US Military-Industrial Pundits: Conflicts of Interest Exposed for 22 TV Guests Who Urged Syrian War + ‘Drone strikes killed more civilians than publicly acknowledged’ – UN investigator

Democracy Now: New research shows many so-called experts who appeared on television making the case for U.S. strikes on Syria had undisclosed ties to military contractors. A new report by the Public Accountability Initiative identifies 22 commentators with industry ties.
While they appeared on television or were quoted as experts 111 times, their links to military firms were disclosed only 13 of those times. The report focuses largely on Stephen Hadley, who served as national security adviser to President George W. Bush. During the debate on Syria, he appeared on CNN, MSNBC, Fox News and Bloomberg TV. None of these stations informed viewers that Hadley currently serves as a director of the weapons manufacturer Raytheon that makes Tomahawk cruise missiles widely touted as the weapon of choice for bombing Syria.
He also owns over 11,000 shares of Raytheon stock, which traded at all-time highs during the Syria debate. We speak to Kevin Connor of the Public Accountability Initiative, a co-author of the report.

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report, as we move on now to a very interesting study that has just come out. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, new research shows many so-called experts who appeared on television making the case for U.S. strikes on Syria had undisclosed ties to military contractors. The report by the Public Accountability Initiative identifies 22 commentators with the industry. While they appeared on television or were quoted as experts 111 times, their links to military firms were disclosed only 13 of those times. Let’s take a look at how some of those pundits were identified during recent television appearances.

JAKE TAPPER: For insight into this high-stakes diplomatic mission, I’m joined by former secretary of state to the Clinton administration, Madeleine Albright.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: OK, let’s analyze all this now with our panel of experts. Former vice chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General James Cartwright.

GREGG JARRETT: General Jack Keane joins us, Fox News military analyst, served as four-star general and Army vice chief of staff. General, good to see you, as always.

JAKE TAPPER: I want to bring in two former generals to talk about this. Anthony Zinni is the former commander-in-chief of CENTCOM, and Michael Hayden is the former CIA director. He’s now a principal with the Chertoff Group, a risk management firm.

FOLLY BAH THIBAULT: Well, joining me now, live from Washington, D.C., is former U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen. Secretary Cohen, thank you for being on Al Jazeera.

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN: Joining us is Ambassador John Negroponte. He served as the first U.S. director of national intelligence, as well as U.S. ambassador to Iraq and the United Nations, and many more posts, I should add. Nice to see you, sir.

JOHN NEGROPONTE: Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: A sampling of recent TV coverage on Syria. All the pundits interviewed currently have ties to military and intelligence contractors, investment firms with a significant defense or intelligence focus, or ties to consulting firms with a focus on defense or intelligence. General Jack Keane, for example, is on the board of General Dynamics. General Anthony Zinni is on the board of BAE Systems. General James Cartwright is on the board of Raytheon.

Joining us now from San Francisco, Kevin Connor, director and co-founder of the Public Accountability Initiative, co-author of the report called "Conflicts of Interest in the Syria Debate."

Lay out what you found, Kevin.

KEVIN CONNOR: Sure. The report really maps out the extent to which the policy conversation on the airwaves around Syria was really dominated by individuals with ties to the defense industry. And these ties, as you laid out there, really were never disclosed—rarely disclosed, only 13 times out of 111 appearances that we identified during the Syria debate.

Now, the importance of that is that readers and viewers at home, who are, you know, seeing these people comment, are introduced to them as having gravitas and credibility—former secretaries of state, diplomats, generals with expertise. You would think these are independent experts who probably retired with a healthy pension, when in fact they’re representing interests that would profit from heightened military activity abroad in Syria. So that has a corrupting effect on the public discourse around an issue like Syria that’s so—so important. And it really goes back to the responsibility of media outlets to disclose these ties and also the individuals here who are implicated in the culture of corruption and the revolving door in Washington.

Anjali mentioned earlier, on the first segment, about the jobs program for the defense industry. And there’s a jobs program in place for the foreign policy establishment as they move out of their public positions onto the boards of these corporations. These aren’t—these are part-time positions, but they’re very high-paying positions. They have financial incentives and fiduciary responsibilities to companies that are profiting from war, profiting from current levels of defense spending. And this is something that viewers at home should be notified of. And it perhaps should preclude their involvement in debates like this, or perhaps they should not get the podium and platform they’re given for their views, given the fact that they have these conflicts of interest that are quite serious in some cases.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Kevin, your report focuses largely on Stephen Hadley, who served as a national security adviser to President George W. Bush. During the debate on Syria, he appeared on CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Bloomberg TV. None of these stations informed viewers that Hadley currently serves as a director of the weapons manufacturer Raytheon that makes Tomahawk cruise missiles. He also owns over 11,000 shares of Raytheon stock, which traded at all-time highs during the Syria debate. Here’s Stephen Hadley being interviewed by Greta Van Susteren on Fox News about the so-called red line on Syria.

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN: Did he, or didn’t he? And does it matter who did, as we sort of fuss about this red line? Joining us is Stephen Hadley, former national security adviser to the Bush administration. Doesn’t—does it—did he set the line? And does it matter?

STEPHEN HADLEY: He did set the line, and it probably doesn’t matter, because the line is set, and the credibility of the country is on—is on the line. And in some sense, the Congress needs to act in such a way so as not to undermine the credibility of President Obama. You know, we only have one president at a time, and he embodies the United States. So if his credibility is undermined, the country’s credibility is undermined. And I think that’s an argument that people are beginning to think about on the—on Capitol Hill.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Stephen Hadley. And, of course, the Tomahawk missile that Raytheon produces was the one that was going to be used in the attack on Syria. Kevin, your response?

KEVIN CONNOR: Well, this is just a really egregious, significant conflict of interest that people should have been notified of. When Hadley was making the rounds to the outlets you mentioned, he also published an op-ed in The Washington Post arguing strenuously for war, and at the time, as you mentioned, serves on the board of Raytheon, has nearly $900,000 worth of stock in that company, makes $130,000 a year in cash compensation, actually chairs the public affairs committee for Raytheon, which means that he has oversight of sort of the company’s public profile and image in the media and in policy circles. So this is really a quite clear conflict of interest, and it should have been disclosed to readers and viewers. The fact that—

AMY GOODMAN: The Washington Post has also been criticized for failing to inform its readers about Stephen Hadley’s defense ties. On September 8th, as you said, Kevin, the paper published an op-ed by Hadley that was headlined "To Stop Iran, Obama Must Enforce Red Lines with Assad." The article described Hadley simply as a former national security adviser in the George W. Bush administration. Fred Hiatt, editorial page editor at the Post, defended the paper’s move. Hiatt said, quote, "More disclosure is generally better than less, but I’m confident that Hadley’s opinion piece, which was consistent with the worldview he has espoused for many years, was not influenced by any hypothetical, certainly marginal, impact to Raytheon’s bottom line." That was Hiatt’s statement. Kevin Connor, your response?

KEVIN CONNOR: Well, first, you know, I would like to say kudos to The Washington Post for actually covering the report and really requiring Hiatt to respond. But his response is really absurd. It demonstrates a really fuzzy understanding of conflicts of interest and ethical issues. This is a clear conflict of interest. The conflicts of interest actually raise the possibility of corruption, the corruption of one’s motives. There are relationships that might call into question one’s motives, and this clearly does. And nothing Hiatt said really, you know, defends against that. Hiatt might, you know, have special insight into Hadley’s inner thinking, given that they are perhaps in the same foreign policy circles. Hiatt has written glowing articles about Hadley in the past, so, you know, this is fairly standard for him in terms of his worldview and his sort of milieu.

AMY GOODMAN: Kevin Connor, we want to thank you for being with us, and we’ll certainly link to your report. Kevin is director and co-founder of the Public Accountability Initiative, co-author of the report called "Conflicts of Interest in the Syria Debate," which was released last week.

This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we’re going to look at fast-food workers. How much are you paying for them to be paid so little? Stay with us.

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‘Drone strikes killed more civilians than publicly acknowledged’ – UN investigator

RT: A UN report accuses the United States of downplaying the number of civilians killed in anti-terrorist drone operations, while failing to assist in the investigation by releasing its own figures.
With the increased use of remotely piloted aircraft in military operations in a number of countries, the nagging question of civilian “collateral damage” as a consequence of these deadly technologies is a growing concern for the United Nations and human right groups.
In Afghanistan, for example, the number of aerial drone strikes surged from 294 in 2011 to 447 during the first 11 months of 2012, according to data released by the US Air Force in November 2012, UN Special Rapporteur Ben Emmerson noted in his interim report, which is due to be presented to the UN General Assembly next Friday.
Pakistan officials confirmed that out of 2,200 deaths “at least 400 civilians had been killed as a result of remotely piloted aircraft strikes and a further 200 individuals were regarded as probable non-combatants.”
Although the first missile test-fired from a drone occurred in February 2001, it wasn’t until the end of 2012 that the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) released data showing that 16 civilians had been killed and 5 injured due to drone strikes during the course of the year.
In its latest published figures, covering the first six months of 2013, UNAMA documented 15 civilian deaths and 7 injuries in seven separate attacks by drone aircraft.
Emmerson’s 24-page document mentions a report by a US military advisor that contradicted official US claims that drone attacks were responsible for fewer civilian deaths compared with other aerial platforms, for example, fighter jets.
He pointed to research by Larry Lewis, a research scientist at the Center for Naval Analyses, who examined aerial strikes in Afghanistan from mid-2010 to mid-2011. With the help of classified military data, Lewis found that the missile strikes conducted by drones were “10 times more deadly to Afghan civilians” than those performed by fighter jets, according to a report by The Guardian newspaper.

Northrop Grumman / Chad Slattery / Handout via Reuters

Lots of targets, little transparency

The United States and the United Kingdom have been reluctant to hand over information regarding drone strikes of any sort, including those that result in civilian deaths. For example, on February 21, 2010, 23 civilians were killed and 12 wounded in a Predator strike in southern Afghanistan's Uruzgan province.
The US military released partially declassified information on the incident, suggesting “administrative and disciplinary sanctions” against the crew for providing misleading “situational information” as well as “a predisposition to engage in kinetic activity (the release of a missile).”
Emmerson said the US, which has attracted a lot of scorn in Afghanistan over the drone attacks, had created "an almost insurmountable obstacle to transparency."
"The Special Rapporteur does not accept that considerations of national security justify withholding statistical and basic methodological data of this kind," Emmerson wrote in the report.
The United Kingdom, which also figured into the report, has officially admitted to one civilian casualty incident, in which four civilians were killed and two civilians injured in a remotely piloted aircraft strike by the Royal Air Force in Afghanistan on March 25, 2011.
However, that figure remains open to speculation given that the United Kingdom’s ‘Reaper’ drone has flown more than 46,000 hours in Afghanistan, averaging three sorties per day, with a total of 405 weapons discharged.

Pakistan hunting ground

Emmerson also reported that Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs provided him with statistics on drone strikes in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan, where the US military has targeted members of Al-Qaeda since 2004.
The government noted the difficulties in determining the exact number of civilian deaths due to particular “topographical and institutional obstacles” of the Tribal Areas, including the tradition of immediately burying the bodies of the dead. So the figures are likely to be an underestimate.
The highest amount of civilian casualties, Emmerson noted, came when the CIA dramatically increased drone attacks in Pakistan between 2008 and 2010. Following intense criticism from Islamabad, however, drone strikes in Pakistan have steadily declined and "the number of civilian deaths has dropped dramatically."

Pakistani schoolgirls walk along a path after school in Mingora, a town in Swat valley (AFP Photo / A Majeed)

In September, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), a non-profit organization launched a project, “Naming the Dead,” to record properly the names and numbers of people who are killed by US drone airstrikes in Pakistan.
Civilian fatalities attributed to US drone strikes have occurred beyond the borders of Afghanistan and Pakistan, including in Yemen, where the figure is 12-58, according to Emmerson. Statistics are not yet available from Iraq or the Nato operation in Libya in 2011.

Who's a target?

Meanwhile, with America’s arch-enemy Al-Qaeda looking increasingly fractured, especially with the death of its terror mastermind, Osama bin Laden, the question as to who now qualifies as a legitimate target of US strikes is becoming more pertinent. More importantly, perhaps, are the limitations that the United States and other countries must recognize as the battle against ‘terrorism’ goes global.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has noted the absence of a clear international consensus on the issue, Emmerson noted. But one thing that is generally accepted, however, is that “international humanitarian law does not permit the targeting of persons directly participating in hostilities who are located in non-belligerent States, given that, otherwise, the whole world is potentially a battlefield,” the report emphasized.
In Washington, the report got a lukewarm reception with White House spokesperson Laura Magnuson saying, “We are aware that this report has been released and are reviewing it carefully.”
She noted that at the National Defense University on May 23, “[T]he President spoke at length about the policy and legal rationale for how the United States takes action against Al-Qaeda and its associated forces. As the President emphasized, the use of lethal force, including from remotely piloted aircraft, commands the highest level of attention and care.”
The Special Rapporteur intends to submit a final report on the subject of robotic aircraft in counter-terrorism operations to the Human Rights Council in 2014. 

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