Politics and Press

The interaction of the press and politics; public diplomacy, and daily absurdities.

Jeff

U.S. Public Diplomacy: Skating on Thin Ice

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There has been a surge (pardon the term) in discussion about the need for a stronger, more effective U.S. public diplomacy program, particularly in the Middle East but not restricted to that part of the world. By all accounts the worldview of the U.S. is at an all time low and recent attempts to improve international opinion on the U.S. have been feeble at best.

So the American media hype over Michelle Kwan going to China as a public diplomacy ambassador has to be viewed as what it appears to be: American public diplomacy directed toward America. Ms. Kwan is, by all reports, a delightful, smart young woman. But what does it do in the grand scheme of things to send a champion ice skater to China to fly our flag? Are we saying that in America a woman of Chinese descent can become a champion? Soon enough the Chinese will produce their own. What this story does is make us feel good about ourselves.

Recognizing the difficulty in mounting an effective public diplomacy program during a period of seriously flawed foreign policy, it is nonetheless past time for the U.S. to develop a coherent, substantive long-term program aimed at improving understanding of the positive parts of American life, including our tolerance for other cultures. Sending world class athletes abroad is not bad, it is simply too meager.

The State of U.S. Broadcasting to Iran

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International broadcasting, a major component of America’s public diplomacy program, has fallen on hard times. This is due partly to major misunderstandings about the nature and value of surrogate broadcasting versus a recent emphasis on building listenership numbers by following a strategy of “dumbing down” the content, most notably in major changes made to Radio Free Europe’s Persian broadcast service and Iraq broadcast service. These services were originally funded by the Congress in the late nineties to provide the kind of surrogate broadcasts that Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty provided to the Soviet Union and the Eastern European bloc during the Cold War: programming of domestic and international news and analysis, cultural developments and interviews and panel discussions with émigrés.

However, early in this decade the Broadcasting Board of Governors were sold on the concept of building an audience of the young by providing a kind of “radio lite”: rock and roll music and brief, light news updates. A serious discussion of the weakness of this approach has recently begun in Washington.

Former CIA Director James Woolsey testified on the Iran broadcasts to the House Committee for Foreign Affairs on January 11, that: “We should … engage in ways similar to those techniques we used in the 1980’s to engage with the Polish people and Solidarity — by communicating directly, now via the Web and modern communications technology, with Iranian student groups, labor unions, and other potential sources of resistance. … We should abandon the approaches of Radio Farda and the Farsi Service of VOA and return to the approach that served us so well in the Cold War. Ion Pacepa, the most senior Soviet Bloc intelligence officer to defect during the Cold War (when he was Acting Director of Romanian Intelligence) recently wrote that two missiles brought down the Soviet Union: Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty. Our current broadcasting does not inform Iranians about what is happening in Iran, as RFE and RL did about matters in the Bloc.”

Earlier, Enders Wimbush, a former Director of Radio Liberty published a lengthy article on the need to change the current approach in the December 18 issue of the Weekly Standard; a follow-up discussion by Edward Kaufman, a member of the Board and Wimbush followed in the January 15 issue of the Weekly Standard. Both are worth reading for insight into the issue

Brooks and Will Strikeout for Bush

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George Will and David Brooks are the establishment defenders of Bush’s Iraqi Follies but do so in a way to make Bush proud of them – dishonestly. Both are working to shift attention from the men (and women) who have scripted, directed and produced the Follies to the poor souls who will, in the end, have to pick up the pieces.

Their argument goes something like this: “President Bush has made some mistakes in managing the Iraq War but he has now produced a new strategy and critics have offered no alternative.” In a discussion with Mark Shields and Jim Lehrer last week, Brooks made that argument while Shields reminded him that Bush had developed no actually new strategy and that there were, after all, several alternatives out there any one of which would reduce the damage being done to the U.S.’s national interest by Bush’s failed policies in Iraq.

Alternatives include those developed by the Iraq Study Group, the concept of partition in Iraq, the concept of gradual U.S. withdrawal and redeployment outside of Iraq, the concept of simply beginning to leave and allowing the various players to sort it out. None of these approaches is perfect – indeed there is no perfect solution to the mess Bush has created. But at some point stopping the flow of American blood and money in a doomed-to-fail attempt to salvage Bush’s reputation will happen – the question now is when.

Brooks and Will both admit that there is little hope that Bush’s “new strategy” will work but, like Bush, are simply unwilling to consider the alternatives that they will not even admit exist.

Bush, Iran, Diplomacy and War

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Last April in an exchange with a friend I wrote about the possible role of diplomacy in the Bush Universe. I post it now as Bush appears to be embarking on a widening of his Iraq fiasco; much of what was said in April seems worth considering nine months later:

“In general I think diplomacy trumps war almost every time. There are no guarantees in diplomacy but neither are there any in war that I am aware of, but the search for common ground – or at least a modus vivendi – is to me worth a better effort than this administration (and I suppose earlier ones) has put forth. But this administration has a special place in the Land of Oz, crippled by its blind arrogance of (illusionary) power. And yes I would say the same about N. Korea. I think we have refused to talk to either country directly because they are “evil” and we are “good” – and we have therefore a self-induced consequence. And it is the consequence that the administration wants so it can change the world to fit its picture of what reality should be. Iraq is the current best example of the results of this kind of thinking.

I think the N. Korean situation is in some ways more complicated. We did a deal with them in which we and the S. Koreans and the Japanese would build nuclear energy plants in return for their not building nuclear weapons. It was, according to the diplomat who was given the unenviable task of managing that agreement – an “orphan” from the start. The U.S. (particularly the Congress – not the smartest lamps in the light store) never really made a serious effort to fulfill their part of the deal and when The Glorious Leader wanted to talk directly to the U.S. there was simply no way anyone could do that and retain domestic political support.

I don’t know whether direct negotiations would have or could have led to different scenarios – but then neither does anyone since it was never tried. I trust Iran and N. Korea about as much as I would trust Cheney/Bush if I were an Iranian given our Iraq adventure….

Would the world be a better place if Iran and N. Korea did not ever have nuclear weapons? Of course. But is it worth going to what amounts to war to stop it without attempting to negotiate? In my view, “no”. We could kiss S. Korea goodbye and we could kiss any hopes for peace on any level in the Middle East goodbye.

Also – I am not sure that the IAEA is as guilty of incompetence on the Iran issue as some say – they were aware as far back as 1996 that Iran was screwing around with nuclear stuff and Blix reported that concern. And it does not help IAEA with policing the nonproliferation pact when Bush plays it fast and loose with India, Brazil etc. We discussed this earlier and I remain concerned on the existential issue – if we give permission to India then we give it to others (in the existential sense – we lose the moral edge).
Of course we cannot blame Bush for every bad thing that happens – but I blame him for the mess in Iraq – we were better off with Saddam in power in a secular country with no WMD than we are now – it has cost us billions of dollars and thousands of lives (many thousands if we want to include Iraqis), has diverted our attention from the important work at hand and has made it easier for the likes of Iran to screw around with us.

I think this is a disaster that has no foreseeable end. It is a mess and the U.S. has played the major role in making it worse than it needed to be. As to whether anything else would have worked better – we will never know.”

April 18, 2006

For BUSH, All The World’s a Stage

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Three events in the last 24 hours suggest that Bush’s struggle to save his presidency from history’s dustbin is heading toward some kind of a military intervention aimed at Iran. Bush threatened Iran in his speech last night; today U.S. forces in Iraq raided an Iranian government office in Irbil, and today in Washington Secretary Rice refused to rule out military operations against Iran while testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Having lied to get us into Iraq there is little question that he would lie to get us into Iran if he thought it might save his deeply diminished reputation. While the governor of Kurdistan and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, expressed their “disturbance and condemnation” over the predawn operation and urged the US military to release individuals arrested during the raid, this is likely to mean nothing to Bush who has transformed himself into a cross between Lady MacBeth and Falstaff when what we need is a Henry the Fifth.

Also fitting into this pattern of fantasy face-saving, it is apparent that the blame for failure in Iraq is being not so subtly shifted to the Iraqis who did not actually invite us in, who did not ask to have their infrastructure destroyed, who did not ask to be transformed from a secular to a Muslim fundamentalist society, who did not ask for its borders to be opened to Al Quada operatives, and who did not ask  for American troops to occupy their country. They want us out and the American people want us out. The administration retains its dogged stupidity and arrogance in the face of advice from military leaders, analysts, world leaders and the American people. Go figure.

BUSH’s SURGE

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There is so much that could be said about the latest Bush “plan” for Iraq but it is almost impossible to consider wasting time expounding so much on the obvious. Below are some excerpts from emails sent among some of the politicsandpress regulars. While these are random and somewhat disconnected it is just not worthwhile to develop a coherent response to the pile of nonsense served up by Bush last night.

1. This one showed up from New Zealand several hours before the speech but after the details had been reported:
GENTS : I say cut and run and quit arguing about surges. I am not being partisan. Strategically it makes sense to me to get out, let the region descend into the fratricide it needs to get out of its system. As long as we are there we are supporting the perception that it is a clash of West vs Islam which is bullshit. The West is way over being about religion. Let the region see that their problems are of their own making and that they can’t rely on selling their resources to feed their religious habit; they have to work and make a life. Anyway,if we’re not there they can attend to their own homemade hell. PLUS oil will go to $100 and we will then HAVE to cut consumption and find better, safer fuels. Cut and run. That’s the ticket.

2. From after the speech also from kiwiland: Watched Bush and the responses. Sick. There is so much differentiated push-back that there is no effective opposition. Obama got’s his plan coming but it isn’t Teddy’s; Edwards has his; Durbin gives the reaction speech but then Pelosi and Reid even nuance that.
… O’Maliki won’t be able to resist sodder-man’s militia; Saudis etc will be tempted to help the Sunnis b4 long….. The presidential race virtually assures there will be no meaningful w/drawal b4 elections.

3. From Washington DC: Listened to the Man myself last night too. He said absolutely nothing to convince any reasonable person that his SURGE was going to accomplish anything other than kill more troops. Caught David Brooks prior to the wizard’s appearance [well, not the wizard actually – the guy in front of the curtain – the wizard is behind the curtain] saying that we don’t have any choice but to add the troops and give it six months. Six months – Brooks is an idiot too. And who should the idiot name for praise in his speech last night, alone of the 535 members of Congress, but one Joe Lieberman. And Reid is saying, well, we’ll have to see. …

4. From Massachusetts: Ken Adelman was on NPR this morning while I was driving to the dump and I felt like ripping out my radio and chucking in with the trash.

The message is partly: “If we leave, the Middle East will become unstable” . What planet are they living on? The middle East and Gulf region MIGHT become UNSATABLE?? Maintaining some semblance of stability in the region was historically our strategic policy – until Dubya invaded. We now have a war in which we are fulfilling the interests of Iran and Syria – our actual “enemies”. Creating a Shiite state leaves the Saudis with no choice but to fund the Sunnis. Al Queda had no operational ability in Iraq pre-invasion; they are now using it as a terrific recruiting and training ground. Iraq used to be a secular state; it will now become a fundamentalist Muslim state. Turkey now also has interests which we have screwed with, and apparently throwing our support to the Shiites screws the Kurds – again. I don’t even think that Israel gains from this mess – even though it is likely that the neocons who masterminded this did it for Israeli reasons. As long as we send troops there we have no hope of getting serious negotiations going within the region and instability – which we have mightily increased will be the rule for a long long time.

It is hard to think of a more disastrous administration than this one In the history of America. Two more years is too long a time to wait for the Congress to find its backbone.

Bush and Iran: Preparing us for the Worst, Part II

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Here is the second portion of the statement begun in the preceding posting:

 “…    Within the last two week, the CIA found the wherewithal to approve an
op-ed — published in the New York Times on December 8, 2006 — by Kenneth Pollack, another former CIA employee. This op-ed includes the statement
that “..Iran provided us with extensive assistance on intelligence,
logistics, diplomacy, and Afghan internal politics.”

     Similar statements by me have been deleted from my draft op-ed by the
Whit e House. But Kenneth Pollack is someone who presented unfounded
assessments of the Iraqi WMD threat — the same assessments expounded by
the Bush White House — to make a high-profile public case for going to
war in Iraq.

     Mr. Pollack also supports the administration’s reluctance to engage
with Iran, in contrast to my consistent and sharp criticism of that
position. It would seem that, if one is expounding views congenial to the
White House, it does not intervene in prepublication censorship, but, if
one is a critic, White House officials will use fraudulent charges of
revealing classified information to keep critical views from being heard.

     My understanding is that the White House staffers who have injected
themselves into this process are working for Elliott Abrams and Megan
O’Sullivan, both politically appointed deputies to President Bush’s
National Security Adviser, Stephe n Hadley.

     Their conduct in this matter is despicable and un-American in the
profoundest sense of that term. I am also deeply disappointed that former
colleagues at the Central Intelligence Agency have proven so supine in the
face of tawdry political pressure. Intelligence officers are supposed to
act better than that.

Bush and Iran: Preparing Us for the Worst, Part I

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Below is Part I of a December 18 Statement by Flynt Leverett, former Bush White House official on Iran and Iraq. It repeats – in more detail – coments made by Mr. Everett in the Ny Times Op Ed pages last week. It is useful to remember the deception and lies used by Bush to gain support for his Iraq fiasco while reading this. Part two follows in the next posting to this blog.
Part I of the December 18 Statement by Flynt Leverett, former Bush White House official on Iran and Iraq:
     “Since leaving government service in 2003, I have been publicly
critical of the Bush administration’s mishandling of America’s Iran policy
— in two op-eds published in the New York Times, another published in the
Los Angeles Times, an article published earlier this year in The American
Prospect, and a monograph just published by The Century Foundation, as
well as in numerous public statements, television appearances, and press
interviews. 

     All of my publications on Iran — and, indeed, on any other policy
matter on which I have written since leaving government — were cleared
beforehand by the CIA’s Publication Review Board to confirm that I would
not be disclosing classified information.

     Until last week, the Publication Review Board had never sought to
remove or change a single word in any of my drafts, including in all of my
publications about the Bush administration’s handling of Iran policy.
However, last week, the White House inserted itself into the
prepublication review process for an op-ed on the administration’s
bungling of the Iran portfolio that I had prepared for the New York Times,
blocking publication of the piece on the grounds that it would reveal
classified information.

     This claim is false and, I have come to believe, fabricated by White
House officials to silence an established critic of the administration’s
foreign policy incompetence at a moment when the White House is working
hard to fend off political pressure to take a different approach to Iran
and the Middle East more generally.

     The op-ed is based on the longer paper I just published with The
Century Foundation — which was cleared by the CIA without modifying a
single word of the draft. Officials with the CIA’s Publication Review
Board have told me that, in their judgment, the draft op-ed does not
contain classified material, but that they must bow to the preferences of
the White House.

     The White House is demanding, before it will consider clearing the
op-ed for publication, that I excise entire paragraphs dealing with
matters that I have written about (and received clearance from the CIA to
do so) in several other pieces, that have been publicly acknowledged by
Secretary Rice, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and former Deputy
Secretary of State Richard Armitage, and that have been extensively
covered in the media.

     These matters include Iran’s dialogue and cooperation with the United
States concerning Afghanistan in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and
Iran’s offer to negotiate a comprehensive “grand bargain” with the United
States in the spring of 2003.

     There is no basis for claiming that these issues are classified and
not already in the public domain.

     For the White House to make this claim, with regard to my op-ed and at
this particular moment, is nothing more than a crass effort to politicize
a prepublication review process — a process that is supposed to be about
the protection of classified information, and nothing else — to limit the
dissemination of views critical of administration policy.”

Iran Study Group and Iran in Wonderland

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This just in from our correspondent in New Zealand:
The NY Times’ last 2 graphs of its main ISG story on thursday are strangely disjointed as if the writer had omitted a connective graph between them.
From the Times: “Critics of the panel’s conclusion called the approach naïve. “The study group is threatening to weaken a weak government,” said Anthony H. Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, one of the groups that helped sponsor the study group, which was established by Congress. And, he added: “There is no ‘Plan B.’ The report does not address what happens if events spiral out of control.”
(missing paragraph)

The most controversial element of the diplomatic strategy is the panel’s case for engaging Iran, though Mr. Baker and Mr. Hamilton, the chairmen, acknowledged in an interview that they thought it unlikely the Iranians would cooperate. Mr. Baker insisted that even if that effort failed, “the world would see their rejectionist attitude.”

It is believed that the omitted middle graph would have read something like this:

“An un-named ISG advisor, who wanted anonymity in order to keep his balls and still be able to sleep at night, told this reporter that Plan B in fact consisted of “events spiraling out of control”. “Once we regionalize the political conflict and further weaken any Iraqi institution that might get in the way of total anarchy then the world will see that rejectionist Iran needs a spanking.” This source acknowledged that there was controversy among the ISG’s “old geezers” about how explicit to be with “this most controversial element. “

The Iraq Study Group’s Shell Game

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Turns out that the Iraq Study Group (ISG) is a colossal shell game. Most of what they recommend won’t work and therefore Bush could argue for doing whatever he comes up with – for instance, bombing Iran, a favorite tactic of his neocon friends and one consistent with his schoolyard bully persona.

I was struck by Baker and Hamilton’s inability in their TV interviews to mention that this particular “Iraq problem” exists only because Bush created it. And what of the Orwellian idea that we need to punish those incompetent Iraqis who do not seem able to fix what we created and totally screwed up? So therefore we pick up our game pieces and go home? But not right away because we need a bipartisan solution  – that is, one in which no one in America need take responsibility for what has turned out to be perhaps the most destructive American foreign policy blunder in the country’s history.

And the ISG can’t come out and say any of that because the president might get pissed off and do something truly nutty just to show everyone who is in charge: mucho macho presidento.

There was a time in the not so distant past when bipartisan support of foreign policy was a centerpiece of American political life and it worked fairly well. Bush has destroyed that for now and perhaps forever. He lied the country into this fiasco, the members of Congress lay down and let him run over them, and Bush has refused to discuss options for over three years while Iraq burned and American soldiers died. And he is psychologically unprepared to take responsibility for this massive foreign policy failure.  We have not had a truly bipartisan foreign policy since the late 80s and are in desperate need of strong, intelligent leadership.

Anyone watching today’s press conference of Bush and Blair has to wonder whether the President is beginning to spin off this planet into a universe all his own. It was not pretty. Look for it on C-Span.