August 19, 2008 at 13:58:18

McCain's Cabal of Nation-Builders and Money Grubbers

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By Ron Fullwood (about the author) Page 2 of 2 page(s)

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In fact, Schennemann was partners in his Iraq lobbying with another facilitator for the former Soviet states, Bruce Jackson, the founder and president of the 'Project on Transitional Democracies', an organization which guided ‘newly independent', former Soviet provinces through the congressional appropriations process to connect the foreign leaders with U.S. tax dollars. Their influence led to the acceptance of many of these countries into NATO compliance and membership. The introduction of these former provinces into the NATO resulted in a boon for weapon's manufacturers as the new republics were required to modernize their military forces to comply with NATO defense requirements.

U.S. ambassador to NATO, Nicholas Burns explained Jackson's (and Schennemann's) role to the Dallas Morning News in 2002: "In Europe, he coaches officials of candidate countries on whom to see, what to say and how to behave in Washington. He also browbeats them on what reforms they need to make and what issues they must address, such as lingering anti-Semitism, if they expect the Senate to let them into NATO."

Bruce Jackson and McCain's Schennemann are political opportunists who thoroughly enmesh themselves in the focus and direction of our nation's foreign policy through the establishment of policy institutes and think-tanks which issue corporate-influenced policy documents and public statements that support, encourage, or echo legislative initiatives in Congress. Jackson described his think-tank activities outside of the corporate boardroom as "hobbies."

Upon leaving the Department of Defense in 1990, Jackson joined Lehman Brothers, an investment bank in New York, where he was a strategist in the firm's proprietary trading operations. Between 1993 and 2002, Mr. Jackson was Vice President for Strategy and Planning at Lockheed Martin Corporation. Is it any wonder that the Bush administration and McCain are so intent on selling missile defense systems (of which Lockheed stands to build and benefit from) to the former Soviet provinces?

"There is no doubt Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction," Scheunemann had reportedly claimed before the Iraq invasion, promoting the fiction of his fellow nation-builder, Chalabi. It was that self-serving fiction (and others) which he and his nation-building partners used to influence the form, basis, and direction of John McCain's foreign policy.

The McCain/Chalabi collaboration was described in the book by award-winning journalist Aram Roston, "The Man Who Pushed America to War: The Extraordinary Life, Adventures and Obsessions of Ahmad Chalabi." Roston writes that McCain was "Chalabi's favored candidate in the 2000 election since Chalabi knew that he would be able to free up the $97 million in military aid plus millions pushed through in Congress and earmarked for Chalabi's exile group."

According to one report, McCain had initially pressured the administration to give Chalabi more money, signing a letter with four other Republican senators complaining that Chalabi's INC wasn't being funded.

What did Chalabi 'win' in Iraq behind his relationship with Scheunemann and McCain's exploitation of American life, limb, and resource? In 2004, it was reported that Chalabi had leaked intelligence to Iran, informing the Iranians that the U.S. had broken their secret communications code. U.S. officials complained that the disclosures meant that Iran's security agencies would have to redo their codes and that, for, perhaps years, American intelligence wouldn't be able to read the transmissions. National security adviser Condoleezza Rice promised Congress a 'full investigation', at the time, but none materialized from the administration.

Also, in 2004 it was reported that Chalabi was counterfeiting old Iraqi dinars - which had been removed from circulation following the fall of Saddam’s regime . . . Police found the counterfeit money along with old dinars in Chalabi’s house during a raid.

The most important value Chalabi has provided the Bush administration's hawks on Iraq recently, has been the position he was gifted in the new Iraqi regime as the administration's shill within the Iraqi government for their latest escalation of force. Chalabi's job was to serve as an intermediary between Baghdad residents and the Iraqi and U.S. security forces as they destroyed homes, lives, and livelihoods in Iraq which found themselves in the way of Bush's swaggering advance. The WSJ reported that Chalabi job was to "help Iraqis arrange reimbursement for damage to their cars and homes caused by the security sweeps in the hope of maintaining public support for the strategy." It's almost certain that Chalabi had his hands all over the unaccountable multi-million dollar money pile the Pentagon reportedly used to pacify the resisting Iraqi communities to facilitate their 'surge.'

In an amazing defiance of the rationale for the pimping he provided for Bush and Petraeus' escalation of force, Chalabi was reported to have 'sabotaged' reconciliation efforts with the Batthists (Chalabi as head of Iraq’s 'de-Baathification commission'); the enabling of which was the main argument Bush gave for his escalation of force to Iraq. The NYT reported that, "Chalabi and members of his organization had sabotaged the American-backed plan by rallying opposition among Shiite government officials in southern Iraq, then taking their complaints to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s most powerful Shiite cleric."

Chalabi's disruptive and self-serving efforts mirrored McCain's foreign policy advisor Scheunemann's initial, ill-conceived opposition to leaving any members of Saddam's Baath party in government positions in his 2003 declaration that: "It is very difficult for me to conceive of democratic institutions being established in Iraq with the Baathist power structure mostly intact."

What is it that John McCain wants to 'win' in Iraq? It's been over five years with over 4100 American lives lost for an aggression of opportunity (that McCain supported, advocated, and voted for) based on lies about a 'threat' to our 'national security.' Is his open-ended support for keeping our troops bogged down there tied to his foreign policy guru Scheunemann's profit-taking and deal-making behind the sacrifices of our nation's defenders and the draining of our hard-earned sacrifices from our nation's treasury?

Certainly, McCain's bellicose response to Russia's military assault on their neighbor was a slam-dunk for his partner Scheunemann's Georgia client's investment. For Scheunemann and his boss McCain, constructing and facilitating faux-democracies abroad behind the sacrifices of American life, limb, and resources is a lucrative enterprise which they intend to perpetuate as our nation's most important and necessary priority. Questions about the efficacy or correctness of this new military expansionism are to take a back seat to the ambitions of these nation-builders and money-grubbing opportunists.

McCain told veterans in Florida on Monday that, "victory in Iraq is finally in sight" and claimed that troops in Iraq are pleading with him for them to stay in Iraq and "Let us win, just let us win." However, the impatience of our troops in Iraq with the foot-dragging and political posturing of McCain and Bush on Iraq is reflected in the total of contributions to the two presidential candidates from troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan which have been reported as favoring McCain's Democratic rival, Barack Obama, by more than 6 to1.

There is a fundamental misreading of our nation's purpose and intention in McCain's macho cheerleading of Bush's blundering occupation and in the Arizona senator's blustering, opportunistic rebuke of Russia. The intention of Americans was clearly expressed in the last congressional election in which they replaced McCain's fellow republican cheerleaders with Democrats pledged to end the occupation. We're not looking for more cowboy militarism or new nation-building boondoggles.

As McCain lectures veterans (and his Democratic rival) about the importance of "good judgment" in matters of national security, he's face-to-face with his own judgment in supporting the Iraq debacle, from it's inception to it's bloody muddle. Whatever McCain hopes to 'win' there will require even more lives and treasure from the shell and ticket-shocked Americans he's expecting to put him in charge. Whatever that is, he's definitely promising to engage our military even further into the muck his lame-duck WH mentor will leave behind.

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Ron Fullwood, is an activist from Columbia, Md. and the author of the book 'Power of Mischief' : Military Industry Executives are Making Bush Policy and the Country is Paying the Price

The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
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