How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda

Frontpagemag.com ^ | September 14, 2004 | Bill Gertz

[fuzzy122]

How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda By Bill Gertz The Washington Times | September 14, 2004

The CIA's Counterterrorist Center has spent more than $15 million in the past three years funding studies, reports and conferences produced by former Democratic administration officials and other critics of the Bush administration.

The latest effort was a $300,000 grant by the CIA to the Atlantic Council for a study co-authored by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism official who wrote a best seller accusing the Bush administration of failing in the war on terrorism by invading Iraq.

[fuzzy122]

How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda By Bill Gertz The Washington Times | September 14, 2004

The CIA's Counterterrorist Center has spent more than $15 million in the past three years funding studies, reports and conferences produced by former Democratic administration officials and other critics of the Bush administration.

The latest effort was a $300,000 grant by the CIA to the Atlantic Council for a study co-authored by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism official who wrote a best seller accusing the Bush administration of failing in the war on terrorism by invading Iraq.

[ApesForEvolution]

Bill Gertz and the Wash Times?

[Dr. Frank fan]

The question is why they fund anti Bush propaganda. Is there a comprehensible explanation one can surmise?

We didn't hear this kind of noise from CIA until Bush launched the Iraq war. Something about this war really set them off. They were happy with the Afghanistan war for example (indeed the CIA was heavily relied upon if my layperson's memory is correct).

The article seems to chalk it all up to "displacing criticism". I'm not sure I'm convinced. Wouldn't they have started whining and undermining Bush soon after 9/11 then?

A more likely explanation is that, as with any institution, this is a turf war and CIA's primary interest is to defend their turf and budget. Let's view the Iraq war in that light: a radical shift, upsetting the apple cart of carefully honed international "inspections"/"sanctions"/etc. The Iraq war was a jolt to the status quo; instead of using the CIA to fight the ongoing war against Hussein secretly, and indefinitely, Bush decided to finish it. This is unacceptable to CIA, which presumably relies on situations like Iraq Containment '91-'03 (and the shady black-market opportunities which result) for a good deal of its budget.

I'm guessing a true explanation would go something like this: We'll keep our common-sense assumption that at heart the CIA is a deeply conservative (in generic sense of that term) institution. They rely on the status quo and do not like to see it upset. And it just so happens that in this case, CIA has determined that the Democrats are the party of the status quo (will not upset the international order, will not engage in radical, bold foreign policy directions) while Bush, by contrast, instituted a messy and indeed radical foreign policy shift.

Hence, CIA must spike Bush for its survival.

Perhaps it's not so difficult to understand after all.

[Rhetorical pi2]

Dammit!!! Who the Hell is in charge here?!! This has got to stop!!

These people weasel their way into positions so that they can hammer away at a Republican administration without having to get out front and identify themselves as political operatives.

[Peach]

How very interesting. Bill Gertz is the only reporter I respect these days. He's simply the best.

[fuzzy122]

I think you may be on to something here.

BEHIND YOU! DUCK!

[GOP_1900AD]

Since Bush played Mr. Nice Guy and never purged CI, I would reckon that there are numerous Clintonites around. Heck, they're probably passing around MoveOn and International ANSWER email blasts and planning anti Bush rallies! Like all other unpurged departments in the Logic Free Zone, there must be thousands of lefties per square mile there!

[Jack Black]

Well if he wins he'll get another chance to purge, and hopefully comlete the ideological cleansing of the entire executive branch.

I'm not holding my breath though.

[Dark Wing]

Surprise, Surprise!

[Tailgunner Joe]

"The products of the [center] have a consistent theme: They criticize the Bush administration and provide ammunition for the Kerry campaign," said one U.S. official who has read the resulting reports and studies.

This official said the academic outreach is the Counterterrorist Center's way of "buying off" criticism of the CIA and the intelligence community by providing hundreds of thousands of dollars in contracts and conferences.

Spokesmen for the Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, American Foreign Policy Council and Hoover Institution said their organizations never have been asked by the CTC to co-host or co-produce any counterterrorism programs.

[Fedora]

Thanks. This part also jumped out at me--lots of interesting names here from both sides of the political fence:

A grant of $250,000 to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, known as CSIS, headed by former Clinton administration Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre

CSIS Board, Counselors, and Advisers

Board of Trustees

Chairman
Sam Nunn*
Chairman and CEO, Nuclear Threat Initiative

Vice Chairman
David M. Abshire
President, Center for the Study of the Presidency,
and Cofounder of CSIS

Chairman, Executive Committee
Anne Armstrong*
Former U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain

Members

Betty Stanley Beene	Kenneth G. Langone
Reginald K. Brack	Donald B. Marron
William E. Brock	E. Stanley O'Neal
Harold Brown	Felix G. Rohatyn
Zbigniew Brzezinski	Charles A. Sanders
William S. Cohen	James R. Schlesinger
Ralph Cossa	William A. Schreyer*
Douglas N. Daft	Brent Scowcroft
Richard Fairbanks	Murray Weidenbaum
Michael P. Galvin*	Dolores D. Wharton
John J. Hamre*	Frederick B. Whittemore
Benjamin W. Heinman, Jr.	R. James Woolsey
Carla A. Hills	Amos A. Jordan, (Emeritus)
Ray L. Hunt	Leonard H. Marks, (Emeritus)
Henry A. Kissinger	Robert S. Strauss, (Emeritus)
*Member of the Executive Committee

Counselors

William E. Brock	Henry A. Kissinger
Harold Brown	Sam Nunn
Zbigniew Brzezinski	James R. Schlesinger
William S. Cohen	Brent Scowcroft
Richard Fairbanks

Senior Advisers

J. Carter Beese	Amos A. Jordan
Bradley D. Belt	John Kornblum
James M. Bodner	Robert H. Kupperman
Stanton H. Burnett	Laurence Martin
Richard R. Burt	Thomas F. (Mack) McLarty
William K. Clark, Jr.	Richard McCormack
Arnaud de Borchgrave	Walter Slocombe
Diana Lady Dougan	Robert Tyrer
Luis E. Giusti	Anthony Zinni (Distinguished Senior Adviser)
Fred C. Iklé (Distinguished Scholar in Residence)

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CSIS Leadership

Corporate Officers

John J. Hamre, President and Chief Executive Officer

Robin Niblett, Executive Vice President and Corporate Secretary

Kurt Campbell, Senior Vice President and Director, International Security Program

Erik R. Peterson, Senior Vice President and Director, CSIS Institute of Executive Education

Patrick M. Cronin, Senior Vice President and Director of Studies

Greg Broaddus, Vice President for Operations and Treasurer

Jay C. Farrar, Vice President for External Affairs

CSIS Specialists

Governance

Robert E. Ebel, Director, Energy and National Security Program

Richard Jackson, Director, Global Aging Initiative

Sherman E. Katz, William M. Scholl Chair in International Business

Shireen T. Hunter, Director, , Islamic Studies Program

James A. Lewis, Director, Technology and Public Policy Program

Erik R. Peterson, William A. Schreyer Chair in Global Analysis

Anne G. Solomon, Senior Associate, Technology and Public Policy Program and Director, Biotechnology Initiative

Sidney Weintraub, William A. Schreyer Chair in Global Analysis

International Security

Anthony H. Cordesman, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy

Arnaud de Borchgrave, Director, Global Organized Crime Project

Kurt Campbell, Director, International Security Program

Michèle Flournoy, Senior Adviser, International Security Program

Clark Murdock, Senior Fellow, International Security Program

Amy Smithson, Senior Fellow, International Security Program

Regions

J. Stephen Morrison, Director, Africa Program

Sidney Weintraub, Director, Americas Program

Bates Gill, Freeman Chair in China Studies and Director, Asia Program

William T. Breer, Japan Chair

Ralph Cossa, President, Pacific Forum CSIS

Simon Serfaty, Director, Europe Program and Brzezinski Chair in Global Security and Geostrategy

Janusz Bugajski, Director, Eastern Europe Project

Jonathan Alterman, Director, Middle East Program

Celeste A. Wallander, Director, Russia and Eurasia Program

Teresita C. Schaffer, Director, South Asia Program

Bulent Aliriza, Director, Turkey Project

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[Lancey Howard]

BUMP

[Lancey Howard]

And another disgusted bump.

[fuzzy122]

Thanks for the bumps(?) I agree, it is disgusting.

MEGA-

Stay Strong
Fuzzy

[Lancey Howard]

Your quite welcome.

[Lancey Howard]

Oh, and I better bookmark this, too.

[piasa]

Richard Clarke bump

[piasa]

Bush administration intelligence and policy officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, disclosed other recent funding activities by the CTC program, in addition to the one at which Mr. Clarke was co-chairman. They include:

•A grant of $250,000 to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, known as CSIS, headed by former Clinton administration Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre. The grant paid for a study on how other major powers are taking advantage of the Bush administration in the global war on terrorism. A CSIS spokesman said that the center's work is bipartisan and that it does contract work with both the Defense Department and CIA.

•$200,000 for a conference paper produced by Steven Simon, a former Clinton administration National Security Council staff member, now with the RAND Corp. Mr. Simon's paper was about how to restructure the U.S. government for the war on terrorism and was to be included as a chapter of a book. Mr. Simon was a deputy to Mr. Clarke.

•A grant of $100,000 for Bruce Hoffman, vice president for external affairs and public spokesman for RAND and a frequent columnist and guest on National Public Radio commenting on terrorism issues. Mr. Hoffman was granted high-level security clearances at the CIA as part of his consultancy.
     Warren Robak, deputy director of RAND's Office of External Communications, said, "Although RAND has done research for the U.S. intelligence community for many years, we do not discuss details or confirm the existence of any individual contract."

     •Travel fees to University of California at Los Angeles law school professor Khaled Abou El Fadl for a paper on U.S. treatment of Muslims.     
Daniel Pipes, a specialist on the Middle East, has called Mr. El Fadl an Islamic extremist who supports "jihad" or holy war. A spokesman for Mr. El Fadl confirmed that he spoke at the CIA, but said he was not paid by the agency. 

Funding for conferences on the failure of U.S. public diplomacy at the Brookings Institution and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, both viewed as liberal in political orientation.

     The Atlantic Council study by Mr. Clarke, along with retired Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the Clinton administration's top anti-drug official, was critical of the Bush administration's approach to NATO and counterterrorism issues. A section of the report states that France has not sought to undermine the U.S. position in Europe.

[Earthdweller]

Gee with all that money they spent you would think the Dems could have won the 2004 election.

Americans out-think the CIA apparently.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!