17 May 2010
The History Channel's New Series Tells A Watered-Down "Story of Us"
3:59 AM | 
Posted by
Brady
Not Your Typical Textbook Treatment:
Anyone who took AP US History at New Bedford High School in the past few years should instantly be reminded of the way in which they were taught American history. We asked the difficult questions. We filled in gaps in the broader historical narrative by uncovering often-invisible ties. We read works by Howard Zinn and Studs Terkel that give voice to minority groups in America. We assumed the roles of seemingly-minor historical figures and told their stories through creative writing and in role-play scenarios. We analyzed essential questions and grappled with ethics problems all while using the most current social media outlets to further our discussions. In short, we ripped the textbook to shreds and reconstructed it piece by piece.
At Boston University, this kind of unconventional approach to teaching American history is the norm. Most of BU's professors (including the recently-deceased Howard Zinn) are among the most distinguished in the field and continually prove that we still have much to learn about American history. A slew of young professors are demonstrating their historian's craft by reexaming primary sources past and present, uncovering new material to challenge a number of supposed truisms, and by evaluating alternative global futures. For now, let me just quickly go over some of the methodology involved in one of my courses entitled, "Americans in the World, United States History in a Transnational Perspective." In future posts I'll explore some of the more interesting lectures and discussions we had as a class.
This course in particular serves as a paradigm of how I think our youth should be taught American history. Certainly we reviewed the basic dates, people, and events. But at this level, these are really of minor concern. Our study of American history was a kind of recovery process in which we uncovered hidden ties, forgotten affinities, and the connections between American people and other people and cultures around the world. We took common textbook histories and put them up against a transnational framework to get a more accurate and complete sense of ourselves. We reviewed letters, diaries, journals, film, and novels to find that the world beyond the U.S. has appeared in a variety of new ways for Americans as something critical to our sense of self and our understanding of our own culture. We looked at how the world has appeared variously as a place of suffering in need of alleviation (in works by Emma Goldman), a place of complicated and critical cutural interactions (in works by Henry James), a sphere of noble political action (in Casablanca), and now in the early 21st century as a place of opportunity and travel and also an environment of unchecked danger (in Syriana). Most importantly, our professor greatly enhanced our understanding of and appreciation for American history while maintaining our continued interest in the subject.
Why the Watered-Down Version of American History?
I think there are a number of reasons why many teachers, textbooks, and documentaries about the United States simply recite important dates and facts while only skimming the surface of analysis. Many of them have to do with the quality of the materials available, the socio-economic status of the students and the community, the dedication of the teachers and administration, general time constraints, and in some cases television ratings. But I also think that politics, religion, and ideology play a huge role in covering up some of the more ugly episodes in our history. For example, some states in the South and the Midwest teach a fundamentally different curriculum than you will find in the Northeast. I'm not just talking about teaching evolution vs. creationism. Some textbooks are more hostile toward immigrants or spend less time covering slavery. Generally in religious schools, America is portrayed as being founded upon Judeo-Christian values, without considering other influences equally. Many times conservative textbooks and districts will champion certain terms like "American Exceptionalism" and omit certain facts that portray America in a negative light such as the fact that many Founding Fathers owned slaves (Sally Hemings ring a bell?). Most often, high school students get a watered-down treatment of events such as Indian removal, overseas expansionism and interventions, the dropping of the atomic bombs, cultural imperialism, segregation, and discrimination. Too much time is spent glorifying America as a beacon of hope and prosperity. While I believe these depictions are true, we must acknowledge that we are less-than-perfect as a nation and a union and making continual moral progress.
Admittedly, there are violators on the other side of the aisle as well. At times, some discussions I had in classes at BU, a very liberal university, seemed almost anti-American and some professors make no attempts to hide their liberal bias. Many of them have great ideas that might work in a theoretical world (like legalizing drugs), but most likely would not work practically (though one could say that these ideas are essential for human progress). My point is, I have deeply religious friends and friends who are atheists and both are sometimes at fault for choosing ignorance or complacency. Also, I need to point out that many other nations teach their youth versions of their history that hide horrors of the past (think of Holocaust deniers). But I think we can foster a climate of patriotism in this country without having to water-down the stories of Chief Joseph or Rodney King.
A Final Thought:
I could argue that in the last decade, teaching America's youth a truthful, complete account of American history from a national and a transnational perspective has never been more important. We are facing an almost-unprecedented economic depression and dismal job market, the cost of higher education has never been higher or more exclusive, and social media has exploded to the point where some young teens aren't developing real social skills. I think a first-rate education, with special attention to our own history, is the most important gift anyone can receive because among many other things, it helps us discover who we are as a people and where we are going as a nation.
I'm not suggesting that everyone needs to get a liberal arts education from an expensive university. The methods I described above are certainly not new and are things that most high school teachers could implement into their curriculum with relative ease, like the teacher I had did. True, there will likely always be a large percentage of the population who won't get this kind of history lesson, won't have access to it, or won't care about it. There are plenty of people in this country who are satisfied with stereotypes, (sometimes) ignorant religious doctrine, or a blindly-patriotic sense of American history that portrays us as the constant victim (to Indian aggression, to interracial marriage, to affirmative action and immigration, etc.). Even more are content with exclusively watching mindless reality TV and biased documentary series. But in this time of uncertainty for our future, I think we owe it to our youth to broaden their understanding of American history.
Much of what I have said about history can be compared to the practice of mapmaking. Both are imaginative enterprises. How we want to define America depends on how we frame the history of it. What we emphasize, what we bring up, is going to determine how our nation looks. We can tell our history as one of exceptionalism, as one of superiority, and put the U.S. at the center of our imaginations. Or we can try to decentralize it. I think it is better to throw ourselves off balance just enough to make us rethink the assumptions we take for granted. Let the politicians and preachers preach about exceptionalism and America's moral example. Let the pundits give us their opinions (but watch both sides). Let the administrators ensure that they play our national anthem each day before public school begins and that they remind us to honor our military servicemen and women (which we should). But let's not let our youth learn American history from one perspective, no matter which ideology or religion might subscribe to it. In teaching American history, we need to acknowledge stereotypes we have of others and consider if they drive our foreign policy. We need to understand that American culture and society has been made and shaped at the edges of the nation not just at the center. Our nation is a process that hinges on wired contexts and has changed over time. Let's encourage more of our youth to travel as part of their education. Travel helps us see what we take for granted, it helps us understand how others percieve us. Seeing the history of the U.S. from outside is a kind of corrective. It offers us a way to learn U.S. history for a purpose besides inoculating us with a good dose of patriotic loyalty. That is of course important. But if we are going to live in a globalized world as we have been told we do, we ought to have a better sense of how we got here and how our national past relates to it.
26 April 2010
The Cost of Death: the Case of Brian Nichols
[The following is an article I wrote that was published in Boston University's Pre-Law Review Magazine,
Spring 2008 edition. The views herein expressed are my own.]
The death penalty is among the most controversial sentencing practices in the American criminal justice system. The United States remains one of few industrialized countries that employ the death penalty as a form of legal atonement. Testing the religious and moral values of the American public, the practice has been notoriously lengthy and costly. While debate over the issue will undoubtedly persist, recent developments in a flagrant, violent crime have had grave implications for supporters of death penalty jurisprudence.
On March 11, 2005, Brian Nichols, a 33 year old African American, appeared in court to face charges of rape and false imprisonment. Nichols’ previous trial for these offenses had resulted in a hung jury. While in the custody of the Fulton County Courthouse in Atlanta, Georgia, Nichols began a violent rampage that would result in the largest manhunt in Georgia’s history. While changing into street clothes to wear in court, he overpowered sheriff’s deputy Cynthia Hall and took her firearm. After attacking the deputy, he entered the private chambers of Judge Rowland W. Barnes, where he encountered another deputy and stole his gun. Nichols then entered a courtroom, shot Barnes in the back of the head, killed court stenographer Julie Ann Brandau, and shot Sergeant Hoyt Teasley, a pursuing officer.
After his escape, Nichols carjacked three vehicles at gunpoint and pistol-whipped a reporter. In search of a hiding place, he murdered federal agent David Wilhelm and kidnapped a woman, who later convinced him to surrender. Georgia authorities arrested him 24 hours later. He was indicted in May 2005 in the same courthouse in which many of the killings occurred months earlier, facing the additional charges of murder, kidnapping, robbery, aggravated assault on a police officer, battery, theft, carjacking, and escaping from authorities. District Attorney Paul L. Howard, Jr. sought the death penalty and the case was expected to cost nearly $5 million and to last up to seven months.
Nichols, a former UPS employee and regular churchgoer, devised an elaborate scheme to break out of an Atlanta jailhouse that involved his pen-pal girlfriend, a paralegal, and at least two sheriff’s deputies. The plot was discovered and foiled in October 2006 when Nichols was moved to another facility. The Nichols case gained further national media attention after it stalled almost three years later. During the pre-trial conference in September 2007, Nichols’ defense team, which had been paid $1.2 million for its services, announced that it was not receiving enough funding from Georgia’s public defender’s office. Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller was forced to suspend the state trial during the jury selection process. Fuller warned that the case might be suspended indefinitely if the defense was not provided adequate funding. The state public defender’s office defied the judge’s order to continue funding the defense attorneys, arguing that it did not possess the necessary funds.
In November 2007, the district attorney appealed to Georgia’s Supreme Court to force Judge Fuller to commence the jury selection process. His request was denied, and the trial was delayed for the fifth time on November 16, 2007. On January 30, 2008, Fuller stepped down from the case after being quoted in The New Yorker magazine as saying, “Everyone in the world knows he did it.” He submitted his recusal to the chief justice of the superior court, noting his breach of impartiality.
In light of these recent, troubling events, the Nichols case raises serious questions about the effectiveness of the death penalty process, a system clearly overburdened. The Supreme Court ruled in Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) that impoverished defendants must be provided free legal counsel in order for proceedings to commence. However, the question of how much these public defenders should be paid and how to assign them remains up to the legal purview of individual states. The system in Georgia had been revised in 2005 and now includes the Georgia Capital Defenders Office, which provides indigent defendants with attorneys specifically trained in capital cases. The funds for these attorneys come from legal fees collected from plaintiffs, since taxpayers were disinclined to pay for expensive capital cases. This system is representative of other systems in states that still practice capital punishment.
In the case of Brian Nichols, the prosecution enjoyed the prospect of eye-witness testimony and a written confession to all four killings. This reality, uncommon in capital cases, has not guaranteed that his victims will be vindicated. The capital punishment system appears broken, with evidence-filled cases taking longer and costing the public more. This reality represents the failures of the capital punishment system and has repercussions that are hard to deny.
According to Amnesty International, 135 countries have abolished the death penalty. The United States remains one of few industrialized countries to permit it. The Nichols case serves as an example of a whimsical practice that is hard to vindicate. Supporters of capital punishment argue that it is the ultimate form of deterrence, incapacitation, and moral correctness. Yet, research by William Bowers of Northeastern University shows that the death penalty does not curtail violence. States that do not allow the death penalty tend to have lower murder rates than those that employ it. Former Texas Attorney General Jim Mattox has remarked, "It is my own experience that those executed in Texas were not deterred by the existence of the death penalty law. I think in most cases you'll find that the murder was committed under severe drug and alcohol abuse." According to a survey by former presidents of America’s top criminological societies, 84 percent of them admitted that research has not proven the death penalty is a deterrent to crime.
Aside from the debatable statistics and research, death penalty cases are extremely expensive. Defendants are afforded an array of additional rights and protections when preparing their defense, including character analysis by experts, psychiatrists, and psychologists. Juries in these cases are asked to consider much more than guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. They must account for factors such as mental illness or any aspect of the defendant’s character or record that may mitigate a lesser sentence. However, if the system is unable to function due to economic constraints, as evidence suggests, it should be abolished. If states are unable to derive the necessary funds, a miscarriage of justice becomes likely, such as in the case of Brian Nichols. If the district attorney had not sought the death penalty, Nichols may well be currently serving a life sentence in prison.
Based on the Brian Nichols case, as well as analysis of the cost-benefit factor, the death penalty is inefficient and ineffective. Legislators should move beyond the moral and religious debate and simply realize the economic constraints of the system. If states cannot provide public defenders with adequate pay, criminals win. In the case of Brian Nichols, he has won, as his case remains suspended until the situation is resolved. The reality of the death penalty in Georgia has shaken Americans’ trust and faith in the criminal justice system.
[The following material was not published.]
[The following material was not published.]
UPDATE: On December 13, 2008, Brian Nichols received multiple life sentences from a judge in Atlanta's Municipal Court. The Nichols case, originally docketed as a capital trial, cost the state of Georgia $3 million dollars. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which compiles data for all 50 states and the District of Columbia, the average annual cost of housing an inmate per year is $25,000. Confining Brian Nichols for 40 years would still not equal the $3 million spent by Georgia to achieve a sentence. Moreover, the prosectors failed to persuade the jury to sentence him to death. If the jury had obliged, the Nichols saga would have continued through the complicated death row appellate process, which would have cost taxpayers even more money.
I do not intend this post to begin a debate over whether or not the death penalty is morally justifiable. Frankly, I believe in some instances it is preferable. Rather, we need to examine the issue from an economic and deterrence standpoint. We need to establish a more concrete connection between capital punishment and deterrence. If such a connection cannot be found, we cannot rely on that argument for justifying the death penalty. Moreover, if the system we employ to convict criminals in capital cases ends up costing us more than housing an inmate for 40 years or more (nearly life), clearly it needs to be revised. Since capital punishment remains a state power, the states are burdened with paying for the cost of the proceedings. If we as a nation insist on retaining this most-antiquated practice, we should at least update the legal process it relies upon.
Assuming that states will never cede this power to the federal government, there are two methods for improving the system that stand out to me:
1.) State and local legislators might need to remove some of the safeguards in the system, particularly at the appellate level, to keep costs down and expedite the process.
2.) Taxpayers will have to foot more of the bill in order to prevent 4 year trials that cost millions of dollars.
I do not intend this post to begin a debate over whether or not the death penalty is morally justifiable. Frankly, I believe in some instances it is preferable. Rather, we need to examine the issue from an economic and deterrence standpoint. We need to establish a more concrete connection between capital punishment and deterrence. If such a connection cannot be found, we cannot rely on that argument for justifying the death penalty. Moreover, if the system we employ to convict criminals in capital cases ends up costing us more than housing an inmate for 40 years or more (nearly life), clearly it needs to be revised. Since capital punishment remains a state power, the states are burdened with paying for the cost of the proceedings. If we as a nation insist on retaining this most-antiquated practice, we should at least update the legal process it relies upon.
Assuming that states will never cede this power to the federal government, there are two methods for improving the system that stand out to me:
1.) State and local legislators might need to remove some of the safeguards in the system, particularly at the appellate level, to keep costs down and expedite the process.
2.) Taxpayers will have to foot more of the bill in order to prevent 4 year trials that cost millions of dollars.
26 August 2009
A Great Light, Has Gone Out
"For me, a few hours ago, this campaign came to an end. For all those whose cares have been
our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die." - Edward M. Kennedy, speaking at the Democratic National Convention in New York on August 12, 1980, having lost his party's nomination for the presidency to Jimmy Carter.
Today we lost a mighty statesman in Edward M. Kennedy. The patriarch and keeper of the flame of the Senate died late Tuesday night at his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts after a year-long battle with brain cancer. My thoughts and prayers go out to his wife Vicky and to the entire Kennedy family. Much will be said about his life in the coming days, weeks, and months, including much about the shrouded Chappaquiddick incident, but as we will see from the endless outpouring of sympathy, tribute, and reflection upon Kennedy's life, he was a man who held the respect of millions from all walks of life.
The last Kennedy warrior in a line of heroic brothers, Ted Kennedy devoted his life to serving the American people and fighting for universal health care. During a time in which the political fruit was most ripe, Senator Kennedy's illness prevented him from employing his remarkable oratory skills to engender support for health care reform legislation. However, it remains in question as to whether the loss of the "Last Lion" of the Senate will be particularly grievous to the health care reform movement. Indeed, Kennedy's Senate vote was considered of such importance that he wrote personal letters to Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and state lawmakers, urging them to change a state law to allow the governor to appoint a replacement should Kennedy be unable to cast his vote. Alas that his premonition proved true. Yet, it is equally likely that Kennedy will become a martyr for health care reform. I cannot ignore the cruel irony in that given Kennedy's insistence that the cause of his life was fighting for health care reform, his death might prove stronger than any words of wisdom he could have conjured in life for President Obama's reform initiatives.
Despite his self-pronounced legislative legacy, Kennedy's life work expanded well beyond the health care horizon. He was a champion of the middle class, for workers' rights, civil rights, education reform and more. Ever-shadowed by the accomplishments of his older brothers in an idealist period, Ted Kennedy worked tirelessly to become a skilled lawmaker. Over the years, he navigated the legislative process masterfully, achieved notoriety for his bipartisanship, and crafted legislation that changed the face of American politics as we know it.
Historians such as Robert Dallek have often said that John F. Kennedy lived an "unfinished life." Yet it seems more precise to portray all three of the Kennedy brothers as having lived unfinished lives. It is a cruel fate for Senator Kennedy that he did not live to see his dream fulfilled. But I believe that his words, as I have quoted above, were not hollow. The Kennedy legacy is one of inspiration, respect, and admiration for one's country. In studying the events of the 1960s and beyond, I can find few other individuals, besides perhaps MLK, who inspired our nation to accomplish such unlikely feats and inculcated unmeasured hope to generations of Americans.
our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die." - Edward M. Kennedy, speaking at the Democratic National Convention in New York on August 12, 1980, having lost his party's nomination for the presidency to Jimmy Carter.Today we lost a mighty statesman in Edward M. Kennedy. The patriarch and keeper of the flame of the Senate died late Tuesday night at his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts after a year-long battle with brain cancer. My thoughts and prayers go out to his wife Vicky and to the entire Kennedy family. Much will be said about his life in the coming days, weeks, and months, including much about the shrouded Chappaquiddick incident, but as we will see from the endless outpouring of sympathy, tribute, and reflection upon Kennedy's life, he was a man who held the respect of millions from all walks of life.
The last Kennedy warrior in a line of heroic brothers, Ted Kennedy devoted his life to serving the American people and fighting for universal health care. During a time in which the political fruit was most ripe, Senator Kennedy's illness prevented him from employing his remarkable oratory skills to engender support for health care reform legislation. However, it remains in question as to whether the loss of the "Last Lion" of the Senate will be particularly grievous to the health care reform movement. Indeed, Kennedy's Senate vote was considered of such importance that he wrote personal letters to Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and state lawmakers, urging them to change a state law to allow the governor to appoint a replacement should Kennedy be unable to cast his vote. Alas that his premonition proved true. Yet, it is equally likely that Kennedy will become a martyr for health care reform. I cannot ignore the cruel irony in that given Kennedy's insistence that the cause of his life was fighting for health care reform, his death might prove stronger than any words of wisdom he could have conjured in life for President Obama's reform initiatives.
Despite his self-pronounced legislative legacy, Kennedy's life work expanded well beyond the health care horizon. He was a champion of the middle class, for workers' rights, civil rights, education reform and more. Ever-shadowed by the accomplishments of his older brothers in an idealist period, Ted Kennedy worked tirelessly to become a skilled lawmaker. Over the years, he navigated the legislative process masterfully, achieved notoriety for his bipartisanship, and crafted legislation that changed the face of American politics as we know it.
Historians such as Robert Dallek have often said that John F. Kennedy lived an "unfinished life." Yet it seems more precise to portray all three of the Kennedy brothers as having lived unfinished lives. It is a cruel fate for Senator Kennedy that he did not live to see his dream fulfilled. But I believe that his words, as I have quoted above, were not hollow. The Kennedy legacy is one of inspiration, respect, and admiration for one's country. In studying the events of the 1960s and beyond, I can find few other individuals, besides perhaps MLK, who inspired our nation to accomplish such unlikely feats and inculcated unmeasured hope to generations of Americans.
01 March 2009
Withdrawal from Iraq? Not So Fast.
As we approach the sixth anniversary of the Iraq War, 
the Obama Administration has revealed its plan to withdraw U.S. troops and end our combat mission by August 31, 2010. The President announced that 50,000 troops will remain in a support role until December 31, 2011. Democrats in Congress largely disapprove of President Obama's plan, while key Republicans such as John McCain (R-AZ) think the plan is fair. Regardless of the political response, the President's announcement illustrates an important reality for voters that may not appear obvious; regardless of the campaign promises and the political slogans, regardless of the unpopularity of the previous administration's policies, a president will almost always listen to his commanders on the ground and respond practically and realistically.
While it would seem like Obama the pragmatist has really changed course from his predecessor, recent history proves otherwise. President Bush, whom Obama had called previous to his announcement, struck a deal with the Iraqis for a phased withdrawal that would have removed most combat troops from Iraq a little later than 18 months. Having secured the presidency, Mr. Obama has extended his campaign promise for a withdrawal by two months and decided to keep 50,000 "support" troops in Iraq until the end of 2011. Yet, political rhetoric aside, these young men and women will be in combat, and they will continue to die in combat. The President's plan largely hinges on the Iraqi government's ability to maintain functioning schools, electricity and water facilities, and economic infrastructure.
There are currently 142,000 troops in Iraq. At the time of this writing, the Department of Defense has confirmed the deaths of 4,251 American soldiers there, with over 30,000 wounded. Most analysts project the Iraq War will cost the U.S. over $2 trillion in total. Admittedly, President Obama's plan is certainly a step in the right direction, but we should not be fooled by the politics that are ever-present in the speeches of our elected leaders.
Regardless of what the administration says, the United States will stay in Iraq or its neighborhood for the forseeable future, which will continue to cost us billions of dollars. The region is politically and militarily unstable and houses some of the most low-cost oil reserves. We have already had a major presence there for some 50 years.
The President has made some admirable proposals to address the domestic effects of the war. In his recent budget proposal, which aims to spend an almost unprecedented $3.6 trillion, he is seeking a 15% increase in veterans funding. The Department of Veterans Affairs has warned that if they are not adequately funded to care for our wounded warriors, we will see an increase in broken families, divorce, unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse, homelessness, and preventable suicides. We have a moral obligation to our soldiers to prevent such catastrophes.
Another expenditure often over-looked is known as "reset" in the Pentagon, the reconditioning of military equipment worn down by operations in a combat zone. Many weapons and armor have been destroyed or deteriorated to the point that are ineffective. The Department of Defense will need millions of dollars to fix these weapons of war.
The government is already hardpressed to convince China to continue buying U.S. treasury bonds to fund our stimulus packages and war habits, and the President has already announced that most top-earning Americans will have to shoulder a heavier tax load. Ending the combat mission in Iraq will certainly help us alleviate our strained military and secure our economic futures. However, let us not forget that the President plans to escalate the number of troops in Afghanistan, which will add new strains. Hopefully, President Obama will continue to seek advice from his commanders, his advisers, and the American people to continue his effort to restore confidence in America at home and abroad.
the Obama Administration has revealed its plan to withdraw U.S. troops and end our combat mission by August 31, 2010. The President announced that 50,000 troops will remain in a support role until December 31, 2011. Democrats in Congress largely disapprove of President Obama's plan, while key Republicans such as John McCain (R-AZ) think the plan is fair. Regardless of the political response, the President's announcement illustrates an important reality for voters that may not appear obvious; regardless of the campaign promises and the political slogans, regardless of the unpopularity of the previous administration's policies, a president will almost always listen to his commanders on the ground and respond practically and realistically.While it would seem like Obama the pragmatist has really changed course from his predecessor, recent history proves otherwise. President Bush, whom Obama had called previous to his announcement, struck a deal with the Iraqis for a phased withdrawal that would have removed most combat troops from Iraq a little later than 18 months. Having secured the presidency, Mr. Obama has extended his campaign promise for a withdrawal by two months and decided to keep 50,000 "support" troops in Iraq until the end of 2011. Yet, political rhetoric aside, these young men and women will be in combat, and they will continue to die in combat. The President's plan largely hinges on the Iraqi government's ability to maintain functioning schools, electricity and water facilities, and economic infrastructure.
There are currently 142,000 troops in Iraq. At the time of this writing, the Department of Defense has confirmed the deaths of 4,251 American soldiers there, with over 30,000 wounded. Most analysts project the Iraq War will cost the U.S. over $2 trillion in total. Admittedly, President Obama's plan is certainly a step in the right direction, but we should not be fooled by the politics that are ever-present in the speeches of our elected leaders.
Regardless of what the administration says, the United States will stay in Iraq or its neighborhood for the forseeable future, which will continue to cost us billions of dollars. The region is politically and militarily unstable and houses some of the most low-cost oil reserves. We have already had a major presence there for some 50 years.
The President has made some admirable proposals to address the domestic effects of the war. In his recent budget proposal, which aims to spend an almost unprecedented $3.6 trillion, he is seeking a 15% increase in veterans funding. The Department of Veterans Affairs has warned that if they are not adequately funded to care for our wounded warriors, we will see an increase in broken families, divorce, unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse, homelessness, and preventable suicides. We have a moral obligation to our soldiers to prevent such catastrophes.
Another expenditure often over-looked is known as "reset" in the Pentagon, the reconditioning of military equipment worn down by operations in a combat zone. Many weapons and armor have been destroyed or deteriorated to the point that are ineffective. The Department of Defense will need millions of dollars to fix these weapons of war.
The government is already hardpressed to convince China to continue buying U.S. treasury bonds to fund our stimulus packages and war habits, and the President has already announced that most top-earning Americans will have to shoulder a heavier tax load. Ending the combat mission in Iraq will certainly help us alleviate our strained military and secure our economic futures. However, let us not forget that the President plans to escalate the number of troops in Afghanistan, which will add new strains. Hopefully, President Obama will continue to seek advice from his commanders, his advisers, and the American people to continue his effort to restore confidence in America at home and abroad.
15 February 2009
Profile: Alexander the Great
[Alexander III of Macedon, 356-323 BCE.]
After his death in 323 BCE, it was remarked, "A tomb now suffices h
im for whom the whole world was not sufficient." How did this Macedonian boy conquer the known world by the age of 32? What character attributes did he possess? What is his legacy? The answers to these questions will reveal the science of his greatness and why Alexander is worthy of his title.At the age of 20, Alexander III became king of Macedonia. Along with the Great King of Persia, he was the most powerful man in the world at the time. He had a 13-year reign, representing the pinnacle of Greek expansion. His death marks the end of Classical Greece and the start of the Hellenistic period. His legacy comprises two of his greatest contributions to history; a flexible, integrated army and the idea of world conquest.
Alexander first demonstrated his leadership quality at the age of 18 at the battle of Chaeronea in August of 338 BCE. His father Philip appointed him commander of the Macedonian heavy cavalry. The Macedonians crushed the league of Greek city-states resisting them and Philip furthered his plans to bring war to Asia Minor against Persia. However, Philip was assassinated in 336 BCE and Alexander managed to rally his father's generals behind him and suppress an attempted revolt by the Greek city-states. Shortly after becoming king, stories of Alexander's god-like qualities began to proliferate. He was treated like a demagogue.
Alexander's character is hard to grasp. He was undoubtedly influenced by the Greek philosopher Aristotle, who tutored him from the age of 13. The information we do have comes primarily from Ptolemy I, who was one of Alexander's top generals and subsequently became the first Macedonian king of Egypt. These questions about Alexander's personality remain largely unanswered.
- Did he believe in his own divinity, or manipulate it? Alexander was declared Pharaoh of Egypt. There were many stories of his other-worldly achievements, including the taming of his world horse Bucephalus. It is probable that Alexander encouraged these stories.
- Why such an obsession with the Trojan War? Alexander was fascinated with the powers of Asia. He frequently invoked the name of Achilles and he supposedly kept a copy of The Iliad under his bed while he slept.
- Why did he adopt Persian customs? Alexander was King of Persia and of Macedon. He had to be the Great King to satisfy his Persian subjects, which required him to be more than a Greek or a Macedonian. The Persians admired the fact that he retained their custom of proskynesis, or bowing in public display to the Great King. His Greek and Macedonian soldiers resented his retention of Persian customs.
- Was he serious about mixing Greek and barbarian? He introduced the Persians into his phalanx. He introduced Greek culture to the barbarians. He married a woman of no political significance. He also married one of the daughters of the Persian Great King Darius III.
- Did he suffer from personality disorders? He has been called an alcoholic and a paranoid.
- What were his true intentions? Did he conceive of conquering the whole world at the beginning of his campaign?
Alexander fully intended to continue his father's quest of invading Asia Minor and attacking the Persian Empire. The Persians relied on satraps, or local rulers to defend the borders of their empire. The Persian infantry was also demonstrably inferior to the Greeks and Macedonians. Alexander's force consisted of 30,40-000 men. His force consisted of the following units; heavy infantry, light infantry, heavy cavalry, light cavalry, and heavy Thessalian cavalry. Their first significant encounter with Persian forces came in 334 BCE at the battle of Granicus River. After his victory here over King Darius, Alexander committed his first serious mistake when he briefly lost control after discovering that Greek traitors had been fighting for the Persians. He began to slaughter them, but eventually stopped. Thus, Greeks fighting for the Persians would not surrender to him again. The result of this victory was that the Persian army in Asia Minor was destroyed. Cities along the coast capitulated to him including Sardis, Miletus, and Halicarnassus. After sending his fleet to destroy Miletus, Alexander sent it home, his second strategic mistake. The Persians would retake Miletus and Alexander would scramble to reassemble his fleet to stop them.
In 334 BCE, he spent the winter in Gordion, which housed a chariot tied with a famous knot. Alexander left Gordian having cut the knot, thereby fulfilling the legend that he would rule all of Asia. Alexander had huge problems moving his host of 30-40,000 in Asia Minor. He headed east and sent his most trusted general, Parmenion, into Central Asia. He had removed the Persian navy's ability to campaign in the Aegean by conquering the coastal cities and installing his own satraps, part of his methodical plan to sack the Persian Empire.
In order to deliver a swift attack and capture cities otherwise out of reach, Alexander split up his forces into flying columns, which moved much faster than his standard army. His move east brought him into conflict with King Darius again, who hoped to stop him from entering Persia. The two met at the battle of Issus in November of 333 BCE. Alexander used reconnaissance to learn of Darius's position. However, his reconnaissance did not reveal that Darius had moved north of his forces. Nonetheless, throughout the course of the engagement he manages to create a gap in the Persian line into which he sent his heavy cavalry. This was his trademark finishing assault, and it caused the general retreat of the Persian army. After Issus, Alexander captured Darius's pregnant wife and all of his daughters (whom he treated well). After he fled, Darius sent an offer of peace, which Alexander refused. He also began calling himself Great King of Persia at that point.
Alexander wanted to leave a pacified Mediterranean behind him, which is why he did not march directly into Persia. He headed south, down the coast, and most Phoenician cities surrendered to him. In the winter he arrived at Tyre, which wanted to remain neutral. After sacrificing to their god Melqart, Alexander proceeded to siege the city until August 332 BCE. He killed 8,000 Tyrians, crucifying 2,000 of them. Everyone else was enslaved except for those supplants at the altar of Melqart. This showed the importance of religion to Alexander. Indeed religion was important to the ancient Greeks in general, as they would almost always consult the gods before taking significant action.
Egypt was the next obstacle for Alexander. On the way, he encountered the fortified city of Gaza. He enslaved the city. When he arrived in Egypt, there was no war to fight. They welcomed him as a liberator from their Persian overlords. He took all the titles of an Egyptian king, including Pharaoh and Son of Ra (the sun-god). While in Egypt, he visited the oracle of the god Zeus-Ammon (the Egyptian equivalent of Zeus) in the middle of the Siwah Oasis. After his visit, he became confident that he was the son of Zeus, and he encouraged the rumors. In Egypt he also sacrificed to the sacred bull Apis. He also founded the first Alexandria in Egypt in 331 BCE.
Darius had been forming a new army of Bactrians and Sogdians. He had also learned the importance of Alexander's heavy cavalry. Some estimates put the number of his new force at 200,000 men. This vastly outnumbered Alexander's 30-40,000. However, Darius also included scythed chariots and 50-100 Indian elephants in his army. Darius flattened the plain of Gaugamela for his chariots, infantry, and elephants. His idea was to use his elephants and chariots to open a hole in the Macedonian line and then encircle the divided units with massed infantry. Alexander had been using reconnaissance to learn of Darius's position. The armies engaged in one of the most studied battles in history. In a display of his tactical genius, Alexander rendered the chariots and elephants ineffective and managed to create an opening in Darius's line. He charged through with his heavy cavalry at a slant. Darius fled (he was later killed by the treacherous Persian Bessus) and the Persian army was routed.
After Gaugamela, Alexander realized the wealth of the Persian Empire. He swiftly moved through the four Persian capitals, Babylon, Susa, Persepolis, and Ecbatana. Alexander and his men found wealth beyond their imagining. It enabled the successor kingdoms after Alexander to buy expensive armies, not something seen with the Greeks or the Macedonians thus far. The Persians had been able to purchase armies with their immeasurable wealth.
In 330 BCE, Alexander ordered Parmenion and his son Philotas executed for a supposed plot against his life. The loss of Parmenion was huge for his army's morale. In 329/8 BCE, he began to march beyond the known Greek world into the northeast Persian Empire. He passed through Bactria, Sogdiana, and into the mountain range called the Hindu Kush (500 miles long). In 328 BCE he killed his friend Cleitus in a drunken rage. He was indisposed after this, and continued to drink heavily. He also began dressing like a Persian king around this time. He began to allow his new Persian subjects to practice proskynesis. His Greek and Macedonian men did not observe the practice. This created a problem for Alexander. He wanted the Greeks and Persians to unite, and uniting their customs would have been a great way to achieve that unification.
Alexander married Roxana, a Bactrian princess, in 327 BCE. Some describe it as a political marriage, but a Bactrian princess was not a significant position of political authority. It is probable that he really loved her. In 326 BCE, he crossed the Indus River. By this time, his troops wanted to return to Macedonia. They had invaded Asia eight years before, had crossed deserts, oceans, snow, mud, some of the tallest mountains in the world, and now they were in rain forests. They began to agitate for a return home, even staging two mutinies (in 326 & 324 BCE). During their crossing of the Indus, Alexander's engineers finished building a fleet and constructing siege weapons.
The first serious resistance Alexander encountered in India came at the Hydaspes River. The Indian King Poros and his force (including elephants) engaged Alexander. It is here that Alexander's reconnaissance failed him again. He failed to anticipate crossing islands in the river, which almost led to disaster. However, Alexander's cavalry won the day again and Poros surrendered. Alexander's beloved horse Bucephalus was killed in this battle.
Finally, Alexander decided to march home since his men would not continue further into India. He had been leaving garrisons at cities behind him to keep open the lines of supply and communication. He had left many Macedonians in charge of pockets of unknown territory he had conquered in India and Persia. The engineers had finished the fleet and Alexander's men sailed down the Indus. Alexander did not want to march back the way he came. He split up his forces and sailed down the Indus. When he stopped temporarily to conquer a few Indian tribes, Alexander was almost killed by one of them, the Mallians. Alexander had scaled the walls of their city himself and was shot by an arrow. He teetered on the brink of death for days. After his recovery, his force set out again. They split up again at the mouth of the Indus. In 325 BCE, they traversed the Gedrosian Desert. The trek over it to Babylon was Alexander's biggest mistake. Thousands of his infantry died in the desert. He finally made it to Babylon in 324 BCE.
In 324 BCE, Alexander fell into terrible depression after the death of Hephaestion, one of his most trusted generals and his alleged male lover since childhood. He died from fever or possibly typhoid, though Alexander suspected Roxana had poisoned him. In 323 BCE, Alexander married another one of Darius's daughters. However, on June 10th, he died suddenly. We do not know how for sure. He might have been poisoned, succumbed to fever, or been infected from the Mallian arrow wound. After his death, Roxana had his new Persian bride murdered.
After his death, his empire broke into three parts; Egypt, Syria, and Macedon/Greece. All three eventually fell to Rome, the last being Egypt in 30 BCE under Cleopatra. The age of the polis was over. The age of the citizen was over. Government was now based on subjects, on Roman rights. The world that followed was a debasement of what had been before. There was an attempt to recreate Classical Greece in the Hellenistic period.
Alexander's unique examples provide insight into how he conquered the known world in so little time:
In 334 BCE, he spent the winter in Gordion, which housed a chariot tied with a famous knot. Alexander left Gordian having cut the knot, thereby fulfilling the legend that he would rule all of Asia. Alexander had huge problems moving his host of 30-40,000 in Asia Minor. He headed east and sent his most trusted general, Parmenion, into Central Asia. He had removed the Persian navy's ability to campaign in the Aegean by conquering the coastal cities and installing his own satraps, part of his methodical plan to sack the Persian Empire.
In order to deliver a swift attack and capture cities otherwise out of reach, Alexander split up his forces into flying columns, which moved much faster than his standard army. His move east brought him into conflict with King Darius again, who hoped to stop him from entering Persia. The two met at the battle of Issus in November of 333 BCE. Alexander used reconnaissance to learn of Darius's position. However, his reconnaissance did not reveal that Darius had moved north of his forces. Nonetheless, throughout the course of the engagement he manages to create a gap in the Persian line into which he sent his heavy cavalry. This was his trademark finishing assault, and it caused the general retreat of the Persian army. After Issus, Alexander captured Darius's pregnant wife and all of his daughters (whom he treated well). After he fled, Darius sent an offer of peace, which Alexander refused. He also began calling himself Great King of Persia at that point.
Alexander wanted to leave a pacified Mediterranean behind him, which is why he did not march directly into Persia. He headed south, down the coast, and most Phoenician cities surrendered to him. In the winter he arrived at Tyre, which wanted to remain neutral. After sacrificing to their god Melqart, Alexander proceeded to siege the city until August 332 BCE. He killed 8,000 Tyrians, crucifying 2,000 of them. Everyone else was enslaved except for those supplants at the altar of Melqart. This showed the importance of religion to Alexander. Indeed religion was important to the ancient Greeks in general, as they would almost always consult the gods before taking significant action.
Egypt was the next obstacle for Alexander. On the way, he encountered the fortified city of Gaza. He enslaved the city. When he arrived in Egypt, there was no war to fight. They welcomed him as a liberator from their Persian overlords. He took all the titles of an Egyptian king, including Pharaoh and Son of Ra (the sun-god). While in Egypt, he visited the oracle of the god Zeus-Ammon (the Egyptian equivalent of Zeus) in the middle of the Siwah Oasis. After his visit, he became confident that he was the son of Zeus, and he encouraged the rumors. In Egypt he also sacrificed to the sacred bull Apis. He also founded the first Alexandria in Egypt in 331 BCE.
Darius had been forming a new army of Bactrians and Sogdians. He had also learned the importance of Alexander's heavy cavalry. Some estimates put the number of his new force at 200,000 men. This vastly outnumbered Alexander's 30-40,000. However, Darius also included scythed chariots and 50-100 Indian elephants in his army. Darius flattened the plain of Gaugamela for his chariots, infantry, and elephants. His idea was to use his elephants and chariots to open a hole in the Macedonian line and then encircle the divided units with massed infantry. Alexander had been using reconnaissance to learn of Darius's position. The armies engaged in one of the most studied battles in history. In a display of his tactical genius, Alexander rendered the chariots and elephants ineffective and managed to create an opening in Darius's line. He charged through with his heavy cavalry at a slant. Darius fled (he was later killed by the treacherous Persian Bessus) and the Persian army was routed.
After Gaugamela, Alexander realized the wealth of the Persian Empire. He swiftly moved through the four Persian capitals, Babylon, Susa, Persepolis, and Ecbatana. Alexander and his men found wealth beyond their imagining. It enabled the successor kingdoms after Alexander to buy expensive armies, not something seen with the Greeks or the Macedonians thus far. The Persians had been able to purchase armies with their immeasurable wealth.
In 330 BCE, Alexander ordered Parmenion and his son Philotas executed for a supposed plot against his life. The loss of Parmenion was huge for his army's morale. In 329/8 BCE, he began to march beyond the known Greek world into the northeast Persian Empire. He passed through Bactria, Sogdiana, and into the mountain range called the Hindu Kush (500 miles long). In 328 BCE he killed his friend Cleitus in a drunken rage. He was indisposed after this, and continued to drink heavily. He also began dressing like a Persian king around this time. He began to allow his new Persian subjects to practice proskynesis. His Greek and Macedonian men did not observe the practice. This created a problem for Alexander. He wanted the Greeks and Persians to unite, and uniting their customs would have been a great way to achieve that unification.
Alexander married Roxana, a Bactrian princess, in 327 BCE. Some describe it as a political marriage, but a Bactrian princess was not a significant position of political authority. It is probable that he really loved her. In 326 BCE, he crossed the Indus River. By this time, his troops wanted to return to Macedonia. They had invaded Asia eight years before, had crossed deserts, oceans, snow, mud, some of the tallest mountains in the world, and now they were in rain forests. They began to agitate for a return home, even staging two mutinies (in 326 & 324 BCE). During their crossing of the Indus, Alexander's engineers finished building a fleet and constructing siege weapons.
The first serious resistance Alexander encountered in India came at the Hydaspes River. The Indian King Poros and his force (including elephants) engaged Alexander. It is here that Alexander's reconnaissance failed him again. He failed to anticipate crossing islands in the river, which almost led to disaster. However, Alexander's cavalry won the day again and Poros surrendered. Alexander's beloved horse Bucephalus was killed in this battle.
Finally, Alexander decided to march home since his men would not continue further into India. He had been leaving garrisons at cities behind him to keep open the lines of supply and communication. He had left many Macedonians in charge of pockets of unknown territory he had conquered in India and Persia. The engineers had finished the fleet and Alexander's men sailed down the Indus. Alexander did not want to march back the way he came. He split up his forces and sailed down the Indus. When he stopped temporarily to conquer a few Indian tribes, Alexander was almost killed by one of them, the Mallians. Alexander had scaled the walls of their city himself and was shot by an arrow. He teetered on the brink of death for days. After his recovery, his force set out again. They split up again at the mouth of the Indus. In 325 BCE, they traversed the Gedrosian Desert. The trek over it to Babylon was Alexander's biggest mistake. Thousands of his infantry died in the desert. He finally made it to Babylon in 324 BCE.
In 324 BCE, Alexander fell into terrible depression after the death of Hephaestion, one of his most trusted generals and his alleged male lover since childhood. He died from fever or possibly typhoid, though Alexander suspected Roxana had poisoned him. In 323 BCE, Alexander married another one of Darius's daughters. However, on June 10th, he died suddenly. We do not know how for sure. He might have been poisoned, succumbed to fever, or been infected from the Mallian arrow wound. After his death, Roxana had his new Persian bride murdered.
After his death, his empire broke into three parts; Egypt, Syria, and Macedon/Greece. All three eventually fell to Rome, the last being Egypt in 30 BCE under Cleopatra. The age of the polis was over. The age of the citizen was over. Government was now based on subjects, on Roman rights. The world that followed was a debasement of what had been before. There was an attempt to recreate Classical Greece in the Hellenistic period.
Alexander's unique examples provide insight into how he conquered the known world in so little time:
- Use of religion. He was scrupulous about performing religious rights constantly. He was careful to practice foreign and local religion. Ex.) Tyre and Melqart. Sacrifice to sacred bull Apis in Egypt. He respected foreign customs. This had an important morale effect on his troops, they respected the fact that Alexander practiced all of the religious customs to ensure their success.
- Understood ideological problems his postition entailed. He had to be Great King of Persia, Pharaoh, and King of Macedon and Greece. He never solved this problem, but he addressed it. Ex.) Proskynesis and the marrying of Darius's daughters.
- Logistics. His example here is without parallel. He supplied 30-100,000 men for 11 years in the field.
- Reconnaisannce. He is almost without parallel in this regard. He almost always knew the disposition, composition, and location of his enemies. Caesar would surpass him in this arena in years to come. This was not typical in antiquity, the territory he conquered was previously unknown. Hard to find food, etc. His reconaissance failed him twice; Darius's move north at Issus and the islands he did not anticipate at the Hydapses River.
- Strategy. His slowness from 334-331 BCE. Alexander was simply conquering the coast of the Mediterranean. He only fought two major battles during this time; Granicus and Issus. He secured his flank first. He took away the ports of the enemy, minizing trireme naval warfare.
- Tactics. He improved his father Philip's Theban tactics of refusing part of his line and using oblique, angled advances. Ex.) Gaugamela. He used shock tactics with his heavy cavalry at a fixed point. He integrated his forces, which was not previously done. His relience on his best general Parmenion. Parmenion commanded the left wing in all of Alexander's battles. The left just barely holds out. This allows Alexander to create gaps and win. Alexander used the engineers his father took from Greece to build catapults and field artillery (first commander to use on the field).
- Innovations. Logistical supplying of 30-100,000 men. Separation of army into flying columns. Coordination of separate forces as they were moved over great distances. Ex.) While moving his fleet down the Indus River. Incorporation of non-Greek and non-Macedonian elements into his force. Ex.) Bactrian and Sogdian cavalry and elephants. Later Hellenistic kings would try to use elephants as shock force, but find they were not very useful. Field artillery. Creation of new types of units, like hipparchies (a heavy cavalry element). Idea of posting commanders to those units no longer based on locales (based on merit instead).
- Intelligence
- Personal courage. Alexander was one of the last commanders we see serving in the front lines like a hoplite. This drove his men to madness, as the behavior was tremendously risky.
- Character. Alexander was famous for his decent treatment of women and captives, though he did occasionally kill his friends and others in drunken rages.
- Personality. His troops loved him (arguably until India).
13 February 2009
The Agency: Success or Failure?
[Seal of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).]
"The CIA will carry out such other operations related to in
telligence as the president and National Security Council may from time to time direct." This vague language can be found in the 1947 legislation that gave birth to the Central Intelligence Agency. The two primary functions of the CIA are to gather information about enemies and potential enemies of the United States and to conduct covert operations abroad. Its domestic counterpart, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), is responsible for domestic intelligence gathering. Yet, as I will demonstrate, there have been times when the CIA has extended its mandate and jurisdiction. That questionable behavior, along with several negative consequences arguably caused by the agency's overseas meddling, has led me to question whether the agency has succeeded in enhancing the national security of the United States. The CIA claims, "The secret of our success is the secret of our success." In order to evaluate its performance and decipher signs of "success," I have revealed some of the agency's most notable covert and intelligence gathering operations since its inception.
The history of our nation's most elite intelligence gathering service is profoundly twisted and clandestine. The CIA is not just a tool of policy; it is a collector and analyzer of information vital to our national security. As such, it is afforded a certain independence and prestige that few other federal agencies can match. However, it is not immune to deficiencies. Throughout many presidential administrations under which it has operated, the CIA suffered from three main weaknesses.
telligence as the president and National Security Council may from time to time direct." This vague language can be found in the 1947 legislation that gave birth to the Central Intelligence Agency. The two primary functions of the CIA are to gather information about enemies and potential enemies of the United States and to conduct covert operations abroad. Its domestic counterpart, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), is responsible for domestic intelligence gathering. Yet, as I will demonstrate, there have been times when the CIA has extended its mandate and jurisdiction. That questionable behavior, along with several negative consequences arguably caused by the agency's overseas meddling, has led me to question whether the agency has succeeded in enhancing the national security of the United States. The CIA claims, "The secret of our success is the secret of our success." In order to evaluate its performance and decipher signs of "success," I have revealed some of the agency's most notable covert and intelligence gathering operations since its inception.The history of our nation's most elite intelligence gathering service is profoundly twisted and clandestine. The CIA is not just a tool of policy; it is a collector and analyzer of information vital to our national security. As such, it is afforded a certain independence and prestige that few other federal agencies can match. However, it is not immune to deficiencies. Throughout many presidential administrations under which it has operated, the CIA suffered from three main weaknesses.
- Failure of leadership. Many of the agency's top guns suffered from alcoholism and mental illness which hampered their ability to carry out the duties of their office and led to a remarkable turnover in leadership. Counting the newly confirmed Leon Panetta, there have been 21 Directors of the Central Intelligence Agency since 1946. This is an astounding number considering the importance of the position.
- Failure of intelligence gathering. Soviet spies and internal moles frequently penetrated the agency at critical points in our country's foreign policy.
- Covert action failures. Many covert actions carried out by the CIA had favorable results in the short-term, but proved to be disastrous in the long-term.
The idea of utilizing spies as effective means of combating an enemy was advocated by the Chinese military philosopher Sun Tzu some 2,500 years ago. While we had spies in the Revolutionary War, it was not until WWII that we organized a system of intelligence gathering. The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) fulfilled that role and served as the model for the CIA.
As the Cold War heated up in the years following WWII, President Truman craved information about what the Soviets were up to. Instead of producing intelligence, the CIA conducted covert operations in Cold War hot-spots that consisted of purchasing elections through subsidizing politicians, a practice we today call bribery. In this way, the agency hoped to roll the Soviets back from Western and Eastern Europe. In 1948, the CIA successfully thwarted the Italian Communist Party from winning a major election. Throughout the early 1950s, the CIA targeted and financed the liberal, anti-communist intelligentsia in France, Great Britain, and West Germany to promote American interests abroad. In addition to spending money, top CIA agents supervised the dropping of emigres into communist Albania and Ukraine, hoping to stimulate Soviet resistance. In both cases, all of the emigres were captured or killed. The man responsible for the operations in Albania was a raging alcoholic who compromised the mission by giving the drop-zone locations to the Soviet spy Kim Philby.
During the Truman Administration, the CIA failed to anticipate some of the most momentous events of the 20th century. Three days before President Truman informed the world that the Soviets possessed an atomic bomb, the CIA had confidently proclaimed that the Soviets were still four years away from nuclear capability. On October 30, 1950, when Chinese forces had already attacked General MacArthur's troops near the Yalu River, the CIA declared that the Chinese had no intentions of invading Korea. Indeed, the inability to penetrate North Korea remains the CIA's longest-running intelligence failure. As for influencing communist China, the CIA sent anti-communist guerrillas into Manchuria in the early 1950s who were all killed or captured.
In an attempt to compensate for failures of ground-level intelligence gathering, the CIA set up secret prisons and enacted Project Artichoke, a program which involved injecting emigres from communist countries with heroine, amphetamines, sleeping pills, and LSD. These interrogations and attempts at mind control lasted four years, until the CIA slipped a drug to an army civilian employee who later jumped to his death from a New York hotel. The program then became a fiasco.
In 1953, the CIA told President Eisenhower that the Soviets would not be able to launch an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) at the United States before 1969. When the Russians tested a hydrogen bomb in August of 1953, the CIA remained quiet. Eisenhower hoped to avoid bankrupting the United States with military operations against the Soviets by utilizing covert action. Eisenhower appointed Allen Dulles, brother of Secretary State John Foster Dulles, to give him "more bang for the buck." In 1953, the CIA green-lit Operation Ajax, overthrew the Mossadegh regime in Iran, and replaced it with the Shah of Iran. There were many short-term benefits by overthrowing the government in Tehran, not the least of which was the installment of a pro-American regime. Many Iranians quickly began to despise the Shah and his secret police, known as the Savak, and blamed the United States for the loss of their remaining civil liberties. Many scholars today see the Shah's overthrow and the taking of hostages in 1979 as revenge for instating the Shah in 1953. The other successful overthrow, dubbed Operation Success, came in 1954. The CIA overthrew the Arbenz government in Guatemala after it threatened U.S. economic interests. In 1955, the CIA failed to overthrow Ahmed Sukarno of Indonesia.
When the bearded revolutionary Fidel Castro stormed Havana in January of 1958, the CIA informed President Eisenhower that agents were devising plans to take Castro out. These plans went into affect under the Kennedy Administration. In 1960, after Belgium withdrew from the Belgian Congo, the new Prime Minister of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba, was suspected of having communist ties to the Soviet Union. The CIA attempted to take him out using lethal toxins. But the CIA station chief in the Congo refused to carry out the order. However, he had maintained contact with General Mobutu, the leader of the army, and arranged to have Lumumba taken out by other means. Mobutu became dictator of the Congo and remained America's close ally for many years.
Kennedy's dealings with the CIA and Castro quickly resulted in a fiasco at the Bay of Pigs in April of 1961. The CIA under Kennedy's direction planned an invasion of mainland Cuba with ex-Cuban emigres. Kennedy, realizing the CIA underestimated Castro's forces and fearing to blow his cover, cut in half the number of aircraft that were intended to take out Castro's air power. Thus, the invaders were bombed on the beach, either killed or taken prisoner. JFK fired Allen Dulles and splintered the CIA by turning over control of covert operations to his brother Robert, the Attorney General. Bobby's plan to take out Castro was dubbed Operation Mongoose. This operation involved the Mafia and many ludicrous ideas to undermine or kill Castro (including one plan to cause Castro's beard to fall out). Meanwhile, the CIA completely missed the fact that the Soviets were sending offensive missiles into Cuba, just 60 miles from Florida's coast. Many scholars have surmised that as a result of Kennedy making enemies with Alan Dulles and Castro, a conspiracy involving the CIA, Castro, and the Mafia might have killed President Kennedy, rather than the lone assassin Lee Harvey Oswald.
President Johnson was concerned with the war he inherited in Vietnam. It is important to note that the CIA was not responsible for monitoring radio traffic from the two destroyers that were allegedly attacked by the North Vietnamese in the Gulf of Tonkin. Thus, I will not draw any parallels to the CIA's failure to obtain credible information regarding WMD in Iraq in 2003. Rather, the CIA breached its charter under Johnson when it followed orders to conduct spying operations on the anti-war movement. Johnson was convinced that the Soviets were funding a domestic anti-war movement in the United States. As a result of his suspicion, the CIA conducted Operation Chaos, a domestic surveillance operation that lasted almost seven years and involved agents infiltrating peace-group meetings and spying on protestors.
President Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger ordered Operation Chaos to continue. He also believed that the CIA was underestimating the Soviet nuclear threat. His pressure on the agency led them to subsequently overestimate Soviet nuclear forces and capabilities. President Nixon directed the CIA to pour money into the Chilean campaign of a reformist Christian Democrat named Eduardo Fray, hoping to prevent a Marxist victory by Salvador Allende. The effort was successful as Fray won the election. But by 1970, Allende had gained popularity and the CIA was unable to buy the election again. Refusing to admit defeat, the CIA station chief in Santiago contacted the Chilean military and informed them that the U.S. would support a military solution to the Allende problem. That promise led to the overthrow and death of Allende and the brutal dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. This short-term success would be overshadowed by long-term implications. The United States had overthrown a democratically-elected government in Chile and installed a brutal dictator who was nonetheless an ally of America.
The CIA was also involved in the Watergate scandal. An agent was provided with a red wig, a voice-altering device, and fake personal identification to break into the Los Angeles office of Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist. Nixon's CIA Director Richard Helms agreed to provide a psychological profile of the anti-war critic Ellsberg, who had leaked the Pentagon Papers and became an enemy of Nixon. Thus, the CIA again spied on American citizens. When the "plumbers" were caught in the Watergate complex, the CIA connections were clearly evident. When Director Helms refused to provide hush money from the CIA's black budget, the Watergate incident went public.
In addition to prompting Nixon to resign, Watergate seriously tarnished the CIA's reputation. Thereafter, Congress began to exercise oversight over the agency. Under the Ford Presidency, the CIA was funneling money to an anti-communist faction in the Angolan Civil War. In a true display of checks and balances, Congress refused to authorize additional funds for the agency's operation. This was clearly a reaction to the Vietnam quagmire from which the U.S. had just emerged.
The CIA demonstrated its lack of vision when it failed to anticipate the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in 1979 and the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. Stansfield Turner, President Carter's new Director of Central Intelligence affirmed, "We did not understand who [Ayatollah] Khomeini was and his support the movement had. We were just plain asleep." Many analysts contend that the taking of U.S. hostages in the same year was payback for the CIA's overthrow of the Mossadegh regime in 1953. Similarly, the CIA erroneously concluded that Moscow would not invade Afghanistan in 1979.
President Reagan appointed his successful campaign manager William Casey as his Director of Central Intelligence. Casey's primary goal was to defeat America's enemies in Latin America. The Sandinista Regime in Nicaragua became a prime target. Since Congress would not appropriate funds, the CIA lacked money to fund the contra rebels in Nicaragua. At the same time, President Reagan was fearful for the safety of six U.S. hostages that were taken captive by Hezbollah in the Lebanese Civil War. Reagan and his new CIA Director William Colby decided to provide Iran (who had political influence over Hezbollah and was at war with Iraq ) with weapons in exchange for the release of the U.S. hostages. The proceeds from the arms deal would fund the contra rebels in Nicaragua. This deal was to be kept secret for fear of the ethical implications. The secret leaked, however, and it damaged the credibility of the Reagan White House and the CIA. The CIA under President Reagan also consistently misread Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Premier. They saw his reforms, glasnost and perestroika, as a campaign of deceit. No one in the agency predicted the collapse of the Soviet colossus in 1989.
Upon taking the presidential oath, George H. W. Bush and the CIA were immediately embarrassed. One of the agency's most valuable agents in Latin America, General Noriega of Panama, had been indicted as a drug smuggler. President Bush and the agency were forced to launch a large-scale military operation to capture the rouge general. The CIA also worked closely with the military and the Bush Administration in Operation Desert Storm. During this conflict in Iraq, the CIA was completely oblivious to the fact that Iraq had been engaged in the pursuit of nuclear weapons. Thus, when Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney learned of this, he refused to believe anything the agency said thereafter, believing them to have become incompetent. That experience had a marked effect on him as the Vice President under President George W. Bush. After invading Iraq in March of 2003, the military and the CIA were unable to find WMD, indicating that Iraq had abandoned its pursuit of nuclear weapons sometime in the 1990s.
While these countless examples may seem selective and a sweeping rebuke of the agency, I want to point out some important considerations. Admittedly, intelligence is a business of risk-taking. While there were errors in operations, in analysis, and in judgment, nearly all of these operations were ordered by the White House and had to be conducted in perilous environments. The Soviet Union was a police state, as is North Korea. It is very difficult to operate in police states because there is no freedom, the press is tightly controlled, and contacts with people are tightly controlled. However, there is no excuse for spying on Americans, whether ordered to or not.
Intelligence is an immoral business by nature. In order to obtain information, you might have to compromise your principles. The question is, how far is too far? The nature of intelligence gathering also arguably contributes to failures of leadership and flaws in character. After all, the CIA often has to enlist criminals, bums, and loons. What other kinds of people would be so willing to betray his/her country and become a spy or a traitor? It is not always easy to find upstanding people who are willing to commit treason. As for our own agents, prolonged exposure to a life of secrecy tends to cause extreme paranoia and a degree of mental instability. The business is not for the faint of heart.
After this assessment, I have not come to an ultimate conclusion. We clearly need to continue utilizing our intelligence agencies to thwart our enemies and potential enemies through intelligence gathering and covert action. But we also need to improve accountability both inside and outside the CIA. By order of President Bush, the Director of Central Intelligence now coordinates his/her efforts with the Director of National Intelligence. I think this improvement in agency coordination will help to prevent the kinds of failures we have seen in the past. Hopefully the Obama Administration, like the Bush Administrations before it, will continue to reorganize the intelligence community to increase its credibility and effectiveness.
24 January 2009
The Terror in Gaza
[A Hamas militant.]
Israel's recent incursion into the Gaza Strip is the latest in 
a series of conflicts involving the Islamic Resistance Movement, better known as Hamas. After 22 days of fighting, Israeli forces declared that they had achieved their objectives and agreed to a unilateral cease-fire. Hamas also declared victory and agreed to a cease-fire, provided that Israel completely withdraws its forces from the Gaza Strip. It is no coincidence that this cease-fire was declared the same week of President Obama's inauguration.
a series of conflicts involving the Islamic Resistance Movement, better known as Hamas. After 22 days of fighting, Israeli forces declared that they had achieved their objectives and agreed to a unilateral cease-fire. Hamas also declared victory and agreed to a cease-fire, provided that Israel completely withdraws its forces from the Gaza Strip. It is no coincidence that this cease-fire was declared the same week of President Obama's inauguration.What was the result of this recent escalation of violence? More than 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed. Thousands of homes were damaged or destroyed, mosques were attacked, a UN school was bombed, and many lives were ruined. It is unlikely that this event will bring the two sides any closer toward an agreement for peace. Rather than initiate a blame-game, I think it is more useful to point out the persistent problem in this conflict; that the Palestinian people do not speak with one voice.
The official representative of the Palestinian people in their territories is the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), of which the Palestinian Authority is a subsidiary. The PLO was established after the 1993 Oslo Accords and is based in the West Bank. In 2006, a group of radical Palestinians known as Hamas won elections in one of the Palestinian territories, the Gaza Strip. Hamas gained popularity by building schools and hospitals in the Gaza Strip. Hamas is described as a terrorist organization by the United States, the EU, Canada, Israel, and Japan. In 2007, Israel withdrew its forces from the Gaza Strip as a gesture to get negotiations going again, though it kept some restrictions such as jurisdiction over air space. Hamas was now fully in control. Hamas has not recognize Israel (like the PLO does) and calls the PLO, Fatah (the largest political party of the PLO), and the late Yasser Arafat (chairman of the PLO) betrayers of the Palestinian cause. This division between the Palestinian people in two camps makes negotiation with Israel near impossible.
Since the takeover by Hamas, Israel closed its border with Gaza and the militant organization has been caught smuggling explosives and arms from Egypt through tunnels. This has caused Egypt to close its border with Gaza as well. Amnesty International has reported that Hamas has trampled upon many civil liberties by closing down newspapers, harassing journalists, and forbidding peaceful demonstrations. It is important to note that Hamas is supported by Syria and Iran, and possibly funded and trained by the latter. Also, there is a militant wing of Hamas that arguably acts independently of Hamas at times. This group is known as the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, and is the only polity within Hamas that Australia and the UK designate as terrorists. Lastly, it should be noted that there are also some radical elements within Israel who would like to see Hamas destroyed.
The record shows that Hamas militants have fired hundreds of home-made Qassam rockets from the Strip into Israeli towns, causing massive destruction to Israeli property and killing some Israelis. Hamas claims these attacks were warranted because Israel was planning to attack Gaza and because Israel halted humanitarian aid to the Palestinians in Gaza. There is no evidence to definitively prove which violation of the Geneva Conventions came first, but many believe Hamas initiated attacks on Israel. Israel has responded by periodically cutting fuel and electricity to Gaza. In January of 2008, Hamas breached the Gaza-Egyptian border. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was faced with hundreds of thousands of Gazans seeking food and supplies. The border was eventually sealed again after minor violence between Egyptian forces and Hamas militants.
More recently, Israel began to attack targets in Gaza with F-16 fighters as rocket attacks into Israel intensified. There is no doubt that both sides have committed atrocious acts in the fighting, with Hamas hiding weapons in schools and Israel bombing them. In some cases, many Palestinian children were killed and no weapons were found in the schools bombed. The conflict boils down to Hamas launching rockets into Israel because it denounces Israel's existence, Israel blocking some humanitarian aid into Gaza along with the UN for fear of attack, the Palestinians in Gaza collectively suffering because of all of this, and Hamas using this suffering as a vehicle for further rocket attacks. The humanitarian suffering in Gaza is real and has caused tensions between the legitimate PLO and Israel as well as between Israel and the international community.
For a cease-fire to last and negotiations to really begin, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and leaders of Hamas need to reconcile their differences. With one voice, Palestinian leaders and Israelis can meet to alleviate the humanitarian suffering in Gaza while keeping Israel safe from further attacks.
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About Me
- Brady
- I am a graduate of Boston University. I majored in political science and minored in history.
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