Retired US General Picks Apart Sen. Cotton’s ‘Scarlet Letter’ to Iran

21st Century Wire says…

The criticism continues to come in regarding Senator Tom Cotton and his gang of 47 working to kill the White House’s current nuclear negotiations with Iran.

One member of the military establishment who is fiercely opposed to the GOP’s  ‘Scarlet Letter’ to Tehran, is retired Major Gen. Paul D. Eaton who deconstructed what he considered to be a fatally flawed political move (see full report below).

Regarding this Iran controversy, earlier, 21WIRE pointed out a major financial conflict of interest between Senator Cotton and the Israeli Lobby who are actively working to derail US government negotiations with Iran. It turns out that this is not the only conflict of interest as Crooks and Liars points out. Overt war hawk Cotton is also in bed with the military industrial complex:

“So this cotton-picking Iran-letter-writing traitor is really sucking up after those fat defense campaign contributions! We are so very surprised! Via Lee Fang at the Intercept:

[…] Cotton will appear at an “Off the Record and strictly Non-Attribution” event with the National Defense Industrial Association, a lobbying and professional group for defense contractors.

The NDIA is composed of executives from major military businesses such as Northrop Grumman, L-3 Communications, ManTech International, Boeing, Oshkosh Defense and Booz Allen Hamilton, among other firms.

Cotton strongly advocates higher defense spending and a more aggressive foreign policy. As The New Republic’s David Ramsey noted, “Pick a topic — Syria, Iran, Russia, ISIS, drones, NSA snooping — and Cotton can be found at the hawkish outer edge of the debate…During his senate campaign, he told a tele-townhall that ISIS and Mexican drug cartels joining forces to attack Arkansas was an ‘urgent problem.’”

On Iran, Cotton has issued specific calls for military intervention. In December he said Congress should consider supplying Israel with B-52s and so-called “bunker-buster” bombs — both items manufactured by NDIA member Boeing — to be used for a possible strike against Iran.

Asked if Cotton will speak about his Iran letter tomorrow, Jimmy Thomas, NDIA Director of Legislative Policy, said, “[M]ost members…talk about everything from the budget to Iran…so it’s highly likely that he may address that in his remarks.” According to Thomas, the Cotton event was scheduled in January, “but certainly we bring people to the platform that have influence directly on our issues.”

One can’t help but think that maybe Cotton and his GOP colleagues are actually taking their marching orders directly from the Israeli Lobby with comments like this:

“Well as Prime Minister Netanyahu said, the alternative to a bad deal is a better deal. The Iranians frequently bluff to walk away from the table. if they bluff this week, call their bluff. The Congress stands ready to impose much more severe sanctions.”

But this has to be the most spot on comment by a Think Progress reader:

US Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.)

Jonathan Capehart
Washington Post

The open letter to the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran signed by 47 senators and instigated by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) was a stunning breach of protocol. One so outrageous that my former colleagues at the New York Daily News dubbed the signers “traitors.”

While it is indeed a slap in the face of President Obama and an affront to the presidency, I’m not sure I would go that far, especially since Cotton is an Army veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. So, I turned to retired Major Gen. Paul D. Eaton for perspective. He wouldn’t say Cotton and Co. were “traitors,” either. He had a better word.

“I would use the word mutinous,” said Eaton, whose long career includes training Iraqi forces from 2003 to 2004. He is now a senior adviser to VoteVets.org. “I do not believe these senators were trying to sell out America. I do believe they defied the chain of command in what could be construed as an illegal act.” Eaton certainly had stern words for Cotton.

“What Senator Cotton did is a gross breach of discipline, and especially as a veteran of the Army, he should know better,” Eaton told me. “I have no issue with Senator Cotton, or others, voicing their opinion in opposition to any deal to halt Iran’s nuclear progress. Speaking out on these issues is clearly part of his job. But to directly engage a foreign entity, in this way, undermining the strategy and work of our diplomats and our Commander in Chief, strains the very discipline and structure that our foreign relations depend on, to succeed.” The consequences of Cotton’s missive were plainly apparent to Eaton. “The breach of discipline is extremely dangerous, because undermining our diplomatic efforts, at this moment, brings us another step closer to a very costly and perilous war with Iran,” he said.

“I think Senator Cotton recognizes this, and he simply does not care,” Eaton went on to say. “That’s what disappoints me the most.” And that’s what’s so scary about this whole episode. The freshman senator from Arkansas and 46 of his Republican colleagues sought to bigfoot Obama on a deal not yet done whose details are not yet known.

In his column today, Michael Gerson makes a point that should have been obvious to all the signatories of the Cotton letter.

If Republican senators want to make the point that an Iran deal requires a treaty, they should make that case to the American people, not to the Iranians. Congress simply has no business conducting foreign policy with a foreign government, especially an adversarial one. Every Republican who pictures his or her feet up on the Resolute Desk should fear this precedent.

This is a point you imagine Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) would have made back in the good old days when he was a statesman. Instead, he signed the letter.

“I expect better from the men and women who wore the uniform,” Eaton said of Cotton. And the American people deserve better from the Senate.