Michael Ledeen

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Michael Ledeen (born August 1, 1941) is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. His political ideas, informed by his views on history and philosophy, have influenced or inspired the Bush administration's war on Iraq.

Ledeen is a contributing editor to the U.S. National Review and the Jewish World Review, and a resident scholar (Freedom Scholar) at the American Enterprise Institute, where he worked with the former chairman of the Defense Policy Board, Richard Perle. Ledeen was a founding member of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs and he continues to serve on the JINSA Board of Advisors. In 1981, he was the "anti-terrorism" specialist of secretary of state Alexander Haig, previously head of SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander Europe).

In 2003, the Washington Post alleged that he was the only full-time international affairs analyst consulted by Karl Rove, George W. Bush's closest advisor.

Contents

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Academic and political career

Ledeen holds a PhD from the University of Wisconsin, where he specialized in the comparative history of German and Italian fascism. At Washington University, Ledeen was denied tenure because of questions reqarding the "quality of his scholarship" and about whether Ledeen had "used the work of somebody else without proper credit," according to history department faculty interviewed by the Washington Post. He was subsequently named Visiting Professor at the University of Rome. One of Ledeen's principal mentors was the German-born historian George Mosse, for whom he was research assistant at the time Mosse wrote two famous books on National Socialism. Another major influence on Ledeen was the Italian historian Renzo De Felice. Ledeen, who has always been staunchly anti-fascist, holds political views which stress "the urgency of combating centralized state power and the centrality of human freedom"[1] that are said to have influenced or inspired the Bush administration. Ledeen has complained that "It's hard to explain to someone who doesn't read very well that there's a difference between authors and the subjects they write about." [Op cit]

Earlier in his career, Ledeen authored Universal Fascism: The Theory and Practice of the Fascist International, 1928-1936, published in 1972 and now out of print. The book, which was his doctoral disseration, was the first work to explore Mussolini's efforts to create a Fascist international in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

In the late 1970s, Michael Ledeen consulted for the Italian military intelligence agencies. This enabled him, along with Arnaud de Borchgrave in "The New Republic," to expose Billy Carter's dealings with the Muammar Gaddafi regime in Libya. According to the Asia Times, "Ledeen's right-wing Italian connections - including alleged ties to the P2 Masonic Lodge that rocked Italy in the early 1980s - have long been a source of speculation and intrigue, but he returned to Washington in 1981 as "anti-terrorism" advisor to the new secretary of state, Al Haig." P2 was also involved in Operation Gladio, which was managed by NATO.Template:Ref

Ledeen was a major figure in the biggest foreign policy scandal of the Ronald Reagan administration. As a consultant of National Security Adviser Robert C. McFarlane, Ledeen vouched for Iranian arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar, and met with Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres, and officials of the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the CIA to arrange meetings with high-ranking Iranian officials and the much-criticized weapons-for-hostages deal with Iran that would become known as the Iran-Contra scandal.1

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Regime change advocacy

Regarding regime change in the Middle East, in 2002 Ledeen criticized the views of former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, writing:

He fears that if we attack Iraq "I think we could have an explosion in the Middle East. It could turn the whole region into a caldron and destroy the War on Terror." One can only hope that we turn the region into a cauldron, and faster, please. If ever there were a region that richly deserved being cauldronized, it is the Middle East today. If we wage the war effectively, we will bring down the terror regimes in Iraq, Iran, and Syria, and either bring down the Saudi monarchy or force it to abandon its global assembly line to indoctrinate young terrorists. That's our mission in the war against terror.2

In 1979, Ledeen was one of the first Western writers to point out that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini was a "clerical fascist," and that while it was legitimate to criticize the Shah's regime, if Khomeini seized power in Iran, the Iranian people would suffer an even greater loss of freedom, and that Khomeini would deprive women of political and social rights.

Ledeen's phrase, "faster, please" has become a signature meme in Ledeen's writings and is often referenced by neoconservative writers advocating a more forceful and broader "war on terror" to be conducted primarily by political support for democratic revolutionaries in the Middle East.

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Controversial theories

Ledeen's National Review columns have consistently advocated regime change, and on one occasion he suggested the possibility that some European countries, in a misguided effort to contain the spread of democracy in the Middle East and the resultant increase of American influence, had embraced anti-democratic values. In a 2003 column entitled "A Theory," Ledeen outlined a possibility that France and Germany, both NATO allies of the United States, "struck a deal with radical Islam and with radical Arabs" to use "extremism and terrorism as the weapon of choice" to bring down a potential American Empire. He stated, "It sounds fanciful, to be sure," but that, "If this is correct, we will have to pursue the war against terror far beyond the boundaries of the Middle East, into the heart of Western Europe. And there, as in the Middle East, our greatest weapons are political: the demonstrated desire for freedom of the peoples of the countries that oppose us." [2]

Ledeen, a prominent and incessant advocate of regime change in Iran, as he had earlier supported the dissident movements within the Soviet Empire, has also stated that Iran is the main backer of the insurgency in Iraq and even supports the al-Qaida network led by al-Zarqawi which has, in reality, declared jihad against Shi'ite Muslims. He cited German and Italian court documents--some of which were also reported in "Newsweek" magazine--that show Zarqawi created a European terrorist network while based in Tehran. Ledeen is a board member of the "Coalition for Democracy in Iran" (CDI), founded by Morris Amitay, a former lobbyist for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. Ledeen has also been part of the board of the U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon. According to the Asia Times, he is the only full-time international affairs analyst regularly consulted by Karl Rove, George W. Bush's closest advisor.

He also supported the theory that the Bulgarian Secret Service was behind Grey Wolves member Mehmet Ali Ağca's 1981 attempt to assassinate Pope John Paul II. The theory was later rejected by the Italian Courts. In early 2005 it was suggested that new evidence, in the form of East German Stasi documents, showed that it was the Bulgarians, in concert with the KGB and Stasi, who were behind the plot. The former head of the Stasi, Markus Wolf, and the Berlin office overseeing the Stasi archive, claim that the documents in question were sent to Italy in 1995 and do not implicate anyone in the attack on the Pope. Gladio "stay-behind" NATO clandestine structure has also been accused of involvement in this attempt. [3]

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Work

  • Universal fascism; the Theory and Practice of the Fascist International, 1928-1936, New York, H. Fertig, 1972
  • co-written with Renzo De Felice Fascism : An Informal Introduction To Its Theory And Practice, New Brunswick, N.J. : Transaction Books, 1976 ISBN 0878551905.
  • The First Duce : D'Annunzio at Fiume, Baltimore ; London : Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977 ISBN 0801818605.
  • Italy In Crisis, Beverly Hills [Calif.] : Sage publications, 1977 ISBN 0803907923.
  • co-written with George Mosse Nazism : A Historical and Comparative Analysis of National Socialism, New Brunswick, N.J. : Transaction Books, 1978 ISBN 0878556613.
  • co-written with William Lewis Debacle, The American Failure In Iran, New York : Knopf :distributed by Random House, 1981 ISBN 0394516577.
  • Grave New World, New York : Oxford University Press, 1985 ISBN 0195034910.
  • West European Communism And American Foreign Policy, New Brunswick, N.J., U.S.A. : Transaction Books, 1987 ISBN 0887381405.
  • Perilous Statecraft : An Insider's Account of the Iran-Contra Affair, New York : Scribner, 1988 ISBN 0684189941.
  • Superpower Dilemmas : the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. at Century's End, New Brunswick, U.S.A. : Transaction Publishers, 1992 ISBN 0887388914.
  • Freedom Betrayed : how America led a Global Democratic Revolution, won the Cold War, and Walked Away, Washington, D.C. : AEI Press ; London : Distributed outside the United States by arrangement with Eurospan, 1996 ISBN 0844739928.
  • Machiavelli on Modern leadership : Why Machiavelli's Iron Rules Are As Timely And Important Today As Five Centuries Ago, New York : Truman Talley Books/St. Martin's Press, 1999 ISBN 031220471X.
  • The War Against The Terror Masters: why it happened, where we are now, how we'll win, New York : St. Martin's Press, 2002 ISBN 031230644X.
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Endnotes

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References

  • "Ledeen Seems To Relish Iran Insider's Role," Charles R. Babcock. The Washington Post. Washington, D.C.: Feb 2, 1987. pg. a.01.
  • [4] FINAL REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT COUNSEL FOR IRAN/CONTRA MATTERS Volume I: "Investigations and Prosecution", Lawrence E. Walsh, Independent Counsel, 4 August 4 1993, Washington, D.C.
  • [5] Michael Ledeen, "Scowcroft Strikes Out," National Review, 6 August 2002.
  • [6] John Laughland, "Flirting with Fascism," The American Conservative, 30 June 2003.
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External links

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