Emile Nakhleh speaks

Emile Nakhleh, until recently the director of the CIA's Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program (which is "the intelligence community's premier group dedicated to the issue of political Islam") has given his first public interview since his retirement to Ken Silverstein of Harpers.  I've had the pleasure of meeting Nakhleh in the past, and have seem in action, and would consider his opinions to always be worth hearing.   He has a lot of interesting things to say, but I'll just excerpt one here, on the American presence in Iraq today:

I have come to believe that our presence is part of the problem and that we should begin to seriously devise an exit strategy. There's a civil war in Iraq and our presence is contributing to the violence. We've become a lightning rod—we're not restricting the violence, we're contributing to it. Iraq has galvanized jihadists; our presence is what is attracting them. We need to get out of there. The idea of Iraq being a model for the region has also been tossed out the window. Now the only question is whether Iraq will become a haven for sectarianism, or follow either the Iranian model or the standard Arab authoritarian model. It's only three years old, but the once-touted model of a secular, democratic Iraq is all but forgotten. This casts a dark shadow on American efforts to spread democracy in the region.
...
We've lost a generation of goodwill in the Muslim world. The President's democratization and reform program for the Middle East has all but disappeared, except for official rhetoric. That was the centerpiece of the President's policies for the region, and now no one is talking about it. We have lost credibility across the Islamic world regarding “democracy” and “representative government” and “justice.” We are devising new rules and regulations for holding people without charge. The FBI has been at Guantanamo for years, and no charges have been brought against anyone. The Islamic world says “you talk about human rights, but you're holding people without charging them.” The Islamic world has always viewed the war on terror as a war on Islam and we have not been able to disabuse them of that notion. Because of Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and other abuses we have lost on the concepts of justice, fairness and the rule of law, and that's the heart of the American idea. That's very serious, and that's where I see the danger in the years ahead.

There's a lot more in the interview, including comments on the bin Laden - Saddam connection, Guantanamo, and Iran.  Check it out!

Comments

[Robert Stevens]

Off Topic:

And again.

Elaph reports Wajeha Al Huwaider has been summoned to Saudi Intelligence headquarters for investigation this morning.

Any info Marc?

[Robert Stevens]

Ooops, METransparent, not Elaph.

[aardvark]

I'll ask around.

[Leila]

War against Islam - Nakhleh speaks as if he thinks this is NOT what America is doing. But it seems that Bush's base, if I can go by the comments I get on my blog from right-wingers - Bush's base thinks that it very much is a war against Islam.

Why shouldn't Muslims perceive it this way too, when all you have to do is read any right wing blog, or lefty blog that discusses Islam and the Arabs, to get a huge blast of "Islam is evil, Muslims want to destroy us, let's get 'em all."

Sorry Mr. Nakhleh, but war is exactly what these people want.