Prof Philip Bobbitt on US Foreign Policy & Strategy

SOURCE https://www.stratfor.com/weekly/strategy-real-time-dueling-enemy-moves Strategy in Real Time: Dueling with an Enemy That Moves Global Affairs July 1, 2015 | 08:00 GMT Print By Philip Bobbitt Strategy is a two-way street. But many commentators act as though formulating a strategy is the same as solving a chess problem. Chess problems are artificially constructed arrangements on a chessboard where the goal is to find a series of moves that leaves the other side no room to evade a checkmate within three or four turns. The sorts of conflicts bedeviling us these days, however, are more like the game of chess itself, in which there is no determinate, continuous series of moves that will guarantee victory every time. Each new contest depends on the actions of the other side, how we react to them, how they respond to our reactions, and so on. Ignoring this aspect of strategy seems to contribute to the widespread view that victory in warfare amounts to the destruction of the enemy, a facile assumption that is all too unthinkingly held. "Defeating the enemy" may be the definition of victory in football, or even in chess for that matter, but not in warfare. Victory in war is the achievement of the war aim, and if, after Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, we still think that victory is simply the devastation of our adversaries, we have a lot of reflecting to do. The Triage of Terror In my last column, I referred to the idea of the "triage of terror," which I discuss further in my book, Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty-First Century. The wars against terror comprise preventing transnational terrorist attacks, precluding the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction for the purposes of compellence rather than deterrence, and protecting civilians from widespread depredation and destruction. Unfortunately, progress in any one of the three theaters of conflict composing the wars on terror often increases the challenges we face in the other theaters. Managing the interrelationship of the three spheres of engagement in a way that prevents success in one arena from grossly exacerbating matters in another — the "triage of terror" — is an important objective of statecraft. For example, a strategy that relies on intervention to suppress the gross violation of human rights through genocide or ethnic cleansing may make states that fear becoming the targets of intervention more anxious to acquire weapons of mass destruction. Strategies that attempt to root out terrorism are often linked to ethnic or sectarian repression or the aggressive repression of human rights. Preemptive counterproliferation strategies by the world's strongest military power could summon burgeoning terrorist armies that challenge the United States through asymmetric means. Understanding the consequences that success in one arena may have for the other wars on terror is a prerequisite for devising an effective strategy in the 21st century. When asked on "Face the Nation" about the Obama administration's commitment to the War on Terror, CIA Director John Brennan said, There has been a full-court effort to try to keep this country safe. Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya, others, these are some of the most complex and complicated issues that I’ve seen in 35 years working on national security issues. So there are no easy solutions. I think the president has tried to make sure that we’re able to push the envelope when we can to protect this country. But we have to recognize that sometimes our engagement and direct involvement will stimulate and spur additional threats to our national security interests. This rather wise and sober assessment prompted something like a scream from the Council on Foreign Relations, which labeled it an "unprecedented recognition" that U.S. "foreign policy can harm U.S. national security." The commentator added that "the next public interview with the CIA director should begin by asking him which engagements and direct involvements he is referring to," and demanded that "Brennan's unprecedented recognition [be] further explored and commented on by the White House, State Department and Department of Defense." But of course we know which engagements Brennan was referring to because he told us in the very passage quoted. What he did not say was that our foreign policy harms our national security. Far from being an astounding concession, Brennan's remarks linking our actions to our enemies' responses were a rather insightful and realistic observation that would electrify only a careless listener. To highlight the distinction between "stimulating additional threats" and "harming U.S. national security," let me turn to another concept mentioned in my first column: Parmenides' Fallacy. Parmenides' Fallacy This fallacy indulges in the frequent, unthinking assertion that we should compare the present state of affairs with the past in order to evaluate the policies that have gotten us to where we are now. In fact, we should compare our current situation with alternative outcomes that would have arisen from different policies, had they been chosen. This is true for prospective policies as well: It is a sophist's [Ancient Greek philosophy teacher's] argument to deride a proposed policy (say, social security reform or free trade) by simply saying we will be worse off after the policy is implemented than we are now. That may well be true. But it could be true of even the wisest policy if other alternatives, including doing nothing, would make us even worse off in the future. Let me give a famous example of Parmenides' Fallacy at work. The turning point in the United States' 1980 presidential race came when Ronald Reagan criticized President Jimmy Carter's record during a debate by asking the American people, "Are you better off today than you were four years ago?" Though rhetorically devastating, this question is hardly the way to evaluate a presidency. After all, the state of the nation will never stay the same for four years, regardless of who is in office. A more relevant question would have been, "Are you better off now than you would have been if Gerald Ford had remained the president and had had to cope with rising oil prices, the Iranian Revolution, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan and soaring interest rates?" In the same way, we should reframe fallacious prospective questions like, "Will we be better off in five years than we are now if we adopt a certain policy?" The better question to ask is, "Will we be better off in five years by adopting this policy than we will be in five years if we do not?" Real Strategy in Real Time We are not necessarily harming national security when we take steps to counter threats that cause our enemies to react in a way that creates new threats. That, in fact, is the essence of strategy:  It is not to dream up a series of unilateral actions that will inevitably lead to the accomplishment of our goals, but to recognize that each measure we take will invariably lead to countermeasures, and to anticipate the ultimate costs of reactions, both ours and theirs. Everyone has a strategy, Mike Tyson famously said, until he gets punched in the mouth. An example of such non-strategic thinking is the idea that the United States is chiefly responsible for its problems, since other states have not wreaked the costs on America that we ourselves have undertaken in the name of deterring them. As another commentator recently observed, "if you look at the past 25 years or so, it is abundantly clear that external enemies have done far less damage to the United States than we have done to ourselves." This confident assertion ("it is abundantly clear") is not a clinching argument, indeed it is not an argument at all. It is merely a rhetorical flourish, and a rather indolent one at that. To be an argument, we would have to know what damage our external enemies would have done to us and to our allies if we had not appropriated large sums for defense and intelligence, if we had not prevented the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and Libya, and if we had not stopped the ethnic massacres in Europe. The debate on U.S. strategy is a timely one, and nothing I have said is a defense of U.S. policies, past or present. Rather, it is a lament that the debate is being pursued in the such terms as these, which add little to our assessment of the wisdom of any particular policy including especially those policies that attempt to achieve our war aims. But the shortcomings of this approach are not merely analytical. There are practical consequences of defining strategy as that which we do, which is to strategy what shadow boxing is to boxing. For this approach often manifests itself in a kind of aphasia: If strategy is what we do, regardless of the actions of others, then there is an inevitable bias toward doing nothing, responding to challenges with a portentous silence. Like aphasia generally it is associated with trauma (like a stroke), and the trauma out of which this silence has emerged is the Vietnam War (for my generation) and perhaps the ill-fated intervention in Iraq for those of a younger age. This attitude can be seen on yard signs and bumper stickers that read: "Stop War: Get out of ____" (fill in the blank: the Balkans, the Baltics, the Middle East). I suppose some people really do believe that if U.S. forces simply leave the field, conflict will abate (as it did in Vietnam after a good deal of political, religious, class and ethnic "cleansing" by Hanoi) and as may yet happen in Iraq should the war there lead to partition after a truly awful period of sectarian violence. We should be careful to distinguish between two groups who seek such American restraint. Some simply hold that, but for U.S. intervention, there would be no war in the world. For this group, the specter of American imperialism lurks behind all the conflicts of the 20th century. Others, however, believe that—whatever the ensuing violence that might follow an American withdrawal, or the violence that might continue undiminished in the absence of an American intervention—the use of U.S. force abroad is more damaging than beneficial to American interests. The irony is that while both these groups criticize U.S. policy for being "unilateralist," they are united in advocating a policy that is unilateral in the extreme, for what act could be more autonomous than removing oneself from conflict regardless of the consequences for others? The first group, who see the conspiratorial reflex of American militarism in every significant conflict around the world might wish to pause and ask themselves whether the world is really better for others—for the peoples of the world who don’t live in the United States—if violence is unchecked by U.S. intervention, for this group professes to be principally concerned about the welfare of other peoples even when American interests are at stake. It should give them pause that polls consistently show that a large majority of Iraqis still support the regime change brought about by the American-led coalition, however angry they are about the feckless occupation that followed. The second group, however, is my principal concern. Putting irony aside, one can’t help but notice that this perspective ignores the value of U.S. alliances, a value that distinguishes us from our principal potential adversaries in the world and which, in my view, is our greatest strategic asset. Real strategy is not just what we do, but it also encompasses more than what our adversaries do. Real strategy is as much about our allies, our potential allies, our potential enemies, and the great body of states and peoples that could go either way. The late Sir Michael Quinlan observed that in conflict we are always likely to be surprised. That is because we prepare our defenses for the attacks we anticipate and so inevitably drive our opponents to pursue the tactics and strategies against targets we have not foreseen. We have been so often surprised these last several decades—sometimes happily so, oftentimes not—that it must be alluring to imagine that strategies of non-engagement at the least would spare us those surprises that haunt American policy. This is an enervated [weak] fantasy. When we are disengaged—when we are not trying to prepare the field for potential conflict and preclude situations that put us at a disadvantage—every act that threatens us and our allies comes as a surprise. SOURCE https://www.stratfor.com/weekly/strategy-real-time-dueling-enemy-moves ---------------------- ꕤ ---------------------- COMMENT The CIA director is talking rubbish when he speaks of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, and Libya, in the same breath as keeping the US 'safe' (but I guess that depends on how you define 'the US' ... lol): "...  full-court effort to try to keep this country safe.  Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya ..." That's just an excuse for US intervention in these remote countries that pose zero threat to distant, powerful, mainland USA. What I think he's really saying is ... we've interfered in all these crazy countries; it's ugly, nasty, and vicious, ... and you can expect some blow-back as a result of this interference.  But, hey, this is just part of strategy - and you're now part of the collateral damage involved in pursuing this strategy of military meddling abroad.  Or, something like that.  Bobbit describes Brennan's sales pitch as a 'rather wise and sober assessment' ... but that's probably because he's in the same political camp as the CIA (and whoever controls the CIA). Bobbit's, the one-man CIA / US interventionist policy cheer squad, the way I see it. Bobbit tells us Brennan didn't say US "foreign policy harms [US] national security,"  before pulling a rabbit out of his hat by drawing on distinctions between: "stimulating additional threats" and "harming US national security." So the 'additional threats' blow-back generated by US foreign policy is no biggie, and you guys:  just have to wear that? It gets even better:  not only is the blowback no big deal, folks, ... it's not even the result of US foreign policy. Wow, that's what you call:  a Magician. Never mind that US actions abroad are the extensions of US foreign policy.  Never mind that, reactions to US actions abroad - are, by extension,  reactions US foreign policy.  And, nasty comb-back is, therefore, really the nasty fruit of US foreign policy. But, of course, that doesn't matter to the policy makers.  What really matters is US foreign policy.   So, it's:  policy above all else. The 'additional threats' (ie what is dismissed as collateral to pursuit of US foreign policy) - be it abroad or domestically - is secondary to the broader agenda of US foreign policy.  The foreign policy agenda is an agenda that doesn't have anything to do with the average American:  an agenda involving regional allies in remote territories, and an agenda involving strategic regional aims, in the service of corporate interests and the allies of corporate interests. The philosopher of law launches into what, to me, appears to be an argument about the structure of argument. I'm no logician or philosopher, but this entire argument as to construct of argument sounds like a con to me. Reframing the question: " ... we should reframe fallacious prospective questions like, "Will we be better off in five years than we are now if we adopt a certain policy?" The better question to ask is, "Will we be better off in five years by adopting this policy than we will be in five years if we do not?"" is an interesting technique.  But what's the point? In the above example, it looks as though you isolate the proposed policy from the current benefits (and yardstick for evaluation), and evaluate a proposed policy on a stand-alone basis ... of projection of some kind?  Not quite sure.  This definitely sounds like a load of garbage (to me): "if you look at the past 25 years or so, it is abundantly clear that external enemies have done far less damage to the United States than we have done to ourselves." "It is not an argument at all. It is merely a rhetorical flourish, and a rather indolent one at that. To be an argument, we would have to know what damage our external enemies would have done to us and to our allies if we had not appropriated large sums for defense and intelligence" It's an argument in which the security state justifies its own existence (and the policies and funding that keep the security state (war state, really) enormous and aggressive etc), by stating that critics have no argument unless they can indicate what would have happened had the government not spent an enormous amount of money on the corporate war chest and intelligence.  Maybe critics ought to look at what value for money these organisations have actually produced (ie what acts did they prevent etc), minus the costs to the entire nation - and to future generations servicing interest payable on corporate war debt, masked as national debt for 'security'. Expect that neocon US interventionist foreign policy promos shall be pitched on the basis of not only commercial interests (passed off as 'US interests,'  'national interests' or 'national security'), but also rationalised as 'altruistic' concern for the welfare of 'allies', as a rationalisation for past intervention, and as a pretext for ongoing and future intervention, on behalf of commercial interests, at US national cost. What on earth is the following: " ... if we had not prevented the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and Libya, and if we had not stopped the ethnic massacres in Europe." Everybody knows 'weapons of mass destruction' was a false pretext used to invade Iraq; Libya has been destroyed by the West ... and now there's chaos & jihadists running amok (and it looks like entire populations of the Middle East and Africa are moving into Europe, via Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary, when entering by Turkey or Greece rather than by Italy).  And those much-invoked US-Anglo refrains of 'ethnic massacres in Europe,' are Western propaganda that has been used as a pretext (and an aftermath rationalisation) for the US-Anglo alliance intervention in the Balkans (where the US has gained control & set up yet another US military base in Kosovo - Camp Bondsteel, described as a small Guantanamo). If there's any sectarian violence in Iraq, it will be because the US and allies demolished a functioning state; so there's no use lamenting that people want the US out of foreign countries, as if it is the rightful US place to intervene abroad, for some 'altruistic' reason (when nothing could be further from the truth). The US military invasion is rationalised as an act of kindness: " ... whether the world is really better for others—for the peoples of the world who don’t live in the United States—if violence is unchecked by U.S. intervention" as if the US is a kindly, freelance, 'policeman' of the world ... 'preventing' violence:  when, in fact, the US is visiting violence upon the world. As for the Iraq poll, even we accept these 'polls' are not a crock of self-serving sh*t, we can hardly equate these ridiculous polls with: Thank you ever so much for invading & destroying our country, killing half a million of our people directly, and another 1.7 million indirectly ... for a profitable future 'greater good,' as seen by Americans and their allies. What I got mostly out of this is:  American interventions all over over the world are mostly about the interests of allies of US corporate interests.  So the Middle Eastern mayhem is probably on account of Saudi Arabia and Israel, as US allies? [ Just my everyday person take on things.  Not based on extensive knowledge. ] FURTHER READING 10th Anniversary Of US Iraq Invasion: 2.7 Million Iraqi Deaths By Dr Gideon Polya 20 March, 2013 This week it is exactly ten years after the US , UK and Australia illegally invaded Iraq on 20 March 2003 on the utterly false and illegitimate excuse that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD).  The invasion occurred after over 12 years of deadly sanctions, war and bombing that had devastated the infrastructure of Iraq , violently killed 0.2 million Iraqis in the Gulf War and killed 1.7 million Iraqis through war-imposed deprivation  ... http://www.countercurrents.org/polya200313.htm *Figures don't look right to me.  Believe it's half a million direct death toll for Iraq (not 0.2 million) referred to above.  Just quickly skimmed.  Have not gone into wide search or detail.  Surprised to find Australia involved in the illegal invasion.  Australian PM of the day (who happens to be a Prof Philip Bobbit fan): John Howard 11 Mar 1996 – 3 Dec 2007 ꕤ

USA - NSA, NATO, POLITICIANS, PR & EXPLOITATION OF CAUSES

U.S.A.  CIA #USA John Brennan #CIA vs US Senate>>under media glare >> improper access .. http://goo.gl/R6kRC3  >Adm Michael Rogers is new #NSA director Hey, Rogers = Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) dude as well. Bunch of others follow US eg., GCHQ to set up cyber centres. ----------------------------------------   NATO #NATO "the military alliance of the imperialist countries of Europe and North America" [Roger Annis] #NATO >>> " ... capitalism’s ongoing economic and financial instability requires new sources of investment and plunder." [Roger Annis] The imperialists expect #Russia to act like #Egypt’s military rulers, who faithfully police #Palestinian rebellion. [fm Roger Annis] #NATO #NATO >> Intense propaganda drive by NATO ..irrationally demonises #Russia & aims 2 win backing for economic & military aggression [Annis] >Left & liberal in world is CEDING 2 NATO drive, agreeing that, yes, there really is a “problem” with Russia. >Consequences Contrary to Snyder, problem is not a #Russian push to the west, but American drive 2 east that has only intensified since Euromaidan/ Lazare ----------------------------------------   'It's On Us' - Political Exploitation "White House: ‘It’s On Us’ campaign targets culture of sexual assault on campus " >http://goo.gl/dhU1dO >> Biden & Obama kicking off campaign. So what's this about really? Is USA that uncivilised? And if so, why? RT> "Obama: "You don't want 2 be..guy who stops a friend from taking a woman home…It's not just ok to intervene, it's your responsibility." >> Hard to imagine #Putin coming out with this. Guess because they don't stoop to female exploitation for PR in Russia. Somebody needs to tweet Barack #Obama 2 ask WHY sexual violence is so prevalent in land of the brave & the free etc - A land of rapists? ----------------------------------------   COMMENT Just quickly posting the data I looked at.   Will have to come back to expand on it.

CIA OBAMA CENSORSHIP OF SENATE REPORT

CIA attempts to censor report into its use, abuse of torture Jamie Seidel, agencies News Corp Australia Network August 12, 2014 11:43AM CHARGED with using “brutal” interrogation methods, the CIA is now engaged in a desperate campaign to keep the details from becoming public. It’s even gone so far as to spy on the US Senate in its efforts. The political storm erupted early last week when powerful Intelligence Committee members protested over the Obama administration’s censorship of the 500-page executive summary of their findings of CIA ‘interrogation’ techniques. The full 6300 page document will never be made public. It was the end product of an examination expected to take six months. It’s since dragged on for five years. The report’s findings are said to be scathing. It is believed to state that the CIA’s ethical and legal breaches were “widespread” and “chilling”. It also is expected to rule that the CIA’s use of waterboarding and other ‘enhanced’ interrogation methods had not proved effective. But we now may never know for certain. Allegations are that the CIA is striving to delete enough key details to make the report incomprehensible — even though many of them have already been made public. “Try reading a novel with 15 per cent of the words blacked out. It can’t be done properly,” Senator Martin Heinrich said in his criticism of the attempted censorship. “Redactions are supposed to remove names or anything that could compromise sources and methods, not to undermine the source material so that it is impossible to understand.” So what is the CIA so keen to hide? What lies beneath the thousands of lines of black ink which will blank out so much of the summary? Why would the White House even allow the CIA to censor a report into its own misconduct? Ultimately it’s the US President who decides what should be marked as classified, and what should be public. The ball is now in President Barak Obama’s court. Here’s what US security analysis’s suspect the the CIA wants to hide: DESTRUCTION OF EVIDENCE: The whole Intelligence Committee investigation would never have happened if it was not for the destruction of key evidence. In one key incident that has been revealed, a CIA official destroyed more than 100 video recordings of the interrogations at the centre of the controversy. [...] WHEN IS TORTURE NOT TORTURE: The Bush administration insisted it wasn’t. The Obama administration says it was. At the heart of the report is whether or not the CIA knew their “enhanced” interrogation was actually torture ... [...] SUPPRESSING DETAILS: We know at least 10 types of torture the CIA applied to its captives. These were listed in the now infamous Justice Department “torture memo” and other evidence which came to light in a 2009 legal review of the allegations. But some speculate that the CIA is now particularly worried about the inherent cruelty of two previously unreported “improvised” interrogation methods ... [...] DELETING CODE NAMES: They’re just code names — acronyms and random words which are designed to disguise the subject to which they refer. But there’s something revealing even about these that the CIA wants to hide. One anonymous government source told US media the CIA was keen to blank-out any indication of name or place. This would remove any form of context for individual events. One would be indistinguishable from another. ... [...] REMOVING MENTION OF SOURCES: This may suggest something of an “own goal” by the CIA in its misinformation campaign. It appears much of the information said to have been gained via ‘enhanced interrogation’ techniques was not. Instead, it was gathered by other means — means the CIA sought to mask behind the brutal face of torture. HIDING MEDIA MANIPULATION: It bears all the hallmarks of an al-Qaeda operation. Sound familiar? It should. It’s a favourite phrase used to invoke international fear and justify CIA actions. But the report appears to reveal that the organisation deliberately leaked false threats and success stories in order to justify the existence of its torture campaigns. Such revelations would deal a severe blow to the agency’s future credibility. EMBARRASSING INCIDENTS: Where the CIA Inspector General’s investigations into CIA behaviour credible? What of specific CIA actions — such as the reported abduction of the family (including a 12-year-old girl) of an opponent of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi? The CIA is keen to tout its successes — real or otherwise. But it has a long history of denial when it comes to failures. [...] WHITE HOUSE TO THE DEFENCE The Obama administration has sought to quash rising anger over the report’s redactions. “We tortured some folks,” President Obama conceded last week. “And we have to, as a country, take responsibility for that so that, hopefully, we don’t do it again in the future.” How censoring the report which is central for imposing such accountability upon the CIA achieves this goal is the issue. [...] EXTRACTS ONLY - FULL @ SOURCE Source - Herald Sun - here

Go to the source and check out the article in full.

Got some really cool pics, too.

There's a massive one of Brennan and I was right:  he looks mean.  LOL

Surprised this is news in Australia and that it's not exactly complimentary.

The public will never know what's going on or have a say on how their country is run.

Even when the government is supposedly moving towards accountability, they're hiding things from the public they're supposed to serve.

CIA CHIEF JOHN BRENNAN

Under fire, CIA chief has key ally By Julian Hattem and Amie Parnes - 08/06/14 06:00 AM EDT ... Brennan was considered Obama’s first choice to lead the CIA in late 2008. But soon after winning the presidency, the left revolted over comments from Brennan that seemed to show his support for “enhanced interrogation” practices, such as waterboarding. The 25-year CIA veteran was subsequently named the president’s counterterrorism adviser, a position that did not need Senate confirmation and had him working out of a windowless office in the White House basement. While it might not have come with the prestige of leading the country’s most recognizable spy agency, being able to work feet from the Oval Office helped cement his relationship with Obama, Lowenthal said. “People used to say he had more access to the president than the [director of national intelligence] or the head of the CIA did,” he said. “They worked very closely together for all those years before the president sent John to Langley.” In addition to Obama, multiple former officials told The Hill that Brennan has another close ally in Denis McDonough, who is now Obama’s chief of staff. The second senior administration official said it was always clear how much McDonough “really, really loved Brennan.” “They’re cut from the same cloth, in terms of no drama and no theatrics,” the source added. “There’s a lot of mutual respect in the abilities of the other … which is why last week was so shocking.” Obama reportedly used to refer to the trio of Brennan, McDonough and Tom Donilon — who served as national security adviser when McDonough was his deputy — as the “grim Irishmen.” Brennan has often come across as a brusque, dour, no-nonsense figure, yet he has gained a number of acolytes in the intelligence community and the White House. In a 2012 interview with The Washington Post, Brennan said he was rejected by the Bush administration — which he left in 2005 to work for a private contractor before joining Obama’s campaign — “because I was not seen as someone who was a team player.” “I’m probably not a team player here, either,” he added, referring to the Obama administration. “I tend to do what I think is right. But I find much more comfort, I guess, in the views and values of this president.” Brennan finally got his shot at the CIA last year, after a sex scandal led to former director, Gen. David Petraeus’s resignation. While announcing the nomination in January 2013, Obama called Brennan “one of my closest advisers” and “a great friend.” http://thehill.com/policy/technology/214433-under-fire-cia-chief-has-key-ally

CIA Chief, John Brennan:

Looks kinda mean.

Raised North Bergen, New Jersey.

A former FBI director (Louis Freeh) came out of  North Bergen ... as did Ice-T! 

I'm more familiar with Cocoa and Ice-T than I am with Freeh.
Freeh sounds like he had an interesting FBI time (long list dealings) before bowing out to practice law.

Likely favours 'enhanced interrogation' techniques (see snowboarding waterboarding).

Brusque (abrupt).
Dour (severe; stern), no nonsense (no fun).
Does his own thing.  Not a team player.

On the plus side:

No drama.
No theatrics.

I'm not much of a team player either, so maybe that should go in the 'plus' section. :)

Torture's probably part of the job, so you can't hold that against him.  Or can you?  What if the subject has no information?  That's really mean.  Real torture, as opposed to a bit of kinky fun, isn't nice.

If torture's part of the job, maybe they should just run a PR campaign to improve the image of torturing suspects?

No way do I believe that he's there simply because of Obama, because I don't believe that any head of government calls the shots alone.

*Brennan was first to acknowledge CIA drone attacks:    "... in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, Afghanistan, and elsewhere."

What?  I thought that was in the military sphere rather than the spy/security domain.

He made a case for the morality, effectiveness and legality of the drone attacks.  But of course.  Like he was going to argue the opposite.

Bystanders killed by drones are 'collateral deaths'.

Brennan said 2011 there had been a single 'collateral death ' ... Bureau of Investigative Journalism (BIJ) called him out on that claim.  BIJ research indicates otherwise (76 deaths).  [*HEY, IT'S THE 'FOURTH COLUMN'! -- the Chris Woods, Bureau of Investigative Journalism article - here]

Wikipedia:

The Atlantic has been harsher in its criticism, saying that "Brennan has been willing to lie about those drone strikes to hide ugly realities."

And the Wikipedia on this dude gets more interesting:

Morris Davis, a former Chief Prosecutor for the Guantanamo Military Commissions compared Brennan to Canadian Omar Khadr, who was convicted of "committing murder in violation of the law of war".  He suggested that Brennan's role in targeting individuals for CIA missile strikes was no more authorized than the throwing of the grenade Khadr was accused of.

Hey, I'm glad I looked.  Wasn't going to bother because I didn't even think the head of CIA would have a listing online.  LOL.

Hey, if this stuff is the stuff online, imagine the stuff we don't even know about!!!

Looks like the only one who had anything to say about the Brennan appointment was Kentucky senator Rand Paul:

... citing President Barack Obama and his administration's use of combat drones, stating “No one politician should be allowed to judge the guilt, to charge an individual, to judge the guilt of an individual and to execute an individual. It goes against everything that we fundamentally believe in our country."

 Needless to say, Rand Paul got overruled.  Got in by senate vote @ 63-34.


Chief of Staff, Denis McDonough:

Looks friendly.

Most likely a team player (one of 11 children!).

McDonough was pushing for Brennan and Chuck Hagel to get onboard the security.

Republicans seem to like him because he consults with them.

*** Could this guy be a mover and shaker?



US Secretary of Defence, Chuck Hagel:

Looks really friendly.

Vietnam vet.

A professor at Edmund A Walsh School of Foreign Service(SFS) - Catholic affiliation + Georgetown Uni, Washington  - a US and international diplomat school and 'global affairs' school.

• Madeline Albright did a stint there, as did a former CIA director and some foreigners.
• School went from 'diplomacy and law' aims to 'research and teaching of global affairs'.
• Faculty members include Albright and Chuck Hagel.
• Supposedly one of the best in world surveys (surveys are just tools for manipulating ppl or taking a punt in business and marketing)
• Qatar financed the opening of branch of SFS in Qatar.

 So is this like a US brainwashing on foreign affairs school?

Tom Donilon

Tom Donilon, former National Security Adviser Obama administration.

"Former member of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group".
 Isn't Bilderberg some kinda 'cult'? LOL

Worked under Clinton Administration and was involved in "negotiating the Bosnian peace agreement and the expansion of NATO".

Negotiations probably went something like this:  do as we say or we bomb you.

Donilon's the Afghan Man ... he worked out the 'strategy' for Afghanistan, whatever that might be (see Obama wars).

Might have rubbed up the National Security Council people the wrong way.  Looks like he didn't appreciate their hard work or something.

Wanted China to do something about hacking (cyber attack and commercial espionage?).

Donilon was also the Bin Laden Man -- he was National Security advisor when Bin Laden was killed.

Donilon is a fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations.

His brother's a lawyer of Joe Biden.  His (lawyer) wife was chief of staff to Biden's missus (the 'second lady' (Biden being the vice pres).

Sounds all cosy in Washington.

After all checking, I've lost track of the point of the article that got me interested in this stuff.

Actually, I don't think there was a point.  Obama likes him.  ... So what?


................................................................................
 Sources:

Unless otherwise indicated, data sourced from Wikipedia.

OBAMA - CIA AND TORTURE

Barack Obama admits: The CIA 'tortured some folks after 9/11' Friday 01 August 2014 “We tortured some folks,” he admitted, “We did some things that were contrary to our values.” In 2009 he described waterboarding, a favourite CIA technique, as torture and “a mistake” and he banned its use by American operatives, but last night’s comments are the most emphatic admission.. President Obama, speaking ahead of the expected release of a Senate report that criticises the CIA’s treatment of captives, steered clear of commenting on the efficacy of torture. He added that he believed the mistreatment occurred because of pressure security officials felt to prevent another attack. He said Americans should not be too “sanctimonious,” about passing judgment through the lens of a seemingly safer present. He also expressed confidence in his CIA director, John Brennan, in the wake of an internal CIA report documenting that the spy agency improperly accessed Senate computers. There have been calls for his resignation by congressional lawmakers. FULL @ SOURCE SOURCE - http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/barack-obama-admits-the-cia-tortured-some-folks-after-911-9644016.html

So there you go ... CIA can do whatever they want ... and the government approves.

Report should be vaguely interesting.

And Brennan's in with O.

LOL

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION TO FIRE CIA DIRECTOR, JOHN BRENNAN?

Check out Ray McGovern's blog http://www.raymcgovern.com/ Will Obama fire CIA Director - John Brennan - over spying on Senate Committee?   [Ray McGovern - ex-CIA]

SEE ALSO Why is Washington Risking War with Russia? http://www.thenation.com/article/180825/why-washington-risking-war-russia