NEOCONS REVIVE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER

Group aims at Islamic terrorism, but next move may be against foreign policy realists.

 Informe de  Tom Regan  en “The Christian Science Monitor” del 23-7-04

Por su interés y relevancia, he seleccionado el artículo que sigue para incluirlo en este sitio web. (L. B.-B.)

It was first founded in 1950 to combat the "red menace" of communism. It came back in the mid-70s for another crack at the Soviet Union. Now a group of lawmakers, academics, and business people has relaunched the Committee on the Present Danger, specifically to fight "Islamic terrorism." Honorary chairmen, Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), along with former CIA director James Woolsey, announced the reorganization of the group at a press conference this week.

James Woolsey, a former CIA director, is chairman of the group, which he says in its third incarnation aims to combat what he calls "a totalitarian movement masquerading as a religion." "We understand very well that this time, the danger that we must address is a danger to the United States but also a danger to democracy and civil society throughout the world, and it is very much our hope to be of support and assistance to those who seek to bring democracy and civil society to the part of the world, the Middle East extended, to which this Islamist terror is now resonant in and generated from," he said.

In an article in The Washington Post jointly authored by Senators Lieberman and Kyl, entitled 'The Present Danger,' the two men say that Islamic terrorism had become the greatest danger to American freedom.

 The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks awoke all Americans to the capabilities and brutality of our new enemy, but today too many people are insufficiently aware of our enemy's evil worldwide designs, which include waging jihad against all Americans and re-establishing a totalitarian religious empire in the Middle East. The past struggle against communism differed in some ways from the current war against Islamist terrorism. But America's freedom and security, which each has aimed to undermine, are exactly the same.

Mr. Woolsey (who championed the idea in 2002 that the US was in World War IV with Islamic terrorism) and Lieberman, as well as many of the other members of the group, have been identified with the neoconservative movement that seeks to expand American power and influence primarily through military action. (Assistant Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz is the most prominent neoconservative currently serving in the Bush administration.) Kyl has strong ties to groups on the Christian right that support neoconservatives' foreign policies goals.

In a piece earlier this year Max Boot, who describes himself as one of those "dreaded neocons," argues that there is no such thing as a neoconservative "cabal" that controls US foreign policy. But Jim Lobe, a longtime critic of neoconservatism, writes in Foreign Policy in Focus that the majority of the group's members "have strongly helped lead the drive to war in Iraq and have long supported broadening President George W. Bush's 'war on terrorism' to include Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia, as well."

One reason the committee may have reemerged could be the current struggle between neoconservatives and conservative "realists" over the future of Republican foreign policy. The Christian Science Monitor reported recently that the neoconservative 'star' has diminished somewhat in Washington because of problems in Iraq, and the neocons' perceived role in taking the US into that war. But the article also suggests that the neoconservative influence remains powerful. The Monitor also reports that any change in GOP foreign policy will not come without "fireworks."

At a recent Washington conference, columnist Robert Novak, a traditional conservative, said a Bush loss could lead to a "volcanic moment" in US politics, with Republicans deciding what to do, for example, with the neocon influence – whose failure in Iraq will be blamed for the party's loss. Debate would also grow, he says, over the place of the Christian Right, which has championed the neocons' foreign policy.

The other key issue that often draws fire down on the neoconservatives is what their critics describe as support for Israel and in particular the Likud government. Some critics charge that neoconservatives promoted the war in Iraq in order to help Israel, and point to statements made in recent months by former Bush advisers that seem to confirm this.

Neoconservative supporters often answer this charge with charges of anti-Semitism, or that such accusations of ties between Israel's Likud party and the neoconservatives are "a myth."

Shmuel Rosner, writing in the Israeli daily Ha'aretz, also describes the battle between the realists, the neoconservatives, and the "paleo-conservatives" (often identified with the positions of former GOP presidential candidate and TV commentator Patrick Buchanan) over foreign policy. He particulary notes the fierce exchange of words between the neo- and paleo- conservatives, which he alleges has more than a touch of anti-Semitism to them.

The paleocons want – in fact, demand – America to go back to being a plain old "republic." Modest and self-enclosed, without pretensions to reform the world, without just wars on distant continents. And they, of course, are the "true Republicans." Authentic. Like in the old days. Republicans who want values and want money, and don't want to waste precious time and resources on an ambitious foreign policy. But above all, they don't want to be like all those intellectuals. Not tiger-skin liberals. Not revolutionaries, not impostors, not opportunists. Not Trotskyites. And for sure, not Jews.

Meanwhile, the battle between neocons and realists has been joined again over the issue of how to deal with Iran, writes Mr. Lobe. Stephen Cook, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), writes in Salon that many of the policies promoted by some key members of the neoconservative group have shown themselves to be "deeply flawed" and the result is significant "policy drift."

A report released by CFR earlier in the week called for a change in US tactics towards Iran. "Iran: Time for a New Approach," written by former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Robert Gates, head of the CIA under the first President Bush, (both firmly in the realist camp) argue that "the only viable US approach to current concerns over nuclear development and terrorism in Iran is to deal directly with the current regime ..."

"[D]espite considerable political flux and popular dissatisfaction," the 79-page report said, "Iran is not on the verge of another revolution. Those forces that are committed to preserving Iran's current system remain firmly in control…"

But neoconservative Michael Ledeen of National Review, argues that the CFR position amounts to an "appeasement of Iran," and would only encourage Iran to support more terrorism.