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 |  Pentagon Unleashes a Holy Warrior
 |  http://ideology.lege.net/holy_warrior/
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 |  William M. Arkin | The Pentagon Unleashes a Holy Warrior
 |  http://truthout.org/docs_03/101703B.shtml
 |  http://truthout.org/docs_03/printer_101703B.shtml
 |
 |
 |    Original:
 |    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-arkin16oct16,1,6651326.story?coll=la-headlines-oped-manual
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 |    The Pentagon Unleashes a Holy Warrior
 |    By William M. Arkin
 |    The Los Angeles Times
 |
 |    Thursday 16 October 2003
 |
 |
 |    Click Here for Video Report: 
 |    http://stacks.msnbc.com/news/980764.asp?0cv=cb10
 |
 |
 |          William M. Arkin is a military affairs analyst who
 |          writes regularly for The Times.
 |
 |
 |    A Christian extremist in a high Defense post can only set
 |  back the U.S. approach to the Muslim world.
 |
 |    In June of 2002, Jerry Boykin stepped to the pulpit at the
 |  First Baptist Church of Broken Arrow, Okla., and described a
 |  set of photographs he had taken of Mogadishu, Somalia, from
 |  an Army helicopter in 1993.
 |
 |    The photographs were taken shortly after the disastrous
 |  "Blackhawk Down" mission had resulted in the death of 18
 |  Americans. When Boykin came home and had them developed, he
 |  said, he noticed a strange dark mark over the city. He had
 |  an imagery interpreter trained by the military look at the
 |  mark. "This is not a blemish on your photograph," the
 |  interpreter told him, "This is real."
 |
 |    "Ladies and gentleman, this is your enemy," Boykin said to
 |  the congregation as he flashed his pictures on a screen. "It
 |  is the principalities of darkness It is a demonic presence
 |  in that city that God revealed to me as the enemy."
 |
 |    That's an unusual message for a high-ranking U.S. military
 |  official to deliver. But Boykin does it frequently.
 |
 |    This June, for instance, at the pulpit of the Good
 |  Shepherd Community Church in Sandy, Ore., he displayed
 |  slides of Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein and North Korea's
 |  Kim Jung Il. "Why do they hate us?" Boykin asked. "The
 |  answer to that is because we're a Christian nation We are
 |  hated because we are a nation of believers."
 |
 |    Our "spiritual enemy," Boykin continued, "will only be
 |  defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus."
 |
 |    Who is Jerry Boykin? He is Army Lt. General William G.
 |  "Jerry" Boykin. The day before Boykin appeared at the pulpit
 |  in Oregon, the Pentagon announced that Secretary of Defense
 |  Donald Rumsfeld had nominated the general for a third star
 |  and named him to a new position as deputy undersecretary of
 |  Defense for intelligence.
 |
 |    In this newly created position, Boykin is not just another
 |  Pentagon apparatchik or bureaucratic warrior. He has been
 |  charged with reinvigorating Rumsfeld's "High Value Target
 |  Plan" to track down Bin Laden, Hussein, Mullah Omar and
 |  other leaders in the terrorism world.
 |
 |    But Gen. Boykin's appointment to a high position in the
 |  administration is a frightening blunder at a time when there
 |  is widespread acknowledgment that the position of the United
 |  States in the Islamic world has never been worse.
 |
 |    A monthlong journalistic investigation of Boykin reveals a
 |  30-year veteran whose classified resumé reads like a history
 |  of special operations and counter-terrorism. From the failed
 |  Iranian hostage rescue attempt in 1980 to invasions in
 |  Grenada and Panama, to the hunt for drug lord Pablo Escobar
 |  in Colombia, to Somalia and various locales in the Middle
 |  East, Boykin has been there. He also was an advisor to Atty.
 |  Gen. Janet Reno during Waco.
 |
 |    He has risen in the ranks, starting out as one of the
 |  first Delta Force commandos and going on to head the
 |  top-secret Joint Special Operations Command. He has served
 |  in the Central Intelligence Agency and, most recently, he
 |  commanded Army Special Forces before being brought into the
 |  Rumsfeld leadership team.
 |
 |    But Boykin is also an intolerant extremist who has spoken
 |  openly about how his belief in Christianity has trumped
 |  Muslims and other non-Christians in battle.
 |
 |    He has described himself as a warrior in the kingdom of
 |  God and invited others to join with him in fighting for the
 |  United States through repentance, prayer and the exercise of
 |  faith in God.
 |
 |    He has praised the leadership of President Bush, whom he
 |  extolled as "a man who prays in the Oval Office." "George
 |  Bush was not elected by a majority of the voters in the
 |  United States," Boykin told an Oregon congregation. "He was
 |  appointed by God."
 |
 |    All Americans, including those in uniform, are entitled to
 |  their views. But when Boykin publicly spews this intolerant
 |  message while wearing the uniform of the U.S. Army, he
 |  strongly suggests that this is an official and sanctioned
 |  view -- and that the U.S. Army is indeed a Christian army.
 |
 |    But that's only part of the problem. Boykin is also in a
 |  senior Pentagon policymaking position, and it's a serious
 |  mistake to allow a man who believes in a Christian "jihad"
 |  to hold such a job.
 |
 |    For one thing, Boykin has made it clear that he takes his
 |  orders not from his Army superiors but from God -- which is
 |  a worrisome line of command. For another, it is both
 |  imprudent and dangerous to have a senior officer guiding the
 |  war on terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan who believes that
 |  Islam is an idolatrous, sacrilegious religion against which
 |  we are waging a holy war.
 |
 |    And judging by his words, that is what he believes.
 |
 |    In a speech at a church in Daytona, Fla., in January,
 |  Boykin told the following story:
 |
 |    "There was a man in Mogadishu named Osman Atto," whom
 |  Boykin described as a top lieutenant of Mohammed Farah
 |  Aidid.
 |
 |    When Boykin's Delta Force commandos went after Atto, they
 |  missed him by seconds, he said. "He went on CNN and he
 |  laughed at us, and he said, 'They'll never get me because
 |  Allah will protect me. Allah will protect me.'
 |
 |    "Well, you know what?" Boykin continued. "I knew that my
 |  God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God
 |  and his was an idol." Atto later was captured.
 |
 |    Other countries, Boykin said last year, "have lost their
 |  morals, lost their values. But America is still a Christian
 |  nation."
 |
 |    The general has said he has no doubt that our side is the
 |  side of the true God. He says he attends prayer services
 |  five times a week.
 |
 |    In Iraq, he told the Oregon congregation, special
 |  operations forces were victorious precisely because of their
 |  faith in God. "Ladies and gentlemen I want to impress upon
 |  you that the battle that we're in is a spiritual battle," he
 |  said . "Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to
 |  destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a
 |  Christian army."
 |
 |    Since 9/11, the war against terrorism has become almost
 |  exclusively a special operations war, melding military and
 |  CIA paramilitary and covert activities with finer and finer
 |  grained integrated intelligence information. Hence, the
 |  creation of Boykin's new job as deputy undersecretary of
 |  Defense for intelligence.
 |
 |    The task facing Boykin, Rumsfeld insiders say, is to break
 |  down the wall between different intelligence collectors and
 |  agencies and quickly get the best information and analysis
 |  for American forces in the field.
 |
 |    But even as he begins his new duties, Boykin is still
 |  publicly preaching.
 |
 |    As late as Sept. 27, he was in Vero Beach, Fla., speaking
 |  on behalf of Visitation House Ministries.
 |
 |    In describing the war against terrorism, President Bush
 |  frequently says it "is not a war against Islam." In his
 |  National Security Strategy, Bush declared that "the war on
 |  terrorism is not a clash of civilizations." Yet many in the
 |  Islamic world see the U.S. as waging a cultural and
 |  religious war against them. In fact, the White House's own
 |  Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim
 |  World reported this month that since 9/11, "hostility toward
 |  America has reached shocking levels."
 |
 |    "Arabs and Muslims respond in anger to what they perceive
 |  as U.S. denigration of their societies and cultures," the
 |  report stated.
 |
 |    The task for the U.S., the report said, is to wage "a
 |  major struggle to expand the zone of tolerance and
 |  marginalize extremists."
 |
 |    Appointing Jerry Boykin, with his visions of holy war in
 |  the Islamic world, to a top position in the United States
 |  military is no way to marginalize extremism.
 |
 |
 |  (In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this
 |  material is distributed without profit to those who have
 |  expressed a prior interest in receiving the included
 |  information for research and educational purposes.)
 |
 |   _ _ _
 |
 |
 |    Original:
 |    http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-general16oct16,1,7655334.story?coll=la-home-headlines
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 |
 |    General Casts War in Religious Terms
 |    By Richard T. Cooper
 |    The Los Angeles Times
 |
 |    Thursday 16 October 2003
 |
 |
 |          The top soldier assigned to track down Bin Laden and
 |          Hussein is an evangelical Christian who speaks
 |          publicly of 'the army of God.'
 |
 |
 |    WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon has assigned the task of
 |  tracking down and eliminating Osama bin Laden, Saddam
 |  Hussein and other high-profile targets to an Army general
 |  who sees the war on terrorism as a clash between
 |  Judeo-Christian values and Satan.
 |
 |    Lt. Gen. William G. "Jerry" Boykin, the new deputy
 |  undersecretary of Defense for intelligence, is a
 |  much-decorated and twice-wounded veteran of covert military
 |  operations. From the bloody 1993 clash with Muslim warlords
 |  in Somalia chronicled in "Black Hawk Down" and the hunt for
 |  Colombian drug czar Pablo Escobar to the ill-fated attempt
 |  to rescue American hostages in Iran in 1980, Boykin was in
 |  the thick of things.
 |
 |    Yet the former commander and 13-year veteran of the Army's
 |  top-secret Delta Force is also an outspoken evangelical
 |  Christian who appeared in dress uniform and polished jump
 |  boots before a religious group in Oregon in June to declare
 |  that radical Islamists hated the United States "because
 |  we're a Christian nation, because our foundation and our
 |  roots are Judeo-Christian ... and the enemy is a guy named
 |  Satan."
 |
 |    Discussing the battle against a Muslim warlord in Somalia,
 |  Boykin told another audience, "I knew my God was bigger than
 |  his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol."
 |
 |    "We in the army of God, in the house of God, kingdom of
 |  God have been raised for such a time as this," Boykin said
 |  last year.
 |
 |    On at least one occasion, in Sandy, Ore., in June, Boykin
 |  said of President Bush: "He's in the White House because God
 |  put him there."
 |
 |    Boykin's penchant for casting the war on terrorism in
 |  religious terms appears to be at odds with Bush and an
 |  administration that have labored to insist that the war on
 |  terrorism is not a religious conflict.
 |
 |    Although the Army has seldom if ever taken official action
 |  against officers for outspoken expressions of religious
 |  opinion, outside experts see remarks such as Boykin's as
 |  sending exactly the wrong message to the Arab and Islamic
 |  world.
 |
 |    In his public remarks, Boykin has also said that radical
 |  Muslims who resort to terrorism are not representative of
 |  the Islamic faith.
 |
 |    He has compared Islamic extremists to "hooded Christians"
 |  who terrorized blacks, Catholics, Jews and others from
 |  beneath the robes of the Ku Klux Klan.
 |
 |    Boykin was not available for comment and did not respond
 |  to written questions from the Los Angeles Times submitted to
 |  him Wednesday.
 |
 |    "The first lesson is to recognize that whatever we say
 |  here is heard there, particularly anything perceived to be
 |  hostile to their basic religion, and they don't forget it,"
 |  said Stephen P. Cohen, a member of the special panel named
 |  to study policy in the Arab and Muslim world for the U.S.
 |  Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy.
 |
 |    "The phrase 'Judeo-Christian' is a big mistake. It's
 |  basically the language of Bin Laden and his supporters,"
 |  said Cohen, president of the Institute for Middle East Peace
 |  and Development in New York.
 |
 |    "They are constantly trying to create the impression that
 |  the Jews and Christians are getting together to beat up on
 |  Islam.... We have to be very careful that this doesn't
 |  become a clash between religions, a clash of civilizations."
 |
 |    Boykin's religious activities were first documented in
 |  detail by William N. Arkin, a former military intelligence
 |  analyst who writes on defense issues for The Times Opinion
 |  section.
 |
 |    Audio and videotapes of Boykin's appearances before
 |  religious groups over the last two years were obtained
 |  exclusively by NBC News, which reported on them Wednesday
 |  night on the "Nightly News with Tom Brokaw."
 |
 |    Arkin writes in an article on the op-ed page of today's
 |  Times that Boykin's appointment "is a frightening blunder at
 |  a time that there is widespread acknowledgment that
 |  America's position in the Islamic world has never been
 |  worse."
 |
 |    Boykin's promotion to lieutenant general and his
 |  appointment as deputy undersecretary of Defense for
 |  intelligence were confirmed by the Senate by voice vote in
 |  June.
 |
 |    An aide to the Senate Armed Services Committee said the
 |  appointment was not examined in detail.
 |
 |    Yet Boykin's explicitly Christian-evangelical language in
 |  public forums may become an issue now that he holds a
 |  high-level policy position in the Pentagon.
 |
 |    Officials at his level are often called upon to testify
 |  before Congress and appear in public forums.
 |
 |    Boykin's new job makes his role especially sensitive: He
 |  is charged with speeding up the flow of intelligence on
 |  terrorist leaders to combat teams in the field so that they
 |  can attack top-ranking terrorist leaders.
 |
 |    Since virtually all these leaders are Muslim, Boykin's
 |  words and actions are likely to draw special scrutiny in the
 |  Arab and Islamic world.
 |
 |    Bush, a born-again Christian, often uses religious
 |  language in his speeches, but he keeps references to God
 |  nonsectarian.
 |
 |    At one point, immediately after the Sept. 11, 2001,
 |  terrorist attacks, the president said he wanted to lead a
 |  "crusade" against terrorism.
 |
 |    But he quickly retracted the word when told that, to
 |  Muslim ears, it recalled the medieval Christian crusaders'
 |  brutal invasions of Islamic nations.
 |
 |    In that context, Boykin's reference to the God of Islam as
 |  "an idol" may be perceived as particularly inflammatory.
 |
 |    The president has made a point of praising Islam as "a
 |  religion of peace." He has invited Muslim clerics to the
 |  White House for Ramadan dinners and has criticized
 |  evangelicals who called Islam a dangerous faith.
 |
 |    The issue is still a sore spot in the Muslim world.
 |
 |    Pollster John Zogby says that public opinion surveys
 |  throughout the Arab and Islamic world show strong negative
 |  reactions to any statement by a U.S. official that suggests
 |  a conflict between religions or cultures.
 |
 |    "To frame things in terms of good and evil, with the
 |  United States as good, is a nonstarter," Zogby said.
 |
 |    "It is exactly the wrong thing to do."
 |
 |    For the Army, the issue of officers expressing religious
 |  opinions publicly has been a sensitive problem for many
 |  years, according to a former head of the Army Judge Advocate
 |  General's office who is now retired but continues to serve
 |  in government as a civilian.
 |
 |    "The Army has struggled with this issue over the years. It
 |  gets really, really touchy because what you're talking about
 |  is freedom of expression," he said, speaking on condition of
 |  anonymity.
 |
 |    "What usually happens is that somebody has a quiet chat
 |  with the person," the retired general said.
 |
 |    Times staff writer Doyle McManus contributed to this
 |  report.
 |
 |
 |  (In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this
 |  material is distributed without profit to those who have
 |  expressed a prior interest in receiving the included
 |  information for research and educational purposes.)
 |______________________________________________________________