Category: News

The piece I wrote for the Daily Caller was in response to a piece by Jamie Weinstein, the senior editor there, in which Weinstein denies aggressive US foreign policy had anything to do with the motivations behind 9/11. I relished in an evidence-based response, but to be honest I’m saddened that this discussion is still going on 10 years after the fact. That the obvious reality – agreed upon by the CIA, the State Department, the FBI, all of the relevant academic literature, reiterated by al Qaeda members ever since, etc. – is still a minority view should trouble us. After all, the evidence is there.

But I actually only chose to respond to a portion of Weinstein’s column (brevity pays these days). He also incorrectly argued that defense budgets aren’t part of our fiscal problems right now. I’ve written enough on defense budgets to lay that one to rest. But Weinstein argues entitlements are the problem. Yes, they’re a problem. But let’s consider discretionary spending as well and what that might do to the debt and deficits: military spending makes up 59% of discretionary spending in the 2012 federal budget. And we’re wasting it on an aging Empire.

The other point I didn’t address in my Daily Caller response was Weinstein’s claim that there is no evidence for the belief that al Qaeda’s aim was to drag the US into a costly war in Afghanistan to bleed us dry à la Soviet Union. Clearly, Weinstein hasn’t done his homework, since this conclusion is broadly agreed upon by experts too. The Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad, murdered by the Pakistani secret service, was perhaps most knowledgable on this point. He delved into the gritty details in his book, published just before his death, in which he features interviews with some of al Qaeda’s and the Taliban’s top operatives and confirms that this was the strategy from the beginning. Investigative journalist Gareth Porter reviewed Shahzad’s book:

Al-Qaeda strategists have been assisting the Taliban fight against U.S.-NATO forces in Afghanistan because they believe that foreign occupation has been the biggest factor in generating Muslim support for uprisings against their governments, according to the just-published book by Syed Saleem Shahzad, the Pakistani journalist whose body was found in a canal outside Islamabad last week with evidence of having been tortured.

Shahzad writes that al-Qaeda strategists believed its terrorist attacks on 9/11 would lead to a U.S. invasion of Afghanistan which would in turn cause a worldwide “Muslim backlash.” That “backlash” was particularly important to what emerges in Shahzad’s account as the primary al-Qaeda aim of stimulating revolts against regimes in Muslim countries.

Shahzad makes it clear that the U.S. occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq were the biggest break al-Qaeda had ever gotten.

And US strategy continues to exacerbate the hatreds against the US fostering for years in the Muslim world, which I spoke to in the piece. I’ll repost part of a previous blog to illustrate that:

…the 2006 National Intelligence Estimate on Trends in Global Terrorism [sic] said that the Iraq war was “breeding deep resentment of U.S. involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement.” It was also admitted, writes Porter, by former head of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center Robert Grenier who said the war “has convinced many Muslims that the United States is the enemy of Islam and is attacking Muslims, and they have become jihadists as a result of their experience in Iraq.” Night raids in Afghanistan, which have been ramped up by Obama to become one of the primary military approaches in the country, get the wrong person 50 percent of the time according to senior commanders in JSOC. Both former CIA Director Michael Hayden and former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair recognized that “hatred of America is increasing in Pakistan” because of the drone strikes, which kill exorbitant numbers of civilians.

So I guess however much it saddens me to be beating the same dead horse all these years past, apparently there is a demand for it.

The big-money rent-seekers in the military industrial complex have been lobbying hard against cuts to the defense budgets. The so-called “super-committee” – the group of representatives tasked with deciding where to cut – have been the target for that lobbying. Unfortunately, those representatives come from states where the some of the biggest military contractors build missiles, aircraft, jet fighters and tanks while employing tens of thousands of workers. That has long been a strategy of defense firms: to spread manufacturing bases of employment around the country to make cuts politically unpalatable to key politicians.

But those jobs are not the kind that really get the economy moving and boost productivity. They’re the kind that get their salaries from taxpayers who otherwise would have spent or saved it in productive ways and then build bombs, which only destroy instead of produce.

And that brings us to the new post from Robert Greenwald and Derek Crowe at War Costs pushing against this idea that military spending is good for job creation. It isn’t.

Panetta and his bosses counterparts in the war industry can play Chicken Little all they want about war budget spending cuts, but they can’t change the simple fact that military spending is terrible at creating jobs, according to a 2009 study by the Political Economy Research Institute. In fact, of the areas of government spending studied by PERI, military spending was the worst at creating jobs. That means that no matter what nightmare scenario Panetta throws out there on possible job losses related to war budget cuts, the alternatives will always be worse.

…It’s not just the profiteers’ claims of job creation that don’t stand up to serious review; their “poor, pitiful us” routine also fails the smell test. At the war industry press conference held on Wednesday, industry spokeswoman Marion C. Blakey said defense had already been cut “into the bone,” and that the industry was collectively “very fragile.” But a look at a few of the 2010 salaries of the CEOs of corporations who make up Blakey’s group’s executive board sure doesn’t reveal any pain or fragility:

• Lockheed Martin CEO Robert J. Stephens made $21.9 million (including $4 million in bonuses)
• Northrop Grumman CEO Wesley G. Bush made $22.9 million
• Boeing CEO W. James McNerney, Jr. made $19.7 million

In a recent interview on Hardtalk, former Secretary of Homeland Security (and co-author of the PATRIOT Act) Michael Chertoff was asked about extraordinary rendition and why the US government sent captured detainees to other countries known for widespread torture. Not only does he deny that the purpose of sending detainees to other countries was so that they would be tortured, but he denies anyone in the US government had knowledge that subjects were tortured when sent to various countries. He says, “I’m not sure I’m going to agree with you that they necessarily knew that people were going to be tortured.”

It’s a virtual certainty at this point, thanks to brilliant journalists beginning with but certainly not ending with Jane Mayer, that everyone involved in the post 9/11 extraordinary rendition program know it was based on torture. Rather than Chertoff’s lies and denial, knowledge of the reality of the program more closely matches with what Dana Priest and Barton Gellman were told very early on:

According to one official who has been directly involved in rendering captives into foreign hands, the understanding is, “We don’t kick the [expletive] out of them. We send them to other countries so they can kick the [expletive] out of them.” Some countries are known to use mind-altering drugs such as sodium pentathol, said other officials involved in the process.

I wonder what Chertoff might have said had he been asked these questions by Maher Arar:

At least the U.S. military and other NATO air forces have already had lots of practice hammering this country.

Who could have ever foreseen that the Islamist radicals would take over after the U.S. helped topple the country’s dictator?

Today’s New York Times: “Islamists’ Growing Sway Raises Questions for Libya”

In the emerging post-Qaddafi Libya… the most powerful military leader is now Abdel Hakim Belhaj, the former leader of a hard-line group once believed to be aligned with Al Qaeda.

The growing influence of Islamists in Libya raises hard questions about the ultimate character of the government and society that will rise in place of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s autocracy.

While many Americans may believe that US policies are designed to address American needs, America’s new Ambassador to Israel explains that this is far from the case.

In a recent speech before the Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI), Ambassador Daniel Shapiro clarified what drives US policies: "The test of every policy the Administration develops in the Middle East is whether it is consistent with the goal of ensuring Israel’s future as a secure, Jewish, democratic state. That is a commitment that runs as a common thread through our entire government."

Shapiro went on to say: "This test explains our extraordinary security cooperation, our stand against the delegitimization of Israel, our efforts on Iran, our response to the Arab Spring, and our efforts on Israeli-Palestinian peace."

It also explains a factor in the downward slide in American prosperity and standing in the world.

US funding of Israel and its weapons industry

Shapiro elaborated: ‘Israel will receive over $3 billion in U.S. funding for training and equipment in the coming fiscal year. This assistance allows Israel to purchase the sophisticated defense equipment it needs to protect itself, by itself, including the world’s most advanced fighter aircraft, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Our assistance has also helped boost Israel’s domestic defense industry."

Continue reading “US Ambassador: Support for Israel Drives All US Mideast Policies”

A good bit of drama found its way into John Walsh’s blog post for Antiwar.com about a resolution, passed at the Veterans For Peace convention last month, to impeach President Obama. Unfortunately, not all the drama was based in reality. Here’s to setting the record straight.

1) The “impeach Bush” resolution Walsh refers to that VFP adopted in August 2004 was not an “impeach Bush” resolution. It said that whoever was elected President in the upcoming November 2004 election had 10 days after inauguration to announce the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and if a timely announcement was not issued, VFP would join the already ongoing effort to impeach Bush. So it would be just as accurate to say that the August 2004 resolution was an “impeach Kerry” resolution or an “impeach whoever was the frontrunner in August” resolution – Republican or Democrat.

2) Walsh added, “…that Mike Ferner, at the time executive director of VFP, made an indignant Bush-bashing speech for impeachment in front of the White House. You can view it here in all its glory. A hard copy letter with the signature of the VFP president was mailed to each member of the House calling for impeachment.”

• I was not executive director of VFP when I made that speech June 16, 2005
• A hard copy letter was not “mailed to each member of the House…”

3) Continuing: “How about the present resolution? Mike Ferner opposed it in the floor debate at the August convention. There has been no rally and none is planned – not in front of the Whhite House or anywhere else. This time a fax of the resolution has been sent to the House members without signature of the (VFP) President.”

• I did not oppose the impeach Obama resolution at the August convention. I was not even present for the debate.
• The June 2005 White House rally was not organized by Veterans For Peace. I gladly accepted a speaking invitation from “AfterDowningStreet.org” who did organize it.
• Our office faxed a copy of the entire impeach Obama resolution, with a cover letter on our letterhead, to each member of the House, just as we did with the 2004 resolution. Walsh is correct that the letter was not signed by the President of VFP. I signed it in my capacity as VFP’s interim director.

4) Walsh concludes, “Unfortunately this story can be repeated in different ways in a variety of ‘progressive’ organizations with leadership more loyal to Dems than to antiwar principle. This writer has witnessed it himself in organizations like PSR and United for Justice and Peace. But the ground is shifting, and much to its credit VFP has led the way.”

• Thanks to Mr. Walsh for the “…has led the way” statement, but let’s be clear on one important point: The most dearly-held section of VFP’s Statement of Purpose is we seek to “…abolish war as an instrument of national policy.” Our experience tells us that the American Empire is a bi-partisan effort and that lives are at stake if we play partisan favorites. We owe no allegiance to party – none.

5) In his bio note, Walsh says “He attempted twice to reach a voice against the resolution but received no reply.” On September 2, I emailed him the names and contact information of two articulate VFP members who gladly agreed to speak with him. I’ve since checked with one of them, Ward Reilly, who sent me a copy of a Sept. 2 email he sent Walsh, explaining in very clear terms why he opposed the resolution.

Finally, I’d like to add that although Mr. Walsh’s article contained a good bit of drama, not all of it was based on the record. But more importantly, what he made no mention of was the spirited debate, before and at the convention, about why to vote yes or no. It cannot be simplified into a debate between principled members who campaigned to “do the right thing” and those who didn’t want to offend Democrats or were afraid of looking like racists. It was this: in order to live up to our Statement of Purpose, how can we strategically join forces with those most likely to be our natural allies so we can gain the political power needed to stop war? Viewed in that light, the story of this resolution looks a little different.

Mike Ferner is a writer from Ohio and a former Veterans for Peace President who is now serving as VFP’s interim director.