Obama Picks a Conscience for The CIA by Ray McGovern

[Joanne98]

At long last. Change we can believe in.

In choosing Leon Panetta to take charge of the CIA, President-elect Barak Obama has shown he is determined to put an abrupt end to the lawlessness and deceit with which the administration of George W. Bush has corrupted intelligence operations and analysis.

First and foremost, the appointment gives hope that torture and "rendition" (a euphemism for kidnapping people for delivery to foreign torture chambers) is over - or will be in less than two weeks.

Character counts. And so does integrity.

With those qualities, and the backing of a new President, Panetta is equipped to lead the CIA out of the wilderness into which it was driven by sycophantic directors with very flexible attitudes toward truth, honesty and the law - directors who deemed it their duty to do the President's bidding - legal or illegal; honest or dishonest. In a city in which lapel-flags have been seen as adequate substitutes for the Constitution, Panetta will bring a rigid adherence to the rule of law.

For Panetta this is no battlefield conversion. On torture, for example, this is what he wrote a year ago:

"We cannot simply suspend in the name of national security. Those who support torture may believe that we can abuse captives in certain select circumstances and still be true to our values. But that is a false compromise. We either believe in the dignity of the individual, the rule of law, and the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, or we don't. There is no middle ground.

"We cannot and we must not use torture under any circumstances. We are better than that."

Please tell those of your friends who rely solely on the Fawning Corporate Media (FCM) that torture is a crime - not only under international law, but also under the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. 2441) passed by a Republican-dominated Congress in 1996. And besides that, torture can never be counted upon to yield trustworthy intelligence-never.

As for integrity, this is nothing new for Leon Panetta. As head of President Richard Nixon's Office of Civil Rights, he insisted on enforcing laws to protect minorities even under pressure from Nixon to get in line with the Republican "southern strategy" of neglecting civil rights. Rather than buckle to these demands, Panetta resigned and later became a Democrat.

How Did We Get Here?

Political courage -- like that demonstrated by Panetta as a young man -- was what was lacking as the Bush administration turned America's principled repudiation of torture inside out, from the top down.

Continued>>>
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/01/09-3

[balantz]

1. I'm blue in the face trying to tell people that Panetta will answer to this guy:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x257459

[MoJoWorkin]

2. Thank you for a positive post! A big recommend!

[peacetalksforall]

3. My gut told me Panetta would be good. I wish McGovern could be on the team.

I admire him for his bravery and integrity. Thank you, Ray.

[Peace Patriot]

4. McGovern mentions Truman criticizing the CIA, but he doesn't emphasize WHEN.

Dec. 22, 1963. A month after the Kennedy assassination.

Let me just explain why that may be important re Panetta.

I'm just reading James Douglass' book, "JFK and the Unspeakable," which points overwhelmingly to the CIA as the probable chief instigator of that assassination (--he points more to Richard Helms, chief of operations, than Allen Dulles, director). Douglass believes that this rare criticism by Truman of the CIA was the result of his suspicion or knowledge of CIA complicity in JFK's death.

Douglass makes a compelling case for the CIA (or a faction within the CIA) as the planning agency, in this extraordinarily well-documented, recently published (by the Maryknoll fathers) book. The key argument of the book is that JFK was going up against the entire "military-industrial complex" in ways that only they knew the full scope of, at the time--on Cuba, on Soviet Russia, on the Berlin Wall, perhaps most significantly on the nuclear arms race, on Laos and on Vietnam. Douglass cites chapter and verse, including lengthy analysis of JFK's backchannel contacts with Krushchev and Castro. JFK was totally fucking up the MIC's war plans, all over the world. I just read the section on Vietnam, and it is beyond question, in my mind, now, that JFK was setting about to undo that CIA-instigated war. He was targeted and killed by our own MIC because of these things*, with the CIA the main planner of his assassination.

Douglass also provides the testimony of the first black Secret Service agent, who says that the other Secret Service agents often joked that, if someone tried to shoot Kennedy, they would step out of the way of the bullet. Douglass' point is that Kennedy was hated and reviled by those who imagined that they could "win" the "Cold War" by turning it into a "hot war" with nukes or other aggression (most of the government, especially the military and intelligence services).

There appear to have been several U.S. agencies involved in his assassination, including the Secret Service, but more particularly involving people within U.S. agencies (not necessarily agency heads) to whom someone else was giving orders (for instance, the removal of Kennedy's Secret Service detail in Dealey Plaza). Douglass is ambivalent about both Dulles and Hoover, and only fingers them in the coverup. I am not so benign about them. What the Warren Commissioners were told was that the "lone gunman" lie was necessary to prevent blaming Russia and Cuba and starting a war; CIA activities, re Oswald, seemed designed to do just that--foment a nuclear attack on Russia and Cuba, and I can't imagine all that going forward--the set up of U.S. intelligence operative Oswald as a defector and communist--without Dulles knowing about it. Also, it is well-known now that Hoover hated Kennedy, and was a devious SOB.

How is this important to the appointment of Panetta? My point is that this secret agency, the CIA, is an octopus, with tentacles in many agencies, and also industries, (including the corporate 'news' industry) and other endeavors such as politics. It operates just like the mafia, only with much more powerful tools. You are either a "made man" or you are not. It is a secret society, a cabal.

But that doesn't mean that there are not tides within it--very strong tides, it would appear. Serious conflicts within this secret government. For instance, the CIA set the Kennedy assassination up to instigate a first strike on Russia and Cuba. But LBJ didn't agree with that goal. That's how the coverup of the CIA's involvement with Oswald happened (the 'lone gunman' lie). Then, as the result of certain horrors--such as Vietnam turned into, and probably also the JFK and RFK assassinations--a strong faction within the CIA began re-formulating their mission as preventing war, not manufacturing it.

We saw a later manifestation of this faction in the Valerie Plame outing. Plame obviously was devoted to preventing war. She headed a WMD counter-proliferation network. Rumsfeld/Cheney outed her primarily to stop that counter-proliferation work (in my opinion, because they were, a) intending to plant nukes in Iraq to be "found" by the U.S. soldiers looking for them after the invasion, and b) were/are engaged in illicit arms traffic). They were trying to root out this 'white hat' faction of the CIA, which had gained ascendancy over the years. Rumsfeld became so frustrated with their intransigence--their lack of cooperation, for instance, in cherry-picking and shaping intelligence to his war purpose--that he set up the Office of Special Plans at the Pentagon, to invent the evidence against Iraq there (and also falsified evidence, dirty tricks and so forth, for his planned attack on Iran).

The 'white hat' faction has been mobilized by this Bushwhack assault on their agency. Leon Panetta is part of the 'white hat' CIA--and has been for decades. He is deep CIA--so deep that almost no one knows who he is, and probably very high up. I won't go into all of the arguments that favor this theory (see my journal), except this one: Barack Obama is not a stupid man. No civilian could possibly hope to heal the wounds inflicted by Rumsfeld/Cheney. In my opinion, Panetta is not a civilian. And you will notice, in the coming days--as with this Ray McGovern article--that criticism of Panetta will only be coming from pro-war, pro-torture profiteers like Diane Feinstein (who quickly shut up, you will notice), and he will be quietly accepted as Obama's choice, despite his "inexperience" (a deep cover myth).

I will mention one other argument in favor of this view. Leon Panetta was a member of Bush Sr.'s "Iraq Study Group" (one of the forces that was mobilized to curtail Rumsfeld and Cheney). You don't get to be a member of the ISG merely by being a budget director or even WH chief of staff (--although the reverse may true--you don't get to be WH chief of staff unless you are CIA). Bush Sr. is CIA, and has been for a long time. I think his hat is gray. He is not 'white hat' but may have some common interests with this better faction of our secret government, or maybe was simply acting as a father. (Rumsfeld/Cheney were getting Jr. into very serious trouble--with revolts going in the CIA, the FBI, the DoJ, and the U.S. military against their policies and plans. And they were seriously blowing the advantage that the U.S. and its corporate rulers had as the world's only "super-power"--something players like Bush Sr had been working on since Reagan. He is evil--don't get me wrong. But he is subtler than Rumsfeld and Cheney, and smarter.)

So, if what you want is a CIA that has some respect for the rule of law--or at least for appearances--(as opposed, say, to abolishing it--which I would prefer)--that is Leon Panetta's job--to strengthen the 'rule of law' or 'white hat' faction in the CIA, and to restore the morale and reputation of the U.S. government--and no civilian could possibly do that, in my opinion.

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*(The MIC's or a faction of the MIC's determination to kill JFK was based on the following JFK actions/policies: detente with, rather than first strike nuking of Russia; the nuclear disarmament treaty that JFK negotiated with Krushchev; opening a dialogue with Castro; failing to nuke Russia and Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis; foiling of a 'rogue' general's plan to start a war at the Berlin Wall; his engineering of a neutral Laos; his firing of the CIA's Dulles and others over the Bay of Pigs; his scuttling of the Bay of Pigs invasion; his determination to withdraw U.S. forces from Vietnam; his adamant refusal to put ground troops in Asia; his successful fight against the U.S. steel industry (major Defense contractors), and finally--something I never even had a hint of, before Douglass' book--JFK's sympathy with leftist revolutionaries. Via his backchannels to Castro, he dissed the horrible Batista regime, as much as said that the Cubans were justified in overthrowing it, and described the U.S. government actions in supporting Batista as "U.S. sins." The Joint Chiefs of Staff and their allies in the MIC totally opposed these efforts at peace, and some were disobedient and even treasonous in their efforts to sabotage them. In other words, after he became president, JFK began to see the reasons for leftist revolution, and determined to stop the forces that were moving inexorably toward nuclear war and other aggression, as the way to 'win' the "Cold War." He wanted peace--a detente with the Soviets and other communist countries and movements. He even longed for it. And his brother, RFK, was really his only ally in this. This is why both were killed.)

[Peace Patriot]

5. Notice the very careful wording in McGovern's section about Panetta's qualifications.

"...those who are informed by alternative media, including many supporters of President-elect Obama, are demanding accountability for Bush's torture policies and are objecting strongly to any appointments tainted by complicity in those policies.

"That sentiment led Obama to look for a CIA director outside the usual list of intelligence professionals who had carefully positioned themselves - and their careers - so as not to offend the Bush administration the past eight years.

"Placing managerial skills and personal integrity over direct intelligence experience, Obama made the surprise choice of Leon Panetta, who followed up his resignation from the Nixon administration with a varied career as a congressman, federal budget director, White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, and a member of the Iraq Study Group." --McGovern

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I could be wrong. I admit that it's based on guessing. But I just don't think that Panetta is a civilian. And I think the above is very carefully worded to avoid a lie (to avoid saying that Panetta is not CIA). The thing is, McGovern would never blow the cover of a fellow member of the CIA. So if he knows that he is, he would never say it. And you will notice that he never says the opposite. He says Panetta is managerial, which Obama valued "over" direct intel experience. This is not to say that Panetta has NO direct intel experience. He says that Panetta was hired from "outside the usual list." But this doesn't say that his NOT CIA. I've looked forward to McGovern weighing in on this appointment. And he has done so exactly as I expected, given my guess about Panetta. Very positive. Carefully worded.

[KoKo]

7. Interesting....what do you think about this, though...

Josh Marshall has this link to a Spencer Ackerman comment over at the Washington Independent. I wasn't sure what to make of it. There's not anything more to the article except what I posted, and I find that strange. Any thoughts?

-------

John Brennan Is Set to Be Really Powerful
By Spencer Ackerman 1/9/09 2:47 PM

Everyone in the blogosphere — Glenn, I’m looking in your direction — who may have thought that John Brennan was kneecapped just because he didn’t become CIA director should check out what President-elect Barack Obama had to say about Brennan during the Blair/Panetta rollout:

"I’m pleased to announce that John Brennan – a close advisor, CIA veteran and former leader of the National Counter-Terrorism Center – will be my Homeland Security Advisor and Deputy National Security Advisor for Counterterrorism, serving with the rank of Assistant to the President. John has the experience, vision and integrity to advance America’s security."

The point isn’t just that Obama hugged Brennan. (”A close advisor… experience, vision and integrity.”) Assistant to the President” is the highest rank that any White House staffer can hold. Anyone with that rank has the right to walk into the Oval Office and get a sit-down with the president. At the beginning of the Bush administration, Dick Cheney fought to ensure that Scooter Libby held that rank.

Now, what’ll that mean? At a minimum, it’ll mean that when Obama is unsure of something he’s hearing from CIA, or from Dennis Blair as Director of National Intelligence, he’ll turn to Brennan for a second or third opinion. It’s way too early to know — but that won’t stop me from wondering — if Brennan at the White House and Deputy CIA Director Steve Kappes might be the actual centers of power for the intelligence community.

http://washingtonindependent.com/24727/john-brennan-is-set-to-be-really-powerful

[Peace Patriot]

8. I think that would be more possible in the past--that Brennan and Kappes,

in those positions, would actually be the centers of power in the intel community. But in view of the war that Rumsfeld/Cheney waged on the CIA, the damage done, the morale, lives, careers and duties to be repaired, the 'rogue' OSP operations (could be still causing trouble around the world), the need to restore professionalism and expertise, and the state of foreign relations, I think it's unlikely that a civilian would be appointed CIA Director, with such a sensitive, difficult, internal job to do. Some people have said just this--that a civilian is not qualified. I don't know if I agree with that (would depend on the civilian), but my guess is that Panetta is not a civilian. Whatever Brennan and Kappes are doing, the REPAIR of the CIA will surely be the responsibility of the Director--at such a critical time--and my guess is that Panetta is deep CIA, high up in the organization, and well-qualified at least on admin/personnel, with some field experience, possibly considerable. (That's why Diane Feinstein shut up, and why many are coming forward now to praise the appointment.)

If I had my druthers, as I said, I'm with JFK: scatter these secret organizations to the wind. God knows they are capable of immense mischief that would be considered legal. They are prone to sub-cabals that get out-of-control, with secret budgets and black ops, that have utter contempt for the rule of law. One of those killed JFK and RFK. To hell with that. This is a DEMOCRACY. Open the windows and doors and let the sunlight shine.

But that's me. Douglass' book is filling me with rage and sadness.

I do appreciate those who resisted these horrible plots and activities--and there have been many. I hope Panetta is one of them. But I don't think we will ever be free of our overlords in the "military-industrial complex"--which is now a global cabal--until we rid ourselves of secret budgets and secret organizations.

[GliderGuider]

6. A less sanguine view of Panetta's appointment

PANETTA AT CIA? – RUN FOR THE HILLS!

What I found was that (IMO) Leon Panetta is a pretty decent guy. He has taken the right stands on many important issues from the drug war, to torture, to Iraq. The biggest "offense" I could find was his direct role in the pardon of Marc Rich. (Rich is/was a heavy and very dirty intelligence/black op player.) Look, everybody at that level has skeletons and that history isn't even worth discussing now. It's what I didn't find that so worries me.

I was looking for anything that suggested Leon Panetta might have had clandestine experience or even some remote exposure to Agency operations. That's what scares me to death.

Let's think of a couple of other "outsiders" who went into CIA. James Schlesinger was an abysmal failure, short-tenured, and a major nerd. Then there was John Deutch… need I say more?

The one prior CIA director which reminds me of Panetta, however, is Admiral Stansfield Turner who was appointed by Jimmy Carter and confirmed in March 1977. And if it turns out the same way there is going to be some serious bloodshed, an evaporation of civil liberties and a ten-fold expansion of covert operations… "off the books". (It eliminates all those messy oversight problems. Saves money on hearings and things like that.)

Turner arrived at CIA as a retired Navy Admiral who had been outside the intel community. His mandate was to clean house and get rid of all those dirty-rotten scoundrels who had committed assassinations, overthrown governments and operated outside the law. The Church and Pike committees had released mountains of incriminating data from the 50s, 60s and 70s. What did Turner do? He fired all those clandestine service people right away.

What did they do?

Well they took all of their knowhow, the black budgets that were off-the-books, their ability to smuggle stupefying amounts of drugs and guns and they started a parallel or "shadow" government that Congress didn't touch until Iran-Contra was a full blown scandal and tens of thousands of Central Americans had been murdered by death squads and American surrogates.