute an "attack upon the United States" wouldn't it?
Where did Newsweek get this information? From "a person with access to the briefing materials who asked for anonymity because of the sensitive subject matter."
From "a person." Not from a "senior official" or even an "official person."
How much longer will the mainstream media allow the government to plant propaganda via anonymous sources?
Joltin' Joe Cola
Tuesday morning at the Senate Intelligence Committee hearings, Joe Lieberman tried to bully witnesses into agreeing with him that the Quds' involvement in Iran had to be sanctioned by Iran's Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei because, well, it just had to be.
Lieberman has turned into a one man Katrina.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
The military is trying to recover from the embarrassment of the secret briefing two weeks ago in which unnamed senior military officials in Baghdad tried to "prove" Iran was providing weapons to militant Shiite groups in Iraq. From Monday's New York Times:
A raid on a Shiite weapons cache in the southern city of Hilla one week ago is providing what American officials call the best evidence yet that the deadliest roadside bombs in Iraq are manufactured in Iran, but critics contend that the forensic case remains circumstantial and inferential.
"Circumstantial and inferential" indeed. It sounds to me like the spinsters are still trying to blow bull feathers up our collective skirt.
The "new evidence," according to the Times, "includes infrared sensors, electronic triggering devices and information about plastic explosives used in bombs that the Americans say lead back to Iran." But it's closer to the truth to say that these sensors, devices and explosives could have come from anywhere. As the Times notes…
The most specialized part of the E.F.P.s [explosively formed projectiles] that were found is the concave copper disc, called a liner, that rolls into a deadly armor-piercing ball when the device explodes. Although American explosives experts say that the liner is deceptively difficult to make properly, the discs in Hilla look like a thick little alms plate or even a souvenir ashtray minus the indentations for holding cigarettes.
The electronics package is built around everyday items like the motion sensors used in garage-door openers and outdoor security systems; in fact, at the heart of some of the bombs found in Iraq is a type of infrared sensor commonly sold at electronic stores like Radio Shack.
Ashtray hardware and Radio Shack electronics. Yeah. This stuff had to come from Iran, all right.
In apparent reaction to the skepticism expressed by darn near everyone about the fact that the original "proof" of Iran's involvement with supplying weapons to Iraqi militants was presented by anonymous sources, the military has now allowed the press to publish a real name--Major Marty Weber, an "explosives expert." I’m halfway surprised Major Weber agreed to go along with being set up as the fall guy in this. It's the sort of thing Private Pyle would have enough sense to walk away from.
According to the Times the military promises that there's more "proof" to come "about materials found in a raid in Diyala Province, the mixed Sunni-Shiite battleground north of Baghdad, that, according to one military official, included enough components to make more than 100 E.F.P.s. The official asked not to be identified because the matter is so sensitive."
If the matter is so damn sensitive, why is yet another "unidentified official" talking about it at all? What, they couldn't find a Gomer dumb enough to attach his name to the to the latest wild assertion?
Higher and Deeper
As the Los Angeles Times reported a few days ago, four years and change of U.S. attempts to back up its claims of Iran's intention to produce a nuclear weapon have run into a dead end.
Although international concern is growing about Iran's nuclear program and its regional ambitions, diplomats here say most U.S. intelligence shared with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has proved inaccurate and none has led to significant discoveries inside Iran.
The officials said the CIA and other Western spy services had provided sensitive information to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency at least since 2002, when Iran's long-secret nuclear program was exposed. But none of the tips about supposed secret weapons sites provided clear evidence that the Islamic Republic was developing illicit weapons.
Hence the administration's shift from mushroom cloud rhetoric to accusations that Iran is providing Iraqi militants with weapons to use against U.S. troops. If such a connection could be made convincingly, it could be used as a justification for war under provisions of the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.
Proof that Iran's government is directly involved in attacks of U.S. armed forces in Iraq could give Mr. Bush all the ammunition he needs to seek war authorization from Congress--if, that is, he bothers to consult Congress. The Resolution also states:
The President in every possible instance shall consult with Congress before introducing United States Armed Forces into hostilities or into situation where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances.
If Mr. Bush had evidence--compelling, manufactured or otherwise--that the Quds force had participated in an attack on U.S. troops, would he then claim that he had no time to confer with Congress before ordering a counterattack?
Given this administration's track record for playing fast and loose with the law, he just might.
What if there's an incident at sea between U.S. and Iranian naval forces? Would Bush bother with Congress before he struck back?
And along comes the March 5 issue of Newsweek with a tale of concerns that Iran may have already targeted New York City for a series of terror attacks. What timely news. These attacks would supposedly be aimed at bridges, tunnels, Jewish organizations and Wall Street. That would constitute an "attack upon the United States" wouldn't it?
Where did Newsweek get this information? From "a person with access to the briefing materials who asked for anonymity because of the sensitive subject matter."
From "a person." Not from a "senior official" or even an "official person."
How much longer will the mainstream media allow the government to plant propaganda via anonymous sources?
Joltin' Joe Cola
Tuesday morning at the Senate Intelligence Committee hearings, Joe Lieberman tried to bully witnesses into agreeing with him that the Quds' involvement in Iran had to be sanctioned by Iran's Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei because, well, it just had to be.
Lieberman has turned into a one man Katrina.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Will Generals Stop Iran War?
I've been saying for some time that the only way the Pentagon might block a strike on Iran would be through key four-star officers resigning in protest. Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter of the Sunday Times reported this week that something like that might be afoot.
As you might expect, Smith and Baxter don't mention any names--either of their sources or of what generals or admirals might be involved. "Four or five generals and admirals" could be the entire Joint Chiefs of Staff or it could be a handful of one and two-stars who whose careers are at a dead end anyway. It's very unlikely that Admiral William Fallon or General David Petraeus would resign over a strike on Iran having just taken over the top two slots in Central Command.
From the sound of things, a majority of the top Pentagon brass thinks a strike on Iran would be a disastrous failure, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates seems to agree with that view. Mr. Bush's chief ally overseas, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, is on record as saying it would not "be right to take military action against Iran."
Yet, not surprisingly, Vice President Dick Cheney insists that the military option remains on the table. If this were coming from anyone but Cheney, I'd be willing to accept it as mere gamesmanship. But Cheney and his neo-confederates have been pushing for war with Iran for a long time.
24
Seymour Hersh appeared on CNN's Late Edition Sunday afternoon and talked about his upcoming story in the March 4 issue of The New Yorker. In "The Redirection" Hersh describes, among other things, how a planning cell in the Pentagon continues to rework the Iran target set.
This week, Senate Democrats will attempt to pass legislation that puts an expiration date on the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. How they'll get that past a Republican filibuster is anybody's guess.
If Congress really wants to keep Mr. Bush from moving against Iran without legislative approval, however, the bill they really need to revise is the War Powers Resolution of 1973. The Resolution, in effect, allows a president to commit troops to combat for up to 60 days before he needs to come to Congress for a declaration of war or "specific statutory authorization." If Mr. Bush can order an air operation against Iran on a 24-hour notice, he can blow up a significant portion of the country in 60 days.
The tricky part for Bush is finding a good enough excuse to pull a stunt of this magnitude.
From the Los Angeles Times we learn that the U.N. deems U.S. intelligence on Iran's nuclear intentions to be unreliable.
The clumsy attempt two weeks ago by unnamed senior defense officials to "prove" Iran is supplying weapons to militant groups in Iraq virtually blew up in their faces. So Mr. Bush's best hope for a justification to bomb Iran is an incident at sea between U.S. and Iranian naval forces.
As the U.S. increases the number of ships deployed to the region, the greater the odds become of such an incident occurring. We can take some comfort in the fact that American and Iranian naval ships have operated in the vicinity of each other in the Gulf and the North Arabian Sea for decades and have learned to avoid "mistakes" that could lead to unintentional weapons exchanges. Nonetheless, the present situation between the two countries is more tense that it has been since the Tanker War in the 80s.
If a U.S. ship is attacked--or perceived to have been attacked--by an Iranian vessel, or hits a mine, would American generals and admirals follow through on the threat to resign rather than participate in a strike on Iran?
If they do, the times we live in will become interesting indeed.
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Some of America’s most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources…
…“There are four or five generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran,” a source with close ties to British intelligence said. “There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible.”
As you might expect, Smith and Baxter don't mention any names--either of their sources or of what generals or admirals might be involved. "Four or five generals and admirals" could be the entire Joint Chiefs of Staff or it could be a handful of one and two-stars who whose careers are at a dead end anyway. It's very unlikely that Admiral William Fallon or General David Petraeus would resign over a strike on Iran having just taken over the top two slots in Central Command.
From the sound of things, a majority of the top Pentagon brass thinks a strike on Iran would be a disastrous failure, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates seems to agree with that view. Mr. Bush's chief ally overseas, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, is on record as saying it would not "be right to take military action against Iran."
Yet, not surprisingly, Vice President Dick Cheney insists that the military option remains on the table. If this were coming from anyone but Cheney, I'd be willing to accept it as mere gamesmanship. But Cheney and his neo-confederates have been pushing for war with Iran for a long time.
24
Seymour Hersh appeared on CNN's Late Edition Sunday afternoon and talked about his upcoming story in the March 4 issue of The New Yorker. In "The Redirection" Hersh describes, among other things, how a planning cell in the Pentagon continues to rework the Iran target set.
…the Pentagon is continuing intensive planning for a possible bombing attack on Iran, a process that began last year, at the direction of the President. In recent months, the former intelligence official told me, a special planning group has been established in the offices of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, charged with creating a contingency bombing plan for Iran that can be implemented, upon orders from the President, within twenty-four hours.
This week, Senate Democrats will attempt to pass legislation that puts an expiration date on the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. How they'll get that past a Republican filibuster is anybody's guess.
If Congress really wants to keep Mr. Bush from moving against Iran without legislative approval, however, the bill they really need to revise is the War Powers Resolution of 1973. The Resolution, in effect, allows a president to commit troops to combat for up to 60 days before he needs to come to Congress for a declaration of war or "specific statutory authorization." If Mr. Bush can order an air operation against Iran on a 24-hour notice, he can blow up a significant portion of the country in 60 days.
The tricky part for Bush is finding a good enough excuse to pull a stunt of this magnitude.
From the Los Angeles Times we learn that the U.N. deems U.S. intelligence on Iran's nuclear intentions to be unreliable.
VIENNA — Although international concern is growing about Iran's nuclear program and its regional ambitions, diplomats here say most U.S. intelligence shared with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has proved inaccurate and none has led to significant discoveries inside Iran.
The officials said the CIA and other Western spy services had provided sensitive information to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency at least since 2002, when Iran's long-secret nuclear program was exposed. But none of the tips about supposed secret weapons sites provided clear evidence that the Islamic Republic was developing illicit weapons.
The clumsy attempt two weeks ago by unnamed senior defense officials to "prove" Iran is supplying weapons to militant groups in Iraq virtually blew up in their faces. So Mr. Bush's best hope for a justification to bomb Iran is an incident at sea between U.S. and Iranian naval forces.
As the U.S. increases the number of ships deployed to the region, the greater the odds become of such an incident occurring. We can take some comfort in the fact that American and Iranian naval ships have operated in the vicinity of each other in the Gulf and the North Arabian Sea for decades and have learned to avoid "mistakes" that could lead to unintentional weapons exchanges. Nonetheless, the present situation between the two countries is more tense that it has been since the Tanker War in the 80s.
If a U.S. ship is attacked--or perceived to have been attacked--by an Iranian vessel, or hits a mine, would American generals and admirals follow through on the threat to resign rather than participate in a strike on Iran?
If they do, the times we live in will become interesting indeed.
#
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
UK Telegraph Telegraphing U.S. Propaganda?
Also at DKos.
With objective reporting like this, who needs Fox News? The UK Telegraph appears to be a willing participant in the Bush administration's propaganda campaign targeting Iran. A recent Telegraph article, written by Damien McElroy, seems specifically crafted to send a message to somebody.
Jehova! Could you bang the war drum any louder, Telegraph? Armada vs. Iran. Ring of steel. Looming threat. Meddling in Iraq and attempts to build a nuclear bomb.
We have, of course, seen no tangible evidence of Iran providing Iraqi militants with weapons or of any attempt by Iran to turn its fledgling nuclear energy industry into a weapon-building program. But that makes no never mind to the Rovewellian random noise generator. All they have to do is bounce the message off of as many walls as possible. If they can keep people scared enough, no one will ask for proof that supports their claims.
Reporter McElroy is embedded onboard the Eisenhower. I have up close and personal experience with this kind of wartime information operation. You get members of the international press onboard an aircraft carrier, get them all gee whiz and golly with a prescription dose of carrier operations (a powerful narcotic, believe me), and then feed them your message.
In the article, The Eisenhower's commander, Captain Dan Cloyd, likened the showdown with Iran to the Cold War. "There was a time when we had two aircraft carriers in the Mediterranean," he told McElroy. "The world changes and we adapt."
The cognizant among us can see the flaws in the analogy of Iran with the old Soviet Union. The problem is that the target audience of this kind of disingenuous persuasion isn't cognizant.
Captain Cloyd also told McElroy that, "Our maritime security mission is about denying the use of the seas to any potential spread of weapons of mass destruction."
This is yet another attempt to make visions of mushroom clouds dance in our heads. Weapons of mass destruction are being transported back and forth across the Persian Gulf? No.
McElroy describes Captain Cloyd as "quietly spoken." I'd like to think that's because the good captain knows he's being used to feed horse feathers into the bullhorn, and doesn't want the phony-baloney message transmitted any more loudly than necessary.
Planting the Demon Seed
The Pentagon's Information Operations directorate has become a loose cannon skittering across the gun decks. It's 2003 document Information Operations Roadmap, approved by Donald Rumsfeld, states that:
But it also argues…
What sublime bollocks. "I wasn't lying to the whole class, I was just lying to that foreign exchange kid, and the rest of the class just happened to hear me because I said it in front of the whole class."
I've said it before, I'll say it again: we continue to tolerate behavior from our administration that we wouldn't tolerate from our children.
And speaking of children: you may not be surprised to learn that I ran across the link to the Telegraph article on the front page of Free Republic.
Geepers, Freepers. How'd you get so creepers?
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
With objective reporting like this, who needs Fox News? The UK Telegraph appears to be a willing participant in the Bush administration's propaganda campaign targeting Iran. A recent Telegraph article, written by Damien McElroy, seems specifically crafted to send a message to somebody.
American Armada Prepares To Take On Iran
It is four and a half acres of US power in the middle of the Arabian Sea but the influence of USS Dwight D Eisenhower stretches hundreds of miles.
The aircraft carrier, backed by its sister vessel, a handful of destroyers and a shoal of support ships, has placed a ring of steel around an increasingly unstable region.
While the Eisenhower is ostensibly assisting US operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is increasingly occupied by the looming threat of Iran.
Recent tensions between the US and Iran over Teheran's meddling in Iraq and attempts to build a nuclear bomb have raised the prospect of its third regional war in a decade.
Jehova! Could you bang the war drum any louder, Telegraph? Armada vs. Iran. Ring of steel. Looming threat. Meddling in Iraq and attempts to build a nuclear bomb.
We have, of course, seen no tangible evidence of Iran providing Iraqi militants with weapons or of any attempt by Iran to turn its fledgling nuclear energy industry into a weapon-building program. But that makes no never mind to the Rovewellian random noise generator. All they have to do is bounce the message off of as many walls as possible. If they can keep people scared enough, no one will ask for proof that supports their claims.
Reporter McElroy is embedded onboard the Eisenhower. I have up close and personal experience with this kind of wartime information operation. You get members of the international press onboard an aircraft carrier, get them all gee whiz and golly with a prescription dose of carrier operations (a powerful narcotic, believe me), and then feed them your message.
In the article, The Eisenhower's commander, Captain Dan Cloyd, likened the showdown with Iran to the Cold War. "There was a time when we had two aircraft carriers in the Mediterranean," he told McElroy. "The world changes and we adapt."
The cognizant among us can see the flaws in the analogy of Iran with the old Soviet Union. The problem is that the target audience of this kind of disingenuous persuasion isn't cognizant.
Captain Cloyd also told McElroy that, "Our maritime security mission is about denying the use of the seas to any potential spread of weapons of mass destruction."
This is yet another attempt to make visions of mushroom clouds dance in our heads. Weapons of mass destruction are being transported back and forth across the Persian Gulf? No.
McElroy describes Captain Cloyd as "quietly spoken." I'd like to think that's because the good captain knows he's being used to feed horse feathers into the bullhorn, and doesn't want the phony-baloney message transmitted any more loudly than necessary.
Planting the Demon Seed
The Pentagon's Information Operations directorate has become a loose cannon skittering across the gun decks. It's 2003 document Information Operations Roadmap, approved by Donald Rumsfeld, states that:
…information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa
But it also argues…
…the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices.
What sublime bollocks. "I wasn't lying to the whole class, I was just lying to that foreign exchange kid, and the rest of the class just happened to hear me because I said it in front of the whole class."
I've said it before, I'll say it again: we continue to tolerate behavior from our administration that we wouldn't tolerate from our children.
And speaking of children: you may not be surprised to learn that I ran across the link to the Telegraph article on the front page of Free Republic.
Geepers, Freepers. How'd you get so creepers?
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Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) writes from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Read his commentaries at Pen and Sword.
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