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<font size=4 color="#FF0000"><b><i>2 articles follow<br><br>
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<a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/lando02072011.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.counterpunch.org/lando02072011.html</a><br><br>
</font><font size=2 color="#990000">February 7, 2011<br><br>
</font><h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4><b>Give Us a Break,
Henry!<br><br>
<br>
</i></font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=5 color="#990000">
Kissinger on
Egypt</b></font></h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4>By BARRY
LANDO<br><br>
</font><font size=3>Always comforting to have Henry Kissinger around to
advise the current U.S. administration what to do. His latest advice to
Obama re Egypt: slow down, take things easier, don't rush Egypt's
sensitive leaders.<br><br>
"We should be looking at a democratic evolution," said
Kissinger. But he warned the U.S. should cultivate key democratic
reformists and military leaders in a low-key fashion during the process.
"It should not look like an American project. The Egyptians are a
proud people. They threw out the British and they threw out the
Russians."<br><br>
On the other hand, when thin-skinned right wing dictators in Argentina,
Chile and Uruguay were disappearing "democratic reformists" by
the thousands in 1976, Henry Kissinger, then Secretary of Statenot
having to worry about lurid accounts of torture on Twitter and Facebook
and Al Jazeera-- advised South American generals to get on with their
grisly task so as not to provoke censure from a U.S. Congress beginning
to waken to the on-going slaughter. Or, as Kissinger put it to Argentine
Foreign Minister Admiral Cesar August Guzzetti, in June 1976, "If
there are things that have to be done, you should do them quickly. But
you should get back quickly to normal procedures."<br><br>
The things to be done were no secret: human rights organizations and
State Department memorandum supplied all necessary details. In Argentina
alone more than 10,000 people had been "disappeared" by the end
of 1976. But, in the name of fighting the Cold War, those messy kinds of
things had to be done said the Generals and their apologistsKissinger
included.<br><br>
Ironically, for the past thirty years, Hosni Mubarak and his apologists
have justified his brutal repression in similar terms. Some are still
doing it. It's just the name of the bogeyman that's changed: from
Communism to Radical Islam aka the Moslem Brotherhoodfrom Fidel Castro's
revolutionary virus to Osama Bin Laden's Al Qaeda. The fact that Al
Qaeda's leaders have condemned the Moslem Brotherhood for its willingness
to participate in Egyptian politics is a detail.<br><br>
The parallels between Egypt and the trio of South American military
dictators is striking. According to the State Department memo on the June
10 meeting between Kissinger and Admiral Guzzetti, obtained by the
National Security Archives, the Argentine told Kissinger, <br><br>
</font>
<dl>
<dd>"Our main problem in Argentina is terrorism. It is the first
priority of the current government that took office on March 24. There
are two aspects to the solution. The first is to ensure the internal
security of the country; the second is to solve the most urgent economic
problems over the coming 6 to 12 months. Argentina needs United States
understanding and support…."<br><br>
</dl>The NSA analysis of that memo continued, <br><br>
<dl>
<dd>"This at a time when the international community, the U.S.
media, universities, and scientific institutions, the U.S. Congress, and
even the U.S. Embassy in Argentina were clamoring about the
indiscriminate human rights violations against scientists, labor leaders,
students, and politicians by the Argentine military, Secretary Kissinger
told Guzzetti: "We are aware you are in a difficult period. It is a
curious time, when political, criminal, and terrorist activities tend to
merge without any clear separation. We understand you must establish
authority."<br><br>
</dl>The U.S. Ambassador had earlier protested to the Argentina
government about the disappearance and torture of human rights workers,
including American citizens. Kissinger, however, told Guzzetti, "In
the United States we have strong domestic pressures to do something on
human rights… We want you to succeed. We do not want to harrass [sic]
you. I will do what I can…."<br><br>
One could almost hear an American official todaysotto vocegiving
similar advice to Egypt's new Vice-President General Omar Suleiman, the
man, let's not forget, who for the past eight years headed up the feared
Intelligence Directorate infamous for systematic brutality, torture and
disappearances; so skilled at their work that it was Suleiman and his
uniformed thugs who were frequently used by the CIA's rendition
program.<br><br>
All of a sudden though, Suleiman with his impeccable dark suit and tie
and unflappable demeanoris now not only the go-to man for torture but
also, the go-to man to engineer "a transition to democracy."
<br><br>
Not too fast a transition though, and certainly not too
democratic.<br><br>
Just as Henry the K. would advise.<br><br>
<font face="Verdana" size=2>Barry M. Lando</b>, a graduate of Harvard and
Columbia University, spent 25 years as an award-winning investigative
producer with 60 Minutes. The author of numerous articles about Iraq, he
produced a documentary about Saddam Hussein that has been shown around
the world. He lives in Paris. His latest book is
“<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1590512383/counterpunchmaga">
Web of Deceit: The History of Western Complicity in Iraq, from Churchill
to Kennedy to George W. Bush</a>.”</font><font size=3>
</font><font face="Verdana" size=2>Lando is currently completing a novel,
"The Fisherman's File", concerning Israel's most closely
guarded secret (it's not the bomb.) He can be reached through his
<a href="http://barrylando.blogspot.com/">blog.<br>
</a>
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</b></font><font size=3>
<a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/wisner02072011.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.counterpunch.org/wisner02072011.html<br>
</a></font><font size=2 color="#990000">February 7, 2011<br><br>
</font><h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4><b>Which One is He
Wearing Today?<br><br>
<br>
</i></font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=5 color="#990000">
Frank Wisner's Two
Hats</b></font></h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4>By ROBERT
FISK<br><br>
</font><font size=3><i>Cairo<br><br>
</i>Frank Wisner, President Barack Obama's envoy to Cairo who infuriated
the White House this weekend by urging Hosni Mubarak to remain President
of Egypt, works for a Washington law firm, Patton Boggs, which works for
the dictator's own Egyptian government.<br><br>
Wisner's astonishing remarks – "President Mubarak's continued
leadership is critical: it's his opportunity to write his own
legacy" – shocked the democratic opposition in Egypt and called into
question Obama's judgment, as well as that of Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton.<br><br>
The US State Department and Wisner himself have now both claimed that his
remarks were made in a "personal capacity". But there is
nothing "personal" about Wisner's connections with the
powerful Washington law firm and lobby shop Patton Boggs, which openly
boasts that it advises "the Egyptian military, the Egyptian Economic
Development Agency, and has handled arbitrations and litigation on the
[Mubarak] government's behalf in Europe and the US". Oddly, not a
single journalist raised this extraordinary connection with US government
officials – nor the blatant conflict of interest it appears to
represent.<br><br>
Wisner is a retired State Department 36-year career diplomat – he served
as US ambassador to Egypt, Zambia, the Philippines and India under eight
American presidents. In other words, he was not a political appointee.
But it is inconceivable Hillary Clinton did not know of his employment by
a law firm that works for the very dictator which Wisner now
defends in the face of a massive democratic opposition in Egypt.<br><br>
So why on earth was he sent to talk to Mubarak, who is in effect a client
of Wisner's current employers?<br><br>
Patton Boggs states that its attorneys "represent some of the
leading Egyptian commercial families and their companies" and
"have been involved in oil and gas and telecommunications
infrastructure projects on their behalf". One of its partners served
as chairman of the US-Egyptian Chamber of Commerce promoting foreign
investment in the Egyptian economy. The company has also managed
contractor disputes in military-sales agreements arising under the US
Foreign Military Sales Act. Washington gives around $1.3bn (£800m) a year
to the Egyptian military.<br><br>
Wisner joined Patton Boggs almost two years ago – more than enough time
for both the White House and the State Department to learn of his
company's intimate connections with the Mubarak regime. <br><br>
Nicholas Noe, an American political researcher now based in Beirut, has
spent weeks investigating Wisner's links to Patton Boggs. Noe
is also a former researcher for Hillary Clinton and questions the
implications of his discoveries.<br>
"The key problem with Wisner being sent to Cairo at the behest of
Hillary," he says, "is the conflict-of-interest aspect... More
than this, the idea that the US is now subcontracting or 'privatising'
crisis management is another problem. Do the US lack diplomats?<br><br>
"Even in past examples where presidents have sent someone
'respected' or 'close' to a foreign leader in order to lubricate an
exit," Noe adds, "the envoys in question were not
actually paid by the leader they were supposed to squeeze
out!"<br><br>
Patton Boggs maintains an "affiliate relationship" with Zaki
Hashem, one of Egypt's most prominent legal firms. It was founded in 1953
and Zaki Hashem himself was a cabinet minister under Mubarak's
predecessor, President Anwar Sadat, and later became head of the Egyptian
Society for International Law.<br>
By a further remarkable irony, one of Zaki Hashem's senior advisers was
Nabil al-Araby, one of the 25 leading Egyptian personalities just chosen
by the protesters in Tahrir Square to demand the overthrow of Mubarak.
Nabil al-Araby, a former member of the UN's International Law Commission,
told me yesterday that he ended his connection with Zaki Hashem three
years ago and had "no idea" why Wisner had come out in
support of Mubarak's continued rule. He himself believed it was essential
Mubarak make a dignified but immediate exit. "The head must
go," he said.<br><br>
When Frank Wisner joined Patton Boggs in March 2009 the company
described him as "one of the nation's most respected diplomats"
who would provide clients with "strategic global advice concerning
business, politics and international law". The firm stated
specifically that "it looks to Ambassador Wisner to use his
expertise in the Middle East and India to assist its American and
international clients."<br><br>
Stuart Pape, managing partner at Patton Boggs, said at the time that
"it is a real coup for the firm to have Ambassador Wisner – one of
the most experienced and highly regarded diplomats – join our ranks...
His in-depth knowledge of global politics and the international financial
world is a huge asset for our clients."<br><br>
We still do not know exactly what kind of "expertise" he has
bestowed upon the dictator of Egypt. But his remarks at the weekend leave
no room to doubt he advised the old man to cling on to power for a few
more months. The vast network of companies with family connections to
Mubarak's regime is, of course, one of the targets of the pro-democracy
demonstrators in Egypt.<br><br>
A spokesman for the State Department said he "presumed"
Clinton knew of Wisner's employment by Patton Boggs and the firm's
links with the Mubarak government, but refused to comment on any conflict
of interest for the envoy.<br><br>
<i>Editors’ note: The 72-year old Wisner has secure footholds in
government and corporate America. Until recently he was vice
chairman of AIG, which he left to become a foreign policy adviser at
Patton Boggs where his brother Graham has long been ensconced.
We’re talking the Permanent Government here. Wisner’s father, Frank Sr.,
ran the CIA’s covert arm at the height of the Cold War, had a nervous
breakdown after the failure of the Hungarian rising of 1956 and committed
suicide in questionable circumstances in a CIA secure facility outside
Washington DC in 1967. AC/JSC<br><br>
</i><b>Robert Fisk</b> is a reporter for the London Independent where
this story was first published. <br><br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
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