Trump Picks General Michael Flynn As National Security Advisor by Stephen Lendman
Media reports indicated Trump chose him. It’s unclear if he accepted. Likely so as otherwise consideration of him for the position would have been kept under wraps.
We’ll know either way soon. The Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (NSA) needs no Senate confirmation.
Duties involve advising the president on national security issues - specifically domestic, foreign, and military policies, along with assuring cooperation between military branches and civilian intelligence agencies.
The 1947 National Security Act established the National Security Council, the NSA its head, the legislation also creating the CIA, America’s first peacetime intelligence agency, succeeding the wartime OSS, dissolved in 1945..
The late Chalmers Johnson once said America “will never again know peace, nor in all probability survive very long as a nation, unless we abolish the CIA, restore intelligence collecting to the State Department, and remove all but purely military functions from the Pentagon.”
He called the CIA the president’s praetorian guard, a private army operating extrajudicially, unaccountable to Congress or the public, menacing fundamental freedoms.
Flynn’s appointment as NSA is worrisome, if he accepts, as appears likely - a known Islamophobe, forced to resign as Obama’s Defense Intelligence Agency director, earlier calling “radical Islamism” a “cancer.”
He wants these elements eliminated without acknowledging America created and supports them, saying “(w)e will win the global war against radical Islamists.”
Last March, he lied, claiming “Brussels is their battlefield. Paris is their battlefield. San Bernardino is their battlefield” - all false flags, along with similar incidents in America and Europe, innocent patsies blamed for state-sponsored crimes.
“I’ve been at war with Islam” for decades, said Flynn, adding “fear of Muslims is rational.” Post- 9/11, he was involved in torture and other disturbing practices.
He suggested killing family members of suspected terrorists is acceptable. Investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill said “(a)long with Gen. Stanley McChrystal and Adm. William McRaven, Flynn was the embodiment of Donald Rumsfeld's view that the world is the battlefield.”
In Iraq and Afghanistan, he “and JSOC (Joint Special Operations Command) waged secret wars with the broader conventional wars and dramatically expanded the pace of night raids.”
Flynn as NSA “means that a very sophisticated, accomplished assassin could end up in a position of tremendous authority.”
At the same time, he’s friendly with Vladimir Putin, hostile to Iran, and according to Program on Peace-building and Rights director David Phillips, he reportedly lobbied for Turkish President Erdogan, raising “ethical concerns, cast(ing) doubt on his suitability for public office.”
“We’re in a world war,” said Flynn. But very few Americans recognize it, and fewer still have any idea how to win it.”
Appointing him NSA, if he accepts, isn’t an encouraging sign, suggesting Trump’s administration intends continued war on Islam - instead of ending what never should have begun.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network