Chalabigate
"Weapons of Mass Deception"
2004-11-20
Behind the AIPAC Probe, Neocons Seen Battling Rivals
By Jefferson Morley
Washington Post
September 7, 2004
A high-level Washington power struggle over U.S. policy toward Iran is driving the espionage investigation of the powerful American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), according to international online observers.
On one side of the conflict are neoconservative officials in the Pentagon who favor bold U.S. action to bring down Iran's theocratic government. On the other side, some see intelligence officials who view the neocons as too close to Israel.
Americans, distracted by two political conventions, the Olympics and summer vacations, probably missed the news that the governments of Israel and Iran spent the summer trading threats to attack each other.
Iran, the most populous country in the Middle East, has been secretly seeking to develop nuclear weapons, according to international weapons inspectors, a charge Tehran denies.
Israel, which has maintained an official stance of nuclear ambiguity, is long suspected of possessing a nuclear arsenal but has never accepted weapons inspections. It is, by all accounts, determined to prevent the emergence of another nuclear power in the Middle East.
In 1982, Israeli jets destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor to prevent Saddam Hussein from developing nuclear weapons. Israeli officials have threatened to do the same in Iran.
In mid-August Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani upped the ante by telling al-Jazeera television that his government might launch preemptive strikes against Israel to protect its nuclear facilities, according to the China Daily.
On Aug. 27, CBS News broke the story that the FBI was investigating Defense Intelligence Agency analyst Lawrence A. Franklin for allegedly sharing sensitive U.S. documents on Iran policy with AIPAC. The Post then reported that the two-year-old probe was broader than just one person and that investigators are looking into whether other defense officials had given sensitive materials to AIPAC and Ahmed Chalabi, the former Iraqi dissident who enjoyed support in areas of the Pentagon before the war.
While the Post quoted sources as saying they were "puzzled" and "baffled" about the motivation of the AIPAC probe, many foreign observers show no such doubt. The AIPAC scandal "stems from bureaucratic competition between neoconservatives and their opponents within the administration," according to columnist Avinoam Bar Yosef of the Jerusalem Post.
A commentator in a leading Arabic daily agreed.
The scandal "tells us less about Israeli spying efforts than it does about the existence of some serious disagreements within the Bush administration on how to deal with Iran," said columnist Helena Cobban in the London-based Dar al-Hayat.In the immediate aftermath of the U.S. military victory in Iraq over Saddam Hussein's army in April 2003, Cobban writes that "many ranking members of the [Bush] administration started talking openly about the need to bring about a similarly violent 'regime change' in Iran and Syria as their next goal."The AIPAC investigation, she says, is a challenge to their ambitions."
More and more people in the U.S. military and the country as a whole have seen how hard it has been to achieve what they wanted in Iraq, alone, and how high the costs have been there," Cobban wrote.
The Economist magazine, in a piece reprinted in the Toronto Star, noted that Franklin worked for two of the leading advocates of "regime change" in Iran: Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, and Douglas J. Feith, the undersecretary for policy."Is there a 'rogue' operation in the administration waging an internal struggle over this policy?" The Economist asked. "If so, is it possible that Franklin's bosses at the Pentagon sent him to get input from the Israelis and the AIPAC to back up their policy position on Iran?"
In the view of Ze'ev Schiff, national security correspondent for the Israeli daily Haaretz, the AIPAC probe is part of the CIA's effort to wrest control of Middle East policy from the pro-Israeli officials at the Pentagon."The CIA sees Israel as disruptive in American efforts to improve its relations with the Arabs," he writes. "It's not surprising that the CIA was the first to charge that Israel has an agent in the Pentagon."Schiff says that as early as 1997, CIA director George Tenet made "stinging" comments to Israeli officials saying Israel "had a spy" in the upper reaches of the U.S. government, Schiff says. No such Israeli spy ever surfaced, and Tenet later apologized to his Israeli counterpart for the remarks, according to Schiff.
Ed Blanche, writing for the Daily Star in Beirut, Lebanon, blames "the permanent national security bureaucracy" in Washington for the AIPAC probe. In his piece, Blanche quotes Duncan Clarke of the American University's School of International Service in Washington as saying Israeli economic espionage has long "infuriated the US intelligence community, especially the FBI and the Customs Service." Duncan goes on to say that Israeli spying on the United States has "left a legacy of distrust" in the U.S. intelligence community.The net effect is that U.S. policy toward Iran seems more unsettled than ever.
In Iran one reformist journalist Mehran Karami says the AIPAC probe should show Iranians that America and Israel are not united against Iran."
If there was no difference between the national interests of America and Israel . . . why would Israel conduct an act of espionage?
We must accept that America is a superpower whose interests involve more than just Israel's interests in the Middle East region," he wrote in the Tehran daily Sharq."By accepting this, we can reconsider and establish independent ties with America away from Arab-Israel conflicts," he concluded.
But in Israel, the hardliners at Debkafile think the AIPAC probe "will be seen in Tehran as tying the Bush administration's hands in a way that will hamper its ability to take action against Iran's advancing nuclear weapons program."As the AIPAC investigation continues, so will the struggle for control of U.S. policy toward Iran.
http://www.aaiusa.org/news/must_read09_07_04wp.htm
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Washington Post
September 7, 2004
A high-level Washington power struggle over U.S. policy toward Iran is driving the espionage investigation of the powerful American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), according to international online observers.
On one side of the conflict are neoconservative officials in the Pentagon who favor bold U.S. action to bring down Iran's theocratic government. On the other side, some see intelligence officials who view the neocons as too close to Israel.
Americans, distracted by two political conventions, the Olympics and summer vacations, probably missed the news that the governments of Israel and Iran spent the summer trading threats to attack each other.
Iran, the most populous country in the Middle East, has been secretly seeking to develop nuclear weapons, according to international weapons inspectors, a charge Tehran denies.
Israel, which has maintained an official stance of nuclear ambiguity, is long suspected of possessing a nuclear arsenal but has never accepted weapons inspections. It is, by all accounts, determined to prevent the emergence of another nuclear power in the Middle East.
In 1982, Israeli jets destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor to prevent Saddam Hussein from developing nuclear weapons. Israeli officials have threatened to do the same in Iran.
In mid-August Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani upped the ante by telling al-Jazeera television that his government might launch preemptive strikes against Israel to protect its nuclear facilities, according to the China Daily.
On Aug. 27, CBS News broke the story that the FBI was investigating Defense Intelligence Agency analyst Lawrence A. Franklin for allegedly sharing sensitive U.S. documents on Iran policy with AIPAC. The Post then reported that the two-year-old probe was broader than just one person and that investigators are looking into whether other defense officials had given sensitive materials to AIPAC and Ahmed Chalabi, the former Iraqi dissident who enjoyed support in areas of the Pentagon before the war.
While the Post quoted sources as saying they were "puzzled" and "baffled" about the motivation of the AIPAC probe, many foreign observers show no such doubt. The AIPAC scandal "stems from bureaucratic competition between neoconservatives and their opponents within the administration," according to columnist Avinoam Bar Yosef of the Jerusalem Post.
A commentator in a leading Arabic daily agreed.
The scandal "tells us less about Israeli spying efforts than it does about the existence of some serious disagreements within the Bush administration on how to deal with Iran," said columnist Helena Cobban in the London-based Dar al-Hayat.In the immediate aftermath of the U.S. military victory in Iraq over Saddam Hussein's army in April 2003, Cobban writes that "many ranking members of the [Bush] administration started talking openly about the need to bring about a similarly violent 'regime change' in Iran and Syria as their next goal."The AIPAC investigation, she says, is a challenge to their ambitions."
More and more people in the U.S. military and the country as a whole have seen how hard it has been to achieve what they wanted in Iraq, alone, and how high the costs have been there," Cobban wrote.
The Economist magazine, in a piece reprinted in the Toronto Star, noted that Franklin worked for two of the leading advocates of "regime change" in Iran: Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, and Douglas J. Feith, the undersecretary for policy."Is there a 'rogue' operation in the administration waging an internal struggle over this policy?" The Economist asked. "If so, is it possible that Franklin's bosses at the Pentagon sent him to get input from the Israelis and the AIPAC to back up their policy position on Iran?"
In the view of Ze'ev Schiff, national security correspondent for the Israeli daily Haaretz, the AIPAC probe is part of the CIA's effort to wrest control of Middle East policy from the pro-Israeli officials at the Pentagon."The CIA sees Israel as disruptive in American efforts to improve its relations with the Arabs," he writes. "It's not surprising that the CIA was the first to charge that Israel has an agent in the Pentagon."Schiff says that as early as 1997, CIA director George Tenet made "stinging" comments to Israeli officials saying Israel "had a spy" in the upper reaches of the U.S. government, Schiff says. No such Israeli spy ever surfaced, and Tenet later apologized to his Israeli counterpart for the remarks, according to Schiff.
Ed Blanche, writing for the Daily Star in Beirut, Lebanon, blames "the permanent national security bureaucracy" in Washington for the AIPAC probe. In his piece, Blanche quotes Duncan Clarke of the American University's School of International Service in Washington as saying Israeli economic espionage has long "infuriated the US intelligence community, especially the FBI and the Customs Service." Duncan goes on to say that Israeli spying on the United States has "left a legacy of distrust" in the U.S. intelligence community.The net effect is that U.S. policy toward Iran seems more unsettled than ever.
In Iran one reformist journalist Mehran Karami says the AIPAC probe should show Iranians that America and Israel are not united against Iran."
If there was no difference between the national interests of America and Israel . . . why would Israel conduct an act of espionage?
We must accept that America is a superpower whose interests involve more than just Israel's interests in the Middle East region," he wrote in the Tehran daily Sharq."By accepting this, we can reconsider and establish independent ties with America away from Arab-Israel conflicts," he concluded.
But in Israel, the hardliners at Debkafile think the AIPAC probe "will be seen in Tehran as tying the Bush administration's hands in a way that will hamper its ability to take action against Iran's advancing nuclear weapons program."As the AIPAC investigation continues, so will the struggle for control of U.S. policy toward Iran.
http://www.aaiusa.org/news/must_read09_07_04wp.htm
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Milton Frihetsson, 14:56
