Fouad Ajami, tutor to presidents

Almost everything that neocon Fouad Ajami writes is good for a laugh. Typically he serves up a preposterously incoherent mix of half-digested stray facts, heavily larded with a peculiar kind of incomprehension and preening about his own brilliance. His op-ed today in the Wall Street Journal is no exception. Perhaps I've already said too much about this once influential ninny, but it's hard to resist taking a stick to Ajami's latest excretion.

The central point, if there is one, appears to be that Ajami is smarter than Barack Obama, whose Iranian policy he considers to be weak and naive. He wants the President to be confrontational with the Iranian leadership. Ajami holds up Ronald Reagan as the model for clear-minded and hard-nosed foreign policy in the Middle East. Apparently Ajami forgets that Reagan sent that Bible and cake to the mullahs in Iran – oh, yeah, and a whole bunch of arms too. Hmmm...maybe it was Reagan's support of Saddam Hussein's attack on Iran, or perhaps his alleged October Surprise, or the Lebanon debacle, that impressed Ajami so much.

But that's just one of the many inconsistencies that render his 'argument' incoherent. Ajami can't decide whether Mousavi actually won the election, or was defeated by a popular Ahmadinejad. Even so, though he can't quite bring himself to say so explicitly, Ajami seems to think that Obama needs to take a strong stance against the Iranian regime and support the street protesters. Obama, he thinks, is subject to delusions about the possibility of a new detente with Iran.

But in truth Iran had never wanted an opening to the U.S. For the length of three decades, the custodians of the theocracy have had precisely the level of enmity toward the U.S. they have wanted -- just enough to be an ideological glue for the regime but not enough to be a threat to their power.

I wonder how many people in Washington are unaware that Iranian hardliners employ anti-Americanism to their own advantage? Anyway, try to reconcile the foregoing with this:

We must rein in the modernist conceit that the bloggers, and the force of Twitter and Facebook, could win in the streets against the squads of the regime. That fight would be an Iranian drama, all outsiders mere spectators.

If the struggle in Iran will be decided by the Iranians themselves, as of course it will be, then how could supportive rhetoric from an American president be of much assistance to the demonstrators? What's more, since Ajami admits that whipping up anti-Americanism helps the hard-liners to hold onto power, wouldn't it be counter-productive for Obama to declare that the demonstrators have US backing?

Yet Ajami dares to complain about "the administration's incoherence".

A final point: Ajami descibes President Carter as having "lost" Iran, as if that country ever belonged to the US. It's the same arrogance he displayed in the spring of 2003 when Ajami declared that "We are now coming into acquisition of Iraq". Ajami is so damned confused that he can't even distinguish between "ours" and "theirs".

crossposted from unbossed.com

Election fraud by the numbers

Two graduate students at Columbia University, Bernd Beber and Alexandra Scacco, have published a compelling statistical demonstration that the disputed Iranian vote counts are fraudulent. For example, focusing on the final digits in the vote tallies reported province by province for each of the four presidential candidates, they point out that some numerals are significantly over- or under-represented. The numeral 7 appears 17% of the time as the final digit, whereas the numeral 5 appears only 4% of the time (when on average a numeral should appear 10% of the time). Since the final digit in a large vote tally can be treated as a random occurrence, it's possible to calculate the probability that such large divergences in final-digit frequencies would arise in authentic vote tallies. The authors put that probability at just under 4%. A professional statistician once remarked to me that when an occurrence has a calculated probability of no more than 3 to 4%, it's pretty safe to conclude that the event in question was not random.

The authors also describe a second (unrelated) test of probability, which makes it that much less likely that the reported Iranian vote tallies are authentic (random) rather than generated through fraud.

I'll simply note that that authors could have performed a third test, with similar results: Some numerals are significantly over- or under-represented when you look at the second-to-last digit in the vote tallies (i.e. the "tens-column"). The numerals in this column as well ought to be randomly generated in an authentic election. But the numeral 7 once again is greatly over-represented (16%), while the numeral 3 is significantly under-represented (5%). I won't bother to crunch the numbers to demonstrate that this result, too, is rather improbable. To quote Beber and Scacco:

As a point of comparison, we can analyze the state-by-state vote counts for John McCain and Barack Obama in last year's U.S. presidential election. The frequencies of last digits in these election returns never rise above 14 percent or fall below 6 percent, a pattern we would expect to see in seventy out of a hundred fair elections.

Thus the frequencies with which the numerals 7 and 3 appear as the penultimate digits of the Iranian vote tallies further reduce the already slim probability that those results are authentic.

crossposted at unbossed.com

US Navy is stockpiling fuel in Persian Gulf

Many Middle East experts have wondered aloud what point there is to the Annapolis peace conference. It appears destined to achieve nothing significant. One of its main goals, I think, must be to demonstrate that Iranian-backed Hamas can in fact be marginalized. That PR victory would be worth enough to the Saudi regime that they'd send their Foreign Minister to a doomed conference.

Simultaneously, the US military is gearing up for some kind of very large show of force against Iran to occur during the next 90 days. Reuters reported over the weekend that large amounts of fuel are being stockpiled at US naval and air bases in the U.A.E., Qatar, and Diego Garcia (where long-range bombers are based).

In the past, these kinds of arrangements have foretold aggressive military operations or major changes in tactics in the region.

For example, we're told in passing that...

In February, oil industry sources told Reuters [Saudi Arabia] had raised the amount of jet fuel earmarked for the military from 1.5 million barrels last year to close to eight million in 2007.

In retrospect, it seems obvious that this quintupling of jet fuel was linked to plans to rely increasingly on air power in Iraq during 2007. The public was assured by the "surge's" architects that the goal was to win hearts and minds with a more carefully calibrated (yeah) counterinsurgency campaign. Had we known of the Saudi jet fuel deal, we might have surmised that the sophisticated strategy also included bombing a lot more Iraqis than before.

The current stockpiling of jet fuel and marine diesel can only be directed against Iran, however (h/t Cernig):

The U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) has tendered for four tankers in November to move at least one million barrels of jet and ship fuel between Gulf ports, from Asia to the Gulf and to the Diego Garcia base, tenders seen by Reuters show...

"They have been very active," said a ship industry source, familiar with the MSC tender process, who asked not to be named.

"Out of the multiple charter requirements they issue, they usually do maybe one or two (tankers) a month in the Gulf. They were quiet over the summer months," he said.

The fuel includes JA1 and JP5, the latter used by carrier-based F-18 fighters. The MSC, asked by Reuters for comment, stated that there was "nothing abnormal about current requirements in the Gulf ". But a doubling of fuel tenders is a pretty good working description of "abnormal". Why deny it?

Reuters adds that even more fuel (including JP5) has been requested from Bahrain by the Defense Energy Support Center. And in addition, there's a very unusual arrangement whereby the MSC has chartered a large oil tanker for 90 days (beginning in early December) to carry fuel, including jet fuel, in any number of trips between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

"What's most interesting is the time-charter in the Gulf. It's a big ship and here we have a commitment for a lot of movement of fuels, backwards and forwards down to the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman," the Gulf source said.

"This confirms there is going to be a lot of activity, possibly a serious demonstration to Iran that the military means to protect the Hormuz Strait," he said.

Yet the US Navy has been conducting exercises and showing the flag in the Persian Gulf regularly. Last week for example there were two naval groups conducting exercises. Therefore the (more than) doubling of naval fuel supplies appears to herald something more than the ordinary level of pushback against the Iranian military presence in the Gulf.

The stockpiles don't appear to be extensive enough to prepare for an actual attack on Iran, and US public opinion hasn't been prepped adequately anyway (despite increasingly tough talk from Bush & Co. during October). My guess is that there will be some other kind of excessive display of bellicosity during December or January.

It will nearly coincide with the Annapolis peace conference. The US exclusion of Hamas from the conference is seen as a challenge to their base of support in the Arab world:

Palestinian and Israeli analysts expected a weakening of public confidence in Hamas after Arab League foreign ministers voted in Cairo on Friday to attend the summit. A decision yesterday by Syria, Hamas' staunchest Arab ally, to send its Deputy Foreign Minister, was seen as a particularly damaging blow.

But Annapolis is intended also as a blow to Iranian prestige.

Hamas, and beyond it, the specter of Iran is focusing the minds of the Arab states too. Islamist movements like Hamas threaten the hold on power of the regions' authoritarian regimes. Iran's regional aspirations, with or without nuclear weapons, make Saudi Arabia, with a large Shiite minority in its eastern oil-producing region, or Bahrain with a majority Shiite population, extremely nervous. A peace settlement in Palestine would remove one area where Iran can make trouble.

Little surprise that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also denounced the Annapolis conference today.

It's tempting to infer, then, that the administration's bellicose planning now for the Persian Gulf may be intended to demonstrate that it can enforce its threat of "increased isolation" for Iran—to quote Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns from earlier this month.

Bellicose posturing is just the kind of plan that a nut like Dick Cheney would think is going to draw wavering countries over to your own side and increase the isolation of those you are threatening. If you can maneuver Iran into a corner by sitting around confabbing in Annapolis, then you ought to be able to do that much better with Cheney's favored means of diplomacy—military confrontation.

crossposted from unbossed.com

"Got to find a link with Iran"

Tomorrow's Observer sheds some further light on the rush to war with Iran. American intelligence officials and interrogators in Iraq, interviewed by reporter David Smith, say that they're under "huge pressure" from Washington to find evidence of links between Iran and captured Iraqi insurgents. The pressure is distorting the way interrogations are conducted, with the goal now being not to discover the truth about the insurgents but instead to find some fuel to throw onto the flames of war.

It's impossible to avoid the parallels with the run-up to the attack upon Iraq.

Micah Brose, a privately contracted interrogator working for American forces in Iraq, near the Iranian border, told The Observer that information on Iran is 'gold'...

Brose, 30, who extracts information from detainees in Iraq, said: 'They push a lot for us to establish a link with Iran. They have pre-categories for us to go through, and by the sheer volume of categories there's clearly a lot more for Iran than there is for other stuff. Of all the recent requests I've had, I'd say 60 to 70 per cent are about Iran.

'It feels a lot like, if you get something and Iran's not involved, it's a let down.' He added: 'I've had people say to me, "They're really pushing the Iran thing. It's like, shit, you know." '

Brose said that reports about Washington's increasingly hawkish stance towards Tehran, including possible military action, chimed with his experience. 'My impression is they're just trying to get every little bit of ammunition possible. If we get something here it fits the overall picture. The engine needs impetus and they're looking for us to find the fuel - a particular type of fuel...

He denied ever being asked to fabricate evidence, adding: 'We're not asked to manufacture information, we're asked to find it. But if a detainee wants to tell me what I want to hear so he can get out of jail... you know what I'm saying.'

Other military intelligence officials in Iraq refused to comment, but one said: 'The message is, "Got to find a link with Iran, got to find a link with Iran." It's sickening.'

The Bush administration's desire to find any evidence to link Iran to attacks on US troops is well known. This report suggests that the word has gone down along the chain of command to beat the bushes until something, anything turns up.

Because starting a new war, rather than understanding the current one, has become the primary goal of intelligence gathering in Iraq today.

A fitting tribute on Veteran's Day, a day of reflection. Or, for George Bush and Dick Cheney, yet another occasion for banging the drums of war.

crossposted from unbossed.com

“We’re closer now to war against Iran than we’ve ever been”

So said Joseph Cirincione this evening at a lecture on nuclear proliferation in Lancaster, PA. A highly respected expert in the field, and until recently the Director for Non-Proliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Cirincione’s comments deserve attention, even from those who don’t believe the situation is that dire.

One of the themes of his talk was that coming to grips with the fear that nuclear weapons cause, and becoming aware of how actors on the political stage evoke and manipulate that fear, is the only way for humans to take control of their own destiny and pull back from the abyss of virtually unchecked nuclear proliferation. People everywhere want to see the end of nuclear weapons, he said, yet the stoking of fear keeps causing us to seek out ever more perilous solutions to the problems.

During the question period I asked him whether he gives credence to reports that the Vice President and his friends were responsible for spreading false stories recently about a supposed nuclear facility in Syria. Cirincione said emphatically that he does believe them: “Absolutely.” As I discussed earlier today, the fear-mongering regarding Syria may be an indication of the direction this administration intends to take with Iran.

Cirincione also stated that he had confirmed that the Bush administration received from Iran a sweeping offer to negotiate a grand bargain in April 2003. The first detailed account of the Iranian offer was given by Gareth Porter last May.

The proposal, a copy of which is in the author's possession, offered a dramatic set of specific policy concessions Tehran was prepared to make in the framework of an overall bargain on its nuclear program, its policy toward Israel, and al-Qaeda. It also proposed the establishment of three parallel working groups to negotiate "road maps" on the three main areas of contention -- weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and regional security, and economic cooperation.

The offer reportedly was drafted by the Iranian ambassador to France, Sadegh Kharrazi, and passed on to the U.S. through the Swiss ambassador to Iran, Tim Guldimann. When the corporate media finally noticed the story last winter, Condoleezza Rice tried to cast doubt on it.

Rice was questioned about the document on Capitol Hill last week. She said she did not recall seeing it when she was national security adviser. "I just don't remember ever seeing any such thing," she said.

This evening, however, Joe Cirincione said that he has spoken to Kharrazi, who confirmed that he drafted the offer, as well as to Guldimann, who confirmed that he had passed it on to the U.S. The offer was (as we now know) rejected more or less abruptly by the neocons in the Bush administration, because they believed the US could force the collapse of the Iranian government. Cirincione described the Bush administration’s refusal to negotiate in 2003 as one of the greatest policy disasters of the last 30 or 40 years in regard to Iran.

It was while describing the consequences of that blunder that he expressed the view that we are closer now than we’ve ever been to war with Iran. It’s a view that a depressingly large number of people have been reaching.

More omens of war against Iran

For the past year I’ve been highly skeptical of claims that George Bush had resolved upon attacking Iran. Whatever he may have wanted early last spring, there were signs by June of 2006 that Bush was stepping back from the abyss. It may have been due to push-back by the Pentagon, or the complete collapse of post-election Iraq, or possibly a temporary eclipse of Cheney’s influence. Much of the administration’s saber-rattling since then I put down as the negotiating tactics of those Mayberry Machiavellis in the White House.

But increasingly these days we’re seeing more ominous signs of actual planning.

For example, a recent report suggests that an additional 20% of our operational fleet of U-2 planes was moved this year to bases in the Middle East in order to spy on Iran.

Today brings further news.

First, a curious provision tucked away in an appropriation bill to outfit B-2 “stealth” bombers with “bunker buster” bombs. The WH described this request as an “urgent operational need”.

From Congressional Quarterly:

Some Democrats are worried that President Bush’s funding request to enable B-2 “stealth” bombers to carry a new 30,000-pound “bunker buster” bomb is a sign of plans for an attack on Iran.

Buried in the $196.4 billion supplemental war spending proposal that Bush submitted to Congress on Oct. 22 is a request for $88 million to modify B-2 bombers so they can drop a Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP, a conventional bomb still in development that is the most powerful weapon designed to destroy targets deep underground.

A White House summary accompanying the supplemental spending proposal said the request for money to modify ­B-2s to carry the bombs came in response to “an urgent operational need from theater commanders.” The summary provided no further details…

Previous statements by the Defense Department and the program’s contractors, along with interviews with military experts, suggest the weapon is meant for the kind of hardened targets found chiefly in Iran, which Bush suspects of developing nuclear weapons capability, and North Korea, which already has tested a nuclear device.

What is most alarming about the request is that the 15-ton bomb is still in its testing phase (the first test was held only in March). Only in June was the first contract (a small one) awarded to Grumman to retrofit the B-2 to carry the MOP. The current request, then, is a massive and sudden expansion of the operation. To what end?

CQ quotes Rep. James Moran (D-VA) and Jim McDermott (D-WA) as saying they believe the bomb capabilities are intended for use against Iran.

[McDermott] said the funding request was the latest of many signs that indicated Bush was contemplating an attack on Iran. McDermott said such a scenario was his “biggest fear between now and the election.”

“We are not authorizing Bush to use a 30,000-pound bunker buster,” he said. “They’ve been banging the drums the same way as they did in 2002 with Iraq.”

Both Moran and McDermott plan to oppose the request in the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense. Others, however, have learned to love the Bomb.

Not all Democratic lawmakers oppose the weapon. Non-nuclear bunker busters have emerged in recent years as favorites of Democrats concerned about Bush administration’s earlier plans to conduct research on nuclear models.

“We need to have this as a conventional weapon,” said Norm Dicks, D-Wash., a member of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. “It adds to our deterrent.”

That may have been the intended object of all that loose talk of nuclear strikes against Iran—to convince wavering Democrats to view a non-nuclear attack as the best outcome they could hope for from this administration. It’s a game that Bush & Co. have played successfully before: Push Democrats into negotiating with themselves until they arrive at the “compromise” he wanted in the first place.

At a minimum, it’s time to jangle those phones in the offices of members of the Defense Subcommittee, chaired by John Murtha.

The leaking of false information about the Israeli attack in Syria on Sept. 5 is also cause for concern. Ten days ago David Sanger and Mark Mazzetti published a Judith-Milleresque report in the NYT claiming that the Israelis had destroyed a nuclear reactor under construction with North Korean help. Neither Israel nor Syria confirmed the allegation, and few experts have credited it.

But it was clear that the Vice President’s minions were pushing the story hard. They appear to have been behind the related and equally false stories that Syria was disassembling the bombed reactor in order to conceal evidence, and that a Syrian diplomat at the U.N. had admitted the facility was a nuclear reactor. It was a classic whispering campaign; the only insider who would attach his name to the allegations was true-believer John Bolton.

Now Steve Clemons appears to have produced some actual inside dope. His sources confirm that Cheney’s gang was behind the dissemination of false information about Syria:

Then, a journalist friend of mine -- not at the New York Times -- confided to me that they were being pressed by the White House and by fellow travelers of the Cheney gang to pump up the Syria nuclear story. This is one of several people who actually used the term "being Judith Miller'd" to me to describe how they felt in their interactions with the administration. Even the way they were using it, it still doesn't describe properly the kind of interaction going on.

Other sources tell Clemons that the Syrian facility probably was working on retrofitting Scud missiles to take chemical weapons warheads that could burst in the air. Be that as it may (and even though Clemons spills a lot of pixels wringing his hands about his inability to find sources who can back up the nuclear allegations by Sanger and Mazzetti), it looks very likely that the real crazies inside the Bush administration (Cheney & Co.) treated the Israeli attack as agitprop.

At a minimum, if Cheney can convince the serious people in Washington that Israel attacked a nuclear facility in Syria, he’ll have built a partial case for an American attack on the Natanz facility in Iran—before the Israelis take the initiative there as well.

And if the Syrians were playing with chemical weapons, then Cheney could count on their refusal to open up the bombed facility or make an international cause celebre of the attack. His own scenario, then, might well go uncorrected. It would thus “prove” that it’s possible to bomb a nuclear facility in a rogue state without provoking an international crisis.

At long last, it’s time for Congress to pass a resolution prohibiting Bush from attacking Iran without explicit authorization from those with Article I authority to make war.

crossposted from unbossed.com

At least 20% of U-2 planes sent to Middle East this year

This statement, made in passing by the Sunday Times defence correspondent Mick Smith, is noteworthy:

Seven American U2 spy planes have passed through RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire this year on their way to Akrotiri in Cyprus or Al-Dhafra in Abu Dhabi, the bases for flights over Iran.

Two observations crowd in:

First, the US is said to have an active fleet of only 35 U-2 planes (nominally headquartered in California). Twenty percent of them, a staggering proportion, were en route this year through England for the Middle East.

Second, Smith’s assertion of fact is apropos of very little in the article. The U-2 information looks to be a salient fact that just needed to see the light of day somehow or other.

The article in which that paragraph is buried requires a closer look. In one sense it mirrors the standard complaints about Iran that one sees in Murdoch papers, except the story is oddly self-deflating.

It focuses on conflicts that the SAS, British special forces, have had with smugglers crossing the Iranian border in the south near Basra. The headline, “SAS raiders enter Iran to kill gunrunners”, seems to be contradicted by the body of the report however (h/t Cernig). It states:

Last week, Bob Ainsworth, the armed forces minister, said the Ministry of Defence was unable to say whether British troops had killed or captured any Iranians in Iraq. The ministry declined to comment, but privately officials insisted British troops never carry out hot pursuit across the border.

Half-way through the article, we would seem to be back to square one. Except that we’re not quite done. Smith rather suddenly shifts the focus away from border firefights:

There have been persistent reports of American special-operations missions inside Iran preparing for a possible attack. But the sources said British troops were solely stopping arms smuggling.

The fighting comes amid an increase in US and British intelligence operations against Iran. Britain’s forces have more than 70 Farsi experts monitoring Iranian communications, and the intelligence is shared with the United States.

Here is where the statement about U-2 flights occurs. Editorially, its inclusion in the story is justifiable (though only barely) as a counter-example of US/UK intelligence sharing.

But note that Smith does not state that the seven U-2 planes have been flying over Iran. He leaves that for the reader to infer, saying only that these are bases “for” flights over Iran. For the U-2 flights over Iraq, as Smith must know, the US doesn’t need the Cypriot and U.A.E. bases. Since 2003 the US has been able to use air fields in Saudia Arabia and Kuwait.

The context of the statement about U-2 planes is important. Smith is portraying the British response to smuggling from Iran as measured, and any conflicts with the Iranian military as straddling the border. Also, these operations are directed simply at blocking the smuggling. (Let’s set aside the question of whether all that is accurate.)

The American special forces, by contrast, are depicted as operating rather deep inside Iran, acting to prepare the ground for a large-scale attack on Iran.

There is a deliberate parallelism with Smith’s treatment of intelligence operations, to which he then turns. The British limit themselves to monitoring signals (presumably from outside Iran). And the US? We’re told it has shipped at least 20% of its U-2 fleet to the region during this year. The implication is clear: The US is regularly violating Iranian air space with U-2 flights, flights that have been stepped up dramatically in recent months by the addition of 7 further U-2 planes.

For several years there have been credible allegations that U-2 planes are spying on Iran, especially after a U-2 crashed in June 2005 at Al-Dhafra air base (U.A.E.).

The United States says the incident occurred as the plane was returning to base after an observation mission over Afghanistan…

Air Force spokesman David Small says U-2 planes are flying daily over Afghanistan and Iraq, in support of American and allied ground forces…

Although the Air Force spokesman did not mention Iran, it's considered certain that the United States is employing the U-2's surveillance capabilities there, as well. Washington suspects Tehran of trying to develop nuclear weapons.

The Boston Globe added:

The military statement also did not specify the nature of the U-2's classified mission, saying only it was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom…

The U-2 mission will probably remain a mystery. Specialists said yesterday that the plane could have been gathering intelligence for operations in Afghanistan.

It could also have been spying over the eastern border into the mountainous regions of Pakistan, where Osama bin Laden is believed to be hiding. Another possibility, they said, was Iran, which borders Afghanistan to the west and where the United States suspects a covert nuclear weapons program is underway.

Operation Enduring Freedom ''is not synonymous with Afghanistan," Pike said. ''What they were looking at and what they were flying over could be two very different things."

In fact, the U.A.E. lies more or less directly south of the main areas of nuclear activity in Iran, as well as the porous low-lying border between Iraq and Iran. Afghanistan, however, is on the other side of Iranian air space from the U.A.E.

It’s also possible that the US may be able to fly U-2 missions to Iran out of Georgia and Azerbaijan, alliances the US has cultivated partly for that reason perhaps.

In the last two months, several articles appeared in the corporate media about the continued need for the U-2’s capabilities. Clearly the stories were being orchestrated by the military for purposes of its own.
Jonathan Karl of ABC was surprised to find at long last that he would be allowed to fly on the spy plane.

Meanwhile U.S. News declared that “The legendary U-2 spy planes are busier than ever”. True, but maybe for reasons other than those explored in the bland report.

If in fact the U.S. has now dedicated an additional 20% of its U-2 fleet to overflights of Iran, then we can make better sense of this modest barrage of stories about the normally secretive U-2 program.

It almost goes without saying that to violate Iranian air space could be an act of war; to do so systematically might be intended as a deliberate provocation.

You may recall that one of George Bush’s last acts in the push toward war in Iraq was to demand that Saddam Hussein accept U-2 flights over his country. It was one of the last gasp of the plan to “wrongfoot” Hussein. The Bush administration reacted petulantly when the dictator finally said he was willing to accede to the demand.

Unlike Iraq, however, Iran may have the capability to shoot down a U-2.

crossposed from unbossed.com

The company presidential candidates keep

Perhaps, like me, you're less than convinced that any of the leading presidential candidates can be trusted entirely to adopt mature policies, however essential. Perhaps you're wondering whether they will definitively and forever sweep into the landfill of history all the many outrages against decency that President Bush has mounded up around the White House, like a fortress of so much manure.

Perhaps you're concerned that once again so-called liberals will try to compete with so-called conservatives in bellicosity, chest-thumping, strong-on-defensism, mine-shaft-gapism, and so forth—thus insuring some kind of continuity in the insane policies of the Bush administration. Perhaps, for example, you fear that each and every one of them would ultimately refuse to withdraw from Iraq (notwithstanding everything), out of an excess of caution regarding what the "serious people" in Washington might think of their hawkish credentials.

You should be worried, because by now virtually every one of them has publicly taken an obstreperous or incautious stance on some foreign policy issue...threatening Iran, for example. It already looks like a race to the bottom, and I fear that there'll be a lot of table-pounding before the primaries are over. This list of hawkish foreign policy advisors assembled by the main presidential candidates may give you even more grounds for concern.

In particular, I'm astounded (though not in the least surprised) to learn that Hillary Clinton relies upon the advice of that notorious Brookings-Institution fool, Michael O'Hanlon.

This is the person who recently returned from a hurried visit to Iraq, hosted by the US military, and declared in an op-ed that (a) he was a longtime critic of the Iraq War, and (b) "we are finally getting somewhere" in Iraq. Neither was true, as many people pointed out.

Last year, sensing that O'Hanlon was going to be promoted hard by the administration's apologists as a 'sensible' (i.e. hawkish) "liberal", I wrote a profile of O'Hanlon's recent career as a self-promoting goofball. His war-mongering has since become legendary, but it's worth emphasizing that O'Hanlon is a laughingstock for a whole range of reasons.

Here I'll quote part of that profile, where I talk about the desperation of think-tank "experts" to retain their seats in front of the microphones:

You can see that that is exactly what O'Hanlon prizes from the boast in his Brookings bio:

O’Hanlon has appeared on the major television networks more than 150 times since September 11, 2001 and has contributed to CNN, MSNBC, BBC, and FOX some 300 times over that same period.

Who in the hell counts up their television appearances? And who subdivides the tally between major and minor networks? It's pathetic, but all too characteristic. These people are desperate self-promoters living in fear that their pretensions to omniscience will be exploded and the microphones snatched away. O'Hanlon, for example, claims to be an expert in eleven areas of national and international policy (including expertise in several Asian countries). Yet he speaks only a single foreign language (French) and his undergraduate degree was in physics.

This know-it-all has been wrong about virtually everything important in Iraq (one of his proclaimed areas of expertise), such as when he congratulated Bush for denying that a civil war had broken out this spring [of 2006]. That was, by his own admission, the day after 30 headless bodies were discovered en masse in Iraq. And a full year after we began seeing headlines regarding the systematic kidnapping and torture committed by Iraqi Interior Ministry forces, he writes drivel like this:

If the country begins to descend toward civil war, the temptation of many [Iraqi security forces] will be to take sides in the sectarian strife rather than stop it.

Puffed up experts such as this are frauds who can only retain their grip upon respectability by avoiding scrutiny of their record.

That's sufficient to demonstrate, I believe, that O'Hanlon's advice even in his areas of "expertise" is about as worthless as any advice could possibly be. Even more troubling, he's a confirmed and unrepentant hawk on Iraq. In other words, he believes in principle in a policy of bashing certain countries, at least certain Middle Eastern countries, as long as the bashing is done efficiently and with some tidiness.

And this is the clown whom Hillary Clinton counts as a trusted advisor? To my mind, that says a great deal about her sense...not just about her preferred foreign policies, but also about her basic sensibilities.

All of the lists of advisors for Democratic candidates are troubling—for whom the lists include and whom they don't include—even if none of the others have stooped as low as to turn to Michael O'Hanlon. And the Republican candidates' advisors are even more extreme (Norman Podhoretz, for heaven's sake).

So it looks like our choices next year may boil down to (a) 8 more years of hell, or (b) 8 more years of heck.

crossposted from unbossed.com