Left Flank

The NYT's David Barstow decries public diplomacy with a conflict of interest from the Defense Department.

To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as «military analysts» whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration's wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

Those business relationships are hardly ever disclosed to the viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks themselves. But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants. The companies include defense heavyweights, but also scores of smaller companies, all part of a vast assemblage of contractors scrambling for hundreds of billions in military business generated by the administration's war on terror. It is a furious competition, one in which inside information and easy access to senior officials are highly prized.

Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.

Analysts have been wooed in hundreds of private briefings with senior military leaders, including officials with significant influence over contracting and budget matters, records show. They have been taken on tours of Iraq and given access to classified intelligence. They have been briefed by officials from the White House, State Department and Justice Department, including Mr. Cheney, Alberto R. Gonzales and Stephen J. Hadley.

In turn, members of this group have echoed administration talking points, sometimes even when they suspected the information was false or inflated. Some analysts acknowledge they suppressed doubts because they feared jeopardizing their access.

That inside gossip is a powerful drug. But, there's another party responsible: the media. Why didn't media groups either challenge these hacks on the air, or just say no? Ratings and funding.

Actually, I don't mind public diplomacy. Governments should go panhandling. But, citizens have to challenge the drugs these hacks are selling, and the media should help at least. Or, is it too much a part of the problem? James Der Derian in «9.11: Before, After, and In Between» coined the term, MIME-NET (military-Industrial-Media-Entertainment Network) in 2002:

Now that Silicon Valley and Hollywood have been added to the mix, the dangers have morphed and multiplied. Think Wag the Dog meets The Matrix. Think of C.Wright Mill's power elite with much better gear to reproduce reality.

So, for the near future, I believe virtuous war as played out by the military-industrial-media-entertainment network will be our daily bread and nightly circus. Some would see us staying there, suspended perpetually, in between wars of terror and counterterror. How to break out of the often self-prophesying circles? Are there theoretical approaches that can critically respond without falling into the trap of the interwar? One that can escape the nullity of thought which equates the desire to comprehend with a willingness to condone terrorism? The use of sloppy analogies of resistance, as well as petty infighting (pace [Christopher] Hitchens, [Noam] Chomsky and their polarized supporters) on the left does not give one much hope of a unified anti-war movement.

For the moment, we need to acknowledge that the majority of Americans, whether out of patriotism, trauma or apathy, think it best to leave matters in the hands of the experts. I think for the immediate future the task will be to distinguish new from old dangers, real from virtual effects, and terror from counterterror in the network wars.

Success breeds more success, or so hopes US Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Gates announced his new Army team:

The nomination of Petraeus to the Central Command post, which was vacated last month when Adm. William «Fox» Fallon abruptly resigned, was not unexpected. It was originally thought Petraeus would become the commander of US European Command and the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO troops in Brussels. But after Admiral Fallon resigned, over his increasingly public views on Iran that appeared to be at odds with the White House, speculation centered on Petraeus to replace him.

The decision to send Petraeus to Central Command and Odierno back to Baghdad hints that there is a shallow bench of officers suited for the job in Iraq. Gates acknowledged that there are only a «handful of generals» who have the experience necessary, but also said the vacancy left by Fallon's resignation left him few options. «So I'm faced with a critical combatant command where a commander is needed and a commander who knows what's going on in the region,» he said.

(…)

Odierno had already been nominated to become vice chief of the Army. That nomination will be withdrawn and Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli will be nominated in his place. General Chiarelli, who had been on the short list to replace Petraeus in Iraq, has been Gates's senior military aide for more than a year.

Intel Dump's Phillip Carter calls this all «musical chairs», especially the part about Odierno and Chiarelli.

I'm a bit surprised to see him moved into the vice chief of staff job, because I thought he was a shoe-in to take the top Iraq job that Odierno just got. But these are both four-star jobs and both important. And, there's definitely some institutional politics going on here. Unlike some of the other generals, Chiarelli remains relatively untainted by the Bush administration and the war in Iraq, because he served as a relatively apolitical corps commander and division commander. So putting him in at Vice means that the Army might get to keep him in a Democratic administration. Look for Chiarelli to be the next MNF-I or CENTCOM commander in January 2009 -- or to join the Joint Chiefs, either as chairman of the Joint Chiefs or chief of staff of the Army.

Thomas P.M. Barnett makes two arguments about Petraeus' promotion: that more responsibility will lead to more flexibility on Iran; that he's a better match for a President Obama than for a President McCain. What if a Vice-President Clinton is as forceful an «advisor» as the current vice-president?

Overall, all three decisions are prudent. It's what Uncle Jimbo likes. However, as Noah Schachtman summarizes, these Army nominations leave a trail of disgruntled old-schoolers in their wake.

I put this story about Dubai wanting to go nuclear (and then, retracting it) into deep freeze until I was reading Frantz and Collins on A.Q. Khan today about Dubai's role in the Pakistani pipeline.

Dubai is one of the seven principalities that form the United Arab Emirates: a sleepy port until a construction boom started in the 1960s, by the 1980s Dubai was a bustling free-trade zone without tariffs or taxes and little in the way of government regulation. Foreign businessmen had been drawn by the freewheeling, explosive economy. Among them was Mohammed Farooq, a stocky Indian who had set up a small import-export business in the Jebel Ali Free Zone. Like Lerch, Farooq was a veteran of the nuclear black market—he had met the engineer in South Africa years before, and they had also crossed paths over the years in their dealings with Khan. Lerch now contacted Farooq and found a willing local partner. Lerch also recruited another alumnus of the Pakistani network, Heinz Mebus. Mebus had worked at Siemens and spoke better English than Lerch, prompting later speculation that he had been the one to write the four-point proposal for Iran on some of his old stationery.

At some point, Lerch or Mebus ran the Iranian deal past Khan, who had access to the centrifuges and components that were a key part of the transaction. As a fellow Muslim who was well-known for his role in building the Islamic bomb. Khan's involvement also served to quell any worries the Iranians still had about a sting operation. Although the Pakistani scientist was willing to participate, he did not want to travel to Dubai for the meeting. Instead, he agreed to provide two centrifuges and some components. At the time, Kahuta was developing a more advanced centrifuge, known as the P-2, so all Khan had to do was dip into his stockpile of P-1s waiting to be melted down and ship them to Dubai. He still operated with complete immunity, without any real oversight, so the goods could be sent out of the country merely on his signature.

Later Khan would rationalize his participation in the transfer of nuclear technology to Iran in a variety of ways. Chiefly, he would argue that providing an atomic weapon to another Muslim country was a way to shift some of the West's scrutiny away from Pakistan. In private, he told friends that he had been encouraged to assist Iran by Pakistani military leaders who were interested in expanding ties with Tehran against the West and Israel. At the time of the first deal, President Zia did not trust the Americans despite the hundreds of millions of dollars in annual aid, any more than he trusted the Soviets occupying the country next door. The secure future that Zia envisioned for Pakistan rested on a new alliance stretching west to unite the west to unite the region's non-Arab Muslims in Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey. This was, in Zia's mind, a formation capable of resisting outsiders and posing a formidable counterweight to India. He had ordered his plan put down in writing and called it the Strategic Regional Consensus.

Perhaps this is just sin by association or coincidence, but Khan went on to own a company (and a private apartment) in Dubai. Dubai became instrumental for Khan's efforts to help not only Iran, but also Iraq and Libya, get the bomb. Do we add Dubai to this list (if not directly, but like the younger apprentice following the master)?

Regardless of how one views it—as unconstitutional or tactically opportunistic—it's a tactical defeat for Ichiro Ozawa. So much for consensus politics!

But really, what law got passed is not worth passing (except in the most symbolic of senses).

In response to past criticism that some of the MSDF fuel provided to other ships was actually used in the war in Iraq, Japanese government officials, in writing, will ask allies to use the fuel only for the anti-terrorism campaign in Afghanistan.

Refueling will only be conducted after the projected routes of the receiving ships are known.

The new law also limits the MSDF's activities to providing fuel and water to other ships.

The original special measures law that led to the start of the refueling mission included such activities as transport by the Air Self-Defense Force, search-and-rescue missions and providing assistance to displaced people.

Those activities were eliminated from the new law.

The new law also has a time limit of one year. If a further extension of the refueling mission is required, the government would have to pass another special measures bill into law.

Just in time to tack to the new US administration's line.

If not for so many other reasons, this conversation with Hans Blix highlights how the North Korean nukes negotiations impacts the Iranian crisis. But, of course, there's what he has to say about Iraq, too.

I'm straying off-topic for how I'm trying to reorient this blog. David Kilcullen (transcript available) points out the fact, that no counter-insurgency, as General David Petraeus is doing in Baghdad, has taken less than ten years to achieve a result. That result would be political, as in Northern Ireland or Malaysia, not military.