Michael Ledeen
Encyclopedia
Michael Arthur Ledeen is an American
specialist on foreign policy. His research areas have included state sponsors of terrorism, Iran, the Middle East, Europe (Italy), U.S.-China relations, intelligence, and Africa (Mozambique, South Africa, and Zimbabwe) and is a leading neoconservative
. He is a former consultant to the United States National Security Council
, the United States Department of State
, and the United States Department of Defense
. He has also served as a special adviser to the United States Secretary of State
. He held the Freedom Scholar chair at the American Enterprise Institute
where he was a scholar for twenty years and now holds the similarly named chair at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies
. He is a contributing editor to National Review
, contributes to the Wall Street Journal, and regularly appears on Fox News and on a variety of radio talk shows. He has been on PBS's NewsHour
and CNN's Larry King Live
, among others. He is a founding member of Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
and serves on their Board of Advisers.
In 1974, Michael Ledeen moved to Rome
where he studied the history of Italian Fascism
. In 1977, he went to Washington to join the Center for Strategic and International Studies
(CSIS) (then affiliated with Georgetown University
). He continues to visit Italy frequently.
In 1980, Ledeen worked for the Italian military intelligence service
as a "risk assessment" consultant. In 1981, Michael Ledeen then became Special Adviser to secretary of state Alexander Haig
.
, where he specialized in Modern Europe. At Washington University in St. Louis
, Ledeen was denied tenure, according to history department faculty interviewed by the Washington Post, because of questions regarding the "quality of his scholarship" and about whether Ledeen had "used the work of somebody else without proper credit". One faculty member said "the 'quasi-irregularity' at issue didn't warrant the negative vote on tenure for Ledeen".
Ledeen was subsequently named Visiting Professor at the University of Rome. One of Ledeen's principal mentors was the Jewish 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 held political views which stress "the urgency of combating centralized state power and the centrality of human freedom" that are said to have influenced or inspired the Bush administration.
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 dissertation, was the first work to explore Italian leader Benito Mussolini
's efforts to create a Fascist international in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Ledeen follows Italian historian Renzo de Felice in drawing a distinction between "fascism-regime" and "fascism-movement", and seems to approve of at least one aspect of the latter, saying "fascism nevertheless constituted a political revolution in Italy. For the first time, there was an attempt to mobilize the masses and to involve them in the political life of the country", and describing the fascist state as "a generator of energy and creativity". Ledeen continued his studies in Italian Fascism with a study of the takeover of Fiume
by Italian irredentist forces under Gabriele d'Annunzio
, who Ledeen argued was the proto-type for Mussolini.
Ledeen is a strong admirer of Niccolò Machiavelli
, whom he regards as one of the greatest political thinkers. In Ledeen's view, Machiavelli combined democratic idealism and the necessary political realism to secure and defend idealism in perfect measure.
In 1980, in the period leading up to the U.S. presidential elections, Ledeen, along with Arnaud de Borchgrave
, wrote a series of articles published in The New Republic
and elsewhere about Billy Carter
's contacts with the Muammar al-Gaddafi
regime in Libya
.
Ledeen has been a long time and active supporter of political dissidents, particularly those of Iranian nationality. In June 2008, he personally purchased the plane ticket to transfer Iranian student activist, Ahmad Batebi
, from Erbil, Iraq, to Washington DC, where Batebi was escorted by NSC
officials from his plane in Dulles International Airport to the custody of his lawyer, Lily Mazahery
.
has stated that "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
." While he acknowledges being paid by the SISMI
in 1980 for "risk assessment", Ledeen denies any connections with Licio Gelli
's masonic lodge. Ledeen told Vanity Fair
that he had been paid $10,000 by the SISMI in 1979 or 1980 for advising them on extradition
matters between Italy and the US. He denied having worked with [Francesco] Pazienza
or Propaganda Due as part of a disinformation scheme. "I knew Pazienza," he explained. "I didn't think P-2 existed. I thought it was all nonsense—typical Italian fantasy." Pazienza, while at SISMI, did help Ledeen obtaining a tape confirming information on "Billygate."
It was during this time in Italy that Ledeen supported the "Bulgarian connection" conspiracy theory
concerning Grey Wolves
member Mehmet Ali Ağca
's 1981 attempt to assassinate
Pope John Paul II
. The theory has since been attacked by various authors and journalists, including Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs, who initially believed the story. The theory was adopted in 2005 by the Italian Mitrokhin Commission
. According to Craig Unger, "With Ronald Reagan
newly installed in the White House, the so-called Bulgarian Connection made perfect Cold War
propaganda. Michael Ledeen was one of its most vocal proponents, promoting it on TV and in newspapers all over the world."
, author Claire Sterling
and former Newsweek
editor Arnaud de Borchgrave. Both Ledeen and de Borchgrave worked for the Center for Strategic and International Studies
at Georgetown University
at the time. All four testified that they believed the Soviet Union had provided for material support, training and inspiration for various terrorist groupings.
Ledeen was a strong proponent of the theories in the book The Terror Network
written by Claire Sterling
that held that the USSR was the source of much of the international terrorism in the world.
's Iran-Contra scandal. As a consultant of National Security Advisor
Robert C. McFarlane, Ledeen vouched for Iranian intermediary Manucher Ghorbanifar
. In addition, he met with Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres
, officials of the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the Central Intelligence Agency
(CIA) to arrange meetings with high-ranking Iran
ian officials as well as the much-criticized weapons-for-hostages deal with Iran. Ledeen's own version of the events is published in his book, Perilous Statecraft.
had bought yellowcake
in Niger
.
According to a September 2004 article by Joshua Micah Marshall, Laura Rozen, and Paul Glastris
in Washington Monthly:
In 2005, Vincent Cannistraro
, former head of counterterrorism operations at the CIA and the intelligence director at the National Security Council
under Ronald Reagan
, when asked by Ian Masters
if Ledeen was the source of the forged memo, replied, "You'd be very close." However, just moments earlier when asked, "Do we know who produced those documents?" Cannistraro stated, " I’d rather not speak about it right now, because I don’t think it’s a proven case"
Former CIA counter-terrorism officer Philip Giraldi
, who is Cannistraro's business partner and a columnist for The American Conservative
, a paleoconservative magazine,
said in an interview on July 26, 2005 that the forgeries were produced by "a couple of former CIA officers who are familiar with that part of the world who are associated with a certain well-known neoconservative who has close connections with Italy" and went on to confirm that he was referring to Ledeen. Giraldi added that the ex-CIA officers "also had some equity interests, shall we say, with the operation. A lot of these people are in consulting positions, and they get various, shall we say, emoluments in overseas accounts, and that kind of thing."
Giraldi more recently stated in The American Conservative:
Andrew McCarthy
and Mark R. Levin
have defended Ledeen, writing
in Iraq
, in 2002 Ledeen criticized the views of former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft
, writing:
Ledeen specifically called for the deposition of Saddam Hussein's regime by force in 2002:
and:
Ledeen's statements prior to the start of the Iraq war such as "desperately needed and long overdue war against Saddam Hussein" and "dire need to invade Iraq" make his later statement that he "opposed the military invasion of Iraq before it took place" to be an "outright lie" to Glenn Greenwald
. However, Ledeen maintains these statements are consistent since: "I advocated—as I still do—support for political revolution in Iran as the logical and necessary first step in the war against the terror masters."
. The New York Times
describes Ledeen's views as "everything traces back to Tehran". Ledeen's phrase, "faster, please" has become a signature meme
in Ledeen's writings (it is currently the title of his blog on the Pajamas Media
website) and is often referenced by neoconservative writers advocating a more forceful and broader war on terror
. In 1979, Ledeen was one of the first Western writers to argue 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 women would be deprived of political and social rights. He presently believes that "No one in the West has yet supported Iranian democratic organizations" and that "aggressive support for those Iranians who wish to be free" would most likely work in ending the clerical government.
According to Justin Raimondo
, Ledeen "holds up Bill Clinton
and Madeleine Albright
as patsies for Khomeini—who supposedly believed that the Ayatollah overthrew Shah Reza Pahlavi
because the Iranian government was 'excessively repressive and intolerant.' While it would not do to come right out and deny the savagery of the Shah’s legendary SAVAK
secret police, Ledeen informs us that, under the monarch’s beneficent rule, 'Iran had become too modern, too tolerant—especially of women and of other religious faiths—and too self-indulgent. The shah had Westernized Iran'—except, perhaps, in his prisons, where the ancient methods of torture were routinely employed on dissidents of all sorts."
Ledeen is currently against both an invasion of Iran or air-strikes within the country. He has argued that the latter may eventually become necessary if negotiations with the Iranian government fail, but it would only be the least bad option of many options and it would lead to many negative unforeseen consequences
. The New York Times
has called Ledeen's skepticism towards military action against Iran surprising given his opposition to the regime. In October 2007, Ledeen argued that:
in Iraq and even supported the al-Qaida network formerly led by al-Zarqawi despite its declaration of jihad
against Shi'ite Muslims. He claimed that German and Italian court documents showed Zarqawi created a European terrorist network while based in Tehran.
Ledeen was a board member of the "Coalition for Democracy in Iran" (CDI), founded by Morris Amitay, a former Executive Director of American Israel Public Affairs Committee
(AIPAC). Ledeen had also been part of the board of the U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon. According to the Washington Post, quoted by Asia Times
, he was the only full-time international affairs analyst regularly consulted by Karl Rove
, George W. Bush
's closest advisor
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." See also: Eurabia (conspiracy theory)
Jonah Goldberg
, Ledeen's colleague at National Review
, coined the term "Ledeen Doctrine" in a 2002 column. This tongue-in-cheek "doctrine" is usually summarized as "Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business," which Goldberg remembered Ledeen saying in an early 1990s speech.
has taken Ledeen to task for what Greenwald calls his history of false statements and inaccurate predictions, calling him "one of the most dishonest and ludicrous jokes on the political scene."
Writing in The Nation
, Jack Huberman, who describes Ledeen as "the most influential and unabashed warmonger of our time", attributes these quotes to Ledeen:
The Buchananite
journal, The American Conservative
has claimed that Ledeen had strong sympathies for Italian fascism
and that "Ledeen’s careful distinction between fascist 'regime' and 'movement' makes him a clear apologist for the latter." Ledeen is also scrutinized with some regularity at Antiwar.com
, particularly by Justin Raimondo
.
According to Christopher de Bellaigue
of the New York Review of Books, Ledeen has purveyed a "distorted analysis of events in Iran" to his readers, claiming, for example, in National Review
online that there were `something like a half a million` Iranians demonstrating the death sentence of Hashem Aghajari
on November 22, 2002 when in fact Bellaigue, in Iran on that date, observed only about 5000 students in the biggest demonstration.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
specialist on foreign policy. His research areas have included state sponsors of terrorism, Iran, the Middle East, Europe (Italy), U.S.-China relations, intelligence, and Africa (Mozambique, South Africa, and Zimbabwe) and is a leading neoconservative
Neoconservatism
Neoconservatism in the United States is a branch of American conservatism. Since 2001, neoconservatism has been associated with democracy promotion, that is with assisting movements for democracy, in some cases by economic sanctions or military action....
. He is a former consultant to the United States National Security Council
United States National Security Council
The White House National Security Council in the United States is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the...
, the United States Department of State
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...
, and the United States Department of Defense
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...
. He has also served as a special adviser to the United States Secretary of State
United States Secretary of State
The United States Secretary of State is the head of the United States Department of State, concerned with foreign affairs. The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet and the highest-ranking cabinet secretary both in line of succession and order of precedence...
. He held the Freedom Scholar chair at the American Enterprise Institute
American Enterprise Institute
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is a conservative think tank founded in 1943. Its stated mission is "to defend the principles and improve the institutions of American freedom and democratic capitalism—limited government, private enterprise, individual liberty and...
where he was a scholar for twenty years and now holds the similarly named chair at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies describes itself as a non-profit, non-partisan policy institute "working to defend free nations against their enemies". It was founded shortly after the September 11, 2001, attacks to address what it regards as the "threat facing America, Israel and the...
. He is a contributing editor to National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
, contributes to the Wall Street Journal, and regularly appears on Fox News and on a variety of radio talk shows. He has been on PBS's NewsHour
The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
PBS NewsHour is an evening television news program broadcast weeknights on the Public Broadcasting Service in the United States. The show is produced by MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, a company co-owned by former anchors Jim Lehrer and Robert MacNeil, and Liberty Media, which owns a 65% stake in the...
and CNN's Larry King Live
Larry King Live
Larry King Live is an American talk show hosted by Larry King on CNN from 1985 to 2010. It was CNN's most watched and longest-running program, with over one million viewers nightly....
, among others. He is a founding member of Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
The Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit think-tank focusing on issues of United States and Israel in national security. JINSA's stated aim is threefold: to ensure a strong and effective U.S...
and serves on their Board of Advisers.
In 1974, Michael Ledeen moved to Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
where he studied the history of Italian Fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
. In 1977, he went to Washington to join the Center for Strategic and International Studies
Center for Strategic and International Studies
The Center for Strategic and International Studies is a bipartisan Washington, D.C., foreign policy think tank. The center was founded in 1962 by Admiral Arleigh Burke and Ambassador David Manker Abshire, originally as part of Georgetown University...
(CSIS) (then affiliated with Georgetown University
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
). He continues to visit Italy frequently.
In 1980, Ledeen worked for the Italian military intelligence service
SISMI
Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare was the military intelligence agency of Italy from 1977-2007....
as a "risk assessment" consultant. In 1981, Michael Ledeen then became Special Adviser to secretary of state Alexander Haig
Alexander Haig
Alexander Meigs Haig, Jr. was a United States Army general who served as the United States Secretary of State under President Ronald Reagan and White House Chief of Staff under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford...
.
Academic and political career
Ledeen holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin–MadisonUniversity of Wisconsin–Madison
The University of Wisconsin–Madison is a public research university located in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1848, UW–Madison is the flagship campus of the University of Wisconsin System. It became a land-grant institution in 1866...
, where he specialized in Modern Europe. At Washington University in St. Louis
Washington University in St. Louis
Washington University in St. Louis is a private research university located in suburban St. Louis, Missouri. Founded in 1853, and named for George Washington, the university has students and faculty from all fifty U.S. states and more than 110 nations...
, Ledeen was denied tenure, according to history department faculty interviewed by the Washington Post, because of questions regarding the "quality of his scholarship" and about whether Ledeen had "used the work of somebody else without proper credit". One faculty member said "the 'quasi-irregularity' at issue didn't warrant the negative vote on tenure for Ledeen".
Ledeen was subsequently named Visiting Professor at the University of Rome. One of Ledeen's principal mentors was the Jewish German-born historian George Mosse
George Mosse
George Lachmann Mosse was a German-born American social and cultural historian. Mosse authored 25 books on a variety of fields, from English constitutional law, Lutheran theology, to the history of fascism, Jewish history, and the history of masculinity...
, 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
Renzo De Felice
Renzo De Felice was an Italian historian, who specialized in the Fascist era.-Biography:He was born in Rieti and studied under Federico Chabod and Delio Cantimori at the University of Naples. During his time as student, De Felice was a member of the Italian Communist Party...
. Ledeen held political views which stress "the urgency of combating centralized state power and the centrality of human freedom" that are said to have influenced or inspired the Bush administration.
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 dissertation, was the first work to explore Italian leader Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
's efforts to create a Fascist international in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Ledeen follows Italian historian Renzo de Felice in drawing a distinction between "fascism-regime" and "fascism-movement", and seems to approve of at least one aspect of the latter, saying "fascism nevertheless constituted a political revolution in Italy. For the first time, there was an attempt to mobilize the masses and to involve them in the political life of the country", and describing the fascist state as "a generator of energy and creativity". Ledeen continued his studies in Italian Fascism with a study of the takeover of Fiume
Italian Regency of Carnaro
The Italian Regency of Carnaro was a self-proclaimed state in the city of Fiume led by Gabriele d'Annunzio between 1919 and 1920.-Impresa di Fiume:...
by Italian irredentist forces under Gabriele d'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...
, who Ledeen argued was the proto-type for Mussolini.
Ledeen is a strong admirer of Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was an Italian historian, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence during the Renaissance. He is one of the main founders of modern political science. He was a diplomat, political philosopher, playwright, and a civil servant of the Florentine Republic...
, whom he regards as one of the greatest political thinkers. In Ledeen's view, Machiavelli combined democratic idealism and the necessary political realism to secure and defend idealism in perfect measure.
In 1980, in the period leading up to the U.S. presidential elections, Ledeen, along with Arnaud de Borchgrave
Arnaud de Borchgrave
Arnaud de Borchgrave is an American journalist who specializes in international politics.Born in Belgium to Audrey Dorothy Louise Townshend, daughter of Major General Sir Charles Vere Ferrers Townshend, and Belgian count Baudouin de Borchgrave d’Altena , head of Belgium's military intelligence...
, wrote a series of articles published in The New Republic
The New Republic
The magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
and elsewhere about Billy Carter
Billy Carter
William Alton "Billy" Carter III was an American businessman who promoted Billy Beer, was a candidate for Mayor of Plains, Georgia, and was the younger brother of United States President Jimmy Carter.-Early years:...
's contacts with the Muammar al-Gaddafi
Muammar al-Gaddafi
Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar Gaddafi or "September 1942" 20 October 2011), commonly known as Muammar Gaddafi or Colonel Gaddafi, was the official ruler of the Libyan Arab Republic from 1969 to 1977 and then the "Brother Leader" of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya from 1977 to 2011.He seized power in a...
regime in Libya
Libya
Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
.
Ledeen has been a long time and active supporter of political dissidents, particularly those of Iranian nationality. In June 2008, he personally purchased the plane ticket to transfer Iranian student activist, Ahmad Batebi
Ahmad Batebi
Ahmad Batebi is a former prisoner of conscience. During his studies at the University of Tehran he gained international fame for his appearance on the July 17, 1999 cover of The Economist magazine, holding up a shirt splattered with the blood of a fellow protester.The photo, which has been called...
, from Erbil, Iraq, to Washington DC, where Batebi was escorted by NSC
NSC
NSC is a three-letter acronym that may refer to:* National Safety Council, an American nonprofit organization* National Salvation Committee, a Ukrainian organization founded during the Orange Revolution...
officials from his plane in Dulles International Airport to the custody of his lawyer, Lily Mazahery
Lily Mazahery
Lily Mazahery is an Iranian-American lawyer, human rights activist, and an expert source on Iran. She is principal of and the founder and president of , an international non-governmental organization .-Overview:...
.
Italy
Ledeen has been accused of associations with shady organizations. For example, Jim LobeJim Lobe
James R. Lobe is an American journalist and the Washington Bureau Chief of the international news agency Inter Press Service. He has also written for Foreign Policy In Focus, Oneworld.net, Alternet, TomPaine.com, Asia Times, and other internet news publications. Lobe is best known for his...
has stated that "Ledeen's right-wing Italian connections—including alleged ties to the P2 masonic lodge
Propaganda Due
Propaganda Due , or P2, was a Masonic lodge operating under the jurisdiction of the Grand Orient of Italy from 1945 to 1976 , and a pseudo-Masonic or "black" or "covert" lodge operating illegally from 1976 to...
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
Alexander Haig
Alexander Meigs Haig, Jr. was a United States Army general who served as the United States Secretary of State under President Ronald Reagan and White House Chief of Staff under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford...
." While he acknowledges being paid by the SISMI
SISMI
Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare was the military intelligence agency of Italy from 1977-2007....
in 1980 for "risk assessment", Ledeen denies any connections with Licio Gelli
Licio Gelli
Licio Gelli is an Italian financier, chiefly known for his role in the Banco Ambrosiano scandal. He was revealed in 1981 as being the Venerable Master of the clandestine Masonic lodge Propaganda Due...
's masonic lodge. Ledeen told Vanity Fair
Vanity Fair (magazine)
Vanity Fair is a magazine of pop culture, fashion, and current affairs published by Condé Nast. The present Vanity Fair has been published since 1983 and there have been editions for four European countries as well as the U.S. edition. This revived the title which had ceased publication in 1935...
that he had been paid $10,000 by the SISMI in 1979 or 1980 for advising them on extradition
Extradition
Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...
matters between Italy and the US. He denied having worked with [Francesco] Pazienza
Francesco Pazienza
Francesco Pazienza is an Italian businessman, and former officer of the Italian military intelligence agency, SISMI. As of April 2007, he has been paroled to the community of Lerici, after serving many years in prison, including a 1993 conviction due to his role in the Banco Ambrosiano scandal,...
or Propaganda Due as part of a disinformation scheme. "I knew Pazienza," he explained. "I didn't think P-2 existed. I thought it was all nonsense—typical Italian fantasy." Pazienza, while at SISMI, did help Ledeen obtaining a tape confirming information on "Billygate."
It was during this time in Italy that Ledeen supported the "Bulgarian connection" conspiracy theory
Conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory explains an event as being the result of an alleged plot by a covert group or organization or, more broadly, the idea that important political, social or economic events are the products of secret plots that are largely unknown to the general public.-Usage:The term "conspiracy...
concerning Grey Wolves
Grey Wolves
The Idealist Youth , commonly known as Grey Wolves , is an ultra-nationalist neo-fascist youth organization. It is accused of terrorism. According to Turkish authorities, the organization carried out 694 murders between 1974–1980.-Name:...
member Mehmet Ali Ağca
Mehmet Ali Agca
Mehmet Ali Ağca is a Turkish assassin who murdered left-wing journalist Abdi İpekçi on February 1, 1979 and later shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981, after escaping from a Turkish prison. After serving 19 years of imprisonment in Italy, he was deported to Turkey, where he served a...
's 1981 attempt to assassinate
1981 Pope John Paul II assassination attempt
The first attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II took place on Wednesday, May 13, 1981, in St. Peter's Square at Vatican City. The Pope was shot and critically wounded by Mehmet Ali Ağca while he was entering the square. The Pope was struck 4 times, and suffered severe blood loss. Ağca was...
Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II
Blessed Pope John Paul II , born Karol Józef Wojtyła , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church and Sovereign of Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death on 2 April 2005, at of age. His was the second-longest documented pontificate, which lasted ; only Pope Pius IX ...
. The theory has since been attacked by various authors and journalists, including Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs, who initially believed the story. The theory was adopted in 2005 by the Italian Mitrokhin Commission
Italian Mitrokhin Commission
The Mitrokhin Commission was a parliamentary commission set up in 2002 by the Italian Parliament, then led by Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing coalition, the Casa delle Libertà, and presided by senator Paolo Guzzanti...
. According to Craig Unger, "With Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
newly installed in the White House, the so-called Bulgarian Connection made perfect Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
propaganda. Michael Ledeen was one of its most vocal proponents, promoting it on TV and in newspapers all over the world."
Consultant on terrorism
In the early 1980s, Ledeen appeared before the newly established Senate Subcommittee on Security and Terrorism, alongside former CIA director William ColbyWilliam Colby
William Egan Colby spent a career in intelligence for the United States, culminating in holding the post of Director of Central Intelligence from September 1973, to January 1976....
, author Claire Sterling
Claire Sterling
Claire Sterling was an American author and journalist whose work focused on crime, political assassination, and terrorism...
and former Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
editor Arnaud de Borchgrave. Both Ledeen and de Borchgrave worked for the Center for Strategic and International Studies
Center for Strategic and International Studies
The Center for Strategic and International Studies is a bipartisan Washington, D.C., foreign policy think tank. The center was founded in 1962 by Admiral Arleigh Burke and Ambassador David Manker Abshire, originally as part of Georgetown University...
at Georgetown University
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
at the time. All four testified that they believed the Soviet Union had provided for material support, training and inspiration for various terrorist groupings.
Ledeen was a strong proponent of the theories in the book The Terror Network
The Terror Network
The Terror Network was a 1981 book by Claire Sterling which argued that the USSR was using terrorists as a proxy force.In part because of the book, CIA director William J. Casey commissioned a Special National Intelligence Estimate on Soviet support for terrorism...
written by Claire Sterling
Claire Sterling
Claire Sterling was an American author and journalist whose work focused on crime, political assassination, and terrorism...
that held that the USSR was the source of much of the international terrorism in the world.
The Iran-Contra scandal
Ledeen was involved in the Reagan administrationRonald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
's Iran-Contra scandal. As a consultant of National Security Advisor
National Security Advisor (United States)
The Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, commonly referred to as the National Security Advisor , serves as the chief advisor to the President of the United States on national security issues...
Robert C. McFarlane, Ledeen vouched for Iranian intermediary Manucher Ghorbanifar
Manucher Ghorbanifar
Manucher Ghorbanifar is an expatriate Iranian arms dealer. He is best known as a middleman in the Iran-Contra Affair during the Ronald Reagan presidency. He re-emerged in American politics during the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq during the first term of President George W...
. In addition, he met with Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres
Shimon Peres
GCMG is the ninth President of the State of Israel. Peres served twice as the eighth Prime Minister of Israel and once as Interim Prime Minister, and has been a member of 12 cabinets in a political career spanning over 66 years...
, officials of the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the Central Intelligence Agency
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...
(CIA) to arrange meetings with high-ranking Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
ian officials as well as the much-criticized weapons-for-hostages deal with Iran. Ledeen's own version of the events is published in his book, Perilous Statecraft.
Yellowcake forgery allegations
Ledeen has been accused of being involved in the forgery which claimed that Saddam HusseinSaddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
had bought yellowcake
Yellowcake
Yellowcake is a kind of uranium concentrate powder obtained from leach solutions, in an intermediate step in the processing of uranium ores. Yellowcake concentrates are prepared by various extraction and refining methods, depending on the types of ores...
in Niger
Niger
Niger , officially named the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. It borders Nigeria and Benin to the south, Burkina Faso and Mali to the west, Algeria and Libya to the north and Chad to the east...
.
According to a September 2004 article by Joshua Micah Marshall, Laura Rozen, and Paul Glastris
Paul Glastris
Paul Glastris is an American journalist and political columnist. Glastris is the current editor in chief of The Washington Monthly and was President Bill Clinton's chief speechwriter from September 1998 to the end of his presidency in early 2001. Before 1998, Glastris was a correspondent for U.S....
in Washington Monthly:
- "The first meeting occurred in Rome in December, 2001. It included Franklin, Rhode, and another American, the neoconservative writer and operative Michael Ledeen, who organized the meeting. (According to UPI, Ledeen was then working for Undersecretary of Defense Douglas FeithDouglas FeithDouglas J. Feith served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy for United States President George W. Bush from July 2001 until August 2005. His official responsibilities included the formulation of defense planning guidance and forces policy, United States Department of Defense relations...
as a consultant.) Also in attendance was Ghorbanifar and a number of other Iranians.
In 2005, Vincent Cannistraro
Vincent Cannistraro
Vincent Cannistraro was Director of Intelligence Programs for the United States National Security Council from 1984 to 1987; Special assistant for Intelligence in the Office of the Secretary of Defense until 1988; and Chief of Operations and Analysis at the Central Intelligence Agency's ...
, former head of counterterrorism operations at the CIA and the intelligence director at the National Security Council
United States National Security Council
The White House National Security Council in the United States is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the...
under Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
, when asked by Ian Masters
Ian Masters (broadcaster)
Ian Masters is a British television broadcaster, commentator, author, screenwriter and documentary filmmaker.Masters worked for the BBC for more than 25 years with the BBC, firstly presenting news and current affairs programmes...
if Ledeen was the source of the forged memo, replied, "You'd be very close." However, just moments earlier when asked, "Do we know who produced those documents?" Cannistraro stated, " I’d rather not speak about it right now, because I don’t think it’s a proven case"
Former CIA counter-terrorism officer Philip Giraldi
Philip Giraldi
Philip Giraldi is a former counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and a columnist and television commentator who is the Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a group that advocates for more even handed...
, who is Cannistraro's business partner and a columnist for The American Conservative
The American Conservative
The American Conservative is a monthly U.S. opinion magazine published by Ron Unz. Its first editor was Scott McConnell, his successors being Kara Hopkins and the present incumbent, Daniel McCarthy....
, a paleoconservative magazine,
said in an interview on July 26, 2005 that the forgeries were produced by "a couple of former CIA officers who are familiar with that part of the world who are associated with a certain well-known neoconservative who has close connections with Italy" and went on to confirm that he was referring to Ledeen. Giraldi added that the ex-CIA officers "also had some equity interests, shall we say, with the operation. A lot of these people are in consulting positions, and they get various, shall we say, emoluments in overseas accounts, and that kind of thing."
Giraldi more recently stated in The American Conservative:
- At this point, any American connection to the actual forgeries remains unsubstantiated, though the OSP at a minimum connived to circumvent established procedures to present the information directly to receptive policy makers in the White House. But if the OSP is more deeply involved, Michael Ledeen, who denies any connection with the Niger documents, would have been a logical intermediary in co-ordinating the falsification of the documents and their surfacing, as he was both a Pentagon contractor and was frequently in Italy. He could have easily been assisted by ex-CIA friends from Iran-Contra days, including a former Chief of Station from Rome, who, like Ledeen, was also a consultant for the Pentagon and the Iraqi National Congress. It would have been extremely convenient for the administration, struggling to explain why Iraq was a threat, to be able to produce information from an unimpeachable “foreign intelligence source” to confirm the Iraqi worst-case. The possible forgery of the information by Defense Department employees would explain the viciousness of the attack on Valerie Plame and her husband. Wilson, when he denounced the forgeries in the New York Times in July 2003, turned an issue in which there was little public interest into something much bigger. The investigation continues, but the campaign against this lone detractor suggests that the administration was concerned about something far weightier than his critical op-ed.
Andrew McCarthy
Andrew C. McCarthy
Andrew C. McCarthy III is a former Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. A Republican, he is most notable for leading the 1995 terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others. The defendants were convicted of the 1993 World Trade Center...
and Mark R. Levin
Mark Levin
Mark Reed Levin is a lawyer, author and the host of American syndicated radio show The Mark Levin Show. Levin served in the cabinet of President Ronald Reagan and was a chief of staff for Attorney General Edwin Meese...
have defended Ledeen, writing
- Up until now, the fiction recklessly spewed by disgruntled intelligence-community retirees and their media enablers—some of whom have conceded that the claim is based on zero evidence—has been that Michael had something to do with the forged Italian documents that, according to the Left’s narrative, were the basis for President Bush’s “lie” in the 2003 State of the Union Address that Saddam Hussein had obtained yellowcake uranium (for nuclear-weapons construction) in Africa.
Iraq War advocacy
Regarding regime changeRegime change
"Regime change" is the replacement of one regime with another. Use of the term dates to at least 1925.Regime change can occur through conquest by a foreign power, revolution, coup d'état or reconstruction following the failure of a state...
in Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
, in 2002 Ledeen criticized the views of former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft
Brent Scowcroft
Brent Scowcroft, KBE was the United States National Security Advisor under Presidents Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush and a Lieutenant General in the United States Air Force. He also served as Military Assistant to President Richard Nixon and as Deputy Assistant to the President for National...
, 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 cauldron 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.
Ledeen specifically called for the deposition of Saddam Hussein's regime by force in 2002:
- So it's good news when Scowcroft comes out against the desperately needed and long overdue war against Saddam Hussein and the rest of the terror masters.
and:
- Question #2: Okay, well if we are all so certain about the dire need to invade Iraq, then when do we do so?
- Ledeen: Yesterday
Ledeen's statements prior to the start of the Iraq war such as "desperately needed and long overdue war against Saddam Hussein" and "dire need to invade Iraq" make his later statement that he "opposed the military invasion of Iraq before it took place" to be an "outright lie" to Glenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald is an American lawyer, columnist, blogger, and author. Greenwald worked as a constitutional and civil rights litigator before becoming a contributor to Salon.com, where he focuses on political and legal topics...
. However, Ledeen maintains these statements are consistent since: "I advocated—as I still do—support for political revolution in Iran as the logical and necessary first step in the war against the terror masters."
Views on Iran
Although Ledeen was in favor of assisting anti-Saddam forces in Iraq short of an invasion, he also believes that Iran should have been the first priority in the war on terrorWar on Terror
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...
. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
describes Ledeen's views as "everything traces back to Tehran". Ledeen's phrase, "faster, please" has become a signature meme
Meme
A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena...
in Ledeen's writings (it is currently the title of his blog on the Pajamas Media
Pajamas Media
PJ Media is a media company that uses the Internet to present and comment on the news.Founded in 2004 by a network primarily, but not exclusively, made up of conservatives and libertarians led by mystery writer, screenwriter, and blogger Roger L...
website) and is often referenced by neoconservative writers advocating a more forceful and broader war on terror
War on Terror
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...
. In 1979, Ledeen was one of the first Western writers to argue that Ayatollah
Ayatollah
Ayatollah is a high ranking title given to Usuli Twelver Shī‘ah clerics. Those who carry the title are experts in Islamic studies such as jurisprudence, ethics, and philosophy and usually teach in Islamic seminaries. The next lower clerical rank is Hojatoleslam wal-muslemin...
Ruhollah Khomeini
Ruhollah Khomeini
Grand Ayatollah Sayyed Ruhollah Musavi Khomeini was an Iranian religious leader and politician, and leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution which saw the overthrow of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran...
was a "clerical fascist
Clerical fascism
Clerical fascism is an ideological construct that combines the political and economic doctrines of fascism with theology or religious tradition...
", 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 women would be deprived of political and social rights. He presently believes that "No one in the West has yet supported Iranian democratic organizations" and that "aggressive support for those Iranians who wish to be free" would most likely work in ending the clerical government.
According to Justin Raimondo
Justin Raimondo
Justin Raimondo is an American author and the editorial director of the website Antiwar.com. He describes himself as a "conservative-paleo-libertarian."-Background:...
, Ledeen "holds up Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
and Madeleine Albright
Madeleine Albright
Madeleine Korbelová Albright is the first woman to become a United States Secretary of State. She was appointed by U.S. President Bill Clinton on December 5, 1996, and was unanimously confirmed by a U.S. Senate vote of 99–0...
as patsies for Khomeini—who supposedly believed that the Ayatollah overthrew Shah Reza Pahlavi
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, Shah of Persia , ruled Iran from 16 September 1941 until his overthrow by the Iranian Revolution on 11 February 1979...
because the Iranian government was 'excessively repressive and intolerant.' While it would not do to come right out and deny the savagery of the Shah’s legendary SAVAK
SAVAK
SAVAK was the secret police, domestic security and intelligence service established by Iran's Mohammad Reza Shah on the recommendation of the British Government and with the help of the United States' Central Intelligence Agency SAVAK (Persian: ساواک, short for سازمان اطلاعات و امنیت کشور...
secret police, Ledeen informs us that, under the monarch’s beneficent rule, 'Iran had become too modern, too tolerant—especially of women and of other religious faiths—and too self-indulgent. The shah had Westernized Iran'—except, perhaps, in his prisons, where the ancient methods of torture were routinely employed on dissidents of all sorts."
Ledeen is currently against both an invasion of Iran or air-strikes within the country. He has argued that the latter may eventually become necessary if negotiations with the Iranian government fail, but it would only be the least bad option of many options and it would lead to many negative unforeseen consequences
Blowback (intelligence)
Blowback is the espionage term for the violent, unintended consequences of a covert operation that are suffered by the civil population of the aggressor government...
. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
has called Ledeen's skepticism towards military action against Iran surprising given his opposition to the regime. In October 2007, Ledeen argued that:
- "Those who believe that I am part of some “hawkish gang” just haven’t noticed that I am opposed to invasion or bombing the nuclear facilities. My fear is that, by failing to promote a non-violent democratization of Iran, we make large-scale violence much more likely."
- "In any event, time will tell, and I share the fear of most commenters [sic] that we will indeed arrive at a horrible choice between Iran with the bomb, or bomb Iran, as Sarkozy and Kouchner have put it. And if that happens, it will demonstrate a terrible failure on the part of the West, including the United States, to craft a serious Iran policy lo these many years."
Controversial theories
Ledeen also believed that Iran is the main backer of the insurgencyInsurgency
An insurgency is an armed rebellion against a constituted authority when those taking part in the rebellion are not recognized as belligerents...
in Iraq and even supported the al-Qaida network formerly led by al-Zarqawi despite its declaration of jihad
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...
against Shi'ite Muslims. He claimed that German and Italian court documents showed Zarqawi created a European terrorist network while based in Tehran.
Ledeen was a board member of the "Coalition for Democracy in Iran" (CDI), founded by Morris Amitay, a former Executive Director of American Israel Public Affairs Committee
American Israel Public Affairs Committee
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is a lobbying group that advocates pro-Israel policies to the Congress and Executive Branch of the United States...
(AIPAC). Ledeen had also been part of the board of the U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon. According to the Washington Post, quoted by Asia Times
Asia Times
Asia Times was a newspaper launched in Thailand by Thai tycoon Sondhi Limthongkul in 1995. The newspaper hired talent from around the world to produce a regional English-language newspaper....
, he was the only full-time international affairs analyst regularly consulted by Karl Rove
Karl Rove
Karl Christian Rove was Senior Advisor and Deputy Chief of Staff to former President George W. Bush until Rove's resignation on August 31, 2007. He has headed the Office of Political Affairs, the Office of Public Liaison, and the White House Office of Strategic Initiatives...
, George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
's closest advisor
In a 2003 column entitled "A Theory," Ledeen outlined a possibility that France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, 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." See also: Eurabia (conspiracy theory)
Jonah Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Jonah Jacob Goldberg is an American conservative syndicated columnist and author. Goldberg is known for his contributions on politics and culture to , of which he is editor-at-large...
, Ledeen's colleague at National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
, coined the term "Ledeen Doctrine" in a 2002 column. This tongue-in-cheek "doctrine" is usually summarized as "Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business," which Goldberg remembered Ledeen saying in an early 1990s speech.
Criticism
Blogger Glenn GreenwaldGlenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald is an American lawyer, columnist, blogger, and author. Greenwald worked as a constitutional and civil rights litigator before becoming a contributor to Salon.com, where he focuses on political and legal topics...
has taken Ledeen to task for what Greenwald calls his history of false statements and inaccurate predictions, calling him "one of the most dishonest and ludicrous jokes on the political scene."
Writing in The Nation
The Nation
The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...
, Jack Huberman, who describes Ledeen as "the most influential and unabashed warmonger of our time", attributes these quotes to Ledeen:
- "the level of casualties (in IraqIraqIraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
) is secondary" - "we are a warlike people (Americans)...we love war"
- "Change—above all violent change—is the essence of human history"
- "the only way to achieve peace is through total war"
- "The purpose of total war is to permanently force your will onto another people"
- "Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business"
The Buchananite
Pat Buchanan
Patrick Joseph "Pat" Buchanan is an American paleoconservative political commentator, author, syndicated columnist, politician and broadcaster. Buchanan was a senior adviser to American Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan, and was an original host on CNN's Crossfire. He sought...
journal, The American Conservative
The American Conservative
The American Conservative is a monthly U.S. opinion magazine published by Ron Unz. Its first editor was Scott McConnell, his successors being Kara Hopkins and the present incumbent, Daniel McCarthy....
has claimed that Ledeen had strong sympathies for Italian fascism
Italian Fascism
Italian Fascism also known as Fascism with a capital "F" refers to the original fascist ideology in Italy. This ideology is associated with the National Fascist Party which under Benito Mussolini ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, the Republican Fascist Party which ruled the Italian...
and that "Ledeen’s careful distinction between fascist 'regime' and 'movement' makes him a clear apologist for the latter." Ledeen is also scrutinized with some regularity at Antiwar.com
Antiwar.com
Antiwar.com is a website devoted to opposing aggressive war, imperialism, and assaults on freedom associated with both. The editors describe their politics as libertarian. Their stated motiviation is, "to show how the imperialistic tendencies of the American government lead to a loss of civil...
, particularly by Justin Raimondo
Justin Raimondo
Justin Raimondo is an American author and the editorial director of the website Antiwar.com. He describes himself as a "conservative-paleo-libertarian."-Background:...
.
According to Christopher de Bellaigue
Christopher de Bellaigue
Christopher de Bellaigue is a journalist who has worked on the Middle East and South Asia since 1994. His work mostly chronicles developments in Iran and Turkey....
of the New York Review of Books, Ledeen has purveyed a "distorted analysis of events in Iran" to his readers, claiming, for example, in National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
online that there were `something like a half a million` Iranians demonstrating the death sentence of Hashem Aghajari
Hashem Aghajari
Hashem Aghajari also Seyyed Hashem Aghajari is an Iranian historian, university professor and a critic of the Islamic Republic's government who was sentenced to death in 2002 for apostasy for a speech he gave on Islam urging Iranians to "not blindly follow" Islamic clerics...
on November 22, 2002 when in fact Bellaigue, in Iran on that date, observed only about 5000 students in the biggest demonstration.
Personal life
Ledeen is married to his second wife, Barbara. His first wife was Jenny Ledeen of St. Louis, Mo. Ledeen has three children: Simone, Gabriel, and Daniel. Simone has worked both in Iraq and Afghanistan for the Department of Defense; Gabriel is currently a Lieutenant in the United States Marines Corps serving his second tour in Iraq; and Daniel is currently serving a Lieutenant in the USMC.Quotations
External links
- Profile at International Analyst Network
- Biography at National Review Online
- Michael Ledeen Archive, National Review Online
- Interview with Ledeen, Front Page Magazine, conducted by Jamie Glazov, 30 December 2003.
- Michael Ledeen Timeline, Center for Cooperative Research.