“…and it’s far more than just in combat areas. There’s more—at least a dozen countries and perhaps more. The President has authorized these kinds of actions in the Middle East and also in Latin America, I will tell you, Central America, some countries. They’ve been—our boys have been told they can go and take the kind of executive action they need, and that’s simply—there’s no legal basis for it.”
Later in the interview, Hersh told Amy Goodman: “An internal report that I wrote about in a book I did years ago, an internal report made by the summer of 2002, estimated that at least half and possibly more of those people had nothing to do with actions against America. The intelligence we have is often very fragmentary, not very good. And the idea that the American president would think he has the constitutional power or the legal right to tell soldiers not engaged in immediate combat to go out and find people based on lists and execute them is just amazing to me. It’s amazing to me.”
And later: “And one of the units that work under the umbrella of the Special Operations Command is known as Joint Special Op—JSOC. It’s a special unit. What makes it so special, it’s a group of elite people that include Navy Seals, some Navy Seals, Delta Force, our—what we call our black units…. And they promote from within. It’s a unit that has its own promotion structure. And one of the elements, I must tell you, about getting ahead in promotion is the number of kills you have.”
“What countries, Sy Hersh,” Goodman asks,”what countries are they operating in?
“A lot of countries,” Hersh told her.
Goodman asked Hersh to name some of those countries. “No, because I haven’t written about it, Amy,” Hersh declined, but then told Goodman: “I will tell you, as I say, in Central America, it’s far more than just the areas that Mr. Hannah talked about—Afghanistan, Iraq. You can understand an operation like this in the heat of battle in Iraq, killing—I mean, taking out enemy. That’s war. But when you go into other countries—let’s say Yemen, let’s say Peru, let’s say Colombia, let’s say Eritrea, let’s say Madagascar, let’s say Kenya, countries like that—and kill people who are believed on a list to be al-Qaeda or al-Qaeda-linked or anti-American, you’re violating most of the tenets.”
Amy Goodman ask one more question on the topic, “Is the assassination wing continuing under President Obama?” “How do I know? I hope not,” Hersh answered. Democracy Now Transcript
Since Seymour Hersh insists on defending his journalistic integrity against all media and political pressures to recant, the Pulitzer Prize winning reporter appears to have adopted a Mohamed Ali style of “rope-a-dope” in a boxing match with Cheney’s protection squads for the title of TRUTH. Hersh now claims President Obama is being victimized by Cheney agents holding sensitive positions in the government. Does Cheney still get a Daily Briefing from these people? And is there a Cheney Cabal working closely with the former Vice-President to undermine the goals of the current administration? If so, all involved would be embracing treason, and all are a greater danger to the Republic than any of the victims of the Cheney Assassination “Ring” or “Wing” ever were.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
