Cockburn
/ St. Clair's Scorching New History of a Decade of War
Now Available!
Today's
Stories
May
19, 2004
Elizabeth
W. Corrie
Caterpillar Should Do the Right Thing,
Now
May
18, 2004
Neve
Gordon
The Gaza Debacle
Doug
Stokes
Imperial Policing: Why Abu Ghraib
Shouldn't Surprise Us
Bob
Wing
The Color of Abu Ghraib
Vanessa
Jones
Man on a Leash
Thomas
P. Healy
Chemical Trespass: the Body Burden
Zeynep
Toufe
Torture and Moral Agency: the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations
Kenneth
Roth
Mistreatment of Detainees in US Custody: a Letter to Bush
Elaine
Cassel
Pre-empting the Bill of Rights: The Other War, One Year Later
Website
of the Day
Truth Against Truth
May
17, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
The John-John Ticket: Kerry Woos McCain
Laura
Santina
Military Conditioning and Abu Ghraib
Mickey
Z.
With Friends Like These: More Election 2004 Madness
Frederick
B. Hudson
Police Terror: Three Mothers Search for Justice
Shakirah
Esmail-Hudani
Inside Abu Ghraib: the Violence of the Camera
Boris
Leonardo Caro
The Revelations of Mr. W.
Alex
Dawoody
Iraq: From Saddam to Occupation
Victor
Kattan
On Watching the Execution of Nick Berg
Ron
Jacobs
Rumsfeld's Sovereignty Shell Game
May
15 / 16, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Green Lights for Torture
Douglas
Valentine
ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited
John
Stanton
Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel
Ben
Tripp
Torture: a Fond Reminiscence
Brian
Cloughley
Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot
Act
Justin
E. H. Smith
Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey
Brandy
Baker
Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism
John
Chuckman
Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape
Bill
Glahn
RIAA Watch: Goon Squad
John
Holt
Fencing the Sky
Ron
Jacobs
The Power of Patti Smith
Brian
J. Foley
Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib?
Robin
Philpot
Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide
Eric
Leser
The Carlyle Empire
Ray
Hanania
From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good
War Crime
Jeff
Halper
Dozers of Mass Destruction
Joe
Surkiewicz
Inside the Baltimore Detention Center
John
Whitlow
Iraq Goddamn
Michael
Leon
Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video
Poets'
Basement
Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert
May
14, 2004
Dr.
Susan Block
Bush's POW Porn
Ron
Jacobs
Secret History of the War on Drugs
William
Blum
God, Country and Torture
Michael
Donnelly
The People v. Corporate Greed: A Victory on the North Coast
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
India Shines
Stephen
Gowans
Building Democracy in Iraq and Other
Absurdities
May
13, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Where is Kerry?
Colm
O'Laithian
Torture and Degradation: Revenge American Style?
Saul
Landau and Farrah Hassan
Wal-Mart: Scrooge with Hi-Tech Accounting
Practices
Ralph
Nader
An Open Letter to Bush on the Inhumane Treatment of Iraqi Prisoners
Willliam
James Martin
Deir Yassin Massacre Recalled
Marc
Salomon
Reality TV Bites
Forrest
Hylton
Law 'n Order in La Paz: All Quiet
on the Southern Front?
May
12, 2004
Blanton
/ Kornbluh
Prisoner Abuse: Cheney Warned in
1992
Virginia
Tilley
So, Who's to Blame?
Bruce
Jackson
James Inhofe, the Dumbest Senator
of Them All
Thomas
P. Healy
No Enemies: Making Peace with Bert Sacks
Linda
S. Heard
Racism and Ignorance: a Lethal Cocktail in Iraq
Norman
Solomon
Spinning Torturegate
Lisa
Viscidi
The People's Voice: Community Radio in Guatemala
Jack
Heyman
View from the Bay Bridge: Longshoremen Plan Mass Workers March
on DC
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Rummy's Reprieve
CounterPunch
Wire
Teamsters Corruption Scandal: Hoffa Exec. Assistant Alleged to
Have Quashed Investigation into Mob Influence
Christopher
Brauchli
Detention Camp, USA
William
S. Lind
Bush's Waterloo?
May 11, 2004
Mark
Engler
On the "Necessity" of Torture
Ray
McGovern
More Troops? A March of Folly
Kurt
Nimmo
Dirty Nukes and Jefferson's Grand Experiment
Mickey
Z.
Less Than Hero
Christopher
Reed
Torture on the Homefront: America's Long History of Prison Abuse
Dennis
Hans
When John Negroponte was Mullah Omar
Bruce
Jackson
Pete Seeger at 85
Mike
Whitney
Killing al Sadr
Simon
Helweg-Larsen
Shrinking the Guatemalan Military
William
A. Cook
The Unconscious Country: Righteous Indignation,
Nakedly Displayed
May
10, 2004
Robert
Fisk
From Hollywood to Abu Ghraib: Racism
and Torture as Entertainment
Wayne
Madsen
The Israeli Torture Template: Rape,
Feces and Urine-Soaked Cloth Sacks
Col.
Dan Smith
The Shame of Abu Ghraib
Joe
Bageant
John Ashcroft, Keep Your Mouth Off My Wife!
Ron
Jacobs
Rummy's Prisongate Blues: Don't Leave Mad; Just Leave
Ben
Tripp
Getting in Touch with Your Inner Savage
Ray
Hanania
Why They Hate Us: Racism, Bigotry and Abuse
Reza
Fiyouzat
"Mishandled" Invasions
Diane
Christian
Images & Abstractions &
Genitals
Website
of the Day
Crushing Iraqi Skulls with Tanks for Sport?
May
8 / 9, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Torture: as American as Apple Pie
Adam
Jones
America's Srebrenica: What About the Hundreds of POWs Suffocated
and Shot at Kunduz?
Douglas
Valentine
Who Let the Dogs Out?: Torture, the CIA and the Press
Kurt
Nimmo
Rush Limbaugh and the Babes of Abu Ghraib
Brian
Cloughley
Humpty Dumpty is Falling
Lucia
Dailey
Forbidden Games
Joanne
Mariner
* * * *: Redacting Moussaoui
Mickey
Z.
Please Forgive U.S.? (There Are No Innocent Bystanders)
John
Chuckman
The Thing with No Brain
Doug
Giebel
Someone Knew: There Were No WMDs
Norm
Dixon
How the Bush Gang Exploited 9/11
Sam
Bahour
A Guiding Light Falls on Ramallah
Susan
Davis
Disorderly Conduct as Fine Art
Dave
Marsh
In a Pig's Eye: Alan Lomax, Dead But Still Stealing
Laura
Flanders
Life with Dick and Lynne
Dave
Zirin
Fans Push Spiderman Off Base
Carolyn
Baker
Why I Won't Vote in 2004
Prince
"Ain't No Sense in Voting"
Dr.
Susan Block
Onan for Two: Liberating Masturbation
Poets'
Basement
Smith, Sleeth, Ford, Albert and Saska
May
7, 2004
Human
Rights Watch
10 Prisons; 9,000 Prisoners: US Detention
Facilities in Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
UnAmerican? I Wish It Were So
Robert
Fisk
An Illegal and Immoral War
Ahmad
Faruqui
The 50th Anniversary of Dien Bien
Phu
Alexander
Zaitchik
From Terrell Unit in Texas to Abu Ghraib: Doesn't It Ring a (Prison)
Bell?
Mike
Whitney
The Price of Victory
Norman
Solomon
This War, Racism and Media Denial
M.
Shahid Alam
A Comic Apology
May
6, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
They Did It for Jessica: Smeared with
Shit; Kicked to Death
Kathy
Kelly
May Day in Pekin Prison: Prison Labor
for the War Machine
Werther
The Sunk Cost Fallacy: War as Vegas
Casino Game
Lawrence
Ferlinghetti
Totalitarian Democracy
Robert
Fisk
"Smoke Him": Video Shows Wounded
Men Being Shot by US Helicopter
John
Janney
Torturing the Way to Freedom?
Christopher
Ketcham
Outlaw Heterosexual Marriage Now!
Alan
Farago
Dead Oceans: So Long, Thanks for the Fish
Sam
Hamod
Bush on Arab TV: Worthless and Demeaning
James
Brooks
Sullen Spring
William
S. Lind
On the Brink of Defeat in Iraq
May
5, 2004
Maj.
Gen. Antonio M. Taguba
Complete US Army Report on Abuse of
Iraqi Prisoners
Kathleen
and Bill Christison
Kerry: a Lost Cause for Progressives?
Will
Youmans
Deal with the Devil: a Palestinian
Zionist and the End of the World
Patrick
B. Barr
Terrorists R Us: the Powerful are Exempt from the Label
Lawrence
Magnuson
Nightline's All-American Morgue
Greg
Moses
Pocketbook of Denuded Ideals
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Tormenting Prisoners, Torturing
Truth
Lee
Ballinger
Cinco de Mayo and Unity
Gilbert
Achcar
Bush's Cakewalk into the Iraq Quaqmire
Website
of the Day
Operation Phoenix & Iraq
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
May
19, 2004
Cat Fight Among
the Neo-Cons
Who is Kenneth
deGraffenried?
By MICHAEL GILLESPIE
Seymour Hersh, who was awarded a Pulitzer
Prize for international reporting for his expose of the My Lai
massacre and its cover-up during the Viet Nam war, is a formidable
figure in the world of big media journalism. He is reported to
be an extraordinarily difficult man whose career has had its
share of awkward moments and rough patches.
In his most recent article
for The New Yorker magazine, a piece titled "The Gray Zone,"
Hersh exposes a super secret program called Copper Green that
got out of control and led to the "prisoner abuse"
scandal at Abu Ghraib. One paragraph caught my attention because
in it Hersh mentions the name of a distant relative, Kenneth
deGraffenried.
The paragraph describes, without
comment, "a bureaucratic battle within the Pentagon."
It was a battle in which Donald Rumsfeld's trusted aide, Stephen
Cambone, now Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, wrested
"control of all special-access programs that were relevant
to the war on terror" from Kenneth deGraffenried. What Hersh
fails to mention is that Kenneth deGraffenried is, or was, a
bona fide member of the Neoconservative cabal that controls the
Bush administration's catastrophic foreign policy.
A Google search for "Kenneth
deGraffenried" turns up only one relevant reference. The
Fellowship Programs page of the web site for The
Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies (IASPS),
lists Mr. deGraffenried as one of two instructors on Intelligence
for the Institute's Strategic Fellowship's for 2002-2003, and
a "former Senior Director of Intelligence Program, National
Security Council (subjects - intelligence, national security)."
IASPS is an organization dedicated to the Neoconservative philosophy
and cause, so much and so explicitly so that the Instintue's
Strategic Fellowship Overview advises potential applicants that,
"Only those who demonstrate a familiarity with the problems
of modern social science and the nation state as these are raised
in the work of Leo Strauss, Eric Voegelin and others reaching
back to Plato and Aristotle will be of interest to this program."
Strauss, of course, is the guiding star in the Neoconservative
firmament. IASPS has a Hebrew language site.
This is not the first time
Kenneth deGraffenried's name has been revealed in the glare of
scandal. I can still recall my surprise when, during the Iran-Contra
hearings many years ago, Lt. Col. Oliver North was asked where
he got the documents he and his secretary, Fawn Hall, so famously
shreded. North testified that when he determined it was time
for certain documents to be shredded, he went to and requested
them from the civil servant who was responsible for National
Security Council's super secret documents, Mr. deGraffenried,
who kept them in his safe. Hersh certainly got one thing right:
Kenneth deGraffenried's experience with the NSC's super secret
programs goes back decades.
Hersh's article leaves his
readers wondering just how acrimonious the battle for "control
of special-access programs that were relevant to the war on terror"
may have been, and why he didn't find it necessary to point out
that this particular bureaucratic battle, seen in the light of
Kenneth deGraffenried's credentials as a bona fide Neocon, seems
to suggest that all was not (and is not) well within the bosom
of the Neoconservative beast, that raw careerism and petty infighting
over control of some of the intelligence community's most secret
black-ops programs may have contributed directly to a deeply
flawed decision-making process that resulted in torture at Abu
Ghraib and elsewhere and the still unfolding scandal that is
rocking the Bush administration.
When Democracy Now's Amy Goodman
interviewed Seymour Hersh yesterday, she specifically asked the
renowned investigative reporter, "Who is Kenneth deGraffenried?"
Perhaps Goodman, like this writer, wondered whether Hersh's mention
of deGraffenried in his expose of the black-ops intelligence
program, Copper Green, run amok in Iraq, was as gratuitous as
it appeared to be. Hersh's reply, that deGraffenried was "sort
of a bureaucratic loser" sounded like a non-answer to the
underlying questions. Why mention deGraffenried and his role
in the "bureaucratic battle within the Pentagon" over
"control of all special-access programs that were relevant
to the war on terror" if deGraffenried was nothing more
than "sort of a bureaucratic loser"? And why fail to
inform readers, either in the story or in follow-on interviews
with reporters like Goodman, that deGraffenried was a Neoconservative
insider, rather than an apolitical civil servant forced out by
the Neocon cabal? Moreover, does "a bureaucratic loser"
rise as a civil service employee to the level of official keeper
of the National Security Council's most secret documents in the
Reagan administration and in later administrations become the
official monitor of the Pentagon's super-secret special-access
programs, programs that Hersh described as "sacrosanct"
until Rumsfeld's aide Cambone decided to take control over them?
Hardly. It is very difficult to imagine that Goodman's curiosity
was misplaced. There is more going on here than Hersh is telling.
And why did Hersh raise these questions in the first place? Stay
tuned.
Weekend
Edition Features for May 15 / 16, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Green Lights for Torture
Douglas
Valentine
ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited
John
Stanton
Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel
Ben
Tripp
Torture: a Fond Reminiscence
Brian
Cloughley
Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot
Act
Justin
E. H. Smith
Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey
Brandy
Baker
Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism
John
Chuckman
Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape
Bill
Glahn
RIAA Watch: Goon Squad
John
Holt
Fencing the Sky
Ron
Jacobs
The Power of Patti Smith
Brian
J. Foley
Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib?
Robin
Philpot
Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide
Eric
Leser
The Carlyle Empire
Ray
Hanania
From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good
War Crime
Jeff
Halper
Dozers of Mass Destruction
Joe
Surkiewicz
Inside the Baltimore Detention Center
John
Whitlow
Iraq Goddamn
Michael
Leon
Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video
Poets'
Basement
Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert
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