Annals of Betraying Democracy: Going Postol
Filed under: Russia
There is an old adage that says: "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach. Those who can't teach, teach gym."
One might add this corollary: "Those who who can, make foreign policy. Those who can't make foreign policy teach political science. Those who can't teach political science teach political science at MIT. And those who can't teach political science at MIT lecture us in the pages of the New York Times."
Teaching political science at MIT is like teaching quantum physics at Le Cordon Bleu. And let's not forget that the Times told us Jimmy Carter's visit to North Korea was going to solve that problem, so it's hardly a reliable source of advice in defending America from its enemies.
Which brings us to the point: In an op-ed column in Wednesday's edition of the New York Times Theodore Postol (pictured above), identified only as "a professor of science, technology and national security policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology," lectured us as to the wisdom of accepting dictator Vladimir Putin's offer of an alternative missile defense system not based in Eastern Europe (Russia has shown neo-Soviet level panic over the idea of a missile defense system being installed in Europe which could block a Russian attack, threatening to place offensive missiles in Kaliningrad to overwhelm such a system). Professor Postol is exactly the same sort of traitor to democracy as was Neville Chamberlain.
Click the jump to read the details of this latest outrage against American national security by those who would betray us to our enemies.
Who is Professor Postol? Well, to start with, there's just one tiny little fact that the nation's "paper of record" declined to tell us about him in its background statement: He doesn't believe missile defense is even possible and spends his life figuring out ways to argue we shouldn't try it. So when dear Professor Postol tells us that we should accept Putin's offer, what he's really saying is that it doesn't matter where our missile defense system is because no matter where it is it won't work, so why not put it wherever Putin wants. He himself admits in a parenthetical statement, as if it's a minor point: "(Let's leave aside, for the moment, the question of whether missile defense will ever be very effective, something I'm quite skeptical about.)"
Leave it aside? Would you take advice on which new car to buy from an Amish farmer who drives a horse and buggy? Quite skeptical? Is the Pope "quite skeptical" about the wisdom of abortion? Truly, the level of dishonesty and partisan skulduggery at the Times knows no bounds.
Another thing the Times didn't care to tell its readers about Professor Postol is that in May 2006, he was exposed as a frenzied crackpot and severely chastised by MIT investigators. It all started in 2000 when he accused the TRW company of exaggerating the effectiveness of their missile defense systems and impugned the academic integrity of two MIT researchers who supported TRW's analysis. He called for an investigation of the researchers by MIT which could have led to serious disciplinary action being taken against them, but when the dust settled the two researchers were cleared and it was Postol who got slapped down. Wikipedia states:
In May 2006, an MIT Ad-Hoc Committee on Research Misconduct Allegation concluded delays in the investigation were caused by a number of factors, including: "initial uncertainty about the applicability of MIT's research misconduct policy to a government [non-MIT] report"; government classification of relevant information, possibly in an attempt to make it unavailable to plaintiffs in the TRW whistle-blower trial; and Postol's failure to provided a clearly written summary of his allegations, which changed repeatedly during the investigation. The committee also found that Postol repeatedly violated MIT confidentiality rules "causing personal distress to the Lincoln Laboratory researchers, their families and colleagues."
Postol is what people of his ilk like to call a "social activist" scientist. What this means in simple terms is that he's popular in such forums as the Village Voice and believes he's smarter than us and that, if we'd only give him absolute power, we'd all be so much happier. In other words, he believes exactly what Neville Chamberlain believed, and acts in exactly the same way.
Here's how he characterizes the issue of the missile defense plan for Eastern Europe in his Times piece:
President Vladimir Putin of Russia has made an offer that President Bush cannot refuse -- not if Mr. Bush truly wants substantive international cooperation on missile defense. Last month, Mr. Putin offered to give America access to data from a Russian early-warning radar unit in Azerbaijan that can observe the launching and flight of any long-range ballistic missiles from Iran. The offer was part of Mr. Putin's effort to keep the United States from setting up its own missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic.There can be few, if any, technical objections to such cooperation. Politics, however, is another story. Those who do not believe that the cold war is over will complain that we cannot trust the Russians to work with us even when it is in our common interests. Another objection -- that President Putin's government is hardly a paragon of democracy and human rights -- ignores the fact that technical cooperation between the countries is a good way to encourage Russia to be closer with the West. President Bush told Mr. Putin last month that "the cold war is over." Cooperating with Russia on missile defense is the perfect way to put those words into action.
Note, again, that the dear professor never says one single word about how he thinks George W. Bush (and Ronald Reagan before him) is an utter idiot for believing that missile defense can work. Note how he blithely assumes that the cold war with Russia is over, using as his sole evidence the statement of a man who he (and the Times editors) secretly believes is an idiot, and note how he even more blithely suggests that by selling out our national security, helping Putin to avoid the system he hates and get the one he loves, we'll magically transform Putin from a frenzied dictator into a reasonable democrat.
Whatever are they smoking up there at MIT?
Neville Chamberlain told us Hitler wasn't dangerous, but only needed to be understood and respected. We listened to him, he was wrong, and the result was World War II. Franklin Roosevelt told us Stalin wasn't dangerous, but only needed to be understood and respected. We listened to him, he was wrong, and the result was the Cold War. Jimmy Carter told us Kim Jong-Il wasn't dangerous, but only needed to be understood and respected. We listened to him, he was wrong, and the result was the appearance of nuclear weapons in North Korea.
Here we go again? Granted, we conservatives can't entirely blame the left where Putin is concerned, since it was our own designated leader who "looked into Putin's eyes" and saw his trustworthy sole. Now, we see the moonbats, like Postol, using those words against us -- something Publius Pundit has been warning would happen for a long time. To be sure, President Bush will have much to answer for when he faces the judgment of history.
But having Bush as his sole authority for the end of the cold war only serves to make Professor Postol that much more ridiculous. He argues that placing a missile defense system in Azerbaijan, as Putin wants, could be "a more effective check on Iran because the technical features of the Russian radar complement those of American missile-defense radar systems, like the one now being set up in Alaska." More effective check? He doesn't believe missile defense is possible! This is simply a boldfaced lie. Moreover, the idea that missile defense in Europe is only necessary to defend the region from an attack by Iran is crazy. Russia itself has far more missiles than Iran (indeed, it's from Russia that Iran would get the missile technology it might use to attack Europe, as well as the technology to defend that technology from a preemptive strike by the West). The defense system is at least as important in protecting NATO allies from Russian aggression as it is in protecting it from Iran, especially given Putin's infamous spate of bellicose rhetoric in recent months -- rhetoric of which the good professor is apparently blissfully unaware.
Professor Postol is already on record acknowledging this, and telling us that we should not attempt to defend ourselves from Russian offensive missiles since we can't, and since trying will only cause the Russians to become more aggressive and dangerous. He's entitled to his "opinion," of course, but he seems to be overlooking the fact that missile defense is highly effective even if it doesn't work. Ronald Reagan's Star Wars initiative forced the USSR to embark upon a ruinous attempt to compete with the USA in military spending, and that effort brought the USSR down without a single shot being fired. Putin's Russia as far more economically feeble than the mighty USSR, and has half its population. Given Putin's frenzied reaction to the Eastern Europe proposal, it's clear the idea was a brilliant one. The idea of responding by doing what Putin, our enemy, wants us to do is simply barbaric -- and deciding to do so on the word of someone like Professor Postol would be suicidal.
Writing in the Moscow Times, Russian defense analyst Alexander Golts neatly sums up the flagrantly misleading nature of Postol's "analysis":
There is no denying that such a joint system -- were it to be developed -- would have a major impact on the nature of U.S.-Russian relations. Not only would U.S. ships be permanently positioned near Russia's shores, but both partners would have access to each other's super-sensitive technologies. But the main point is that if the United States were to accept the Russian offer, it would have to entirely reject its present strategy of intercepting enemy warheads in space using missiles with a range of more than 2000 kilometers. In addition, the joint project would mean that the billions of dollars that the United States has already spent on its unilateral anti-missile system would be for naught. The other problematic aspect of Russia's proposal is that it would require an unusually high level of trust in each other to make this new relationship work. And Russia has done everything in its power to undermine this trust. A case in point: Ivanov has promised that if the United States does not cancel its plans to place a radar in the Czech Republic and elements of anti-missile batteries in Poland, Russia will deploy Iskander rockets in Kaliningrad aimed at U.S. installations in Europe. If Russia deploys these weapons, it will violate the terms of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. This in turn could lead to a new stand-off with Europe. On the surface, Moscow has offered to create a joint global anti-missile system that would significantly improve U.S.-Russian relations. But Moscow has threatened a new military stand-off if Washington refuses its proposal and if it develops its anti-missile system in Europe. Thus, Moscow has proposed an absolutely meaningless and unrealistic initiative that will only distract and irritate Washington at a time when the Kremlin is frantically looking for U.S. support for Putin's successor.
Golts captures the essence of Putin's hypocrisy in a nutshell: "Imagine a situation in which a good acquaintance -- but not a close friend -- suggests that you start a joint venture that requires you to invest all of your savings. If you hesitate, he whips out a revolver and threatens to shoot your close relatives. This is how Russia's most recent suggestion for cooperation with the United States on a joint anti-ballistic missile defense system comes across."
But this basic reality is lost on cowardly fools like Professor Postol. Just like Chamberlain, Postol chooses to ignore all these basic facts -- indeed, he has no qualifications whatsoever to assess Russian intentions, and chooses to rely, with utter dishonesty, on the assessment of President Bush, a person he considers a clueless dolt. In so doing, he's trying to sell us down the river.
Let's stop him, shall we?
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