Wednesday, June 27, 2007

"EL JEFE" SILENCED


Dominican Republic


from the book



The CIAs Greatest Hits



by Mark Zepezauer





Rafael Trujillo took power in the Dominican Republic in a 1930 coup d'etat and received enthusiastic backing from Washington for most of the next 30 years. His methods for suppressing dissent were sickeningly familiar-torture and mass murder. The US raised no objections, and Trujillo returned the favor by becoming a totally reliable supporter of US policies in the UN.



As often happens with such tyrants, however, he got too greedy. His personal business holdings grew until he controlled some three-fifths of the Dominican economy, which threatened the "favorable investment climate" that client states are set up for in the first place.



Also, when it started to look like Castro's revolutionary army would take over Cuba, the US began to worry that Trujillo's excesses might inspire a similar revolution. For whatever reasons, the CIA began plotting Trujillo's assassination in 1958.



Trujillo's life came to an abrupt end in May 1961, and while proper deniability was maintained in Washington, this is one of the best-documented CIA assassination plots (according to the 1975 Church Committee). The US attempted to maintain the corrupt essence of the Trujillo regime without Trujillo, but the 1962 elections brought a physician named Juan Bosch to power.



Bosch was anti-Communist and pro-business but, foolish man, he was dedicated to establishing a "decent democratic regime" through land reform, low-rent housing and public works projects. He was deposed by a CIA-backed coup after only seven months in office. When a popular countercoup tried to restore Bosch to power in 1965, the US invaded the island and installed a series of murderous regimes which have maintained a favorable investment climate ever since.



While he never lived long enough to see it enshrined as the "JFK Doctrine," President Kennedy once offered a fairly clear-cut rationale for US interventions abroad. Referring to the Dominican Republic, he said, "there are three possibilities...a decent democratic regime, a continuation of the Trujillo regime, or a Castro regime [by which he meant Bosch]. We ought to aim at the first, but we really can't renounce the second until we are sure that we can avoid the third."



In practice, we've hardly ever used the first option. Virtually all of our client states are similar to the Trujillo regime-and to the regimes we replaced him with.

Source: http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA%20Hits/DominRep_CIAHits.html

FAMILY JEWELS

CIA Releases 'Family Jewels'


27 June 2007
Watch CIA Family Jewels report / Real broadband - download video clip
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The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has declassified hundreds of once-secret documents, detailing some of the agency's activities from the 1950s through the early 1970s. They include a plot to assassinate Cuban President Fidel Castro. VOA's Robert Raffaele has the story.

Family jewels document
The CIA released the documents on its website, in response to a 1992 Freedom of Information Act request.

CIA Director Michael Hayden called the documents a "glimpse of a very different time and a very different agency."

Besides the plot against Mr. Castro, the documents describe domestic spying, opening of private mail and the investigation of journalists.

Michael Gelter
Michael Gelter
Agents watched former Washington Post reporter Michael Getler for three months in 1971. "They were watching who I was talking to. They took pictures of who I was having lunch with. They actually took pictures through the picture window of our home," he said.

CIA employees have nicknamed the documents "the family jewels." They were compiled in 1973 by then-CIA director James Schlesinger as he sought details about whether and when the CIA might have overstepped its authority.

Former CIA Director James Schlesinger (holding pipe)
Former CIA Director James Schlesinger (left)
Many details became known in testimony before two Congressional committees and one presidential commission investigating alleged intelligence abuses.

Gary Thomas, Voice of America's National Security Correspondent, says, "I think what it came down to was, a lot of this came down from the White House, it came down from the federal agents that they wanted this stuff done. [U.S. Attorney General] Bobby Kennedy wanted Fidel Castro assassinated."

Thomas says although the official release offers no stunning revelations, it may spark more debate about frustrations within the intelligence community. "These investigations of the time led to putting up barriers between the CIA and other agencies, on domestic law enforcement or intelligence cooperation. They [intelligence community] were afraid they would get caught on domestic surveillance. And this issue has now come back to the fore because now they're saying, 'Well, those committees actually hurt our domestic surveillance efforts, which might have prevented the 9/11 attacks, had we had a more robust domestic surveillance.' And I think if there is one thing these documents will do, is it might reignite that debate."

Revelations in the 1970s about covert CIA activities directly resulted in the creation of two congressional committees that oversee U.S. intelligence matters.

Source: http://www.voanews.com/english/2007-06-27-voa36.cfm

BLACK-OUT IN GOTHAM



NYC Power Outage Shuts Down Train Lines
Wednesday, June 27, 2007

NEW YORK - A power outage in the city's Upper East Side neighborhood cut traffic lights and some train service Wednesday afternoon, officials and residents said. The extent of the outage wasn't immediately clear.

"There's something happening on the Upper East Side. I can't tell you how big it is yet," said Bob Magee, a spokesman for Consolidated Edison.

Residents said traffic lights were out for 20 blocks on Lexington Avenue between the 60s and the 80s, while others said that the East Side subway lines weren't operating.

Con Edison couldn't say how many customers had lost power. The city was in the second day of temperatures well over 90 degrees.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was evacuated around 4 p.m. and visitors sitting on the outside steps in the sweltering heat. The streetlights up and down Fifth Avenue were dark.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

CHENEY'S OFFICE SUBPOENAED

Jun 27, 2007 3:08 pm US/Eastern Whopper No. 3: Dick Cheney on Iraq.

Vice President Dick Cheney's office was subpoenaed for documents about President Bush's eavesdropping program. AP

White House, Cheney's Office Subpoenaed

CBS News Interactive: Domestic Surveillance

(AP) WASHINGTON The Senate Judiciary Committee subpoenaed the White House and Vice President Dick Cheney's office Wednesday for documents relating to President Bush's controversial eavesdropping program that operated warrant-free for five years.

Also named in subpoenas signed by committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., were the Justice Department and the National Security Council. The four parties have until July 18 to comply, according to a statement by Leahy's office.

The committee wants documents that might shed light on internal disputes within the administration over the legality of the program, which Bush put under court review earlier this year.

"Our attempts to obtain information through testimony of administration witnesses have been met with a consistent pattern of evasion and misdirection," Leahy said in his cover letters for the subpoenas. "There is no legitimate argument for withholding the requested materials from this committee."

Echoing its response to previous congressional subpoenas to former administration officials Harriet Miers and Sara Taylor, the White House gave no indication that it would comply.

"We're aware of the committee's action and will respond appropriately," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said. "It's unfortunate that congressional Democrats continue to choose the route of confrontation."

The showdown between the White House and Congress could land in federal court.

Leahy's committee and its counterpart in the House have issued the subpoenas as part of a sweeping look at how much influence the White House exerts over the Justice Department and its chief, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

The probe, in its sixth month, began with an investigation into whether administration officials ordered the firings of eight federal prosecutors, for political reasons. The House and Senate Judiciary committees previously had subpoenaed Miers, one-time legal counsel, and Taylor, a former political director, in that probe.

But with senators of both parties already concerned about the constitutionality of the administration's efforts to root out terrorism suspects in the United States, the committee shifted to the broader question of Gonzales' stewardship of Justice and his willingness to go along with the wiretapping program.

The Bush administration secretly launched the spy program, run by the National Security Agency, in 2001 to monitor international phone calls and e-mails to or from the United States involving people the government suspected of having terrorist links. The program, which did not require investigators to seek warrants before conducting surveillance, was revealed in December 2005.

After the program was challenged in court, Bush put it under the supervision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, established in 1978. The president still claims the power to order warantless spying.

Debate continues over whether the program violates people's civil liberties, and the administration has gone to great lengths to keep it running with extensive presidential discretion.

Piquing the committee's interest was vivid testimony last month by former Deputy Attorney General James Comey about the extent of the White House's effort to override the Justice Department's objections to the program in 2004.

Comey told the Judiciary Committee that Gonzales, then-White House counsel, tried to get Attorney General John Ashcroft to reverse course and recertify the program. At the time, Ashcroft lay in intensive care, recovering form gall bladder surgery.

Ashcroft refused, as did Comey, to whom Ashcroft had temporarily shifted the power of his office during his illness.

The White House recertified the program unilaterally. Ashcroft, Comey, FBI Director Robert Mueller and their staffs prepared to resign. Bush ultimately relented and made changes to the classified program that the Justice officials had demanded, and the agency eventually recertified it.

The fight was one of the most bitter disputes of the Bush presidency and questions remain over whether the program tramples people's civil liberties. The administration says the program is crucial to preventing more terrorist attacks.

Fratto defended the surveillance program as "lawful" and "limited."

"It's specifically designed to be effective without infringing Americans' civil liberties," Fratto said. "The program is classified for a reason -- its purpose is to track down and stop terrorist planning. We remain steadfast in our commitment to keeping Americans safe from an enemy determined to use any means possible -- including the latest in technology -- to attack us."

Majority Democrats and some Republicans are skeptical and have sought to find out more details about the program and how it has been administered.

Leahy's panel is required to serve the subpoenas to specific people within the offices named. One is addressed to Gonzales, while the others are addressed to: David S. Addington, Cheney's chief of staff; White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten, V. Phillip Lago, executive secretary of the National Security Council - or "other custodian of records" in their offices.

The subpoenas themselves seek a wide array of documents on the program from the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks to the present. Among them are any documents that include analysis or opinions from Justice, the National Security Agency -- which administers the program -- the Defense Department, the White House, or "any entity within the Executive Branch" on the legality of the electronic surveillance program.

(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

Source: http://wcbstv.com/topstories/topstories_story_178131512.html

AMERICAN APOCALYPSE

American Apocalypse: Road-map to Armageddon?

Eileen Fleming

Internationally renowned Theologian, Reverend Dr. Stephen Sizer, Vicar of Christ Church in the UK is coming to Florida. His one and only public speaking engagement will be held Tuesday, July 3, 2007 at 3 PM at the United Church of Christ, 203 Washington Street, New Smyrna Beach, FL. 32168.

Reverend Sizer's thirteenth book, Zion's Christian Soldiers? Will be released in the autumn of 2007, but due to the current events in Gaza and Palestine, the Volusia Peacecenter and Florida Palestine Solidarity Network have arranged to bring him here so American citizens can learn how the secular state of Israel and American foreign policy, combined with the theology promoted in the Left Behind series has contributed to the exodus of the indigenous Palestinian Christians from the Holy Land.

The presence of the descendents of the first century Christians has decreased from 20% of the total population of the Holy Land to less than 1.3% since 1948. Reverend Sizer will enlighten all present as to why the Christian Exodus has reached a crisis situation and what concerned Americans can do to help the most well educated and consistently nonviolent citizens to remain in their homeland.

"Stephen Sizer's work on Christian Zionism is the most important and comprehensive on the subject to date, and should be read by all students of the Middle East and by Christians concerned about a just resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Christian Zionism raises vital theological and political challenges that must be addressed head-on by Christians in the West, particularly evangelicals. The impact of this terribly misguided movement is increasingly putting Christians in the Middle East at risk, and it seems a far cry from the witness and message of Jesus Christ." Professor Don Wagner, North Park University, Chicago (author of Anxious for Armageddon & Dying in the Land of Promise). This event is free and open to the public, all welcome.

For further details contact: Dana Humphrey at (386) 846-3932 or info@volusiapeacecenter.org

http://www.wearewideawake.org/



by WAWA (71 articles, 339 comments) on Wednesday, June 27, 2007 at 8:39:53 AM

Source: Comment to Article @: http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_dennis_d_070624_this_is_jesus___we_g.htm

BORIS BUSH

June 27, 2007

Boris Bush

By Russ Wellen

"It's a complicated relationship," President Bush says of Russian President Vladimir Putin and himself (as well as the US and Russia). They seemed to get off on the good foot at their first meeting in 2001. "I looked the man in the eye," Bush said. "I was able to get a sense of his soul." He may have thought he was on the way to a relationship as chummy as Reagan and Gorbachev's. But anyone who thinks the former KGB official liked being called Pootie Poot has another thing coming.

After the recent Group of Eight summit in Rostock, Germany, William Douglas of the McClatchy News Service quoted think-tank dweller Uri Ra'Anan: "Bush has overemphasized personal chemistry in dealing with Putin. . . . He actually believes that foreign policy can be done on personality and charm. Putin views that as weakness."

All presidents personalize politics, but few to Bush's extent. In fact, after a sly maneuver Putin pulled off at the summit, "President George W Bush looked bewildered," according to MK Bhadrakumar writing on Asia Times Online, "[and] no leader likes to look bewildered at a glittering political show." Bhadrakumar's funereal pronouncement? "The chill in US-Russia relations is set to deepen."

What exactly did Putin do? It seems that, with his sixth degree black belt in judo, he executed what Bhadrakumar called a "smart diplomatic judo flip." Bush, of course, wants to install the missile defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland. But if he and Putin were, as Bush might once have wished, as close as brothers, this counts as a serious intrusion on Vlad's side of the bedroom.

Putin had the temerity to suggest that an existing early-warning station of Russia's in Azerbaijan "could be a substitute to the United States' planned anti-ballistic-missile (ABM) system in Central Europe." Moscow's "diplomatic judo flip," writes Bhadrakumar, may have put the administration in "an unforgiving mood."

Despite being shown up by Putin, Bush invited him to visit his family compound in Kennebunkport, Maine shortly before July 4th. But, according to The Washington Post, Toby Gati, a former State Department official, said, "All the warm words and backslapping aren't going to change the fact that there's no 'there' there.' There's no substantive relationship."

Not only is Bush in over his head with Putin, he's as ham-handed as Putin's predecessor, Boris Yeltsin. Look at how "the Motherland's drunken, bloblike train wreck of a revolutionary leader," as Matt Taibbi called him on the occasion of his death, handled the Chechnyan civil war.

Actually, it was two wars. Few have synopsized the conflicts as neatly as Max Abrahms writing in the Fall 2006 issue of MIT's International Security magazine. The main thesis of his article, "Why Terrorism Does Not Work," is that terrorists' messages are obscured by their attacks, which are inevitably interpreted as attempts to destroy a country and its people.

9/11, of course, is the case in point –- a success for bin Laden on many levels, but nada when it came to al Qaida's raison d'etre: driving the infidels out of the Middle East and eliminating Israel. When Chechen rebels bombed three Russian apartment buildings in 1999, killing a total of 229 citizens, a Russian public once disposed to be sympathetic to Chechen demands for independence now turned a deaf ear.

Providing background, Abrahms explains, "With the collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s several North Caucasian republics declared sovereignty. In 1991 Chechnya's first president, Dzhokar Dudayev, took the additional step of declaring independence. Federal forces invaded Chechnya in December 1994 to reestablish control in the breakaway republic."

Now check out the parallels with how Yeltsin handled that first war, which continued until 1996, with how Bush and crew wrecked Iraq. "When the war broke out, the Russian public and even the secret police perceived it as precipitate [hasty –- Ed.], believing diplomatic solutions had not been exhausted. Boris Yeltsin's position on the war did not gain popularity as it unfolded. Top military commanders openly resigned and condemned the president for not pursuing negotiations.

"From the onset of military operations until the cease-fire in August 1996, some 70 percent of Russians opposed the war. Disdain for the war manifested itself most clearly in public attitudes toward Defense Minister Pavel Grachev [read: Rumsfeld –- Ed.]. Opinion polls rated [Yeltsin's] approval at only 3 percent."

That's when Yeltsin's path deviated from Bush's and, electoral prospects imperiled, he "folded to domestic pressure, calling for an end to all troop operations in Chechnya and the immediate commencement of negotiations with [the rebels]." As clumsy as both were, Bush turned out to be way more bull-headed than Yeltsin.

In the second Chechen civil war, though, all hell broke loose. Thanks to not only the apartment bombings but the even more unimaginable atrocity of Beslan, Putin, once in power, enjoyed the almost complete support of the Russian public, unlike Yeltsin. He responded with the proverbial Iron Fist.

According to War Nerd, writing in Moscow's The eXile: "The Russian 'contractors' (meaning mercenaries) raid Chechen villages, kidnap men who might be guerrillas, torture and shoot them, and make play with their families if the mood is right." They not only killed rebel president Aslan Maskhadov, but his successor, Abdul-Khalim Sadulayev.

In other words, Putin, known in Russian judo circles for "his wicked sweeping leg throw (Haraigoshi)," is not an opponent to be trifled with.





Authors Bio:

Russ Wellen is the nuclear deproliferation editor for OpEdNews. He's also a columnist and editor at Freezerbox.com.

"It's hard to tell people not to smoke when you have a cigarette dangling from your mouth."
-- Mohamed El Baradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency

Source: http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_russ_wel_070627_boris_bush.htm

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

STAND DOWN ORDERED: NORMAN MINETA

Mineta Confirms Cheney Ordered Stand Down
06-26-2007

Jones Report
Aaron Dykes

Former Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta answered questions from members of 9/11 Truth Seattle.org about his testimony before the 9/11 Commission report.

Mineta says Vice President Cheney was "absolutely" already there when he arrived at approximately 9:25 a.m. in the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center) bunker on the morning of 9/11. Mineta seemed shocked to learn that the 9/11 Commission Report claimed Cheney had not arrived there until 9:58-- after the Pentagon had been hit, a report that Mineta definitively contradicted.

Norman Mineta revealed that Lynn Cheney was also in the PEOC bunker already at the time of his arrival, along with a number of other staff.

Mineta is on video testifying before the 9/11 Commission, though it was omitted in their final report. He told Lee Hamilton:

“During the time that the airplane was coming into the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President…the plane is 50 miles out…the plane is 30 miles out….and when it got down to the plane is 10 miles out, the young man also said to the vice president “do the orders still stand?” And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said “Of course the orders still stand, have you heard anything to the contrary!?

Mineta confirmed his statements with reporters, saying "When I overheard something about 'the orders still stand' and so, what I thought of was that they had already made the decision to shoot something down."

Mineta was still in the PEOG bunker when the plane was reported down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

"I remember later on when I heard about the Shanksville plane going down, the Vice President was right across from me, and I said, 'Do you think that we shot it down ourselves?' He said, 'I don't know.' He said, 'Let's find out.' So he had someone check with the Pentagon. That was about maybe, let's say 10:30 or so, and we never heard back from the DoD until probably about 12:30. And they said, 'No, we didn't do it.'"


Norman Mineta's Testimony Before the 9/11 Commission-- which was NOT included in the final report and which DISPUTES the Commission's timetable for Vice President Dick Cheney on 9/11

The two hour time delay is suspicious given the Vice President's own account of the dedicated video communications available that morning, as he told it to Tim Russert of Meet the Press on September 16, 2001.

"We had access, secured communications with Air Force One, with the secretary of Defense over in the Pentagon. We had also the secure videoconference that ties together the White House, CIA, State, Justice, Defense--a very useful and valuable facility. We have the counterterrorism task force up on that net. And so I was in a position to be able to see all the stuff coming in, receive reports and then make decisions in terms of acting with it."

At a bare minimum, this confirmation by Norman Mineta is in gross contradiction to the 9/11 Commission Report and poses serious questions about the Vice President's role in ordering NORAD to stand down on 9/11.

Source: http://www.roguegovernment.com/news.php?id=2747

KISSINGER LINKED TO "2" 1970'S COUPS


Kissinger Linked To Two 1970s Coups
06-26-2007

Raw Story
Larisa Alexandrovna and Muriel Kane

“In all the world the things that hurt us the most are the CIA business and Turkey aid,” Kissinger declares in one of those documents, a White House memorandum of a conversation from Feb. 20, 1975. On the surface, the comment seems innocuous, but the context as well as the time period suggests Kissinger had abetted illegal financial aid and arms support to Turkey for its 1974 Cyprus invasion.

In July and August of 1974, Turkey staged a military invasion of the island nation of Cyprus, taking over nearly a third of the island and creating a divide between the south and north. Most historians consider that Kissinger – then Secretary of State and National Security Advisor to President Gerald Ford – not only knew about the planned attack on Cyprus, but encouraged it.

Some Greek Cypriots believed then, and still believe, that the invasion was a deliberate plot on the part of Britain and the US to maintain their influence on the island, which was particularly important as a listening post in the Eastern Mediterranean in the wake of the October 1973 War between Israel, Egypt, Jordan and Syria.

According to columnist Christopher Hitchens, author of the book The Trial of Henry Kissinger, "At the time, many Greeks believed that the significant thing was that [Prime Minister Bulent] Ecevit had been a pupil of Kissinger's at Harvard."

Several intelligence sources, who wished to remain anonymous to maintain the security of their identity, confirmed to RAW STORY that Kissinger both pushed for the Turkish invasion of Cyprus and allowed arms to be moved to Ankara.

However, a former CIA officer who was working in Turkey at the time, suggests that Kissinger's statement in the memorandum about Turkish aid likely means the Ford administration, following Kissinger’s advice, conducted business under the table with right-wing ultra-nationalist General Kenan Evren, who later dissolved Parliament and became the dictator of Turkey in a 1980 coup.

“The implication is that the US government was dealing directly with General Evren and circumventing the [democratically elected] Turkish government,” the former CIA officer said. “This was authorized by Kissinger, because they were nervous about Ecevit, who was a Social Democrat.”

“We technically cut off military aid for them,” the officer added, referring to an arms embargo passed by Congress after the invasion. “Technically… technically, but this would imply that the military and/or probably CIA aid continued even after the aid was cut off by Congress. This may substantively be what led to the overthrow eventually of Ecevit.”

According to the former CIA officer, Turkey’s democratically elected President Ecevit had good relations with the Johnson administration, but the Nixon administration, where Kissinger served as National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, had issues with Ecevit.

“I don't remember now what all the issues were,” the source said. “But I remember that the White House did not like Ecevit.”

Kissinger could not be reached for comment Monday.

Kissinger, Rumsfeld, and Cheney, then and now

Though no longer a government official, Kissinger remains a powerful force in Washington – particularly within the Bush Administration. Dr. Kissinger was the first choice by President Bush to lead a blue ribbon investigation into the attacks of September 11, 2001. However, he resigned shortly after the 9/11 Family Steering Committee had a private meeting with him at his Kissinger and Associates Inc. New York office and asked him point blank if he had any clients by the name of Bin Laden.

According to Monica Gabrielle, who lost her husband Richard in the attacks and who was present as part of the 12-member 9/11 Family Steering Committee during the private meeting, the White House seems to have overlooked Dr. Kissinger's apparent conflict of interest.

"We had the meeting with him... the whole Steering Committee, all 12 of us. Because we are basically doing our due diligence and asking for his client list to be released to see if there was a conflict of interest between his client list and potential areas of investigation," said Gabrielle during a Tuesday morning phone conversation, recounting the events of December 12, 2002. "We went back and forth with him, discussing his client list... asking him who was on it, if there were conflicts and so forth," she continued.

"Lorie [Van Auken] asked, do you have any Saudi clients on your list? And he got a blank look. Then Lorie asked, do you have any clients by the name of Bin Laden? And he was stuttering and mumbling, and finally said he would maybe, possibly consider releasing the client list to an attorney but not for the public."

Dr. Kissinger did not reveal his client list but withdrew his name the next day without public explanation.

In Bob Woodward’s State of Denial, Kissinger says he met regularly with Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to offer advice about the war in Iraq. “Victory over the insurgency is the only meaningful exit strategy,” Kissinger said.

Cheney, along with former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, first came to prominence during the administration of President Ford. Rumsfeld had served in various posts under Nixon before being sent to Europe as the US ambassador to NATO in 1973, a period that included the Cyprus coup. When Ford became president on August 9, 1974, immediately preceding the second wave of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, Rumsfeld returned to Washington to serve as his chief of staff, while Cheney became deputy assistant to the president.

Rumsfeld and Cheney gained increasing influence under Ford, reaching their apex of power in November 1975 with a shakeup that saw Rumsfeld installed as Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney as White House chief of staff, and George H.W. Bush replacing William Colby as CIA director.

Together, Rumsfeld and Cheney created a bubble not unlike the one that has enveloped President George W. Bush’s White House, surrounding Ford with a close knit group of advisors who worked to head off any possibility of openness about past misdeeds and to turn the administration sharply to the right.

The aid to Turkey referenced in Kissinger’s cryptic remark was precisely the subject of Congressional oversight on the Executive Branch in 1974-75. In a foreshadowing of how Iran Contra would play out a decade later, the White House violated both US and international law in providing arms and financing to the Turks for the Cyprus invasion.

The CIA, through various spokespeople, would not comment on how much additional information with regard to Kissinger, the attack on Cyprus, and the events leading up to the 1980 coup in Turkey with US support would be part of the declassified documents to come out this week. The only thing the agency would say is that “this was a different CIA at a different time,” and “people need to remember that.”

The Chile Coup

Around the time of President Nixon's resignation in August 1974, investigative reporter Seymour Hersh started hearing accounts of illegal foreign and domestic CIA activities. On December 20, 1974, Hersh confronted CIA Director William Colby and received confirmation of everything he had learned. Two days later, Hersh went public with the story.

The Family Jewels were described in a New York Times front page article titled “Huge C.I.A. Operation Reported in U.S. Against Antiwar Forces, Other Dissidents in Nixon Years.” According to Hersh, James Schlesinger, who served briefly as CIA director in 1973, had ordered the report in response to the crimes collectively known as Watergate.

Hersh's article stated, “An extensive investigation by the New York Times has established that intelligence files on at least 10,000 American citizens were maintained by a special unit of the C.I.A. that was reporting directly to Richard Helms, then the Director of Central Intelligence and now the Ambassador to Iran.”

Then-CIA director William Colby's initial impulse was to reveal everything in order to give the CIA a clean slate, but President Ford and Kissinger disagreed. By January 3, 1975 when Colby was summoned to the White House for a briefing, they had decided to keep the lid on by forming a blue ribbon commission under Vice President Nelson Rockefeller.

The "memorandum of conversation" document released by the National Security Archive, dated January 4, 1975, transcribes portions of a follow-up meeting between Ford and Kissinger the next day.

Kissinger complains to President Ford about Colby's urge to come clean, saying, "You will end up with a CIA that does only reporting, and not operations ... He has turned over to the FBI the whole of his operation."

Former CIA Director Helms "said all these stories are just the tip of the iceberg,” Kissinger continues, adding “If they come out, blood will flow." After offering a few examples, Kissinger concludes by remarking mysteriously, "The Chilean thing -- that is not in any report. That is sort of blackmail on me."

The meaning of this remark is far from clear, suggesting as it does that the 693 pages of the Family Jewels were only "the tip of the iceberg" and that among what was left out was a "Chilean thing" that Kissinger perceived as having the potential for blackmail on himself.

It has been known since the revelations of the 70's that prior to Chile's 1970 presidential elections, President Richard Nixon, Kissinger and Helms actively pursued ways to head off the victory of leftist Salvador Allende, including sponsoring an abortive military coup.

"I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go Communist because of the irresponsibility of its own people,” Kissinger famously said at the time.

After Allende was democratically elected and became president, the US put economic pressure on Chile and encouraged further military plots -- a two-pronged strategy similar to that currently being employed against Iran -- while Kissinger a continued to press for stronger action.

The CIA's Directorate of Operations was particularly active in Chile in 1972-73, the period leading up to Allende's violent overthrow in September 1973 in a military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet. Following the coup, Kissinger strongly supported the new authoritarian government.

After Helms left the CIA in 1973 to become ambassador to Iran, he offered a series of vague denials when asked about CIA involvement in Chile. Among Helms' claims were "that the CIA hadn't given money directly to Allende's opponents, that the CIA didn't try to fix the vote in the Chilean Congress because investigation had shown it couldn't be arranged, that the CIA didn't try to overthrow the Chilean government because the Agency failed to find anyone who could really do it."

In 1977, Helms was convicted of perjury for his statements and given a two-year suspended sentence and a fine that was paid by his friends from the CIA. As with the more recent perjury of Vice President Cheney’s former chief of staff Scooter Libby's concerning the outing of a CIA officer, Helms' had lies served the purpose of protecting his superiors, notably Kissinger.

However, in Prelude to Terror, historian Joseph Trento offers a somewhat different account of Helms' actions, suggesting a deeper Kissinger involvement.

"From Iran, Helms heard enough about the criminal investigation to issue a threat through his old colleague Tom Braden,” Trento writes. “Braden remembered Helms saying, 'If I am going to be charged, then I will reveal Kissinger's role in these operations.'" Trento adds in a footnote that "Helms himself confided to old friend and CIA colleague (from Iran) Tom Braden that he would resort to [revealing embarrassing state secrets] and 'bring down Henry Kissinger' in the process."

Even apart from Trento's assertions, Kissinger's concern with "the Chilean thing -- that is not in any report" hints at involvement in the 1973 coup. But if Trento's claims are accurate, Kissinger might also have been referring to a threat by Helms to bring him down, both in his remark that "Helms said all these stories are just the tip of the iceberg. If they come out, blood will flow," and in his cryptic description of "the Chilean thing" as "sort of blackmail on me.

Source: http://www.roguegovernment.com/news.php?id=2748

EVERYONE IS NOW "AL QAEDA"

Everyone we fight in Iraq is now "al-Qaida"

(updated below)

Josh Marshall publishes an e-mail from a reader who identifies what is one of the most astonishing instances of mindless, pro-government "reporting" yet:

It's a curious thing that, over the past 10 - 12 days, the news from Iraq refers to the combatants there as "al-Qaida" fighters. When did that happen?

Until a few days ago, the combatants in Iraq were "insurgents" or they were referred to as "Sunni" or "Shia'a" fighters in the Iraq Civil War. Suddenly, without evidence, without proof, without any semblance of fact, the US military command is referring to these combatants as "al-Qaida".

Welcome to the latest in Iraq propaganda.

That the Bush administration, and specifically its military commanders, decided to begin using the term "Al Qaeda" to designate "anyone and everyeone we fight against or kill in Iraq" is obvious. All of a sudden, every time one of the top military commanders describes our latest operations or quantifies how many we killed, the enemy is referred to, almost exclusively now, as "Al Qaeda."

But what is even more notable is that the establishment press has followed right along, just as enthusiastically. I don't think the New York Times has published a story about Iraq in the last two weeks without stating that we are killing "Al Qaeda fighters," capturing "Al Qaeda leaders," and every new operation is against "Al Qaeda."

The Times -- typically in the form of the gullible and always-government-trusting "reporting" of Michael Gordon, though not only -- makes this claim over and over, as prominently as possible, often without the slightest questioning, qualification, or doubt. If your only news about Iraq came from The New York Times, you would think that the war in Iraq is now indistinguishable from the initial stage of the war in Afghanistan -- that we are there fighting against the people who hijacked those planes and flew them into our buildings: "Al Qaeda."

What is so amazing about this new rhetorical development -- not only from our military, but also from our "journalists" -- is that, for years, it was too shameless and false even for the Bush administration to use. Even at the height of their propaganda offensives about the war, the furthest Bush officials were willing to go was to use the generic term "terrorists" for everyone we are fighting in Iraq, as in: "we cannot surrender to the terrorists by withdrawing" and "we must stay on the offensive against terrorists."

But after his 2004 re-election was secure, even the President acknowledged that "Al Qaeda" was the smallest component of the "enemies" we are fighting in Iraq:

A clear strategy begins with a clear understanding of the enemy we face. The enemy in Iraq is a combination of rejectionists, Saddamists and terrorists. The rejectionists are by far the largest group. These are ordinary Iraqis, mostly Sunni Arabs, who miss the privileged status they had under the regime of Saddam Hussein -- and they reject an Iraq in which they are no longer the dominant group. . . .

The second group that makes up the enemy in Iraq is smaller, but more determined. It contains former regime loyalists who held positions of power under Saddam Hussein -- people who still harbor dreams of returning to power. These hard-core Saddamists are trying to foment anti-democratic sentiment amongst the larger Sunni community. . . .

The third group is the smallest, but the most lethal: the terrorists affiliated with or inspired by al Qaeda.

And note that even for the "smallest" group among those we are fighting in Iraq, the president described them not as "Al Qaeda," but as those "affiliated with or inspired by al Qaeda." Claiming that our enemy in Iraq was comprised primarily or largely of "Al Qaeda" was too patently false even for the President to invoke in defense of his war.

But now, support for the war is at an all-time low and war supporters are truly desperate to find a way to stay in Iraq. So the administration has thrown any remnants of rhetorical caution to the wind, overtly calling everyone we are fighting "Al Qaeda." This strategy was first unveiled by Joe Lieberman when he went on Meet the Press in January and claimed that the U.S. was "attacked on 9/11 by the same enemy that we're fighting in Iraq today". Though Lieberman was widely mocked at the time for his incomparable willingness to spew even the most patent falsehoods to justify the occupation, our intrepid political press corps now dutifully follows right along.

Here is the first paragraph from today's New York Times article on our latest offensive, based exclusively on the claims of our military commanders:

The operational commander of troops battling to drive fighters with Al Qaeda from Baquba said Friday that 80 percent of the top Qaeda leaders in the city fled before the American-led offensive began earlier this week. He compared their flight with the escape of Qaeda leaders from Falluja ahead of an American offensive that recaptured that city in 2004.
The article then uses the term "Qaeda" an additional 19 times to describe the enemy we are fighting -- "Qaeda leaders," "Qaeda strongholds," "Qaeda fighters," "Qaeda groups," the "Qaeda threat," etc. What is our objective in Iraq? To "move into neighborhoods cleared of Qaeda fighters and hold them."

In virtually every article from the Times now, anyone we fight is automatically designated "Al Qaeda":

* June 21 (by Michael Gordon and Alissa Rubin):
American troops discovered a medical aid station for insurgents -- another sign that the Qaeda fighters had prepared for an intense fight . . . In a statement, the American military said it had killed 41 Qaeda operatives.

* June 20 (by Michael Gordon):

The problem of collaring the Qaeda fighters is challenging in several respects. . . The presence of so many civilians on an urban battlefield affords the operatives from Al Qaeda another possible means to elude their American pursuers. . . . Since the battle for western Baquba began, Qaeda insurgents have carried out a delaying action, employing snipers and engaging American troops in several firefights.
* June 19 (by Michael Gordon and Damien Cave):
The Qaeda and insurgent strongholds in Baquba are strongly defended, according to American intelligence reports [though even that article described the enemy in Baquba as "a mix of former members of Saddam Hussein's army and paramilitary forces, embittered Sunni Arab men, criminal gangs and Qaeda Islamists"]
*June 17 (by Thom Shanker and Michael Gordon):
With the influx of tens of thousands of additional combat troops into Iraq now complete, American forces have begun a wide offensive against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia on the outskirts of Baghdad, the top American commander in Iraq said Saturday.

The commander, Gen. David H. Petraeus, in a news conference in Baghdad along with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, said the operation was intended to take the fight to Al Qaeda's hide-outs in order to cut down the group's devastating campaign of car bombings. . . .

The additional American forces, General Petraeus said Saturday, would allow the United States to conduct operations in "a number of areas around Baghdad, in particular to go into areas that were sanctuaries in the past of Al Qaeda."

From The Washington Post today:
The battle came Friday to the town of Khalis, about 10 miles northwest of Baqubah. U.S. forces saw a group of al-Qaeda in Iraq gunmen attempting to avoid Iraqi police patrols and infiltrate Khalis from the southwest, according to a U.S. military statement. . . . .

With those deaths, at least 68 suspected al-Qaeda operatives have been killed in the offensive, according to the U.S. military's tally.

And here is the headline from CNN's article yesterday:


Note that, in the sub-headline, CNN totals the number of "militants" killed as 68, which, in the headline, magically becomes "68 al Qaeda militants killed." That is because, in our media, everyone we kill in Iraq, and everyone who fights against our occupation, are all now "al Qaeda."

Each of these articles typically (though not always) initially refers to "Al Qaeda in Iraq" or "Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia," as though they are nothing more than the Iraqi branch office of the group that launched the 9/11 attacks. The articles then proceed to refer to the group only as "Qaeda," and repeatedly quote U.S. military officials quantifying the amount of "Qaeda fighters" we killed. Hence, what we are doing in Iraq is going after and killing members of the group which flew the planes into our buildings. Who could possibly be against that?

Are there some foreign fighters in Iraq who have taken up arms against the U.S. occupation who are fairly called "Al Qaeda"? Probably. But by all accounts -- including the President's -- they are a tiny part of the groups with guns who are waging war in Iraq. The vast, vast majority of them are Iraqis motivated by a desire to acquire more political power in their own country at the expense of other Iraqi factions and/or to fight against a foreign occupation of their country. To refer to them as "Al Qaeda" so casually and with so little basis (other than the fact that U.S. military officials now do so) is misleading and propagandistic in the extreme.

Making matters much worse, this tactic was exposed long, long ago. From the Christian Science Monitor in September, 2005:

The US and Iraqi governments have vastly overstated the number of foreign fighters in Iraq, and most of them don't come from Saudi Arabia, according to a new report from the Washington-based Center for Strategic International Studies (CSIS). According to a piece in The Guardian, this means the US and Iraq "feed the myth" that foreign fighters are the backbone of the insurgency. While the foreign fighters may stoke the insurgency flames, they make up only about 4 to 10 percent of the estimated 30,000 insurgents.
And in January of this year, the Cato Institute published a detailed analysis -- entitled "The Myth of an al Qaeda Takeover of Iraq" -- by Ted Galen Carpenter, its vice president for defense and foreign policy studies, documenting that claims of "Al Qaeda in Iraq" is "a canard that the perpetrators of the current catastrophe use to frighten people into supporting a fatally flawed, and seemingly endless, nation-building debacle."

What is always most striking about this is how uncritically our press passes on government claims. War reporting in Iraq is obviously extremely difficult and dangerous, and it takes a great deal of courage to be in Iraq in order to file these stories. There is no denying that.

But precisely because of those dangers, these reporters rely almost exclusively on the narratives offered by U.S. military officials selected by the Bush administration to convey events to the press. Almost every one of the articles referenced above is shaped from start to finish by accounts about what happened from American military commanders (with, in isolated instances, accounts from Iraqis in the area). That is inevitable, though such accounts ought to be treated with much greater skepticism.

But what is not inevitable is to adopt the patently misleading nomenclature and political rhetoric of the administration, so plainly designed to generate support for the "surge" (support for which Gordon himself admitted he has embraced) by creating the false appearance that the violence in Iraq is due to attacks by the terrorist group responsible for 9/11. What makes this practice all the more disturbing is how quickly and obediently the media has adopted the change in terms consciously issued by the Bush administration and their military officials responsible for presenting the Bush view of the war to the press.

UPDATE: Posts from other bloggers who previously noticed this same trend demonstrate how calculated it is and pinpoint its obvious genesis. At Kos, BarbInMD noted back in May that Bush's rhetoric on Iraq had palpably shifted, as he began declaring that "Al-Qaida is public enemy No. 1 in Iraq." The same day, she noted that Bush "mentioned Al-Qaida no less than 27 times" in his Iraq speech. As always, a theme travels unmolested from Bush's mouth into the unexamined premises of our newspapers' front pages.

Separately, Ghillie notes in comments that the very politically cognizant Gen. Petraeus has been quite noticeably emphasizing "the battle against Al Qaeda" in interviews for months. And yesterday, ProfMarcus analyzed the top Reuters article concerning American action in Iraq -- headline: "Al Qaeda fight to death in Iraq bastion: U.S" -- and noted that "al qaeda is mentioned 13 times in a 614 word story" and that "reading the article, you would think that al qaeda is not only everywhere in iraq but is also behind all the insurgent activity that's going on."

Interestingly, in addition to the one quoted above, there is another long article in the Post today, this one by the reliable Thomas Ricks, which extensively analyzes the objectives and shortcomings in our current military strategy. Ricks himself strategy never once mentions Al Qaeda.

Finally, the lead story of the NYT today -- in its first two paragraphs -- quotes Gen. Odierno as claiming that the 2004 battle of Falluja was aimed at capturing "top Qaeda leaders in the city." But Michael Gordon himself, back in 2004, published a lengthy and detailed article about the Falluja situation and never once mentioned or even alluded to "Al Qaeda," writing only about the Iraqi Sunni insurgents in that city who were hostile to our occupation (h/t John Manning). The propagandistic transformation of "insurgents" into "Al Qaeda," then, applies not only to our current predicament but also to past battles as well, as a tool of rank revisionism (hence, it is now officially "The Glorious 2004 Battle against Al-Qaeda in Falluja").

UPDATE II: More on this topic, including a reply to various responses to this post, is here.

-- Glenn Greenwald Glenn Greenwald drawing

ARNOLD PRAISES TONY BLAIR

10.30am update
Schwarzenegger praises Blair over climate change

Matthew Tempest, political correspondent
Tuesday June 26, 2007

Guardian Unlimited

Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tony Blair meet outside Downing Street on June 26 2007. Photograph: Johnny Green/PA Wire.

Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tony Blair meet outside Downing Street today. Photograph: Johnny Green/PA Wire.

Arnold Schwarzenegger today praised Tony Blair's environmental leadership as "truly a model for the world", as the two men met in Downing Street on Mr Blair's last full day as prime minister.

Mr Schwarzenegger, the former actor turned governor of California, is in the UK for a day of round-table talks with Mr Blair, the environment secretary, David Miliband, and business leaders, on climate change.

He revealed that it was only thanks to Mr Blair "getting everyone back round the table" at this month's G8 that any deal at all was achieved.

In an early morning press conference between the two men, Mr Schwarzenegger said that the prime minister's visit last year had "been an inspiration to everyone in California", and the state had now copied a British style cap-and-trade model on curbing emissions.

Mr Blair, in his turn, praised Mr Schwarzenegger's "vision and leadership" on the issue, which has seen California lead a small number of US states in adopting Kyoto-style targets, despite Washington having pulled out of that treaty back in 2001.

Asked if the meeting would be Mr Blair's last bilateral talks at No 10, his official spokesman said: "I suppose that will be the case."

The PM signed a deal with Mr Schwarzenegger and BP last year in California, and today the governor praised the UK's ten-year economic growth with carbon emission reductions as "truly a model for the rest of the world".

Mr Blair cracked a gag with the assembled press corps, harking back to Mr Schwarzenegger's role in the Terminator movies.

Without confirming or denying whether he would become an international envoy to the Middle East, the PM joked: "My press officer said to me, whatever else you do this morning, don't say: 'I'll be back'."

Mr Schwarzenegger said he would support Mr Blair's appointment as envoy for the quartet of the US, EU, UN and Russia, which is leading the international drive for Middle East peace.

But the governor, who has made the battle against climate change a personal crusade, added: "Out of selfish reasons I hope that he becomes the envoy for the environment and brings all the countries of the world together to join some kind of treaty - a Kyoto kind of treaty - that everyone can join and we can all together reduce greenhouse gases.

"I think the prime minister is the only person who can do that."

The governor spoke with the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, yesterday on climate change, and today put California's success in agreeing action on the environment down to getting Republicans and Democrats to work together. "It's the only way we're going to fix anything", he told reporters in Downing Street.

He also joked that Number 10's "delicious British breakfast" had caused him to put on five pounds in weight.

Source: http://politics.guardian.co.uk/green/story/0,,2111687,00.html

THE NEOCON EXPERIMENT IN THE MIDDLE EAST

Sunday, June 17, 2007

The Vast and Messy Neocon Experiment in Iraq and the Middle East

by Rodrigue Tremblay

"We shall have no peace as long as the whole territory of the Land of Israel will not return under Jewish control.... A stable peace will come only then, when Israel will return to itself all its historical lands, and will thus control both the Suez and the Ormudz channel.... We must remember that Iraqi oil fields too are located on the Jewish land."

Avrom Shmulevic, rabbi and historian

"[American ] strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power."..[His removal is absolutely vital to] "the security of the world in the first part of the 21st century" and for "the safety of American troops in the region, of our friends and allies like Israel and the moderate Arab states, and a significant portion of the world's supply of oil."

Neocons' January 26, 1998 letter to President Bill Clinton

"Israel made a large contribution to the decision to embark on this [Iraq] war. I know that on the eve of the war, [Ariel] Sharon said, in a closed conversation with senators, that if they could succeed in getting rid of Saddam Hussein, it would solve Israel's security problems."

Robert (Bob) Novak, American veteran reporter

We do know, with absolute certainty, that he [Saddam Hussein] is using his procurement system to acquire the equipment he needs in order to enrich uranium to build a nuclear weapon.”

Vice President Dick Cheney, September 2002

Like apprentice sorcerers, a group of pro-Israel Neocons, took hold of U.S. foreign policy under President George W. Bush and designed the most wicked and the most improvised war of aggression by any country against another that one can remember. This small group of ideologues, lacking in judgment, knowledge and wisdom but full of fanaticism, arrogance and hubris seized upon a double opportunity to advance their narrow interests at the expense of the American people, the Iraqi people and world peace and order.

Their first opportunity came when an inept and an inexperienced politician was barely elected president of the United States in November 2000, Texas Governor George W. Bush. Clustered around Vice President Dick Cheney and around then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, they successfully established a parallel government within the Bush-Cheney administration, de facto independent of the Office of the National Security Advisor (Condoleezza Rice), of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) (George Tenet) and of the State Department (Colin Powell).

The leading warmongering Neocons were Cheney's Chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby (recently convicted of perjury) and Cheney's Middle East advisor, David Wurmser, plus the top decision makers at the Pentagon, Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Under Secretary Douglas Feith, assisted by the head of the Defense Policy Board, Richard Perle and by Elliott Abrams, head of the Middle East policy at the National Security Council. On the ground in Iraq, they later could count on an advisor and protégé of former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and a director of Kissinger Associates, L. Paul (Jerry) Bremer, whose fateful decisions involved dismantling the entire Iraqi government and firing the heavily armed 400,000 strong Iraqi army. —This small group of insiders was supported by a host of outside lobbies, by an army of sycophants in Washington pro-Israel think tanks and by far-right journalists and media at large.

The second opportunity arose with the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that traumatized the American people and made them vulnerable to manipulation, deception, forgery and lies, and any other tactics used to justify an illegal war of aggression against Iraq.

The Neocon plan for the Middle East was initially crafted in Israel, in 1996, by a group of advisors to then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, of the Likud Party. These advisors were Richard Perle, James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser, all of them directing or collaborating with the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies (IASPS), a think tank headquartered in Jerusalem, with a Washington office, and supported by the Scaife Foundation and the Bradley Foundation. —It is to be noted also that many of these individuals later found their way to the highest echelons of the Bush-Cheney administration. Their Israeli policy plan for the Middle East entitled "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm", was published by IASPS, and it called for a grand strategy of total war in the Middle East, using the military power of the United States to do the job.

Iraq became the testing ground for the Neocons' grand plan. The Neocons viewed Iraq as an immediate threat to Israel, and in the long term, they dreamed of overthrowing the ruling Iraqi Baath Party in order to transform the entire Middle East in Israel's favor. Indeed, Saddam Hussein got into the Neocons's sight even before he took three annoying decisions in the early 2000s.

First, Iraq announced in September 2000, in the middle of the U.S. presidential election, that from then on, it would demand to be paid in euros instead of dollars for its oil exports. Second, Saddam Hussein began rewarding the families of suicide bombers in Israel with a compensation of $25,000, a move that enraged the Israeli government and its allies within the U.S. government. And third, in a move that deeply shook up oilmen Bush II and Cheney, he announced on April 8, 2002, that Iraq would suspend its oil exports for one month, as a protest against the slow pace toward settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and against Israel's refusal to cease its illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories.

The Oil-Israel nexus is at the core of the motivations for Bush-Cheney's fateful decisions to launch an illegal war against Iraq on March 20, 2003. Maintaining U.S. control over Middle East oil and shoring up the state of Israel are the two fundamental and interrelated rationales for involving American military might in a string of wars in the Middle East. —Last November 1, (2006) President George W. Bush finally all but confessed that the U.S. must maintain occupying troops (indefinitely) in the Middle East to keep the flow of oil coming, because (if we leave) "extremists [may] be in a position to use oil as a tool to blackmail the West... and they will do so unless we abandon Israel ". He has also said in the past that the U.S. is committed to defending Israel, no matter what. Thus, in Bush's own words, the invasion of Iraq was a 'preventive aggression' to grab Iraqi oil, turn Iraq into an oil colony and support anything Israel does to the Palestinians!

In my book 'The New American Empire', 'Oil and Israel' were precisely the two main reasons I identified for the U.S. invading a Middle East country that had not attacked the United States; it had nothing to do with the hogwash of 'weapons of mass destruction', 'al Qaeda', the 'war on terror' or 'democracy'. It had everything to do with oil and Israel and the power of such related interests within the American political system.

What Bush was echoing in his declaration is that grand plan designed by pro-Israel neocon ideologues within and outside the Bush-Cheney administration to reshape the entire Middle East region to fit American oil interests and Israel's strategic interests. —Unfortunately, this is a flawed and illegal plan that was crafted and implemented in a climate of arrogance, amateurishness, stupidity and incompetence on a high scale. The gruesome and messy results are all there to be seen by everyone with eyes to see.

The great scandal is that much of the raw truth about the Iraq War has been hidden from the vast majority of Americans. Maybe a paper like the New York Times should publish this article to compensate for all the falsehoods it published on its front page during the months that preceded the war.

________________________________________

Rodrigue Tremblay lives in Montreal and can be reached at rodrigue.tremblay@yahoo.com

Visit his blog site at: www.thenewamericanempire.com/blog.

Author's Website: www.thenewamericanempire.com/

Check Dr. Tremblay's coming book "The Code for Global Ethics" at: www.TheCodeForGlobalEthics.com/_______________________________

Posted, Sunday June 17, 2007, at 5:30 am

Source: http://www.thenewamericanempire.com/blog.html