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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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 Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 7:53 pm Post subject: SecDef Nominee Robert M. Gates Thread... |
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Regardless of what some may be saying about Robert M. Gates, this man is a pro, in the Powell mold, and, I believe, one of the best possible choices to advise W. Bush on fixing, as best we can, Iraq. Let's get to know him a little better. And in his own words.
Joined CIA and went into the Directorate of Intelligence in 1968/1969.
Gates on Vietnam as he saw it then...
| Robert M. Gates wrote: |
Vietnam. The war dominated everything by 1969. The passing of the Johnson administration and obvious commitment of the new President to leave Vietnam did not still the antiwar demonstrations...
...inside the government there were many, especially young people -- and middle-aged parents influenced by their college-age kids -- who shared hostility to the war and to the so-called Establishment. I was now twenty-five, had served in the air force, and was a CIA analyst working on Soviet policy in the Middle East and Africa. I and virtually all of my friends and acquaintences in CIA were opposed to the war and to any prolonged strategy for extracting us. Feelings among my colleagues...were strong. Many from CIA marched in antiwar demonstrations on the Mall and at the Pentagon. My one and only was the May 9, 1970, demonstration after the U.S. military offensive in Cambodia.
Popular impressions then and now about CIA -- especially as a conservative, Cold War bureaucratic monolith -- have always been wrong. In the late 1960s and early 1970s not only was antiwar sentiment strong at the Agency, we were also influenced by the counterculture. There is no doubt in my mind that some of my older colleagues and supervisors, presumably influenced in some measure by their college-age children, experimented with marijuana and perhaps even other drugs. Antiwar and anti-Nixon posters and bumper stickers festooned CIA office walls... |
...more later. |
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bnrockin
Joined: 27 Feb 2006
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 9:03 pm Post subject: |
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| He is the president of my University and he has done an AMAZING job. I've had the privelage to meet him on many different occasions and he always sent an e-mail to us at least once a month. I have the most amount of faith in him! |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 9:28 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks, Bnrockin.
Here is Gates's experience in govt summarized...
| Robert M. Gates wrote: |
| I worked for six Presidents, from Lyndon Johnson to George [H.W.] Bush, and eight Directors of Central Intelligence. I served on the National Security Council staff in the White House under four Presidents, during this quarter of a century -- Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George [H.W.] Bush. I was CIA's head of analysis (Deputy Director for Intelligence), Deputy Director of Central Intelligence (and for nearly six months Acting Director) during the Reagan administration. I served as Deputy National Security Advisor and then as Director of Central Intelligence under George [H.W.] Bush. |
Gates on President Ronald W. Reagan's Central American policies...
| Robert M. Gates wrote: |
By the end of 1984, I concluded that we were kidding ourselves if we thought the Contras might win. I wrote [Director of Central Intelligence William J.] Casey on December 14, and began by saying, "The Contras can't overthrow the Sandinista regime." I continued that we were muddling along in Nicaragua with a halfhearted policy because of the lack of agreement within the administration and with Congress on our real objectives. I urged moving to an overt policy including withdrawal of diplomatic recognition; providing open military assistance and funds to a government-in-exile; imposing economic sanctions, perhaps including a quarantine; and using air strikes to destroy Nicaragua's military buildup -- no invasion but no more Soviet/Cuban military deliveries. I concluded, "Relying on and supporting the Contras as our only action may actually hasten the ultimate, unfortunate outcome."
The foulest word in the professional intelligence officer's lexicon is "zealot," and too many associated with the Central American effort, both in and out of CIA [a subtle reference to Lt. Col. Oliver North and co.], were zealots. And that made a lot of people nervous. They hadn't seen anything yet. On Central America, and there alone, the DCI himself was a zealot.
Casey's zealotry on Central America contributed greatly to creating deep divisions inside the administration. Shultz supported the covert action, but he believed the administration had to have a diplomatic or negotiating track as well in order to succeed in Central America, and also to build congressional and public support. He was very attuned to the growing opposition on Capitol Hill. On the other side, Casey, Clark, Weinberger, and Kirkpatrick fundamentally were opposed to negotiations of any kind... |
Stand by for Gates on Executive-Congressional relations and Gates on Cheney...
Last edited by Gopher on Wed Nov 08, 2006 10:03 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 9:53 pm Post subject: |
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I too think he has the potential to do a great job. I only wish he had been appointed long ago.
Here is another good read by Fred Kaplan.
http://www.slate.com/id/2153287/ |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 10:40 pm Post subject: |
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Since Gates is from the analytical division, and if as Kaplan says he does distrust the covert ops people, then its likely all the black ops-superhero BS adventurism that has been getting the US in trouble in the War on Terror is about to abrubtly end.
And that alone would be fantastic news. |
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EFLtrainer
Joined: 04 May 2005
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:03 pm Post subject: |
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Rumsfeld quits; Bush taps Gates
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By ROBERT BURNS and KATHERINE SHRADER, Associated Press Writers
WASHINGTON - After years of defending his secretary of defense, President Bush on Wednesday announced Donald H. Rumsfeld's resignation within hours of the Democrats' triumph in congressional elections. Bush reached back to his father's administration to tap a former CIA director to run the Pentagon...
Bush said Robert Gates, 63, who has served in a variety of national security jobs under six previous presidents, would be nominated to replace Rumsfeld. Gates, currently the president of Texas A&M University, is a Bush family friend and a member of an independent group studying the way ahead in Iraq.
The White House hopes that replacing Rumsfeld with Gates can help refresh U.S. policy on the deeply unpopular war and perhaps establish a stronger rapport with the new Congress. Rumsfeld had a rocky relationship with many lawmakers. |
| Quote: |
Gates took over the CIA as acting director in 1987, when William Casey was terminally ill with cancer. Questions were raised about Gates' knowledge of the Iran-Contra affair, and he withdrew from consideration to take over the CIA permanently. Yet he stayed on as deputy director...
Gates won confirmation, but only after hearings in which he was accused by CIA officials of manipulating intelligence as a senior analyst in the 1980s.
Melvin Goodman, a former CIA division chief for Soviet affairs, testified that Gates politicized the intelligence on Iran, Nicaragua, Afghanistan and the Soviet Union. "Gates' role in this activity was to corrupt the process and the ethics of intelligence on all of these issues," Goodman testified. |
Sound familiar? Isn't that what got us into the current war, the wrping/falsifying of intelligence? To wit:
| Quote: |
| The Bush administration's use of intelligence on Iraq has been a central theme of criticism from Democrats who say the White House stretched faulty intelligence from U.S. spy agencies to justify invading Iraq in 2003. |
And the ever-popular:
| Quote: |
| Gates is a close friend of the Bush family, and particularly the first President Bush... |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:14 pm Post subject: |
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| EFLtrainer wrote: |
| Quote: |
| Gates is a close friend of the Bush family, and particularly the first President Bush... |
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Yes, damn that elder Bush for entering Baghdad and causing chaos in Iraq!!!
Meanwhile, the Kaplan article contradicts Goodman's testimony, and puts Gates' controversy in a different light.
| Fred Kaplan wrote: |
But the nomination was withdrawn after concerns were raised about Gates' role in the Iran-Contra scandal.
The withdrawal was ironic. Gates had risen through the agency's analytical ranks�he joined the agency as a Soviet specialist in 1966, straight out of college�and he would have been the first CIA director to have done so. Like many analysts, he distrusted the covert-ops branches. Although he was Casey's trusted chief of staff and then his deputy director, he did not, for instance, share his boss's enthusiasm for the war against the Nicaraguan Contras; he saw it as a diversion from more-serious threats. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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Good lord Gopher, what have you done to your avatar?  I liked the last one much better - except that one couldn't help thinking of Jessica Lange and kitchen tables...!  
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:41 pm Post subject: |
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Gates on Executive-Congressional relations: more on the Iran-Contra case and allegations against him re: Reagan's failed attempt at nominating him DCI in 1987...
Does this sound irresponsible, arrogant, or unwilling to learn from mistakes to you, by the way?
| Robert M. Gates wrote: |
On December 3, 1986, I was told by CIA's Office of Congressional Affairs that the Senate Intelligence Committee wanted me to testify the next day on Iran-Contra. I was surprised and a little dismayed. I had been DDI until April, had had virtually nothing to do with the operational side of CIA's activities in Central America (or anywhere else) up to that time, and the Iran operation already was in place and going on well before I became DDCI. From time to time I had weighed in with Casey when I felt the Agency was being harmed by our own mistakes in Central America (e.g., the mining and my recommendation for a change in DDO). I had reviewed findings as DDI and occasionally would be given a chance to comment on proposed activities. Sometimes Casey listened to me; just as often he did not. Similarly, I had gotten a glimpse of the Iran operation in a meeting with McMahon and others in early December 1985, but was more fully clued in at the end of January when the DI was asked to provide intelligence on the Iraqi battle front for Iran. McMahon and I had objected to Casey and had been overruled. At the time, I had no knowledge of Casey's close working relationship with North on Central America or of the DCI's aggressive involvement in the arms-for-hostages dealings.
...I went to the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing room, S-219, a bit uneasy but fairly confident that I had acted properly at each step of the way...
The congressional inquiries did not ever accuse me of wrong-doing in Iran-Contra. But I was severely criticized...
In his testimony before the Iran-Contra Committee, Shultz had said, "I don't give myself an A-plus in all this" and "I looked and asked myself, did I do enough, could I have done more?" I asked myself the same questions and I did not like my answers, despite a sense that whatever I might have done likely wouldn't have changed anything. I had expertly handled foreign policy crises for years. In my first crisis as DDCI, I gave myself a C-minus...
Because I had been close to Casey and at CIA during the period of Iran-Contra, because of my failure to act more vigorously as described above, and because this was at an early stage in the investigations and there were still many unanswered questions about CIA's (and my) role, I ran into a buzz saw from several Republicans and most of the Democrats on the committee when President Reagan nominated me to take Casey's place as DCI. Congress was outraged over Iran-Contra, and I was the first piece of business to greet the new Democratic majority in the Senate on their return to work in February 1987. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:48 pm Post subject: |
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Ah...! Much better.  |
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EFLtrainer
Joined: 04 May 2005
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| Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2006 12:18 am Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| EFLtrainer wrote: |
| Quote: |
| Gates is a close friend of the Bush family, and particularly the first President Bush... |
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Yes, damn that elder Bush for entering Baghdad and causing chaos in Iraq!!!
Meanwhile, the Kaplan article contradicts Goodman's testimony, and puts Gates' controversy in a different light.
| Fred Kaplan wrote: |
But the nomination was withdrawn after concerns were raised about Gates' role in the Iran-Contra scandal.
The withdrawal was ironic. Gates had risen through the agency's analytical ranks�he joined the agency as a Soviet specialist in 1966, straight out of college�and he would have been the first CIA director to have done so. Like many analysts, he distrusted the covert-ops branches. Although he was Casey's trusted chief of staff and then his deputy director, he did not, for instance, share his boss's enthusiasm for the war against the Nicaraguan Contras; he saw it as a diversion from more-serious threats. |
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What has any of that to do with his known tendency to distort intelligence? |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2006 12:33 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| ...his known tendency to distort intelligence? |
Nonsense. Palpable fabrication.
There were two major instances of politicized intelligence estimates during the Reagan Administration: Reagan and Casey insisted on forcing an estimate that showed Soviet Russia supporting and directing all terrorist ops worldwide (when in fact, many if not all of them were locally-derived phenomena, their Soviet-bloc weaponry and probably sometimes Soviet intelligence and training assistance notwithstanding); and Casey's insistence that John Bross, I believe, CIA's Latin Americanist NIO, draft an estimate showing that Mexico was on the verge of becoming the "next Iran."
No one ever bought the first (excepting the journalist/author who had given Casey the idea in the first place); and the second never got off the ground: Bross told Casey he would resign in protest rather than sign such an estimate. Casey may have written and disseminated something himself following this, but it carried no real weight and everybody knew it.
How about we listen to what Gates has to say about the typical estimates he produced on Nicaragua at this time...?
| Robert M. Gates wrote: |
...we had prepared a new intelligence estimate on Nicaragua, "The Outlook for the Insurgency." It did not provide much good news. While acknowledging the growing number of Contras, the assessment noted the small scale of their activities compared to insrugents in El Salvador, the need for a tangible success soon, their inadequate strength and tactical direction, and the lack of a political strategy. It concluded that the Contras had not yet succeeded in capturing or destroying arms shipments from Nicaragua to the guerrillas in El Salvador.
Casey gave the draft estimate to the President on June 25, 1983, with a cover note that said, "We are losing in Central America..." |
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EFLtrainer
Joined: 04 May 2005
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| Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2006 1:18 am Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| Quote: |
| ...his known tendency to distort intelligence? |
Nonsense. Palpable fabrication. |
You seriously need to get back to school and study English. He HAS distorted policy for political reasons. That's not fabrication, its fact. If you want to quibble the use of "tendency", feel free, but his distortions are FACT. Also, you have absolutely no way of knowing how often and on what issues he did this. You can only know those that have come to light.
When are you going to learn the language? Fact = fabrication. Jesus.... No wonder you're a Republican.
Hell, I haven't even advocated for or against. I have simply posted info and expressed doubt about someone who has been known to lie. We've had enough of that, haven't we? Shouldnt we think seriously about admitting yet another person known to lie for political purposes into the halls of the White House? Maybe? Just a little bit?
If you think he's a good nominee, then argue for him honestly, not by distorting what is known about him. If you think his other abilities and skills balance his past, just say so, dont justify his past errors. Or, if you think he's matured or altered his way of doing things in some way, fine. But dont lie about his past lies. It adds to neither his nor your credibility. It also further adds to the perception that you know a lot and understand little. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2006 1:53 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| He HAS distorted policy for political reasons. That's not fabrication, its [sic] fact... |
I do not think it possible "to distort policy for political reasons." But perhaps you are right; perhaps I should go back to school to learn what these kinds of avant-garde statements that you produce from time to time actually mean.
In any case, I think you are alleging "he has distorted what are supposed to be professional intelligence estimates to serve his political masters and their narrow, partisan purposes."
If that is indeed what you are alleging, please tell me how you know this and please also reference at least one specific intelligence estimate if you expect anyone here to believe you.
Thanks in advance for your continued professional attitude.
Your pal,
Gopher |
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EFLtrainer
Joined: 04 May 2005
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| Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2006 5:53 am Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| Quote: |
| He HAS distorted policy for political reasons. That's not fabrication, its [sic] fact... |
I do not think it possible "to distort policy for political reasons." But perhaps you are right; perhaps I should go back to school to learn what these kinds of avant-garde statements that you produce from time to time actually mean.
In any case, I think you are alleging "he has distorted what are supposed to be professional intelligence estimates to serve his political masters and their narrow, partisan purposes."
If that is indeed what you are alleging, please tell me how you know this and please also reference at least one specific intelligence estimate if you expect anyone here to believe you.
Thanks in advance for your continued professional attitude.
Your pal,
Gopher |
My mistake, but you knew I meant intelligence. It is childish to pick at that which you already know, eh? And, no, I've not got the time nor the patience, nee, the need, to hunt down any report. The SWORN statements of those he worked with suffice. There is no need to reinvent the wheel.
You would do well, if *you* wish to be taken seriously, to stop pretending a day in the Library of Congress is necessary to discuss policy. Reams of words do nothing but fill the screen. Give us the salient bits, leave the rest home with your ego.
Once again you have allowed your enmity where I am concerened cloud your judgement and your actions. You posted a quotation that had nothing to do with the issue under discussion, for example. The guy isn't necessarily trustworthy. You have some evidence to the contrary, feel free to post it. |
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