As to keeping secrets, the above answer applies. We have the best trained, most technological black ops agents in the history of the world. There are thousands of them, CIA, NSA (which no one knew of for decades, despite several thousand employees), Delta force (who will not admit Delta Force exists nor say anything about it), and other more secret groups including Blackwater, a mercenary, corporate funded army. The operatives are psychologically profiled for innate characteristics which allow them to keep information under intensive interrogation. Then they receive years of training in techniques to enhance those skills, allowing them to resist torture. Covert ops are built on clandestine activity. Operating in the shadows, agents have overthrown governments, fomented rebellion, arranged assassinations, made drug money and funneled it to resistance fighters, sold weapons, stolen weapons, given Russian weapons away to blame activities on our enemies, and lived with false identities in foreign countries for years without anyone knowing, and they never breathed a word. (One example, a grisly 1940’s and 50’s CIA mind-control program included 80 institutions, hundreds of doctors, and more than a few deaths, yet no one ever spoke about it. Discovery happened through an accidental connection.) From these tens of thousands of covert personnel, the most elite would have been chosen, tested and subjected to months of black ops mental programming. The statement that these highly trained operatives cannot keep a secret is absurd. Thousands of would-be heroes kept ULTRA secret for 29 years after World War II, with far less incentive and training than these perpetrators.
One stunning fact is that the FBI wanted profile for Osama bin Laden does not even mention 911. They refer to a 1998 bombing. When muckraker.com contacted them, they said, ‘the FBI has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 911.’ Despite that odd admission, we invaded Afghanistan. Interestingly, a prior negotation with the Taliban to pass a critical oil pipeline through that same country failed.
Whistleblower Russ Tice, a military intelligence analyst, has sought to testify before Congress about his information on 911, and been refused. National Security Whistleblowers Coalition put a list of thirteen people prepared to testify to the 911 Commission. All were turned away, ignored, or censored. The list included eight FBI agents, a colonel from the Defense Intelligence Agency, a special agent of ATF, a member of the security division of the FAA, and emergency attack specialist from the USDA, an NSA senior analyst. Many other intelligence and law enforcement agents contacted the commission but were refused the chance to testify. Many who have tried to testify have been demoted, lost jobs, and even imprisoned.
Most disturbing is that people seem to not be paying attention. Perhaps the birth of Brad and Angelina’s new baby, or the ugly demise of Britney Spears are more pressing concerns, thus worthy of the awesome media attention paid, but I respectfully find this to be a gross error in proportion. This matter is far from over. The world looms upon an abyss.
America once sounded the clarion call of freedom and equality for all men. In 1776, this nation struggled as a small colony and put democracy onto the world stage. Many free nations have been born and all the world has benefited, seeing by clear example that tyranny was not the mandate of heaven. Now we have fallen into the illusion that despotism cannot strike our shores. Perhaps this belief is true, but where is the proof? Rome was a Republic for 200 years longer than we have now been when Julius Caesar pulled his fascinating coup.
World history shows perhaps ten or twelve true democracies. Most have fallen, and no logic will protect us from ignorance of this situation. No blind hope that things will improve can suffice now. Does no one feel it in the air, the cold chill that tells all our easy days are vanished? Can anyone sense, in the culture itself, a shadow as it settles over Earth? The annals of history are open for all to read. In the twentieth century alone Stalin killed 60 million, Chairman Mao (praised by David Rockefeller) – 60 million, Hitler – 6 million Jews, 20 million others, Guatemala – 300,000, Cambodia – 2 million, Turkey – 1.5 million, Rwanda – 800 thousand. And the list goes on.
We have become a nation engaged in endless war. Due to our power, the globe must also endure this same fate. The Project for a New American Century (PNAC), begun in 1996, stated as its first, but not foremost aim, a war with Iraq. Their official document said they needed ‘a new Pearl Harbor’ to engage the overt and extreme policy of American militarization. Their primary stated goal is to actually fight and win major engagements in multiple theatres simultaneously. The definition is non-distinguishable from World War III. Twelve members of PNAC hold high staff in the current administration. Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Jeanne Kirkpatrick, Elliot Abrams, and Jeb Bush are among the PNAC members. Two of their goals, the New Pearl Harbor and the war with Iraq, have already occurred.
The cost of this war is now measured at a trillion dollars, some 200 times the initial estimate of 50 billion. This figure fails to account for future costs such as health concerns for soldiers and equipment replacement, an almost certain doubling. The cost is still rising by nearly a billion dollars per day. We have lost over 4400 soldiers and thousands more civilian volunteers. Tens of thousands of wounded must be added to the equation. The suicide rate of veterans is more than double that of the civilian populace and possibly up to four times as high for war time veterans. The age from 20-24, those serving in Iraq, is the highest. 6256 Veterans took their own life in 2005.
Then we must consider the loss of foreign life, which now numbers a million casualties. Were all of these terrorists? Millions of Iraqis and Afghanis have fled their homes. We have created the greatest refugee state on the planet, as bad as the genocide in Rwanda. Are we yet avenged for our 3000 dead?
Can we so easily justify such a swathe of ruin based on our own wounds? How many of these were innocents? How many children? How many new terrorists have our actions created? Why are we so silent when so much proof of deception has been produced? The war was based on lies as all the world knows. They knew there were no WMD’s and there was no Iraqi connection to al-Quaeda. We, as countrymen, are complicit in this war if we fail to speak against it. Why does no one complain? Where once I was proud to be American, today I am ashamed. Worse, I am now afraid.
This madness has bankrupted the most powerful nation on Earth and now they are eager to begin the next phase: war with Iran. We are rattling their bars through many means, including our old friend: covert operations. Iran may have some greater unity of culture and nationalistic spirit. They may actually fight. I make no defense of the Iranian leader, he is a clear madman who believes in the return of the twefth Imam to lead Iran into battle against the infidels. But perhaps we should bide our time until the twelfth Imam returns to begin battle. It may be a considerable wait and he is up for re-election in 2009. Our brave and worthy soldiers could use some peace-time. His power is far from absolute, too. An intelligent overthrow from inside could be worth consideration.
The Iranian people are far more progressive than the media presents. Iran hosts the largest Jewish population in the middle East, bar Israel, and they live in harmony with their Islamic neighbors while their leader, elected on a progressive platform, has changed and now rails for destruction of Israel. Sharin Ebadi won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003. She accepted her prize unveiled causing shock and outrage among Islamic fundamentalists. However, upon return to Tehran, she was greeted by hundreds of thousands of ecstatic supporters.
70% of the population are under thirty and they blog against the leader with some impunity. The right wing clergy controlling the nation is drastically out of step with this youthful, politically active element. Iran is ripe for reform. If we simply attack her outright, or instigate attack by conceiving of this country as a monolithically fundamental country, we make a terrible error. We unite the people against us. Instead we should do what we do best, engage in blue-jean propaganda. We should speak of civil liberties, humanitarian reforms, and good education, which is what the people there want. They are sick of repressive regimes. Women want to cast off their veils instead of choking in the heat, and people want to view Islam based on the principles of life and love. The great majority reject terrorism outright. We can be friends with Iran and we are foolish for simply going to war. We can engage in diplomacy with the current leaders, while running a free speech campaign to the people via radio, ala WWII’s ‘Voice of Freedom,’ suggesting democratic initiatives and a better quality of life for all the people. We can inculcate a much desired democracy among the people. Why are we so eager to go to war with the country which could be our strongest ally, providing a possible anchor point for the Middle East?
The huge furor over the Mohammed cartoons has been played up by an extremist government out of touch with its people and by a fanatical Western media anxious to prove that terrorism is systemic to Islam. The two governments almost seem to co-ordinate efforts, though ours is probably playing theirs as they wish. This protest involved four hundred in a city of twelve million. The protest, destroying the Dutch embassy, was freely allowed by a government that is ridiculously repressive against even peaceful demonstrations. One must wonder why. The general mood of Iran is not so enraged or incensed as we have been led to believe. It is a select minority characterized as the majority. Viewing our own nation by this logic, we are all Branch Davidians. We all drank the kool-aid.
Ahamadinejad, the Iranian leader, is in fact mocked by his own people, on blogs, for his claim to be surrounded by a luminous light as he spoke before the UN. [1] He was elected on promises of progressive reform, promises he quickly abandoned. Perhaps we should allow the Iranian people the opportunity to speak their voice and change leadership during their 2009 elections. They look likely to shift sharply to the left. All other candidates speak of talks with the West and détente. Even words like partnership appear in the more progressive approaches.
Why would our administration not listen to their head of General Command, Marine General William Fallon? He resigned in protest over the war-like stance of the administration toward Iran. Another high-ranking General refused the position of Iraqi theater command on a similar basis. Instead of listening to our military experts, the administration has wrested $400 million in covert ops funding against Iran.
