From the Archive: As the 12-year Afghan War grinds to what many Americans see as failure, ex-Defense Secretary Robert Gates and other hawks won’t admit their counterinsurgency “surge” in 2009 was a waste of lives and money or that U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry…
Category: Intelligence
When the CIA’s Empire Struck Back
Exclusive: In the mid-1970s, Rep. Otis Pike led a brave inquiry to rein in the excesses of the national security state. But the CIA and its defenders accused Pike of recklessness and vowed retaliation, assigning him to a political obscurity that…
A Rare Indictment of US Atrocities
Since World War II, the U.S. government has routinely sidestepped blame for the slaughters that have accompanied American foreign policy. One of the few high-profile condemnations occurred when playwright Harold Pinter accepted the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2005, as…
Ronald Reagan: Worst President Ever?
From the Archive: Ronald Reagan, who was born on Feb. 6, 1911, ranks among the most honored U.S. presidents of modern times with his name etched into public buildings across the country. Even Democrats shy from criticizing his legacy. But…
How Misread Cables Fed Iran Hysteria
Official Washington saw how bad intelligence led to the disastrous Iraq War, but U.S. analysts and “experts” like David Albright charged down the same path on Iran’s alleged nuclear program. Again, key “evidence” collapsed under scrutiny, Gareth Porter wrote for Inter Press…
Where the Real ‘Iran Threat’ Lies
The endless double standards demonstrated by U.S. pols and pundits toward U.S. “friends” vs. “enemies” have created a wildly distorted frame for a public trying to distinguish between genuine threats and propaganda themes, as Lawrence Davidson found regarding Iran.
Neocons Seek New Ultimatum on Syria
Exclusive: The Washington Post’s neocon editors are pushing for another U.S. military ultimatum against a Muslim country in the Mideast. Citing discredited “evidence” pinning the Aug. 21 Sarin attack on the Syrian government, the Post wants President Obama to re-issue a war…
Worse Than Orwell
President Obama has promised reform of the NSA’s mass collection of data on virtually all Americans and much of the world. But his proposals are limited and his speech failed to offer clemency to Edward Snowden who made the public…
Reading Iran All Wrong
U.S. foreign policy elites often speak in their own echo chamber of acceptable thought and thus grow more and more detached from the real world. Such a case is the recent punditry about Iran, as Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann…
An Afghan War for Drones?
Amid the Afghan government’s growing resistance to an extended U.S. military stay, the Obama administration is trying out a new rationale: the need for a launching pad for drones. But it may be a case of a weapons system causing…