Naval War College

Peter Voskamp, the editor of the Block Island (R.I.) Times, has reaffirmed my report that there was political pressure to keep Walt & Mearsheimer, the authors of the bombshell paper criticizing the Israel lobby, from speaking at the Naval War College in Newport 2 weeks back:

The [Israel lobby] paper was essentially off-limits for discussion at last week's forum. The [War College] Public Affairs Office confirmed that the college had received pressure from unnamed Congressmen to cancel the professors' appearance.

Voskamp is an enterprising journalist. As a grad student at University of Texas/Austin 3-1/2 years ago, he interviewed Admiral Bobby Ray Inman, the former deputy director of the CIA, now a professor of national policy at UT, and asked him whether oil interests were pushing for war in Iraq.  read more »

On Charlie Rose (rebroadcast yesterday), oilman-turned-hedgefunder Boone Pickens added his voice to the Roscoe Bartlett camp, saying we have passed the peak of oil production and will be facing shortages. The optimistic Pickens spoke of "rough times" with $100-a-barrel oil, but steered clear of predicting catastrophe.

Yet another voice belongs to Navy Secretary Don Winter, who warned last week at the Naval War College that just recently, the "fear factor" coming from the spike in oil prices had made an impact in the world economy "in the billions." In the subsequent press conference, I asked Winter whether Roscoe Bartlett wasn't a prophet, in his belief that unless we start conserving now, there will be civil disruptions over oil. "I've talked to the congressman, I've had several engagements with him," Winter, a fellow engineer, said, and though he stopped short of endorsing the Bartlett view, said, "A lot of what he has said has come true." Hark.

This is the new secretary of the Navy, Donald C. Winter, sworn in a few months ago. He opened up the Naval War College's conference on strategy that I attended Tuesday in Rhode Island, and when I heard that he was a former VP at Northrop Grumman, I was prepared to write him off.

Then he spoke. Winter is charming, fast on his feet and extremely impressive. He would seem to represent a new spirit in the Bush Administration, of do-good internationalism. For he stressed that a central function of the Navy is humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.

Bringing a white ship even into a Muslim area, it is recognized as a peaceful mission. And bringing in NGOs only heightens that understanding...Public opinion about the US in particular but also about the western world in general is materially affected as these people see us for what we really are....There's a natural shaping of hearts and minds in favor of the U.S....

At a subsequent press conference, a reporter asked why we should be using the Navy "for the new Peace Corps and new Red Cross around the world."

Winter responded with ease and vigor. "I would not tend to characterize it that way. We have a new set of responsibilities around the world. And this is a win/win. We're helping, and I think the sailors love doing this."

Navy people, he said, get a lot more satisfaction from bailing people out after the tsunami than from more traditional functions. Aye-aye, sir.  read more »

The item I did on John Mearsheimer's talk at the Naval War College in which he likened Iraq to The Plague has generated a great deal of comment, all favorable. Frankly, I'm honored to have gotten his words out to a wider audience and learned, through this process, of what a sophisticated military our country has. Props to Mearsheimer and the men and women in white!

The reason I went to the Naval War College was to hear Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, authors of the controversial paper on the Israel lobby, address an audience of officers and experts at the Navy's 57th annual Current Strategy Forum. It's remarkable when you think about it. Back in April, Harvard people were saying they were going to have all kinds of forums on the paper—to denounce it, as Hillel director Bernard Steinberg told me. Well, no forums. There's been an embarrassed silence. And as has been argued here before, that probably stems from the fact that there is strong underground support for the paper's findings, including its assertion that the disastrous decision to invade Iraq came partly out of pro-Israel pressure. Yes, that's hard to talk about.  read more »

Meanwhile, (as Col. Larry Wilkerson has already indicated) the military is listening.