Posted on 08/19/2002 10:08:38 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
- To judge by the press, the world’s sagest and most influential foreign policy expert is a 77-year-old named Brent Scowcroft. Mr. Scowcroft’s argument against an American attack on Saddam Hussein was the lead opinion piece in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal. The New York Times made it its lead, front-page news article on Friday and Saturday and its lead editorial on Friday. The Times editorial called Mr. Scowcroft’s words “an extraordinary challenge to the Bush administration” and “the equivalent of a cannon shot across the White House lawn.”
All of which makes it appropriate to ask just who is Brent Scowcroft, anyway? The Wall Street Journal said “Mr. Scowcroft, national security adviser under Presidents Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush, is founder and president of the Forum for International Policy.” The New York Times didn’t even mention the Forum for International Policy, describing Mr. Scowcroft in a front-page news dispatch as “the first President Bush’s national security adviser” and as a Bush family friend.
Well, “national security adviser” and “Forum for International Policy” sound prestigious and high-minded. But neither the Times nor the Journal mentions that Mr. Scowcroft’s main business since 1994 has been as president of the Scowcroft Group, whose Web site describes it as “an international business advisory group.” The firm on Friday declined to disclose to The New York Sun the names of its clients, but its Web site says they include “industry leaders” and “foreign direct investors” in sectors that include “energy.”
Among the services the Scowcroft Group’s Web site says it offers is to “provide access to government agencies.” The company also says it offers “practical experience with the many regulatory and political institutions that affect the activities of companies abroad.” Let’s see — industry leaders and foreign direct investors in the energy sector, with activities overseas, being provided with “access to government agencies.” When this happens with respect to, say, Vice President Cheney’s energy task force, the New York Times goes into high dudgeon. But when it involves an appeasement line in the Persian Gulf, the oil interests get a total pass.
Scrutiny has been just as stunningly absent when it comes to Mr. Scowcroft’s non- profit front group, the Forum for International Policy. According to the Forum’s Web site, its 12-member board of trustees includes some real all-stars. There is Rita Hauser, the PLO-apologist whose law firm, Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, has racked up millions of dollars in legal fees over the years as a registered foreign agent of Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority. There is Kenneth L. Lay, the disgraced former chief executive of Enron. There is also John Deutch, who, as director of central intelligence for President Clinton, famously kept classified materials on an unsecure home computer and, who, as Michael Ledeen will report in his forthcoming book “The War Against the Terror Masters,” deliberately changed the CIA’s priorities so that warning of a potential surprise attack on America was no longer among them.
The Forum for International Policy is on the same floor of the same Washington office building as the Scowcroft Group, and the Forum’s tax return lists the Scowcroft Group as a “related” organization. The Forum and the Scowcroft Group also apparently share some personnel in addition to Mr. Scowcroft himself. The Forum’s August 2001 tax return lists Virginia Lampley as the nonprofit group’s executive vice president and treasurer; Ms. Lampley is also a founding principal and the managing director of the for-profit Scowcroft Group, according to the Scowcroft Group’s Web site. Similarly, Charles A. Gillespie Jr. serves as both a resident senior fellow of the Forum for International Policy and a principal of the Scowcroft Group. Arnold Kanter serves as both a resident senior fellow of the Forum for International Policy and a principal and founding member of the Scowcroft Group. Eric Melby serves as both a senior resident fellow of the Forum for International Policy and a principal and founding member of the Scowcroft Group. Kevin Nealer serves as both a senior resident fellow of the Forum for International Policy and a principal and partner of the Scowcroft Group. Daniel Poneman and Joel Shin also serve both as senior resident fellows of the Forum for International Policy and as “principal members” of the Scowcroft Group, according to the Web sites of the forum and of the Scowcroft Group.
There’s nothing wrong with a charity and a business being closely related. If Mr. Scowcroft prefers when writing op-ed articles to pass himself off as president of the “Forum for International Policy” — without disclosing the close ties between the Forum and the Scowcroft Group, with its unidentified “foreign direct investors” in sectors that include “energy” — well, we suppose that’s his prerogative. But for the New York Times, which made Mr. Scowcroft’s op-ed piece the subject of its lead, front-page news stories for two days running, not to mine this vein, that is a stunning lapse.
Beyond the question of Mr. Scowcroft’s current employer, there is the question of his own track record. He’s been a critic of the moral clarity that President Reagan used to lead America to victory in the Cold War. In one of Mr. Scowcroft’s sections of a book he co-wrote with George H.W. Bush, Mr. Scowcroft writes, “It was my sense that the ‘Evil Empire’ rhetoric had been excessive. It tended to frighten our allies and make support of American leadership of the West more difficult.”
In a January 25, 1987, article he co-wrote in the New York Times Magazine, Mr. Scowcroft compared Mr. Reagan’s tax cuts with the Gipper’s decision to walk out of the Reykjavic summit with the Soviet Union rather than give up on the Star Wars strategic defense initiative. “The decision to undercut the revenue base in 1981 and the decision to trash deterrence in 1986 had certain features in common,” he wrote. “Both leave the country now with huge deficits — political and financial — and require dedication and rebuilding so that the nation can merely return to where it once was.”
Opponents of a war against Saddam Hussein may well ask, why all the focus on Mr. Scowcroft personally, rather than on his argument? The answer is that his argument is so weak that we can only surmise that the main reason anyone is paying attention to it is that Mr. Scowcroft is behind it. In that Thursday Wall Street Journal op-ed, Mr. Scowcroft makes three main discernable claims: First, that “Saddam’s goals have little in common with the terrorists who threaten us, and there is little incentive for him to make common cause with them.” Second, that “Israel would have to expect to be the first casualty” of an American attack on Saddam. And third, that an attack on Iraq would somehow “jeopardize” the American campaign against terrorism.
Now, whatever Saddam’s incentives for making common cause with the terrorists who threaten us, he has already done so — paying the families of Palestinian Arab terrorists the likes of whom have murdered 36 Americans in suicide attacks, sheltering a terrorist on the FBI’s most wanted list for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, observing of September 11 that America was “…reaping the fruits of [its] crimes against humanity.” If the Israelis have so much to fear from the results of an American attack, they have even more to fear from a delay; that is why Prime Minister Sharon’s spokesman told the Associated Press, “Any postponement of an attack on Iraq at this stage will serve no purpose. It will only give him [Saddam] more of an opportunity to accelerate his program of weapons of mass destruction.”
Far from jeopardizing the American campaign against terrorism, an attack on Iraq is an essential part of it. And for those trying to understand why a Bush family friend and adviser would emerge in the middle of a desperate struggle between America and her mortal enemies to suggest backing down from the tasks that need to be undertaken, the place to look is precisely Mr. Scowcroft’s personal bona fides and the commercial interests he has taken on since his years in government service.
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Not sure what to do about Iraq? Read on.
Have yet to take a position regarding Iraq? Haven't made up your mind yet where you stand? Still not quite sure if you're for or against toppling Saddam?
Well, let me help you.
The roster of opponents to action in Iraq reads like a who's who of the finest, most brilliant military thinkers today. Take it from me, these people are pillars -- indeed, the creme-de-la-creme -- of the national security community, unparalleled paragons of winning war strategy, tactics -- you name it.
Take Gen. Maureen Dowd.
For those of you in Palm Beach county, Gen. Dowd unquestionably stands among the world's most preeminent thinkers -- a venerable authority not just on military affairs, but on darn near everything you can think of. Whether it's brokering peace in the Middle East, to the sex lives of Hollywood apotheosis Michael Douglas, Gen. Dowd has the answers.
Heck, my motto is, 'when in doubt, just ask Gen. Dowd -- she's the sage'.
Not impressed?
Okay, I'll toss out another name.
How's about Gen. Bill Press?
Not familiar with him? Ha! Shame on you.
Look, he may be a political commentator, but don't let that fool you. Beneath that goofy, geeky, dorky, cartoonish facade, lies a military genius, a true oracle on war and peace.
Okay, okay, so he's not exactly a General.
So what? Let me tell you, the man is battle-hardened, a veteran of combat like few men have ever seen.
Remember the Monica wars and the battle of impeachment? That's when he earned his metals and honors, courageously defending his commander-in-briefs, Der Schlickmeister, directing the tanks and artillery, heroically fending off Republican fusillades of mean-spirited allegations.
Battle-hardened, indeed!
Huh? Still not impressed? Sheesh. You're one tough customer, aren't you?
Does the name Chris Matthews ring a bell?
Some swill-spewing, silly, giddy TV talking-airhead, you say?
Think again.
Talk about intellectual fire-power! Maxine Waters -- step aside.
The Hardball host once worked in the White House of one of history's greatest successes -- Jimmy 'Killer-Rabbit' Carter!
Yes-siree, Bob.
Sure he was wrong about Reagan and the Soviets and the Cold War and 'Star Wars' and the military and Bush and the Taliban and Afghanistan and the 'axis-of-evil'......
...okay, okay, never mind. You're still not impressed, I see.
Of course, if VIPs as towering as Dowd and Press and Matthews won't jolt you off the fence, well then, what about foreign policy savants like Barbara Streisand?
Or Madeline Albright?
Or Sandy Burger?
No? Still not impressed?
All right. I've got just the name: Gen. Brent Scowcroft!
Ah, yes! The media's flavor-of-the-week (it was Dick Armey last week).
Scowcroft was Bush-the-elder's National Security Affairs Advisor during Desert Storm.
In an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal, Don't Attack Saddam, Scowcroft warned the Bush administration to keep hands-off Iraq.
Basically, he offers the following:
1) Forget about being pro-active. Be reactive. Pretend 9/11 never happened. Bury your head in the sand. Wait till the enemy strikes first, then, and only then, strike back. Wait till he hits us with weapons of mass destruction -- then react.
The Scowcroft principle: Don't just do something, stand there!
2) The "coalition" is more important than the mission itself. In fact, it should determine the mission. As President, your first duty is to protect and defend the coalition. It says so in the constitution. The U.N. constitution, that is.
3) Forget about leadership. Go wobbly, George. Be a follower. Listen to the Euroweenies. Be an Angloweenie. Listen to the Saudis. Listen to the Syrians. Let them know you feel their pain. Listen to the people who danced and pranced and celebrated in the streets when the towers fell. Don't -- repeat: Don't -- do anything that might make them mad. They might not like us if we do. Make 'em mad, and they'll unleash Armageddon on you! Can't do that, wouldn't be prudent.
(Backing down now would shatter the credibility of the United States. Our reputation would be left in tatters, our enemies, emboldened.)
4) Forget about making a case. There is no case against Saddam. He's not a terrorist, nor is he connected to terrorism.
(Saddam is funding the families of homicide bombers in Israel, $50,000 each. Moreover, Iraq was behind the first World Trade Center bombing in February of '93. Saddam plotted the attempted assassination of President Bush (41) in Kuwait in '93. New Yorker reporter Jeffery Goldberg has extensively documented close connections between Iraqi intelligence and top al-Qaeda leaders. No link to terrorism, eh, Scowcroft? Nice try.)
5) Forget that Saddam is blatantly violating the terms and conditions of a ceasefire. No big deal.
6) Trust weapons inspections. We all know how good that worked for 10 years, right?
Wait a minute.....hmmmmmmm.....Gee, did you notice something? Scowcroft sounds awfully defensive, doesn't he? Why, come to think of it, he's really defending himself -- his harebrained advise to leave Saddam in power after Desert Storm.
In short, this is damage control, pure and simple. Big time C.Y.A. This is about ego. Scowcroft's ego. He just can't bring himself to admit he was wrong.
Scowcroft memo to Bush: Forget history. Don't learn from our mistakes. Repeat them.
To the American people, Scowcroft's message is:
Trust me. Don't trust Bush. Don't trust Rumsfeld. Don't trust Tommy Franks. Don't trust Condi Rice. No, I'm not in the loop, nor am I privy to high-level info nor high-level planning nor secret intelligence. Nor do I get any briefings. I'm completely in the dark. But trust me.
Uh, trust you, Gen. Scowcroft?
Gee, excuse me, but I see one itsy-bitsy problem with this: Your track record. According to you (circa summer 1990), Saddam would never invade Kuwait and the Soviet Union would never collapse.
Not exactly confidence building, now is it?
One more thing -- this is a big one:
"[Scowcroft] OPPOSED even toppling the Taliban in Afghanistan, which he thought would be, diplomatically, too difficult to do", Rich Lowry of National Review told Hardball Thursday night.
Trust you, Gen. Scowcroft? Ah, thanks, but no thanks.
Team Bush has earned my trust.
Anyway, that's...
My two cents...
"JohnHuang2"
AND LONG LIVE THE NEW YORK SUN!
AND LONG LIVE THE NEW YORK SUN!
Amen =^)
We know what they'll do, they'll go back to quoting only RATS!!
Liberate the Iraqi Sheeple NOW!!
FReegards...MUD
I am going to start checking them out.
Thanks, John, and thanks for your essay, whicih is, as usual, spot on.
At least the WSJ put it on their opinion page. The rapid glee with which the NYTimes created a front page story from this (taken as a lead in "lesser" media all around the country this weekend) indicates they are on the Saudi boat. Maybe that Friedman guy is all palsy again with his "NYTimes/Saudi Peace Plan" buddies, and they're feeding him disinfo.
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