A conversation about foreign policy with former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft & former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
http://www.charlierose.com/shows/2007/06/15/1/an-hour-with-zbigniew-brzezinski-brent-scowcroft-henry-kissinger
An hour with Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft & Henry Kissinger P2
Brzezinski will be paired with former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft who will testify about their views on the strategic context of America's actions in Iraq.
This may be covered by C-Span but will also be available in full at CNN's Pipeline:
SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITEE TESTIMONY -- ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI
February 1, 2007
Mr. Chairman:
Your hearings come at a critical juncture in the U.S. war of choice in Iraq, and I commend you and Senator Lugar for scheduling them.
It is time for the White House to come to terms with two central realities:
1. The war in Iraq is a historic, strategic, and moral calamity. Undertaken under false assumptions, it is undermining America's global legitimacy. Its collateral civilian casualties as well as some abuses are tarnishing America's moral credentials. Driven by Manichean impulses and imperial hubris, it is intensifying regional instability.
2. Only a political strategy that is historically relevant rather than reminiscent of colonial tutelage can provide the needed framework for a tolerable resolution of both the war in Iraq and the intensifying regional tensions.
If the United States continues to be bogged down in a protracted bloody involvement in Iraq, the final destination on this downhill track is likely to be a head-on conflict with Iran and with much of the world of Islam at large. A plausible scenario for a military collision with Iran involves Iraqi failure to meet the benchmarks; followed by accusations of Iranian responsibility for the failure; then by some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the U.S. blamed on Iran; culminating in a "defensive" U.S. military action against Iran that plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
A mythical historical narrative to justify the case for such a protracted and potentially expanding war is already being articulated. Initially justified by false claims about WMD's in Iraq, the war is now being redefined as the "decisive ideological struggle" of our time, reminiscent of the earlier collisions with Nazism and Stalinism. In that context, Islamist extremism and al Qaeda are presented as the equivalents of the threat posed by Nazi Germany and then Soviet Russia, and 9/11 as the equivalent of the Pearl Harbor attack which precipitated America's involvement in World War II.
This simplistic and demagogic narrative overlooks the fact that Nazism was based on the military power of the industrially most advanced European state; and that Stalinism was able to mobilize not only the resources of the victorious and militarily powerful Soviet Union but also had worldwide appeal through its Marxist doctrine. In contrast, most Muslims are not embracing Islamic fundamentalism; al Qaeda is an isolated fundamentalist Islamist aberration; most Iraqis are engaged in strife because the American occupation of Iraq destroyed the Iraqi state; while Iran -- though gaining in regional influence -- is itself politically divided, economically and militarily weak. To argue that America is already at war in the region with a wider Islamic threat, of which Iran is the epicenter, is to promote a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Deplorably, the Administration's foreign policy in the Middle East region has lately relied almost entirely on such sloganeering. Vague and inflammatory talk about "a new strategic context" which is based on "clarity" and which prompts "the birth pangs of a new Middle East" is breeding intensifying anti-Americanism and is increasing the danger of a long-term collision between the United States and the Islamic world. Those in charge of U.S. diplomacy have also adopted a posture of moralistic self-ostracism toward Iran strongly reminiscent of John Foster Dulles's attitude of the early 1950's toward Chinese Communist leaders (resulting among other things in the well-known episode of the refused handshake). It took some two decades and a half before another Republican president was finally able to undo that legacy.
One should note here also that practically no country in the world shares the Manichean delusions that the Administration so passionately articulates. The result is growing political isolation of, and pervasive popular antagonism toward the U.S. global posture.
It is obvious by now that the American national interest calls for a significant change of direction. There is in fact a dominant consensus in favor of a change: American public opinion now holds that the war was a mistake; that it should not be escalated, that a regional political process should be explored; and that an Israeli-Palestinian accommodation is an essential element of the needed policy alteration and should be actively pursued. It is noteworthy that profound reservations regarding the Administration's policy have been voiced by a number of leading Republicans. One need only invoke here the expressed views of the much admired President Gerald Ford, former Secretary of State James Baker, former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft and several leading Republican senators, John Warner, Chuck Hagel, and Gordon Smith among others.
The urgent need today is for a strategy that seeks to create a political framework for a resolution of the problems posed both by the US occupation of Iraq and by the ensuing civil and sectarian conflict. Ending the occupation and shaping a regional security dialogue should be the mutually reinforcing goals of such a strategy, but both goals will take time and require a genuinely serious U.S. commitment.
The quest for a political solution for the growing chaos in Iraq should involve four steps:
1. The United States should reaffirm explicitly and unambiguously its determination to leave Iraq in a reasonably short period of time.
Ambiguity regarding the duration of the occupation in fact encourages unwillingness to compromise and intensifies the on-going civil strife. Moreover, such a public declaration is needed to allay fears in the Middle East of a new and enduring American imperial hegemony. Right or wrong, many view the establishment of such a hegemony as the primary reason for the American intervention in a region only recently free of colonial domination. That perception should be discredited from the highest U.S. level. Perhaps the U.S. Congress could do so by a joint resolution.
2. The United States should announce that it is undertaking talks with the Iraqi leaders to jointly set with them a date by which U.S. military disengagement should be completed, and the resulting setting of such a date should be announced as a joint decision. In the meantime, the U.S. should avoid military escalation.
It is necessary to engage all Iraqi leaders -- including those who do not reside within "the Green Zone" -- in a serious discussion regarding the proposed and jointly defined date for U.S. military disengagement because the very dialogue itself will help identify the authentic Iraqi leaders with the self-confidence and capacity to stand on their own legs without U.S. military protection. Only Iraqi leaders who can exercise real power beyond "the Green Zone" can eventually reach a genuine Iraqi accommodation. The painful reality is that much of the current Iraqi regime, characterized by the Bush administration as "representative of the Iraqi people," defines itself largely by its physical location: the 4 sq. miles-large U.S. fortress within Baghdad, protected by a wall in places 15 feet thick, manned by heavily armed U.S. military, popularly known as "the Green Zone."
3. The United States should issue jointly with appropriate Iraqi leaders, or perhaps let the Iraqi leaders issue, an invitation to all neighbors of Iraq (and perhaps some other Muslim countries such as Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, and Pakistan) to engage in a dialogue regarding how best to enhance stability in Iraq in conjunction with U.S. military disengagement and to participate eventually in a conference regarding regional stability.
The United States and the Iraqi leadership need to engage Iraq's neighbors in serious discussion regarding the region's security problems, but such discussions cannot be undertaken while the U.S. is perceived as an occupier for an indefinite duration. Iran and Syria have no reason to help the United States consolidate a permanent regional hegemony. It is ironic, however, that both Iran and Syria have lately called for a regional dialogue, exploiting thereby the self-defeating character of the largely passive -- and mainly sloganeering -- U.S. diplomacy.
A serious regional dialogue, promoted directly or indirectly by the U.S., could be buttressed at some point by a wider circle of consultations involving other powers with a stake in the region's stability, such as the EU, China, Japan, India, and Russia. Members of this Committee might consider exploring informally with the states mentioned their potential interest in such a wider dialogue.
4. Concurrently, the United States should activate a credible and energetic effort to finally reach an Israeli-Palestinian peace, making it clear in the process as to what the basic parameters of such a final accommodation ought to involve.
The United States needs to convince the region that the U.S. is committed both to Israel's enduring security and to fairness for the Palestinians who have waited for more than forty years now for their own separate state. Only an external and activist intervention can promote the long-delayed settlement for the record shows that the Israelis and the Palestinians will never do so on their own. Without such a settlement, both nationalist and fundamentalist passions in the region will in the longer run doom any Arab regime which is perceived as supportive of U.S. regional hegemony.
After World War II, the United States prevailed in the defense of democracy in Europe because it successfully pursued a long-term political strategy of uniting its friends and dividing its enemies, of soberly deterring aggression without initiating hostilities, all the while also exploring the possibility of negotiated arrangements. Today, America's global leadership is being tested in the Middle East. A similarly wise strategy of genuinely constructive political engagement is now urgently needed.
It is also time for the Congress to assert itself.
The President of the United States and Secretary of State would restore some of their lost luster by making some combination of James Baker, Lee Hamilton, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Brent Scowcroft co-Middle East Envoys to help take this penultimate quagmire we are in a direction that might start a virtuous cycle of possibilities rather than the disaster that is unfolding.
-- Steve Clemons
Posted by steve at January 31, 2007 02:29 PM
Comments
Love to hear this guy talk. Common sense and the plain truth just has a certain ring to it.
'Zbigger than life.
Posted by: rich at January 31, 2007 03:30 PM
Love to hear this guy talk. Common sense and the plain truth just has a certain ring to it.
'Zbigger than life.
Posted by: rich at January 31, 2007 03:32 PM
steve - if the hearing is not available on c-span TV, one can listen (for free) to the audio live via http://www.capitolhearings.org/ (click on the room link). that is how i listened to part 1 of the hearing today (with kissinger and albright).
Posted by: selise at January 31, 2007 03:35 PM
I appreciate Mr. Brzezinski's well-intentioned comments on Iraq and the mideast. Without discussing them in detail, I suggest they're misguided in terms of the implicit intentions of the Bush administration. The administration is run by businessmen. They're objective is to put money in the bank. Money for themselves and their supporters. The purpose of the Iraq invasion was to secure cheap oil and to open a new market for American goods and services in the mideast "good capitalist" objectives. That venture is paid for by the Americans; from their pockets and veins. The benfits go to private corporations; the Halliburtons and Carlisle Groups. The Bush administration cares not a whit for democracy - its a dynastic fiefdom. They promote trade with China where the government silences their people. The Bush administration cares not a whit about diplomacy. They abandoned mediation of the Israeli-Palestine conflict. They neglected to intervene in the Hezbollah-Israeli war in Lebanon. Bush administration foreign policy is spookily like Al-Qaeda's; seed chaos until you can take over by brute force.
The American people must hold the Bush administration accountable; where are the measurable results we want to see - we're the ones who pay. Bush will continue to hornswoggle us until we do. To borrow from Warhol: "politics is what you can get away with".
Conrad Skinner
Posted by: connski at January 31, 2007 03:52 PM
Finally - it's been said!! The clear facts should have displaced the endless "sloganeering", mindless flag waving, and Manichean world view years ago.
Posted by: ChuckK at January 31, 2007 03:55 PM
I know from my own research the role of Bernard Baruch in starting World War One for Zionist bankers and for Zionism -- to profit from war industries, to pit Christian against Christian in a war of extermination in the trenches of Europe and Christian against Muslim in the Muslim lands -- then owned by Turkey -- in order to capture and control (under British proxy) Palestine and in order to own the vast wealth of middle eastern oil, and to obtain the usury from war financing.
I reached this conclusion on my own -- only recently have I discovered that our greatest historian, Charles Beard, and one of our greatest sociologists, Harry Elmer Barnes, reached the same conclusions about why World War One was really fought and who actually set it in motion. For example, it was thought that the war that began in August 1914 would end after a few months, after the money ran out, but it did not -- the profiteering bankers kept it going because they wanted it. World War One -- which forever deformed Western civilization and killed millions -- was a crime of Zionism. And I have also learned about how publishing and the institutions of higher learning and all channels of information to the public have been controlled by rich Zionist Jews to conceal the truth about why this war was fought.
And the same can be said for the Great Depression and for World War Two and the Cold War. Baruch played key roles in each of these manipulated tragedies...monumental, unspeakably horrible enormous disasters made by and made for Zionists -- made by this racist ideology that today enslaves us all.
War does not exist unless society is organized for war -- and the Zionist Jew bankers -- their agents are called neo-cons in some circles and New Democrats in others -- and in a thousand other false-faces it is the same racist cultural insanity of the Zionist Jews.
Posted by: Dick at January 31, 2007 04:00 PM
Mr. Brzezinski speaks the plain and simple truth in this matter. Is there any chance at all that those with the power to radically change the direction of Bush's Middle East ride into hell will actually listen? I'd like to think so, but I have my doubts. Congress, which is America's last hope of avoiding the looming catastrophe, seems too caught up in the best way to wrist-slap (with a ruler or without?) than to take any serious and sober action.
Posted by: Wren at January 31, 2007 04:01 PM
I agree with e-v-e-r-y, s-i-n-g-l-e, w-o-r-d of Brzezinski.
He is THE CLEAREST of the few, that have explained EXACTLY what AMERICAN POLICY SHOULD BE.
Compare what he says with the convoluted pussy footing crapola coming out of our presidential candidates.
Brzezinski represents America better than they do.
Posted by: Carroll at January 31, 2007 04:11 PM
Mr. Brzesinsi's proposal of how we should move forward sounds absolutely right, as is Steve's suggestion of a team of high-level envoys to implement a diplomatic strategy. The problem with this, as with so many who suggest a way forward, is that they do not take the next step of saying what to do if (when) the Bush administration rejects the plan. I opposed going to war and have seen it as a mistake every step of the way. Yet I can't bring myself to support total withdrawal from Iraq because of the national chaos, and possible regional conflagration, that would follow.
Someone like Mr. Brzesinsi (or Steve?) needs to help us understand which is the best way forward of the two realistic options: 1) withdraw and accept the awful consequences; or 2) hang on and and accept the thousands of deaths and hundreds of billons of dollars necessary to wait for an administration capable of a realistic policy.
Personally, for now, I feel it is our moral responsibility to hang on in spite of the costs to us, because the costs to the Iraqi's would be greater if we withdraw.
Tom
Posted by: Tom at January 31, 2007 04:12 PM
To end this war, the American people and the world must see Zionism for what it is -- and root it out from places of power -- that means not only root it out of government, but to take away the wealth of Zionism and limit its fortunes . AIPAC cannot be permitted to continue to own Congress and both major parties -- and any third-party they may need to 'rise up' to divide and conquer enlightened opposition.
Society is an organism...with the Zionist merchant bankers controlling the brain -- adapted for war -- adapted for master-slave (debt-slavery, tax-slavery, wage-slavery, capital monopoly, land monopoly) relationships between the Zionist elite and the sub-human beasts of burden. Such an organism is functioning perfectly from the standpoint of the Zionist 'brain' -- we are not going to see any elimination of disastrous war and genocide or economic catastrophes or the degradation of our humanity and community. The Zionist brain feels no pain, only gain, from the evils that are killing us.
Posted by: Dick at January 31, 2007 04:34 PM
http://www.senate.gov/~foreign/about.html
You can access the members and their phone numbers thru this link.
We should call and leave a message if nothing else that they BETTER PAY ATTENTION to what Brzesinsi is saying because we are,and we are comparing it to their mumbling, fumbling crapola.
They need to know they better get on the American express instead of their double talk campaign train.
And watch Biden during this hearing and you will see the difference between someone with his own agenda and someone without a personal agenda when it comes to American policy.
Posted by: Carroll at January 31, 2007 04:39 PM
Thanks for the link Carroll.
Sad that all the voices of reason, experience, wisdom, and all those who actually express any real concern for the future of America and Americans, - are systemically dismissed, drowned out, suppressed, silenced, and slimed by the ruthless fascists in the Bush government and the republican reich whose singular concern, and exclusive interests are focused entirely on ghoulishly exploiting the dead and the horrors of the Pearl Harbor like event of 9/11, engorging their personal off sheet accounts, and entrenching their ill-gotten fascist grip on political power.
"Deliver us from evil."
Posted by: Tony Foresta at January 31, 2007 04:58 PM
The underlying message in Mr. Brzezinski clear exposure of the present situation and a sane plan to remedy all these years of brute force is that this administration will not relinquish its power in the name of reason or redress the situation in the name of sanity.
Congress will either have to wrestle itself back to its position as the first power as declared in the Constition or aa clearly stated we are carening directly to even greater clamities.
Now the question is... Members of Congress, what is your job?
Posted by: Marcia at January 31, 2007 05:09 PM
know from my own research the role of Bernard Baruch in starting World War One for Zionist bankers and for Zionism -- to profit from war industries, to pit Christian against Christian in a war of extermination in the trenches of Europe and Christian against Muslim in the Muslim lands -- then owned by Turkey -- in order to capture and control (under British proxy) Palestine and in order to own the vast wealth of middle eastern oil, and to obtain the usury from war financing.
I reached this conclusion on my own -- only recently have I discovered that our greatest historian, Charles Beard, and one of our greatest sociologists, Harry Elmer Barnes, reached the same conclusions about why World War One was really fought and who actually set it in motion. For example, it was thought that the war that began in August 1914 would end after a few months, after the money ran out, but it did not -- the profiteering bankers kept it going because they wanted it. World War One -- which forever deformed Western civilization and killed millions -- was a crime of Zionism. And I have also learned about how publishing and the institutions of higher learning and all channels of information to the public have been controlled by rich Zionist Jews to conceal the truth about why this war was fought.
And the same can be said for the Great Depression and for World War Two and the Cold War. Baruch played key roles in each of these manipulated tragedies...monumental, unspeakably horrible enormous disasters made by and made for Zionists -- made by this racist ideology that today enslaves us all.
War does not exist unless society is organized for war -- and the Zionist Jew bankers -- their agents are called neo-cons in some circles and New Democrats in others -- and in a thousand other false-faces it is the same racist cultural insanity of the Zionist Jews.
Posted by Dick at January 31, 2007 04:00 PM
blatant, classic anti-semitism. hands down. plain and simple. no ifs ands or buts.
but i wouldn't expect anyone here to take exception with this hateful and ignorant scree.
after all, the jews are the root of all evil in the world, right?
who knew that mel gibson read TWN?? :)
Posted by: Winnipeger at January 31, 2007 05:15 PM
Winnipeger:
The crowd here was objecting to "Dick" with a shake of the head and SILENCE. His thesis is simply off-topic as both Steve and Regular Readers share certain premises about intelligent interchanges, like dealing with the POST and not with yet another conspiracy theorist trying to highjack the thread. I mean even the German historians are fine with the conclusions of GERMANY'S AIMS IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR (1966). But thanks for taking up the cudgel. Yes, indeed, some blogmentors are meant to be smitten about the heads and shoulders like Amalekites.
Posted by: Robert M. at January 31, 2007 05:31 PM
Ah, Dick, some surprising statements here.
Can you share your sources with us?
Posted by: Pearl at January 31, 2007 05:32 PM
PRESIDENT PELOSI ASAP!!!!!
Brzezinski's realities will never be accepted by this White House, nor will his proposed four steps for a political solution. Impeachment proceedings against BOTH Bush & Cheney must start immediately to prevent protracted and expanded conflict that will inevitably occur with these criminals.
Both Bush and Cheney must be impeached because their flagrant offenses against the Constitution and the nation are so serious that the very survival of Constitutional government and the separation of powers on which it is based are at risk.
A dual POTUS/VPOTUS coup or impeachment is imperative, resulting in President Pelosi.
Posted by: Easy E at January 31, 2007 05:51 PM
I am reminded of one of Billmon’s most powerful posts, where he compared the 1988 -9 Soviet Union Politburo to the current US administration. It seemed to him (as it does to me) that leaders in both countries (including the Baker-Hamilton ISG), had played the lie/deceive game for so long that they were no longer capable of recognizing their own lies.
Nice that Brzezinski is still able to tell the difference. It remains to be seen how much the committee will hear, and how much they remain locked in an obsolete gestalt. But then even the South Africans eventually got it.
Posted by: erichwwk at January 31, 2007 06:21 PM
Why "penultimate quagmire"? Meaning the "ultimate" is Afghanistan?
Posted by: goubuli at January 31, 2007 06:53 PM
How typical of Brzezinski to put together a mostly sensible statement pointing toward liquidation of the Iraq commitment, and then step hard on his own message with an irrelevant crack about "colonial tutelage."
Even after all this time he can't shake the habit of a lifetime, can't bury the Central European academic polemicist to play the American statesman. It's as if he never left Poland. In the best case, Brzezinski gets his name added to the many other foreign policy types who have come out against the Bush administration's Iraq policy; but in the worst, which may be more likely, his argument gets ignored in the midst of a noisy, pointless debate over whether America's role in Iraq is really "reminiscent of colonial tutelage." Just what we need.
Posted by: Zathras at January 31, 2007 07:12 PM
At this point in time it is counterproductive to suggest that Bush and Cheney begin to act rationally, and to heed the suggestions of Brzezinki et. al.
What is the purpose is expressing what is only a wish---one you surely know will not be fulfilled?
Rather than wishing for unicorns, you should express support for an action within the realm of the possible. Among the effective proposals are impeachment or having Congress for a troop withdrawal from Iraq.
It may seem like I'm being nitpicky here, but IMO saying "Bush and Cheney would do well to listen to x" is akin to uttering another Friedmanesque deadline. Are we to wait until we know that Bush and Cheney will not heed the wise advice of Brzezinski before committing to an effective course of action? I say no, and I don't appreciate the hint of a suggestion that we wait for Bush and Cheney in any respect. Bush and Cheney can only aid US foreign policy by becoming irrelevant. That must be forced upon them, one way or another.
Posted by: Marky at January 31, 2007 07:19 PM
"That must be forced upon them, one way or another."
Bush blew off the Baker-Hamilton Commission, Pelosi said that impeachment is "off the table," and funding won't be cut for Iraq. Personally, I would like to see Bush and Cheney turned over to a war crimes tribunal, but that will never happen.
How can anything be "forced" on this administration?
Posted by: susan at January 31, 2007 08:24 PM
Molly Ivins, dead at 62...a real loss.
Posted by: Pearl at January 31, 2007 08:30 PM
Posted by erichwwk at January 31, 2007 06:21 PM
>>>>>>>>>>
Yes, I miss Billmon, his way of telling the truth about events was pure art.
Posted by: Carroll at January 31, 2007 09:04 PM
Bush and Cheney have been virtually unchallenged now for over six years. They long ago ceased pushing the envelope to see what they can get away with. Our Congress failed to rein them in, and they are now operating in a political environment that has virtually NO checks and balances. It simply doesn't matter what conclusions the ISG or Brzezinski arrive at, nor is there any incentive for them to accept or act on suggestions. Six years of doing exactly as they please, without fear of being held accountable, has created the current situation where we have a president that ignores anything other than the voices of a small cadre of fanatics, and a vice-president who is apparently completely detached from reality. The idea that these people will "listen to" Brzezinski is ludicrous. The botttom line is that this Administration is a threat to our national security, and, in fact, has already seriously damaged our national security. The Iraq war is NOT the most pressing issue facing Americans today. The most pressing issue is a Presidential Administration that is criminally operating outside of domestic and international law, and is seriously threatening our national security.
Until this Congress institutes impeachment proceedings, and starts using honest rhetoric, with terms like "treason", "lies", "war criminals", "war profiteering", "perjury", and "high crimes", then this administration will continue to drive our nation to ruin.
Posted by: Pissed Off American at January 31, 2007 09:12 PM
This is all very nice, but it means nothing. The only chance we have to avoid an attack on Iran is for Congress to affirmatively deny that war power through an appropriate resolution. I do not think that will keep him from giving the order, but it MAY allow those charged with carrying it out to refuse it.
Everything else that Congress is doing right now is merely politics and if we wait until the PR campaign is allowed to beat the drums, it will be too late as our courageous Congress will deem it unwise to undercut the President while engaged in an international crisis.
Posted by: mlaw230 at January 31, 2007 09:47 PM
Thanks Zbrig. But what you suggest to get us out of the Iraq quagmire will never happen. The real solution is to impeach Bush/Cheney. Ironically, I think Hillary, Biden, Dodd, McCain and all the wannabe presidents would not support impeachment. Their ambitions would trump justice being served. This unflattering presumption is made even in light of the fact that if ever there was more than enough justification for presidential impeachment it is in these current tragic times.
Pelosi would be good for two terms. What a dramatic turn of events this would be. If only congress would assert its constitutional responsibilities.
Posted by: Frank at January 31, 2007 10:40 PM
All the more reason to impeach Bush & Cheney:
CHENEY'S HANDWRITTEN NOTES IMPLICATE BUSH IN PLAME AFFAIR
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/013107Z.shtml
When will Congress finally wake up???????????
Posted by: Easy E at January 31, 2007 10:56 PM
Listen...the dems are not going to impeach Bush, forget it. It suits their 2008 ambitions better for him to stay in the WH.
We would be better off calling for mutiny in the CIA and Pentagon instead.
That has more of a chance of happening than an impeachment.
Posted by: Carroll at January 31, 2007 11:11 PM
I think that Brezinski has clarified the options in Iraq.
Rather than telling Bush/Cheney what they might do, I think he has given those who want to improve our situation in the Middle East clear ideas of how that might be done.
He has offered a positive response to the situation, rather than a negative reaction, which seems to be where we are much of the time.
Posted by: Bob Reid at January 31, 2007 11:17 PM
All:
The President is a stubborn man. He will go to war with Iran becuase that is what he believe in and there is nothing anyboady can do to stop him.
Posted by: pen Name at January 31, 2007 11:49 PM
pen Name is right.
Bush is going to keep drawing lines in the sand until he gets to Iran
Then we have the problem of congress, the same folks, dems and repubs, who cheered the bombing of Lebanon, in clear violation of international laws and said it was the right thing to do. An moment as low for the US as the invasion of Iraq and our torture fetish.
Then we have the current crop of presidential contenders, Edwards, Hillary,Obama etc...all who whom, except for Clark and Hagel who haven't entered the race, are beating the Iran drums also.
Then we have the Israeli goverment and AIPAC and a lot of big money from the right winger Jews of AIPAC in the campaign season running the Iran holocaust express.
No, I don't think any of them are going to listen to Brzezinski. The lawmakers who could do something are all struting their hour upon the stage in full blown oblivion to anything except their own ambitions and delusions. They really do think that becuase they sit in Washington they are protected from any ramifications of what they cause to happen in the world.
Take a look at the Herzliya Conference madness...and tell me who the nazis really are..
http://www.antiwar.com/pat/?articleid=10429
I also noticed an article where George Soros said the US needs to start "de nazisfying" itself..imagine that, a guy who actually had some personal experience with, and knows a thing or two about the nazis regime... but who will do it?..congress?...I don't think so. Any of the current presidential hopefuls?..I don't see any.
Posted by: Carroll at February 1, 2007 12:38 AM
What Brzezinski articulates are the recent feelings of the American electorate translated into the language of the statesman. We haven't heard statesmanlike language recently because Bush/Cheney haven't included any statesmen in their government (Condi Rice simply doesn't qualify). It's refreshing to hear isn't it? I think we can help turn this language into action by forwarding these remarks to our representatives in Washington and underscoring the line about Congress asserting itself. I don't want to sound polyanish but I believe people have power if they're willing to use it and now is a time to use it because the future, in any language, is looking grim.
Posted by: Neil at February 1, 2007 01:26 AM
Personally, to me, I don't think that Zbigniew Brzezinski is saying anything controversial in the least. I bet if you looked back to authors during the collapse of the Roman Empire, you'd find people saying similar things.
Bush's policy is a huge explosive increase upon the general Cold War model of deterrence, but even then certain colonial dynamics were at play. Interesting how empire props up these mindless self-deluded leaders who, in the process of launching an aggressive war against a country that was not the least threat to us at the time, committed grave human rights abuses against Iraqis, with their society destroyed and many of the most important people gone, their young women even at the age of 14 being raped, their security out the window regardless of who you are.
This is precisely how empire works. If one were to ask me precisely what the downfall of this particular empire is going to be, and is proving to be, I'd tell you that there are two things: both Bush's blindness and imperialism's bankruptcy as a model for foreign policy. See, he doesn't even see this: the Shia and Kurd leaders in Iraq are acting in accord with Bush's military interests only because it suits their own interests. They will see, as Saudi Arabia is, that in the end you cannot be allied with Bush's policy of aggression and must instead deal with the regional actors on the ground. Look at the constant flow of news, and you'll see that the Iraqi government is constantly holding talks with Iran and Syria, and is now even going to be having a huge Iranian bank in its country.
There's nothing particularly moral or immoral about normal diplomacy, which necessitates the downfall of our colonial tutelage. All it means is putting a fair, even-handed face to the world, and although we will likely face a large loss of political influence, we can still at this point maintain equitable economic relationships around the world without war. The American people are pretty peaceful people, but are now at once complicit it the huge crimes of Bush in Iraq and elsewhere, and are also stuck in this vicious media and social loop, erected by Bush and his supporters, where you don't even get information about the huge human rights abuses by Bush, like when US warplanes killed over a hundred Somali nomads who happened to be lighting a fire at night (see Oxfam).
Posted by: Mike at February 1, 2007 03:58 AM
"The President of the United States and Secretary of State would restore some of their lost luster by making some combination of James Baker, Lee Hamilton, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Brent Scowcroft co-Middle East Envoys to help take this penultimate quagmire we are in a direction that might start a virtuous cycle of possibilities rather than the disaster that is unfolding"
Steve, You try to be opmistic, but the President and Secretary of State are irreparably tainted goods as well as the long list of co-conspirators, the same who are now polishing their plans for Iran.
I think that you and those concerned with a decent foreign policy have no hope of such an about face from this administration. They are determined to impose by force, internationally and domestically their twisted comcept of human nature. Our population is used as a tool, to carry out their intention, because intention it is.
Posted by: Marcia at February 1, 2007 05:06 AM
Zbigniew BRzezinski is a proud American-Pole. (One has only to glance at his "peacock" photo to realize this.) But he is also, as an avatar of his rich historical Polish heritage, the quintessential romantic. One is reminded of the cavalry charge of the heroic Polish officers against the panzer divisions of the Wehrmacht, at the beginning of the Second World War.
Likewise, Brzezinski is leading a diplomatic cavalry charge against the Islamist fanatics that can only end in placing America on the hill of CALVARY. For a diplomatic "surge", as he proposes, without the United States first solidifying its dominance on the field of battle, and hence negotiating with its irreconcilable implacable foes from a position of weakness, will render to the global jihadists and their state sponsors, such as Iran, a tremendous victory against the US that will instantly threaten the vital geopolitical interests of the latter, if not bring the US to stare into the abyss of its self-inflicted extinction as a dominant power.
This is the "hemlockean" strategic remedy that our romantic Zbigniew Brzezinski proposes, a presumed votary of realpolitik, to the American political elite.
Posted by: Con George-Kotzabasis at February 1, 2007 05:54 AM
As tens of thousands who've read my board could attest, Brzezinski's analyses and conclusions square perfectly with my own as written both beforehand and concurrently under my true name, so I cannot disagree with his "words of advice" to THIS Congress or his "bashing" of THIS President and HIS advisors.
Nonetheless, it should not be forgotten or ignored that it was the manipulatively-given and ignorantly-taken advice of this same man, to President Carter, that had INITIALLY FOMENTED the now-called "Islamic Terrorism," by creating and sponsoring the Taliban in Afghanistan, "to trap Russia into its own 'Vietnam quagmire' at that time".
The whole, documented story can be read in SourceWatch, at this URL
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Zbigniew_Brzezinski
This is quoted therefrom:
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In a 1997 interview for CNN's Cold War Series, Brzezinski hinted about the Carter Administration's proactive Afghanistan policy before the Soviet invasion in 1979, that he had conceived.
Interviewer: How did you interpret Soviet behavior in Afghanistan, such as the April revolution, the rise of... I mean, what did you think their long-term plans were, and what did you think should be done about it?
Brzezinski: I told the President, about six months before the Soviets entered Afghanistan, that in my judgment I thought they would be going into Afghanistan. And I decided then, and I recommended to the President, that we shouldn't be passive.
Interviewer: What happened?
Brzezinski: We weren't passive.
The National Security Archive, Interview with Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, for CNN's Coldwar Series, June 13, 1997
7 months after the interview for the CNN series, Brzezinski, in a interview for the French publication, Le Nouvel Observateur, was more forthright, and unapologetically claimed to be the mastermind of a feint which caused the Soviet Union to embark upon a military intervention to support their client government in Kabul, as well as training and arming extremists, which later became the Taliban government.
Q: When the Soviets justified their intervention by asserting that they intended to fight against a secret involvement of the United States in Afghanistan, people didn't believe them. However, there was a basis of truth. You don't regret anything today?
Brzezinski: Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter: We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.
Q: And neither do you regret having supported the Islamic [integrisme], having given arms and advice to future terrorists?
Brzezinski: What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?
Le Nouvel Observateur, Interview with Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, Paris, January 15-21, 1998, translated by Bill Blum - [4]
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Posted by: Joseph Sarandos at February 1, 2007 06:13 AM
Brezinski regularly makes a monkey out of his co-guest Walter Russell Meade, when they appear on the Newshour. The most trenchant and accurate critics of Bush foreign policy we have.
Posted by: bob h at February 1, 2007 06:32 AM
I am delighted that someone so high and well known within the system will speak out like this. But has he said anything that hasn't already been said by totally unknowns like Mr. and Ms. America? I don't think so. And besides, other than looking towards the next elections coming up, members of Congress aren't listening anyway.
The question is not "Who's on first?", but more accurately, Who's ruinning the country? Congress is certainly not running it.
You don't have to be a blind conservative not to see it, just an ignorant one to deny it.
Posted by: Dennis at February 1, 2007 08:52 AM
Brezinski, being a Pole, has a distinct advantage and that may explain why he has been able to adjust (after creating the mujaheddin)and understand the big picture where others of his generation (including the ISG) cannot. Let’s remember he opposed Gulf War 1 in 1990, for exactly the right reasons, and predicted what would happen.
He, along with Reagan, also read Gorbachev right, and saw how the events precipitated in Poland, and then Hungary would lead to the fall of the USSR, although he still could not conceive that it would be non-violent. But both saw (as did George Schultz, but not Scowcroft), that while USSR had ossified into “old sphinxesâ€, Gorbachev was different.
Gorbachev’s in his December 1988 speech before the UN (when he announced the unilateral reduction of 500,000 troops to the Warsaw Pact) stated “force and the threat of force cannot and should not be an instrument of foreign policy…â€
Gorbachev was also leery of the GWBush administration, “These people were brought up in the years of the Cold War and still do not have any foreign policy alternatives. I think that they are still concerned that they might be on the losing side. Big breakthroughs can hardly be expectedâ€.
Carroll, I too wish billmon would chime in here, and flesh out how we also have an ossified “Politburoâ€, with folks like 2nd generation politico Jon Kyl still locked into the paradigm of soft colonies, and force being the tool to preserve that.
Posted by: erichwwk at February 1, 2007 09:09 AM
Billmon has been absent for weeks now. No one seems to have information about him. I check in almost everyday.
Posted by: Marcia at February 1, 2007 10:36 AM
Billmon has been absent for weeks now. No one seems to have information about him. I check in almost everyday.
Posted by: Marcia at February 1, 2007 10:37 AM
Billmon has said his goodbye, deciding to concentrate on family and a large mortgage. The Investment group with which he has contracted to pay those bills is unfortunately not as enlightened as Richard Vague. Perhaps what the AR and the NAF has done with its Terrorism Report will change that.
In any case Miguel de Icaza http://tirania.org/blog/ has archived the blog at
http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.billmon.org
PS sorry for the wierdness in interpreting the quote character from a cut and paste, making the Gorbachev quotes unclear. If I may repeat they were:
force and the threat of force cannot and should not be an instrument of foreign policy
and (referring to the GWBush Admin):
These people were brought up in the years of the Cold War and still do not have any foreign policy alternatives. I think that they are still concerned that they might be on the losing side. Big breakthroughs can hardly be expected
Posted by: erichwwk at February 1, 2007 11:41 AM
I think some consideration should be given to the proposition that the non-publicized strategy of the Bush administration in Iraq is that - given the regional and domestic politics-
1. It is in the best interest of the United States that stalemate continue among warring factions in Iraq for the foreseeable future, and
2. United States tactics should, under no circumstances, operate in a way that would strengthen the Iraqi government to the point that it would be able to defend its existence without the assistance of the United States military forces, before such time as the United States is successful in achieving the Bush administration's goals vis a vis Iran.
What evidence is there that stalemate is an unspoken strategy of the Bush administration? A stalemate strategy would explain some Bush administration comments we hear that might otherwise seem illogical or delusional. For example,
1. Why Mr. Bush can state with a straight face that it is essential that only 21,500 additional troops be sent to Iraq when he describes the situation as potentially catastrophic for the future of our nation, and there is an informed consensus that this is an insufficient number. It is an insufficient number to result in a decisive military outcome, but is enough to continue the stalemate policy in a way that addresses corrosive political concerns that there is no strategy.
2. Why Mr. Cheney continues to assert that we are doing fine in Iraq, and that things are not as bad as some would say. This statement could otherwise be seen as a lie, a delusion, or a misreading of the evidence of the current situation in Iraq. If the hypothesized strategy is in place, it is an honest, rational, and perhaps correct assessment based on a stalemate strategy.
What would be the object for a stalemate strategy? I would consider the following-
1. The Bush administration began the war thinking that it could easily topple Hussein and install its own man to run the country as an ally and client nation to the United States. Mr. Chalabi appeared to be its man for the job, but when it became apparent that Chalabi could not muster the minimum Iraqi support to make this viable, even if he could be trusted, the Bush administration was left without a candidate to run the Iraqi nation. Until one surfaces, the Bush administration will play "dog in the manger", essentially holding a veto over a government until it finds its man.
2. The United States cannot muster sufficient military force to achieve a decisive military outcome resulting in an ally and client nation. In lieu of that, or until such time as it can, stalemate, essentially a war of attrition, is the best it can do.
3. The worst outcome possible for the Bush administration is a strong Iraqi government, able to exist without the assistance of the United States. Such a government, as Juan Cole and others have noted many times earlier, would most probably be a strong ally of Iranian interests, rather than an ally of the United States. How could the Bush administration survive if, after all the lives of our soldiers have been lost and hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars spent, the result of that is that we have gotten rid of a nation that stood as an enemy to our enemy, Iran, and created a nation that is the ally of our enemy. In fact, as Mr. Brzezinski has pointed out, the war justification de jour is that it is part of a larger battle against Iran and its allies.
4. A weak Iraqi government allows United States oil interests to form oil development agreements on favorable terms.
I have not decided in my own mind that there is such a stalemate strategy in place - I do not know enough about the situation to really deal with the question fairly - but believe it ought to be explored.
Posted by: TJ at February 1, 2007 05:19 PM
"Right or wrong, many view the establishment of such a hegemony as the primary reason for the American intervention in a region only recently free of colonial domination."
Mr. Clemons, you got to be kidding. What is all this neo-con babble about 'global benevoplent hegemony' about then? Of course for them that it's a goal.
It may not be your goal, but then we're not talking about your intention but about what America's current Administration wants. How are terms like 'Full Spectrum Dominance', or another favourite of mine, not allowing emergence of a 'Near Term Competitor' (variable for either China, Russia and/ or Old Europe) to be understood if not in this light? Just empty babble? Not really.
These terms are still elements of the actual US National Security sort-of-Strategy.
Posted by: confusedponderer at February 4, 2007 01:14 PM
Actually, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is even more trickery. To understand it you have to replace the word Jews with Illuminati and goyim with cattle then you will understand, jews are just pawns in the game like the rest of us, yeah some illuminati are jews, butthe contollers of the protocols and the actual "zionists" arent racist, they are power mad control freaks who despise the middle class and lower class. (im not jewish)
Posted by: j123 at February 6, 2007 12:43 PM
If someone says anything about Iraq without mentioning oil, they are lying.
The action they recommend may sound good, but if they are lying abour something so central to what is going on, and pretend the war is the result of the over-exuberance of giddy ideologues, they are lying.
The Iraqis know oil is central to the war. The rest of the Arab World does. The rest of the WORLD does. Even most Americans know it on some intuitive level even though our media has scrupulously avoided any mention of the oil motive. Yet these talking heads still insult our intelligence by pretending we believe the lies.
