DNI John Negroponte
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Negroponte
This week I was sent a link to what seems to me like a rather free-speaking article in Time Online Edition. For anyone under the impression that the US is allowing Iraq's democratic political forces to operate freely, this article shouldn't be overlooked.
http://www.time.com/time/columnist/karon/article/0,9565,1048927,00.html?promoid=rss_top
The information in this article keeps coming to mind for me. I was laying in bed this morning thinking about this stinking situation in Iraq. Some of my readers may know that I tend to believe things about the US and Iraq that don't appear in MSM (mainstream media) print or on network news and aren't even generally written about in the alternative media. I tend to discredit the claims that the US and Israeli intelligence agencies don't have much of a foothold and thus don't have much clout in Islamic countries like Iraq. I tend to think it is unbelievably naive to expect people to believe such a claim of impotence and it is equally naive to believe the claim, even though many patriotic Americans do.
It would be even more naive, though, to believe that now, two years after the overthrow of Iraq, there isn't a strong presence of US and Israeli intelligence in Iraq. Of course there is and of course it is having an impact, but what is that impact? Intelligence agencies no longer just gather information, they are the instruments used to carry out secret operations. So what secret operations are these agents of the US and Israel carrying out in Iraq?
Here's the thing. Without covert operations in Iraq, the country will slip into the hands of its political majority, the religious Islamic Shiites. This is not in America's interests since the US clearly wants control of Iraq's resources and Islam, as the declared enemy of Israel and the Christian US, isn't likely to reliably grant that. Neither the US nor Israel are likely to see their will carried out in an Islamic nation. But there are only four ways to avoid that outcome. One is to influence elections. It would appear that the January election demonstrated that this is not a good option. The second way is financial, to throw money at Iraq as a reward for doing things our way. I might call that the Chalabi way and that doesn't seem to be working either.
The third way is to use military force to overcome the political enemies of US and Israeli interests. Clearly, that is an option that the US has been exercising liberally in Iraq, but it has its limitations. The US military cannot be seen as attacking democratically legitimate political factions within Iraq. That would raise international objections and would be politically unpopular here within the US. It would invalidate the claim that the US is interested in establishing democracy in Iraq if US soldiers were being used to narrow the political playing field.
The fourth method for ensuring US and Israeli interests in Iraq is the use of covert activities. Covert activities are nothing new to politics. Spies and assassins have been around for as long as there have been governments, even tribal governments. If there is anything new in spying and political assassinations, it is the belief that the general public is supposed to be turning a blind eye to the assassinations role of covert agents. Political correctness dictates that we the people leave that to our leaders while we deny that it is happening. But it is happening all around the world and it is happening in Iraq.
America's leaders are aware of this. Bush and Rice and Rumsfeld are all aware of this since each has command over it. Veiled threats like Rumsfeld's in this Time article, are issued to leaders who know all too well the power of covert operations. Very little is lost in the translation.
Embassies act as the sanctuaries and control posts for covert operations in foreign countries. For two years it has been reported that the US embassy in Baghdad would be the largest embassy in the world. John Negroponte has a history of aiding covert operations even when those operations violate US law, violate Congressional mandate, as with Iran-Contra. Negroponte, before being nominated to the post of head of all US government civilian covert operations, was head of the US embassy in Baghdad.
Convince me that he as DNI won't use covert operations in Iraq to carry out US foreign policy.
This week I was sent a link to what seems to me like a rather free-speaking article in Time Online Edition. For anyone under the impression that the US is allowing Iraq's democratic political forces to operate freely, this article shouldn't be overlooked.
http://www.time.com/time/columnist/karon/article/0,9565,1048927,00.html?promoid=rss_top
The information in this article keeps coming to mind for me. I was laying in bed this morning thinking about this stinking situation in Iraq. Some of my readers may know that I tend to believe things about the US and Iraq that don't appear in MSM (mainstream media) print or on network news and aren't even generally written about in the alternative media. I tend to discredit the claims that the US and Israeli intelligence agencies don't have much of a foothold and thus don't have much clout in Islamic countries like Iraq. I tend to think it is unbelievably naive to expect people to believe such a claim of impotence and it is equally naive to believe the claim, even though many patriotic Americans do.
It would be even more naive, though, to believe that now, two years after the overthrow of Iraq, there isn't a strong presence of US and Israeli intelligence in Iraq. Of course there is and of course it is having an impact, but what is that impact? Intelligence agencies no longer just gather information, they are the instruments used to carry out secret operations. So what secret operations are these agents of the US and Israel carrying out in Iraq?
Here's the thing. Without covert operations in Iraq, the country will slip into the hands of its political majority, the religious Islamic Shiites. This is not in America's interests since the US clearly wants control of Iraq's resources and Islam, as the declared enemy of Israel and the Christian US, isn't likely to reliably grant that. Neither the US nor Israel are likely to see their will carried out in an Islamic nation. But there are only four ways to avoid that outcome. One is to influence elections. It would appear that the January election demonstrated that this is not a good option. The second way is financial, to throw money at Iraq as a reward for doing things our way. I might call that the Chalabi way and that doesn't seem to be working either.
The third way is to use military force to overcome the political enemies of US and Israeli interests. Clearly, that is an option that the US has been exercising liberally in Iraq, but it has its limitations. The US military cannot be seen as attacking democratically legitimate political factions within Iraq. That would raise international objections and would be politically unpopular here within the US. It would invalidate the claim that the US is interested in establishing democracy in Iraq if US soldiers were being used to narrow the political playing field.
The fourth method for ensuring US and Israeli interests in Iraq is the use of covert activities. Covert activities are nothing new to politics. Spies and assassins have been around for as long as there have been governments, even tribal governments. If there is anything new in spying and political assassinations, it is the belief that the general public is supposed to be turning a blind eye to the assassinations role of covert agents. Political correctness dictates that we the people leave that to our leaders while we deny that it is happening. But it is happening all around the world and it is happening in Iraq.
America's leaders are aware of this. Bush and Rice and Rumsfeld are all aware of this since each has command over it. Veiled threats like Rumsfeld's in this Time article, are issued to leaders who know all too well the power of covert operations. Very little is lost in the translation.
Embassies act as the sanctuaries and control posts for covert operations in foreign countries. For two years it has been reported that the US embassy in Baghdad would be the largest embassy in the world. John Negroponte has a history of aiding covert operations even when those operations violate US law, violate Congressional mandate, as with Iran-Contra. Negroponte, before being nominated to the post of head of all US government civilian covert operations, was head of the US embassy in Baghdad.
Convince me that he as DNI won't use covert operations in Iraq to carry out US foreign policy.
posted by Bill | 10:28 AM
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