Tag Archives: George W Bush

Terrorism’s business partners

In the wake of recent bombings in London and Egypt confirming the vulnerability of even relatively vigilant societies to Islamofascist terrorism, the question occurs: Are we serious about fighting this menace with every instrument at our disposal?

A Loopy Loophole

A test of the seriousness of the U.S. Senate will be offered as soon as tomorrow. Senators will be asked to choose between two amendments to the defense authorization bill (S.1042) bearing on one of this country’s most powerful and yet largely unutilized tools: Denying U.S. investment capital, technology and other commercial benefits to state-sponsors of terror.

To be sure, successive administrations have imposed economic and trade sanctions on terrorist-sponsoring states like Iran, Libya, Sudan, Cuba, Syria and North Korea. Existing law – notably, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) – grants the President the authority to bar U.S. companies from doing business with nations that do business with terrorists.

Unfortunately, there is a loophole in the law, a loophole some American firms have used to circumvent and undermine U.S. sanctions. By establishing an offshore subsidiary, these companies have proceeded to engage in commerce with sanctioned states even though the parent is prohibited from doing so.

In some cases, the affront to the letter and spirit of the law has been egregious. Front companies amounting to little more than an offshore post office box have been created to perform end-runs around official efforts to stem the money flowing to those who are trying to kill us.

Bipartisan ‘Outrage’

This practice has properly inspired bipartisan outrage in the Senate. Last week, two Senators – Frank Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey, and Maine Republican Susan Collins, who chairs the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee – expressed incredulity and anger at this flouting of the law and outdid each other offering amendments intended to put an end to it.

Sen. Lautenberg told his colleagues: "President Bush has made the statement that money is the lifeblood of terrorist operations. He could not be more right. Amazingly, some of our corporations are providing revenue to terrorists by doing business with these rogue regimes. My amendment is simple. It closes a loophole in the law that allows this to happen, that allows American companies to do business with enemies of ours."

For her part, Sen. Collins declared: "The allegations are that these foreign subsidiaries are formed and incorporated overseas for the specific purpose of bypassing U.S. sanctions laws that prohibit American corporations from doing business with terrorist-sponsoring nations such as Syria and Iran. There is no doubt that this practice cannot be allowed to continue….The examples that we have heard, where American firms simply create new shell corporations to execute transactions that they themselves are prohibited from engaging in, are truly outrageous."

Replacing One Loophole with Another?

If the two Senators have a shared determination to stop U.S. companies from using foreign subsidiaries to engage in such "truly outrageous" behavior, they part company over how to do that. The Lautenberg amendment would explicitly amend IEEPA to ensure that foreign subsidiaries controlled or fifty-one percent or more owned by American businesses are bound by the same sanctions regimes as are the parent companies.

Citing State Department concerns about the impact such an "extraterritorial" extension of U.S. law would have on American foreign investments and this country’s relations with its allies, Sen. Collins has offered an alternative to the Lautenberg language. The Collins amendment would seek to penalize individuals or entities who evade IEEPA sanctions – if they are "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States." This is merely a restatement of existing regulations.

The problem with this formulation is that, in the process of purportedly closing one loophole, it would appear to create new ones. As Sen. Collins told the Senate: "Some truly independent foreign subsidiaries are incorporated under the laws of the country in which they do business and are subject to that country’s laws, to that legal jurisdiction. There is a great deal of difference between a corporation set up in a day, without any real employees or assets, and one that has been in existence for many years and that gets purchased, in part, by a U.S. firm."

It is a safe bet that every foreign subsidiary of a U.S. company doing business with terrorist states will claim it is one of the ones Sen. Collins would allow to continue enriching our enemies, not one prohibited from doing so. If the Senate is serious about truly closing this loophole, it must adopt the Lautenberg Amendment.

The Bottom Line

The Lautenberg amendment will not, by itself, win the war on terror. It is evidence of our seriousness of purpose, however. Flouting American law in ways that undermine the financial front in that war is not only, as Sen. Collins puts it, "outrageous"; it is hazardous to our health. And, as the most recent attacks in Europe and the Middle East underscore, not just our health but that of others – including those in whose countries such foreign subsidiaries operate.

Adoption of the Lautenberg amendment will have one other salutary effect. It would also require the Securities and Exchange Commission to ensure that shareholders are made aware if publicly traded companies own at least 10 percent of a foreign company doing business in violation of U.S. sanctions on state-sponsors of terror. Such transparency would enable American investors to demonstrate their seriousness about this war, too, by divesting the stocks of such companies who partner with our enemies.

Orgs oppose ‘globotaxes,’ give Bolton recess appt

The Center for Security Policy today released an open letter to President Bush commending him for his nomination of John R. Bolton to become the next U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations – and urging a recess appointment be made to ensure Mr. Bolton is in place before the UN tries in September to impose international taxes on American citizens.

 

The letter states, in part:

In our judgment the Nation can ill-afford further delay of action on the BoltonGiven the momentous nature of that agenda – and the danger that some of its items may pose for American interests and sovereignty – we urge you to ensure that you are represented in New York at the earliest possible time by a man who enjoys your confidence and trust, and ours. nomination. As you know, the United Nations has a very full agenda this Fall.

 

Of particular concern is the prospect that the upcoming high-level plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly from September 14-16 will be used to implement various ideas for international taxes. As you know, such proposals are not new. In fact, these initiatives have long been seen as a means of underwriting world government, or at least diminishing this country’s ability to influence the United Nations by dint of its granting (or withholding) of large sums in annual dues.

 

What is new, however, is that some believe the United States now must agree to the imposition of one form or another of global taxation….We are sure that you share our unalterable opposition to the imposition of international taxes on American citizens and entities by unelected, unaccountable international bureaucrats. As things stand now, however, our only hope of avoiding such ominously precedential "solidarity contributions" – whether they be imposed on airline tickets, currency transactions, international commerce or the internet – is for your view to be faithfully, articulately and effectively represented at the UN. (Emphasis added throughout.)

 

 

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President of the Center for Security Policy, which circulated the open letter, said upon its release: "The Bush Administration is on notice: Millions of Americans represented by the forty-one signatories of this letter will not support the imposition of ‘globotaxes’ on them and their countrymen. It is time to draw a firm line against what the UN euphemistically calls ‘innovative funding mechanisms’ and John Bolton is the man to do it on the East River."

The U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday unanimously adopted an amendment offered by Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) opposing globotaxes. It would require, among other things, that:

United States representatives at the United Nations shall (1) use the voice, vote, and influence of the United States to vigorously oppose any effort by the United Nations or any of its specialized or affiliated agencies to fund, approve, advocate, or promote any proposal concerning the imposition of a tax or fee on any United States person in order to raise revenue for the United Nations or any such agency; and (2) declare that a United States person shall not be subject to any international tax and shall not be required to pay such tax if such tax is levied against such person.

 

For more information about the UN’s plans for international taxation – and the negative repercussions such globotaxes would have for American sovereignty, security and interests, see Smoking Gun: Shocking Truth Uncovered About U.N. Taxation Plan; U.S. Citizens Targeted for Trillions of Dollars by the International Bureaucrats and Insider-Trader George Soros, a newly released study by America’s Survival, Inc. (www.usasurvival.org).

 

Among the signatories and organizations represented on the open letter to President Bush are the following: David A. Keene, Chairman, American Conservative Union; Paul M. Weyrich, National Chairman, Coalitions for America; Gary L. Bauer, President, American Values; Fred L. Smith, Jr., Founder and President, Competitive Enterprise Institute; Colin A. Hanna, President, Let Freedom Ring, Inc.; Phyllis Schlafly, Founder and President, Eagle Forum; Mariam Bell, National Director of Public Policy, The Wilberforce Forum; Tom Schatz, President, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste; Alan Keyes, Chairman, Declaration Alliance; Melanie Morgan, Chairman, Move America Forward; Donald E. Wildmon, Founder and Chairman, American Family Association; and Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform.

July 21, 2005

Hon. George W. Bush
The White House
Washington, D.C. 20500

 

Dear Mr. President:

 

We write to thank you for selecting John R. Bolton to become the next U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Like you, we are appalled at the delay in getting Mr. Bolton on the job, and share your displeasure with the mistreatment of this outstanding public servant by partisan critics of your Administration and its policies.

 

In our judgment the Nation can ill-afford further delay of action on the Bolton nomination. As you know, the United Nations has a very full agenda this Fall. Given the momentous nature of that agenda – and the danger that some of its items may pose for American interests and sovereignty – we urge you to ensure that you are represented in New York at the earliest possible time by a man who enjoys your confidence and trust, and ours.

 

Of particular concern is the prospect that the upcoming high-level plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly from September 14-16 will be used to implement various ideas for international taxes. As you know, such proposals are not new. In fact, these initiatives have long been seen as a means of underwriting world government, or at least diminishing this country’s ability to influence the United Nations by dint of its granting (or withholding) of large sums in annual dues.

 

What is new, however, is that some believe the United States now must agree to the imposition of one form or another of global taxation. They contend that, pursuant to agreed Millennium Development Goals contained in the Report of the International Conference on Financing for Development (dubbed the "the Monterrey Consensus"), the United States and other developed nations are obliged to provide 0.7 percent of their gross national income in foreign aid (also known as Official Development Assistance or ODA).

 

According to Kofi Annan’s special advisor, Dr. Jeffrey Sachs, the United States has only provided 0.15 percent and, therefore, would be short by some $65 billion each year from 2002 to the target year of 2015. The aggregate shortfall would amount to $845 billion above and beyond what the U.S. provides in ODA – a sum neither any President nor any Congress is likely to approve.

 

Hence, we are told, there is a need for "innovative funding mechanisms" (a euphemism for international taxes) such as "solidarity contributions on international plane tickets." On February 6, 2005, France, Germany, Chile, Brazil, Algeria and Spain formally issued a "Berlin Declaration" that proposed to use such involuntary "contributions" to raise revenues to "combat hunger and poverty and finance global sustainable development, inter alia health programs including the fight against HIV/AIDS and other pandemics." Other schemes include the so-called "Tobin Tax" on international currency transactions that could raise an estimated $13 trillion for the United Nations and other international purposes.

 

Unfortunately, international tax proposals have now made their way little-noticed into Annex II of the Gleneagles G-8 meeting communiqu?, a section entitled "Financing Commitments." It states, in part, that: "A group of countries above [evidently a reference to the UK, France, Germany and Italy] firmly believe that innovative financing mechanisms can help deliver and bring forward the financing needed to achieve the Millennium Development Goals" – namely, more Overseas Development Assistance.

 

We are sure that you share our unalterable opposition to the imposition of international taxes on American citizens and entities by unelected, unaccountable international bureaucrats. As things stand now, however, our only hope of avoiding such ominously precedential "solidarity contributions" – whether they be imposed on airline tickets, currency transactions, international commerce or the internet – is for your view to be faithfully, articulately and effectively represented at the UN.

 

For these reasons among many others (including the opportunity to secure systemic UN reform, the need to get to the bottom of the Oil-for-Food scandal, etc.), we call upon you, if possible, to reach prompt agreement with the bipartisan Senate leadership to enable a final vote on John Bolton’s nomination before the August recess. Failing that, we respectfully urge that you enable Mr. Bolton to get to work at long last by conferring on him a recess appointment as soon as Congress adjourns next month.

 

Sincerely,

 

David A. Keene, Chairman, American Conservative Union

Paul M. Weyrich, National Chairman, Coalitions for America

Gary L. Bauer, President, American Values

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President, Center for Security Policy

Fred L. Smith, Jr., Founder and President, Competitive Enterprise Institute

Colin A. Hanna, President, Let Freedom Ring, Inc.

Phyllis Schlafly, Founder and President, Eagle Forum

Mariam Bell, National Director of Public Policy, The Wilberforce Forum

Tom Schatz, President, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste

Alan Keyes, Chairman, Declaration Alliance

Melanie Morgan, Chairman, Move America Forward

Donald E. Wildmon, Founder and Chairman, American Family Association

William J. Murray, Chairman, Religious Freedom Coalition

Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform

Ron Shuping, Senior Vice President of Programming, The Inspiration Networks

Jim Backlin, Vice President of Legislative Affairs, Christian Coalition of America

William Greene, President, RightMarch.com

Andrea Lafferty, Executive Director, Traditional Values Coalition

Beverly LaHaye, Founder and Chairman, Concerned Women of America

William Levi, CEO and President, Operation Nehemiah Missions International

Richard Falknor, Executive Vice President, Maryland Taxpayers Association, Inc.

Chuck Muth, President, Citizen Outreach

Robert B. Carleson, Chairman, American Civil Rights Union

Paul Caprio, President, Family-PAC Federal

Stephen Stone, President, Renew America

Cliff Kincaid, President, America’s Survival. Inc.

Kay Daly, President, Coalition for a Fair Judiciary

Rev. Russell Johnson, Chairman, Ohio Restoration Project

Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, Chairman, Traditional Values Coalition

Steven Mosher, President, Population Research Institute

John J. Karch, Executive Director, Slovak League of America

C. Preston Noell III, President, Tradition, Family, Property Inc.

Tom Shields, Chairman, Coalition for Marriage and Family

Bruce Chapman, President, Discovery Institute

Nancy C. Purcell, Field Representative, Global Bridges

George Landrith, President, Frontiers of Freedom

Ann Buwalda, Esq, Director, Jubilee Campaign USA

Kristin Wright, Executive Director, Stand Today

Ron Pearson, President, Council for America

Jeff Gayner, Chairman, Americans for Sovereignty

Erping Zhang, Executive Director, Association for Asian Research

Deborah Weiss, Blogsforbush.com; GOPbloggers.com

 

The Jewish state-icide

Decision Brief     No. 05-D 33                                       2005-07-11

(Washington, D.C.): Suddenly, the world is seized with the danger of ignoring the Islamofascists in our midst. Lengthy front-page articles in Sunday’s New York Times and Washington Post describe how British authorities allowed this virulent ideology-masquerading-as-a-religion to establish – and metastasize – into a veritable “Londonistan” in the years preceding last week’s murderous attacks on the host community.

The complacency shattered by the four bombs in London has been replaced with hard questions about the threat posed to other West societies. The French, Dutch, Germans and Italians are suddenly seized with the prospect that their own Londonistans are festering Islamist breeding grounds, sores that can at any time subject transportation and other soft targets in these democracies to the sort of bloodletting seen over the past fifteen months in Spain and Britain.

Here in America, political correctness still compels the conversation to focus mostly on the vulnerabilities of our infrastructure and what is – or is not – being done to mitigate them. There is, however, a growing appreciation post-London that we can no longer ignore the fact that Islamofascists are hard at work here as well, seeking to dominate their co-religionists as the prerequisite for forcing the rest of us to submit to a new, global Caliphate under an unforgiving religious law called Shari’a.

No Worries about ‘Gazastan,’ Though

The one place we apparently are indifferent to the rising power of the Islamists is in the would-be state of “Palestine.” There, the establishment of an Islamofascist Gazastan is not only being tolerated by the West. It is being enabled by the government of Israel, the G-8 and the Bush Administration.

To be sure, the government of Ariel Sharon (which is determined to unburden itself next month of Palestinian populations in Gaza and parts of the West Bank), the leaders of eight industrial nations (who last week pledged $3 billion for Palestine) and President Bush (who has been a steadfast supporter of Israel and opponent of terror) have something different in mind. They envision a democratic Palestinian state living peaceably side-by-side with Israel.

Unfortunately, this prospect is no more likely at the moment than was that of an Islamofascist Londonistan living side-by-side in peace with its non-Islamist neighbors. If anything, it is less likely since the West’s behavior can only be seen as a reward for Palestinian terror. Alan Dershowitz put it well in a posting on FrontPageMagazine.com‘s website on July 8:


    The Palestinian Authority, and its leaders, are the godfathers of international terrorism. They developed airplane hijacking into a high art. They invented the high-profile murder of athletes and other prominent public figures. Were it not for their employment of terrorism, the Palestinian cause would today be regarded as the fifth-rate human rights issue that it rightfully is. But because the Palestinian leadership has always used terrorism (from the 1920’s on) as the tactic of first resort, their cause has received worldwide recognition. (Emphasis added.)

Nobody Here but Us Terrorists

Now, that recognition will be extended to a Palestinian terrorist state. Such will be its character whether the Islamofascists’ ally – Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority’s recently elected president – somehow manages to hold onto power or, as seems more likely, his ruling clique is soon replaced by the Islamists of Hamas. (Abbas celebrated the London bombings in Damascus, where he was the guest Thursday night at a festive meal hosted by Syrian dictator Bashir Assad, along with Hamas’ Khaled Mashal, Islamic Jihad’s Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, and Ahmed Jibril, head of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, all designated as terrorist organizations by Britain and the United States.)

The emergence of a new Arab state-sponsor of terror that is flush with Western cash and enjoys the protection of the international community will, of course, be a mortal threat to Israel. Having enhanced the stature of terrorists determined to destroy the Jewish State, Israelis will find the Islamists making a redoubled effort to do just that from their new safe-havens.

The existential threat to Israel is made all the greater by the deep domestic divisions now evident over Sharon’s so-called “disengagement” plan. There is serious talk that a civil war may ensue over that initiative, which is now opposed by a majority of Israelis. Such a conflict is being fueled, in part, by secular Jews who seek to destroy the political power of their religious countrymen.

Should anything approaching a civil war eventuate, Israel’s Arab enemies must be expected to exploit what would thus be afforded: the best chance ever to realize their unrequited ambition to “drive all the Jews into the sea” – especially if, as is now being proposed, Israel were to allow Egyptian and Jordanian/Palestinian armies to return to Gaza and the West Bank, respectively.

A Threat to America, As Well

Gazastan will be a terrible menace for the United States, too. Such an Islamofascist state will not only threaten the very existence of Israel, our closest, democratic ally in the Middle East. Given the Palestinians’ record of past treachery towards other Arabs, it should be expected to undermine the Bush strategy of bringing to power moderates elsewhere in the region.

The creation of a new Palestinian safe-haven for terrorist recruitment, training and planning will also endanger Americans and their interests in Iraq, Europe, Asia and here at home. The fact that such terrorists will benefit from the counter-terrorist training, funding and arms we are giving the Palestinian Authority will only exacerbate this threat.

The Bottom Line

For states as for individuals, the rule should be that “friends don’t let friends commit suicide.” It’s not too late for the U.S. to discourage Israel from doing just that by abandoning Gaza and parts of the West Bank under present circumstances – and the lessons of Londonistan make clear that we must.

A memorial hijacked?

Decision Brief     No. 05-D 32                                       2005-07-05


(Washington, D.C.): For many of the families of the 3,000 American citizens who were murdered on September 11, 2001, the worst thing that could happen would be for their loved ones’ sacrifice and loss to be forgotten. To ensure that didn’t happen, federal, state and local authorities have put millions of tax dollars towards a memorial on the site of Ground Zero – the place where the twin towers of the World Trade Center once stood in lower Manhattan.


It Can Get Worse


Incredible as it may seem, those charged with translating that laudable commitment into reality have come up with plans that could surpass even the 9/11 families’ worst fears: A scheme for the design and use of the Ground Zero complex that threatens, at best, to obscure and, at worst, to defame the memory of those lost on that day.


Part of the problem lies with the plan itself. Its centerpiece would not be a September 11th Memorial. Rather, it would be something called the International Freedom Center (IFC). The Memorial would be located in a basement, with only 50,000 square feet assigned to its displays. Such a facility would be unable to display most of the recovered 9/11 artifacts, requiring the rest to be exhibited elsewhere.


Worse yet, a memorial that size is estimated to be able to accommodate only half the roughly 20,000 visitors expected to come to the site each day. Where, you might ask, would the rest go?


IFC: Justifying the Attackers?


It appears that they would have two choices: The first would be the massive, 300,000-square foot, above-ground International Freedom Center that would be built on top of the 9/11 Memorial. A posting on the excellent new website created by 9/11 family members and their supporters, www.TakeBacktheMemorial.org, observes:



The International Freedom Center is slated to contain a history of mankind’s oppressions and the struggles to end them. [For example, the IFC’s web site declares: “It will tell stories…of Jim Crow segregation – but also [of] Martin Luther King, who helped stamp it out. Inspiring people through these stories to do freedom’s work today is our best long-run defense against more 9/11’s.”]


It will also host evening-time political debates for ideologues of all ilks. [The IFC’s president, Richard Tofel, wrote in the Wall Street Journal last month, “The International Freedom Center will host debates and note points of view with which you – and I – will disagree.”] The IFC will be right there to take in the overflow (for a fee) and to teach them about all of history’s inhumanities and valiant freedom marches to end them. All of the inhumanities and freedom marches – other than the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the United States’ valiant march to end terrorism, that is.


The not-so-hidden agenda behind the International Freedom Center can be discerned from the sorts of people involved in its underwriting and/or conceptualizing its displays. These include:



-Leftist billionaire George Soros, whose declared hostility towards President Bush masks a deeper anti-Americanism, evident in his equating of Abu Ghraib with 9/11;


–Michael Posner, executive director at Human Rights First and driving force behind a “Stop Torture Now” campaign whose sole object is the U.S. military;


–Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union who wants the IFC to feature exhibits demonstrating how after 9/11 the Patriot Act and other measures have impinged upon civil liberties in the United States; and


-two radical-left Columbia professors – Eric Foner, who declared immediately after 9/11, “I am not sure which is more frightening: the horror that engulfed New York City or the apocalyptic rhetoric emanating daily from the White House,” and Nicholas DeGenova who once asserted that, “The only true heroes are those who find ways to defeat the U.S. military.”


In addition to the problematic exhibits and activities (including the Tribecca Film Festival, which recently featured a “dark comedy” about 9/11) likely to be housed by the International Freedom Center, its designers have also incorporated a “Drawing Center” in the site. According to the Washington Post, the latter recently featured “installations that depicted the well-publicized image of a hooded detainee at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib and linked President Bush to Osama bin Laden.”


When challenged about the prospect that such facilities would be used for divisive purposes utterly at odds with a solemn memorializing of the dead, New York Governor George Pataki precipitated a First Amendment fight by announcing, “We will not tolerate anything on that site that denigrates America, denigrates New York or freedom or denigrates the sacrifice and courage that the heroes showed on September 11th.” Not surprisingly, neither the left-wing IFC nor the similarly-minded Drawing Center is likely to agree to such constraints.


Do Your Part for the War Effort: ‘Go Shopping’


If all else fails, visitors who find themselves unable to do at Ground Zero what they came for – namely, to pay their respects to those lost on 9/11 – and who are repulsed by the IFC’s anti-American propaganda will have another alternative. They can shop. The Port Authority is reportedly trying to jam 600,000 square feet of retail space throughout the site.


The Bottom Line


Where, it might be asked is President Bush on all this? The IFC’s wealthy chairman and driving force is Tom Bernstein, one of Mr. Bush’s former business partners and large campaign contributors. Perhaps that’s why White House spokesperson Dana Perino has said only: “We realize how important a matter this is to the people of New York, but it’s a matter the people of New York should decide.”


Actually, the hijacking of the 9/11 Memorial is something that is important to all Americans, and it is something that we expect our President and legislators to prevent.

Don’t cut and run in the War on Terror

On the eve of President Bush’s major address tonight on the status and prospects of the War on Terror, the Center for Security Policy released a new "web ad" warning that there is no way the United States can safely follow the advice of Mr. Bush’s critics who would have us cut and run from Iraq and Guantanamo Bay.

The ad, which can be viewed at http://erdb1.eresources.com/cspvideo/Title01_high.wmv, points out that setting a timetable for withdrawing from Iraq and/or closing the U.S. facility for detaining unlawful combatants at Guantanamo would unmistakably convey weakness to our enemies. The result would not only be more bloodshed abroad but quite possibly renewed attacks in the United States, as well.

Center for Security Policy President Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. noted, "President Bush must make the case in his remarks tonight for staying the course, not just in the Iraqi front of this global conflict, but everywhere we confront Islamofascist and other enemies bent on our destruction. As the Center’s new web ad makes clear, we have no choice but to prevail – and the American people require now more than ever clear, convincing and steady leadership about the consequences of our failure to do so."

The web ad’s script reads as follows:

Since 9-11, most Americans know the world is a dangerous place. Islamic terrorists hate us for who we are and what we stand for.

Some people seem to think, however, that if we retreat our terrorist enemies will leave us alone. They say we should close Guantanamo, where captured foes are kept from waging war against us. They say we should get out of Iraq even though democracy is just getting a foothold. They seem to think we’ll be safer if we cut and run.

But our enemies will see this as proof of our weakness. They’ll be more convinced than ever that murdering Americans advances their cause, and they’ll try to do so again here at home.

The next time someone suggests America should cut and run from the War on Terror, ask them – run to where?

 

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Amnesty: For North Korea

By Patrick Devenny

The far-Left is nothing if not tenacious. Not only has Amnesty International condemned the United States in the harshest possible terms — in the middle of a war when international image is vital — but its most recent report spends more time criticizing the rogue pranks at Gitmo more harshly than the death camps run by the North Koreans.

Rather than apologizing after referring to the American detention center in Guantanamo Bay as a gulag, Amnesty International has attempted a unique maneuver to break out of its public relations death spiral. The "non-partisan" advocacy group has taken to calling actual gulag survivors and begging for their endorsement of Amnesty’s statement. In an editorial published in The Washington Post on June 18th, Soviet gulag veteran Pavel Litvinov recounted how a senior Amnesty staffer called him asking for his public support. When Litvinov suggested there was quite a difference between his own experiences and those of the terrorists imprisoned in Guantanamo, the staffer responded "Sure, but after all, it attracts attention to the problem of Guantanamo detainees."

This kind of shocking disregard for the facts in the name of anti-American agitprop is hardly surprising to long time critics of Amnesty. When Amnesty International’s executive director, Irene Khan, made her reckless gulag assertion, it was the latest in a string of grating hyperbole. If Amnesty can turn the detention facility in Guantanamo into a gulag, imagine how they would judge a truly brutal prison system. Imagine what Amnesty would say, what they would write, about a hypothetical country with actual death camps, reeducation centers, and government sponsored murder on a scale rarely seen in history.  

Of course, such a country does exist: it’s North Korea. You would hardly know about Pyongyang’s cruelty, however, if you were limited to reading Amnesty International annual reports.   As originally pointed out by CSP Senoir Fellow Lt. Colonel Gordon Cucullu , Amnesty cannot be bothered with the testimony of those escaping from Kim Jong-Il’s prison state. The group is more than willing to deem the testimony from violent jihadists "troubling" and "credible," but North Korean citizens are considered "untrustworthy." So what exactly does Amnesty say about North Korea in its latest report?  

Not much. The first thing you will notice when reading Amnesty’s 2005 report on human rights in North Korea is the length of the article, or rather, lack of same. Amnesty writers have managed to fit the abject brutality of North Korea into an article shorter than the one you are reading now. Amnesty, amazingly, takes only 1,351 words to describe the most brutal and despotic regime on the face of the earth. In comparison, Israel, or in Amnesty parlance "Israel/Occupied Territory," needs 2,592 words. The U.S, not surprisingly, rates three times the North Korean word count. North Korea’s 200,000 slave laborers, its dozens of political prison camps, its mass interrogation and torture facilities near the Chinese border, all in 1,351 words.

In actuality, the Amnesty International report on North Korea barely mentions any of these horrors. It is 1,351 words of avoidance and oversight, of misdirection and outright ignorance. Whether this is intentional or simply shoddy research (either is certainly possible when Amnesty is involved) is, in the end, irrelevant. While Amnesty takes great strides to attack the Bush administration, it barely scratches the surface of the North Korean nightmare. What does Amnesty miss? Let us start with its treatment of the prison camps, or, as Amnesty calls them, "detention centers." Amnesty criticizes the detention centers for being overcrowded and being run by cruel guards who often beat prisoners. Of course, Amnesty’s description of North Korean prisons is fairly similar to their nightmarish portrayal of the American penal system.

Leftist critics of President Bush’s "aggressive" policy towards North Korea blanched when he had the temerity to declare that North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il operated concentration camps. If anything, the president’s rhetoric was excessively restrained. The communist government of North Korea operates nothing less than a nightmarish prison camp system analogous to the murderous designs of Hitler and Stalin. An estimated 12 camps, or kwan-li-sos, are currently run by the government, which hold between 150,000-200,000 total prisoners. In the camps, those imprisoned are often forced to labor until they die, either by starvation or exhaustion. The camps themselves are massive, with some larger than American counties and one, Camp Huaong, larger than the city of Washington D.C. In other camps, it is estimated that 20 to 25 percent of the total prison population dies every year, leading to a staggering amount of death. These prisoners are often arrested by authorities with no explanation or formal procedure. In some instances, three generations are jailed together, with children being imprisoned for the imagined crimes of their grandparents. In other smaller prison camps, run by the North Korean security apparatus, prisoners are routinely tortured and politically "re-educated." These camps are not hidden, one can easily view satellite photos of them, along with descriptions from the many North Koreans who have escaped. Amnesty, apparently, has not found such evidence compelling enough to include this in their report.

Another aspect of Amnesty’s human rights analysis is North Korea’s treatment of women. If you listen to Amnesty, female prisoners in North Korea have it rough, but nothing extraordinary. Apparently, women are "humiliated" before their trials by being strip searched. Prisons also lacked women’s restrooms and female inmates were routinely "degraded" by authorities. All of this is fairly loathsome, but as Amnesty so readily reminds us, North Korea is, after all, a signatory to the UN’s Women’s Convention.

North Korea ‘s ratification of the Women’s Convention certainly does not help women who become pregnant in the country’s camp system. Amnesty fails to even mention the horrific practice of forced abortion and infanticide that regularly takes place inside the kwan-li-so. Escaped detainees report numerous instances of prison guards carrying out forced abortions on multiple women at a time. In other scenarios, the babies are delivered, only to be immediately slaughtered by security police. Amnesty apparently forgets to tell the story of one female inmate, a school teacher caught trying to escape to Mongolia, who had been captured and was almost beaten to death at the Onsong In-min-bo-an-seong punishment camp in November 1999. Another female inmate imprisoned in a security facility recalled seeing an elderly woman made to do repetitive exercises until she passed out and died on the floor. These testimonies represent just the tip of the iceberg concerning the horrific fate awaiting imprisoned women in North Korea, who are also subject to mass rape by prison guards. Again, Amnesty fails to mention these atrocities, featuring absolutely zero testimonies or inmate interviews in their latest report.  

One of Amnesty’s main complaints and criticisms concerning the United States is its preservation of the death penalty. Amnesty’s report breathlessly recounts the 59 executions carried out in the United States during the 2004, which supposedly represents the United States’ continued abuse of "international law." Amnesty also makes reckless accusations that various American crime labs produce faulty results in death row convictions. The American government is deemed "retentionist" in its refusal to sign various anti-death penalty conventions sponsored by the United Nations.

Regarding the North Korean "death penalty," if arbitrary and public executions can be described by such a judicial designation, Amnesty is considerably more subdued. Instead of the lengthy examination given to the American death penalty, Amnesty delivers a cursory criticism of the North Korean penchant for "secret executions," although no cases are cited. The truth is far more disturbing than Amnesty’s four sentence description imparts. Executions are a part of every day life in North Korea, where "class enemies" are regularly hanged in public squares, with hundreds of school children forced to watch. Execution-worthy crimes include petty theft, Christian worship, or attempting to escape North Korea (many escapees have been forcibly returned by China, demonstrating their complicity in this cycle). Those who have fled North Korea have described the construction of several mass execution facilities that can be mobilized quickly were the United States to attack. A recent video smuggled out of North Korea showed three prisoners, charged with fleeing the country, tied up to poles and shot by firing squads. Yet Amnesty fails to mention this case which is actually captured on video, unlike the claims of imprisoned Islamic extremists on Guantanamo. Indeed, citing no supporting evidence, Amnesty declares that executions in North Korea have actually decreased.     

Defenders of Amnesty may claim, as Amnesty itself does throughout its report, that North Korea is so isolated that it would be nearly impossible to compile a comprehensive and lengthy report on their human rights abuses.

‘The Oslo Syndrome’

Decision Brief     No. 05-D 25                                       2005-05-31


(Washington, D.C.): Last week, the President of the United States effusively praised Mahmoud Abbas, Yasser Arafat’s right-hand man for some forty years. In the White House Rose Garden, Mr. Bush described Abbas as a “man of courage,” explaining that he takes “great faith in not only [Abbas’] personal character, but the fact that he campaigned on a platform of peace – he said, ‘Vote for me, I am for peace.’ And the Palestinians voted overwhelmingly to support him.”


In light of what is actually happening in the proto-state Abbas (a.k.a. Abu Mazen) was elected last January to govern, such characterizations seem at best to be wishful thinking, at worst willful and dangerous self-delusion. As a new web ad (www.CenterforSecurityPolicy.org) makes clear, if the Palestinian people truly want peace, there is very little evidence that they are moving in that direction under Abu Mazen.


‘Facts on the Ground’


To the contary, terrorist organizations are not being dismantled by Abbas. Instead, groups like Hamas with the avowed mission of destroying Israel are ascendant. They are winning local elections and taking full advantage of the “hudna” (temporary suspension of hostilities) to rebuild their offensive capabilities against Israel.


Hamas and other terrorists are being integrated into Palestinian security forces, receiving valuable training and even arms from American and European personnel. In addition, burgeoning quantities of ever-more powerful weapons are being smuggled into Gaza from Egypt.


Meanwhile, Palestinians are being encouraged by official imams whose sermons are broadcast on Abbas-controlled media to kill Jews and destroy America. For example, less than two weeks before Mr. Bush welcomed Abu Mazen to the White House, Sheik Ibrahim Mudeiris claimed on Palestinian Authority TV that history showed the torture, exile and murder of Jews to be legitimate and the Muslim conquest of the United States inevitable.


If the evidence is so clear that the Palestinian state Abu Mazen is a-building will be but a new state-sponsor of terror, how could President Bush – who in June 2002 rejected that prospect and has devoted his presidency to eliminating such sponsors – possibly be turning a blind eye to the facts on the ground? How could he be insisting that Israel make still further territorial and political concessions, including over Jerusalem, let alone be handing over directly to the Palestinian Authority $50 million in U.S. taxpayers’ funds?


Call it “the Oslo Syndrome.”


This is the title of an important new book (Smith and Kraus Global, 2005) by Dr. Kenneth Levin, a psychiatrist and historian who is a clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School. As the subtitle – “Delusions of a People Under Siege” – makes clear, Dr. Levin is concerned with a pathology that has prompted the Jews of Israel to embrace the false promise of peace ostensibly on offer first from Arafat, now from his former right-hand man. A similar malady appears to be afflicting official Washington, as well.


The Oslo Syndrome at Work


Dr. Levin describes the roots of this pathology as follows: “[It] lies in psychological responses common among chronically besieged populations, whether minorities subjected to defamation, discrimination and assault or small nations under persistent attack by their neighbors. People living under such stressful conditions often choose to accept at face value the indictments of their accusers in the hope of thereby escaping their predicament.”


“The Oslo Syndrome” chronicles the delusions of successive groups within the Jewish world, with a particular focus on the most prominent and contemporary of the phenomena – that of politicians and organizations associated with “the Peace Movement.” Dr. Levin explains: “The Peace Movement’s stance in fact was as divorced from reality as had been German Jews’ blaming of Polish Jews for anti-Semitism, or secular European Jews’ blaming of the religious, or socialist Jews’ blaming of the Jewish bourgeoisie. But proponents of the Movement, cowed by the persistence of the siege and desperate to see its end, chose to delude themselves. They grasped at any seemingly positive statement coming from an Arab political figure and ignored all the countervailing evidence.”


For example, the self-deluded chose to ignore unwelcome statements by Faisal al-Husseini, an Arafat and Abbas crony who was for years the Palestine Liberation Organization’s proxy representative in Jerusalem. Al-Husseini declared in 2001 that the Oslo “peace” accords of 1992 between Israel and Arafat were but a “Trojan Horse,” designed to advance the Palestinians’ abiding goal of liberating their “country,” whose boundaries would be “from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea.” In other words: No Israel.


Al-Husseini’s ambitions were of a piece with those long espoused by his relative, Haj Amin al-Husseini, the notorious Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, whose complicity with Adolf Hitler helped advance the Fuhrer’s “Final Solution” for the Jews and deny the latter refuge in their historic homeland. Incredibly, even the Holocaust Museum in Washington – a magnificent institution designed to serve as a conscience for all time – is in denial and contributing to the Oslo Syndrome: It refuses to include in its permanent exhibition anything about the Mufti’s role in past Arab anti-Semitism, or to address manifestations of this form of systemic racism so evident in the Muslim world today.


The Bottom Line


Dr. Levin notes in an article published at www.JewishPress.com that, “The ongoing Arab siege does cast a shadow over the lives of Israelis. At the same time, they have created a free, vibrant, extraordinarily successful society. It remains to be seen whether they are prepared to go on nurturing what they have built as they await changes in the Arab world that will open it to genuine peace, or they will instead, in their eagerness for ‘normalcy’ and an end to the siege, once more delude themselves into pursuing fantasies of peace that will threaten everything they have created.” Or, he might have added, whether the U.S. government will, in its own act of self-delusion, encourage or compel Israel to do the latter?


 

‘Whose partner is Abu Mazen?’

On the eve of President Bush’s White House meeting today with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the Center for Security Policy released a "web ad" raising serious questions about the guest’s true intentions and the risks – to America as well as Israel – associated with his actions.

 The ad points out that Abbas, who is also known as Abu Mazen, has proven to be less a partner for peace with Israel than a partner with terrorist organizations like Hamas. This can scarcely come as a surprise since, as the right-hand man of Yasser Arafat for decades, he is not exactly a new leader "not compromised by terror" – whose election Mr. Bush made, nearly three years ago, a precondition for U.S. recognition of a Palestinian state.

Neither has Abbas, since his election nearly six months ago, made perceptible progress towards Mr. Bush’s other preconditions, including "entirely new political and economic institutions, based on democracy, market economics and action against terrorism."

Center for Security Policy President Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. observed, "The danger is that by tolerating Abu Mazen’s actual performance – to say nothing of rewarding and reinforcing it by providing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of U.S. aid indirectly or, worse yet, directly to an unreformed, corrupt, unaccountable and terrorist-supporting Palestinian Authority – U.S. interests in dismantling state-sponsors of terrorism will be seriously undermined."

The web ad’s script is as follows:

"Everyone hoped Palestinian President Abu Mazen would prove to be a partner for peace with Israel. Instead, he’s become a partner with terrorist organizations like Hamas that are determined to destroy Israel.

"His security services are training and arming known terrorists. He’s done nothing about powerful weapons being smuggled into Gaza and their use against Israelis. Shockingly, Abu Mazen’s controlled media are urging Palestinians to kill Christians and Jews and to hate America. And he’s letting millions of our tax dollars be used to create a new state-sponsor of terror called ‘Palestine.’

"Mr. President. Don’t be deceived. Abu Mazen is no friend of America – and no true partner for Israel."

To view the ad click here.

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Security experts urge Bolton confirmation

Caspar Weinberger, James Woolsey, George Shultz, Ed Meese and Max Kampelman Among Powerhouse Bipartisan Group Calling for Swift Approval of President’s Nominee

 It is expected that the Senate will soon vote on President Bush’s nomination of John Bolton to become the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In anticipation of this historic vote, the Center for Security Policy is releasing an updated version of a letter in support of Mr. Bolton it had circulated earlier this month to the Foreign Relations Committee, and which has now been signed by ninety-four of America’s most accomplished defense and foreign policy practitioners.

The signatories’ recommendation that Mr. Bolton be confirmed for this position is backed by the decades of experience in international affairs that they collectively have in service at the highest levels of the U.S. government, and parallels the endorsement the nominee has received from President George W. Bush, who recently explained "John’s distinguished career and service to our nation demonstrate that he is the right man at the right time for this important assignment."

The bipartisan group’s joint letter makes three main points:

  • John Bolton is well-qualified, both by background and by temperament, to represent America at the United Nations at a critical time in the organization’s history : "John Bolton[‘s]…tenure as the Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations during the administration of George H.W. Bush and as Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security during this presidency have honed Mr. Bolton’s indisputably impressive intellect and robust diplomatic skills in ways that will serve the nation well at the UN.
  • His representation will be in the tradition of two of America’s best ambassadors to the United Nations: Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Jeane Kirkpatrick : "The sort of assertive representation of U.S. interests that has been the hallmark of such appointees sometimes discomfits other diplomats. History suggests, however, that it can be indispensable to catalyzing constructive change of the kind virtually everyone agrees is needed at the UN."
  • Criticism of Secretary Bolton lately orchestrated on behalf of a group of retired diplomats is misplaced – and wrong : His views on arms control are identical to those of George W. Bush, the man elected twice by the American people to craft U.S. security policy. They are, moreover, eminently sensible in light of hard experience with countries that cheat and use treaties to wage asymmetric warfare against us.

Center President Frank J. Gaffney observed: "Serious national security practitioners from both political parties applaud President Bush’s choice of John Bolton to lead U.S. efforts to make the UN’s purpose once again what it was at its founding – to champion and protect freedom around the world. He is the right man for this tough job at a critical time. The Nation will be well served if the Senate allows him to start doing it at the earliest possible moment."

4 April 2005 (reflecting additional signatures as of 25 May 2005)

Hon. Richard G. Lugar
Chairman, Senate Foreign Relations Committee
450 Senate Dirksen Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510

Dear Mr. Chairman:

In the next few days, the Foreign Relations Committee will be considering the nomination of the individual that the President has chosen to represent him and serve the interests of the United States at the United Nations. We write urging early and favorable consideration of the President’s nominee, the Honorable John R. Bolton.

John Bolton has distinguished himself throughout a long and multifaceted career in public service and in the private sector. In particular, his tenure as the Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations during the administration of George H.W. Bush and as Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security during this presidency have honed Mr. Bolton’s indisputably impressive intellect and robust diplomatic skills in ways that will serve the nation well at the UN.

As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has observed, Mr. Bolton will bring these attributes to bear in the tradition of two of the most outstanding of America’s ambassadors at the United Nations: Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Jeane Kirkpatrick. To be sure, the sort of assertive representation of U.S. interests that has been the hallmark of such appointees sometimes discomfits other diplomats. History suggests, however, that it can be indispensable to catalyzing constructive change of the kind virtually everyone agrees is needed at the UN.

Some retired diplomats suggest that Secretary Bolton’s positions on various controversial arms control treaties should disqualify him from serving at the UN. Their criticism is misdirected. Mr. Bolton’s views about each of these accords are identical to those of President Bush. While the signatories are certainly free to oppose the Administration’s positions, their differences seem to be with a man twice elected by the American people to design and execute security policies, rather than with one of his most effective and articulate officials in advancing those policies.

We believe, moreover, that the Bush Administration’s stances on such treaties reflect a clear-eyed assessment of the real limits of diplomacy with nations that do not honor their commitments, that deliberately conceal their activities so as to defeat verification and that seek to use bilateral and multilateral agreements as instruments of asymmetric warfare against nations like the United States that abide by their treaty obligations. Far from being a disqualifier, this view is an eminently sensible and responsible one in light of past experience.

In short, Secretary Bolton’s formidable grasp of the issues of the day, his exemplary previous service to our country and the confidence President Bush reposes in him will make him an outstanding and highly effective representative to the United Nations.

We request that you share this assessment of Secretary Bolton with your colleagues and ensure that it is reflected in the record of the Foreign Relations Committee’s deliberations on his nomination.

Sincerely,

William P. Clark, former National Security Advisor to the President; former Deputy Secretary of State

Caspar W. Weinberger, former Secretary of Defense; former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare; former Director of the Office of Management and Budget

George P. Shultz, former Secretary of State; former Secretary of Treasury; former Secretary of Labor; former Director, Office of Management and Budget

Edwin Meese, former Counselor to the President; former Attorney General

William J. Bennett, former Secretary of Education; former Director, National Office of Drug Control Policy

Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House of Representatives

R. James Woolsey, former Director of Central Intelligence

John F. Lehman, Jr., former Secretary of the Navy; Member of 9/11 Commission

Max M. Kampelman, Counselor to the Department of State; former Ambassador and Head of Delegation to the U.S.-Soviet START and Defense and Space Negotiations

Dr. William Schneider, Jr., former Under Secretary of State; Chairman, General Advisory Committee on Arms Control & Disarmament, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

Charles M. Kupperman, former Special Assistant to the President; former Deputy Director of the Office of Administration, the White House; former Executive Director, General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

Frank Ruddy, former U.S. Ambassador to Equatorial Guinea

Christopher DeMuth, former Administrator, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., former Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy (Designate); former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear Forces and Arms Control Policy

Phyllis Kaminsky, former Director, United Nations Information Center

Major General Paul E. Vallely, USA (Ret.), former Deputy Commanding General, U.S. Army, Pacific

Dr. Daniel Goure, former Director, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy

Barbara J. Comstock, former Director of Public Affairs, Department of Justice

Christopher D. Lay, former Special Assistant to the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy

Dr. Kathleen C. Bailey, former Assistant Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

Dr. Robert B. Barker, former Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Atomic Energy

Becky Norton Dunlop, former Special Assistant to the President for Cabinet Affairs; former Assistant Secretary of Interior

Lieutenant General Thomas G. McInerney USAF (Ret.), former Assistant Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force

Harvey Feldman, former Ambassador to Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands; founding Director of the American Institute in Taiwan; Alternate Representative to the United Nations

Richard Perle, former Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy

Jose S. Sorzano, former Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations

J. William Middendorf, former Secretary of the Navy; former Ambassador to: the Netherlands, the European Union and the Organization of American States

Jed L. Babbin, former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense

Dennis Hays, former Ambassador to Suriname

Michael Skol, former Ambassador to Venezuela; former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs

Kim Flower, former Director for Latin America, National Security Council

Vice Admiral Robert R. Monroe USN (Ret.), former Director, Defense Nuclear Agency; former Director, Navy Research and Development

Roger W. Robinson, Jr., former Senior Director for International Economic Affairs, National Security Council

Otto J. Reich, former Special Envoy for Western Hemisphere Initiatives; former Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs; former Ambassador to Venezuela

James T. Hackett, former Associate Director of the U.S. Information Agency; former Acting Director of the Arms Control & Disarmament Agency

Abraham D. Sofaer, former Legal Advisor, Department of State

Tidal W. McCoy, former Acting Secretary of the Air Force; former Assistant Secretary of the Air Force

Dr. Curtin Winsor, Jr., former Ambassador to Costa Rica

Dr. Dov S. Zakheim, former Undersecretary of Defense (Comptroller); Deputy Under Secretary of Defense, Planning and Resources; Assistant Under Secretary of Defense, Policy and Resources

Charles H. Fairbanks, Jr., former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs

M.D.B. Carlisle, former Assistant Secretary of Defense of Legislative Affairs

James B. Longley, Jr., former Member, U.S. House of Representatives

Lieutenant General Edward L. Rowny, USA (Ret.), former Chief U.S. Negotiator for the START Negotiations; Special Advisor to the President and Secretary of State; JCS Representative to the SALT II Negotiations

Michael A. Ledeen, former Special Advisor to the Secretary of State

Morris J. Amitay, Foreign Service Officer (Ret.)

Dr. Mark Albrecht, former Executive Secretary, National Space Council

Vice Admiral N. Ronald Thunman USN (Ret.), Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Submarine Warfare

Peter Robinson, Speechwriter and Special Assistant to President Reagan

Vice Admiral William D. Houser, USN (Ret.), former Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Air Warfare

Admiral Ronald J. Hays USN (Ret.), former Commander-in-Chief, Pacific; former Vice Chief of Naval Operations

Robert Pastorino, former Ambassador to the Dominican Republic; former member of the National Security Council staff

William Kristol, former Chief of Staff to the Vice President

David Frum, former Speechwriter and Special Assistant to the President

William L. Ball III, former Secretary of the Navy

Dr. Dominic J. Monetta, former Assistant Secretary of Energy (designate), Office of New Production Reactors; former Director of Science and Technology, Office of the Secretary of Defense

John C. Wobensmith, Senior Executive Service (Ret.), Department of Defense

Dr. John Lenczowski, former Director of Europe and Soviet Affairs, National Security Council

Dr. Norman A. Bailey, former Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs; former Director of International Economic Affairs, National Security Council

Andrew C. McCarthy, former Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York

Amoretta M. Hoeber, former Deputy Under Secretary of the Army for Research and Engineering

Richard Schifter, former Deputy Representative to the UN Security Council; former Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs

Herbert Romerstein, former Director, Office to Counter Soviet Disinformation, United States Information Agency

Edward V. Badolato, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy for Energy Emergencies; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy for Security Affairs

Dr. Alan L. Keyes, former Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs; former Representative to the United Nations Economic and Social Council

David J. Trachtenberg, former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy

Joseph diGenova, former U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia

Victoria Toensing, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Criminal Division

Robert L. Livingston, former Member of Congress; former Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee

Stephen D. Bryen, former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense; former Director, Defense Technology Security Administration

Dr. William R. Graham, former Chairman, General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency; former Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy; former Science Advisor to the President

Major General Larry Taylor, USMCR (Ret.), former Commanding General, 4th Marine Aircraft Wing

Dr. William R. Van Cleave, former Member, Delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks; former Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Strategic Policy and Planning

Clark S. Judge, former Special Assistant and Speechwriter to the President

Lieutenant General Charles A. May Jr., USAF (Ret.), former Assistant Vice Chief of Staff

Admiral Jerome Johnson, USN (Ret.), former Vice Chief of Naval Operations

Admiral Leon A. Edney, USN (Ret.), former Commander, U.S. Atlantic Command; Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic

Everett Briggs, former Ambassador to Honduras; former Ambassador to Panama; former Ambassador to Portugal

C. Boyden Gray, former Counsel to the President

Lieutenant General Paul G. Cerjan, USA (Ret.), former President, National Defense University

Robert Turner, former Assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs (Acting)

Joshua Gilder, former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights

Douglas R. Graham, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Senate Affairs; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategic Defense, Space and Verification Policy

Tom Boyatt, former Ambassador to Colombia; former Ambassador to Upper Volta

Richard W. Carlson, former Ambassador to the Seychelles

Gerald P. Carmen, former Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Geneva

Raymond Tanter, Personal Representative of the Secretary of Defense to Arms Control Negotiations in Madrid, Helsinki, Stockholm, and Vienna; former member of the National Security Council staff

Sonia Landau, former Assistant Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Information Policy

John Tkacik, Foreign Service Officer (Ret.)

Dennis Goodman, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations

Ben Gilman, former Member of Congress; former Chairman of the House International Relations Committee

General John L. Piotrowski, USAF (Ret.), former Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Space Command

Carol B. Hallett, former Commissioner of Customs; former Ambassador to the Bahamas

Sid Shachnow, Major General US Army (Ret.), Commanding General John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School (Airborne), Fort Bragg North Carolina

Peter R. Rosenblatt, former Personal Representative of the President to the Negotiations on the Future Political Status of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands

 

Confirm Bolton

Decision Brief     No. 05-D 24                                          2005-05-23


(Washington, D.C.): George Voinovich is an honorable man. So, when the junior Senator from Ohio says he has decided to vote against President Bush‘s nomination of John Bolton to be the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations on the basis of the record developed in the Foreign Relations Committee, one has to ask: What record?


Let the Record Show


The transcripts of the Committee hearings and business meetings on the Bolton nomination, and the interviews with various State Department, intelligence community and other past and present government employees now available online, establish that – while there are certainly people who dislike Secretary Bolton – the numerous, highly publicized complaints against him have not been substantiated. Even more troubling is the fact that relevant information Senators need to know has been withheld from them.


The complaint that has been most frequently cited by Mr. Bolton’s critics is to the effect that he sought to manufacture or otherwise manipulate intelligence and tried to get two analysts who resisted him fired. Mr. Bolton denies doing so. And the record backs him up.


The Committee’s sixteen interviews conducted on this topic establish the following: When John Bolton sought in early 2002 to give a speech that addressed, among other things, the capability for offensive biological weapons inherent in Cuba’s advanced biotech industry, he did it by the book. Since the draft speech drew on available intelligence, his office – represented by a staffer, Fred Fleitz, who is himself a career CIA analyst – sought Intelligence Community clearance.


Although intelligence did indeed support Mr. Bolton’s proposed statement, as Thomas Fingar, then-Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research (INR) put it: “[INR analyst Christian Westermann] tried to flag to Fred where he thought the draft was going beyond the IC consensus as conveyed in a DIA-led briefing on the Hill.”


Westermann then proceeded – in a manner the Foreign Relations Committee record confirms Mr. Fingar and two of Westermann’s other INR supervisors agreed was improper – to try to sabotage clearance of the Bolton speech by the Intelligence Community. When confronted with evidence he had done so, Westermann lied to Mr. Bolton. The result was that Bolton understandably felt he could not trust the analyst, a sentiment he conveyed to Westermann’s ultimate boss, Assistant Secretary of State Carl Ford.


As part of a scathing personal attack on Mr. Bolton, Ford testified to the Committee that he had “the impression that I had been asked to fire the analyst.” But under questioning he was unable to say that was what Bolton actually asked for. And two of his subordinates explicitly told the Committee that Bolton had not sought to have Westermann fired, simply given other duties.


Mr. Ford might have ascertained this to be the case had he bothered to make inquiries. He told the Committee, however, that he had not done so. And, in any event, Westermann’s immediate supervisor testified that he was “not aware” of Mr. Bolton’s response to the analyst’s misconduct making people in INR “antsy” about working with Sec. Bolton. So much for the latter’s purported “chilling effect” on intelligence with which he disagreed and those who generated it.


A second analyst, the then-National Intelligence Officer for Latin America, Fulton Armstrong, similarly earned Mr. Bolton’s ire when he took it upon himself to disparage the Under Secretary of State in a meeting with three Senators shortly after the Cuba speech was given. Armstrong asserted that Mr. Bolton had not properly cleared the speech within the Intelligence Community. The Foreign Relations Committee has established, however, that this claim was untrue, a fact documented by a coordination sheet properly signed off on by every relevant agency and by Carl Ford’s testimony.


Cover-up?


What Senators like George Voinovich might not have gotten from their review of the Committee’s record, however, is why assessments of Cuban offensive biological warfare capabilities would engender such unprofessional behavior on the part of two intelligence analysts. That would be because the record has been deliberately left incomplete on this important score.


Foreign Relations staffers took testimony from one witness who was, at the time of the Bolton speech, the Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs – Otto Reich. They refused to include in the transcript, however, information that Senators need to know.


Specifically, Mr. Reich pointed out that secret U.S. assessments about Cuba had been compromised. The woman responsible for Cuba at the Defense Intelligence Agency – whose briefing on the Hill Westermann was so attached to – was Ana Belen Montes, a spy for Fidel Castro. Montes’ name was also redacted from documents submitted to the Committee by the Intelligence Community that might have shed light on her role in disinforming the U.S. about Cuba.


Neither does the Committee record reflect the background Mr. Reich provided about Fulton Armstrong. Fortunately, although his testimony on this topic was obliged to be “off the record,” Secretary Reich wrote in the Wall Street Journal on April 14, 2005 that:


        In my opinion, and that of many of my fellow “intelligence consumers,” we were not receiving the best possible intelligence analysis from this highly placed officer. I documented complaints about the analyst in question in a classified three-page letter which I handed out to [his] supervisor. I specifically stated that I did not want to see the officer punished in any way, but that I did expect from the intelligence community a less biased and more professional analysis, which this individual had proven incapable of providing.


The Bottom Line


Senators should, indeed, judge Secretary Bolton by the record. What is available, confirms that Mr. Bolton is a man of integrity, conviction, fortitude with the ability to get things done, even in a hostile bureaucracy – perfect qualifications for the UN. The information deliberately withheld from the record, moreover, only reinforces the bottom line: John Bolton should be confirmed.