10 mars 2003 — Richard Perle, dont on parle beaucoup et dont on sait pas mal (voir notamment sur ce site, un portrait de Perle<\/a> et des articles sur lui<\/a>), se fait un honneur d’\u00eatre un homme discret, — un honneur et un avantage. C’est aussi un homme d’une influence exceptionnelle au sein de l’administration GW, par l’interm\u00e9diaire de sa fonction de pr\u00e9sident du Defense Policy Board (DPB), groupe influent de consultants ext\u00e9rieurs travaillant pour le Pentagone et conseillant l’administration sur sa politique de s\u00e9curit\u00e9 nationale ; au travers du DPB, Perle, un des leaders des n\u00e9o-conservateurs, fait transiter son exceptionnelle influence.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Ce week-end, l’honneur et l’avantage de Perle, c’est-\u00e0-dire son goût de la discr\u00e9tion, ont \u00e9t\u00e9 mis \u00e0 rude \u00e9preuve.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n • Un article<\/a> du New Yorker<\/em> du fameux reporter Seymour Hersh, d\u00e9veloppe plusieurs faits troublants qui tendraient \u00e0 impliquer Perle dans plusieurs investissements qui profitent manifestement de sa position de puissance et d’influence au sein de l’administration GW. Dans l’article de Hersh, on retrouve Perle dans des tractations avec l’homme d’affaire iranien Khashoggi (notamment au cours d’un d\u00e9jeuner \u00e0 Marseille le 3 janvier, Perle ayant une villa dans le Sud de la France et Khashoggi un appartement \u00e0 Cannes) ; Perle envisageant de monter des soci\u00e9t\u00e9s pouvant profiter des opportunit\u00e9s \u00e9conomiques en Irak, apr\u00e8s l’invasion ; Perle ayant d’ores et d\u00e9j\u00e0 investi dans certaines soci\u00e9t\u00e9s, au sein du groupe d’investissement Trireme Partners, où l’on retrouve Henry Kissinger et Gerald Hillman, qui font partie du DPB de Perle ; — doit-on ajouter : et ainsi de suite… ? Ci-apr\u00e8s, quelques paragraphes de l’article de Hersh.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n « Khashoggi is still brokering. In January of this year, he arranged a private lunch, in France, to bring together Harb Saleh al-Zuhair, a Saudi industrialist whose family fortune includes extensive holdings in construction, electronics, and engineering companies throughout the Middle East, and Richard N. Perle, the chairman of the Defense Policy Board, who is one of the most outspoken and influential American advocates of war with Iraq.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n (…)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Perle is also a managing partner in a venture-capital company called Trireme Partners L.P., which was registered in November, 2001, in Delaware. Trireme’s main business, according to a two-page letter that one of its representatives sent to Khashoggi last November, is to invest in companies dealing in technology, goods, and services that are of value to homeland security and defense. The letter argued that the fear of terrorism would increase the demand for such products in Europe and in countries like Saudi Arabia and Singapore.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » The letter mentioned the firm’s government connections prominently: \u00ab\u00a0Three of Trireme’s Management Group members currently advise the U.S. Secretary of Defense by serving on the U.S. Defense Policy Board, and one of Trireme’s principals, Richard Perle, is chairman of that Board.\u00a0\u00bb The two other policy-board members associated with Trireme are Henry Kissinger, the former Secretary of State (who is, in fact, only a member of Trireme’s advisory group and is not involved in its management), and Gerald Hillman, an investor and a close business associate of Perle’s who handles matters in Trireme’s New York office. The letter said that forty-five million dollars had already been raised, including twenty million dollars from Boeing; the purpose, clearly, was to attract more investors, such as Khashoggi and Zuhair.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n (…)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Four members of the Defense Policy Board told me that the board, which met most recently on February 27th and 28th, had not been informed of Perle’s involvement in Trireme. One board member, upon being told of Trireme and Perle’s meeting with Khashoggi, exclaimed, \u00ab\u00a0Oh, get out of here. He’s the chairman! If you had a story about me setting up a company for homeland security, and I’ve put people on the board with whom I’m doing that business, I’d be had\u00a0\u00bb—a reference to Gerald Hillman, who had almost no senior policy or military experience in government before being offered a post on the policy board. \u00ab\u00a0Seems to me this is at the edge of or off the ethical charts. I think it would stink to high heaven.\u00a0\u00bb<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Hillman, a former McKinsey consultant, stunned at least one board member at the February meeting when he raised questions about the validity of Iraq’s existing oil contracts. \u00ab\u00a0Hillman said the old contracts are bad news; he said we should kick out the Russians and the French,\u00a0\u00bb the board member told me. \u00ab\u00a0This was a serious conversation. We’d become the brokers. Then we’d be selling futures in the Iraqi oil company. I said to myself, ‘Oh, man. Don’t go down that road.'\u00a0\u00bb Hillman denies making such statements at the meeting.<\/em> »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n • Interrog\u00e9 sur ces all\u00e9gations dans l’\u00e9mission de la CNN Late Edition de Wolf Blitzer, le 9 mars,<\/a> Perle a r\u00e9agi avec une violence extr\u00eame, accusant Hersh d’\u00eatre un terroriste. L’accusation a laiss\u00e9 Blitzer pantois. Ci-dessous, le passage de l’\u00e9mission sur ce point pr\u00e9cis :<\/p>\n<\/p>\n « BLITZER<\/em><\/strong> : All right. Tom, hold on a minute. You know, we are basically all out of time for this segment. But before you go, Richard, I want to give you a chance to respond.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » There’s an article in the New Yorker magazine by Seymour Hersh that’s just coming out today in which he makes a serious accusation against you that you have a conflict of interest in this because you’re involved in some business that deals with homeland security, you potentially could make some money if, in fact, there is this kind of climate that he accuses you of proposing.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Let me read a quote from the New Yorker article, the March 17th issue, just out now. \u00a0\u00bbThere is no question that Perle believes that removing Saddam from power is the right thing to do. At the same time, he has set up a company that may gain from a war.\u00a0\u00bb<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » PERLE<\/em><\/strong> : I don’t believe that a company would gain from a war. On the contrary, I believe that the successful removal of Saddam Hussein, and I’ve said this over and over again, will diminish the threat of terrorism. And what he’s talking about is investments in homeland defense, which I think are vital and are necessary.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Look, Sy Hersh is the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist, frankly.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » BLITZER<\/em><\/strong> : Well, on the basis of — why do you say that? A terrorist?<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » PERLE<\/em><\/strong> : Because he’s widely irresponsible. If you read the article, it’s first of all, impossible to find any consistent theme in it. But the suggestion that my views are somehow related for the potential for investments in homeland defense is complete nonsense.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » BLITZER<\/em><\/strong> : But I don’t understand. Why do you accuse him of being a terrorist?<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » PERLE<\/em><\/strong> : Because he sets out to do damage and he will do it by whatever innuendo, whatever distortion he can — look, he hasn’t written a serious piece since My Lai.<\/em> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n » BLITZER<\/em><\/strong> : All right. We’re going to leave it right there. Richard Perle, thank you very much.<\/em> »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Les r\u00e9actions de Richard Perle face \u00e0 Blitzer constituent une bonne mesure de la g\u00eane où le met l’enqu\u00eate de Seymour Hersh. Il n’est pas question ici de se demander si Perle peut \u00eatre inqui\u00e9t\u00e9 pour \u00ab\u00a0conflit d’int\u00e9r\u00eat\u00a0\u00bb ou toute autre appr\u00e9ciation \u00e9thique, mais de constater combien cette situation fait naître les plus grands doutes sur la substance et les fondements de la politique extr\u00e9miste qu’il pr\u00e9conise et qui est effectivement suivie par les États-Unis, et sur le point de pr\u00e9cipiter une guerre, peut-\u00eatre de graves d\u00e9sordres, etc.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Ces interventions confirment de fa\u00e7on troublante une dimension nouvelle qu’on ne cesse de voir se dessiner plus pr\u00e9cis\u00e9ment : la dimension affairiste de la politique de s\u00e9curit\u00e9 nationale US, et la proximit\u00e9 de plus en plus grande de cette dimension avec l’id\u00e9ologie extr\u00e9miste (n\u00e9o-conservatrice). Un personnage comme Bruce K. Jackson (on a d\u00e9j\u00e0 beaucoup parl\u00e9 de BKJ sur ce site<\/a>) s’av\u00e8re finalement extr\u00eamement proche d’un personnage comme Richard Perle, autant par l’activit\u00e9 id\u00e9ologique que par l’activit\u00e9 de lobbying, et par l’activit\u00e9 affairiste tout simplement. On a confirmation de la proximit\u00e9 \u00e9galement tr\u00e8s grande, aujourd’hui, du business<\/em>, de la politique et de l’id\u00e9ologie aux USA, — et non pas, selon le sch\u00e9ma classique du business<\/em> manipulant ou finan\u00e7ant l’id\u00e9ologie et la politique, mais du business<\/em> faisant partie int\u00e9grante de l’id\u00e9ologie et de la politique, formulant et dictant lui-m\u00eame la strat\u00e9gie am\u00e9ricaine.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Perles de Perle (suite) 10 mars 2003 — Richard Perle, dont on parle beaucoup et dont on sait pas mal (voir notamment sur ce site, un portrait de Perle et des articles sur lui), se fait un honneur d’\u00eatre un homme discret, — un honneur et un avantage. C’est aussi un homme d’une influence exceptionnelle… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[3874,3736,3831],"class_list":["post-65505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faits-et-commentaires","tag-dpb","tag-kissinger","tag-neo-conservateurs"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65505\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}L’affairisme et la politique de s\u00e9curit\u00e9 nationale US<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n