 Is the U.S. Exporting Terrorism?
Friday August 27th, 2010 | The New American
The CIA is worried that the United States will become known as an exporter of terrorism, according to a recent revelation by the Internet whistleblower site WikiLeaks.org.
The leaked three-page CIA report explained that a number of American citizens have gone abroad in recent years to conduct terrorism, helping al-Qaeda, radical Israeli terrorist groups, and Irish terrorists. The report notes that while the intelligence agencies have focused upon attempts by [.....]
Continue reading the rest of this article here
5 Million Iraqis Killed, Maimed, Tortured, Displaced -- Think That Bothers War Boosters Like Christopher Hitchens?
The immensity of Iraqi civilian suffering is incomprehensible. How can war's cheerleaders claim to fight on behalf of the people whose lives they helped destroy?
July 01, 2010 | By Fred Branfman | Alternet
Fred Branfman, author of the article “5 Million Iraqis Killed, Maimed, Tortured, Displaced — Think That Bothers War Boosters Like Christopher Hitchens?” discusses the demonstrably false assertion that Iraqis are “better off” now than under Saddam Hussein, why liberal warhawks like Hitchens bear a moral burden for Iraqi civilian deaths, the ongoing class war in America (that the billionaires are winning) and why holding elections does not qualify Iraq as a democracy.
MP3 here. (28:58)
Fred Branfman is a writer and longtime activist who directed the Indochina Resource Center during the war in Indochina. Visit his Web site.
Read Fred Branfman's article here
We need less secrecy and more accountability in our military ranks, and we need to encourage more of our young soldiers to share this view. Right now, all thinking, caring Americans need to contact their congress members and fight for soldiers like Bradley Manning, an American hero hidden away in a Kuwait jail. The military hopes you forget about him.
The US Army is holding Specialist Bradley Manning incommunicado in Kuwait on charges of leaking to WikiLeaks video of Apache helicopter pilots gunning down two Reuters cameramen and a number of Iraqis in a Baghdad neighborhood. The video is devastating in what it reveals about cold-blooded hi-technology warfare in a place like Baghdad. See it at: http://www.collateralmurder.com/
Manning’s action follows precisely the arc Joseph Campbell describes in his famous book Hero With a Thousand Faces of the young warrior who leaves home to descend into Hell, where he learns something and then returns to impart that knowledge to his people. [.....]
Continue reading the rest of this opinion here
Media Missing the McChrystal Point
FAIR Media Adviory | June 25, 2010
The media firestorm over the Rolling Stone profile (6/22/10) of General Stanley McChrystal mostly missed the real point of the article, which was a damning portrait of the U.S. war in Afghanistan.Much of the media coverage stressed the criticism and insults hurled by McChrystal and his staff at various administration figures. Some of these remarks were more substantive than others. A joke about Joe Biden ("Bite Me") has been overblown; McChrystal and his staff seemed to be suggesting a list of possible gaffes the general might make following a speech.The real significance of the piece is in the criticism--voiced by soldiers in Afghanistan and military experts--of the war itself. "Even those who support McChrystal and his strategy of counterinsurgency know that whatever the general manages to accomplish in Afghanistan, it's going to look more like Vietnam than Desert Storm," wrote Rolling Stone's Michael Hastings. [.....] Continue reading here
And here: Using the McChrystal Moment to Raise a Forbidden Question:
Did 9/11 Justify the War in Afghanistan?
They hate us for our freedoms? Cause and Effect in the War on Terror
By Glenn Greenwald | June 22, 2010 | Salon.com
American discussions about what causes Terrorists to do what they do are typically conducted by ignoring the Terrorist's explanation for why he does what he does. Yesterday, Faisal Shahzad pleaded guilty in a New York federal court to attempting to detonate a car bomb in Times Square, and this Pakistani-American Muslim explained why he transformed from a financial analyst living a law-abiding, middle-class American life into a Terrorist: [.....]
Continue reading the rest of this article here
Democracy Now! Exclusive:
With Rumored Manhunt for Wikileaks Founder and Arrest of Alleged Leaker of Video Showing Iraq Killings, Obama Admin Escalates Crackdown on Whistleblowers of Classified Information
Democracy Now! The War and Peace Report
Broadcast on Thursday, June 17th, 2010
Pentagon investigators are reportedly still searching for Wikileaks co-founder Julian Assange, who helped release a classified US military video showing a US helicopter gunship indiscriminately firing on Iraqi civilians. The US military recently arrested Army Specialist Bradley Manning, who may have passed on the video to Wikileaks. Manning’s arrest and the hunt for Assange have put the spotlight on the Obama administration’s campaign against whistleblowers and leakers of classified information. We speak to Daniel Ellsberg, who’s leaking of the Pentagon Papers has made him perhaps the nation’s most famous whistleblower; Birgitta Jónsdóttir, a member of the Icelandic Parliament who has collaborated with Wikileaks and drafted a new Icelandic law protecting investigative journalists; and Glenn Greenwald, political and legal blogger for Salon.com. [includes rush transcript] [......]www.democracynow.org
 The History of BP/British Petroleum and Its Role in the 1953 Iran Coup
Democracy Now! The War and Peace Report
Broadcast on Thursday, June 14th, 2010
Stephen Kinzer, author of All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror, looks at the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company’s role in the 1953 CIA coup against Iran’s popular progressive prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh. [......]
Part 2 here: www.democracynow.org [includes rush transcript]
Memorial Daze: Quandary of Empire
By Philip A Ferruggio | May 29, 2010 Consortium News.com
Editor’s Note: At a time of two unfinished wars halfway around the world, Memorial Day’s focus on the sacrifices of men and women who have gone to war for the United States is stirring up a different mix of emotions than usual.More and more Americans are torn between their desire to show respect for the sacrifices that these soldiers made and the broader concern that the United States is behaving like a global empire, a quandary that Philip A Farruggio addresses in this guest essay:Hitler’s German army invaded and occupied Poland. Many soldiers were killed. The Japanese invaded and occupied Nanking and Shanghai. They had many soldiers killed. The same for the British when they occupied India and Palestine. [.....]
Read the entire article here
EXCLUSIVE:
Flotilla Passengers Huwaida Arraf of Free Gaza Movement and Retired
Army Col. Ann Wright Respond to Israeli Claims on Deadly Assault
Democracy Now! The War and Peace Report
Broadcast on Tuesday, June 03, 2010
Huwaida Arraf, chairperson of the Free Gaza Movement, and retired US Col. Ann Wright were on the flotilla when it was attacked. They join us to describe the assault and their subsequent detention in Israeli prison. We also speak to Sawsan Zaher, a staff attorney at Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, who interviewed many of the activists in detention.The bodies of nine activists killed by Israeli troops on the Gaza aid flotilla arrived in Turkey Thursday morning. The Anatolia news agency reports that eight of the dead were Turks and one was a US citizen of Turkish origin. Turkish forensic experts have confirmed that all nine were shot with guns. [includes rush transcript] [......]
www.democracynow.org
Friendly Fire: Did an American Mine Sink South Korean Ship?
News Analysis, Yoichi Shimatsu, May 27, 2010 | New America Media
BEIJING - South Korean Prime Minister Lee Myung-bak has claimed "overwhelming evidence" that a North Korean torpedo sank the corvette Cheonan on March 26, killing 46 sailors. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton claimed that there’s "overwhelming evidence" in favor of the theory that North Korea sank the South Korean Navy warship Cheonan. But the articles of proof presented so far by military investigators to an official inquiry board have been scanty and inconsistent.There’s yet another possibility, that a U.S. rising mine sank the Cheonan in a friendly-fire accident. [ .....]
Continue this article here
The Panama Deception
1993 Academy Award, Best Documentary Feature
We Report. You Decide.
A riveting Academy Award-winning critique of the government's history of militarization, made all the more timely by the current “war on terrorism.”
The Panama Deception documents the untold story of the December 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama; the events which led to it; the excessive force used; the enormity of the death and destruction; and the devastating aftermath. The Panama Deception uncovers the real reasons for this internationally condemned attack, presenting a view of the invasion which widely differs from that portrayed by the U.S. media and exposes how the U.S. government and the mainstream media suppressed information about this foreign policy disaster.
The Panama Deception includes never before seen footage of the invasion and its aftermath, as well as interviews with both invasion proponents like Gen. Maxwell Thurman, Panamanian President Endara and Pentagon spokesperson Pete Williams, and opponents like U.S. Representative Charles Rangel (D-NY.), Panamanian human rights workers Olga Mejia and Isabel Corro and former Panamanian diplomat Humberto Brown.
|
