Justin Raimondo
Neocon Coup at CIA? It will be if John Lehman takes over
Fri Jul 9, 2004 14:46
64.140.158.22

July 9, 2004
Neocon Coup at CIA? It will be if John Lehman takes over
by Justin Raimondo
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=2984

All this folderol about how the neoconservative moment is over, and the War
Party totally discredited, is just so much wishful thinking, as the prospect
of John F. Lehman's nomination as CIA chief makes all too clear. Rumor has
it that Porter Goss is out - too partisan - and Lehman is leading the pack.
If so, this is a testament to the neocons' bureaucratic staying power.

Formerly an investment banker with Paine Webber, Inc., Lehman was President
of the Abington Corporation, (1977-81), a lobbying and consulting firm, a
staff member of the National Security Council under Henry Kissinger, and
deputy director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. He has been
associated with the neoconservative network in Washington since the good old
days of Iran-Contra. In 1981, President Ronald Reagan appointed Lehman
Secretary of the Navy: he served until 1987. In 1983, a mysterious package
of documents arrived at the New York Times, a fortuitous delivery that led
to a piece by reporter Jeff Gerth in which Lehman, along with Richard Perle,
was accused of accepting payments from Israeli arms dealers Shlomo
Zabludowicz and his son, Chaim Zabludowicz, who were Perle's clients in
1980. They paid $90,000 to Abington Corporation: Perle kept $50,000, while
Abington got the rest.

Lehman blamed his wife: Perle said he did the work for the Zabludowicz clan
before he was employed by the government. Whatever.

In any case, as per the custom in Washington, Lehman and Perle survived the
scandal, as neocons always do, and lived to fight another day.

Lehman's most recent position has been as a member of the 9/11 Commission,
where he excoriated Richard Clarke for writing a book, and went on Meet the
Press declaring that a prominent member of Saddam's militia had been
identified as a member of Al Qaeda, confusing two different Arab names in
the process and getting it thoroughly wrong. The Washington Post pointed out
the discrepancy to Lehman, who brushed it aside, claiming it really made no
difference: he stood by his claim.

Oh well, whatever..

In the early 90's, Lehman joined up with the Committee on U.S. Interests in
the Middle East, a neocon front group organized by Richard Perle, Elliott
Abrams and Douglas J. Feith, and headed up by Frank Gaffney. The Committee
lobbied for more U.S. tax dollars for Israel, and, among other activities,
in 1992 bought a full-page ad in the New York Times viciously denouncing
President George H. W. Bush as an appeaser for pressuring then-Israeli prime
minister Yitzhak Shamir to open negotiations that eventually led to the Oslo
process:


"As friendly as the United States is with many Arab states, when it comes to
the Arab-Israeli conflict, the United States must be squarely on the side of
the Israelis."

The principal founders and sponsors of the Committee, which broke with
Dubya's dad over this issue, are now in charge of U.S. foreign policy, and
of the last two holdouts - the Department of State and the CIA - it looks
like they're about to take Langley.

Although long associated with the War Party through his connections to Ball
Aerospace Technologies - a major manufacturer of NASA and Pentagon
satellites - and the board of the Center for Security Policy, a
neoconservative redoubt, Lehman seems to be trying to distance himself from
the neocons and their foreign policy views now that he's up for the CIA
post. However, his record speaks for itself.

He has long exhibited a Laurie Mylroie-like obsession with Iraq, claiming,
for instance, that Saddam was behind the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000.
The bombing, as it turned out, was the work of al-Qaeda, and had nothing
whatsoever to do with Iraq. A few days after the 9/11 terrorist attacks
Lehman signed an open letter calling on the President to attack Iraq.

Keeping in mind his demonstrated inability to keep Arabic names straight, do
we really want to appoint to the CIA's top post a man so often proved wrong?

The bureaucratic brawl that took place between the CIA and the Pentagon in
the prelude to war is now being resumed with new ferocity: the latter's
policies may be discredited, and Iraq may be in ruins, along with the
alleged "liberation," but just because they're losing the war on the
overseas front doesn't mean the neocons can't ultimately carry the day in
Washington.

Former counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke, and the anonymous author of
Imperial Hubris, along with a whole raft of former U.S. diplomats and
government officials, have been on the offensive lately, targeting the
neocons as duplicitous seducers who had their way with us and then left
American soldiers and taxpayers with the burden of a costly occupation. The
Lehman boomlet shows, however, that, far from being on the run, the neocons
are counterattacking.

The question now is: will the White House wait until after November to make
the CIA appointment? By then, of course, it may be too late. This is a
purely political calculation for the Republicans, but it seems to me they
are in a position to act boldly. After all, the White House can always
accuse the Democrats of making a partisan political issue out of a vital
matter of national security if they raise a fuss.

Politics may prevent the Democrats from raising a proper ruckus, yet they'll
no doubt be shocked - shocked! - if CIA Director John Lehman, in probing the
source of our pre-war "intelligence failure," goes easy on his own brother.
But don't say I didn't warn you..

- Justin Raimondo
==========================

MSNBC - NBC: Lehman considered top prospect to head CIA