[Peace-discuss] Achcar covering up his support for Middle East wars

[Robert Naiman]

Some Syrians are indeed opposed to the Syrian government, and that is
surely normal, why not? But why should it be considered Satanic for Syrians
opposed to the Syrian government to be willing to engage with the Syrian
government? Palestinians who are willing to engage with the Israeli
government are considered exemplary. Why should Syrians who are opposed to
the Syrian government who are willing to engage with the Syrian government
be *ipso facto* "discredited"?

Robert Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
(202) 448-2898 x1

Senate: Wield the Constitution to Stop Saudi Starvation of Yemeni Children
https://www.change.org/p/senate-invoke-war-powers-to-stop-saudi-from-starving-yemeni-kids



On Wed, Feb 21, 2018 at 10:27 PM, Karen Aram via Peace-discuss <
peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

> His reference to “the opposition” is misleading, it implies they are
> “Syrians” fighting Assad. They are ISIS, the Free Syrian Army, and Al
> Nusra, or whatever they call themselves now. Achtar attempts to legitimize
> them by referring to them as the “opposition.”
>
> Because Chomsky refers to him as “my friend” Achtar has credibility?
> Regime change is the goal of the US, so obvious when Achtar wrote the
> below, as quoted by Chomsky. And, as Chomsky says, “that can’t be done.”
>
> So now Achtar wants to drive a wedge between Russia and Iran, by
> suggesting the US will leave if the Iranians leave. The US has only since
> Trump came into power, admitted being in Syria, as if they went in due to
> what, the Iranians? And, what about Israel, will they leave?
>
>
>
>
> > On Feb 21, 2018, at 20:10, C G Estabrook <cgestabrook at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > ================================
> > Noam Chomsky on Syria: October 27, 2016
> >
> > Q: Is there any hope for working with Russia on this?
> >
> > NC: There may be some hopes. In the case of Syria, there's simply no
> alternative (no realistic alternative, short of destroying Syria) to having
> some kind of transitional government with Assad certainly involved, maybe
> in power. It's ugly, but there's no alternative. My good friend [Gilbert
> Achcar] has an article in The Nation [that] says -- although he wrote it
> right before the cease-fire -- that the cease-fire will never last, because
> as long as Assad remains in power, the opposition will continue to fight
> until the death of Syria. So he says we have to do something to get Assad
> out of power, but that can't be done. That's the problem.
> >
> > =================================
> > Gilbert Achcar on Syria: September 19, 2016
> >
> > “The Syrian Truce and Obama’s Exit Strategy.” Without an agreement for
> Assad to step down and allow a transition toward a pluralist government, no
> cease-fire stands a chance.
> >
> > As almost everybody can now tell, the new cease-fire agreement on Syria
> is doomed to break down, as would any such agreement that does not settle
> the core political problem of the crisis. Of course, even a respite that
> doesn’t last is better than nothing at all (although the truce has so far
> been very disappointing with regard to humanitarian relief).
> >
> > But short of an agenda that includes a comprehensive agreement for
> Bashar al-Assad to step down and allow a transition toward a pluralist
> government, no cease-fire stands a chance in that war-torn country. Were
> the mainstream opposition to accept a diktat for a sellout, it would be
> rapidly outflanked by the fighters, for whom anything less than the Assad
> clan’s departure from power would be tantamount to accepting that hundreds
> of thousands of Syrians were killed, and still more maimed, and huge swaths
> of the country turned to rubble, for nothing.
> >
> > For a truce to lead to the kind of compromise that underpins a genuine
> peace, there must be strong incentives among all parties to the conflict.
> The lack of such incentives is precisely why the Oslo Accords, signed in
> Washington 23 years ago, failed to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict:
> Those accords were predicated on the postponement of decisions on all
> crucial issues, including the fate of Israeli settlements in Palestinian
> territories occupied in 1967. The result was predictable: Israel actually
> consolidated its grip over the West Bank in the aftermath of the accords,
> provoking increased Palestinian resentment and an eventual collapse of the
> “peace process.”
> >
> > Without a balance of military forces on the ground in Syria, which would
> compel the Assad regime and its Iranian backers to seek real compromise, a
> genuine political settlement is not possible. We have nearly the opposite:
> A Syrian regime, emboldened by Iranian and Russian support, that boasts
> about reconquering the whole country. As testified by the key protagonists,
> the issue of creating such a balance of forces—especially by providing the
> Syrian opposition with anti-aircraft missiles capable of limiting the
> Syrian regime’s use of air power, its main weapon of large-scale
> destruction—has been the principal bone of contention on Syria within the
> Obama administration since 2012. The fact that this issue is still divisive
> is attested by the Pentagon’s reluctance to greenlight the agreement
> negotiated by Secretary of State John Kerry.
> >
> > It was reported (leaked, that is) that US military planners had no
> confidence that the Syrian regime and its Russian and Iranian backers would
> comply with a cease-fire geared toward compromise. In addition, the
> Pentagon is unwilling to share military data on the Syrian opposition with
> its Russian counterpart for fear it might be used to further bombard the
> former. And they are right to be suspicious. Kerry has already deserved a
> place in history as an outstanding embodiment of diplomatic naïveté, i.e.
> his belief in the ability to solve conflicts through negotiations that are
> not backed by action on the ground (what was aptly described in the
> Financial Times as his “boundless confidence in his ability to solve
> problems if he can only bring the concerned parties together in one room”),
> and his amazingly wishful thinking with regard to Moscow’s willingness to
> help the United States out of the Syrian predicament.
> >
> > It is most unlikely, however, that Barack Obama—who can hardly be
> suspected of ingenuousness—shares his secretary of state’s idiosyncrasies.
> The US president has stubbornly refused to change his attitude on Syria
> over the past four years despite overwhelming evidence that it was allowing
> the conflict to degenerate into a catastrophe for the Syrian people and one
> more major disaster for US foreign policy, after Afghanistan and Iraq. In
> so doing, Obama has only managed to convince a major part of Arab public
> opinion that the United States, which invaded Iraq and bombed Libya for
> incomparably less than what has been unfolding in Syria over the past five
> years, cares only about oil-rich countries. If anyone in the region had any
> illusion about the democratic and humanitarian pretexts invoked by
> Washington in previous wars, they have lost them completely by now. As
> Anthony Cordesman, one of the most astute observers of the
> military-political situation in the Middle East, recently observed, the US
> president is now entirely focused on an “exit strategy”—not an exit from
> the Syrian crisis, though, but his own exit from office.
> >
> > [Gilbert AchcarGilbert Achcar is a professor at SOAS, University of
> London. His many books include The Clash of Barbarisms (2002, 2006);
> Perilous Power: The Middle East and US Foreign Policy, co-authored with
> Noam Chomsky (2007); The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of
> Narratives (2010); The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab
> Uprising (2013); and, most recently, Morbid Symptoms: Relapse in the Arab
> Uprising (2016).]
> >
> > ###
> >
> >
> >> On Feb 21, 2018, at 10:02 PM, Karen Aram via Peace-discuss <
> peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
> >>
> >> Exactly, we should demand our government withdraw. Is that what Achtar
> is suggesting? One might get that impression, but at what cost? Why should
> the Russians or Syrians believe the US given the number of times we have
> broken cease fires. The suggestion that the US will leave Syria if Iran
> leaves, is nonsense, and what about Israel will they leave Syria if Iran
> leaves? I see this as a ploy to drive a wedge between Russia and Iran.
> >>
> >>
> >>> On Feb 21, 2018, at 16:31, C G Estabrook <cgestabrook at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> I think we should pay attention to what he says, rather than who (we
> think) he is. We should demand our government withdraw.
> >>>
> >>> “...Moscow and Assad proclaim that they are willing to have
> international observers monitoring new elections. They may be betting on
> Assad’s victory in free presidential elections today in Syria, because the
> Assad regime is one bloc whereas the opposition is very much divided. The
> fact that the opposition is in shambles may give the Assad regime enough
> confidence to undergo such a scenario.
> >>>
> >>> "However, for such a settlement to happen, an international agreement
> is necessary first. In the Moscow-sponsored Sochi talks, only Russia,
> Turkey, Iran, the Syrian regime, and a discredited part of the Syrian
> opposition did participate. In the UN-sponsored talks in Geneva, the United
> States and Europe are involved. I can’t see the US accepting an agreement
> that does not stipulate the withdrawal of all foreign troops that entered
> Syria after 2011. In other words, the US would say, “We are willing to
> leave Syria provided that Iranian forces leave it as well.” That’s why the
> US is currently sticking to the region east of the Euphrates. Washington’s
> message to the Russians is: “We will leave Syria to you if you get it rid
> of the Iranians, otherwise we won’t.”
> >>>
> >>> —CGE
> >>>
> >>>> On Feb 21, 2018, at 5:24 PM, Karen Aram via Peace-discuss <
> peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> Here is my thoughts on the Achcar article, thank you Carl for posting
> it on FB:
> >>>>
> >>>> Achcar is and was a war supporter. In this article he refers to the
> US having boots on the ground fighting ISIS since 2014. The US was not
> fighting ISIS, we were supporting them. Also, the US was in Syria covertly
> likely going back to 2011, when Achcar refers to Russians and Iranian
> involvement predating US.
> >>>>
> >>>> Any assumption that Moscow will agree with the US to insist on Iran
> leaving Syria is nonsense. The Russians are smarter than that, they know
> they need to support Iran vs. the US. Syria isn't just about the oil, its
> about containment of Russia, and Iran is what comes after destruction of
> Syria. So no matter what this guy has to say, he is obfuscating US
> imperialism.
> >>>> The US wants partition, and plans to occupy permanently.
> >>>>
> >>>> His suggestions and prognostications are an attempt to make the US
> look good, and Russia, Iran look bad when they don’t compromise and give in
> to our demands.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>> On Feb 21, 2018, at 13:58, C G Estabrook <cgestabrook at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Morgenthau’s character was undoubtedly noble, but nobility doesn’t
> bestow infallibility (nor inversely, as perhaps in the case of Achcar), as
> I’m sure you admit.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> An example: the recent presidential election raised the question of
> American exceptionalism. Was one candidate (DJT) veering toward
> isolationism? Or would he (like the other - HRC) proudly carry the banner
> of exceptionalism?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Can the matter be decided by determining which candidate was more
> noble?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Aristotle asked, Would you rather have your sandals made by a good
> person, or a good cobbler?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> ==============================<https://nam03.safelinks.
> protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fchomsky.info%
> 2F20131006%2F&data=02%7C01%7C%7Cf2739b20638e457a82f408d579764ae9%
> 7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636548471317799072&sdata=
> KudQisT0h0vdUemPzh8a0lsDYE%2B%2BPypbMYFA9%2BBqG40%3D&reserved=0
> >======================
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The [isolationism/exceptionalism] debate is narrower than it may
> seem. There is considerable common ground between the two positions, as was
> expressed clearly by Hans Morgenthau, the founder of the now dominant
> no-sentimentality ‘realist' school of international relations. Throughout
> his work, Morgenthau describes America as unique among all powers past and
> present in that it has a 'transcendent purpose' that it 'must defend and
> promote' throughout the world: 'the establishment of equality in freedom.’
> The competing concepts ‘exceptionalism' and ‘isolationism' both accept this
> doctrine and its various elaborations but differ with regard to its
> application...
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The competing doctrine, isolationism, holds that we can no longer
> afford to carry out the noble mission of racing to put out the fires lit by
> others. It takes seriously a cautionary note sounded 20 years ago by the
> New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman that “granting idealism a near
> exclusive hold on our foreign policy” may lead us to neglect our own
> interests in our devotion to the needs of others.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Between these extremes, the debate over foreign policy rages.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> At the fringes, some observers reject the shared assumptions,
> bringing up the historical record: for example, the fact that “for nearly
> seven decades” the United States has led the world in aggression and
> subversion — overthrowing elected governments and imposing vicious
> dictatorships, supporting horrendous crimes, undermining international
> agreements and leaving trails of blood, destruction and misery.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> To these misguided creatures, Morgenthau provided an answer. A
> serious scholar, he recognized that America has consistently violated its
> “transcendent purpose.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> But to bring up this objection, he explains, is to commit “the error
> of atheism, which denies the validity of religion on similar grounds.” It
> is the transcendent purpose of America that is “reality”; the actual
> historical record is merely “the abuse of reality.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> In short, “American exceptionalism” and “isolationism” are generally
> understood to be tactical variants of a secular religion, with a grip that
> is quite extraordinary, going beyond normal religious orthodoxy in that it
> can barely even be perceived. Since no alternative is thinkable, this faith
> is adopted reflexively.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Others express the doctrine more crudely. One of President Reagan’s
> U.N. ambassadors, Jeane Kirkpatrick, devised a new method to deflect
> criticism of state crimes. Those unwilling to dismiss them as mere
> “blunders” or “innocent naivete” can be charged with “moral equivalence” —
> of claiming that the U.S. is no different from Nazi Germany, or whoever the
> current demon may be. The device has since been widely used to protect
> power from scrutiny.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Even serious scholarship conforms. Thus in the current issue of the
> journal Diplomatic History, scholar Jeffrey A. Engel reflects on the
> significance of history for policy makers.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Engel cites Vietnam, where, “depending on one’s political
> persuasion,” the lesson is either “avoidance of the quicksand of escalating
> intervention [isolationism] or the need to provide military commanders free
> rein to operate devoid of political pressure” — as we carried out our
> mission to bring stability, equality and freedom by destroying three
> countries and leaving millions of corpses.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The Vietnam death toll continues to mount into the present because
> of the chemical warfare that President Kennedy initiated there — even as he
> escalated American support for a murderous dictatorship to all-out attack,
> the worst case of aggression during Obama’s “seven decades.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Another “political persuasion” is imaginable: the outrage Americans
> adopt when Russia invades Afghanistan or Saddam Hussein invades Kuwait. But
> the secular religion bars us from seeing ourselves through a similar lens.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> One mechanism of self-protection is to lament the consequences of
> our failure to act. Thus New York Times columnist David Brooks, ruminating
> on the drift of Syria to “Rwanda-like” horror, concludes that the deeper
> issue is the Sunni-Shiite violence tearing the region asunder.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> That violence is a testimony to the failure “of the recent American
> strategy of light-footprint withdrawal” and the loss of what former foreign
> service officer Gary Grappo calls the “moderating influence of American
> forces.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Those still deluded by “abuse of reality” — that is, fact — might
> recall that the Sunni-Shiite violence resulted from the worst crime of
> aggression of the new millennium, the U.S. invasion of Iraq. And those
> burdened with richer memories might recall that the Nuremberg Trials
> sentenced Nazi criminals to hanging because, according to the Tribunal’s
> judgment, aggression is “the supreme international crime differing only
> from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated
> evil of the whole.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The same lament is the topic of a celebrated study by Samantha
> Power, the new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In “A Problem from
> Hell: America in the Age of Genocide,” Power writes about the crimes of
> others and our inadequate response.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> She devotes a sentence to one of the few cases during the seven
> decades that might truly rank as genocide: the Indonesian invasion of East
> Timor in 1975. Tragically, the United States “looked away,” Power reports.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Daniel Patrick Moynihan, her predecessor as U.N. ambassador at the
> time of the invasion, saw the matter differently. In his book “A Dangerous
> Place,” he described with great pride how he rendered the U.N. “utterly
> ineffective in whatever measures it undertook” to end the aggression,
> because “the United States wished things to turn out as they did.”
> >>>>>
> >>>>> And indeed, far from looking away, Washington gave a green light to
> the Indonesian invaders and immediately provided them with lethal military
> equipment. The U.S. prevented the U.N. Security Council from acting and
> continued to lend firm support to the aggressors and their genocidal
> actions, including the atrocities of 1999, until President Clinton called a
> halt — as could have happened anytime during the previous 25 years.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> But that is mere abuse of reality.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> It is all too easy to continue, but also pointless. Brooks is right
> to insist that we should go beyond the terrible events before our eyes and
> reflect about the deeper processes and their lessons.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Among these, no task is more urgent than to free ourselves from the
> religious doctrines that consign the actual events of history to oblivion
> and thereby reinforce our basis for further “abuses of reality.”
> >>>>> ===================================================
> >>>>>
> >>>
> >>
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