Word is Obama intends to announce his selections for his National Security team on the Monday after Thanksgiving. In the interim, here's some speculation:
Sources Say: USMC General James Jones for National Security Officer, ADM Dennis Blair for DNI, John Brennan for CIA, and Gates to remain at Defense.
Democratic sources tell ABC News that President-elect Obama appears to be turning to two retired four-stars for his National Security Adviser and his Director of National Intelligence.
Marine Gen. James L. Jones (Ret.), the former head of NATO and U.S. forces in Europe, has emerged as the leading candidate to serve as the National Security Adviser for President-elect Obama.
Admiral Dennis C. Blair (Ret.), former Commander-in-Chief of U.S. Pacific Command and a 6th-generation naval officer, has emerged as the top candidate to be President-elect Obama's Director of National Intelligence. He recently met in Chicago with the president-elect.
ABC News
With many Democrats expecting Robert M. Gates to remain as defense secretary, the emerging national security team appears to be centrist in orientation, with deep experience in many of the areas likely to be the focus of Obama's foreign policy -- including wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and instability in Pakistan and the Middle East, where Obama advisers have been signaling a desire to make an early mark in the stalled peace process.
WashPost
And for the CIA, the buzz seems to be trending towards John Brennan, a veteran CIA analyst. Our McJoan did a nice counter argument to his selection. The Atlantic reports:
Democratic and national security sources say that former National Counterrorism Center head John Brennan remains the favorite to be nominated director of the Central Intelligence Agency even as his pending appointment raises the hackles of some Obama advisers because of his ties to George Tenet and controversial programs.
.......
Brennan, who was once slated to be deputy to current DNI Mike McConnell, is a lifelong Republican who converted to Obama last year, after his friend Tony Lake asked Brennan to serve on an intelligence advisory panel. A career CIA officer, Brennan favors a holistic and systematic approach to intelligence gathering, and earned the respect of Democrats as the founding director of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center, now the National Counterrorism Center.
Atlantic
Brennan is a Middle East expert by academic preparation and experience, and a UT grad.
Denny Blair is an interesting pick, his area expertise is the Pacific. He was the military Liaison to the CIA for a while, otherwise he is not known as an Intel guy. He was a Rhodes Scholar with Bill Clinton and was at Annapolis with Jim Webb and Ollie North.
Jones has extensive NATO and EURO experience, and is currently Rice's middle east envoy. monitoring bilateral compliance with the "roadmap".
DISCLAIMER Alert: I have worked for both Blair and Jones, and have a great deal of confidence in their integrity, talent and professionalism.
Interesting choices. The picks are career security specialists without partisan histories. Sen Chuck Hagel and Gen Wesley Clark have been mentioned, also.
Any thoughts? Would you recommend any changes? How do you think this team will would get along with Ms. Clinton at State? Rumor has it that Hilary won an agreement to be able to pick her own staff.
What does this portend for the middle east peace process?
Jones was in the news recently for reporting on progress towards the "Roadmap", the report was supposed to be public but the administration decided to not publish it. Apparently it was critical of both sides, according to Steve Rosen, indicted but not convicted former AIPAC Policy director::
More recently, while serving as Rice's special envoy for Middle East Security, Jones prepared a report on Israel's policies in the territories that Ha'aretz described as "extremely critical…scathing…makes Israel look very bad."
The Jerusalem Post said "this document could become a source of friction between Jerusalem and Washington." The World Tribune said it "blasted Israel's role" for "hampering the movement of PA forces, blocking plans for weapons shipments and technology to the Palestinians and resisting coordination." All three reports said that Jones wanted to publish his findings, but the White House decided to keep the reports confidential.
Rosen
Brent Scowcroft and Zbig Brezinski in an OP-Ed proposed a set of principles that HAARETZ is calling a draft "Obama Plan"
The crux of their plan to solve the conflict centers on four principles which they believe Obama ought to adopt and publicly declare as policy:
An Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines, with slight alterations that are to be mutually agreed upon.
Compensation for Palestinian refugees in lieu of exercising the right of return to pre-1948 Israel.
Jerusalem as a "real home" to two capitals.
A demilitarized Palestinian state.
. Haaretz
Jones has proposed a withdrawl of ISraeli Security forces form the West Bank, with a NATO or US led international security force taking their place to ensure Israeli security. This is unpopular in ISrael. .
It looks like Israeli withdrawl from the settlements in the Jordan Valley is the price of peace.
Israeli PM Olmert is in town today, seeking assurances from Bush that the $30B aid grant to Israel is not in jeopardy of reduction or having new conditions placed on it as a result of the change in administrations.