March 15, 2009
By now most everyone knows the former Ambassador Charles "Chas" Freeman has withdrawn his appointment to be the Obama admin's top intelligence analyst. If you heard anything about his controversial nomination and favorable views toward Saudi Arabia and the Tianemen Square massacre, it was no thanks to the mainstream media. Instead conservative and Jewish bloggers are credited with -- or blamed for -- his bowing out. Freeman himself lashed out at the "pro-Israel lobby" in DC for wrecking his nomination.
Mainstream media reported on Freeman's angry withdrawal, but very little of the controversy itself. Caroline Glick, a conservative columnist for
The Jerusalem Post, writes about why the entire episode, from his apointment to withdrawal, is disturbing to American intelligence and to Israel.
Glick notes that the main controversy "revolved around his financial and political ties to potential and actual US adversaries" and not his views on Israel, which were prediminantly negative.
Whatever the reason for his resignation, it is a good thing that Freeman was forced to resign. It is a very good thing that the man writing the US's National Intelligence Estimates and briefing the president on intelligence matters is not a hired gun for the Saudi and Chinese governments who believes that Jewish Americans have no right to participate in public debate about US foreign policy. But while his appointment was foiled, the fact that a man like Freeman was even considered for the post tells us two deeply disturbing things about the climate in Washington these days.
First and foremost, Freeman's appointment gives us disconcerting information about how the Obama administration intends to relate to intelligence. Freeman was appointed by Adm. Dennis Blair, President Barack Obama's director of national intelligence. Blair stood by Freeman's appointment even after information became known about his financial ties to foreign governments and his extreme views on Israel and American Jews were exposed. Blair repeatedly extolled Freeman for his willingness to stake out unpopular positions.
Blair ... defended Freeman ...(and) the Islamic Republic. He claimed that just because Iran is enriching uranium, there is no reason to believe that the mullahs are interested in building a bomb. That is, America's top intelligence officer is willing to take Iran's word on everything.
On the other hand, he isn't willing to take Israel's word on anything. Although he acknowledged that his nonchalant assessment of Iran was based on the same information as Israel's dire assessment of Iran, Blair scoffed at Israel's views, claiming that they are colored by the Jewish state's fears. In his words, "The Israelis are far more concerned about it, and they take more of a worst-case approach to these things from their point of view." ...
THE SECOND disturbing development exposed by Freeman's appointment is the emergence of a very committed and powerful anti-Israel lobby in Washington. In the past, while anti-Israel politicians, policy-makers and opinion-shapers were accepted in Washington, they would not have felt comfortable brandishing their anti-Israel positions as a qualifying credential for high position. Freeman's appointment shows that this is no longer the case. ...
From September 11, to Russia's invasion of Georgia, from Hamas's victory in the 2006 Palestinian elections to the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate that claimed Iran ended its nuclear weapons program in 2003, it is clear that in recent years, the US intelligence community has regularly substituted wishful thinking for true analysis. Freeman's appointment and the emergence of the anti-Israel lobby as a major force in Washington policy circles show that turning the US away from Israel has become a key component of that wishful thinking.
But, as they say in the world of intelligence, forewarned is forearmed.
Read it all
here.
