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NATO Air Strike Kills 150 Afghan Civilians

NATO Air Strike Kills 150 Afghan Civilians


Rahmatullah, 19, a victim of Friday’ NATO air strike, tries to sit up on his bed in a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan, Saturday, Sept. 5, 2009.

Pajwok Afghan News
September 5, 2009

Residents of Chahar Dara district in northern Kunduz province say more than 150 civilians were killed and 20 others wounded in Friday’s air strike by NATO-led forces.

The bombing in Haji Aman village came as insurgents and residents emptied oil into jerry canes from tankers hijacked by Taliban militants from the Kunduz-Baghlan Highway.

Inhabitants of the area told Pajhwok Afghan News all those killed in the bombardment were civilians and there were no Taliban at the site at the time the attack took place. Fighters had left the scene after they asked the people to take fuel for free.

An elder from Sarak-i-Bala neighbourhood, Abdul Rahim, said 15 children were among the 50 people of Yaqubi village killed in the bombing raid.

The man, who lost two sons in the incident, argued: “Poverty brought us to this stage.” No guerrillas were among the dead, he said, explaining the fighters well before the deadly assault.

A 50-year-old woman bitterly cried while standing in front of her ruined house. She said her three sons, husband and a grandson perished in the bombardment. Locals showed this reporter as many as 50 graves of civilian victims.

In the Maulvi Naeem village, residents said 20 civilians were killed in the incident. Haji Najmuddin, a tribal elder, lost two nephews. He claimed chemicals bombs were dropped on the villagers. Clothes of his nephews were not damaged but their bodies were badly charred, the man argued.

This reporter saw the graves of those killed in the air strike. Seventy of the fatalities were from Yaqubi and Maulvi Naeem villages and the rest from three other areas.

Meanwhile, Kunduz Governor Eng. Muhammad Omar said a delegation from Kabul had arrived in the district to investigate the incident and determine the exact number of civilian deaths.

Government gives up hope of more European Nato help in Afghanistan
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6143065/Government-gives-up-hope-of-more-European-Nato-help-in-Afghanistan.html

Afghan President: NATO Air Strike a “Major Error”

Afghan air strike galvanises war protesters

US troops raid Afghan hospital, says aid group

EU Nations Slam NATO Air Strike in Afghanistan

 



Mass Censorship of Dead Marine Photo

Mass Censorship of Dead Marine Photo

Paul Craig Roberts
Antiwar.com
September 7, 2009

Americans have lost their ability for introspection, thereby revealing their astounding hypocrisy to the world.

U.S. War Secretary Robert Gates has condemned the Associated Press and a reporter, Julie Jacobson, embedded with U.S. troops in Afghanistan, for taking and releasing a photo of a U.S. Marine who was wounded in action and died from his injury.

The photographer was on patrol with the Marines when they came under fire. She found the courage and presence of mind to do her job. Her reward is to be condemned by the warmonger Gates as “insensitive.” Gates says her employer, the Associated Press, lacks “judgment and common decency.”

The American Legion jumped in and denounced the Associated Press for a “stunning lack of compassion and common decency.”

To stem opposition to its wars, the War Department hides signs of American casualties from the public. Angry that evidence escaped the censor, the war secretary and the American Legion attacked with politically correct jargon: “insensitive,” “offended,” and the “anguish” and “pain and suffering” inflicted upon the Marine’s family. The War Department sounds like it is preparing a harassment tort.

Isn’t this passing the buck? The Marine lost his life not because of the Associated Press and a photographer, but because of the war criminals – Gates, Bush, Cheney, Obama, and the U.S. Congress that supports wars of naked aggression that serve no American purpose, but which keep campaign coffers filled with contributions from the armaments companies.

Marine Lance Cpl. Joshua M. Bernard is dead because the U.S. government and a significant percentage of the U.S. population believe that the U.S. has the right to invade, bomb, and occupy other peoples who have raised no hand against us but are demonized with lies and propaganda.

For the American war secretary it is a photo that is insensitive, not America’s assertion of the right to determine the fate of Afghanistan with bombs and soldiers.

The exceptional “virtuous nation” does not think it is insensitive for America’s bombs to blow innocent villagers to pieces. On Sept. 4, the day before Gates’ outburst over the “insensitive” photo, Agence France Presse reported from Afghanistan that a U.S./NATO air strike had killed large numbers of villagers who had come to get fuel from two tankers that had been hijacked from negligent and inattentive occupation forces:

“’Nobody was in one piece. Hands, legs, and body parts were scattered everywhere. Those who were away from the fuel tanker were badly burnt,’ said 32-year-old Mohammad Daud, depicting a scene from hell. The burned-out shells of the tankers, still smoking in marooned wrecks on the riverbank, were surrounded by the charred-meat remains of villagers from Chahar Dara district in Kunduz province, near the Tajik border. Dr. Farid Rahid, a spokesperson in Kabul for the ministry of health, said up to 250 villagers had been near the tankers when the air strike was called in.”

What does the world think of the United States? The American war secretary and a U.S. military veterans association think a photo of an injured and dying American soldier is insensitive, but not the wipeout of an Afghan village that came to get needed fuel.

The U.S. government is like a criminal who accuses the police of his crime when he is arrested or a sociopathic abuser who blames the victim. It is a known fact that the CIA has violated U.S. law and international law with its assassinations, kidnappings, and torture. But it is not this criminal agency that will be held accountable. Instead, those who will be punished will be those moral beings who, appalled at the illegality and inhumanity of the CIA, leaked the evidence of the agency’s crimes. The CIA has asked the U.S. Justice (sic) Department to investigate what the CIA alleges is the “criminal disclosure” of its secret program to murder suspected foreign terrorist leaders abroad. As we learned from Gitmo, those suspected by America are overwhelmingly innocent.

The CIA program is so indefensible that when CIA director Leon Panetta found out about it six months after being in office, he cancelled the program (assuming those running the program obeyed) and informed Congress.

Yet, the CIA wants the person who revealed its crime to be punished for revealing secret information. A secret agency this unmoored from moral and legal standards is a greater threat to our country than are terrorists. Who knows what false flag operation it will pull off in order to provide justification and support for its agenda. An agency that is more liability than benefit should be abolished.

The agency’s program of assassinating terrorist leaders is itself fraught with contradictions and dangers. The hatred created by the U.S. and Israel is independent of any leader. If one is killed, others take his place. The most likely outcome of the CIA assassination program is that the agency will be manipulated by rivals, just as the FBI was used by one mafia family to eliminate another. In order to establish credibility with groups that they are attempting to penetrate, CIA agents will be drawn into participating in violent acts against the U.S. and its allies.

Accusing the truthteller instead of the evildoer is the position that the neoconservatives took against the New York Times when after one year’s delay, which gave George W. Bush time to get reelected, the Times published the NSA leak that revealed that the Bush administration was committing felonies by violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The neocons, especially those associated with Commentary magazine, wanted the New York Times indicted for treason. To the evil neocon mind, anything that interferes with their diabolical agenda is treason.

This is the way many Americans think. America über alles! No one counts but us (and Israel). The deaths we inflict and the pain and suffering we bring to others are merely collateral damage on the bloody path to American hegemony.

The attitude of the “freedom and democracy” U.S. government is that anyone who complains of illegality or immorality or inhumanity is a traitor. The Republican Sen. Christopher S. Bond is a recent example. Bond got on his high horse about “irreparable damage” to the CIA from the disclosures of its criminal activities. Bond wants those “back stabbers” who revealed the CIA’s wrongdoings to be held accountable. Bond is unable to grasp that it is the criminal activities, not their disclosure, that is the source of the problem. Obviously, the Whistleblower Protection Act has no support from Sen. Bond, who sees it as just another law to plough under.

This is where the U.S. government stands today: Ignoring and covering up government crimes is the patriotic thing to do. To reveal the government’s crimes is an act of treason. Many Americans on both sides of the aisle agree.

Yet, they still think that they are The Virtuous Nation, the exceptional nation, the salt of the earth.

Many Newspapers Fail to Carry AP Photo of Deadly Afghan Incident

AP Photo Of Wounded Marine Sparks Debate

 



Former Intel. Officer: Cheney Responsible for 9/11

Former High-Ranking Intelligence Officer: Cheney Responsible for 9/11

Washington’s Blog
September 2, 2009

David Steele is a former 20-year Marine Corps infantry and intelligence officer, the second-ranking civilian in U.S. Marine Corps Intelligence, and former CIA clandestine services case officer.

Steele has previously written that “9/11 was at a minimum allowed to happen as a pretext for war”.

This month, Steele went further, writing:

Pakistan briefed Cheney [about the plans for the terrorist attacks ahead of time] …nations also got wind of this and warned the CIA. We also had two walk-ins to the FBI, one in Orlando, one in Newark, that were dismissed by the FBI because the names were all virgins and not in the FBI data base—the arrogance of stupid bureaucracy.

Cheney saw an opportunity for what Bush called his trifecta, and gave it to him by giving the go-ahead to ISI and Al Qaeda, and ordering up a terrorism exercise that allowed him to send all relevant close-in air defense strip alert craft away from the target areas, and to disable the NORTHCOM normal response to flight path diversion.

While the details might be open to debate, many other very high-level intelligence officers have said the “official” explanation for 9/11 makes no sense. And see this and this.

Bobcats Over Washington on 9/11: What Were Two Mystery Aircraft Doing
Overhead at the Time of the Pentagon Attack?

Cheney Considered Idea to Kill U.S. Navy Seals and Blame it on Iran

 



U.S. Marine: Pelosi Should Look For Swastika On Her Arm

U.S. Marine: Pelosi Should Look For Swastika On Her Arm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Mac2wYiaH8

Veteran at Town Hall Tells Congressman Boren: “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtb_XSeU8_g

Congressman Herger calls Obama plan ‘threat to democracy’

 



FBI hunts American citizens for deadly bombing in Pakistan
FBI turns its suspicion on the American people for the massive explosion in Pakistan, a truck detonated near a Marriott Hotel in Islamabad which killed around 60 people. Pakistan authorities are looking into evidence linking U.S. marines to the explosion.

FBI hunts American citizens for deadly bombing in Pakistan

World Net Daily
September 29, 2008

Aafia Siddiqui, alleged al-Qaida “fixer” whose interrogation has the FBI on alert

As Pakistani investigators hunt the terrorists behind the massive Marriott Hotel bombing in Islamabad, FBI agents in the U.S. have begun aggressively hunting for Americans who have recently returned from trips to Pakistan where they may have trained at al-Qaida camps, WND has learned.

A coast-to-coast dragnet has been launched partly in response to leads developed in the arrest of one of al-Qaida’s “fixers” in the U.S., say FBI officials. They report the bureau is in a race against time to identify Pakistan-trained sleeper cells and disrupt a possible pre-election “October surprise.”

For the first time since 9/11, counterterrorism field agents have been authorized to spy on young Muslim men and women – including American citizens – who have traveled to Pakistan without any specific evidence of wrongdoing.

Read Full Article Here

Pakistan Investigating US Marine Activity Inside Marriott Hotel Days Before Huge Bombing
http://noworldsystem.com/2008/09/26/..explosion-to-us-military/

 



Pakistan Connecting Deadly Explosion to U.S. Military

Pakistan Investigating US Marine Activity Inside Marriott Hotel Days Before Huge Bombing

Steve Watson
Infowars.net
September 24, 2008


A view of a deep crater caused by Saturday’s massive truck bombing at Marriott hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan Sunday, Sept. 21, 2008. The bombing devastated the luxury hotel in Pakistan’s capital, killing some 60 people and injuring more than 250

Pakistani authorities investigating last Saturday’s huge bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad are looking into evidence that US marines were occupying two floors just days prior to the blast and were witnessed unloading a truckload of steel cases inside.

“The authorities want to ascertain if it was a routine exercise or part of some special mission that does not have the approval of the government of Pakistan,” Pakistan’s largest newspaper The News reported.

The reports of the mysterious activity first surfaced in the Pakistani media on Sunday.

According to the accounts, several witnesses, including Pakistani government officials, described seeing a US embassy truckload of steel boxes unloaded while all entrances to and from the hotel were locked down at around midnight on the 16th September.

The cases were not taken through security scanners in the hotel’s lobby, but were shifted directly to the fourth and fifth floors, the same floors that fire broke out on after the truck bombing on Saturday.

“Already, the government has got information that several rooms on the fourth floor of the Marriott were in permanent use of the US authorities. Three of these rooms were said to be inter-connected and contained some intelligence equipment and other material allegedly used for espionage,” The News also reported.

The reports have also been picked up in the press in Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

A US embassy statement said that the marines were a routine team of support personnel that often precede and/or accompany certain US government officials, and that the cases contained communication equipment.

Further rumours that several senior officers of the CIA were staying at the hotel at the time of the attack were also strenuously denied by the US embassy statement as “inaccurate, irresponsible, baseless and completely without any foundation whatsoever.”

“Al Qaeda” was quickly portioned with the blame once more just hours after the dust had settled, while the Taliban have also been touted as suspects.

Meanwhile new claims have surfaced linking the bombing to an Islamic fundamentalist group based in Iran.

In our leading article earlier this week which has since been picked up by the Pakistan Daily, we detailed how Pakistan’s new leadership were due to dine at the hotel, but changed the venue at the last minute, according to a senior government official.

This raises the question, whether it be “Al Qaeda”, the Taliban or some other group of anti-American “terrorists”, why would they want to decapitate the new anti-US administration of Pakistan?

 

Pakistan hotel bombing kills at least 60

AFP
September 21, 2008

A suicide bomber detonated a truck packed with explosives at the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad on Saturday, killing at least 60 people in a brazen attack in the heart of the Pakistan capital.

Around 200 people were wounded, some critically, and there were fears more dead would be found in the fiery wreckage of the hotel, a popular gathering place for politicians, foreigners and the Pakistan elite.

Officials said they were worried the building, engulfed in flame after the blast ruptured a gas pipeline, would collapse. A security official said many people leapt to their deaths from upper floors rather than be burnt alive.

The bombing came shortly after new President Asif Ali Zardari, who faces a struggle to rein in Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, delivered his inaugural address to parliament only a few hundred metres away.

It was one of the deadliest attacks in an increasingly bloody campaign by militants in Pakistan, a vital ally in the US-led “war on terror,” and presented Zardari with a major challenge just days after he took office.

Read Full Article Here

Why Would “Al Qaeda” Want To Decapitate Anti-US Leadership In Pakistan?
http://www.prisonplanet.com/why-..-in-pakistan.html

Pakistan probes mystery of US Marines’ steel boxes in Marriott
http://www.hindustantimes.com/Stor..%27+steel+boxes+&strParent=strParentID

“U.S. drone” crashes in northwest Pakistan
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20080924/tpl-uk-pakistan-drone-81f3b62.html

Zardari ‘was target of bomb plot’
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/itn/20080922/twl-zardari-was-target-of-bomb-plot-41f21e0.html

Pakistan blames US raids for hotel bombing
http://www.independent.co.uk/ne..r-hotel-bombing-938952.html

 



Former Syrian minister: US guilty for 9/11 attacks

Former Syrian minister: US guilty for 9/11 attacks

Jerusalem Post
September 12, 2008

The Syrian government daily Teshreen marked the seventh anniversary of 9/11 this week in a unique fashion: by publishing an article by Syria’s former information minister blaming US intelligence agencies for the attacks.

According to Mahdi Dakhlallah, in a piece that appeared Wednesday, the intelligence agencies were behind the September 11, 2001 attacks to provide a pretext for a preplanned US plan to invade Iraq and Afghanistan.

“These plans were ready and prepared [in advance] – and all that was needed was to find a pretext to begin their immediate implementation,” wrote Dakhlallah, in a piece of which excerpts were translated by MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute.

Dakhlallah wrote that in the US, the end justifies the means, and Washington’s overarching goal was to invade Afghanistan “to get close to the Caspian Sea gas and oil pipelines, and then to invade Iraq and to fix the poles of the tent of unipolarity in the ground.”

Indeed, wrote Dakhlallah, “the shock following 9/11 created an American public opinion that supported the war, aggression, and madness of our time, to which Afghanistan, Iraq, and all global stability fell victim. No one believes that it would have been possible to invade Afghanistan and Iraq in the same way and so fast had it not been for the 9/11 attacks. That’s how it always is: the end justifies the means.”

Dakhlallah wrote that on the seventh anniversary of 9/11, the truth about the events remained to be told.

“The world may have to wait 25 years for the truth to come to light and for the secret documents and information about what happened to be presented.

“But who cares about the truth?”

According to Dakhlallah, “What is important, always, is the use of the events in order to carry out a strategy planned in advance – which raises the possibility that the injured party itself carried out the deed, especially if the matter concerns a country with great strategic interests such as the US.”

 

U.S. Marine for 9/11 Truth interviewed

Scientists: “Unusual Magnetic Forces” Caused Twin Towers Collapse
http://www.prisonplanet.com/scientists-unusual-magnetic-forces-caused-twin-towers-collapse.html

Key Witness to WTC 7 Passes Away in Hospital at 53
http://www.infowars.com/?p=4602

 



Fabled Enemies (the movie)
September 14, 2008, 1:35 pm
Filed under: 9/11, 9/11 commission, 9/11 commission report, 9/11 Explosions, 9/11 Eyewitness, 9/11 Firefighters, 9/11 hijackers, 9/11 Mysteries, 9/11 planes, 9/11 survivors, 9/11 Truth, 9/11 wargames, 9/11 whistleblowers, 9/11 workers, Able Danger, Afghanistan, Air Force, air force one, al-qaeda, Alabama, alaska, Alex Jones, anthrax, army, ATF, barry jennings, BBC, BBC foreknowledge, biden, Big Brother, Bill Clinton, bin laden, Bush Sr., California, Canada, carlyle group, CIA, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Congress, Continuity of Government, Controlled Demolition, Cynthia McKinney, DEA, Dennis Kucinich, Department of Defense, Department of justice, DHS, Dick Cheney, Dictatorship, DoD, Donald Rumsfeld, double agent, Echelon, Empire, EPA, False Flag, FBI, federal crime, Flight 93, florida, Fort Detrick, George Bush, george h. w. bush, Ground Zero, Homeland Security, House, INS, inside job, IRS, ISI, Israel, jerusalem, jihadist, joe biden, lee hamilton, Loose Change, Luke Rudkowski, marine, Martial Law, Media, michael chertoff, middle east, Military, mineta, Mineta Testemony, mohammed atta, money fraud, money laundering, Mossad, Mystery Plane, nation building, navy, New York, NIST, NORAD, NSA, occupation, Pakistan, Patriot Act, Pentagon, Philip Zelikow, Propaganda, Psyops, Richard Armitage, Saudi Arabia, SEC, secret service, Senate, sibel edmonds, special forces, Spy, State Sponsored Terrorism, sudan, Surveillance, Taliban, telecoms, Texas, thomas kean, Turkey, visa, War Crimes, war games, War On Terror, warrantless search, warrantless wiretap, Washington D.C., We Are Change, White House, World Trade Center, Zionism | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fabled Enemies (the movie)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2144933190875239407&hl=en

 



Navy warship made out of 9/11 steel
August 11, 2008, 2:27 pm
Filed under: 9/11, 9/11 Truth, marine, navy, New York, USMC, War On Terror, World Trade Center | Tags: ,

Introducing The USS New York – Made From Steel From The Towers Of 9/11

Say Anything Blog
August 7, 2008

This is amazing:

It was built with 24 tons of scrap steel from the World Trade Center .

It is the fifth in a new class of warship – designed for missions th at include special operations against terrorists. It will carry a crew of 360 sailors and 700 combat-ready Marines to be delivered ashore by helicopters and assault craft.

Steel from the World Trade Center was melted down in a foundry in Amite , LA to cast the ship’s bow section. When it was poured into the molds on Sept 9, 2003, ‘those big rough steelworkers treated it with total reverence,’ recalled Navy Capt. Kevin Wensing, who was there. ‘It was a spiritual moment for everybody there.’

Junior Chavers, foundry operations manager, said that when the trade center steel first arrived, he touched it with his hand and the ‘hair on my neck stood up.’ ‘It had a big meaning to it for all of us,’ he said. ‘They knocked us down. They can’t keep us down. We’re going to be back.’

The ship’s motto? ‘Never Forget’

Damn, that’s fine.

 



Karl Rove knew of problems with anthrax vaccine

White House memo exposes Rove knew of problems with anthrax vaccine

Raw Story
August 7, 2008

The Department of Defense continued its controversial mandatory anthrax vaccinations program despite high ranking Bush administration officials acknowledging there were problems with the vaccine within months of the Bush administration taking office—well before the 9/11 attacks and the October 2001 anthrax letters.

A 2001 memorandum from former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove to then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz indicates that the White House knew of problems relating to the Gulf War Syndrome and the military’s controversial anthrax vaccine.

Obtained by RAW STORY earlier this year from a senior military official and referenced in today’s New York Daily News, Rove wrote, “I do think we need to examine the issues of both Gulf War Syndrome and the Anthrax vaccine and how they can be dealt with. They are political problems for us.”

Read Full Article Here

U.S. Soldiers Die From Mystery Vaccination



Afghanistan Opium Supplies 93% of World’s Heroin

Afghanistan Opium Supplies 93% of World’s Heroin

NY Times
August 5, 2008

In the morass that is Afghanistan, not just the Taliban are flourishing. So too is opium production, which increasingly finances the group’s activities. There is no easy way to end this narcotics threat, a symptom of wider instability. Even a wise and coordinated plan of attack would take years to bear real results. But the United States and the rest of the international community are failing to develop one. They must work harder, smarter and more cooperatively to rescue this narco-state.

The scope of the problem is mind-numbing. Opium production mushroomed in 2006 and 2007, and Afghanistan now supplies 93 percent of the world’s heroin, with the bulk going to users in Europe and Russia. According to official figures, the narcotics trade rakes in about $4 billion a year, which is about half of Afghanistan’s gross domestic product. It strengthens the extremist forces that American and NATO troops are fighting and dying to defeat; it undermines the Afghan state they are trying to build; and it poisons drug users across Europe, where many people do not see Afghanistan as their problem and leaders are shamefully ignoring the connection.

Last week, the United Nations reported an alarming new development: Afghan drug lords are recruiting foreign chemists, mostly from Turkey, Pakistan and Iran, to help turn raw opium into highly refined heroin. Doing so adds value and lethality to the product they export.

American, European, Afghan and United Nations officials have sabotaged their mission by continuing to bicker over why poppy cultivation has skyrocketed, what to do about it and who should act. In a particularly damning indictment in The Times Magazine, Thomas Schweich, a former State Department official, blamed corrupt Afghan officials, internal policy divisions and the reluctance of American and NATO military to take on counternarcotics roles, as much as the Taliban.

Mr. Schweich should have pointed a finger at President Bush for the fundamental failure in Afghanistan. Mr. Bush put too few resources into the country after 9/11, then left the aftermath to NATO and various warlords while America shifted focus to the disastrous war of choice in Iraq. The results: a Taliban and Al Qaeda resurgence coupled with historic poppy crops.

It is very good news that 20 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces may soon be free of poppy cultivation, but that means production is overwhelmingly concentrated in the south, largely in Helmand Province, where the Taliban are strongest and the government is weakest.

Mr. Schweich’s main recommendation — to aggressively eradicate poppy crops by aerial spraying — is politically untenable and of questionable value. Other things can be done, or done better, including building a criminal justice system that can prosecute major drug traffickers and having American and NATO forces play a more robust role in interdiction. The Afghan and American governments have broken ground on a new airport and agricultural center in Helmand — an encouraging attempt to help farmers shift from poppies to food crops.

Allegations that President Hamid Karzai protects officials and warlords in the trade are troubling. Washington and its allies must press him to address this problem. They also should seize assets and ban visas for major traffickers who have homes outside Afghanistan.

Longer term, the answer lies in a consistent, integrated and well-financed plan to establish security throughout Afghanistan, put kingpins in jail, develop a market economy and a functioning government in Kabul, and rapidly expand incentives for smaller farmers to stop growing poppies. It is all one more daunting Bush administration legacy that will be left for the next president to fix.

U.S. adds 30 days to Marines’ tours in Afghanistan
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN0473020080804

Pentagon OKs over $10 billion in arms sales for Iraq
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080801/pl_nm/..n3aHyCY1DJlX6GMA

New US defense strategy centers on ‘long war’
http://rawstory.com/news/afp/New_US_defense_..nters_on__07312008.html

1 In 4 Soldiers Have Hearing Loss
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/08/gns_hearingloss_080408/

 



U.S. Soldiers Die From Mystery Vaccination

U.S. Soldiers Die From Mystery Vaccination

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JH4iMrFsrGA

Judge OKs mandatory anthrax vaccine
http://www.rawstory.com/news/moc..anthrax_vaccine_02292008.html

Deadly Vaccine News Archive
http://nwsarchive.wordpress.c…ly-vaccines-archive/

 



Operation Garden Plot: Military & U.N. to Control Civil Dissent

Operation Garden Plot: Military & U.N. to Control Civil Dissent

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXPtmvdWDo

What is Operation Garden Plot
http://www.uhuh.com/control/garden.htm

 



CIA Funded Warlords Turn Guns On U.S. Troops

CIA Funded Warlords Turn Guns On U.S. Troops

U.S. News
July 11, 2008

The war in Afghanistan reached a wrenching milestone this summer: For the second month in a row, U.S. and coalition troop deaths in the country surpassed casualties in Iraq. This is driven in large part, U.S. officials point out, by simple cause and effect. Marines flowed into southern Afghanistan earlier this year to rout firmly entrenched Taliban fighters, prompting a spike in combat in territory where NATO forces previously didn’t have the manpower to send troops. “We’re doing something we haven’t done in seven years, which is go after the Taliban where they’re living,” says a U.S. official.

But amid a well-coordinated assassination attempt on Afghan President Hamid Karzai and large-scale bombings last week in the capitals of both Afghanistan and Pakistan, U.S. forces are keenly aware that they are facing an increasingly complex enemy here—what U.S. military officials now call a syndicate—composed not only of Taliban fighters but also powerful warlords who were once on the payroll of the Central Intelligence Agency. “You could almost describe the insurgency as having two branches,” says a senior U.S. military official here. “It’s the Taliban in the south and a ’rainbow coalition’ in the east.”

Indeed, along with a smattering of Afghan tribal groups, Pakistani extremists, and drug kingpins, two of the most dangerous players are violent Afghan Islamists named Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Jalaluddin Haqqani, according to U.S. officials. In recent weeks, Hekmatyar has called upon Pakistani militants to attack U.S. targets, while the Haqqani network is blamed for three large vehicle bombings, along with the attempted assassination of Karzai in April.

Ironically, these two warlords—currently at the top of America’s list of most wanted men in Afghanistan—were once among America’s most valued allies. In the 1980s, the CIA funneled hundreds of millions of dollars in weapons and ammunition to help them battle the Soviet Army during its occupation of Afghanistan. Hekmatyar, then widely considered by Washington to be a reliable anti-Soviet rebel, was even flown to the United States by the CIA in 1985.

Read Full Article Here

 



Iraq Looking At U.S. Timetable For Withdrawal

Iraq Looking At U.S. Timetable For Withdrawal

Reuters
July 7, 2008

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki raised the prospect on Monday of setting a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops as part of negotiations over a new security agreement with Washington.

It was the first time the U.S.-backed Shi’ite-led government has floated the idea of a timetable for the removal of American forces from Iraq. The Bush administration has always opposed such a move, saying it would give militant groups an advantage.

The security deal under negotiation will replace a U.N. mandate for the presence of U.S. troops that expires on December 31.

“Today, we are looking at the necessity of terminating the foreign presence on Iraqi lands and restoring full sovereignty,” Maliki told Arab ambassadors in blunt remarks during an official visit to Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates.

“One of the two basic topics is either to have a memorandum of understanding for the departure of forces or a memorandum of understanding to set a timetable for the presence of the forces, so that we know (their presence) will end in a specific time.”

Read Full Article Here

 

How You Ended The War

Opposition to Iraq War Hits 68% in U.S.
http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/31178

Kucinich To Introduce One Article Of Impeachment
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Kucinich_to_bring_single_article_of_0708.html

‘No plans for early Afghanistan pullout’
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/?page..7�8story_8-7-2008_pg7_52

Soldier found dead in Texas apartment after shootout with police
http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/long..121.story?page=1

Canadian court rules Iraq war illegal
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/ne..b3-9bbc-bb4687684d5f

Panel urges new law on government war powers
http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN0826563920080708

Injured Iraq War Veterans Pay More for Health Care, Report Says
http://www.bloomberg.com/..N6Dgs3JM&refer=us

 



Mexican Army Carrying Out Assassinations In U.S.?

Mexican Army Carrying Out Assassinations In U.S.?

KFYI
June 26, 2008

The suspects may have been hired by drug cartels to perform home invasions and assassinations in the U.S.

Police reports show that three men arrested in a Phoenix home invasion and homicide Monday may have been active members of the Mexican Army.

While on the J.D. Hayworth show, Phoenix Law Enforcement Association President Mark Spencer said that the men involved were hired by drug cartels to perform home invasions and assassinations.

The Monday morning incident at 8329 W. Cypress St. resulted in the death of the homeowner. Between 50 and 100 rounds were fired at the house.

Spencer said a police officer told him that one of the men captured said they were completely prepared to ambush Phoenix police, but ran out of ammunition.

He added that all were all dressed in military tactical gear and were armed with AR-15 assault rifles. Three other men involved in the invasion escaped.

Read Full Article Here

 

National Guard on U.S-Mexico border will end mid-July

LA Times
June 23, 2008

An upcoming deadline of July 15, when the remaining National Guard personnel on the U.S- Mexico border are due to be withdrawn, has raised fears that without them the increased drug violence in the border area could spill into the United States.

“When the Guard was posted along the frontier in 2006 to help the strapped Border Patrol, critics warned that sending soldiers would be an insult to Mexico and that innocents could get shot by troops trained for combat, not law enforcement.”

“Now those worries have given way to fears that without the Guard’s help, a bloody drug cartel war on the Mexican side will spill into the U.S. and overwhelm the Border Patrol.” Dallas Morning News

Read on…

Meanwhile, conflict between Mexico’s drug cartels and law enforcement agencies continues. The Associated Press is reporting that Mexican soldiers captured at least 10 suspected members of a Tijuana-based drug cartel in a raid on a child’s baptism party in the border city.

 

Texas Real Estate Slump Lets Mexicans Take It Back

Bloomberg
June 25, 2008

A rising peso and an economy growing faster than the U.S. have given some Mexicans the buying power to take advantage of the housing slump in Texas, which became part of the U.S. under an 1848 treaty that ended a three-year war between the two countries.

The peso has gained 3.2 percent against the dollar since the beginning of the year. The economy, which rose 2.6 percent in the first quarter from a year ago, is expected to grow 2.6 percent this year, according to a central bank survey of 31 economists in May. The U.S. economy is forecast to grow 1.4 percent in 2008, according to a Bloomberg survey of 57 economists.

Marco Ramirez of McAllen, Texas, is among those trying to sell foreclosed Texas homes to Mexicans. Ramirez’s company, called Now! Co., has bought 32 Texas properties and has options on 88 more. His best prospects are Mexican buyers, especially in Monterrey, 150 miles from the Texas border, he said.

`Great Time to Buy’

“Many of these people have children who are studying in the U.S.,’’ Ramirez said. “They’ve been renting or leasing and now it’s a great time to buy.’’

Mexico is better known for providing the U.S. with cheap labor than investment. The U.S. is home to an estimated 12 million Mexican-born residents, about half of them living there illegally, according to the Pew Hispanic Center in Washington.

Sales of existing U.S. homes in April fell 18 percent to an annual pace of 4.89 million from 5.93 million a year ago as banks shied away from making new loans, according to the National Association of Realtors in Washington.

20 People Killed in Mexican Border City
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewF..0806/INT20080625c.html

Bush Signs Citizenship Bill For Soldiers
http://www.baltimoresun.com/new..7jun27,0,3711849,print.story

 



FBI & DHS Behind Indianapolis Martial Law Drills

FBI & Homeland Security Behind Indianapolis Martial Law Drills

Daily Newscaster
June 19, 2008

For over two weeks 2,300 Marines have been using the city of Indianapolis and its civilian population as a “simulated urban combat zone” under the direction of FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.

The exercises began on June 4th when Mayor Greg Ballard surrendered 26 sites around the city. The corporate press, Marine spokesmen, and officials with the city of Indianapolis have all been using the same talking points in an attempt to pacify local citizens and moderate any dissent. The official story has been that the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit is here to do pre-deployment training in a realistic urban environment. Col. Mark J. Desens, the unit’s commanding officer, said “Our aim in Indianapolis is to expose our Marines to realistic scenarios and stresses posed by operating in an actual urban community. The city’s new mayor Greg Ballard concurs with the commander saying, “I think it’s very good training for them…actually, city fighting, urban fighting is really the most dangerous type of fighting there is.”

But the cover story has several obvious flaws, as the Marines have a multitude of facilities in which to experience “realistic scenarios.” To begin Camp Lejeune is home of MOUT Military Operations Urban Terrain or urban combat training village, modeled after an Iraqi town. Located in Kuwait is a high tech realistic urban MOUT training facility (watch video) covering 30 acres and costing taxpayers 15 million to build. The FBI in Quantico, VA has an extensive “Hogan’s Alley,” urban combat training center where the Marines could practice for pre – deployment and fire live ammunition.

In fact live fire exercises are the preferred and usually required type of training for units deploying to combat zones, the Army performs this type of training at the Joint Readiness Training Center in Fort Polk Louisiana. The JRTC offers improved unit readiness by providing a highly realistic, stressful, joint and combined arms training across the full spectrum of conflict, current and future. Perhaps the biggest flaw in the cover story being sold by the controlled press and others is that, “Most of the Marines with the 26th MEU are Iraqi combat veterans.” according to Col. Hill of Camp Lejeune.

While the Marines and their spokesmen are being put front and center for public consumption the “terror drills” they are conducting have been set up by the FBI under TAMACOR. The TAMACOR program is designed to integrate federal and state law enforcement agencies with the USMC. Taken from a Department of Defense memo, “The TAMACOR Program supports the FBI by coordinating regional FBI SWAT training during USMC special operations training on non-DoD facilities.” Under TAMACOR the Marines have been training to perform law enforcement functions since 1992 when the FBI and Marines formalized the agreement with the signing of the initial MOU, Memorandum of Understanding. Civilian authorities and their appointed agents have been using these MOU’s to weaken Posse Comitatus over the years, initially using the War on Drugs as their justification.

We have learned from Major T. A. Smith, Chief Deputy of the Bartholomew County Sheriff’s Office that the Department of Homeland Security is also behind these operations. However when questioned no one from the Department of Homeland Security or the FBI would elaborate on their involvement, referring us back Lt. Patrick, Public Affairs Officer of the 26th MEU.

Compartmentalization and keeping people in the dark about training Marines in a police role seems to be a major objective of these exercises. This is evident in the stream of propaganda coming from civilian authorities and the controlled press these last few weeks. From the Indianapolis Star we are told, “Indianapolis residence hoping to experience a bit of shock and awe.” Mark Casey a local Indianapolis blogger says, “A word to the Indianapolis wise [see if you like martial law you are “wise.”] … when you see that formation of helicopters flying low over your back yard this week, remember that its only a drill!”

According to the Indianapolis Mayor there is really no need to be concerned. “I don’t think it was necessary for any citywide meetings on this,” Ballard said. “The neighborhoods will be well-informed on what’s going on.” Perhaps some meetings would have been beneficial since the owner of one the surrendered sites, Rich Banta was not told about the plans. Banta said, “That it [Eastgate Consumer Mall] is a construction site … I’d hate to see a Ray’s Trash truck run into a helicopter.” When speaking to another city official a little bit of truth slipped out when Debbie Fletcher of the Indianapolis/Marion Country Emergency Management Agency said, “We don’t want anyone thinking that there’s an invasion happening or that we declared martial law or something like that.”

The preponderance of the evidence strongly suggest that the Marines in Indianapolis are being prepared for civilian law enforcement functions in direct violation of Posse Comitatus which prohibits federal troops from exercising state law enforcement police or peace officer powers to maintain “law and order” on non-federal property. I suspect most of the Marines in the 26th are not even aware of their role in this joint law enforcement exercises. Neither the Marines nor Indiana police have been briefed on the significance of the Posse Comitatus Act.

Due to alternative press coverage and public awareness much of what the FBI and DHS had planned for the citizens of Indianapolis has been scaled back or cancelled. Marines did execute a mock terror cell raid on and occupied apartment complex but there is little evidence of the other locations mentioned in earlier press releases being used. Largely Marine training has been restricted to Camp Atterbury and the Raytheon facility on the city’s east side, leaving the Marines biggest public exposure to be at the Indiana State Fairgrounds during a community outreach day.

It is critically important for all readers to understand that it is the military veterans of this nation who are sounding the alarm as rogue elements within our government have decided to Cross the Rubicon misusing the relationship between the public and U. S. Armed Forces to desensitize military and law enforcement personnel and encourage them to accept what was once considered unacceptable. “We’re all part of the national defense mechanism in some way,” Ballard said. “The impact on the city will be very minimal. . . . They just have to trust us that we’re doing the right thing for the city and the nation.”

The ultimate mission of the Marine Corps is to protect and defend The Constitution, not to practice waging war against America.

 



Letterman: “Cheney Couldn’t Care Less About Americans”

Letterman: “Cheney Couldn’t Care Less About Americans”

 



Iraq war costs may reach $2.7 trillion

Iraq war costs may reach $2.7 trillion

Press TV
June 13, 2008

The costs on American taxpayers may reach $2.7 trillion by the time the Iraq war ends, according to a Congressional testimony.

In a hearing held by the Joint Economic Committee Thursday, members of the Congress heard testimony about the current costs of the war and the future economic fallout from returning soldiers.

At the beginning of the conflict in 2003, the Bush administration gave Congress a cost estimate of $60 billion to $100 billion for the entirety of the war. However, the battle has been dragging on much longer than most in the government expected.

William Beach, director of the Center for Data Analysis, told the Congress that the Iraq war has already cost taxpayers $646 billion.

That’s only accounting for five years, and with the conflict expected to drag on for another five years, the figure is expected to more than quadruple, Beach added.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said the war costs taxpayers about $430 million per day.

“It is long past time for the administration to come clean and account for the real costs of the war in Iraq,” said Schumer. “If they want to disagree with our estimates or with other experts … fine – they should come and explain why.”

The Bush administration, which was invited to give testimony, declined to participate.

The Pentagon has previously said that the war costs approximately $9.5 billion a month, but some economists say the figure is closer to $25 billion a month when long-term health care for veterans and interest are factored in.

 

Iraqi PM suggests US might be asked to leave

Raw Story
June 13, 2008

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki suggested that US forces might be asked to leave if the two countries cannot agree on the new status of forces agreement, McClatchy reported Friday.

Maliki, seen above, made the comment after pressure from Shiite lawmakers who feel that Iraq’s sovereignty is threatened by US forces and after talks over the status of forces agreement “reached an impasse,” according to McClatchy.

“Iraq has another option that it may use,” Maliki said during a visit to Amman, Jordan. “The Iraqi government, if it wants, has the right to demand that the U.N. terminate the presence of international forces on Iraqi sovereign soil.”

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said that although talks over the security pact are struggling, Baghdad and Maliki are committed to concluding the agreement, Reuters reported Friday.

“I think it’s too early really to judge this agreement that it is dead or there is no way out,” he said after attending a U.N. Security Council meeting on Iraq.

The U.N. mandate for a US presence in Iraq expires at the end of the year, McClatchy reported.

An excerpt from the McClatchy story details the nations’ conflict over the status of forces agreement:

“Maliki acknowledged that talks with the U.S. on a status of forces agreement “reached an impasse” after the American negotiators presented a draft that would have given the U.S. access to 58 military bases, control of Iraqi airspace and immunity from prosecution for both U.S. soldiers and private contractors.

The Iraqis rejected those demands, and U.S. diplomats have submitted a second draft, which Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih told McClatchy included several major concessions. Among those would be allowing Iraq to prosecute private contractors for violations of Iraqi law and requiring U.S. forces to turn over to Iraqi authorities Iraqis that the Americans detain.”

Iraq says talks with U.S. on pact reach “dead end”
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSCOL33273620080613

Blackwater’s Private CIA
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/87200/?page=entire

4 Afghan civilians killed in US raid
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=59546&sectionid=351020403

US Napalm Iraqi Children (Warning-Graphic)
http://thingsimportanttoharry.blogspot.c..ldren-warning.html

Doctors To Study Iraq Birth Defects
http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30200-1318608,00.html

GAO: Military Fails To Examine Troops Properly
http://www.usatoday.com/ne..-deploy-report_N.htm?csp=1

 



Marine Sacked For Throwing Puppy Off Cliff

Marine Sacked For Throwing Puppy Off Cliff

News.Com.Au
June 12, 2008

A US Marine has been kicked out of the corps and another has been punished after a video surfaced of Marines throwing a puppy off a cliff in Iraq.

The video, which was posted on YouTube, showed two Marines joking and holding up a puppy before it was hurled into a gully.

Marine Corps Base Hawaii said today that Lance Corporal David Motari received unspecified “non-judicial punishment” and “is being processed for separation” from the Marine Corps, the Associated Press reported.

The second Marine, Sergeant Crismarvin Banez Encarnacion received unspecified “non-judicial” punishment.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=y7hdKzeRhK0

Malkin’s Conspiracy Theories Proven Wrong
http://www.roguegovernment.com/news.php?id=9943

 



Above the law: the Bush crime syndicate

Above the law: the Bush crime syndicate

Washington Post
April 2, 2008

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXpavT5RCP8

The Bush crime syndicate genuinely believed that the president was above the law. It’s not hyperbole — it was an actual legal opinion:

The Justice Department sent a legal memorandum to the Pentagon in 2003 asserting that federal laws prohibiting assault, maiming and other crimes did not apply to military interrogators who questioned al-Qaeda captives because the president’s ultimate authority as commander in chief overrode such statutes.

[…]

Sent to the Pentagon’s general counsel on March 14, 2003, by John C. Yoo, then a deputy in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, the memo provides an expansive argument for nearly unfettered presidential power in a time of war. It contends that numerous laws and treaties forbidding torture or cruel treatment should not apply to U.S. interrogations in foreign lands because of the president’s inherent wartime powers.

“If a government defendant were to harm an enemy combatant during an interrogation in a manner that might arguably violate a criminal prohibition, he would be doing so in order to prevent further attacks on the United States by the al Qaeda terrorist network,” Yoo wrote. “In that case, we believe that he could argue that the executive branch’s constitutional authority to protect the nation from attack justified his actions.”

Interrogators who harmed a prisoner would be protected by a “national and international version of the right to self-defense,” Yoo wrote. He also articulated a definition of illegal conduct in interrogations — that it must “shock the conscience” — that the Bush administration advocated for years.

“Whether conduct is conscience-shocking turns in part on whether it is without any justification,” Yoo wrote, explaining, for example, that it would have to be inspired by malice or sadism before it could be prosecuted.

Read Full Article Here

Torture for Profit

Memo: Bush Authority Trumps Torture Ban
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2008/04/01/bush-memo.html

Top Bush Administration officials pressured underlings to use torture tactics at Guantanamo
http://rawstory.com/news/20..underlings_0402.html

Hersh: children raped at Abu Ghraib, Pentagon has videos
http://www.boingboing.net/2004/07/15/hersh-children-raped.html

Secret DOJ Memo Says Fourth Amendment Has “No Application” After 9/11
http://infowars.net/articles/april2008/030408Memo.htm



Democrats Admit They Won’t Stop Iraq War

Democrats Admit They Won’t Stop Iraq War

Redwood Age
April 4, 2008

Democrats signaled on Friday that they don’t see much hope in ending the Iraq war this year so long as President Bush insists U.S. troops remain committed there in large numbers.

But party leaders wrote to Bush on Friday anyhow, telling him it’s not too late to change course and pleading with him not to leave the war for the next president to handle.

“We are deeply concerned that you and the congressional Republican leadership are intent on staying the current course throughout your administration and then handing the Iraq war off to future presidents,” the Democrats wrote.

Others said they hope to see continued efforts to force troop withdrawals, but acknowledged they were unlikely to succeed.

“I expect most of our troops to still be there” come the end of the year, said Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

“Until there’s either a big enough majority in the Senate or a change in the president’s (approach), I don’t see a significant improvement situation improvement in Iraq,” he later added, in a conference call with reporters on Friday.

Read Full Article Here

 

The United States will “make a significant additional contribution” in troops to Afghanistan in 2009

BBC News
April 4, 2008

The US intends to send a “significant” number of extra troops to aid Nato’s effort in Afghanistan in 2009, Defence Secretary Robert Gates has said.

The unspecified increase will come regardless of whether US troop levels in Iraq are reduced, Mr Gates said.

US President George Bush made the offer at a Nato summit in Romania, he said.

Although the final decision will rest with the next president, Mr Gates said there was bipartisan backing for “success” in Afghanistan.

The US currently has about 17,000 troops deployed in Afghanistan.

Map of the main troop deployments in Afghanistan

“The president indicated that he expected in 2009 that the United States would make a significant additional contribution,” said Mr Gates as he flew from the Bucharest summit to the Gulf state of Oman.

Shortfalls

The defence secretary added that combating Taleban insurgents in Afghanistan would remain a high priority for the next US president, regardless of their political affiliation.

“I believe this is one area where there is very broad bipartisan support in the United States for being successful and I think that no matter who is elected they will want to be successful in Afghanistan,” said Mr Gates.

Read Full Article Here

 



U.S. VA documents 73,846 deaths from Iraq Wars

U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs documents 73,846 deaths from Iraq Wars as of May 2007

The Canadian
April 6, 2008

U.S. media organizations like CNN, NBC, FOX and others recently reported that the death total of U.S. combatants in Iraq War had just reached 4,000. The problem is that this data seems to be an intentional distortion. Indeed, official U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs data indicates that the death total from the attrition of Iraq Wars had already reached 73,846, as of May 2007. In comparison Sky News reports that during the Vietnam War, 58,000 soldiers were killed between 1964 and 1973, an average of 26 a day. LINK

It is indeed, a well known fact that in a so-called free society, the U.S. President George W. Bush administration has banned media organizations from photographing most of the coffins, along with the maimed military personnel returning into the U.S. from Iraq. And, if you think that the U.S. President Bush administration has followed “freedom of the press” in Iraq, you have made a sudden mistake.

Journalists in Iraq, who have not prostituted themselves into disseminating the Bush administration’s public relations on the “overall success” of the Iraq War, are being subjected to oppressive persecution.

Journalists have complained of fascist-style harassment.

Is this the action of a U.S. President, who is fighting for democracy, that fundamentally relies on transparency toward supporting a critically informed public?

Indeed, award-winning independent Journalist Dahr Jamail reports that “when the United States handed over power to a ’sovereign’ Iraqi interim government, [Paul] Bremer [former U.S. administrator in Iraq] simply passed on the authority to Ayad Allawi.” LINK

Mr. Dahmail further documents that, Mr. Allawi is the “U.S.-installed interim Prime Minister, who has had longstanding ties with the British intelligence service MI6 and the CIA.” LINK

Investigative Journalist Dahr Jamail, also reports that Allawi’s “media commission had sent out an official ’order’ for news organisations to “stick to the government line on the U.S.-led offensive in Fallujah, or face legal action.” The warning was sent on the letterhead of Mr. Allawi.

The result is that Iraq has become under the Bush administration, a far worse “modern Stalinist” police state, than Iraq had ever been under Saddam Hussein. Over 1 million people in Iraq have been reportedly killed, as the direct result of the Bush regime’s pre-emptive War in Iraq. This is in addition to the over 73,000 U.S. military personnel already killed, as documented by U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.

Mr. Bush has coordinated an effort to limit the American public’s understanding of the current Iraq War, based upon the myth-making presentation of the War. That myth-making” has sought to convince Americans, in part, that the war is taking a far less toll of American lives.

Indeed, it is apparent that the U.S. Bush administration, is anxious to “declare progress” and “victory” in Iraq, so that it can pursue its further military expansionist agenda against Iran. Seymour M. Hersh has sounded alarm bells about the Bush regime’s nuclear war ambitions against Iran. LINK

But, “The Bush administration has rejected comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam, which traumatized Americans a generation ago, with a sad procession of military body bags and television footage of grim wartime cruelty,” observed China Daily. LINK

The intellectual inspiration for the U.S. Bush administration’s public relations management of the Iraq War, is Leo Strauss. Wikipedia notes that “Strauss asks his readers to consider whether it is true that noble lies have no role at all to play, in uniting and guiding the polis.” LINK

In 2003, the magazine Foreign Policy In Focus, noted that thanks to the “Week in Review” section of the 4 May 2003 edition of the New York Times and another investigative article in a recent New Yorker magazine, “The cognoscenti have suddenly been made aware that key neoconservative strategists behind the Bush administration’s aggressive foreign and military policy, consider themselves to be followers of Strauss. LINK

Two other very influential Straussians, noted by Foreign Policy in Focus in May 2003, “include Weekly Standard Chief Editor William Kristol and Gary Schmitt, founder, chairman, and director of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). This is a six-year-old neoconservative group whose alumni include Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon [then] chief Donald Rumsfeld, as well as a number of other senior foreign policy officials.” LINK

“PNAC’s early prescriptions and subsequent open letters to President George W. Bush on how to fight the war on terrorism, have anticipated to an uncanny extent precisely what the administration has done.” LINK

The Executive Intelligence Review (EIR), notes that a leading “Straussian” advisor to the Bush Administration has been “Paul Wolfowitz, who was trained by Strauss’ alter-ego and fellow University of Chicago professor Allan Bloom. EIR specifically noted that Wolfowitz has helped champion the “war party” within the civilian bureaucracy at the Pentagon. LINK

Strauss emphasized that ’myths’ are “vitally needed” to “give people meaning and purpose and to ensure a stable society”; and even though he was Jewish, he praised Nazi Germany for embracing the power of myth to control the development of “liberal tendencies” in society. In the view of Strauss, presenting the truth harms society, by liberating “the governed” as “free thinkers” from the “necessary” social control of “elites”.

The Bush administration is inspired by the neo-fascist ideology of Leo Strauss, and has sought to dupe the American public into ignorance about the human suffering of U.S. military personnel in Iraq, by using Straussian techniques of political manipulation.

Shadia Drury, in Leo Strauss and the American Right (1999), argues that Strauss taught different things to different students and inculcated an elitist strain in American political leaders, that is linked to imperialist militarism and to Christian fundamentalism.

Drury accuses Strauss of teaching that “perpetual deception of the citizens by those in power is critical, because they need to be led and because they need strong rulers to tell them what’s good for them.”

Nicholas Xenos in “Leo Strauss and the Rhetoric of the War on Terror,” Logosjournal.com similarly argues that Strauss “was not an anti-liberal in the sense in which we commonly mean ’anti-liberal’ today, but an anti-democrat in a fundamental sense; a true reactionary. Strauss, was somebody who wanted to go back to a previous, pre-liberal, pre-bourgeois era of blood and guts; of imperial domination, of authoritarian rule, and of pure fascism.”

The U.S. President Bush administration’s stated goal of staying in Iraq, to guide Iraq into democracy, and also to combat “terrorists” who threaten American and international security interests, is an apparent clever Straussian ruse. The Bush administration seeks an apparent agenda in Iraq which is far from being the affirmation of democracy and peace.

The lives of Americans have been lost not in the defence of democracy and toward global peace, but as apparent “ritual sacrifices” to the messianic Eugenic ideology of America’s ruling elites. The War on Terrorism appears to being used as a pseudonym for a Eugenics War, that seeks to use the pre-text of terrorists, to execute genocide against Iraqis, through the exploitation of and the “sacrifice” of more than 73,000 U.S. military personnel.

Get the full U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs report: PDF LINK

 

What military spending is doing to our economy

Daily Kos
March 31, 2008

Massive federal deficits, not enough money for social programs. Where have all our tax dollars gone? The charts below (click for full page versions) show how our income tax dollars were spent in FY2007, which ended last September 30 (data from Budget of the United States Government: Historical Tables Fiscal Year 2009, Table 8.7). As you can see, 52.7% of these discretionary funds went to the military.

These charts exclude expenditures for Social Security, Medicare, and federal highways since these programs are paid from dedicated taxes maintained in separate trust funds. They also exclude interest paid on the national debt since that spending is “mandatory”, not “discretionary”. These charts show the part of the federal budget that Congress and the President directly allocate each year (with the funds derived from our income taxes, corporation taxes, excise taxes, estate and gift taxes, and other miscellaneous taxes).

 

5 Years Too Many

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iah-ESLQHTs

Army War Tours To Be Cut From 15 To 12 Months
http://news.yahoo.com/s/a..B4gvEERKqU0pNgLpu.WwvIE

Blackwater Contract In Iraq Renewed Another Year
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/200..x1VSlDa396qFhpEJ9lOzZa7gF

Iraq War Is A Eugenics Orchestrated Genocide
http://www.agoracosmopolitan.com/home/Frontpage/2008/03/29/02304.html

Iraqi casualties at highest level since August
http://www.rawstory.com/new..st_level_s_04012008.html

 



McCain’s mistress has gone missing for 44 days

McCain’s mistress has gone missing for 44 days

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wKgc3IP9Hw

Why Won’t McCain Sign the GI Bill?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK_9sI7hzAc

McCain: Osama bin Laden and I agree on Iraq
http://rawstory.com/news/2008.._quote_as_0324.html

Buchanan: McCain would have us go to war with Russia
http://www.buchanan.org/blog/?p=975

CNN catches McCain making contradictory statements about Sadr.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/04/..-statements-about-sadr/

 



U.S. death toll in Iraq reaches 4,000

U.S. death toll in Iraq reaches 4,000

CNN
March 23, 2008

The four were killed when a homemade bomb hit their vehicle as they patrolled in a southern Baghdad neighborhood, the U.S. military headquarters in Iraq said. A fifth soldier was wounded.

The grim milestone comes less than a week after the fifth anniversary of the start of the war.

“No casualty is more or less significant than another; each soldier, Marine, airman and sailor is equally precious and their loss equally tragic,” said Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, the U.S. military’s chief spokesman in Iraq.

“Every single loss of a soldier, sailor, airman or Marine is keenly felt by military commanders, families and friends both in theater and at home.”

Of the 4,000 U.S. military personnel killed in the war, 3,263 have died in attacks and fighting and 737 in nonhostile incidents, such as traffic accidents and suicides. Eight of those killed were civilians working for the Pentagon.

Also Sunday, at least 35 Iraqis died as the result of suicide bombings, mortar fire and the work of gunmen in cars who opened fire on a crowded outdoor market. Nearly 100 were wounded in the violence.

Estimates of the Iraqi death toll since the war began range from about 80,000 to the hundreds of thousands. Another 2 million Iraqis have been forced to leave the country, and 2.5 million have been displaced from their homes within Iraq, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

Read Full Article Here

Ambassador Bush personally bullied UN diplomats into supporting Iraq war
http://prisonplanet.com/articles/march2008/230308Ambassador.htm
US wants Britain to lead ’surge’ in southern Iraq: report
http://www.spacewar.com/reports/U..in_southern_Iraq_report_999.html
Hans Blix slams Iraq war as ’tragedy’
http://www.spacewar.com/2006/080320010207.x9ljrgla.html

Forbidden fields: Oil groups circle the prize of Iraq’s vast reserves
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5b24f674-f5e6-11dc-8d3d-000077b07658.html

’We live in a nightmare. Death and carnage is everywhere’ -Baghdad resident
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/20/iraq1

Talk Of Troop Surge For Afghanistan
http://www.usnews.com/articles/news..-for-afghanistan_print.htm

 



Gang Members Get Trained in the Army

In 2003 there were just 16 incidents of gang members in the U.S. Armed Forces, while in 2006 the total was 10,309

New America Media
March 9, 2008

While hundreds of Mexican soldiers are deserting the army to join drug trafficking gangs, California is facing the opposite problem: A growing number of gang members here have infiltrated the U.S. Armed Forces in order to receive military training.

The numbers speak for themselves: In 2003 there were just 16 incidents of gang members in the U.S. Armed Forces, while in 2006 the total was 10,309, according to the study, “Gang-Related Activity in the U.S. Armed Forces Increasing,” released in 2007 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Twenty-two official entities, including the Los Angeles Police Department, participated in the report.

This study, classified as sensitive and meant for use by official agencies, reveals the presence of street gangs like the Mexican Mafia (EME), the Mara Salvatrucha, Hells Angels, The 18th Street Gang, the Norteños, the Sureños, as well as various supremacist groups on military bases.

Two years before this report came to the light, the Ceres Police Department, in northern California, already knew its fatal results.

Howard Stevenson, sergeant of the force, was killed by Andrés Ray, a Marine who went AWOL from Camp Pendleton and who police say was a longtime member of the Norteños.

According to a report by the Ceres Police, Raya shot the sergeant five times in cold blood, with two shots to the head. Three other officials were injured in the incident and the gang member lost his life.

As a result of the bloodshed, local Police Chief Art De Werk told his staff to treat the anti-gang fight as an exercise in military strategy.

“Gang members are using the techniques and skills learned in the Army to commit crimes, and there is no doubt about that. The worrisome thing is that they endanger not only officials but all of society,” says Gregory Lee, former supervisor of the national Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and private consultant in Los Angeles.

In Southern California the orders are clear: Any indication that a gang member has military training must immediately be reported.

Each time authorities enter a gang member’s house, said an anti-gang official who preferred to remain anonymous, “We have precise orders to look for photos, Army uniforms, anything related to the Army or that demonstrates a military training of that gang or gang member.”

That information is classified in a special gang database, according to the source.

“For us, it is vital to know if we are confronting an enemy with military training,” says Lieutenant George Zagurski, member of the intelligence unit of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. He declined to state the number of local gang members known to have been trained by the Army.

“These are facts for exclusive and official use. We do not want to discuss this with the public,” the lieutenant told La Opinión.

Despite the confidential nature of the topic, some experts calculate that out of 100 people who enter the Army, two have a gang affiliation.

“It’s an open secret that the ringleaders of local gangs are encouraging their younger members to enter the Army and receive military training and later to train the rest of the group,” claims the former DEA advisor.

The National Gang Task Force reports that from 2003 to 2006, the Army investigated more than 100 cases of crimes that involved soldiers related to the most dangerous gangs in the country.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Armed Forces Criminal Investigation Command has documented the death of at least two soldiers – killed, it appears, by other soldiers with ties to rival gangs. It also registered an increase in the amount of violent incidents between soldiers who are affiliated with gangs.

“Officials do not want this topic spoken about because it uncovers how the Army, in its rush to recruit more soldiers, has had to lower its security standards, allowing in volunteers with criminal backgrounds. We all know that a high number of soldiers has died on the battlefield and others have deserted. We don’t have enough soldiers and the Army has strict orders to increase the number of enlisted troops nationwide, even if that means recruiting criminals,” Lee maintains.

Under the so-called “moral waiver,” the Armed Forces between 2003 and 2006 permitted into the Army 4,230 convicted criminals, 43,977 people with misdemeanors on their records and 58,561 drug addicts. In 2007, another 10,000 people with criminal records were recruited by the Pentagon, according to an investigation by the Michael D. Palm Center, based in Santa Barbara, Calif.

“The problem is not that the Armed Forces are recruiting convicts. On the contrary, we think that the Army has very good programs of rehabilitation. The problem is the increase. The Army is more worried about filling its recruitment quotas than in looking for the best candidates,” says lead researcher Michael Bucai.

Nevertheless, it is becoming more and more difficult to detect links between gangs and those interested in enlisting in the Army. According to gang experts, these mafias are using new strategies to infiltrate their members into the Armed Forces.

“Many older gang members are taking care of their newer members so that they maintain a clean criminal record and thus can have unrestricted access to the Army or guns,” says an anti-gang official. “We have noticed that in common crimes, gang members are forced to give the name of another member of the group that already has a record so that he gets written up and helps the others to remain clean.”

The infiltration of gang members into the Armed Forces must be taken seriously because it represents an important risk for local and national security, says the former DEA agent.

“Gang violence is getting more and more acute and bloody and is the price that society must pay for the faults in the system,” Lee opines.

On various occasions, La Opinión tried to contact the Department of Defense spokesperson to understand how they are dealing with the issue. However, as of this issue, there has been no response.

At an international anti-gang police summit in Los Angeles on March 3, officials weighed in about whether gang members have infiltrated the U.S. military.

“These are just rumors,” said Christy McCampbell, Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. For his part, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said he did not know of any evidence of gang infiltration in the U.S. Army but would consider looking into the matter.

Also at the summit, Martín Escorza, head of the National Gang Task Force, said the issue is real. Adding to the problem, he said, is the presence of gang members trained in the armed forces of their respective countries, like El Salvador or Mexico.

As border tightens, smugglers raise their game
http://www.reuters.com/article/d..94320080310

 



KBR Water In Iraq Makes Troops Sick

U.S. Troops in Iraq Sickened By Water from Cheney-Linked Firm

AP
March 9, 2008

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeIxHQ-lkuM

Dozens of U.S. troops in Iraq fell sick at bases using “unmonitored and potentially unsafe” water supplied by the military and a contractor once owned by Vice President Dick Cheney’s former company, the Pentagon’s internal watchdog says.

A report obtained by The Associated Press said soldiers experienced skin abscesses, cellulitis, skin infections, diarrhea and other illnesses after using discolored, smelly water for personal hygiene and laundry at five U.S. military sites in Iraq.

The Defense Department’s inspector general’s report, which could be released as early as Monday, found water quality problems between March 2004 and February 2006 at three sites run by contractor KBR Inc., and between January 2004 and December 2006 at two military-operated locations.

It was impossible to link the dirty water definitively to all the illnesses, according to the report. But it said KBR’s water quality “was not maintained in accordance with field water sanitary standards” and the military-run sites “were not performing all required quality control tests.”

The report said KBR took corrective steps and was providing adequate water quality by November 2006. But military units at the two sites they controlled were still failing to perform required quality control tests and maintain appropriate records by that time.

“Therefore, water suppliers exposed U.S. forces to unmonitored and potentially unsafe water,” at the military sites by late 2006, the report said.

The problems did not extend to troops’ drinking water, but rather to water used for washing, bathing, shaving and cleaning. Water used for hygiene and laundry must meet minimum safety standards under military regulations because of the potential for harmful exposure through the eyes, nose, mouth, cuts and wounds.

Bush ‘may’ ignore Congress on Iraq
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=46308&secti..3510203

Upswing in Iraq attacks not a trend: U.S. military
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080309/ts_nm/iraq_dc_2

60,000 Iraq Vets Diagnosed With PTSD
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0803/S00119.htm

Baghdad blast toll rises, deadliest for months
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSL0157942120080307

Army Falsely Claims That Lowering Standards Has Not Affected Troop Quality
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/03/03/recruiting-standards/