by Wayne White

The Bush administration’s deception and irresponsible military action involving Iraq had a wide-ranging adverse impact on populations in countries critical to the enforcement of international standards regarding war crimes. Yesterday’s vote by the British parliament to oppose UK participation in military action against Syria illustrates just how deep that [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Wayne White

The Bush administration’s deception and irresponsible military action involving Iraq had a wide-ranging adverse impact on populations in countries critical to the enforcement of international standards regarding war crimes. Yesterday’s vote by the British parliament to oppose UK participation in military action against Syria illustrates just how deep that mistrust and anxiety still runs today.  Yet, as British Prime Minister David Cameron has said, failure to act could give the Syrian regime a virtual “green light” to take even more brutal measures against the opposition and Syrian civilians. Nonetheless, the vote should warn the Obama Administration to slow down (and perhaps scale back) its plans for punitive military action considerably in order to address the serious concerns that surround it.

Five days after the August 21 attack, we have just learned, a regime attack was launched against an urban area in the vicinity of Aleppo using incendiary munitions that terribly burned scores of schoolchildren. This additional outrage took place even before Bashar al-Asad and his unconditional allies in Moscow and Tehran were buoyed by the news from London. Though not banned, the use of horrific flammable munitions against an urban area could offer yet another a foretaste of what is to come in the absence of a firm international response.

Official and public disquiet over the planned strike emanating from the UK, Germany, global media, and the US typically features concerns associated with the distortions of intelligence and military overreach of the Bush Administration ten years ago. Although wariness toward potentially deceitful government behavior is a healthy counterbalance overall, such concerns can be taken to extremes.

In the wake of the Bush Administration’s appalling abuses and their weighty negative consequences, a global mindset has developed in which practically all pronouncements out of Washington are subject not only to great scrutiny, but almost knee-jerk skepticism — even when pitted against assertions on the part of notoriously abusive and deceitful authoritarian governments like Syria’s that face virtually no domestic accountability whatsoever.

Consequently, there have been wide-ranging demands for a UN Security Council (UNSC) mandate despite its futility in the face of a certain Russian veto because Moscow fully supports the Syrian regime in its war of internal repression and is incapable of viewing the facts of this case impartially.  Similar Russian tolerance of atrocious war crimes in Bosnia on the part of another of Moscow’s allies in the 1990’s compelled a NATO coalition to act in lieu of the UNSC.  But that was prior to the 2002-2003 episode of US (and UK) intelligence deception in support of a vastly more extensive military intervention.

Still, the Obama Administration must deal with the situation as it is.  Barreling ahead with a “compressed” timeline for punitive strikes despite extensive pushback resembles in the eyes of many just the sort of brash behavior exhibited by the Bush Administration.  And this is precisely what President Obama (and French President Francois Hollande) should avoid under the circumstances.

Personally, I believe some observers are exaggerating the potential fallout from limited military action in this case.  In fact, much of the bluster from Damascus and Tehran probably consists mainly of scare tactics meant to play to nervous Western constituencies. However, to head off any regrettable consequences, allied punitive action against Syria must narrowly focus on the issue at hand—and not be expanded to include strikes meant to weaken the regime and play out over two to three days.

Critical to salvaging the situation and calming many of those now hesitant, the White House must patiently await the results of the UN inspection team.  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said the findings should be made available to the UN Security Council on Sunday.

Sunday is only two days away. The Syrian military is tied down holding various vital positions lest the rebels move in and seize them, so it cannot simply go away and hide in preparation for punitive strikes strikes — even if proper consultations require another week. And if the UN inspection results confirm the use of nerve agent against the affected Damascus suburbs, that information could reinvigorate the Western allies to act more as Washington hopes (even if, as expected, the Russians once again block UNSC consensus to serve their own craven interests in Syria).

Gregory D. Johnsen, a Princeton scholar who has emerged as a key Yemen analyst, explains why promoting John O. Brennan to CIA director following David Petraeus’ resignation is counterproductive:

Mr. Brennan is the president’s chief counterterrorism adviser and the architect of this model. In a recent speech, he claimed that [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Gregory D. Johnsen, a Princeton scholar who has emerged as a key Yemen analyst, explains why promoting John O. Brennan to CIA director following David Petraeus’ resignation is counterproductive:

Mr. Brennan is the president’s chief counterterrorism adviser and the architect of this model. In a recent speech, he claimed that there was “little evidence that these actions are generating widespread anti-American sentiment or recruits for A.Q.A.P.,” referring to Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

Mr. Brennan’s assertion was either shockingly naïve or deliberately misleading. Testimonies from Qaeda fighters and interviews I and local journalists have conducted across Yemen attest to the centrality of civilian casualties in explaining Al Qaeda’s rapid growth there. The United States is killing women, children and members of key tribes. “Each time they kill a tribesman, they create more fighters for Al Qaeda,” one Yemeni explained to me over tea in Sana, the capital, last month. Another told CNN, after a failed strike, “I would not be surprised if a hundred tribesmen joined Al Qaeda as a result of the latest drone mistake.”

Rather than promote the author of a failing strategy, we need a C.I.A. director who will halt the agency’s creeping militarization and restore it to what it does best: collecting human intelligence. It is an intelligence agency, not a lightweight version of Joint Special Operations Command. And until America wins the intelligence war, missiles will continue to hit the wrong targets, kill too many civilians and drive young men into the waiting arms of our enemies.

The Nation’s Jeremy Scahill injects some badly needed context into the media frenzy over David Petraeus’s CIA resignation by examining the four-star General’s legacy against the backdrop of an increasingly militarized intelligence agency:

As head of US Central Command in 2009, Petraeus issued execute orders that significantly broadened the ability [...]]]> via Lobe Log

The Nation’s Jeremy Scahill injects some badly needed context into the media frenzy over David Petraeus’s CIA resignation by examining the four-star General’s legacy against the backdrop of an increasingly militarized intelligence agency:

As head of US Central Command in 2009, Petraeus issued execute orders that significantly broadened the ability of US forces to operate in a variety of countries, including Yemen, where US forces began conducting missile strikes later that year. During Petraeus’s short tenure at the CIA, drone strikes conducted by the agency, sometimes in conjunction with JSOC, escalated dramatically in Yemen; in his first month in office, he oversaw a series of strikes that killed three US citizens, including 16-year-old Abdulrahman Awlaki. In some cases, such as the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, commandos from the elite JSOC operated under the auspices of the CIA, so that the mission could be kept secret if it went wrong.

Election Day in the United States was — as it has been since 1845 — a Tuesday, which meant that it also coincided with “Terror Tuesday,” the label attached to the meetings held by President Obama and his inner national security circle to discuss and authorize drone strikes based on the Administration’s [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Election Day in the United States was — as it has been since 1845 — a Tuesday, which meant that it also coincided with “Terror Tuesday,” the label attached to the meetings held by President Obama and his inner national security circle to discuss and authorize drone strikes based on the Administration’s secretive “targeted kill lists.” Shortly after the election results came in, it was reported that the US almost certainly carried out a targeted killing operation in Yemen against a reported al Qaeda target in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The individual targeted, ’Adnan al-Qadhi, who is said to have been killed along with 2 other AQAP suspects, was reportedly suspected of helping plan the 2008 Embassy Sana’a bombing.

As usual, there has been no independent verification for Yemeni claims that the three men were killed.

Yemen-watcher Gregory Johnson noted on his blog Waq al-Waq that the strike suggested there would be little reevaluation of the drone program — being carried out over Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and in the coming weeks, Mali and Libya — even though it continues to raise costs not wholly justified by reported successes:

So, even if the accusations against al-Qadhi were true and he was involved in the 2008 US Embassy attack and even if the US did have intelligence that he was about to carry out an attack on US personnel in Yemen or planning a strike against the US – did the US also have intelligence that all of the other individuals within the car were also involved?

This is important.  The US has carried out, by my best estimate, between 37 – 50 strikes this year in an attempt to kill 10 – 15 people.  Many of those 10 – 15 people are still alive (see: Nasir al-Wihayshi, Said al-Shihri, Qasim al-Raymi, Ibrahim Asiri and so on) but people are dying in Yemen.

And while we in the US may not feel or realize this, it is very real in Yemen.  And this is causing problems and – I continue to say – is one of the key reasons behind the rapid growth of al-Qaeda in Yemen. 

There are, however, some signs suggesting the program will be reevaluated by the President and his White House advisers as calls mount for greater scrutiny.

It would be difficult for the Administration to scale back a program it has invested so heavily in and touted without actually admitting to too much, Stephen Walt blogged, following Obama’s victory. He went on:

I fear that re-election will convince his team that they’ve basically got the right formula: drones, special forces, covert action, secrecy, etc., combined with a very cautious approach to diplomacy. This is certainly preferable to the follies of the Bush administration, but it also means that the U.S. will be engaged in lots of trouble spots but unable to resolve any of them.

Greg Miller, the author of the Washington Post‘s recent insider account of the intra-Administration debate on expanding the drone program, had also noted that the debate was rather circumscribed: “[t]here were a couple dissenters who had a seat at the table … They lost those seats at the table.”

The program has again received a full-throated endorsement from the Center for a New American Security — a think tank close to the Obama Administration — as the lesser evil in comparison to deploying Pakistani or American forces to to carry out ground offensives.

Spencer Ackerman, writing at Wired, suggests a debate could occur due to diplomatic considerations, but with few officially put-forward alternatives in play:

“There is a recognition within the administration that the current trajectory of drone strikes is unsustainable,” [Michael] Zenko [of the Council on Foreign Relations] says. “They are opposed in countries where strikes occur and globally, and that opposition could lead to losing host-nation support for current or future drone bases or over-flight rights.” In other words, tomorrow’s America diplomats may find that drones overshadow the routine geopolitical agenda they seek to advance. The trouble is, the administration’s early search for less-lethal policies to supplement or supplant the drones isn’t promising.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pulled an “October surprise” out of his hat when he announced his Likud party would form a joint list in the upcoming election with Avigdor Lieberman’s fascist Yisrael Beiteinu party. This is more of a partnership than a merger, but it has profound implications.

In [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pulled an “October surprise” out of his hat when he announced his Likud party would form a joint list in the upcoming election with Avigdor Lieberman’s fascist Yisrael Beiteinu party. This is more of a partnership than a merger, but it has profound implications.

In partnering with Lieberman, Netanyahu is likely chasing moderate voices out of his cabinet, his coalition and his own party. The outcome will surely mean an even harder line stance against the international community, especially the European Union.

Netanyahu obviously believes that increasing Israel’s already significant isolation is worth what he thinks will be increased impunity in dealing with the Palestinians and neighboring Arab states. He hopes that the merger will better equip him in defending against any potential comeuppance from Barack Obama if he wins re-election. If Romney wins, Bibi believes he will have a government ready and willing to take full advantage of a neoconservatives return to foreign policy power in the US. He is certain that his lobby in the US will keep Israel kosher enough, even though this move is going to alienate large numbers of US Jews and will likely increase growing tensions between the US Jewish and Protestant communities.

The effects will be even more profound within Israel. The expanding racism and xenophobia will kick into overdrive and, unless Labor or some new centrist party can truly capture an anti-racist spirit — which seems unlikely — the Israeli public will shift even farther right, and more liberals will be leaving.

But one thing this move will not affect is Iran, at least in the short run. Ha’aretz editor Aluf Benn believes that Netanyahu just created a war cabinet, one which will hasten an Israeli attack, and possibly even frighten the United States into attacking Iran itself before Israel does. I doubt it.

To start with, Benn does make some important points. He writes:

…Netanyahu has finally renounced his attempt to portray himself as a centrist, as a statesmanlike and moderate leader. The mask that he put on before the previous election has finally been tossed into the trash. With Lieberman as second in command and heir to the throne, and his supporters in prominent spots on the joint ticket, Likud will become a radical right-wing party, aggressive and xenophobic, that revels in Israel’s isolation and sees the Arab community as a domestic enemy and a danger to the state.

Quite true, and he later points out that the level of western-style democracy that was defended even by hawks like Benny Begin and others in Likud like Dan Meridor was just put in the crosshairs. What is left of that idealism in centrist Israel won’t survive.

But if, as Benn frames it (correctly, I think), Lieberman essentially replaces Ehud Barak as Bibi’s right hand man, this hardly shifts hard toward war. The final makeup of the next cabinet is still unclear. This joint list idea is going to narrow support for Netanyahu, not broaden it. The influential Shas party is no longer a realistic partner for Bibi, as they are strongly opposed to Yisrael Beiteinu. That’s a big loss. The joint list is almost certain to secure fewer seats than the parties would have separately, but this was a price Netanyahu was willing to pay to lead the biggest party in the Knesset next time (Kadima has the most seats in the current Knesset). But Bibi will have to offer someone, perhaps Yair Lapid’s new Yesh Atid party, some serious carrots to form a majority coalition without Shas. So the makeup of the cabinet and whether it will really be myopic enough to ignore what could become a growing movement against a unilateral strike in the public sphere remains to be seen.

But Benn’s calculation misses important points. First, Barak was a pro-attack force, and a powerful one, until the last few weeks, when he seemed to break with Netanyahu and strike a more moderate tone. Many analysts, as well as several people I’ve spoken to with some inside knowledge, believe this was pure theater to make Barak more electable. If that was the idea, it failed, and few expect Barak’s Atzmaut party to get enough votes in January to gain any seats at all in the Knesset. In any case, Barak is not the voice of moderation Benn makes him out to be.

More importantly, while cabinet opposition to a unilateral Israeli strike was certainly important, the major impediment remains: the military and intelligence establishment. Much like in the United States, where an AIPAC-influenced Congress has been beating the drums for war, the actual soldiers and commanders recognize the ramifications and difficulties of an attack on Iran. That’s not to say in either case that these military leaders would refuse an explicit order from their respective commanders-in-chief. But in both countries, the opposition has been much more important in preventing an attack to date than political forces.

Benn is correct in one sense: having Lieberman as deputy to Bibi’s sheriff is a war time configuration. It’s meant to strengthen the central government, to enable a greater degree of martial law in the event of war and to continue more of it when the war ends. It’s meant to diminish the influence of the military and intelligence leaders who have had the temerity to raise concerns about a war Netanyahu desperately wants.

But at this moment, it does not bring a war with Iran any closer than it was before. We can be thankful for that, at least. And, in a number of other ways, this move may backfire on Bibi in both the short and long terms. That would be more hopeful if there were a viable alternative in Israel or a president in the United States who was willing to take advantage of Israel’s radicalized image to exert real pressure (like that suggested by Protestant leaders earlier this month) for a regional peace agreement. Maybe that’s a second-term Obama, but I’m not holding my breath for that one. In an era of grim outlooks, I’ll content myself with knowing that this move by Netanyahu will not bring war with Iran any closer.

Back in January, academic Matthew Kroenig claimed the United States could militarily strike Iran without causing havoc and catastrophe in the region. His arguments were widely criticized and supported by the usual suspects. Jamie Fly, the neoconservative executive director of the Foreign Policy Initiative, disagreed with Kroenig, but only because [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Back in January, academic Matthew Kroenig claimed the United States could militarily strike Iran without causing havoc and catastrophe in the region. His arguments were widely criticized and supported by the usual suspects. Jamie Fly, the neoconservative executive director of the Foreign Policy Initiative, disagreed with Kroenig, but only because Kroenig did not go far enough. Then in May the two penned an op-ed arguing that President Obama had offered Iran too many carrots. This was just days before the talks almost collapsed after the only “relief” the Western-led negotiating team offered Iran was spare parts for aircraft that have suffered tremendously under sanctions. What would assist the negotiation process, according to Fly and Kroenig? More threats of military force, of course.

Although using the military option on Iran hasn’t exactly taken off as a preferred choice here in Washington, Kroenig and like-minded folks working at prominent platforms like the Wall Street Journal continue to beat their drums. That’s likely one reason why the Council on Foreign Relations hosted a debate moderated by Foreign Affairs editor Gideon Rose between Kroenig and Trita Parsi, a prominent US-Iran relations analyst and president of the National Iranian American Council. The entire debate is worth listening to, but in a nutshell, Kroenig reiterates the arguments from his article: out of the 3 potential outcomes with Iran — successful diplomacy, nuclear containment and military conflict, the third is most likely and planning should begin even while the US continues its diplomatic track with Iran. Israel isn’t equipped to do the job, so the US should carry out “limited” strikes and only respond devastatingly if Iran retaliates with more than wimper by, for example, closing the Strait of Hormuz.

Parsi accordingly points out several flaws in Kroenig’s argument: an Iranian nuclear weapon is neither inevitable nor imminent, diplomacy has neither failed nor been whole-heartedly utilized and the experience of the Iraq War, which took the lives of 5,000 Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, shows that a war with Iran is hardly going to be quick and relatively painless as Kroenig suggests. Parsi adds that as with the lead-up to the Iraq War, proponents of the military option with Iran are not from the military or intelligence communities. In fact, neoconservative hawks regularly contest the validity of intelligence and military assessments, which is ironic to say the least. Parsi also notes that as former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has repeatedly emphasized, bombing a country is the best way to convince it that it needs a nuclear deterrent to ward of future attacks…

Roger Z. George, a former national intelligence officer who teaches at the National War College in Washington, explains how to avoid making the same mistakes the US made before invading Iraq in 2003, with Iran:

News and views relevant to US foreign policy for Sept. 11

“New intelligence on Iran nuke work”: The Associated Press reports that the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) has received intelligence from the United States, Israel and at least two other Western countries showing that Iran has “moved further toward the [...]]]> via Lobe Log

News and views relevant to US foreign policy for Sept. 11

“New intelligence on Iran nuke work”: The Associated Press reports that the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) has received intelligence from the United States, Israel and at least two other Western countries showing that Iran has “moved further toward the ability to build a nuclear weapon”.

“Nuclear Mullahs, Continued”: Bill Keller responds to reader questions about his column that argues against a preemptive war on Iran’s nuclear program:

Q: You say that after an attack, Iran would have strong motivation to rebuild its nuclear facilities, this time faster and deeper underground. But the Israeli attacks on nuclear reactors at Osirak, Iraq, in 1981 and Al-Kibar, Syria, in 2007 were quite successful in keeping those countries non-nuclear.

A: First, Iran’s multiple facilities, well fortified (especially the centrifuges buried deep in the rock at Fordow, near Qom) present a much tougher target than the reactors in Iraq and Syria. Second, and more important, the Osirak attack, far from stopping Iraq’s nuclear ambitions, hastened them. After Israel bombed the reactor, Saddam Hussein launched an accelerated, covert program to manufacture nuclear weapons. When the First Gulf War ended his ambitions in 1991, that program was well underway. Experts disagree how far Saddam was from having a weapon (estimates ranged from six months to three years) but the Israeli strike in Iraq accomplished what many fear a strike in Iran would accomplish: it gave the nuclear weapons program new life. Third, Israel’s attack on the (suspected) nuclear reactor in Syria was kept secret for a long time, so that Syria did not feel obliged to undertake reprisals against the superior Israeli military. It’s inconceivable that Iran and the world would not know whom to hold responsible for an attack on its facilities, and Iranian leaders would have to lash back, if only to save face. Fourth, what ended Iraq’s nuclear ambitions was a full-scale military invasion in 1991 – followed by an (unnecessary and botched) occupation in 2003. No doubt, occupying Iran would solve the problem of its nuclear program. Anybody up for that?

“Former CIA Chief: Obama’s War on Terror Same as Bush’s, But With More Killing”: Wired reports that Michael Hayden has offered words of praise for President Obama’s counterterrorism agenda after initially criticizing the POTUS’s early comments against programs Hayden helped formulate under George W. Bush, such as the use of “enhanced interrogation” techniques and domestic wiretapping:

“But let me repeat my hypothesis: Despite the frequent drama at the political level, America and Americans have found a comfortable center line in what it is they want their government to do and what it is they accept their government doing. It is that practical consensus that has fostered such powerful continuity between two vastly different presidents, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, when it comes, when it comes to this conflict,” Hayden said Friday while speaking at the University of Michigan.

….

But Hayden, in a nearly 80-minute lecture posted on C-Span, said Obama came to embrace Bush’s positions. Both Bush and Obama said the country was at war. The enemy was al-Qaida. The war was global in nature. And the United States would have to take the fight to the enemy, wherever it may be, he said.

“The Deafness Before the Storm”: Vanity Fair’s Kurt Eichenwald delivers a bombshell report in the New York Times on the 11^th anniversary of the September 11^th attacks arguing that the Bush Administration had received multiple warnings prior to August 2001 from the CIA about Osama bin Laden’s intent and capabilities to attack US targets. According to Eichenwald, the White House dismissed the agency’s sources as agents “in” on a maskirovka directed by both Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden:

But some in the administration considered the warning to be just bluster. An intelligence official and a member of the Bush administration both told me in interviews that the neoconservative leaders who had recently assumed power at the Pentagon were warning the White House that the C.I.A. had been fooled; according to this theory, Bin Laden was merely pretending to be planning an attack to distract the administration from Saddam Hussein, whom the neoconservatives saw as a greater threat. Intelligence officials, these sources said, protested that the idea of Bin Laden, an Islamic fundamentalist, conspiring with Mr. Hussein, an Iraqi secularist, was ridiculous, but the neoconservatives’ suspicions were nevertheless carrying the day.

…

“The U.S. is not the target of a disinformation campaign by Usama Bin Laden,” the daily brief of June 29 read, using the government’s transliteration of Bin Laden’s first name. Going on for more than a page, the document recited much of the evidence, including an interview that month with a Middle Eastern journalist in which Bin Laden aides warned of a coming attack, as well as competitive pressures that the terrorist leader was feeling, given the number of Islamists being recruited for the separatist Russian region of Chechnya.

“Iraqi Spokesman: Al-Hashemi Is ‘Connected Directly’ To Terrorists”: Al-Monitor interviews Iraqi Government spokesman Ali Aldabbagh on the in absentia death sentence against the country’s Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi and the ongoing oil revenues dispute between Baghdad and the Kurdish north. The wide-ranging interview also touched on Iran-Iraq relations, including an oblique reference to reports that the US is pressuring Iraq to do more to undermine Iranian assistance to the Syrian regime:

Al-Monitor:  The US has asked Iraq to inspect Iranian planes flying to Syria to prevent arms and material from reaching the Syrian government. Is this a reasonable request? Will the government of Iraq consider doing so?

Aldabbagh:  The US never asked [us] to do so, but it is our commitment not to allow the flow of arms or fighters to both parties in Syria. We had informed the Iranians that Iraq will never [allow the] use [of] its airspace to do so. Iraq is ready to be part of international efforts to stop any arms to Syria. We protect our borders from [allowing the flow of] any equipment or fighters to or from Syria. Iraq is totally committed to these principles. The US had satisfied with Iraq measures toward Syria.

Al-Monitor:  How do you assess Iraq-Iran relations? Does your relationship with Iran complicate your ties with the United States, as in the case of Syria?

Aldabbagh:  Never, on the contrary. The US understands that Iraq should maintain good relations with Iran, as we [have] been mediating between them. Even with the Syrians, we differ on some issues with US, while we agree and have the same ideas on some Syrian aspects. Such differences never affect our relations — the US respects Iraq sovergnity [sic] in building relations with others.