It is possible to believe that the U.S. is no longer selling arms to Iran, but it turns out that would be a belief and not a fact. The AP reports in the Boston Globe today that the General Accounting Office has announced that the Pentagon has sold over 1400 parts for F-14 fighter jets to the public since announcing that they would no longer be sold. Turns out that Iran is the only country still flying that plane and has been desperate for parts to keep them in the air. The fact Iran’s F-14s planes originally came from the U.S. only enriches the irony.
U.S. Foreign Policy
Arms to the Poor: From Krupp to Bush
The military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned against is alive and well – even if their products are sometimes shoddy and ineffective. The arms business has become one of America’s great exports as it arms countries like India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq. These days it is reminiscent of the Krupp family business which discovered that it was possible to sell arms to just about anyone in the 19th century, leading to their selling arms and defenses to both sides during World War I. And of course the company was instrumental in arming the German armies during WW II, making huge amounts of profit and paying little in labor since the government kindly supplied them with slave labor. I suppose it is something of a come down for the family now to be selling coffee grinders and espresso machines.
But not to worry, there are plenty of companies willing and able to take on the challenge of arming the world. And while it can be argued that everyone does it, the United States remains in first place in maintaining its post WW-II leadership in finding ways to arm countries or selected rebels around the world. The rationale for doing this is not always clear and is usually done for transitory reasons, and not infrequently with mixed consequences.
The U.S. government and arms manufacturers armed Iran under the Shah and of course saw those armaments fall into the hands of the revolution. Adding insult to injury, the Reagan administration provided arms to Iran as part of its Iran-Contra policy/scandal. (The income from these sales of weapons to Iran under Reagan were then used to provide arms to the Contras in Nicaragua). At around the same time the U.S. provided arms to Saddam Hussein in an effort to support its war against Iran. More recently the U.S. provided arms support to the forces of Osama bin Laden to fight the Russians in Afghanistan. The list goes on and the positive consequences have mostly fallen to the American companies that are heirs to the Krupp value system – and the politicians whose campaigns are funded by the arms manufacturers. In any case the arms provided to Iran, Saddam Hussein, and bin Laden have all been used against our national interest at one time or another.
Now we have the latest proposed handout to the arms companies. Having totally screwed up Iraq and most of the Gulf region with Bush’s fiasco, we are searching for ways to cut our losses and one way is to bribe Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain with upwards of $20 billion in sales to this group of gulf states and some $30B of new sales to Israel. All of this is in addition to whatever arms remain in Iraq after a war that is now estimated to cost over a trillion dollars. The hope and the wish seem to be that all these new weapons in the region will keep our Iraq adventure from becoming the beginning of a monstrous disaster in the region. Also that these countries will all work to keep Iran at bay.
One of the clever strategies of the family Krupp was to sell defensive armor to one side and then stronger weapons to the other and then the first side would need even stronger defensive armor, and the cycle would continue. With all of the new weapons around the world it is clear that the U.S. will need to improve its weaponry and defenses and so the Krupp strategy is alive and well and the cycle can continue.
The Omnipotent Mr. Cheney
The Washington Post is running a 4-part report on the Vice Presidency of Richard Cheney. The report, prepared by Barton Gellman and Jo Becker and entitled “Angler” which is Mr. Cheney’s secret service code name, paints a picture of our Vice President as the man behind the throne, pulling strings, Oz-like, that direct many of our most critical domestic and foreign policy programs. One example is the role Mr. Cheney played in how the United States would handle “terrorists” captured during the apparently unending “war on terror”. Mr. Cheney developed the draft order that Mr.Bush signed, putting into operation the policy permitting the indefinite confinement of foreign terrorism suspects without any access to the courts. Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Advisor Condi Rice, nominally in charge of such things, knew nothing about the order until after it was executed. The secrecy is typical of Cheney’s modus operandi. As stated in the Gellman/Becker report:
“Across the board, the vice president’s office goes to unusual lengths to avoid transparency. Cheney declines to disclose the names or even the size of his staff, generally releases no public calendar and ordered the Secret Service to destroy his visitor logs. His general counsel has asserted that “the vice presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch,” and is therefore exempt from rules governing either. Cheney is refusing to observe an executive order on the handling of national security secrets, and he proposed to abolish a federal office that insisted on auditing his compliance.
“In the usual business of interagency consultation, proposals and information flow into the vice president’s office from around the government, but high-ranking White House officials said in interviews that almost nothing flows out. Close aides to Cheney describe a similar one-way valve inside the office, with information flowing up to the vice president but little or no reaction flowing down.”
Mr. Cheney has played a similar role in approving use of extremely inhumane treatment of “terrorist” prisoners (which many believe amounts to torture), gatekeeping Supreme Court nominees, and squelching environmental initiatives – all with a degree of secrecy that is startling. Past vice-presidents have attended state funerals and promoted run-of-the-mill programs, such as Mr. Gore’s efforts to improve the bureaucracy’s efficiency. Not so Mr. Cheney. While the President signs the executive orders and makes the public appearances, Mr. Cheney pulls the strings from his undisclosed locations. The Post report confirms that Mr. Cheney is in fact our co-President, exercising power as Vice-President as it has never been exercised before.
The Candidates and Iraq: Avoiding Reality
A recent Op-Ed piece in the Washington Post recognizes what should by now be obvious to any serious candidate for the presidency: by any reasonable definition the Iraq War is lost. The decision to invade was based on a combination of ignorance, arrogance and deception; the waging of the war was naïve and simple-minded, and the management of the follow-up has been nothing short of a disaster. The surge is most recently defined by General Petraeus as a ten-year effort; that is a time line the American people will not accept. Nor will they accept the Bush/Cheney concept of a new “Korea-type†50 year involvement. The American people have determined that it is not in the national interest and they are – finally – smarter than their leaders.
So, what is going on with the primary campaigns among both Republicans and Democrats? It seems obvious that the major foreign policy challenge facing America is first, how to extricate itself from Bush’s Iraq fiasco and second, and perhaps more important, to begin to define an appropriate role for the United States in the Middle East and Gulf region post-Iraq. But the campaign rhetoric is largely confined to how long to stay in Iraq, how many troops to leave behind, can Americans face the fact of defeat, and isn’t it about time the Iraqis cleaned up the mess we made.
No one can know what will happen when U.S. troops leave Iraq but we can certainly predict what will happen if we stay because it is happening already – more American deaths, more Iraqi deaths, throwing good American after bad, more Iraqis leaving their country, and a terrific training and recruiting ground for Al Queda.
But to read the press and listen to media news one would think that staying in Iraq was an actual option. It is not and the more time spent pretending otherwise is time lost to the serious effort needed to redefine America’s role in the world in a way that reflects both reality and America’s real national interest. This public discussion needs to begin now and needs to be led by those who would be our next president.
The Iraq Solution: Let’s Give Them Guns!
As evidence of the likely failure of the surge strategy in Iraq begins to surface the U.S. is reported to be moving toward a strategy of arming Sunnis so they can defend themselves against Al Queda. It is an almost breathlessly desperate idea, forged in the failure of a four-year disaster and reminiscent of the arms we provided to the Taliban in Afghanistan while they were fighting the Russians. While there are many lessons available from that adventure perhaps the best one would be that the weapons ended up with the forces of Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar. We all remember them.
A lengthy piece in the NY Times describes some of the risks:
“But critics of the strategy, including some American officers, say it could amount to the Americans’ arming both sides in a future civil war. The United States has spent more than $15 billion in building up Iraq’s army and police force, whose manpower of 350,000 is heavily Shiite. With an American troop drawdown increasingly likely in the next year, and little sign of a political accommodation between Shiite and Sunni politicians in Baghdad, the critics say, there is a risk that any weapons given to Sunni groups will eventually be used against Shiites. There is also the possibility the weapons could be used against the Americans themselves.â€
So, we invade Iraq for whatever reason is the current rationale, accomplish the mission in weeks but forget to deal with the aftermath. Four years later the winners appear to be the Shias which creates a little problem with our Sunni friends in Saudi Arabia and Jordan but is welcomed by our ‘enemies†in Iran and Syria. Arms would be provided only to those Sunnis promising not to use them against their Shia neighbors and only against Al Queda. It is understandable that failure can produce desperate measures but will the U.S. really do something this risky?
Al Hurra: Fair and Balanced News?
Al Hurra is America’s Arabic language TV station and it is performing with typical Bush administration competence. Intended to bring trustworthy news to the Arab world as an antidote to anti-American media in the region and by so doing, to serve as a tool of American foreign policy, the station has managed to turn itself into a propaganda conduit for the other side.
In an incredibly naïve strategy to build credibility among potential viewers the station has – on several occasions – broadcast speeches, rants, and statements from leaders of Hezbollah and Hamas, many of which have been rabidly anti-American and all intended to present reality through the prism of terrorist rationales.
Al Hurra has been a disaster since its inception and bringing in Larry Register last fall from – of all places, CNN – to run the operation has proven to be a major mistake. CNN is – like most of the major broadcast news media – committed to pretending to be objective by giving time to even the most ridiculous points of view on major issues. It fills time and God knows we would not want a news organization to accept facts as they are and simply report them. So we have endless programs with all sorts of weird views presented because – well, someone believes them and we need to give them a chance to peddle their snake oil.
Apparently Register thought it important to provide a soapbox for some of the most destructive characters in the Middle East as proof of our “objectivityâ€. This is reminiscent of the decision VOA made after the attacks of 9/11 to broadcast – in its entirely and without challenge – a mind-bending speech by Mullah Omar, the head of the Taliban.
Should American international broadcasting ignore the statements of leaders of groups like Hezbollah, Hamas and the Taliban? Of course not, but the way to do that is to invite them on to either be interviewed by a tough, knowledgeable interviewer or invite them to participate in a round table with a variety of points of view represented. They would in all likelihood decline the invitation but then that refusal can be reported.
Finally, for those moderate voices in the Arab world – those seeking peaceful change in the region – the broadcast of unchallenged speeches from leaders of terrorist groups for them simply destroys the credibility that Al Hurra needs to be effective. Imagine Radio Liberty broadcasting Stalin’s speeches during the Cold War. Their audience would no longer trust them and no longer listen to them.
The Arab world’s moderates and reformers are the ones that we most need to support and Al Hurra, if managed well, could provide some of that support by broadcasting honest news without pandering to the fringe elements. The expected resignation of Larry Register in the next week or so is a good first step.
IRAQ UPDATE: Good Money After Bad
As we enter the fifth year of the Bush Iraq Fiasco, there continue to be amazing stories of rampant corruption, mind-boggling incompetence and a pig-headed obstinate inability to face reality.
The country has been entertained for five months as President Bush resists the congressional majority’s calls for “deadlines†in its funding bill for Iraq. Refusing to accept the inevitable, Bush continues to dream of an as yet undefined “victory†in Iraq while the Congress searches for a veto proof funding bill that will set a timetable for the U.S. to begin to move troops out of Iraq.
The latest move in this political dance macabre is away from “deadlines†to “benchmarks†– apparently a less inflammatory word for Bush but still not acceptable if there are any specific dates applied. This in spite of – or maybe because of – a lack of evidence that the “surge†will be effective in anything other than raising the American death toll while merely delaying the inevitable.
However, one group that is moving toward deadlines is the Iraq Parliament, with a majority of its members signing on to the principle of deadlines for American troops to leave – but agreeing with the American view that the withdrawal should not be precipitous and should be timed to the readiness of Iraqi troops to maintain security. While this might not satisfy either Bush or the Congress, (it is, after all, their country) they are moving toward reality at a faster pace than Bush. Meanwhile the death toll mounts, ca. 100 Americans per month and ca. 100 Iraqis a day.
Another development in Iraq is reminiscent of Paul Wolfowitz’s comment in 2003 that Iraqi oil would pay the costs of reconstruction after a brief victorious battle. That has turned out to be as good an idea as Wolfowitz’s handing his girlfriend a $60G raise and foisting her on the State Department. Turns out that having paid for destruction of Iraq’s infrastructure we are now paying for its reconstruction as well and it is not going well. Iraq oil production is not close to the predicted levels and the NY Times reports today that a draft report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office describes a situation in which from $5 to $15 million a day of Iraqi oil is disappearing – either through government corruption, smugglers or – worse yet – insurgent theft. The latter translates into an oil production program that in effect is bankrolling the insurgents who are killing American troops.
The press cannot seem to come to grips with all of this – choosing to argue about the when and how of withdrawal without ever coming out and saying that withdrawal is inevitable. Defeat is in the air and is a tough pill for politicians and bloviating journalists to swallow with their pride in their throat. It looks an awful lot as though the day is coming and it would seem to be a good idea to start thinking about the future and how we can undo the damage of the miserable mistakes made by Bush and his band of fools. Bush predicted a new world after Iraq and he is going to get it and would be well advised to start thinking about how to interact with that new world.
Finally, it seemed somehow appropriate to have Dick Cheney threatening Iran on a aircraft carrier deck just four years after Bush got into his costume and declared “mission accomplished†– also on a carrier deck. Fact is that Cheney and Bush are in many ways headed for the kind of irrelevance that Tony Blair faced and at least had the sense to resign from office.
Rice’s Bungled Attempt to Bring Democracy to Iran
A few years ago, after reporting on the Abu Ghraib prison torture scandal, Seymour Hersh commented that he viewed Condoleezza Rice as the most incompetent of all National Security Advisors in the history of that position. Obviously there was competition for that title (e.g. H. Kissinger) but new evidence indicates that Ms. Rice has taken her incompetence to new levels as Secretary of State.
The United States has been funding efforts to support a movement toward democratization in Iran for many years. Radio Azadi was started by Radio Free Europe in that late 90s and it became a successful broadcaster of solid news, analysis and culture into Iran with a significant audience among the elites in the reform movement. This effort was emasculated shortly after the Bush election when it was changed to Radio Farda, and turned into a broadcaster of American rock and roll. This was representative of the dumbing down of American culture and was based on the belief that a larger audience of teenagers listening to music was somehow more important than an audience of mature members of the reform movement listening to serious and credible news.
Add to that the recent report that the U.S. has committed $75 million to promote democracy in Iran and that Secretary Rice has announced this to some fanfare in the U.S. and considerable angst in Iran. The problem is not that the money is being spent – it is that Ms. Rice was not smart enough to understand that by announcing it – in the context of Bush’s “axis of evil†and “regime change†blathering – she would put all possible recipients of support from the U.S. in jeopardy. It is the kind of program that you play close to the chest with the hope that your support can facilitate reformers in their pro-democracy efforts. Rice’s play for publicity has had the opposite effect with Iranian intellectuals, writers, journalists, human rights activists, etc. in increased jeopardy.
According to a Washington Post piece on April 28:
“…The money is a persistent focus during interrogations, say Iranians who have been questioned or detained. “If you look at the crackdown on non-government organizations and human rights defenders over the past six months, one common facet is that they were all suspected of receiving foreign funds,” said Zahir Janmohamed, Amnesty International USA’s advocacy director for the Middle East. “It’s not just the funding but the rhetoric around the funding about ‘regime change’ and the ‘axis of evil.’ ”
The National Iranian American Council said it had warned the State Department “that the mere idea of sending money with this language would make the work of pro-democracy activists in Iran all the more difficult. It has turned out to be worse than what many people feared. The mere fact that the United States has been talking about using NGOs has made Iran’s thriving civil society a main suspect of trying to do change inside Iran,” said the council president, Trita Parsi….â€
Iceland’s new guardians – Denmark and Norway
Since the end of World War Two, the USA has invaded a number of countries that were considered to be involved in threatening political developments – Korea, Vietnam, Iraq are only the most prominent – but there is one allied contry, and NATO member, that didn’t have to be invaded or occupied to have US troops in strength presnt on its soil for more than half a century – Iceland. After the war, and despite a great deal of opposition, Iceland agreed to have US troops stay on to protect a country without armed forces from aggression. In 2006, against the will of the Icelandic government, the US withdrew its troops from its substantial air force base in Keflavik, leaving the 300,000 Icelanders without a military presence. Now the lands from which Viking colonialists sailed forth to settle the uninhabited island more than a thousand years ago – Norway and Denmark – will sign a military agreement with Iceland in Oslo on Thursday. Norway will station military planes in Keflavik and Denmark will augment the civilian Icelandic Coast Guard – which defeated the UK in the famous Cod War – with Danish military ships. Only in case of a real invasion would the US get involved, as would all NATO countries according to the NATO Charter.
The Return of the Evil Empire?
There were many factors that contributed to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, including a nutty economic system made even nuttier by corruption and incompetence among the leadership. But more important to many was the brutality of a regime that allowed very little in the way of what we consider commonplace freedoms. Perhaps chief among these was freedom of the press,
Throughout the Cold War America’s Radio Liberty served as a surrogate Russian radio station, providing news, analysis and cultural programs that – for over forty years – made Radio Liberty the most responsible source available in Russia for both domestic and international news. The Russian Service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) suffered a serious blow in 1993 when freshman senator Russell Feingold made a strong effort to close the radios because “the Cold War was overâ€. Feingold lacked any real understanding of international broadcasting and the role it has always played as a tool of foreign policy and a mode of public diplomacy and so the Radios survived in a much-diminished status with a budget reduced by 70% and the Russian broadcast service took much of the hit.
Well yes, the cold War is over but what do we have in its place? A Russia in which journalists critical of the government are routinely murdered, a TV and radio scene in which all the important networks are state-run, and a population more interested in consumer goods than civil liberties.
Over the weekend it was reported that state-run radio in Russia has been handed a new set of rules – 50% of news about Russia must be “positiveâ€, there is to be absolutely no mention of opponents to the government by name, and the United States is to be labeled the “enemyâ€. So we are back to the 70’s and early 80’s with no more “Glasnost†and a powerful former KGB director as president – with the possibility on the horizon of a change in Russian laws that would provide the opportunity for President Putin to continue in office beyond his term.
It is well past time for a renewal of our commitment to an active public diplomacy that includes provision of serious news and analysis to those citizens of Russia (and other countries) that hunger for the truth. Feingold never understood the importance of that effort and did serious damage to our public diplomacy effort.