Douglas J. Feith
Douglas Jay Feith (born July 16, 1953 in Philadelphia, PA) is a former aide to Democratic Party senator Henry M. Jackson, and was the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy under the George W. Bush administration from July 2001 to August 8, 2005. His father, Dalck Feith, was a Holocaust survivor who lost his parents and seven siblings during the Holocaust. He has drawn criticism for his anti-Oslo Accords and anti-Camp David Accords stance. He currently serves as a professor at Georgetown University.
Abu Ghraib
Feith's office was responsible for the oversight of military prisons including Abu Ghraib, and Feith himself created the policy of ignoring the Geneva Conventions against torture. Nevertheless, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld defended Feith's decision in August 2004 when he told the press that Feith is "a rare talent. He is one of the intellectual leaders in the administration" and "without question one of the most brilliant individuals in government"; chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Peter Pace said of Feith: "Doug Feith is a patriot. I have watched this man for four years. He cares only about what is best for the United States."
Other members of the George W. Bush administration have offered starkly different assessments. Several officials have implied that his allegiance to Israel sometimes appears stronger than his allegiance to the United States of America. Then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, for example, responded to one of Feith's presentations by saying "Thanks, Doug, but when we want the Israeli position we’ll invite the ambassador."[1] Similarly, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's chief of staff, stated that he saw Feith as one of many people who seemed like "[a] card-carrying member[] of the Likud Party.[1] I often wondered if their primary allegiance was to their own country or to Israel. That was the thing that troubled me...."
Senior members of the armed forces have also criticized Feith. General Tommy Franks once referred to Feith as "the f***ing stupidest guy on the face of the earth." Colonel Wilkerson, cited above, said that "Seldom in my life have I met a dumber man." Lieutenant General Michael DeLong said that "Feith wasn't somebody we enjoyed working with, and to go much further than that would probably not be a good thing. To be honest, we blew him off lots of times. Told the secretary that he's full of baloney, his people working for him are full of baloney....He had some people around him that weren't very good. He thought he knew more than he did, which is dangerous."[2]
