JJA: “True enough, although their son was in the Israeli Defense Forces at the time, so there are at least some grounds for saying he was ‘really’ an Israeli.”
ML: “Fair enough. But he’s certainly wrong about Hezbollah.”
JJA: “You bet. And his departure rant suggests that he really doesn’t have the temperament you want in your top analyst.”
ML: “And that raises questions about Blair’s judgment, too, doesn’t it?”
JJA: “The same questions arise. Is Blair going to be just another participant in the policy debates, or will he stick to his job, and just do intelligence? He just had a “round table” with some journalists, for example. I don’t like that.”
ML: “It seems to be all the rage. Even the Brits do it, nowadays.”
JJA: “Yeah, I’m years out of style, I know.”
ML: “Out of style, nothing, you’re dead as a doornail.”
JJA: “haha, yes. So I’m really like the dinosaurs. Truly. But I still think the head of a secret intelligence service should save his words for his president, and for those endless oversight committees.”
ML: “And did he stick to intelligence?”
JJA: “Not hardly. When he was asked about Iran, he unburdened himself of this:
…the important thing that we’re doing with Iran is trying to figure out the overall relationship, and to try to work for a future in which Iran sees that it can have its security without nuclear weapons. And that it can advance both its economic prospects and its own view of where it is in the region, and in the world, without the use of the backing of extremist groups and possessing nuclear weapons.
ML: “And your point is?”
JJA: “THAT IT IS NOT HIS JOB TO TALK ABOUT ‘WHAT WE’RE DOING.’ HIS JOB IS TO TELL US WHAT THEY ARE DOING.”
ML: “You don’t have to yell.”
JJA: “Sorry.” He started to cough.
ML: “You still smoking cigarettes? I thought they’d cracked down on that.”
JJA: “Maybe when Bloomberg gets here. Anyway, you’re a fine one to talk about smoking…”
ML: “Cigars are different.”
JJA: “That’s what Freud thought, and look how he ended up.”
ML: “You giving lectures on smoking? Good grief.”
JJA: “Obama is supposed to ask Blair how the Iranians see the world, and Blair is supposed to answer THAT question. Then Obama is supposed to ask Blair what the Iranians are up to, and Blair tells him. If Obama asks him what he thinks we should do about Iran, Blair is supposed to say, ‘that’s not my job, Mr. President. It’s hard enough to understand these guys, believe me’.”
ML: “Got it. Anything else catch your attention?”
JJA: “Damn right there was. That incredible line about the Guantanamo terrorists.”
All of a sudden there was a bit of static, and it sounded like the wires were frying.
ML: “Oh, yes, that bit about welfare for terrorists?”
JJA: “IT’S EFFING INCREDIBLE.”
More sparks, and an acrid smell, kind of a mixture of burning insulation and Camels.
JJA: “HE JUST TOSSES IT OFF: ‘If we are to release them in the United States, we need some sort of assistance for them to start a new life.’ CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT? NOW HE’S THE ATTORNEY GENERAL AND THE SECRETARY OF HHS!!!
And he was gone. There are limits to his patience, after all. Even there.
Cicero long ago wrote that the very best method of communicating serious ideas is to write them in a dialogue. What a wondeful post, Dr. Ledeen.
Very interesting and true.
I think Blair has already turned out to be a big disappointment after all. This guy steals the ball on Iran and the Al-Qaeda terrorists in Gitmo. On Iran, he is practically saying to the mullahs :
“Hey, if you set aside the nuke thing, we(the US) are not only going to recognize you and give you all sorts of legitimacy as a regime(oh, and yeah,by the way too: we will also stop calling you ‘regime’ afterwards)–but we(the US) will actually help you become ‘secure’(translation: we won’t try to topple your regime, note: as if they have been trying so far!–…and not only that, but we(the US) will also give you money and economic aid and make you the “super power of the region”(the fantasy that mullahs have wet dreams about.)
Who’s side is this Blair guy on? This is typical of the eager deal-maker appeasers who ultimately score goals against their own team. But IS he in or team?
Obama is sure surrounding himself with terrible advisors, and I thought Condi sucked!
What’s Angleton saying about the Kremlin and the SCO these days?
““HE JUST TOSSES IT OFF:”
Taking that in the British sense there’s a lot he just tosses off.
I agree with “a Duoist,” (well, Cicero).. Whenever I want to know the counterpoint to a point — or a counter-counterpoint — writing it in dialogue is an easy way to see it formulate. These convos with Angleton are always interesting.
Oh Michael,I really miss your ouija board and the chatting with JJA.
ML: “Cigars are different.”
JJA: “That’s what Freud thought, and look how he ended up.”
ROFL! Thanks Michael! That Ouija board has bandwidth.
Lost your e-mail address so this is off topice-
Is Gabe Ledeen your son-saw article in JPost.
Also
Mike:
I’m becoming more and more convinced that the biggest threat to Israel is not the Arabs-but the lazy parasitic Haredi who used to be a pleasant zoo one visited on a trip to Israel but now suck the lifeblood out of the secular society and make unreasonable demands. They try to define who and what is a Jew. This nonsense about harassing the Pope at the Kotel is unbelievable.
I think the problem is that Israeli Governments, whether you like them or not, in the final analysis, and the population in general can deal with the Arabs.but a kind of guilt from non-observant Jews allows the Haredi to sponge off and direct Israeli society.
Is also becoming more prevalent in the Diaspora where normal good Jewish kids are becoming lazy torah scholars in schools funded by Jewish Federations.
In St. Louis the Haredi won’t even attend the Yom Hashoah ceremony because there will be a female cantor.
Why am I wrong?
Angleton singlehandedly crippled US intelligence with his childish obsessions. He would have been a star in a Stalinist police apparatus, because he instinctively fed his own people into the meat grinder of groundless, whispered accusations.
So naturally, Ledeen makes him the hero. It’s the standard neocon method: pick the worst possible side and push it, even when it’s obviously a bad idea.
Re. Ira Zad’s post, I wish all we were offering is a trade where Iran won’t get nuclear weapons and we won’t undermine their regime. As awful as the latter is for the people of Iran, who are we kidding? If Bush didn’t overthrow the regime, the current administration will? Hah. No Iranian nukes for us agreeing not to do something we won’t do anyway is a great deal for us.
But Iran knows that, too. So Iran will pretend to offer to halt all efforts to get nuclear weapons, and we’ll pretend to believe them and unlock sanctions and ship over all the other carrots we have thought of.
Iran is on the path to getting nuclear weapons and we spend all our time debating amongst ourselves about exactly where on that path Iran is. Amazing.
Sir,
I was under the impression that JJA switched to Virginia Slims towards the end of his life…
Also Mr/Ms Rogers—in spite of his many faults, JJA more or less founded most modern CI techniques. Your lack of knowledge is showing a bit. Best of luck with that!
Brian, I agree, the regime is more fortified from the outside: by EU and US than it has ever been in its 30-year nasty existence. And the shame of it is that this full, unconditional appeasement by the west is happening exactly at the time when the regime has very weak support inside of Iran and is despised by most all Iranians.
That shows our lack of acuity in recognizing when to offer carrots and when to pull the trigger. Shame on us for bending to the Islamist head terrorist of the world, Iran.
More evidence of this accelerated US “appeasement galore” policy towards the Islamic Republic of Turbaned Terrorist Turds of Tehran surfaces(pun intended) every day.
For example, look what L.A.Times brought in today; the same aforementioned crap that the lunatic left L.A.Times has the audacity(of Hope?) to print:
“Change is mandatory for the U.S. administration. For as history demonstrates, either you change, or you are forced to change.”
– By Ali Akbar Javanfekr who is the presidential advisor for press affairs to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
So basically L.A.Times is giving an Op-Ed space to the right hand man of Hitler. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6009880.ece?Submitted=true
I have said it before, and I say it again now: our only hope to derail this obvious process of the legalization and legitimization of the Iranian regime by EU & US are either the rising of Iranian people themselves to topple the regime, or Netanyahu and Leiberman. No other way left.
The rest of the options we are seeing today will surely lead to disaster for Iran’s secular democracy.
I said yestersay(above): “…either the rising of Iranian people themselves to topple the regime, or Netanyahu and Leiberman. No other way left.”
Well one of those “ways” just went up in odds ten-fold today; Here We Go: http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/netanyahu_obama_iran/2009/04/02/198955.html
Well, after all, there’s so much appeasement of, and softy weakness towards the mullahs by US that any red-blooded Israeli or for that matter any red-blooded Iranian could take. Let’s hope that if the bombings do happen(which there is increasing likelihood that they will), it will be a trigger for the Iranian people to finally rise up in droves against the Islamic Republic of Terrorists in Tehran and ultimately topple it.
After seeing Obama and Hillary in action, it’s refreshing to see there are still clear-headed leaders in the world who are not into making deals with evil and see facts as they are clearly.
You can’t love evil, you can’t accommodate evil, you can only destroy evil.
Post 14 Irad:
If you were going to attack someone within the near future would you broadcast it to the world? Bibi’s statements indicate Israel will do nothing at the moment and since the window of opportunity is closing it is unlikely Israel will do a thing. Furthermore doing it effectively is another story.
The next strategy is containment. Good luck world.