HOUSE TARGETS ANOTHER US ENVIRONMENTAL GROUP OVER ITS FOREIGN TIES

House lawmakers sent a letter Monday to the environmental group Earth justice demanding documents regarding its ties to foreign officials and environmental activists, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.

The letter from top Republicans on the House Committee on Natural Resources is the fourth sent to environmental groups over their ties to foreign governments. It’s the second letter related to environmental opposition to the U.S. military presence in Okinawa, Japan.

Lawmakers say Earth justice’s political activities may require them to register as a foreign agent, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The DCNF. Earth justice is an environmental law firm often represents environmental activists in litigation.

“The Committee is concerned that your organization’s political activities within the United States in opposition to the relocation of [Marine Corps Air Station] Futenma and the continued military presence in Okinawa may require compliance with” the Foreign Agents Registration Act, Republicans wrote to Earth justice president Abigail Dillen.

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Trump Should Have Followed His Instincts On Afghanistan

President Trump reversed himself on Afghanistan Monday in announcing thousands of more troops are heading to the war-torn nation.

In his address Monday night, Trump admitted that he went against his instincts on doubling-down on America’s military commitment in Afghanistan.

“My original instinct was to pull out — and, historically, I like following my instincts. But all of my life, I’ve heard that decisions are much different when you sit behind the desk in the Oval Office,” the president stated.

The person arguably most responsible for that change of mind is National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster. It has long been reported that the Army general wanted more troops in Afghanistan — the problem was convincing the president to agree.

Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon was a vocal opponent of increasing troop numbers and urged for a gradual withdrawal from Afghanistan. Trump himself agreed with this sentiment in numerous past statements on Twitter.

“We should leave Afghanistan immediately. No more wasted lives,” he tweeted back in 2013. “If we have to go back in, we go in hard & quick. Rebuild the US first.”

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Trump’s ‘America First’ Base Unhappy with Flip-Flop Afghanistan Speech

President Trump’s “America First” base was the biggest loser of Trump’s speech on Afghanistan Monday night, and many quickly expressed their disappointment at the business-as-usual address from the president who had once promised to limit American intervention abroad and focus on nation-building at home.

Trump’s speech, in which he pledged to increase the number of troops in the 16-year-war, was the first since the departure of Chief Strategist Steve Bannon and confirmed the fears of many on the right that without a strong nationalist voice in the West Wing, the President would revert to the same old fare that Americans had voted to reject in November.

Using many of the same vague promises that previous presidents had used, including a repeat of Obama’s promise not to give a “blank check” to Afghanistan and a pledge to finally get tough on Pakistan, it was a far cry from the “America First” foreign policy he laid out in the months before election day.

On Fox News, which has traditionally been supportive of military escapades, the reaction was mixed. While on-air the reception was broadly positive, other commentators weren’t convinced. Fox News Radio’s Todd Starnes accused the president of changing his campaign promise from “America First” to “Afghanistan First.”

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Is Trump Enlisting in the War Party?

By firing off five dozen Tomahawk missiles at a military airfield, our “America First” president may have plunged us into another Middle East war that his countrymen do not want to fight.

Thus far Bashar Assad seems unintimidated. Brushing off the strikes, he has defiantly gone back to bombing the rebels from the same Shayrat air base that the U.S. missiles hit.

Trump “will not stop here,” warned U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley on Sunday. “If he needs to do more, he will.”

If Trump fails to back up Haley’s threat, the hawks now cheering him on will begin deriding him as “Donald Obama.”

But if he throbs to the war drums of John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio and orders Syria’s air force destroyed, we could be at war not only with ISIS and al-Qaida, but with Syria, Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.

A Syrian war would consume Trump’s presidency.

Are we ready for that? How would we win such a war without raising a large army and sending it back into the Middle East?

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Trolling for War with Russia

Some 50 State Department officials have signed a memo calling on President Obama to launch air and missile strikes on the Damascus regime of Bashar Assad.

A “judicious use of stand-off and air weapons,” they claim, “would undergird and drive a more focused and hard-nosed U.S.-led diplomatic process.”

In brief, to strengthen the hand of our diplomats and show we mean business, we should start bombing and killing Syrian soldiers.

Yet Syria has not attacked us. And Congress has not declared war on Syria, or authorized an attack. Where do these State hawks think President Obama gets the authority to launch a war on Syria?

Does State consider the Constitution to be purely advisory when it grants Congress the sole power to declare war? Was not waging aggressive war the principal charge against the Nazis at Nuremberg?

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Blowback—–The Washington War Party’s Folly Comes Home To Roost

Exactly 26 years ago last week, peace was breaking out in a manner that the world had not experienced since June 1914. The Berlin Wall—-the symbol of a century of state tyranny, grotesque mass warfare and the nuclear sword of Damocles hanging over the planet—-had come tumbling down on November 9, 1989.

It was only a matter of time before the economically decrepit Soviet regime would be no more, and that the world’s vast arsenal of weapons and nuclear bombs could be dismantled.

Indeed, shortly thereafter according to Gorbachev, President George H.W. Bush and Secretary Baker promised that NATO would not be expanded by “as much as a thumb’s width further to the East” in return for acquiescing to the reunification of Germany.

So with its “mission accomplished” there was no logical reason why NATO should not have been disbanded in parallel with the Warsaw Pact’s demise, and for an obvious and overpowering reason: On November 9, 1989 there were no material military threats to US security anywhere on the planet outside of the suddenly vanishing front line of the Cold War.

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US has 'legal basis' for strikes against ISIS in Syria, Power says

President Obama has the authority to launch strikes against Islamic militants in Syria, even without a stamp of approval from the United Nations, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. said Sunday.

Samantha Power said that, while there's broad support among U.N. Security Council members for taking the fight to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), also known as ISIL, the United States has the legal right to launch Syrian strikes without the group's explicit backing.

"Consistent with the U.N. charter, we [think] – it would depend on the facts and circumstances of any particular strike in Syria – that we have the legal basis we need," Power said on ABC's "This Week" program.

Asked specifically about the possibility that Russia would veto such authority, Power suggested the Russians would back the United States.

"Russia has vetoed in the past, but on very different issues," Power said. "Russia has made clear, for a long time, its opposition to ISIL."

Power said a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, convened by Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday, left U.S. officials confident that the international community is universally supportive of the fight against ISIS.

"It showcased just how much support there is on the Security Council and in the broader international community for the anti-ISIL effort," she said.

Obama on Wednesday will be in New York to address the U.N. General Assembly in a bid to rally more international support behind that effort.

"Because we’re leading the right way, more nations are joining our coalition," Obama said Saturday in his weekly radio address. "Over 40 countries have offered to help the broad campaign against ISIL so far – from training and equipment, to humanitarian relief, to flying combat missions."

While France last week joined the ISIS fight by launching direct air strikes on the terrorist militants in Iraq, no country has yet committed to helping the United States should Obama expand those strikes into Syria.

Power acknowledged that no other country has said explicitly that they would join an aerial campaign in Syria. But she strongly suggested that such support is forthcoming.

"It will be up to each country to announce for itself whether it's prepared to participate in a combat role or can provide military equipment," Power said. "I will make you a prediction … which is that we will not do the airstrikes alone."

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President Obama Announces Air Strikes in Iraq: 'Today America Is Coming to Help'

UPDATE, 6:03 AM: A senior administration official that spoke with reporters after Obama’s speech stressed that no airstrikes have taken place at this time in Iraq, but would be postured to take targeted military action.

President Obama announced late Thursday night that he authorized air strikes to assist the Iraqi people in their fight against terrorist forces of the Islamic State.

He also announced aid to the Yazidi people in Iraq who are trapped and starving on Mount Sinjar.

He explained that the United States has a “mandate” to act in order to “prevent an act of genocide,” although he cautioned that America would “act carefully and responsibly.”

“Today America is coming to help,” he said.

Obama acknowledged that he ran for office vowing to get America out of Iraq and vowed that there would be no combat troops sent into the country.

“As Commander-in-Chief, I will not allow the United States to be dragged into fighting another war in Iraq,” he insisted.

Obama closed his statement with an examination of America’s responsibility to act in the world to help fight terrorism.

“My fellow Americans, the world is confronted by many challenges, and while America has never been able to right every wrong, America has made the world a more secure and prosperous place,” he said.Obama also reminded American citizens of his duty to act.

“When the lives of American citizens are at risk we will take action. That’s my responsibility as Commander-in-Chief, and when many thousands of innocent civilians are in danger of being wiped out and we have the capacity to do something about it, we will take action," he said. "That is our responsibility as Americans. It’s a hallmark of American leadership."

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Government Releases Memo Justifying Killing US Citizens With Drones

The United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals released a secret White House memo Monday explaining the legal justification for a lethal drone strike in Yemen against U.S. citizen and al-Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki in 2011.

Based on facts provided by the intelligence community and Department of Defense, as an “operational leader” of an “enemy force,” al-Awlaki is not excluded from “lethal action” on the part of the military simply by virtue of being born in the U.S.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) prepared the memorandum, which stated that employing a drone strike against al-Awlaki was legally justifiable ”as part of the United States’ ongoing non-international armed conflict with al-Qaeda.”

Further justification was cited under a U.S. military force authorization granted by Congress after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C.

The memo states that al-Awlaki was still entitled to his Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches, seizures and unfair due process while abroad, but that a ”decision-maker” such as the president could “reasonably conclude” that the terrorist leader represented a “continued” and “imminent” threat to U.S. national security.

“In addition to the nature of the threat posed by al-Awlaki’s activities, both agencies here have represented that they intend to capture rather than target al-Awlaki if feasible,” the memo reads. “Yet we also understand that an operation by either agency to capture al-Awlaki in Yemen would be infeasible at this time.”

Senators tasked with advice and consent authority over President Obama’s nomination of David Barron to the U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals demanded to see the memo, which was written while Barron served as acting chief of OLC. Barron wrote numerous opinions justifying drone strikes on U.S. citizens.

“The realities of combat” validate such uses of force as ”necessary and appropriate” according to Barron, who cited the landmark Bush-era Supreme Court case Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, which ruled that U.S. citizens could be considered and detained as “enemy combatants.” However the same ruling mandated such designated detainees receive some form of due process.

“Due process analysis need not blink at those realities,” Barron wrote.

“There are few questions more important than the question of when the government has the authority to kill its own citizens,” American Civil Liberties Union Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer said in a Business Insider report. ”This memo’s release will allow the public to better understand the scope and implications of the authority the government is claiming.”

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Pentagon knew Bergdahl’s whereabouts but didn’t risk rescue for ‘deserter’

The Pentagon on several occasions had ground-level intelligence on where Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was being held captive at various times — down to how many gunmen were guarding him — but special operations commanders repeatedly shelved rescue missions because they didn’t want to risk casualties for a man they believed to be a “deserter,” sources familiar with the mission plans said.

Commanders on the ground debated whether to pull the trigger on a rescue several times in recent years, according to one of the sources, a former high-level intelligence official in Afghanistan, who said the conclusion each time was that the prospect of losing highly trained troops was too high a price to pay for rescuing a soldier who walked away from his unit before being captured by the enemy.

A second source told The Washington Times that the rescue operation plans were “high risk” and became even less attractive in recent months when officials in the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command grew convinced that the Taliban and the militant Haqqani network, whose operatives were holding Sgt. Bergdahl, were eager to cut a deal for his release.

“Joint Special Operations Command always had the rescue mission on the table and it was entirely under their ownership, but the big question centered on whether Bergdahl was somebody you risk lives for when you still have time and space to maneuver diplomatically,” said the source, a high-level congressional aide, who, like the former intelligence official, spoke only on the condition of anonymity.

The aide also said there was frustration among some on Capitol Hill that the Obama administration had botched an opportunity to exert leverage over the Taliban, particularly since the U.S. military could have used force to secure Sgt. Bergdahl’s release.

“The prisoner swap was being built up as the only option that was available. But there’s been knowledge of the general vicinity of where Bergdahl was, down to how many guys were guarding him,” said the aide.

The catch, the aide added, is that special operations commanders and others at the Pentagon never sought approval for the rescue mission from the White House because they believed in the pursuit of a diplomatic deal.

The aide said military officials in Afghanistan spent recent months pushing for a stronger deal than was ultimately struck, but were “superseded” by the White House and State Department. The aide would not comment on what the parameters of a “stronger” deal may have looked like, beyond saying they would have involved the Pakistani government.

The former intelligence official who spoke with The Times corroborated that assertion but declined to offer further details, saying only that the deal turned out the way it did because “the administration wanted to close the door on this no matter what the price was.”

Separately, the former official said, “Military commanders were loath to risk their people to save this guy. They were loath to pick him up and because of that hesitancy, we wind up trading five Taliban guys for him.

“The mentality was, ‘We’re not going to lose more of our own guys on this,” the former official said.

Both of the sources said military officials across the special operations community were appalled by the terms of the deal that ultimately got struck over the weekend between State Department-led negotiators and the Taliban, effectively securing Sgt. Bergdahl’s release from Haqqani network custody in exchange for the release of five former Taliban commanders from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

U.S. Special Operations Command declined to comment on the revelations provided to The Times.

But The Associated Press reported that after weeks of intensive searching for Sgt. Bergdahl in 2009 the military decided against making an extraordinary effort to rescue him, especially after it became clear that he initially was being held in Pakistan under the supervision of the Haqqani network, a Taliban ally with links to Pakistan’s intelligence service.

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War Party Oligarch

IIs the Republican Party’s Middle East policy up for bid?

For four days ending Sunday, a quartet of presidential hopefuls trooped to Las Vegas to attend the annual gathering of the Republican Jewish Coalition.

Impresario: Sheldon Adelson, the Vegas-Macau casino mogul whose fortune is estimated at $39 billion — 8th richest man on the planet — and who dumped $92 million into the election of 2012.

Adelson kept Newt Gingrich alive with a $15 million infusion of ad money, gutting Romney, and then sank $30 million into Mitt’s campaign.

This time Sheldon wants to buy himself a winner.

Ari Fleischer, press secretary to Bush 43, and a member of Adelson’s RJC fiefdom, put it plain and simple: “The ‘Sheldon Primary’ is an important primary. … anybody running for the Republican nomination would want to have Sheldon at his side.”

One such man is Jeb Bush, son and brother to presidents, who was the prize bull at Sheldon’s cattle show. Daniel Ruth of the Tampa Bay Times speculates on Jeb’s motive in showing up:

“Would you slink into Las Vegas to schmooze gambling mogul Sheldon Adelson who regards GOP presidential nominees as if they were trophy heads mounted in his den, if you had no interest in the White House? Bush is not going to Vegas to catch Meat Loaf’s act at Planet Hollywood.”

The 2016 presidential hopefuls “are falling at his feet,” said a veteran Republican strategist of the 80-year-old oligarch. Each of those who came — Bush, Chris Christie, and Govs. Scott Walker and John Kasich — apparently auditioned, one by one, before the godfather.

In 2016, says Adelson’s top political adviser Andy Abboud, Sheldon’s “bar for support is going to be much higher. … There’s going to be a lot more scrutiny.”

Guess that means no more Newts.

Victor Chaltiel, a major donor and Adelson friend who sits on the board of Las Vegas Sands, tells us Sheldon “doesn’t want a crazy extremist to be the nominee.” Adds Shawn Steel, a big California GOP money man, Sheldon is a “very rational guy.”

Perhaps. But last fall at Yeshiva University, this “very rational guy” gave this response to a question from Rabbi Shmuley Boteach on whether he supports U.S. negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program:

“No. What do you mean support negotiations? What are we going to negotiate about? What I would say is, ‘Listen, you see that desert out there, I want to show you something.’ …

You pick up your cell phone and you call somewhere in Nebraska and you say, ‘OK let it go.’

“So, there’s an atomic weapon, goes over ballistic missiles, the middle of the desert, that doesn’t hurt a soul. Maybe a couple of rattlesnakes, and scorpions, or whatever.

“And then you say, ‘See! The next one is in the middle of Tehran. So, we mean business. You want to be wiped out? Go ahead and take a tough position and continue with your nuclear development.

“‘You want to be peaceful. Just reverse it all, and we will guarantee that you can have a nuclear power plant for electricity purposes, energy purposes.’”

Adelson’s response was recorded by Philip Weiss of Mondoweiss website who was at Yeshiva and filmed the interview. Weiss says the audience cheered Adelson’s proposed nuclear strike on Iran and no one on the stage, not Wall Street Journal columnist Bret Stephens, peeped a word of dissent.

And this is a “very rational guy,” who doesn’t want “a crazy extremist to be the nominee”?

This is someone Republican presidential candidates must appease, if they don’t want tens of millions in attack ads run against them?

This is someone the Republican presidential hopefuls must hearken to now?

Again, so it would seem.

During his talk before the few dozen members of the RJC, Gov. Chris Christie recounted his recent trip to Israel: “I took a helicopter ride from the occupied territories” and came “to understand the military risk that Israel faces every day.”

Christie’s effort at bonding boomeranged. An angry Morton Klein of the Zionist Organization of America confronted Christie to demand that he explain just what he meant by “occupied territories.”

For half a century, the United States has considered the West Bank occupied land where Israeli settlements are illegal under the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Whatever Christie’s response, it did not satisfy the ZOA or Klein who declared: “Either [Christie] doesn’t understand the issue, or he’s hostile to Israel.”

Whereupon Christie, in a private audience with Adelson, apologized.

A source close to Adelson told Politico that Christie made clear “that he misspoke when he referred to the ‘occupied territories.’ And he conveyed that he is an unwavering friend and committed supporter of Israel, and was sorry for any confusion that came across as a result of the misstatement.”

The governor is a tough guy, but this sounds like groveling.

Is this what Republican presidential candidates must do now?

Kowtow to this fattest of fat cats who wants to buy himself an American war on Iran?

Is that what has become of the party of Reagan?

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The Fun-House Mirror That Is the Syria Decision

Alan Lowenthal has a headache.

Who can blame him? The freshman House member, a California Democrat, is genuinely torn—torn up, really—over whether to vote for military strikes against Syria. After a classified briefing Wednesday in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, he was heading back to Long Beach, no closer to a decision than before.

"This is a very pained discussion," he said. "There are no good answers, and there are very grave consequences no matter what we do. There's a moral dilemma about the use of chemical weapons—which are just terrible—by a dictator. On the other hand, there are consequences that we've seen when we involve ourselves, especially unilaterally, and we could put ourselves tremendously at risk."

Perhaps the most unenviable job in the world these days is to be a member of the Congress wrestling with what to do about the crisis in Syria. There are fierce, competing pressures swirling around these fence-sitters, depending on their rank, party affiliation, constituents' demands, foreign policy orientation, and, yes, even their reelection prospects or ambitions for higher office. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has called it a "vote of conscience," suggesting that politics won't come into play, but everyone knows that's impossible in such a highly polarized environment and with midterms a little over a year away.

Liberal Democrats such as Lowenthal have a natural resistance to war, but they also want to back up one of their own in the White House. Then there are the polls showing that a majority of voters oppose military action. Of the 653 e-mails, phone calls, and social-media comments Lowenthal's office has received, only 11 favor strikes.

Also weighing on him and other members is Israel's security. As a Jew, Lowenthal said, he's particularly sensitive to the horrific images of innocent people being gassed. But does bombing Syria increase or decrease the threat that its ally, Iran, poses to Israel? Lowenthal isn't sure.

Republicans feel a different set of pressures. Some view the president's decision to ask Congress for authority as a trap, laying the groundwork for sharing the blame. "A lot of people in Congress wish he had not bucked it to them," said Republican lobbyist Charlie Black. Siding with a Democratic president could be a major liability for Republican members facing primary challengers next year or contemplating their party's White House nomination in 2016. "There's almost a reflexive impulse among Republicans to oppose anything Obama is for," said Mike McCurry, who was a State Department spokesman and a press secretary for President Clinton. Among the potential GOP presidential candidates, Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Ted Cruz of Texas have denounced Obama's plan; Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida voted against military force as a member of the Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday.

Such votes could emerge as key campaign issues three years from now. Just ask former Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who voted with dozens of other Democrats to go to war in Iraq in 2002. What seemed like a safe vote at the time, amid a certain amount of post-9/11 patriotic fervor, turned toxic in the Democratic presidential primary six years later.

Clinton, who went on to become Obama's secretary of State, came out in support of military action in Syria this week.

But there was no cloaking this move in 9/11 unity. "Before the next presidential election, we'll know which side was right on Syria and which side was wrong," said Republican consultant Steve Schmidt, who advised 2008 nominee John McCain.

In a sign that some Republicans are putting their feelings about the White House aside, House Speaker John Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor are backing Obama's call for military action. That Boehner, Cantor, Pelosi, and Obama are on one side, and Paul, Rubio, and Cruz are on the other—along with liberal Democrats such as Reps. Charlie Rangel of New York and Alan Grayson of Florida—makes it starkly clear that this is no party-line vote. The old rules, under which Democrats resist military entanglements and Republicans champion foreign intervention, no longer apply. That leaves members even more isolated and confused.

Lowenthal could never have contemplated that the Democratic president who won election opposing the war in Iraq would urge him to green-light a missile strike in another part of the Middle East. Nor could Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., have envisioned the split in his party over foreign intervention.
"Of course it matters what the speaker of the House says, but it also matters what most of the members of my community say, and my constituents from left to right oppose involvement," Gardner said. "In the end, I will vote according to what I believe is right."

Gardner insists the vote "transcends politics." With the lives of women and men in uniform at stake, this isn't like voting on the farm bill or the debt ceiling. "This vote is in a category by itself," he said. "You can't compare it to any other vote."

The complexities of the crisis in Syria make it difficult to calculate political advantage. So a debate laced with politics, in some respects, is somehow liberated from politics. That makes the upcoming vote all the more unpredictable. Even the large majority of Americans wearily fed up with the dysfunction in Congress will be watching closely. No one has the luxury of turning away.

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CODEPINK protester crashes Senate hearing on Syria: ‘The American people do not want this’

CODEPINK co-founder and anti-war activist Medea Benjamin interrupted a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on the possibility of a U.S. military strike in Syria on Tuesday, prompting a response from Secretary of State John Kerry after she was ejected from the proceedings.

Video posted by Talking Points Memo shows Benjamin “We don’t want another war,” before being grabbed by security and led out of the hearing. She can also be heard saying, “Nobody wants this war. Cruise missiles, launching cruise missiles, means another war. The American people do not want this.”

The outburst led Kerry to briefly interrupt Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s testimony by suggesting he felt empathy toward Benjamin.

“You know, the first time I testified before this committee when I was 27 years old, I had feelings very similar to that protester,” said Kerry, who spoke out against the Vietnam War in 1971 as a member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War. “And I would just say that is exactly why it is so important that we are all here having this debate, talking about these things before the country and that the Congress itself will act representing the American people. I think we all can respect those who have a different point of view, and we do.”

In 2012, Benjamin protested a speech by another Obama administration official, counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan, saying the White House’s use of unmanned attack drones was “making us less safe by killing so many innocent people around the world.”

Watch footage of Benjamin’s protest, posted by TPM on Tuesday, below.

Military gradually moving toward women in combat

Plans to phase women into combat roles are progressing gradually, military representatives told a House panel Tuesday, but Democrats and Republicans remain cautious about the transition.

 

Officers from the Navy, Air Forces, Army and Marines presented plans to integrate women into front line positions by 2016 to the Armed Services Military Personnel subcommittee. Representatives indicated confidence that the new policy, stemming from a January decision to lift a ban on women serving in combat roles, would not threaten the country’s military readiness.

 

“Women have been attached to our combat unit for several years,” said Major General Bennet Sacolick, the director of force management and development for the U.S. Special Operations Command. “And they have performed magnificently.”

 

But committee members presented a variety of issues that the Armed Services must overcome, chief among them winning over public support.

 

A critical task for the Army and Marines especially is reassessing the physical and mental standards required of a front line soldier. While military officials insisted that their efforts are science-based and long overdue, Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev., said a vocal minority will equate any changes in the baseline to lowering standards for females.

 

“I don’t envy you,” said Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev. “There is not universal acceptance of this concept, though more so today than there was five, 10, 15 years ago.”

 

Another Republican, Rep. Jackie Walorski of Indiana, wondered if sexual assaults would increase as more women are moved into combat roles and questioned whether the military had adequately addressed the issue.

 

“The [sexual assault] debate sitting here is raging,” Walorski said.

But Juliet Beyler, the director of officer and enlisted personnel management for the Department of Defense countered that “the more we treat servicewomen equally, the more they will treat women with respect.”

 

Democrats were more worried that an institution dominated by males for centuries was too slow in taking on this issue and was ill-equipped to adequately address the concerns of female infantry.

 

Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H., for example, said that “uniforms have not really been wonderful for women” and added that women put on the front lines should not be without other female soldiers.

“Make sure when you move these women into these combat [jobs], we’re not isolating them,” she said.

 

Lt. General Robert E. Milstead Jr. of the Marines said that was already being addressed.

“We don’t plan on dropping a single [female] marine here and a single marine here,” Milstead said. “We have a minimum of two or three per unit.”

 

To help women entering combat roles, Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Calif, said the military should be mindful to put women in senior positions to serve as role models.

 

“If they’re not doing the No. 1 job of the military, which is combat, then they probably won’t be wearing stars on their uniforms,” Sanchez noted.

 

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Egyptian Politician: U.S. Ambassador Member of Muslim Brotherhood 'Sleeper Cells'

Mustafa Bakari, an Egyptian politician, issued a brutal assessment of U.S. Ambassador to Egypt, Anne Patterson. Bakari stated, “In my opinion, she [Patterson] is a member of the sleeper cells of the Brotherhood, likely recruited by Essam al-Erian or Muhammad al-Baltagi.” 

In a June 18 speech, Patterson made the following statement in a speech about the turmoil in Egypt:
“Some say that street action will produce better results than elections,” Patterson said. “To be honest, my government and I are deeply skeptical.”

John Hudson at Foreign Policy wrote of her reluctance to criticize Morsi:

Patterson in particular resisted opportunities to criticize the Morsy government as it implemented increasingly authoritarian policies. In a memorable May interview with the Egyptian English-language news site Ahram Online, she repeatedly dodged pointed questions about Morsy's leadership. "The fact is they ran in a legitimate election and won," she said. "Of course it is challenging to be dealing with any new government. However, at the state institutional level, we are for instance still liaising with the same military and civil service personnel, and thus have retained the same long-established relations."

In response to Patterson’s statements, and President Obama’s policy decisions on Egypt, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) also wrote in Foreign Policy that the U.S. had become a "partner" to the Muslim Brotherhood government:

Tragically, America has been relegated to the sidelines. The number of U.S. Embassy personnel has been reduced, and a travel warning has been issued for Americans in Egypt -- and for good reason. The people protesting in the streets were not only carrying anti-Morsy signs. They were also carrying signs with slogans like "Obama Supports Terrorism" and "Obama Supports Morsy," as well as pictures of the American ambassador to Egypt, Anne Patterson, with a large red "X" through her face. Some of these were set on fire. On Friday, Andrew Driscoll Pochter, an American college student who was in Egypt to teach English to schoolchildren, was stabbed to death as he took pictures of the protesters.  

In what has to be one of the most stunning diplomatic failures in recent memory, the United States is -- in both perception and reality -- entrenched as the partner of a repressive, Islamist regime and the enemy of the secular, pro-democracy opposition.

As a result, Patterson, who is reportedly in line for a promotion as Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, has been increasingly viewed, according to Hudson, as the “key implementer for a policy that at least offers tacit support to the Muslim Brotherhood.”

The State Department has embraced Patterson’s statements and approach. Spokesman Patrick Ventrell said in early July, “The ambassador has very much stated U.S. policies.”

Indeed, Patterson, who met with senior Muslim Brotherhood officials—an act perceived by Morsi opponents as sleeping with the enemy—has had the total support of the State Department all along. She was awarded the Secretary’s Distinguished Service Award twice, in 2010 and 2008, and the Ryan Crocker award for expeditionary diplomacy in 2010.

As Raymond Ibrahim at Gatestone Institute observed, the reasons Egyptians dislike Patterson run deeper.

Ibrahim pointed out that last week El Fagr reported that Patterson demanded the release of all Muslim Brotherhood members currently being held for questioning from Supreme Commander of the Egyptian Armed Forces, General Abdul Fatah al-Sisi:

And when Sisi rejected this order, the American ambassador began threatening him that Egypt will turn into another Syria and live through a civil war, to which Sisi responded violently: “Neither you nor your country can overcome Egypt and its people.”

Previously, Ibrahim wrote that Patterson was reported as “meddling” in the affairs of the Egyptian people when she attempted to “communicate with General Sisi, demanding dialogue with the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, and concessions to them,” to which Sisi reportedly responded: “Stop meddling in our affairs… the Egyptian people are capable of looking after their own welfare.”

In addition, Al Nahar reported that Patterson had incited the Salafi Nour Party, a fundamentalist group that withdrew from negotiations with Egypt’s interim government, to “tamper with the political scene and the road map and to threaten to withdraw from political participation if Dr. Muhammad Baradei becomes elected as Prime Minister…”

Ibrahim wrote that “Patterson’s ‘meddling’ in Egypt’s affairs is not limited to General Sisi and the Egyptian media.” He noted that several of Egypt’s revolutionary forces, including Tamarod, which played a major role in the recent revolt, are planning a protest in front of the U.S. embassy in Cairo, and will be “calling for the ejection of ambassador Anne Patterson.”

Earlier in July, Ibrahim reported that even Muhammad Heikal, a respected political commentator of the Arab world, said that during an interview, Patterson had assured the Muslim Brotherhood’s Hisham Qandil, Egypt’s Prime Minister under Morsi, that “there are many forms of pressure, and America holds the keys to the Gulf.”

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State Department ‘withholding information’ on Benghazi

House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa on Tuesday accused the Obama administration of “withholding information” about the Benghazi terror attack. The California Republican has subpoenaed more documents related to the talking points on the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate that left four Americans dead.

In a subpoena sent Tuesday, Issa requested “all documents and communications referring or relating to the Benghazi talking points” sent to or from a list of ten current and former State Department officials.

“The State Department has not lived up to the Administration’s broad and unambiguous promises of cooperation with Congress,” Issa said in a letter sent Tuesday to Kerry. “Therefore, I am left with no alternative but to compel the State Department to produce relevant documents through a subpoena.”

On May 15, the White House released 100 pages of emails and documents on the subject. Those same documents, according to Issa’s letter, were forwarded to the committee several days later in response to a request.

Issa said that was not sufficient information, saying that information “crucial” to his committee’s investigation was being “withheld.”

In the emails, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland raised concerns about including some information, such as any mention of al-Qaida involvement in the attack, for fear that it would leave the State Department open to criticism.

But Issa said questions remain because the correspondence “suggests that she did not raise these concerns in a vacuum.”

The deadline for Secretary of State John Kerry to turn over the documents is Friday, June 7, 2013, at noon.

State Department spokesman Patrick H. Ventrell pushed back on the idea that the State Department had been anything but helpful in the Oversight Committee’s investigation.

“We have demonstrated an unprecedented degree of cooperation with the Congress on the issue of Benghazi, engaging in over 30 hearings and briefings for Members and staff, and sharing over 25,000 pages of documents with Committees,” Ventrell said in a statement.

“The State Department remains committed to working cooperatively with the Congress and we will take stock of any new or outstanding requests for information, and determine the appropriate next steps,” he said.

“Secretary Kerry and the President are focused first and foremost on implementing the ARB’s recommendations and going above and beyond — to ensure that our men and women have the security they need to carry out their vital missions. All of us — in the Administration, in the Congress, in the media — we should all be focused on the issue of protecting the American diplomats and development experts who are working every day to advance America’s national interest and global leadership,” he added.

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Congress must decide if it or the president declares war

Last week, in a hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., asked Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, "do you think you can act without Congress to initiate a no-fly zone in Syria?"

Panetta -- a former congressman -- bobbed, weaved, and waffled: "Our goal would be to seek international permission and we would ... come to the Congress and inform you and determine how best to approach this ...."

That answer would be "breathtaking to the average American," Sessions declared: you're going to seek "international permission" and then maybe you'll tell Congress what you're doing?

Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., apparently found it "breathtaking" as well. On Wednesday, he launched a preemptive strike of his own, in the form of a resolution "expressing the sense of Congress that the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an Act of Congress constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution."

Is unauthorized war-making an impeachable offense? Certainly. As Hamilton explains in "The Federalist," the impeachment power serves as "an essential check in the hands of that body upon encroachments of the executive," aimed at "those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust."

Given the many abuses of public trust committed by presidents over two centuries of constitutional history, isn't it surprising we've only had two and a half presidential impeachments?

(For those keeping score at home. that's Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton and Richard M. Nixon -- who resigned before the articles of impeachment were put before the full House.) Any way you look at it, that's far too few.

In fact, Congress considered impeaching Nixon for waging war without authority. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., drafted an article of impeachment based on the secret bombing of Cambodia, charging Nixon with violating his oath of office by ordering "the concealment from the Congress of the facts ... concerning the existence, scope and nature of American bombing operations in Cambodia in derogation of the power of the Congress to declare war."

That charge did not make it into the final articles of impeachment, which is too bad. As the House Judiciary Committee's William Hungate, D-Mo., put it at the time: "It's kind of hard to live with yourself when you impeach a guy for tapping telephones and not for making war without authorization."

Alas, Rep. Conyers, who has tried to impeach three Republican presidents for unauthorized war-making, stayed silent in 1999 when Bill Clinton ignored three congressional votes denying him authority to wage war in Kosovo. For Conyers and too many others, illegal wars are OK as long as you like the president who is waging the war.

You can't fairly accuse Jones of similar constitutional hypocrisy. Jones rose to national attention in 2003, when, in a fit of pique over France's refusal to back the Iraq War, he ordered the House cafeteria to rename french fries "Freedom Fries."

But his doubts about the war grew: "I did not vote my conscience and I sent kids to die, and they didn't have to go," he said later. In 2007, Jones tried to set things right by introducing the constitutional War Powers Resolution, which would limit the president to defensive uses of force.

You may look at Jones as a Don Quixote tilting at windmills with a flaccid lance. I see him as somebody armed with a more powerful weapon, the Constitution, and I think he's making an important point: The impeachment power is there for a reason.

Who reviews the U.S. 'kill list'?

There has been remarkably little public debate in the U.S. about drone strikes, which have killed at least 1,300 people in Pakistan alone since President Obama came to office.

When it comes to national security, Michael V. Haydenis no shrinking violet. As CIA director, he ran the Bush administration's program of warrantless wiretaps against suspected terrorists.

But the retired air force general admits to being a little squeamish about the Obama administration's expanding use of pilotless drones to kill suspected terrorists around the world — including, occasionally, U.S. citizens.

"Right now, there isn't a government on the planet that agrees with our legal rationale for these operations, except for Afghanistan and maybe Israel," Hayden told me recently.

As an example of the problem, he cites the example of Anwar Awlaki, the New Mexico-born member of Al Qaeda who was killed by a U.S. drone in Yemen last September. "We needed a court order to eavesdrop on him," Hayden notes, "but we didn't need a court order to kill him. Isn't that something?"

Hayden isn't the only one who has qualms about the "targeted killing" program. The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), has been pressing the administration to explain its rules for months.

In a written statement, Feinstein said she thinks Awlaki was "a lawful target" but added that she still thinks the administration should explain its reasoning more openly "to maintain public support of secret operations."

As Hayden puts it: "This program rests on the personal legitimacy of the president, and that's dangerous."

There has been remarkably little public debate about the drone strikes, which have killed at least 1,300 people in Pakistan alone since President Obama came to office. Little debate inside the United States, that is. But overseas, the operations have prompted increasing opposition and could turn into a foreign policy headache.

It's odd that the Obama administration, which came into office promising to be more open and more attentive to civil liberties than the previous one, has been so reluctant to explain its policies in this area. Obama and his aides have refused to answer questions about drone strikes because they are part of a covert program, yet they have repeatedly taken credit for their victories in public. After months of negotiations, Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. won approval from the White House to spell out some of the administration's legal thinking in the Awlaki case. But his statement, originally promised for last month, has been delayed by continued internal wrangling.

When it is issued, officials said, the statement is likely to add a few details to the bare-bones rationale the administration has offered in a handful of public statements and court proceedings. The administration has said that strikes against suspected terrorists are justified for two reasons: First, that Al Qaeda is at war with the United States, which makes any participant in Al Qaeda operations an enemy combatant; and second, that anyone directly involved in terrorist plots against Americans poses an "imminent danger" to U.S. security.

Holder may also shed light on an issue that has been less clear: Should a terrorist suspect who is a U.S. citizen get special treatment? Some in the intelligence community argue that the answer is no — that a U.S.-born member of Al Qaeda is no different from an American who joined, say, the German army in World War II. But civil libertarians argue that in a murky war against terrorism, an American such as Awlaki deserves some kind of due process before his name goes on the CIA's "kill list."

In fact, officials say, Awlaki did get more due process than most Al Qaeda suspects on the list. They say the administration made a point of naming Awlaki publicly as an Al Qaeda leader — putting him on notice, in effect — before he was killed. And they say the Justice Department held that Awlaki could be killed only if it was not feasible to capture him. The administration has refused to release that legal opinion, in part because it's not sure it wants those standards to turn into a binding precedent for later cases.

But there are questions that go beyond the legal underpinning for targeted killing. Who puts names on the "kill list," and who reviews them? And is the process rigorous enough to withstand outside scrutiny?

In the case of a U.S. citizen such as Awlaki, Obama makes the final call. Or so said Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, who offered a rare bit of on-the-record clarity in an interview withCBS' "60 Minutes" last week. "In the end, when it comes to going after someone like that, the president of the United States has to sign off," Panetta said.

There's also scrutiny from Congress. "There is no intelligence activity the [Senate] Intelligence Committee follows more closely, or conducts more oversight on, than CIA counter-terrorism operations along the Afghan-Pakistan border," Feinstein said, studiously avoiding the word "drone."

But congressional oversight comes after the fact, and it is divided between Congress' intelligence committees, which review CIA operations, and its armed forces committees, which review military operations.

That's one reason some former officials argue that the administration needs to set up a clearer, more rigorous system of internal review — for its own good. John B. Bellinger III, who served as the State Department's top lawyer during the Bush administration, believes a good solution would be to expand the jurisdiction of the judges who currently authorize wiretaps to cover targeted killing cases as well.

But most intelligence officials hate that idea. "Why on earth would you want to get a judge involved?" asked one. A better solution, he said, would be appointing a special review office made up of seasoned officials who can't be fired, to insulate them from bureaucratic pressure. But that would still invest life-or-death power in a secret corner of the intelligence community, without a clear constitutional foundation.

The biggest problem with this newly invented form of clandestine warfare is that its rules have been made on the fly. The Obama administration, like the Bush administration, has made crucial decisions with little outside review and virtually no public scrutiny.

The administration says it has the authority to kill U.S. citizens who are active in Al Qaeda, but it's never explained how that squares with the Constitution's guarantee of due process. It's past time that it did so.