Intelligence, information, truth and power
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, April 3, 2009

When the Israel lobby launched its frantic campaign to obstruct the appointment of Chas Freeman as chairman of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), it was as though a notorious anti-Zionist was just about to torpedo US-Israeli relations. The idea that Ambassador Freeman could have played an important role in improving America’s national security and its position in the world apparently didn’t enter the minds of those who saw him as a threat.

Now that the furor has died down, Freeman has given an interview with Jim Lobe from the Inter Press Service and he outlines the approach that he had hoped to bring to the handling of intelligence and its role in government. What Freeman touches upon actually reaches far beyond the issue of intelligence and points to fundamental questions about how information is viewed and how its use shapes our lives.

This is how the issues were laid out in the interview:

Jim Lobe: Because much of the talk around Washington after your appointment – before, during and after your withdrawal – has so narrowly focused on a few issues, there was never much public debate about what you hoped to accomplish in the job of NIC chairman.

Chas Freeman: I was, frankly, approaching this with a fairly well thought out but still hypothetical focus on process with some additional questions of substance that I wanted to explore. I say hypothetical, because you never know until you encounter bureaucratic or other realities whether your notion of what needs to be done is in fact realistic or feasible.

But my sense was there have been several problems with the intelligence community and its output in recent years. Obviously, there’s been a problem of quality, illustrated along with the other problem – credibility – very nicely in the run-up to the Iraq War and the credulity with which the intelligence community responded to assertions by exile and special interest groups and others, and its willingness to slice and dice its conclusions to suit the political taste of its principal consumers.

Jim Lobe: What sorts of procedural changes were you thinking about implementing?

Chas Freeman: In general, I would’ve tried very hard to encourage members of the intelligence community to use classified information as a form of corroboration for information that is not classified, or is not terribly sensitive even if it is classified. In other words, I would urge analysts to write down rather than write up terms of levels of classification.

The theory here is that, whereas many people in the (NIC) have tended to see the value of intelligence as directly proportional to its level of classification, this, in fact, misunderstands the nature of intelligence. Intelligence is simply information that is relevant to statecraft or decision-making. If it’s on the front page of the Financial Times or Inter Press or has been stolen out of the Kremlin safe, the key question is what is its reliability and how much can you rely upon it in understanding the situation you confront and in forming policies to deal with that situation.

I must say much of the criticism of my appointment focused on the apparently horrifying possibility that I might actually produce intelligence that might not conform to political convenience or correctness but reached some other conclusion – intelligence that wouldn’t fit the preconceptions or policy preferences of its consumers. And that would be unacceptable.

The tendency to tie the value of intelligence to its level of classification is the product of a philosophical view of information that has profound implications.

The crucial issue is whether information is viewed as a repository of truth or power.

Is information valued because it illuminates understanding or because it can serve as a means to an end?

Information as a repository of power needs to be guarded and channeled in the most effective way. Its value becomes diluted through loss of ownership.

Information as a repository of truth acquires value if it can be tied to other information through a process of exchange. Its value is enhanced through the relinquishment of ownership.

Democracy rises or falls on its ability to sustain the free flow of information. As a practical necessity that flow needs to be managed yet if this is treated as an exercise in the control of power, democratic governance itself will be undermined.

Those who saw Freeman as a threat were looking through the prism of information-as-power. They thought he would be a gatekeeper who held back information that would serve their agenda while promoting the flow of information whose dissemination would act against their interests. What they failed to see was that Freeman never shared their presuppositions about the nature of information.

The Israel lobby gets pumped up with blood lust
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, March 12, 2009

The first line of defense has come crashing down.

Denying the existence of the Israel lobby is like saying there’s no such thing as global warming.

But just as global warming deniers later decided to reposition themselves by acknowledging its reality while suggesting it was harmless, those who now reluctantly concede that the lobby exists want to insist that it is benign and not particularly powerful. They charge that far more dangerous than the lobby are its critics: a fanatic bunch of slanderers who stand at the vanguard of a global wave of anti-Semiticism.

Even so, the lobby that preferred to hide in the shadows has now broken cover and while intoxicated with victory wants to bring down another quarry.

In a victory message (revealed by Mondoweiss), Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, heralded Steven Rosen’s “achievement” after having got “the word out” — mobilized the lobby. Pipes applauded Rosen because, “Only someone with Steve’s stature and credibility could have made this happen.” There was a campaign and in three weeks it accomplished its goal: Chas Freeman bowed out.

But even now, the editors of the Washington Post want to try and sustain the charade that there is no lobby and denounce those of us who think otherwise:

Mr. Freeman issued a two-page screed on Tuesday in which he described himself as the victim of a shadowy and sinister “Lobby” whose “tactics plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency” and which is “intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government.” Yes, Mr. Freeman was referring to Americans who support Israel — and his statement was a grotesque libel.

For the record, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee says that it took no formal position on Mr. Freeman’s appointment and undertook no lobbying against him. If there was a campaign, its leaders didn’t bother to contact the Post editorial board.

If the Post’s editorial board was truly outside the loop here it probably says less about the vigor of the campaign and more about the diminishing influence of their editorial page. It’s role is now that of being granted the final word — one that can then be applauded by its bloodthirsty allies like Marty Peretz: “With cool and stiletto words, the Post has put this man in the bin.”

(That’s an interesting choice of imagery and reinforces what I suggested yesterday: that it would in many ways be more fitting if we talked about the Israel mob instead of the lobby. Be that as it may, the language has now solidified in popular usage and Israel lobby it is. All that remains to be contested is whether it should be lobby or Lobby. I’m sticking with the small “l” since I think this is an entity held together with much stronger ideological than organizational glue.)

As for the Post’s assertion that AIPAC played no part, that might be its official position though Dan Fleshler says the organization didn’t just sit back and watch:

Very reliable sources inform me that Josh Block, an AIPAC spokesperson, contacted bloggers and journalists expressing concern about Freeman. That is probably what Freeman referred to when he mentioned “easily traceable e-mails” in the announcement that he was giving up the fight. Trust me on this one. I had to think twice about writing it because I want Block, who is generally very nice to critical journalists at the AIPAC Policy Conferences, to be nice to me. There is no way I would have written it unless it were manifestly true, and important.

Even it were not true, it is simply inconceivable that Mark Kirk, Charles Schumer and other Congressfolk who publicly objected to Freeman would have done so without the encouragement – or winks and nods – of AIPAC. The Hill is where it lives and breathes, and nothing this important could have been orchestrated without its blessing.

Walter Pincus adds:

Only a few Jewish organizations came out publicly against Freeman’s appointment, but a handful of pro-Israeli bloggers and employees of other organizations worked behind the scenes to raise concerns with members of Congress, their staffs and the media.

For example, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), often described as the most influential pro-Israel lobbying group in Washington, “took no position on this matter and did not lobby the Hill on it,” spokesman Josh Block said.

But Block responded to reporters’ questions and provided critical material about Freeman, albeit always on background, meaning his comments could not be attributed to him, according to three journalists who spoke to him. Asked about this yesterday, Block replied: “As is the case with many, many issues every day, when there is general media interest in a subject, I often provide publicly available information to journalists on background.”

Yesterday, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, which tried to derail Freeman’s appointment, applauded his withdrawal. But it added: “We think Israel and any presumed ‘lobby’ had far less effect on the outcome than the common-sensical belief that the person who is the gatekeeper of intelligence information for the President of the United States should be unencumbered by payments from foreign governments.”

The suggestion that neither Freeman’s views on Israel nor the efforts of the Israel lobby were central is however quite easy to refute by engaging in a simple line of conjecture.

Consider the blog post through which Steven Rosen “got the word out”:

Readers of this blog know that I have been generally quite positive about the appointments the new Adminsitration is making for Middle East policy positions. Today’s news is quite different. According to Laura Rozen at the Foreign Policy blog, Chas W. Freeman, Jr., the former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, will become chairman of the National Intelligence Council, and may at times participate in daily intelligence briefings to President Obama. This is a profoundly disturbing appointment, if the report is correct. Freeman is a strident critic of Israel, and a textbook case of the old-line Arabism that afflicted American diplomacy at the time the state of Israel was born. His views of the region are what you would expect in the Saudi foreign ministry, with which he maintains an extremely close relationship, not the top CIA position for analytic products going to the President of the United States.

Here is a sample of his views on Israel, from his Remarks to the National Council on US-Arab Relations on September 12, 2005: “As long as the United States continues unconditionally to provide the subsidies and political protection that make the Israeli occupation and the high-handed and self-defeating policies it engenders possible, there is little, if any, reason to hope that anything resembling the former peace process can be resurrected. Israeli occupation and settlement of Arab lands is inherently violent. …And as long as such Israeli violence against Palestinians continues, it is utterly unrealistic to expect that Palestinians will stand down from violent resistance and retaliation against Israelis. Mr. Sharon is far from a stupid man; he understands this. So, when he sets the complete absence of Palestinian violence as a precondition for implementing the road map or any other negotiating process, he is deliberately setting a precondition he knows can never be met.”

Here is another example from 2008: “We have reflexively supported the efforts of a series of right-wing Israeli governments to undo the Oslo accords and to pacify the Palestinians rather than make peace with them. … The so-called “two-state solution” – is widely seen in the region as too late and too little. Too late, because so much land has been colonized by Israel that there is not enough left for a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel; too little, because what is on offer looks to Palestinians more like an Indian reservation than a country.”

According to Foreign policy blog, Freeman has told associates that in the job, he will occasionally accompany Director of National Intelligence Adm. Dennis Blair to give the president his daily intelligence briefing. His predecessor, Thomas Fingar, wore a second hat as deputy director of national intelligence for analysis.

Now subtract the parts relating to Israel. You’re left with this:

Readers of this blog know that I have been generally quite positive about the appointments the new Adminsitration is making for Middle East policy positions. Today’s news is quite different. According to Laura Rozen at the Foreign Policy blog, Chas W. Freeman, Jr., the former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, will become chairman of the National Intelligence Council, and may at times participate in daily intelligence briefings to President Obama. This is a profoundly disturbing appointment, if the report is correct. His views of the region are what you would expect in the Saudi foreign ministry, with which he maintains an extremely close relationship, not the top CIA position for analytic products going to the President of the United States.

According to Foreign policy blog, Freeman has told associates that in the job, he will occasionally accompany Director of National Intelligence Adm. Dennis Blair to give the president his daily intelligence briefing. His predecessor, Thomas Fingar, wore a second hat as deputy director of national intelligence for analysis.

Is this the basis of a campaign? I don’t think so.

What now follows?

Fred Kaplan makes an interesting argument:

Chas Freeman is a high-profile figure. He became one by his own design, through public speeches, some of them deliberately provocative. Making him NIC chairman would—unjustly but unavoidably—hurl all intelligence, and all policy based on intelligence, into the fray of fractious politics.

However, this is where Freeman’s foes misplayed their hand. Had they let Freeman step into the job, they could have used him as the whipping boy for all foreign-policy measures they don’t like—especially those involving the Middle East and China—and it might have been easier for them to rally opposition. But now it will be indisputably clear that the president is the one making policy. They’re left with Barack Obama as their target—and one thing that’s clear, so far, is that those who sling mud at Obama wind up hitting themselves.

This might turn out to be true but there are already indications that having successfully thrust a stiletto into Freeman, those who still have blood on their hands now have DNI Blair in their sights.

“It wasn’t until Mr. Freeman withdrew from consideration for the job, however, that it became clear just how bad a selection Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair had made… The real question is why an administration that says it aims to depoliticize U.S. intelligence estimates would have chosen such a man to oversee them,” says the Washington Post.

“Blair revealed his true colors by hiring Freeman. From here on out, every intel product will be treated as suspect. The Obama administration’s attempt to politicize the intelligence process has badly muddied the waters,” wrote Michael Goldfarb in The Weekly Standard.

Did Freeman’s foes misplay their hand, as Fred Kaplan suggests, or are they now one step closer to achieving a much more significant goal: to be able cast doubt on any statement the DNI makes.

Freeman needed to be finished off and put “in the bin.” Blair just needs to be crippled.

The Israel lobby tightens its stranglehold on American politics
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, March 11, 2009

Nothing disturbs Washington’s political culture more than uninvited honesty.

Chas Freeman’s eloquent yet blunt explanation of why he has decided not to take up the post of chairman of the National Intelligence Council was described as “intemperate” by the ever-temperate James Fallows and as “a bit too hot, for my taste” by Joe Klein. (Both Klein and Fallows, I should note, were not among Freeman’s critics.)

To those who regard Freeman’s statement as somehow an affront to the decorum that Washington expects I would ask this: Is it better to apply make-up over a festering boil, or is it better to lance it?

Joe Klein, even now unwilling to acknowledge the existence of an “Israel lobby,” insists that Freeman was the victim of an attack by a mob — a largely Jewish neoconservative mob — but not a lobby. That strikes me as merely a semantic quibble. If Israel “lobby” sounds too dignified, I have no problem with calling it the “Israel mob” — it is indeed a kind of political mafia.

But however anyone wants to characterize or label the Israel lobby, no one can dispute that it is tenacious. Freeman’s assessment that were he to take up the intelligence position he would remain “under constant attack” is most likely accurate. His choice to remain in private life is understandable. If anything constructive is to come out of this episode — and I think it can — it is that the workings of the Israel lobby are now more transparent than ever.

The campaign against Freeman was led by the indicted former director of AIPAC, Steven Rosen. While the victory champagne was no doubt still flowing, the editors of the Washington Post saw fit — with amazing timing — to add their own toast by calling on the Attorney General to drop the case against Rosen in which he has been charged under the Espionage Act. The Post argues:

The government has the right to demand strict confidentiality from government officials and others who swear to protect its secrets. The Justice Department errs egregiously and risks profound damage to the First Amendment, however, when it insists that private citizens — academics, journalists, think tank analysts, lobbyists and the like — also are legally bound to keep the nation’s secrets. The prosecution in effect criminalizes the exchange of information.

I’m no legal expert, but it would seem that the case hinges not on whether individuals outside government can legally be the recipients of classified information. Rather, the case would seem to rest on a determination of AIPAC’s actual nature.

Even if it is not registered as an agent of a foreign government, if AIPAC can be demonstrated to have been functioning as such, then as an AIPAC official, Rosen could presumably be shown to have been acting on behalf of the Israeli government.

As Douglas M. Bloomfield, a former legislative director and chief lobbyist for AIPAC, writes: “The American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its leaders could be the biggest losers in a case that threatens to expose the group’s inner secrets.”

He continues:

Although AIPAC claims it has nothing to do with the convoluted case, it is also on trial, in a way. The organization fired the pair [Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman] and said they were rogues acting beneath the group’s standards. That will be shot full of holes from all directions in court, whether in the criminal case or in a likely civil suit by the defendants claiming damage to their reputations and careers.

The mere threat of a multimillion-dollar civil suit could prompt a very generous settlement offer from AIPAC in exchange for a vow of silence from the former staffers. But don’t worry; AIPAC can easily afford it.

Soon after the FBI raided AIPAC offices, the organization launched a fund-raising campaign to defend against any charges, and the appeals for money didn’t stop when it fired the pair. Since the scandal broke in 2004, AIPAC’s fund-raising juggernaut has hauled in so much dough that one senior staffer told me that “it’s coming in faster than we know what to do with it.”

JTA quoted tax records showing AIPAC raised $86 million in 2007, doubling 2003’s $43 million. Not all of that money was a result of the espionage case, but many millions were.

In cutting loose the pair, AIPAC insisted it had no idea what they were doing. Not so, say insiders, former colleagues, sources close to the defense, and others familiar with the organization.

One of the topics AIPAC won’t want discussed, say these sources, is how closely it coordinated with Benjamin Netanyahu in the 1990s, when he led the Israeli Likud opposition and later when he was prime minister, to impede the Oslo peace process being pressed by President Bill Clinton and Israeli Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres.

That could not only validate AIPAC’s critics, who accuse it of being a branch of the Likud, but also lead to an investigation of violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

Clearly, nothing worries AIPAC and its supporters more than the possibility that the organization — and by extension the Israel lobby as a political force — might face wider public scrutiny.

The campaign against Chas Freeman was not driven by an exaggerated estimation of his importance; it was a strategic battle in defense of the lobby’s deeply entrenched political authority. The importance of the fight was evident by the fact that it was fought in the open. But having come right out into the open, it is now that much more difficult for the lobby to retreat into the shadows.

And as Steven Rosen once wrote in an AIPAC internal memo: “A lobby is like a night flower. It thrives in the dark and dies in the sun.”