In 1985, President Ronald Reagan nominated
Robert Gates to be director of central intelligence
(DCI), but he was denied confirmation because
a majority of members on the Senate intelligence
committee believed he was lying about his knowledge
and role in Iran-contra. The independent counsel
for Iran-contra, Lawrence Walsh, “found
insufficient evidence to warrant charging Gates
with a crime,” but he established that
Gates knew early on about Oliver North’s
illegal support for the Contras and the illegal
diversion of funds.
In 1991, Gates survived the confirmation process
to become DCI despite the opposition of more
than 30 senators who believed that his remarks
were scripted and that he was not candid in
discussing his role in the politicization of
intelligence on the Soviet Union, Central America,
and Southwest Asia. In his memoir in 1996, Gates
says nothing about the CIA’s exaggeration
of Soviet military forces, although he spent
a great deal of his working life at the CIA
tailoring national intelligence estimates on
Soviet military capability and intentions. And
today, Gates is lying about the Iraq War, arguing
that an intelligence failure was the reason
for the Bush administration’s decision
to launch a preemptive attack against Iraq.
Gates told PBS's Tavis Smiley this week that
the United States will be more cautious about
launching another preemptive attack because
of the intelligence failures of the Iraq War.
But the role of the White House and the CIA
in distorting the intelligence on Iraq had nothing
to do with the decision to go to war. The Bush
administration relied on phony intelligence
to create and employ a strategic disinformation
campaign to convince the Congress, the media,
and the American people of the need for war.
President Bush wanted the war to establish
himself as a genuine commander-in-chief; Vice
President Dick Cheney wanted the war to create
a more powerful presidency; Secretary of Defense
Donald Rumsfeld wanted the war to make his case
for transforming the military into a smaller
and more mobile force; National Security Advisor
Condi Rice wanted the war because the old boy
network favored it. Sadly, Secretary of State
Powell knew that going to war made no sense,
but he unwisely made the phony case for war
at the United Nations because he wanted to be
seen as a team player. And now Gates, who owes
all of his success to the Bush family, is helping
George W. Bush make the case that faulty intelligence
was responsible for the Iraq War.
There are lessons to be learned about the Iraq
War, but the role of faulty intelligence in
the declaration of a preemptive attack is not
one of them. The Congress must learn that it
needs to rebuild its legitimacy and credibility,
which was lost on its way to authorizing force
against Iraq. The professional military must
learn that it cannot be an accomplice in presidential
deception, which should have been the lesson
from the Vietnam War.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff never challenged
the presidential lies during the tragic buildup
in Vietnam or the run-up to the Iraq War. The
mainstream media must learn to challenge conventional
wisdom and to examine the arguments of the contrarians,
who were right about Vietnam and Iraq. Judith
Miller of the New York Times was not the only
victim of the disinformation of the Bush administration;
Walter Pincus of the Washington Post and Michael
Gordon of the Times should have been skeptical
of the information they were given.
The major task of the press is to hold any
administration’s feet to the fire in regard
to duplicity. The American people must also
learn to be more skeptical in times of crisis,
when presidents often engage in deception to
make the case for war. James Polk did so before
the Mexican-American War; William McKinley did
so before the Spanish-American War; Lyndon Johnson
did so to support the buildup in the Vietnam
War. The Congress, the military, the media,
and the public must understand the importance
of loyal dissent, particularly in wartime.
President Barack Obama blundered badly when
he decided to retain Robert Gates as secretary
of defense. Obama genuinely believes in change
in international security. In his inaugural
address, he emphasized that “our power
alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle
us to do what we please.” He argued that
the “world has changed, and we must change
with it.” Secretary of Defense Gates,
on the other hand, has traditional notions on
the importance of post-Cold War military supremacy.
He believes that American military policy and
the weapons we bought to defend ourselves won
the Cold War against the Soviet Union. In his
memoir, he described the Cold War as a prizefight
in which a sudden flurry of hooks and jabs put
the big guy down for the count. Obama has questioned
the need for the policies of the Bush administration
that Gates favors, including the deployment
of a national missile defense at home; a ballistic-missile
defense system in East Europe; NATO membership
for Georgia and Ukraine; and the abrogation
of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
These policies are responsible in part for
the isolation of the United States from the
international community. Real change requires
an end to the superpower notions of unquestioned
military superiority and militarization of national
security policy.
At a crucial time in the discussion of strategic
policy in Afghanistan, where additional troops
will not reverse the steady deterioration there,
it is essential that the Congress, the media,
and the military also recognize the limits of
power against the Taliban and recognize the
need to study the case for withdrawal from Afghanistan.
We must learn from the mistakes of the misuse
of power, which occurred in Cuba, Vietnam, and
Iraq. We all know the words of naval commander
Stephen Decatur regarding “our country,
right or wrong.”
But we must never forget the words of Carl
Schurz, a major general in the Union Army and
then a senator, who said “Our country,
right or wrong. When right, it ought be kept
right; when wrong, to be put right.”
Melvin A. Goodman is senior fellow at the
Center for International Policy and adjunct
professor of government at Johns Hopkins University.
He spent more than 42 years in the U.S. Army,
the Central Intelligence Agency, and the Department
of Defense. His most recent book is “Failure
of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the
CIA.”
Copyright 2009 The Public
Record
