I'm mostly at a loss as to what you think this adds?

I know that the Bush/Obama GWOT has generated lots of rambling conspiracy theories. There was one for a long time about how this German citizen was imprisoned in his hotel room in Macedonia and after abuse there was shipped off to a (you're gonna love this) "black site" prison run by the (seriously - this is laugh out loud, these crazy conspiracy KooKs) C I A.

Yeah, right. Oh, and they claimed that BOEING had a subsidiary involved in all this. You know "torture flights" Cue the eewwww eeeeeee ewwwww scarey music. It gets even more ridiculous. They say this guy was picked up bc he had the wrong name (com'on, like you said about JSOC, there's just no evidence we have that kind of slackjawed idiots at CIA) and that it took them months to figure out they had the wrong guy. I mean, get real. Obviously if anything like that had happened, the Presiden would have fired people and there would be criminal prosecutions here in the US and apologies and the countries that hosted those "black sites" would be sending people to prison too.

I mean, these conspiracy nuts act like we having had to spend all kinds of time and effort with investigations that just keep telling them, over and over, that no one did anything wrong and that crazy German guy is an idiot. I mean Boeing - torture flights - seriously? Get real. It's gotten so bad that there's some nutty group of French-Canadians who have been pretending that our ex-DAG signed off on and arranged for the shipment of this Al Qaeda General - guy named Maher Arar - to torture. I mean, sure, Pepsico never claimed it would like to buy the world a Coke, but still, it's not like they'd hire a guy who signed off on sending a Canadian off to be tortured in Syria. As if.

Then there was that crazy story about our good friend in Afghanistan, Gen Dostum, and these shipping containers and how Bush and Obama let him return and return to the "site" of this so-called "crime" and destroy evidence and things. Yikes - people are just nuts.

Then there's that nutcase in Italy who made all those claims about a big conspiracy to kidnap some guy there and cart him off to torutre. Sheez. And as if that wasn't enough, you had the Boys from Brussels moving SWIFT offices over some half baked conspiracy claims - get this, they said that the US was just using made up stuff they were calling administrative warrants to waltz in and take any financial info they wanted with no oversight. I mean com'on, that wouldn't last a minute, right? No need to get all huffy and have European privacy court hearings and move and stuff.

Between you and me, Blake, the whackos have taken over the country. I mean, at some point I'm even betting that some of them are going to start questioning perfecly plausible stories about pregnant women, tied up and killed by those ghastly Muslims during family naming celebrations and pretending that the highly competent and professional JSOC would go into a home, kill a district prosecutor and local police chief along with the two pregnant women and that they would even, in some kind of highly competent and professional fashion, carve those dead women up for the bullets.

But even so Blake, can't you do a bit better on shooting Hersh down than just saying that General Boykin's actions have only been described by anecdote. I mean, sure, your source points out that being a religious zealot (who typically would rather kill than convert fwiw) might cap someone's career so that, you know, they might only rise tot he level of Wm Boykin, but surely you can do better?

Sending ya the love, brother.

I just had to add - it's not even just the reaction to the GWOT. These nut cases have been at it for a lot longer. I mean, in our GWODrugs, they have even suggested that the CIA was linked to the shoot-down of a small plane carrying an American missionary husband and wife and their two children and, get this, that the CIA played a role in the death of the woman and her infant child by targeting their plane to be destroyed.

And now, a good and solid patriot named Jon Burge is being sentenced to FIFTY FOUR months- all because some kooks say he lied about torturing people. As if he could sit there in his capacity as police chief and run a gang of torturers out of his office and sit out investigations without ever being caught until after the statute of limitations had run.

Sheez louise - amazing that people think when there's a bad agenda, there will be cover up.

As far as the military being impervious to the fanatical religious right, hasn't anyone read about the atmosphere at Colorado Springs that forces cadets to proclaim their undying devotion to jesus in order to remain above suspicion at that institution?

There may not be reams of verifiable data available to prove that there's a crusader mentality in the military, but the fact that Boykin wasn't reprimanded after his remarks while Bush was in office and the fact that the only proactive actions the Obama administration has undertaken is in investigating and persecuting gay service members, we could certainly use a helluva lot more civilian oversight of the military, and not from Bob Gates.

There's no one I'd rather go downhill on this ride with than Sy Hersh.

This is the report of speech as reported by the Gulf Times. Notice no mention of 'Conspiracy Theories'

US foreign policy and the lack of change to come about during the first two years of Barack Obama’s presidency were the focus of the latest in Georgetown’s distinguished lecture series last night, when world famous investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh expressed his shock at the inaction of an administration that promised to change the nation’s outward policies – especially in the Middle East.
Referring to conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, tensions with Pakistan and Iran and various other issues related to the region, Hersh argued that Obama’s administration has failed to advance from the Bush years.?
The Pulitzer Prize winner, who broke the story of the massacre at My Lai, spoke about religious tensions affecting foreign policy, stating that a prevalence of anti-Islamic sentiment has led to many US army officials believing themselves to be on some sort of ‘crusade.’?
Citing numerous examples of US generals and various other officials, Hersh spoke of their religious beliefs, and argued that they have set back the concept of religious tolerance by centuries through their actions.
Hersh explained that he is currently working on a book about former vice-president, Dick Cheney, and spoke about the Bush/Cheney years, arguing that the administration witnessed “8 or 9 neo-conservatist wackos” that took over the government.?
What worried Hersh the most, he explained, was the ease with which they were able to do so; what disappoints him the most, is the fact that little has altered with the change of administration.
Torture in Afghanistan, assassination missions in Pakistan, and the continued support of an Israeli regime with questionable intentions are all serious issues that have yet to be significantly addressed by Obama according to Hersh, who pointed out possible routes for the president which he hopes – but doubts – he will follow in the future.
Hersh also expressed concerns about Israel and the shift to the right represented by the new political appointments in their government.
With more hawkish and right-wing Israeli politicians replacing or in the process of replacing outgoing officials, Hersh worries about what the future may hold.
He also expressed concerns about Israel’s lack of willingness to deal with Fatah, even after being offered “the deal of their dreams.”
Referring to Afghanistan, Hersh spoke of Mullah Omar, and expressed his belief that the US must enter into a dialogue with him if they wish to get out of the country in the foreseeable future.
Arguing that there are no national security concerns related to the US involvement in Afghanistan, he urged Obama to withdraw from the country as soon as possible to avoid any more loss of life in the drawn out conflict.
“There is a way out,” he suggested, referring to Omar, adding “but we’re not going to take it.”
Hersh also expressed his concerns about developments in Iraq, and stated his belief that Iraqis “would rather burn their oil” than see it go to the US.
Recent developments in Tunisia were also a focus of Hersh’s speech, during which he opined that the events there will “scare the hell” out of other leaders in the region.
Countries experiencing economic distress could well witness similar political action, he argued.
Looking to leaders in the region, he argued that the current system has seen many rulers clutching on to power by appeasing the US and providing them with natural resources.
“They know they are allowed to continue their despotic ways because we are here to back them up,” he said, adding that leaders in the region effectively stay in power because “we (the US) get what we want.”
Hersh has long been known as a controversial journalist, but his conviction in his beliefs was plain to hear during his presentation yesterday, and it is this conviction and that of other journalists, he argued, that will help bring information and power to the Arab world.
“We don’t always look at ourselves in ways we should,” he argued, adding that the US has created a legacy that will be “very hard to pay off.”
Describing himself as “shocked and appalled” at Obama’s apparent lack of desire to change the situation he found thrust upon him when he entered the White House, Hersh did offer one crumb of comfort – albeit a wishful one.
He argued that Obama may be biding his time, ensuring that he wins re-election before “becoming more like the Abraham Lincoln style President we hoped he would be.”?
Hersh suggested that Obama may well be waiting before delivering on the promises he made upon entering the White House, but admitted his concern, conceding: “I’m very sceptical.”

Check out its website at http://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org/ if you think the military, especially the Air Force, doesn't have a problem with religious fanaticism. The founder, Michael Weinstein, is an Air Force Academy graduate, as is his son. He is ex-JAG, so he knows something about the law.

The Air Force has already admitted it has a problem with "Christian" extremism and fanaticism. Hersh's claims thus seem to be in line with this admission.

Wow. I have literally read ZERO reasonable comments on here so far...ZERO. The man is not after you. Just because there are some religious crazies in uniform does not mean that they are the majority, or that it is policy...they are not, it is not. Please, please...stop! At some point you have to realize that the government/ military/ CIA whatever, is just a collection of human beings. They are different in belief, culture, race, education, and background...and they are fallible. Get over it. Hersh is just an angry liberal, and I am no conservative, but you guys blindly supporting him is just funny.

Why is it that explaining it by more context only points at the clumsiness of the original writing? Perhaps because of the rambling?

Well! That's good enough for me!

If they said that they are not in some grand conspiracy then I guess that's the last word on that one.

Thanks for clearing that up for us.

I'm curious as to how Blake Hounshell knew Hersh's "arm perched jauntily on the podium" when he claims not to have an available video of Hersh's talk and is relying solely on a recording. Perhaps someone who was actually there, told him Hersh's arm was perched "jauntily" on the podium. Which makes it hearsay.

Pack your stuff. off to info wars for you. You broke the 24th commandment "thou shalt not make any speculation nor give creedance to speculationers" (o thats right only the Knights have access to that secret text) lol, strike one. Violated the nationalist playbook by you mentioning the military without saying "our heros" strike two. then you readdressed it and made it even better strike three your outahere.

when he said in his testimony about looking for WMDs in Iraq:

KAY: It's really what goes to the heart of the integrity of our own process. I generally believe that it's important to acknowledge failure.

I also think we've got enough history to understand that closed orders and secret societies, whether they be religious or governmental, are the groups that have the hardest time reforming themselves in the face of failure without outside input.

I must say my personal view -- and it's purely personal -- is that in this case, it will -- you will finally determine that it is going to take an outside inquiry both to do it and to give yourself and the American people the confidence that you have done it.

from:
Dr David Kay's Testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/KAY401A.html

Mr. Hounshell seems to think that logically fallacious arguments such as ad hominem attacks , appeals to authority, and appeals to popularity should carry some weight among readers of Foreign Policy, as distinguished from viewers of Fox News. Hopefully that assumption is incorrect.

Hhere's a repost from the previous thread, to show there is evidence of such a religion-based organization in our national security organizations:

(Excerpts from an old Covert Action Quarterly article at
http://www.mosquitonet.com/~prewett/caqsmom25.1.html)

"...Representing initially the most powerful and reactionary segments of the European aristocracy, for nearly a thousand years beginning with the early crusades of the Twelfth Century, it has organized, funded, and led military operations against states and ideas deemed threatening to its power. It is probably safe to say that the several thousand Knights of SMOM, principally in Europe, North, Central, and South America, comprise the largest most consistently powerful and reactionary membership of any organization in the world today....

Although an exclusively [Roman] Catholic organization, in this century it has collaborated with, and given high awards to non-Catholic extremists in its current crusade against progressive forces in the West, the national liberation movements, and the socialist countries...

...SMOM's influence in Germany survived World War II intact. On November 17, 1948 SMOM awarded one of its highest honors, the Grand Cross of Merit, to Reinhard Gehlen, the Nazi chief of intelligence on the Soviet front. He was subsequently installed by the Americans as the first chief of West Germany's equivalent of the CIA, the Bundesnachtrichtdienst (BND: federal secret service), under West German Chancellor Adenauer, a devout Catholic who had received the Magistral Grand Cross personally from SMOM Grand Master Prince Chigi...

...In addition to Casey, and James Buckley, its current members, or Knights, after the feudal fashion, include Lee Iacocca, John McCone, William Buckley, Alexander Haig, Alexandre de Marenches (the chief of French Intelligence under Giscard d'Estaing, himself a Knight of SMOM), Otto von Hapsburg, and various leaders of the fascist P-2 Masonic lodge in Italy. While its organizational funding is relatively modest, its leverage is maximized by the presence of its Knights in key positions in other private and governmental structures throughout the world...

...After the appointment of Knight of Malta William Casey as head of the Central Intelligence Agency, and another Knight, James Buckley, as head ot U.S. propaganda against Eastern Europe at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, several historians noted with interest President Reagan's call during the summer of 1982 for a "crusade" against the "Evil Empire" in Eastern Europe...

...The President of the American Eastern Association of SMOM is J. Peter Grace, President of W.R. Grace Company, who was a key figure in Operation Paperclip, which brought Nazi scientists to the U.S. "

This is kind of informal. Hersch has some really good analyses out there. But it shows how the man thinks, which is good.

His written analyses hang together better, and have verifiable links and footnotes. Here I think you can't blame him for that because this seems really off-the-cuff.

There is a problem with over-zealous Christians in the military, but my opinion is that it is probably not, statistically speaking, any greater than the problem we have with over-zealous Christians in civilian society in the US.

Muslim-paranoia is real in the US, and it creates a corresponding Christian-paranoia among American Muslims. I think that's a thing we should all be aware of and all work to eradicate within ourselves.

I believe the right way to deal with terrorism is to treat it as a crime and to use crime-fighting technologies to deal with it. Therefore we can take the religious affiliation out of the designation of someone as a terrorist, and instead judge them by whether they have committed, or have conspired to commit, acts of terrorism regardless of their religious affiliation. But I digress.

The main thing I notice about Hersch is he continually asks a question I myself continually ask and never get solid answers for: why, in 2011, are we still in AfPak? What are we trying to accomplish there, besides some vague notion that has something to do with GWOT or possibly American-empire fantasies? What is the actual threat to the USA? Is it energy? Is this a part of what has been called the Pipelinistan wars?

Why are we there? Because GE and Raytheon, and yes, Boeing, need ever renewing weapons contracts to keep the military-industrial-political complex afloat?

By now it's common wisdom that Obama doesn't consider any of his campaign promises binding, but no other politican does either, so that's really not a surprise.

To better understand what Hersh is talking about, folks need to read Jeff Sharlet's The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power.

While Hounshell may be right that Hersh rambled; Hounshell is wrong to assume that the type of Christian fundies Hersh speaks of want to convert Muslims. They don't want to convert, they want to rule.

- mike

* No one is claiming that the Knights of Malta or Opus Dei run our military; however it’s clear that people who share the reactionary, magical beliefs of those organizations have significant influence in our command structure.

* It’s undeniable that the clash-of-civilizations, Islam-is-a-gutter-religion perspective is a substantial pillar of the political support for our war policy.

* The allegation of religious influence in our war making is not refuted by the fact that our boots-on-the-ground COIN warriors in Af/Pak quickly realize that a West-is-best, come-to-Jesus approach will not be helpful in their work.

* The larger point is that anyone who claims to be on a mission from God has descended to the intellectual and moral level of bin Laden and Ahmadinejad, and the ‘war on terror’ will be a futile scam as long as the USA establishment continues to legitimize that type of thinking.

I recommend listening to hundreds of hours of Sy Hersh videos and audios. What comes out is how inarticulate he is, VERBALLY. This has been the case since the 1970s. Hersh is a WRITER, not a speaker. And more so, Hersh has been diving into the depths of that cesspool we call the Pentagon for decades. Everything that floats therein has sought to get into his head. Yet, his record as a journalist has yet to me matched. The mil’s half-wit PR guys, think that slick format PowerPoints make up for their lack of rigorous expository abilities, so they are the LAST who can speak about Hersh's journalistic abilities; the fact remains that if one looks at his reporting and "official" reaction to it since My Lai, one notes an informative consistency on his part and just plain bad lying on that of his mil-critics. What's worse, as in battle, they like uneven odds. So they swarm him with mantras such as the current brouhaha.

Right now, the cathedrals/mosques issue is a dying ember. Petraeus and his Peanut Gallery of "experts" cannot turn an old mare into a race horse. We are losing, just as Hersh predicted from the start and for the reasons he gave. He does NOT make-up quotes and he multi-checks the leads he uses—THAT is the basis of his consistent bull’s eyes. An awful lot of serious students of the US military have been confirming what he wrote so quoting him as “ranting” just won't make him irrelevant. I think he is much more of a reliable correspondent than let us say Peter Berger who has now joined the Petraeus Peanut Gallery. Berger indeed rants, as can be seen from videos of his debates performance:

http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/past-debates/afghanistan/#dm-col-a

Yet I don't see the unformed services' uniformed thinking criticize him for Berger’s hyperbolic BS. Nor do I see DoD darlings like Kilcullen and others like him chewed up for occasional outbursts. The last douse was passed over with an undeserved apology.

Lastly, no one journalistic source is a "this is it" Biblical Prophet. After all, they depend on what others say, and though generally lacking at the Pentagon, the CIA is full of skilled Pied Pipers that can line up "investigative" journalists, leading them all to drown professionally in rivers of official propaganda. Each of us should remember the stories Rummy's team filled the media pages with and know that the pot calling the kettle black is nothing new. Our duty is to search out truth for ourselves from every possible source rather than, as Nir Rosen put it, let ourselves be fooled by opinion spewing Petraeus Peanut Gallery "experts" taken on "baby sitting tours" as honored luminaries.

America is drowning in deceptive advertisement from corporate cannibals of all sorts seeking their thinning share of the declining golden eggs that taxpaying geese lay. We're a broke nation and the military is just another self-serving estate in our regime trying to maintain its massive budget. Nevertheless, every decade of so, the naked generals with no uniforms become visible. Hersh is one man alone taking on BS tsunamis to expose the invisible nakedness of the generals and he's got quite a record of saving truths from war to prove it. They say that truth is the first casualty in war and through numerous wars, small and big, Hersh has tirelessly labored responsibly to salvage as many truths as possible. While the Pentagon's record is stamped "secret" to cover-up utter imbecility, Hersh's work can only operate in full exposure. Americans prefer viewing video than reading; in the Hersh case reading is worth the effort to get at what is his real work. It will only then be clear that he earned all his awards trying to get truth to people. It has been a thankless job for he sought to expose the most fundamental traits of our military-first solutions that repeatedly got us defeated. So READ HERSH before you judge him and stop with all this sidelining. Unlike the Pentagon, he is truly an open book.

http://www.harpers.org/archive/2009/05/0082488
Jesus killed Mohammed: The crusade for a Christian military.

"Odds are good that JSOC is not being overrun by Catholic fanatics. " Did Hersh say that it was? You are the one projecting conspiracy theory on his words.

As for your data point, "one former Green Beret and defense official" dismissing Hersh in a "Department of Defense authorized news outlet", well, of course a conspirator is going to say that! oops.

What's scary is that after Vietnam blew all the hot air out of Pentagon officers, Wall street advertised that it would pay $billions for military type aggressiveness so long as it emanates from cognitively hot brains. And so, all our Napoleons went to Wall Street and West Point got the crippled class of '76, the one taking something of an "open book" exam on the engineering final. At that time, the academies were taking what they could get. Invariably, Tom Rocks blamed the output on the academies and called for closing them down. But truth is that quality control was sacrificed for warm bodies. Americans have been able to say: "Ain't my kid going to war," so they proved most tolerant of and generous with the academies' products in command. So long as there's a Four-Stars ready to take command of an "off budget" war, Mr. & Mrs. America could continue to buy real estate for profit without worrying about another Air alQaeda media event like 9/11. And so we had a whole bunch of Four-Stars like Keane, Petraeus, McChrystal....who thought that ballsy BS would assure them a spectacular post military retirement career. The trick was to pass off to Congress a dead chicken as a gracefully swimming swan. Hersh, having seen the Mekong River clotted with floating dead chickens screamed at us: it's a replay of all the craziest parts of that whole experience! He devoted his life to trying to stand on his feet and shout "Fire! Fire! Fire!" as the military's careless forest crown fire was coming at us. Hersh's works are now a documentary part of American history. And, as during Vietnam, the small minded guys who can't see the big picture hate him. Except that now he's more desperate for he's screaming that the arsonists are setting the fire in the same way as they did in the 1970s when they almost burned down the house. I can sure empathize with his frantic sense of despair at the sight of missing cerebral circuits at the Pentagon causing command personnel to repeat the worst errors of the past. And, given their limitations, I perfectly well understand why such slanderous crap is all they can come up with in retort!

I find it incredibly amusing that a large number of the comments I've seen over the past few days have all attacked the writers without even bothering to investigate whether or not Mr. Hersh had said those things*. Doing good work in 1969 and 2004 does not make someone immune to criticism, nor should we automatically leap to their defense without looking at the situation. I have no idea whether he believes it or if old age is starting to take its toll but if he is arguing that a charity organization is involved in efforts to suborn the U.S military then I think we should be a bit more cautious when we listen to him.

*As a note, I actually started looking around to see if this was true or not (something that apparently none of the responders thought they should do). By now it's been confirmed that yes, he did indeed make those statements.

enerals Shepard,del Valle,Byers,Willoughby,Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamolton,,Marquis de Amodio,Admirals Sir Barry Domville,Baker,Porter,Howard,Spellman and many others were especially qualified Knights of Malta selected by the Supreme Council to serve on the ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE of the Sovereign Order of Saint John of Jerusalem as shown on page 103,"The Captain's Polygraph" ISBN 978-142690310-6. Theabove Knights have been singled out for their brilliant and outstanding careers as Soldiers of Christ****.Retired regular military officers are subject to Courts Martial until death. Politically,retirements have mostly been allowed. Let Seymour Hersh have his say before condemnation.