Chas Freeman and preemptive cringe

Charles "Chas" Freeman, the former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia who is slated to become chair of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), is being praised by his supporters as a brilliantly "contrarian" analyst. But has anyone gone back to examine the analyses? Here is an example from June 2002:
"I'm a very practical man, and my concern is simply this: that there are movements, like Hamas, like Hizbullah, that in recent decades have not done anything against the United States or Americans, even though the United States supports their enemy, Israel. By openly stating and taking action to make them - to declare that we are their enemy, we invite them to extend their operations in the United States or against Americans abroad. There's an old adage which says you should pick your friends carefully. I would add: you should be even more careful when designating your enemies, lest they act in that manner."

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Did Hamas really win in Gaza?

One way to approach this question is to ask whether Hamas has achieved the objectives for which it escalated the crisis, by its refusal to extend the cease-fire. Musa Abu Marzuq, number two in the Damascus office, explained the primary Hamas objective in a very straightforward way: "The tahdiyeh had become 'a ceasefire [in exchange for another] ceasefire,' with no connection either to the crossings and [the goods] transported through them, or to the siege. Terminating it was [thus] a logical move." So Hamas gambled, escalated, and now finds itself, once again, in a "cease-fire for a cease-fire." Israel's primary objective was to compel a cease-fire by means of deterrence alone, without opening the crossings, thus serving its long-term strategy of containing and undercutting Hamas. This it has achieved, so far.

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Imad who?

As Hizbullah's official funeral of Imad Mughniyeh unfolded last week - Hizbullah's leader eulogized him over a coffin decked in Hizbullah's flag - it was useful to recall the party's denial of his very existence over all these many years. Mention of his name to Hizbullah officials would draw a blank stare or blanket denial. "Hizbullah professes no knowledge of the man," the New York Times reported in 2002. A journalist who interviewed a top Hizbullah official and parliamentary deputy, Abdullah Kassir, once asked him if he knew Mughniyah. "Kassir flashed a blistering look and responded curtly, 'I have no answer.'"

Hizbullah's leader, Hasan Nasrallah, followed a double tack: he would defend "freedom fighter" Mughniyeh, but not acknowledge him. "The American accusations against Mughnieh are mere accusations," he was quoted as saying. "Can they provide evidence to condemn Imad Mughniyeh? They launch accusations as if they are given facts." But when pressed, Nasrallah "refused to reveal whether Mughniyeh has a role in Hizbullah." Of course.

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Crude and tasteless

In September of last year, Pat Buchanan, founder of the weekly magazine The American Conservative, published an article on its pages entitled "Fascists Under the Bed." In that piece, Buchanan attacked President Bush for his assertion that we are "at war with Islamic fascism." As a prelude, Buchanan made a general critique of the reckless way analogies to fascism have been deployed in American politics. Buchanan:

Orwell said when someone calls Smith a fascist, what he means is, "I hate Smith." By calling Smith a fascist, you force Smith to deny he's a sympathizer of Hitler and Mussolini...Since the 1930s, "fascist" has been a term of hate and abuse used by the Left against the Right, as in the Harry Truman campaign. In 1964, Martin Luther King Jr. claimed to see in the Goldwater campaign "dangerous signs of Hitlerism." Twin the words, "Reagan, fascism" in Google and 1,800,000 references pop up.

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