Author: Scott H

Another Journalism Scandal – the Debat/ABC case

Item: A “counter-terrorism expert” of dubious credentials has been fabricating reports for leading media organizations. Imagine that.
The “expert” in question is one Alexis Debat, whom the London Times (Murdoch Media) cited as their source for the following screaming headline, “Pentagon ‘three-day blitz’ plan for Iran.”

“THE Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive airstrikes against 1,200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranians’ military capability in three days, according to a national security expert.
Alexis Debat, director of terrorism and national security at the Nixon Center, said last week that US military planners were not preparing for “pinprick strikes” against Iran’s nuclear facilities. “They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,” he said.
Debat was speaking at a meeting organised by The National Interest, a conservative foreign policy journal. He told The Sunday Times that the US military had concluded: “Whether you go for pinprick strikes or all-out military action, the reaction from the Iranians will be the same.” It was, he added, a “very legitimate strategic calculus”.

That is, why bother hitting just narrow targets inside Iran somehow connected to violence against Americans in Iraq? Because we can “calculate” that Iranians will hit back hard with additional assets, then we better pre-emptively strike at the retaliatory capability too. And thus, smash the entire country. (Does this logic have an echo to last summer in Lebanon, 2006?)
One problem for the story, the “expert” source of this revelation stands accused of being a disinformation specialist, one who for years has been embedded with ABC News and Washington’s influential Nixon Center think tank. This no doubt is a fast moving story, and I have my own file of Debat doozies, including a disputed April 3rd ABC report of this year that the US, via Pakistan, was secretly providing support to Baluchi insurgents against Iran.
I’m also recalling a widely cited Debat essay, published in The National Interest, from last December 8th, wherein he argued against the Baker-Hamilton Commission recommendations (“There’s nothing we can offer Iran or Syria that they would be interested in”) and instead cynically argued for “a further empowerment of the Sunni militias….” Why, because “the ensuing chaos… would apply significant pressure on the Shi‘a leadership in Baghdad.” (and somehow result in a Milosevic style Dayton deal.) One wonders if Debat also works for Petraeus.
Debat’s present troubles apparently owe to his penchant for publishing long – and faked – interviews, in France’s Politique Internationale, with major American and international figures, including Alan Greenspan, Colin Powell, Bill Gates, Nancy Pelosi, Kofi Annan, and a recent “scoop” with Presidential Candidate Barrack Obama. Debat’s reputation for fabricating stories supposedly was whispered about, but not publicly exposed until a September 7th report in Rue89 . Debat’s initial denial only made matters worse.
ABC now claims they (quietly) “demanded his resignation” in June (without clarifying when they got it). ABC is also sticking to the lame line that the integrity of their reports was not compromised. The Nixon Center cut Debat loose only after the “Rue89” story. Debat’s reports are now disappearing fast from the net.
For more of the details on the scandal, including a hint that Debat claimed he was a Pentagon contractor, see Laura Rozen’s MoJO blog entry. In “Subject to Debat: What did ABC Know and When Did It Know It?,” Rozen observes,

“Overall, the picture of Debat that emerges from these interviews is of a smart, ambitious and cunning operator who would claim to be getting text messages from Middle Eastern intelligence operatives while at meetings with Ross and others at ABC, with tips that seemed too good to be true (which some colleagues believe were bogus), yet were used as “exclusives.”

I suspect there’s more to it than just “cunning” ambition; this is ambition with a neoconservative-style agenda. Rozen also raises key questions about ABC’s internal handling of Debat “scoops” and its present investigation. That is, will Brian Ross’s now tainted “investigative unit” be tasked with investigating itself? (For example, will it touch that Valentines’ Day 2003 story about Udai Hussein being more brutal than his father – the one that cited Debat and was part of media blitz to justify invading Iraq?) Lastly, “enquiring minds will want to know” if ABC will drop the Cheney-like insistence that, “it was confident that all of Debat’s reports for ABC had been vetted and multiple sourced and were standing up to scrutiny.”
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Added note: In this excellent “attytood” comment, Will Bunch of The Daily News points out a “neoconservative” link to Politique Internationale – the French journal that long posted Debat’s fabricated interviews. (The journal’s recent claims that they didn’t know how “crazy” Debat was are, on the face of them, absurd. How many complaints did they get over how many years?) Turns out no less than the infamous Amir Taheri has been an editor at PI from around 2001 until recently. Remember Taheri ? Top “star” in Mdme Benador’s stable of neoconservative propagandists, Taheri was the author of the May 2006 “Yellow Stars for Iranian Jews” disinfo fabrication.
Birds of a feather flock together.

A 9/11 Blessing

(This is Scott writing)
For the past six years, I haven’t had any birthdays. 9/11’s come and go – mostly go. It just hasn’t seemed right to celebrate anything on a day when every American will remember the searing horrors of six years ago.
Lately, I’ve been reminded anew of life’s fragility. An admired Professor recently lost her husband of many decades. Then a brilliant friend lost precious two-year-old son Jude after a tragic pool accident. He and his family now head back to Lebanon, where ironically, I pray they can find peace and “home.” My own long-time mentor is facing a serious heart surgery soon; he has too many much needed books, from Jefferson to Iran, yet to write!
Yet I met a sweet little angel just a few hours ago who already has changed my outlook on life, and 9/11 in particular. Her name is Jessica Anne Harrop, and she’s all of 7 lbs, 2 oz.
Forgive my happiness; she’s beautiful.
jessica2.jpg
Jessica is also my first grand-child.
Special thanks to my son Keith and his lovely wife Rachel for such a present! Rachel is doing well, though she’s understandably very tired after a delayed and rather long delivery.
Yet it was especially considerate of Jessica to take her time – an extra week – in arriving so she could share a birthday with her… hey, what am I now?
A grandpa? I am sooooo not ready for this. Folks think I’m not old enough; my career’s on hold; I’m not even “gray” yet.
Not to worry Jessica dear, panic attack over. You’re a bright and inspiring new Light in our lives. May our world yet be a saner and happier place with you in it.

“Consider the blameless; observe the upright; there is a future for the man – and woman – of peace.”
— Psalm 37:37

Senator Chuck Hagel to “retire”

The New York Times web site is reporting that Senator Chuck Hagel, R-Nebraska, will not run for re-election to the Senate, nor for the White House.
We’ve written about Senator Hagel here before, in general admiring his status as a rare Republican foreign policy maverick, a clear-thinker with the credentials, the experience, and most importantly, the nerve to stand up to the neconservative infiltration and takeover of the Republican Party.
Hagel was anti-war on Iraq, when being anti-Iraq war wasn’t cool…. in either party. As a decorated Vietnam veteran, Hagel early on warned of Vietnam ghosts in Iraq.
Yet Hagel has been a creature of the US Senate, and in that political role, he’s often bent with the wind, (such as on the habeas corpus for detainees issue) perhaps in hopes of living to fry bigger political fish. That earned him the back-handed compliment from one Nebraska blogger:

“He’s Chuck Hagel, folks – the thinking man’s unthinking Republican. And, you almost have to like him; you just can’t count on him.”

I think that’s too harsh, but I find myself disappointed that he apparently hasn’t found a viable way to run for national office next year.
So what’s behind Hagel’s decision not to run for anything next year – at least not at this time?

1. Was it his disgust with his own Republican Party? I’ve seen reports that neoconservatives were raising mountains of out-of-state cash for a nasty challenge to Hagel in the upcoming Republican primary.
2. Was it a sense that the Republican Party stands on the threshold of being crushed next year in the US Senate? That prospect, perhaps ironically, increases with Hagel withdrawing. If fellow veteran Bob Kerry indeed returns to Nebraska, the Democrats might well add Hagel’s seat to their Senate winnings next year. (They could also take John Warner’s seat here in Virginia, provided they can find another “maverick” like Jim Webb.)
3. If that indeed is his assessment, might Hagel be calculating that it’s more prudent for him to sit this slaughter out, and be available as the elder “realist” statesman to help with a Republican reconstruction by 2012?
4. Or is Hagel “thinking” yet again — that there might still be a chance for re-surfacing on a serious third party ticket for the White House next year? Perhaps Sam Waterston’s “Unity08” might yet persuade him. Or maybe New York’s Mayor Bloomberg might draft him — as David Broder recently suggested.

In my opinion, the Republican Party is in crisis mode, even as it refuses to admit it. It has strayed dangerously far from its own grand heritage as the Party of Lincoln, “TR,” “IKE,” and even “the Gipper.” Worse, it has abandoned all too many fundamental American values.
With most of the Republican Presidential candidates, including Fred Thompson, now running hawkishly to the right of Dick Cheney, Chuck Hagel could take a huge chunk of disaffected “Eisenhower Republicans” with him, wherever and whenever he goes. I sense many anti-war-party Democrats also admire and might support Hagel, should the Democratic candidates self-destruct in kow-towing to the neocon returnees into their ranks. Ah, wishful thinking?
Hagel’s formal announcement on Monday should be interesting. I’m counting on him not to go quietly.

Cartoon: Iranians as Cockroaches!?

I learned today of a particularly disturbing political cartoon published on September 4th in the Columbus (Ohio) Post-Dispatch. Drawn by Michael Ramirez, the cartoon very much illustrates themes I’ve written about here several times before — that when all else in the Middle East fails, the change-the-subject Bush/Cheney Administration and friends can resort to the fail-safe “blame Iran game” as the root of all such troubles.
The cartoon in question displays a regional map with Iran and a sewer pipe at its center, the source of hordes of cockroaches infesting the region. You can see the Dispatch version here. I have since discovered that the cartoon was first published on June 25th, in full color, in the internationally circulated Investors’ Business Daily. (click here or here)
Before presenting additional details about the artist and the controversy, I am pleased to publish here an eloquent and courageous open letter to the Columbus Post-Dispatch, from Marsha B. Cohen, a scholarly colleague at Florida International University in Miami. (with my emphasis added)
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From: Marsha Cohen
To the Editor: Columbus Post Dispatch

For over four decades, Fidel Castro has been considered one of the most odious leaders in the Western hemisphere. After he took power, hundreds of thousands of Cubans fled their island home for Miami (where I live and work), and where they have prospered. Many of them have been among the most vocal opponents of any moves by the US government to normalize relations with Cuba. Even now that Castro is old and sick, and at death’s door, he remains a hated symbol of a revolution gone wrong, that rapidly morphed into a detested enemy of the interests and values of the US.
Nevertheless, no Florida newspaper would ever dare to depict Cuba as a sewer, with cockroaches from it spreading out across North and South America. The outrage expressed, even by the regime’s most vociferous opponents, to the insult to their Cuban identity and beloved homeland, would put the police on crisis alert, and make headlines throughout the entire country.
Yet in an editorial cartoon, published on Sept 4. the Columbus Dispatch had no compunctions about portraying Iran as a sewer, and Iranians as cockroaches. Its decision to do so–regardless of the political motives of the editorial board, of the artist, or the message they were trying to convey–is unfortunate, and reflects more shamefully on the values and integrity of your newspaper than on the Iranian people, both in Iran and and those who have made their home in this country and other parts of the world, that this cartoon (whether intentionally or unintentionally) maligned and demeaned.
I hope that every organization that considers itself a champion of civil and human rights will express its outrage at the publication of this cartoon. Had the “cockroaches” been designated Jews, Blacks or Hispanics, the cartoon never would have made it into print in a respectable newspaper. And if it did, the objections and the fury generated throughout the community would have been loud, swift and resonant.
Anyone who would not want to see themselves and their ethnic group depicted in this way by a cartoonist is morally obligated to vociferously object to its publication. While the rights of a free press may extend to the promotion of racism, hatred and dehumanization, this does not mean you, as a newspaper, are obligated to exercise that right, or that decent people everywhere should not denounce your decision to do so when you do. Your disgusting representation of Iranians–irrespective of their regime–deserves nothing less than nationwide condemnation.
Sincerely,
Marsha B. Cohen
Miami, Florida

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Well said and thanks Marsha Cohen.
A few additional tidbits on the cartoonist and the controversy:

Continue reading “Cartoon: Iranians as Cockroaches!?”

An Iranian Surprise (or not)

I’m pre-occupied at the moment on two legacy projects, including an essay on former Iranian President Khatami. Nearly a year ago here at Monticello’s International Center for Jefferson studies, Khatami’s comments on the compatibility of Islam with Democracy included the assertion that even Iran’s supreme “Leader,” currently Ayatollah Ali Khamenehi, is subject to popular will.
While his extended comments deserve more careful discernment, Khatami and allied Iranian reformers have continued to advance what some observers will deem a “revolutionary” suggestion. Yet it’s also a view that Iran’s naysayers and those itching for a confrontation will be loathe to concede.
Khatami will contend that what he has in mind isn’t “revolutionary” at all, as it’s already in Iran’s constitution, in the form of Iran’s Assembly of Experts – (Majlis-e Kobragan), a body whose 86 members must be elected. The Experts Assembly in turn has responsibility for selecting and monitoring the performance of Iran’s Leader — even removing the Leader, as they might see fit.
Last fall, the doubters emphasized variations on a theme – that the Experts Assembly, Iran’s presumed “College of Cardinals,” was either irrelevant, ignored, captive to hardline clerics, or unrepresentative of popular sentiment due to vetting of candidates, etc., etc. In any case, “the system,” we were knowingly instructed, would never permit popular sentiment to play a real role over the Leader.
Last December 14th, on the eve of Iran’s fifth elections for this assembly, the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute hosted a forum where the main “theme” offered by distinguished observers was that the Experts Assembly was a “disabled body” – one that would remain controlled by hardliners.
Funny thing, somebody forgot to tell Iran’s moderate conservatives and reformists that the elections were meaningless and a foregone conclusion. They coalesced around former Presidents Khatami and Rafsanjani – to hand key hardline figures a startling defeat on Dec. 15th. Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, the presumed mentor to Iran’s current firebrand President Ahmadinejad, tellingly placed a distant 7th in Tehran voting, far behind front runner Rafsanjani. Turn out was higher than past Assembly elections, in part because voters perceived real choices and stakes at hand.
Undaunted, the Iran doubters were out yet again before yesterday’s internal elections at the Experts Assembly to select a new chairman to replace a deceased former chair. Israeli analyst Meir Javedanfar confidently predicted that

“In all likelihood, the right wing conservatives, headed by Ayatollah Yazdi, will beat moderate conservatives because they seem more united and organized. The infighting between moderate conservatives will most probably mean that Ayatollah Rafsanjani, their best known candidate, will be unable to pull off a ‘Shimon Peres,’ and suddenly emerge as a winner after a string of losses. Unfortunately for the West, this means that the chances for a compromise in the nuclear talks will be less likely, as this group is the one most likely to back such an option.”

Javendar, like the AEI forum, got it rather backwards.
Rafsanjani, already head of Iran’s powerful Expediency Council, has been elected Chair of the Assembly of Experts. Echoing Khatami’s views, one Reuters report cited analysts who

“…said the election showed that more moderate conservatives like Rafsanjani were gaining ground in Iran, where there is increasing discontent with the ruling hard-liners over rising tensions with the West, a worsening economy and price hikes in basic commodities and housing….
Rafsanjani’s election is yet another no to the fossilized extremists
While extremists… propo[und] the theory that the legitimacy of Iran’s clerics to rule the country is derived from God, Rafsanjani is believed to side with pro-democracy reformers who believe the government’s authority is derived from popular elections.”

The doubters though are already explaining it away, beginning with Michael Slackman who opines in today’s New York Times,

“Theoretically, Mr. Rafsanjani should be a powerful force…. But Ayatollah Khamenei has the final say on all matters of state. He has shown no interest in restoring Mr. Rafsanjani’s influence and has long viewed him as a challenge to his own authority, many political analysts said.”

Never mind that the Assembly ostensibly has the final say over Khamenehi. For Slackman to be more optimistic would undercut his own lead story, also in today’s NYTimes, on how “hard times and isolation” are actually helping hardliners maintain their power.
I’ve never quite accepted the all-too-easy view that Rafsanjani and Khamenehi are necessarily at loggerheads; sometimes they’re on what R.K. Ramazani once referred to as the same “tandem bicycle.”
Flatly at odds with Slackman, consider Barbara Slavin’s USA Today report: “Iranian Shakeup a Setback for Hardliners.” Note she has quotes supporting this interpretation from two of the speakers (Khalaji & Sammii) at last December’s AEI forum (the very one that didn’t see change coming to the Experts Assembly…)
Alas, Slavin closes her story with a quote from CRS Iran-watcher Kenneth Katzman who attributes potentially encouraging signs of change in Iran to US pressure. If only it was that simple.
The skeptics will have it both ways, as usual. The prospects for Iranian reforms are either a. rendered less likely while Iran is under siege and/or b. somehow attributable to external pressures when they do materialize.
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Footnote: I am particularly struck that Mehdi Khalaji (of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy) has apparently changed his tune to now lend support to Slavin’s report theme that Rafsanjani’s new position and the recent change at the top of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are both challenges to hardliners around President Ahmadinejad.
Contrast this view with the breathless reporting in Murdoch Media on Sunday, specifically the London Times, by disinformation specialist Uzi Mahnaimi. (the one whom Jonathan Edelstein noted here at jwn last Jan. 8th “seems to make a career of revealing that Israel is about to attack Iran.”) Now he spins one about the Guard leader change being a victory for hardliners, and his only mentioned source is the notoriously unreliable “National Council of Resistance of Iran” – (aka PMOI, MEK, etc. — a group which ironically has been on the US State Department’s terrorist list for the past decade.)

Secluded trail “Secret” in Ch’ville

I, for one, am impressed that Helena manages to keep running, and running well, even while writing an instant important book. Bravo!
Alas, I’ve not been one to run much on hard surfaces, not since breaking an ankle running X-country decades ago on a hard road course in West Chester, PA. Yet I have been “running” a lot lately, mostly on softer surfaces. I’m always on the look-out for “softer” trails for walking and running — and getting away from cars and crowds.
At the risk then of spoiling a well-kept exercise secret around Charlottesville, I recently have been enjoying the new extensions to the Saunders Trail system. I am not talking about the popular Saunders Trail that begins at a parking area near the intersections of Route 53 and 20 and extends nearly two miles to the Monticello entrance.
The core Saunders Trail is so well designed and maintained by the private Monticello Foundation that even wheel-chair athletes can enjoy its perfect grading. I recommend the upper boardwalk section of the main trail late in the fall, when the leaves are down and just before sunset — great vistas.
But I’ve never been one to stick to the “beaten path.” So last fall I began exploring rather un-marked side trails that cut up into the steep hills along the trails. Somebody maintains these side trails nicely. If you go back these side trails, don’t be in a hurry — as they can be confusing, until you come to the next intersection. (!) For locals who know the general topography, such mild uncertainty is “invigorating.”
The newest formal addition to the Saunders trail system comes in the form of 2+ miles of informal mowed trails that wind in and around the 150 acre “Secluded Farm.” If you like “soft trails” in pastoral settings, these are great for exercise and for reflection. Road-runners may find the “carpets” soothing when the joints get sore from pavement pounding.
Alas, unless you get high up onto the ridge, the sounds of highways and “civilization” are often too nearby. (For a real escape, that’s what the George Washington National Forest or Shenandoah are for — but those fragile glimpses of paradise are an hour away.)
For a regular nearby sanctuary, I’m grateful to Monticello for these trails and for not charging us to enjoy them. May these “green pastures” go on restoring many a soul and heart.
And let’s keep it a secret too. :-}

Introducing the “Right to Dry Movement”

In the category of the “completely different,” let’s hang-out for a moment with the burgeoning “right to dry” movement. That’s right, the right to dry — one’s clothes on an outdoor clothes line.
What’s become of our land? Some of my most sublime early childhood memories in the 60’s are of running through backyards of Texas-Eastern company row-homes in Eagle, PA, dodging and twisting through the billowing sheets. Sometimes the lines would get stretched down and became a nasty way to lose a baby tooth. My generation recognizes where the sports phrase, “getting clotheslined” originates.
But do today’s football players have a clue what a clothesline is? Tried recently to buy “clothesline” at your local Lowe’s or Wal-Mart?
What’s become of our supremely efficient air-drying technology?
A key culprit, it seems, originates in the national proliferation of homeowners’ associations. In their collective “wisdom,” they tend overwhelmingly to ban the airing of our clean laundry as too uncivilized, too unsightly. Especially – and ironically – in California. Fer sure dude.
Now, with energy prices reaching new peaks, independent spirits in Vermont (where else?) are leading a counter-culture movement to restore our right to get clotheslined!
Consider the Vermont Clothesline Company, with its stylish lines for hanging your duds. (if you aren’t creative enough to “rig” your own solution.)
And if you’re stuck with an authoritarian homeowners’ group block, help is here in the form of “Project Laundry List.” Curiously, on their home page, PLL lists these six “rational” reasons why the right to dry naturally should be not be abridged.

1. Clothes last longer.
2. Clothes and sheets smell better.
3. Conserve energy. (as electric dryers use 5-10% of residential electricity)
4. Save money.
5. Physical activity which you can do outside.
6. Clothes dryer fires account for about 15,600 structure fires, 15 deaths, and 400 injuries annually.

I think the Project can be more bold! Let’s take a page from the Bush machine and invoke national security!
Those of us able and willing to dry our laundry outside, even sometimes, are saving energy – lots of it. Even better than wildly inefficient ethanol or the distant hope of switchgrass, “hanging out” with your laundry is something many of us can do.
We now have a “new” simple answer to the question of how can we reduce our dependence on foreign oil

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind.

Next time your Association Lords want to tear down your clothesline, wag the red, white & blue in their faces. It’s all about national security.

Bush vs. JAG (w/ help from TJ)

Today’s Boston Globe reported startling dissent at the top ranks of America’s military lawyers toward the Bush Administration’s recent rule-making on CIA interrogations of prisoners. Read the whole report here. The crux of their concern, as delivered to three top US Republican Senators:

“The Judge Advocates General of all branches of the military told the senators that a July 20 executive order establishing rules for the treatment of CIA prisoners appeared to be carefully worded to allow humiliating or degrading interrogation techniques when the interrogators’ objective is to protect national security rather than to satisfy sadistic impulses.“

Here’s how the new get-out-jail-free card works for the CIA interrogators
Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions outlaws “cruel treatment and torture” and “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment….” As the US Supreme Court ruled last year, “in all circumstances,” detained prisoners are “to be treated humanely.”
Never mind vague, lame Bush spokesperson claims to the contrary, the “tortured language” in the President’s executive order fudges the Geneva prohibition’s clarity by adding a critical caveat. According to the military JAG’s,

CIA interrogators may not use “willful and outrageous acts of personal abuse done for the purpose of humiliating or degrading the individual.” As an example, it lists “sexual or sexually indecent acts undertaken for the purpose of humiliation.”

In short, in the view of the US military’s own top lawyers, the “for the purpose” escape clause means an interrogator can be as sadistic, cruel and humiliating as they wish, provided they didn’t do it “for the purpose” of being sadistic, cruel, or humiliating. Put crassly, if you mistreat a prisoner, your best defense is to say you did it for America’s “national security.”
Amazingly, the Army’s top JAG officer, Major General Scott C. Black, felt compelled to send a memo to lower ranking officers and soldiers,

“reminding them that Bush’s executive order applies only to the CIA, not to military interrogations. Black told soldiers they must follow Army regulations, which “make clear that [the Geneva Conventions are] the minimum humane treatment standard” for prisoners.

No doubt General Black is worried about much confusion in the ranks, even among officers. After all, what’s a soldier to think? (especially the ones who for the past several years have gotten their moral compasses from “24” and had Faux News piped in round-the-clock to their mess halls) How is it, they might wonder, that the CIA can “do it” but we can’t? Wink, wink… Besides, as a certain relative of mine would reason, he’s my “duly elected commander-in-chief.”
I hope I can get a copy of General Black’s memo. (If anybody has it, please post.)
Before readers start waving the “liberal” bogey about the Boston Globe, consider that several quotes in today’s report come from an oped published last month in the Washington Post by former Marine Commandant P.X. Kelley and distinguished University of Virginia Law Professor, Robert F. Turner.
These two-tour Vietnam veterans are, shall we say, not easily branded as “liberal.” Bob Turner, a former Reagan Administration player, happens to be a friend from the past (don’t hold that against him); we even shared an office for a year. Turner lately has been carrying a lot of water for President Bush and the imperial Presidency – as it takes so much of Bob’s previous energetic scholarship to its most extreme breaking point. (including defending executive privilege and Presidential signing statements.)
It’s all the more noteworthy then that Kelley & Turner came out squarely opposed to the President’s end-run around the Geneva Accords for the CIA. They write,

“It is firmly established in international law that treaties are to be interpreted in “good faith” in accordance with the ordinary meaning of their words and in light of their purpose. It is clear to us that the language in the executive order cannot even arguably be reconciled with America’s clear duty under Common Article 3 to treat all detainees humanely and to avoid any acts of violence against their person.”

(As a recent Jefferson fellow,) I’m especially interested that they twice invoke Thomas Jefferson:
In April of 1793, Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson wrote to President George Washington that nations were to interpret treaty obligations for themselves but that “the tribunal of our consciences remains, and that also of the opinion of the world.” He added that “as we respect these, we must see that in judging ourselves we have honestly done the part of impartial and rigorous judges.”
(This is part of Jefferson’s intense policy debate with Alexander Hamilton before the President Washington, regarding whether or not the treaty with France was still in force, amid France’s own revolutionary tumult. Of special note, both Jefferson & Hamilton quoted extensively from international legal texts – Vattel especially – in making their cases. Wonder when the last time anything similar happened in Washington?)
In a letter to President James Madison in March 1809, Jefferson observed: “It has a great effect on the opinion of our people and the world to have the moral right on our side.” Our leaders must never lose sight of that wisdom.
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I’m overdue to publish an essay on Jefferson and the Treatment of Prisoners of War. (Jefferson had considerable experience with some of the same thorny issues faced today — and at times, he was tempted to err on the side of “harsh retribution”….)
Yet for the moment, here’s one favorite Jefferson quote regarding the treatment of 4,000+ British & Hessian Prisoner’s of War detained here in Charlottesville. (out “Barrack’s Road”) Writing in 1779 to then Governor Patrick Henry, Jefferson is defending expenditures for the care of the detained:

“Treating captive enemies with politeness and generosity” was “for the benefit of mankind to mitigate the horrors of war.”

Jefferson reasoned the experience would be a good example to be seen by what he referred to in the Declaration of Independence as “a Candid World.”
Contrary to the American founders, the Bushists, yet again, have demonstrated they have anything but a “decent respect to the opinions of mankind.”

Why Arms Sales to the Persian Gulf will Backfire

Recent Bush Administration plans to sell $20 billion in arms to the Gulf Arab states (while giving $30 billion plus to the Israelis) are being defended primarily within the logic of “balance of power.”
Out the window is Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s “transformational diplomacy” or peace through democracy promotion. We’re back to the old policy of peace through power. One might build an essay quoting Rice against herself.
Writing in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer, emeritus University of Virginia Professor R.K. Ramazani points out a singular problem with such massive arms sales and power-balancing for the Persian Gulf region – namely, such policies haven’t worked before and are likely to be counter-productive yet again:

“The Bush administration’s plan to sell $20 billion of sophisticated weapons to Saudi Arabia and five other Arab monarchies is likely to backfire and produce less regional security. Far from balancing Sunni Arab states against Shia Iran, such massive arms sales may ignite conflicts that will make the current war in Iraq look like child’s play.”

Before unpacking Ramazani’s argument, consider Anthony Cordesman’s mainstream “realist” defense of such arms sales in a recent New York Times essay. We’ve commented here at justworldnews on the ordinarily respected Tony Cordesman in the past, particularly the commentary he did last summer while embedded with the Israeli military as it pounded Lebanon.
But Cordesman is hardly a cheerleader for the Bush Administration or for the neoconservative vantage point. Yet he felt it necessary to disclose that the beltway thinktank where he works, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, receives considerable financial support from Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the US Government – not to mention US military contractors. For one measured critique, see this “Werther” original by an anonymous northern-Virginia defense analyst.
While Cordesman has at times been a blunt, non-ideological critic of Bush Administration’s Iraq mis-steps, his New York Times argument in favor of the arms sales, the “Weapons of Mass Preservation,” boils down to the following points:

1. Critics of such arms sales are not operating in the “real world.” The Persian Gulf remains a critical “vital interest” to the US and the world economy. Oil must be “defended.”
2. We cannot defend oil “without allies,” and Saudi Arabia is the only “meaningful” ally available. (and oh never mind the recent “minor” reports of Saudi salafists showing up as guerrillas in Iraq. As for democracy and all that, allies like the Saudis inevitably are “less than perfect.”)
3. The chief threat then to “our” oil (e.g., to “jobs”) is Iran. (No evidence needed or presented.)
4. Announced arms sales (and gifts) to the region are really nothing new, as, after inflation, Israel may be getting less arms than before.

R.K. Ramazani, by contrast, asks a question Cordesman avoids – namely, does power-balancing in the region actually work? That is, can we demonstrate that it has produced stability and defended American interests?
(Disclosure, I helped condense this essay from a much longer draft, and even then two paragraphs were left out. Indeed, those of us who have known Professor Ramazani might recognize that this essay condenses 54 years of scholarship — and a year’s worth of advanced IR lectures.)
First, the balance of power hasn’t worked in the past; worse, it’s been counter-productive:

“For more than 50 years, the United States has obsessively played one Persian Gulf country against another, selling arms to allies to protect vital interests, primarily crude oil. Yet this balancing game has repeatedly proved counterproductive.
During the Cold War, Dwight Eisenhower sold arms to Iraq to counter Soviet support of Egypt, rendering Iraq vulnerable to an anti-Western revolution in 1958. Richard Nixon gave the Shah a blank check to bolster Iran against “radical” Iraq, but in the process catalyzed Iran’s 1979 revolution. Ronald Reagan then backed “moderate” Iraq against “fundamentalist” Iran, and, in turn, created the aggressive Saddam Hussein war machine that invaded Kuwait.
After ejecting Iraq from Kuwait in 1991, George H.W. Bush sold arms to the Gulf’s smaller Sunni monarchies to counter the power of Shia Iran. Yet the U.S. alliance with Saudi Arabia contributed to the rise of al-Qaeda. The subsequent destruction of the Taliban and Hussein regimes ironically eliminated Iran’s most bitter enemies, leaving Iran even stronger.”

With each new infusion of massive western arms, the regimes we supposedly are defending against other threats in turn are destabilized from within. For example, people dissatisfied inside Iran with the Shah of Iran’s repression naturally blamed the outside power that provided him with the massive arms that were the means, if not the source, of their misery. Pogo anyone?
Ramazani then offers, for the first time, a different insight on just why “balance of power” concepts that have been favored in the west since the 17th Century have been so difficult to apply to the Persian Gulf:

Continue reading “Why Arms Sales to the Persian Gulf will Backfire”

Mia Farrow: “virtual hostage”

Irony alert
Those familiar with Farzaneh Milani’s path-breaking literary analysis will recognize the phrase “hostage narrative,” a term she has been devloping over many years to apply to that best-selling genre of politically tinged “true stories.” In these “hostage narratives,” women writers who are now “liberated” or “un-veiled” tell the world of their past “cultural captivity” in their native, usually Muslim lands.
In this genre, as Professor Milani documents, the line between “fact” and “fiction” gets lost, as those sympathetic to the “message” focus only on the cause served. It’s a great way to sell books and a shrewd way to “heat up” the political culture to support bombings and invasions to “liberate” the presumed hostages. Thus the sequel:
“Reading Lolita while bombing Tehran.”
(And oh by the way, are women now better off in today’s de facto Islamic Republic(s) of Iraq than they were under Saddam? Where’s columnist Ellen Goodman been on that?)
Veteran actress Mia Farrow now takes the “hostage narrative” to a new, virtual realm, with her over-the-top offer to exchange herself for the “freedom” of a Sudanese “dissident” rebel leader and Darfur advocate, Suleiman Jamous. Depending on the source you read, Jamous is a “virtual prisoner” who cannot leave a UN hospital and/or cannot leave the country for medical treatment.
To Sudan’s President, Ms. Farrow writes,

Mr. Jamous is in need of a medical procedure that cannot be carried out in Kadugli… Mr. Jamous played a crucial role in bringing the SLA to the negotiating table and in seeking reconciliation between its divided rival factions.
I am… offering to take Mr. Jamous’s place, to exchange my freedom for his in the knowledge of his importance to the civilians of Darfur and in the conviction that he will apply his energies toward creating the just and lasting peace that the Sudanese people deserve and hope for.

How curious. Ms. Farrow’s “courageous offer” to become a female hostage in a Muslim land is a recognizable stroke of p.r. brilliance. It’s getting widespread softball media treatment in the US, as anything supporting the long-suffering Sudanese Darfuris is “hip” in the US and must be “a good thing.” And besides, she’s a UNICEF goodwill ambassador, and what’s the harm — particularly if it helps focus the international microscope back on unresolved Sudanese nightmares? (US international broadcasting has been prominently featuring Ms. Farrow’s offer too….)
Ms. Farrow of course knows there isn’t a chance the Sudanese government will take her up on her offer to become a “hostage.” What a p.r. disaster for them that would be!
In her best acting yet, Ms. Farrow professes to the media the sincerity of her wish to be a real hostage. Indeed.
We’ll likely have to settle for Ms. Farrow keeping a journal for enthralled admirers of her “ordeal” as a surreal hostage-in-waiting – a “virtual hostage” on behalf of a “virtual prisoner.”
Oh the drama. I feel another best-seller in the works, no doubt for a worthy cause. (Aren’t they all? Though perhaps in Mia Farrow’s case, the title, “Not Without My Daughter” might be a bit inappropriate…..)
So what’s next? Hundreds, if not thousands, of Darfur activists on college campuses signing up to join Mia as “virtual hostages?” eh? Me & Mia? No doubt that’s too harsh.
I hear Ms. Farrow’s next movie will be a comedy.