[Vision2020] 9-15-17, IPA: Harvard Called “Disgraceful” Following CIA Pressure on Manning Fellowship

[Ted Moffett]

http://www.accuracy.org/release/harvard-called-disgraceful-following-cia-pressure-on-manning-fellowship/Harvard
Called “Disgraceful” Following CIA Pressure on Manning Fellowship
September 15, 2017



The *New York Times* reports: “Facing harsh criticism, a Harvard dean said
early morning that he was revoking his invitation to Chelsea Manning, a
former United States soldier convicted of leaking classified information,
to be a visiting fellow at the university. …

“Michael J. Morell, a deputy director at the intelligence agency under
President Barack Obama, resigned as a fellow on Thursday, calling the
invitation to Ms. Manning ‘wholly inappropriate.’ He said it ‘honors a
convicted felon and leaker of classified information.’ …

“Later, the director of the CIA., Mike Pompeo, withdrew from a Harvard
forum he was scheduled to participate in that night, citing Ms. Manning’s
fellowship as the reason.”

Fox News reported Thursday: “Liz Cheney: Cut off Harvard’s federal funding
over Chelsea Manning appointment.”

RootsAction just launched a petition: “Tell the Harvard Kennedy School:
Revoking Chelsea Manning’s Fellowship Is Disgraceful
<https://act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action4/common/public/?action_KEY=13056>
.”

JESSELYN RADACK, jess at exposefacts.org, @JesselynRadack
<https://twitter.com/JesselynRadack>

Radack is director of the Whistleblower & Source Protection Program
(WHISPeR) at ExposeFacts <https://whisper.exposefacts.org/>. She stated
today: “It is ironic that Michael Morell, a former CIA leader involved in
torture and drone killings, had a crisis of ‘conscience’ that prompted
Harvard’s Kennedy School to withdraw its invitation to humanitarian Chelsea
Manning.

“Harvard obviously offered Chelsea Manning a visiting fellowship because of
the valuable contribution she could make, and revoked it under pressure
from the CIA. So much for academic freedom.”

JOHN KIRIAKOU, jkiriakou at mac.com, @johnkiriakou
<https://twitter.com/johnkiriakou>
A former CIA analyst, Kiriakou spent 23 months in prison after helping
expose the CIA’s torture program. His most recent book is *Doing Time Like
A Spy: How the CIA Taught Me to Survive and Thrive in Prison*.

He said today: “Harvard should be ashamed of itself. Chelsea Manning
exposed evidence of U.S. war crimes. Mike Morell was an instrumental player
in the CIA’s torture, rendition, and secret prison programs. And the
University casts its lot with the torturer. CIA officers with crimes
against humanity in their pasts know they have a home at Harvard.”

MATTHEW HOH, [currently in North Carolina; in NYC starting Monday],
matthew_hoh at riseup.net
In 2009, Hoh resigned his position with the State Department in Afghanistan
in protest of the escalation of the war there by the Obama administration.
See 2009 *Washington Post* piece about Hoh: “U.S. official resigns over
Afghan war
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/26/AR2009102603394.html>.”
He previously had been in Iraq with a State Department team and with the
U.S. Marines. He is now a senior fellow with the Center for International
Policy.

He said today: “The Harvard Kennedy School’s incredibly fast and virulently
shameful rescinding of its offer of a visiting fellowship to Chelsea
Manning due to the complaints of the CIA director and former deputy
director should not be a surprise to anyone who has witnessed the increased
impact of federal funding on private universities. In 2014 Harvard received
over $600 million in grants and subsidies from the federal government. I am
quite certain that funding was on the mind of the Harvard deans as they
bowed and scraped to the CIA and did their best to remedy their problem
before President Trump had time to tweet any threats.

“Understanding Harvard’s desire for federal funding is the simplest way to
understand how and why moral and intellectual honesty has been abrogated so
willingly and consciously by Harvard. Mike Morell, the former CIA deputy
director who resigned his fellowship in protest of Chelsea Manning
receiving hers, directed, oversaw and covered-up the torture and murder of
prisoners, drone assassinations, mass domestic spying and the spying on and
hacking into U.S. Senate computers. Chelsea Manning’s crimes were to let
the world know of the U.S. government’s crimes, crimes in violation of U.S.
and international law that Morell and the CIA committed. Reviews done by
the U.S. Department of Defense attested that Chelsea Manning’s actions
resulted in no one being killed and no one being put at risk, what they
actually did was to show the world the U.S. and CIA’s war crimes and
failings. For causing that embarrassment and exposure, and for letting the
world know the truth, the CIA will always hate her.”

Hoh notes the *New York Times* story from 1986: “Scholar to Quit Post at
Harvard Over CIA Tie
<http://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/02/us/scholar-to-quit-post-at-harvard-over-cia-tie.html>
.”

Also see from Ray McGovern: “Mike Morell’s Kill-Russians Advice
<https://consortiumnews.com/2016/08/12/mike-morells-kill-russians-advice/>.”

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Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
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