This is an interesting little animated piece detailing the changing map of empires coming and going throughout history. Puts things in some historical perspective (something many citizens of the United States of Amnesia do not have a lot of, I’m afraid to say).
Wow. Hey, maybe it was the ‘terrorists’ who stole the Diebold source code missing from Maryland in order to hack our elections.
Vice President Dick Cheney said on Monday insurgents had stepped up attacks in Iraq to try to sway next week’s U.S. elections and they were constantly surfing the Web to keep tabs on American public opinion.
“Whether it’s al Qaeda or the other elements that are active in Iraq, they are betting on the proposition they can break the will of the American people,” Cheney told Fox News. “…They’re very sensitive to the fact that we’ve got an election scheduled.”
Cheney, a driving force in the decision to invade Iraq in 2003, spoke eight days before congressional elections with polls showing Bush’s Republican party at risk of losing control of Congress to the Democrats.
Voter disaffection over Iraq, where the U.S. military death toll for October has reached 100, is seen as a critical factor that could hurt Republican chances in the Nov. 7 ballot.
Cheney said America’s enemies in Iraq possessed the Internet savvy to monitor U.S. developments, helping them to time attacks aimed in part at influencing the elections. But he cited no evidence to back the theory.
Read The Full Article Here
There is no longer any doubt or mistake about it. These warmongers are criminally negligent fools who should not just be removed from office, but held legally liable for their crimes.
Shortly after the invasion of Afghanistan Donald Rumsfeld told his team to start planning for war in Iraq, but not to bother planning for a long stay, a high-ranking military official said in an interview.
“The secretary of defense continued to push on us … that everything we write in our plan has to be the idea that we are going to go in, we’re going to take out the regime, and then we’re going to leave,” Scheid said. “We won’t stay.”
Scheid said the planners continued to try “to write what was called Phase 4,” or the piece of the plan that included post-invasion operations like occupation.
Even if the troops didn’t stay, “at least we have to plan for it,” Scheid said.
“I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that,” Scheid said. “We would not do planning for Phase 4 operations, which would require all those additional troops that people talk about today.
It’s also worth recalling the standards for justice and the punishments meted out in Nuremburg (Article 6 is of particular interest here, I would think). Ah yes, those were the good old days, back when America was prosecuting war criminals instead of promoting them.
This has been talk in the press about a split up of Iraq amongst ethnic lines as a possible outcome since before the invasion. Now the discussion goes towards the fact that the risk that needs mitigation is of a Shia breakaway attempting to become part of Iran. The Administration’s primary plan has always been to rule Iraq’s oilfields as a unitary puppet-state; three states just makes matters more complicated and easier to lose control of. In addition, the Shia faction has always been most likely to become a client of Iran if left to its own devices; yoking it to the Sunnis and the Kurds helps to prevent this. Remember that Khomeini spent most of his exile from the Shah in the holy city of Qum in Iraq; there is a long-standing relationship between the areas going back to Roman times, when the Euphrates marked the boundary between Rome and Sassanid Persia. However, the Shias own the all-important port at Basra. Without Basra, oil cannot be easily exported to the West; pipelines and roads north most efficiently serve the Russians, not Americans or “international” oil companies. Therefore, the Americans must control Basra and either one of the two main oil regions, southern or northern/Kurdish. Unfortunately, the Shia hold Basra and the south, and the Americans’ best allies (although one questions their common sense) are the Kurds in the north. Ultimately, they are all going to realize that their best interests are served by selling their own oil to the SCO, either directly to Russia by the Kurds, or indirectly by allowing Iran to act as their agent in the case of the Shia.
Whether America catches on or not, the Shanghai Cooperative Organization has essentially re-established the Cold War geostrategic balance with two major differences: Iran is now firmly in the other camp; and we have reached the slow downside of the Peak Oil phenomenon — and most importantly, the sharp downside of U.S. and British internal supplies. Alaska, Texas, and the North Sea are all in declining production, and the major new Gulf find is actually quite small and extremely difficult to get to by historical standards, as well as smack-dab in the middle of hurricane territory. I am becoming convinced that World War III has indeed begun — an extended network of strategic alliances based on intent to dispute possession of key territories at all costs. And Americans fondly rely on their past history of expansion to believe that they can’t be defeated … a foolish idea, since no empire is eternal, and they all believe they’re unbeatable until they get dusted.
Allowing the breakdown is now discussed regularly as the only “realistic” solution politically, however, it won’t give the Bushies what they want — a captive oil-producing territory. That’s probably why they’re starting to threaten to move on Iran as well. Of course, if they do, they will destroy *our* country pretty much as thoroughly as they will Iran. But hey, the economy is going to head for its permanent slide beginning next year, anyway. There’s no coming out of this tailspin; the point of no return is past. The Iraq war will finish us whether or not we commit lunacy in Iran.
P.S.: Don’t worry too hard. “If the end of the world is nigh, it is time to be in Cincinnati. Everything comes to Cincinnati twenty years late.” - Mark Twain
- Posted by Cynndara Morgan for USTV Media
Gabriel Kolko delivers this sober analysis on the limits of traditional military power, and the ever-increasing dangers we face with the proliferation of more readily available nuclear weaponry.
Technology is now moving far faster than the diplomatic and political resources or will to control its inevitable consequences—not to mention traditional strategic theories. Hizbollah has far better and more lethal rockets than it had a few years ago, and the U. S. Army has just released a report that light water reactors–which 25 nations, from Armenia to Slovenia as well as Spain, already have and are not covered at all by existing arms control treaties—can be used to obtain weapons-grade plutonium easily and cheaply.
Within a few years, many more countries than the present ten or so will have nuclear bombs and far more destructive and accurate rockets and missiles, not to mention the means to deliver them accurately. Weapons-poor fighters will have far more sophisticated tactics as well as far more lethal equipment, which makes the heavily equipped and armed nations lose the advantages (as in Vietnam and Iraq) of their overwhelming firepower. The battle between a few thousand Hizbullah fighters and a massive, ultra-modern Israeli army proves this. Among many things, the war in Lebanon is a window of the future, and either the Israelis cease their policy of bluster and intimidation, and finally accept the political prerequisites of peace with the Arab world, or they too will eventually be wrecked by cheaper nuclear weapons.
This seems some kind of surreal nightmare from an apocalyptic comic book story, but alas, it is true. The war criminals currently grasping the levers of power in the American government are in the throes of finalizing plans to attack Iran and plunge the world into complete turmoil (birth pangs of a new Mideast and all, you know. Dawning of a New World Order). And these people call themselves ‘Christians’. So much for ‘Blessed are the Peacemakers’ I guess. But then, that is sooo Pre-9/11 mindset. Don’t you know, 9/11 everything changed. Everything. Even our values and principles. Or so say the neo-con artist ‘christians,’ the ultimate apocalyptic post-modernists.
As reports circulate of a sharp debate within the White House over possible US military action against Iran and its nuclear enrichment facilities, The Nation has learned that the Bush Administration and the Pentagon have issued orders for a major “strike group” of ships, including the nuclear aircraft carrier Eisenhower as well as a cruiser, destroyer, frigate, submarine escort and supply ship, to head for the Persian Gulf, just off Iran’s western coast. This information follows a report in the current issue of Time magazine, both online and in print, that a group of ships capable of mining harbors has received orders to be ready to sail for the Persian Gulf by October 1.
The ironies in this report abound. A military spokesman named “Kafka” and the ship leading the attack armada is the Eisenhower, named after the President and war hero general who warned us that the greatest danger to our republic lay within from the monied interests of the military-industrial-congressional complex. It is truly tragic that his name is being used as a moniker for a weapon to initiate the kind of process he warned us most emphatically against.
Read the full report, “War Signals” by Dave Lindorff in The Nation
Read here former Senator Gary Hart’s take on the impending attack against Iran and its use as an “October Surprise” to influence the coming Congressional elections
Robert Parry distills the history of the Bush family’s involvement with Iran, the hostages, Iran-Contra arms sales, and the importance of these facts in the impending Bushevik march towards war.
This investigative report is ESSENTIAL reading for every American, and before it becomes too late. It is also provides good insight into the tangled relationship between the U.S. and Israel.
Having gone through the diplomatic motions with Iran, George W. Bush is shifting toward a military option that carries severe risks for American soldiers in Iraq as well as for long-term US interests around the world. Yet, despite this looming crisis, the Bush Family continues to withhold key historical facts about US-Iranian relations.
Those historical facts – relating to Republican contacts with Iran’s Islamic regime more than a quarter century ago – are relevant today because an underlying theme in Bush’s rationale for war is that direct negotiations with Iran are pointless. But Bush’s own father may know otherwise.
Read The Complete Consortium News Report
Global Research reports on Iran’s preparations for an impending American attack. This is getting beyond serious now. If we as Americans do not put an end to this criminal irresponsibility, we will be just as responsible as the German people were for their acquiescence to the war crimes perpetrated in their names.
A blistering editorial from the Hartford Advocate on the pressing need for regime change at home now, before its too late. It also brings to light the true nature of the potentially devastating power of nuclear weapons today.
The American press doesn’t seem to have the guts and/or brains to take the initiative to point out the obvious. At least our allies the British don’t have the same reluctance to take on the truth of the matter. But it is not surprising to get such refreshingly concise analysis as this considering this is the paper that George Orwell used to work for.
We can only see off the serious threat we face if we separate real Muslim grievances from al-Qaida’s homicidal mania
George Bush sometimes sounds more like the Mahdi, preaching jihad against infidels, than the leader of a western democracy. In his regular radio address to the American people on Saturday he linked the British alleged aircraft plotters with Hizbullah in Lebanon, and these in turn with the insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan.
All, said the president of the world’s most powerful nation, share a “totalitarian ideology”, and a desire to “establish a safe haven from which to attack free nations”. Bush’s remarks put me in mind of a proverb attributed to Ali ibn Abu Talib: “He who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare, and he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere.”
In the United States a disturbingly large minority of people - polls suggest around 40% - remain willing to accept Bush’s assertions that Americans and their allies, which chiefly means the British, are faced with a single global conspiracy by Islamic fundamentalists to destroy our societies.
In less credulous Britain one could nowadays fit into an old-fashioned telephone box those who believe anything Bush or Tony Blair says about foreign policy. Many of us are consumed with frustration. We know that we face a real threat from Muslim fundamentalists, and that we are unlikely to begin to defeat this until we see it for what it is: something infinitely more complex, diffuse and nuanced than the US president wishes to suppose.
A good expose on the true underpinnings of what this God forsaken war in Lebanon is about and who was behind making it happen (many being the same cast of characters we all unfortunately quite familiar with here). Israel seemed to be taken in by the allure of enacting their own “shock and awe” campaign, only to have to rush in troops when it worked as smashingly well as the American version in Iraq only a handful of years earlier.
Amid the political and diplomatic fallout from Israel’s faltering invasion of Lebanon, some Israeli officials are privately blaming President George W. Bush for egging Prime Minister Ehud Olmert into the ill-conceived military adventure against the Hezbollah militia in south Lebanon.
Bush conveyed his strong personal support for the military offensive during a White House meeting with Olmert on May 23, according to sources familiar with the thinking of senior Israeli leaders.
Olmert, who like Bush lacks direct wartime experience, agreed that a dose of military force against Hezbollah might damage the guerrilla group’s influence in Lebanon and intimidate its allies, Iran and Syria, countries that Bush has identified as the chief obstacles to U.S. interests in the Middle East.
As part of Bush’s determination to create a “new Middle East” – one that is more amenable to U.S. policies and desires – Bush even urged Israel to attack Syria, but the Olmert government refused to go that far, according to Israeli sources.
One source said some Israeli officials thought Bush’s attack-Syria idea was “nuts” since much of the world would have seen the bombing campaign as overt aggression.
Read The Full Article Here
The President is required to immediately go back to Congress for Authorization to Keep Troops in Iraq!
The Current military situation in Iraq does not reflect the originally stated Immediate National Threat Presented to Congress for the authorization of Use of Force. The subsequent use of American armed forces and financial expenditures to support such forces under these new conditions have not been authorized by Congress or the American People.
The Administration must realize that it does not have the legal authority to promote its failed war policy outside its original stated national threat mandate. United States Military force has not been authorized to support one side or the other of the religious sectarian violence within Iraq, no more than it would be authorized to support a particular religious group within America. There is a separation of Church and State in America and that holds true in democracies we are fostering around the world. American military Men and Women have not been sent to Iraq no are we authorized by any law, to intercede militarily to impose or support a type of religious belief either Sunni or Shiite within the country of Iraq.
Tax dollar expenditures in the billions and American lives of over 2,500 have currently been spent to eliminate the immediate threat Iraq posed to America and this has been done. Any further military actions or monetary expenditures against Iraq outside the original congressional mandate are illegal under American Law and International Law and would open Americans up to Civil and Criminal liabilities.
- Posted by Michael C. Boetjer, Captain U.S. Army, Double Blue Star Father, Fort Wayne, Indiana
