Jack Ross responds to the post above about Marty Peretz:
I wonder if Chas Freeman represents the horrible shattering of Marty's illusions that he or the cadre he trained could make things better on the inside, and that he can't keep up the ghost about Obama for long. Indeed, in marveling at the Republicans' sheer idiocy in their tack against Obama's economic plans, I realized that they haven't had very much to say about his foreign policy moves thus far - a huge watershed!
Also, what can one say to Peretz's invocations of the Christian Zionism of the two awakenings - "both religious and secular"! I've said before that the only thing I can conclude from seeing the invocations of that history is that those who do it are secret followers of Shabtai Tzvi. Perhaps its also analogous to the retreat into mysticism of post-Hitler intellectual fascists.Also: He says something like "someone so totally illiberal would be completely new to a Democratic administration". Hogwash. Generally speaking, the height of Cold War support for right-authoritarians was under Kennedy, it was under Reagan that there was a substantive reversal toward greater support for democracy in the world.
But as to "Arabism" specifically, the most forthright opponents of Zionism in the State Department were found under Truman, not Eisenhower, and were the very architects of the Marshall Plan and of Cold War liberal policy. In addition to Marshall and Acheson, these included Henry Byroade, a critical player in the Marshall Plan who would become notoriously friendly with [Ross's biographical subject] Rabbi Elmer Berger.
The only really compelling example of a Republican "Arabist" is John Foster Dulles, whose early distinction had been as the chief foreign policy adviser to Tom Dewey and thus the leading advocate of a "me too" foreign policy for the Republicans in the 40s.
I often think that if the current generation of Democrats had been faced with the Communist menace, we would have lost. Its nearly complete acquiescence to the Zionists, and it's enthusiastic embrace of politically correct doctrine, leads me to believe it is far more dedicated to superficial ritualism than it is to any firm moral or political democratic principles.
I can only hope that the nascent resistance to Zionism is indicative of a larger awakening.
Jack Ross: "But as to "Arabism" specifically, the most forthright opponents of Zionism in the State Department were found under Truman, not Eisenhower, and were the very architects of the Marshall Plan and of Cold War liberal policy. In addition to Marshall and Acheson, these included Henry Byroade, a critical player in the Marshall Plan who would become notoriously friendly with [Ross's biographical subject] Rabbi Elmer Berger."
Yes, it's fascinating to find out about Berger, and the exploits of Byroade, "Ropes of Sand" (W.C. Eveland), etc. But these were also American Century apparatchiks, swashbucklers among Arab potentates. The saw the Middle East as much through the lens of western/American domination as anyone, I would posit (and will stand corrected regarding those figures who had a real respect for Arab cultures and peoples). What's now called "realism" is no better than philo-Zionism if it's central concern is "American interests." So I think Berger needs to be placed in that context. A decent man, a man who probably grew deeper because of his dissenting views and the response to them, but not a visionary in terms of post-colonialism (again, I'll stand corrected by Ross's research). But someone who did appreciate what had happened to the Arab Jews, what was lost (now so distorted and used for Zionist propaganda purposes).
Generally speaking, the height of Cold War support for right-authoritarians was under Kennedy, it was under Reagan that there was a substantive reversal toward greater support for democracy in the world.
I've heard this argument made before, but have never seen any substantiation for it. Chomsky has often repeated the first part of the argument in his zeal to discredit Kennedy and his administration. The idea that there was greater support for democracy in the world under the Reagan administration is a bit far-fetched, in my opinion.
I'd heartily agree. Given the Reagan era support for the Contras against the democratically elected Sandanista government in Nicaragua, its hard to see where a rational case could be made for greater support for democracy in the world under Reagan. Hell, given the Iran-Contra affair, where Reagan administration officials lied to Congress and illegally side-stepped both the US ban on aid to the Contras and the ban on selling arms to Iran, a case can be made that the Reagan Administration didn't really support democracy in the US, much less anywhere else in the world.
I do not disagree at all with David Green, I wrote as I did of the Cold War liberals as an old-fashioned isolationist – most of whom, at least in congress, were actually very pro-Zionist – and just to make a point about Peretz's nonsense. Perhaps I should have pointed that out in the post.
And no question, "Arabism" was a spectacular failure, and in defense of my subject Berger would write quite candidly and cynically of his CIA-connected friends. The best article here is "The Islamic Way of War" by Andrew Bacevich, published in The American Conservative right after the Lebanon War.
People still take seriously the "democratic" bona fides of the Sandanistas? That's not necessarily to say the contras were much better, hell many were former Sandanistas themselves.
Thanks Jack. With both Arabism (Robert Kaplan) and Christian Zionism (Michael Oren) there's been too many interested in getting it wrong. And then all that convoluted mess has to be dealt with when you want to get it right.