Last March General David Petraeus, then head of Central Command, sought to undercut his own testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee that was critical of Israel by intriguing with a rightwing writer to put out a different story, in emails obtained by Mondoweiss.
The emails show Petraeus encouraging Max Boot of Commentary to write a story-- and offering the neoconservative writer choice details about his views on the Holocaust:
Does it help if folks know that I hosted Elie Wiesel and his wife at our quarters last Sun night?! And that I will be the speaker at the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camps in mid-Apr at the Capitol Dome...
Petraeus passed the emails along himself through carelessness last March. He pasted a Boot column from Commentary's blog into in an "FYI" email he sent to an activist who is highly critical of the U.S.'s special relationship with Israel. Some of the general's emails to Boot were attached to the bottom of the story. The activist, James Morris, shared the emails with me.
Back on March 13, Mark Perry broke the explosive story that Gen. David Petraeus was echoing Joe Biden's view that the special relationship with Israel is endangering Americans.That same day, Tuesday, March 16, Petraeus testified before Congress, and on Thursday the 18th, MJ Rosenberg at Media Matters wrote a piece celebrating Petraeus's realist views on Israel/Palestine.
Enter activist James Morris, long been a tiger on the question of whether Israel's security motivated the disastrous decision to invade Iraq. Morris runs the website "Neocon Zionist Threat to America" and is a regular call-in questioner on CSPAN and He sends emails to people in authority
On March 19, Morris sent Petraeus an email congratulating him on his views on Israel/Palestine. And the same day, Petraeus responded to Morris with one word, "FYI", and the Commentary piece by Boot.
The commanding general obviously didn't realize it, but his copy of the Commentary piece was pasted in above his email correspondence with the author, Max Boot, and Gfoeller.
Spotting Gen. David Petraeus in a photo chatting up a little old lady shouldn’t make one recoil with odd feelings of discomfort.
Except that the little old lady is none other than the indomitable 87-year-old Gertrude Himmelfarb, mother of Bill Kristol (who is at Petraeus’ elbow) and wife of the late Irving Kristol, godfather of neoconservatism. The photo was taken on May 6, the night Petraeus spoke at the Washington neoconservative confab – the annual American Enterprise Institute gala – as a recipient of the 2010 Irving Kristol Award.
Pen and Sword
Jeff Huber
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
What, Me McWorry?
NOTES FROM THE LEVANT
NOTES FROM THE LEVANT
David Petraeus for president? He keeps speculation alive.
Army Gen. David Petraeus, credited with devising a counterinsurgency doctrine to save Iraq from chaos, spoke at a Thursday dinner for conservatives and neo-conservatives. He didn't exactly squelch speculation about a possible presidential bid.
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US Army Gen. David Petraeus talks during a press conference in Kandahar city, Afghanistan, April 30.
Allauddin Khan/AP
Speculation has run rampant for months that Gen. David Petraeus, who heads the US Army’s Central Command and is widely credited with lead authorship of the “people first” counterinsurgency doctrine implemented in Iraq and Afghanistan, is toying with the idea of a run for the White House.
Gen. Petraeus' Link to High-Profile Suicide in IraqGreg Mitchell
Blogger, The Nation, "Media Fix"
Posted: June 28, 2010 10:34 AM
The scourge of suicides among American troops and reservists (which I've covered since 2003) remains a serious and seriously under-reported problem. One of the most high-profile cases involves a much-admired Army colonel and ethicist named Ted Westhusing -- who, in his 2005 suicide note, pointed a finger at rising U.S. general named David Petraeus.
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