Bad Moon Rising
A new cabinet will mark neocon ascendancy
Philip Giraldi • December 12, 2017 Back during the admittedly brief shock and awe period that immediately followed on the Trump electoral victory, it appeared that there might be an actual realignment of American foreign policy.
The neoconservatives virtually unanimously had opposed Donald Trump in the most vile terms, both in the GOP primaries and during the actual electoral campaign, making clear that Hillary was their choice for a future full of unrelenting, ideologically driven warfare to convert the world to democracy. By that metric, one would assume that Trump would prefer to be roasted on a spit rather than have neocons on his national security team, and many in the punditry did agree with that analysis and went on to share that view.
At
the time, I agreed, but I did note that the neoconservatives have
proven to be remarkable resilient, particularly as many of them have
remained true to their Democratic Party values on nearly everything but
foreign policy, where they are irredeemable hawks, hostile to Russia and
Iran and always reliably in the corner of Israel. In short, many
neocons can be unmasked as Hillary Clinton Democrats if one looks at
them issue by issue, which certainly helps to explain some subsequent
developments.
Some
Washington observers who actually care about such things have been
writing how there has been a kumbaya process going on between
self-described conservative neocons and liberal interventionists.
Katrina vanden Heuvel describes the progressive hawks as “the essential-country crowd,” borrowing a phrase from ex-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
There
are inevitably minor disconnects between the two groups based on their
motives for aggression – Democrats claim to do it to bring democracy and
freedom while Republicans say they do it to enhance national security.
Both are lying in any event as it all comes down to great power
rivalries, with big powerful nations pushing smaller weaker nations
around because they are able to get away with it and feel more
comfortable if everyone lines up behind them.
So
everyone in Washington and New York’s financial services industry
agrees that a more assertive America is a better America even when the
reality is that no one winds up with either democracy or security. Which
brings us to the latest shuffle in the Donald Trump cabinet and what it
is likely to mean down the road. Multiple sources are predicting
Tillerson out and Mike Pompeo in at State Department with Pompeo
replaced at CIA by Senator Tom Cotton. The White House is denying the
story, calling it “fake news,” but it is clear that Trump is
uncomfortable with the current arrangement and Tillerson will be gone
sooner or later.
Mike
Pompeo as Secretary of State replaces a somewhat bumbling businessman
adept at dealing in energy futures contracts who has been struggling
with reducing State’s enormously bloated payroll. Pompeo, a real
hard-nosed political hardliner who tends to see complex issues in fairly
simplistic ways, has become a presidential confidant, briefing Trump
frequently on the state of the world, most recently pushing for the
horrific decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. In a recent speech
, Pompeo criticized the CIA, observing that it had both forgotten how
to spy, which is almost certainly true, while adding that it will have
to become “more vicious” to accomplish its mission of making the United
States “safe.” Pompeo would like to turn the United States into an
unleashed wrecking ball directed against the enemies of the American Way
and he appears intent on starting that process in the Middle East.
And
Pompeo will be replaced as CIA Director by Tom Cotton. The less said
about Tom the better, but I will attempt to summarize in 8 words here:
Tom is completely owned by the Israel Lobby. In his 2014 election as
junior Senator from Arkansas, he received $1 million from the Emergency
Committee for Israel headed by Bill Kristol as well as additional
assistance from the Republican Jewish Coalition. In March 2015, Tom paid
those supporters back when 47 Republican United States Senators signed a
letter allegedly written by him
that was then sent to the Iranian government directly, warning that any
agreement over that country’s nuclear program reached with President
Barack Obama would likely be overturned by the Congress. The letter,
which undercuts the authority of the American president before an
international audience, was signed by the entire Republican Party
leadership in the Senate and also included then presidential contenders
Rand Paul, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.
I
do not wish to imply that Cotton and Pompeo are somehow stupid, but
they do tend to see the world in a very monochromatic fashion, just like
their boss. Pompeo was first in his class at West Point and Cotton
graduated from Harvard as an undergrad and also from the Law School.
Trump claims to be the smartest person in the room no matter where he is
standing. But for all the academic credentials and other posturing, it
is hard to imagine how the new choices could possibly be worse from a
common-sense perspective unless one includes Nikki Haley, who is,
fortunately, otherwise engaged. Haley really is stupid. And ambitious.
And is also owned by the Israel Lobby, which appears to be a thread that
runs its way through all the Trump foreign policy appointees.
What
is wrong about the whole Trump team is that they all seem to believe
that you can go around the world kicking the shit out of everyone
without there being any consequences. And they all hate Iran for reasons
that continue to be obscure but may be connected to their relationships
with – you guessed it – the neoconservatives and the Israeli Lobby!
Yes,
the neocons are back. I noted back in October that when Pompeo and
National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster wanted a friendly place to drop
by to give a policy speech that would be warmly received they went to
the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), whose marketing masthead slogan
is “Fighting Terrorism and Promoting Freedom.” FDD is currently neocon
central, used like the American Enterprise Institute was when Dick
Cheney was Vice President and needed a friendly audience. It is headed
by Canadian Mark Dubowitz, whose passion in life is making sure that
sanctions on Iran are enforced to the letter. Unfortunately, it is not
easy to deport a Canadian.
Neocon
watchers will undoubtedly note that big names like Brill Kristol, the
Kagans, Michael Chertoff and Max Boot will not be showing up in
government. True, but that is because they will instead be working
through their foundations, of which FDD is only one. The Alliance for
Securing Democracy, which has recently sprung up in lobby-land, markets
itself as “bipartisan, and transatlantic…” but it actually is pure
neocon. Its goal is to “expose Putin’s ongoing efforts to subvert
democracy in the United States of America and Europe.” It includes the
usual neocon names but also has the loyal Democratic opposition,
including ex-CIA Acting Director Mike Morell and Jake Sullivan, both of
whom were top level advisers to Hillary Clinton.
The
replacement of former political appointees in the government has been
so slow in Trump’s first year that it has actually benefited the neocons
in their recovery. Many survivors of the two previous administrations
are still in place, nearly all of whom reflect the hawkishness prevalent
during 2001-2016. They will be supplemented by second and third tier
neoconservatives, who will fill in the policy gaps, virtually
guaranteeing that the neocon crafted foreign policy that has been around
for the past sixteen years will be here for some time longer.
What
all this means is that, now that the Palestinians have been disposed
and the Israelis rewarded, we can expect armed conflict with Iran within
the next year, followed by increased hostility towards Moscow as
Russiagate continues to play out. I do not even want to guess at what
kind of insanity the gang in the West Wing Situation Room will come up
with for dealing with North Korea. The good news is that the builders of
home bomb shelters, a booming enterprise when I was growing up back in
the 1950s and 1960s now used to cultivate mushrooms, will be back in
business.
Philip
M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the
National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation that
seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.
Website is www.councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box
2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
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