"The agenda, as always, begins with trying to find out what is happening in the world, and then doing something about it, as we can, better than anyone else. Few share our privilege, power, and freedom -- hence responsibility." - Noam Chomsky, in posting #9 below ______________________________________________________________ http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/lists='newslog' 17 articles posted to newslog on 18 Apr 2003: 1 - Eyewitness: US Troops Initiated Looting 2 - How and why the US encouraged looting in Iraq 3 - Robert Fisk: Oil Ministry protected while others burn 4 - Experts: Looters Had Keys to Iraqi Vaults 5 - The pulling down of the Statue was a staged media event 6 - "Baghdad did not fall -- it was handed over" 7 - Democracy for Iraq?...Don't believe it for a minute! 8 - Dynacorp sex-slavers to police Iraq 9 - Noam Chomsky re: Iraq invasion & aftermath 10 - Don't forget the oil: the payoff is huge 11 - Syria: next victim of Bush's Panzer Divisions 12 - Fuhrer Bush's version of Mein Kampf 13 - "Behind Our Backs" - Bush torpedoes the economy 14 - While we're watching the War, WTO takes over... 15 - Saddam: a career in service to the CIA 16 - Northern Ireland: British army aided paramilitaries 17 - Meanwhile in Columbia: Bush funds the Death Squads Excerpts follow... ______________________________________________________________ 1 - Eyewitness: US Troops Initiated Looting "During the morning everybody that tried to cross the streets had been fired upon. But during this strange silence people eventually became curious. After three-quarters of an hour the first Baghdad citizens dared to come forward. At that moment the US solders shot two Sudanese guards, who were posted in front of a local administrative building, on the other side of the Haifa Avenue. "I was just 300 meters away when the guards where murdered. Then they shot the building entrance to pieces, and their Arabic translators in the tanks told people to run for grabs inside the building." Q: "But people in Baghdad tore down a big statue of Saddam?" "They did? It was a US tank that did this, close to the hotel where all the journalists live. Until noon on the 9th of April, I didn't see a single torn picture of Saddam anywhere. If people had wanted to turn over statues they could have gone for some of the many smaller ones, without the help of an American tank. Had this been a political uproar then people would have turned over statues first and looted afterwards." ______________________________________________________________ 2 - How and why the US encouraged looting in Iraq ...As in every action of the Bush administration, personal greed and profit-gouging are an important aspect. The ransacking of Iraqi government facilities, added to the devastation caused by American bombing, is part of the process of demolishing the large state-run sector of Iraq's economy, to the benefit of American companies. Already contracts have been awarded to private American firms to provide new school books, replace looted medical equipment, even train a new Iraqi police force. There is more at stake, however, than rank hypocrisy or an appetite for Iraq's oil wealth. The looting in Iraq directly serves the political interests of American imperialism in cementing its domination of the conquered country. The Bush administration is seeking to encourage the emergence of a new ruling elite in Iraq, formed from the most rapacious, reactionary and selfish elements, which will serve as a semi-criminal comprador force entirely subservient to the United States. The acquisition of property through the theft of Iraqi state assets serves to bind these elements to the US occupation forces by their own economic self-interest... ______________________________________________________________ 3 - Robert Fisk: Oil Ministry protected while others burn ...Iraq's scavengers have thieved and destroyed what they have been allowed to loot and burn by the Americans -- and a two- hour drive around Baghdad shows clearly what the US intends to protect. After days of arson and pillage, here's a short but revealing scorecard. US troops have sat back and allowed mobs to wreck and then burn the Ministry of Planning, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Irrigation, the Ministry of Trade, the Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Information. They did nothing to prevent looters from destroying priceless treasures of Iraq's history in the Baghdad Archaeological Museum and in the museum in the northern city of Mosul, or from looting three hospitals. The Americans have, though, put hundreds of troops inside two Iraqi ministries that remain untouched -- and untouchable -- because tanks and armoured personnel carriers and Humvees have been placed inside and outside both institutions. And which ministries proved to be so important for the Americans? Why, the Ministry of Interior, of course -- with its vast wealth of intelligence information on Iraq -- and the Ministry of Oil... ______________________________________________________________ 4 - Experts: Looters Had Keys to Iraqi Vaults "It looks as if part of the looting was a deliberate planned action," said McGuire Gibson, a University of Chicago professor and president of the American Association for Research in Baghdad. "They were able to take keys for vaults and were able to take out important Mesopotamian materials put in safes. "I have a suspicion it was organized outside the country, in fact I'm pretty sure it was," Gibson said. He added that if a good police team was put together, "I think it could be cracked in no time." ______________________________________________________________ 5 - The pulling down of the Statue was a staged media event [One of these should work. The photos tell a different story than CNN does. -rkm] http://globalresearch.ca/articles/NYI304A.html http://www.twf.org/News/Y2003/0411-Statue.html ______________________________________________________________ 6 - "Baghdad did not fall -- it was handed over" ...While Arabs all over the Middle East now routinely talk of the deal that saved Baghdad, they also speculate that the same deal may have saved Saddam. Unlike the hunt for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, which preoccupied U.S. forces for months, the hunt for the dictator no longer appears to be the top priority for U.S. forces in the wake of Baghdad's fall. ______________________________________________________________ 7 - Democracy for Iraq?...Don't believe it for a minute! ...So there you have it...the modern-day occupation of the Iraq, a key country in the heart of the Arab world and Islam. Forget all the rhetorical swashbuckling about 'the Iraqi people' and 'democracy'. The democracy the Americans have in mind for Iraq will be akin to what they have brought to the Palestinians -- CIA at the top, agents throughout, quisling officials in the news flying around to this and that meeting to get their marching orders and payoff-bank accounts... MOSUL, Iraq (AFP - 4-15-03 - 11:30pm) At least 12 people were killed and scores wounded in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul when US troops fired on a crowd angered by a speech by the new US-backed governor, witnesses reported. "We didn't fire at the crowd, but at the top of the building," the spokesman added. "There were at least two gunmen, I don't know if they were killed." But witnesses charged that US troops fired into the crowd after it became increasingly hostile towards the new governor, Mashaan al-Juburi. ______________________________________________________________ 8 - Dynacorp sex-slavers to police Iraq The British daily The Observer recently revealed that US military contractor Dyncorp has won a multi- million-dollar contract to police post-Saddam Iraq... In Bosnia, Dyncorp personnel were involved in sex slave trading of young girls as well as a number of fraudulent acts. Several Dyncorp employees have been accused of videotaping the rape of one woman. "The longer I stayed in Bosnia the worst these men acted. Finally one day I heard a something to the effect of DynaCorp employee brag that his girl wasn't a day over twelve. I reported this all to the CID of the Army. I also reported the problems to my supervisors and co-workers, but all stayed the same in DynCorp's little Bosnian Boys Club. For going to the CID I was fired, put in protective custody and have had my name thrashed by Dyncorp..." ______________________________________________________________ 9 - Noam Chomsky re: Iraq invasion & aftermath ...in September 2002: the administration released its National Security Strategy, sending many shudders around the world, including the US foreign policy elite. The Strategy has many precedents, but does break new ground: for the first time in the post-war world, a powerful state announced, loud and clear, that it intends to rule the world by force, forever, crushing any potential challenge it might perceive. Iraq was...a perfect choice for an "exemplary action" to establish the new doctrine of global rule by force as a "norm of international relations." A high official involved in drafting the National Security Strategy informed the press that its publication "was the signal that Iraq would be the first test, but not the last." "Iraq became the petri dish in which this experiment in pre-emptive policy grew," the New York Times reported -- misstating the policy in the usual way, but otherwise accurate. ______________________________________________________________ 10 - Don't forget the oil: the payoff is huge Iraq has oil reserves of 112 billion barrels, second only to Saudi Arabia, which has some 265 billion barrels. Iraqi reserves are seven times those of the combined UK and Norwegian sectors of the North Sea. But the prize for oil companies could be even greater. Iraq estimates that its eventual reserves could be as high as 220 billion barrels. Three giant southern fields - Majnoon, West Qurna and Nahr Umar have the capacity to produce as much as Kuwait. The first two could each equal Qatar's production of 700,000 barrels a day. "There is nothing like it anywhere else in the world. Its the big prize," Mr Butt said. ______________________________________________________________ 11 - Syria: next victim of Bush's Panzer Divisions MER: Now strategically isolated and militarily endangered, the screws are being put to Syria and to the few remaining bastions of opposition to near-total Palestinian defeat and near-total Israeli hegemony. The world stage is being set for a politically- economically-militarily imposed 'agreement' -- one quite literally to be shoved down the parched and bloodied throats of the Palestinians and thrust upon the weak/divided/corrupt Arab States. It is a historical rape of the region almost laughingly pursued in the name of 'freedom' and 'democracy'. [The Independent - 14 April 2003]: There is something unseemly, not to say alarming, about the way in which the US appears to be setting up Syria as the next threat to world peace and security even before the guns have fallen silent in Iraq. With looting and violence continuing, barely restrained, over the weekend, President Bush and his senior officials peppered Syria with warnings about its behavior - warnings all too reminiscent of the ones that preceded the war on Iraq. ______________________________________________________________ 12 - Fuhrer Bush's version of Mein Kampf Toronto Star, April 17, 2003, quoting Bush: "Our military is strong and our military is ready, and we intend to keep it that way,"..."Across the world, terrorists and tyrants are learning that America ...will act in our own defence,"... "Instead of drifting towards tragedy, we will protect our security and we will promote peace in the world." ..."In this new era of precision warfare, we can target a regime. Our aim is to strike the guilty. "Terrorists and tyrants have now been put on notice: They can no longer feel safe behind innocent lives," ..a senior Democratic senator told the New York Times yesterday. "This administration will never end the war..." And, according to Democrats, it puts the onus on their candidates to slug it out over who can keep Americans safer, with Bush having a powerful edge. Already, in the last few days, the White House has refocused its enmity from Iraq to Syria... It's an Orwellian scenario, straight out of 1984. "For the sake of the security of this country, and for the sake of peace in this world, the United States must maintain every advantage in weaponry and technology and intelligence...our edge in warfare comes ... because of the American spirit of enterprise. The character of our military reflects the character of our country," he added, before touring Boeing's facilities. "America uses its might in the service of principle." And, repeatedly, Bush said the military conflict isn't over. "Our work is not done; the difficulties have not passed," ______________________________________________________________ 13 - "Behind Our Backs" - Bush torpedoes the economy PAUL KRUGMAN, New York Times, April 15, 2003: ...we have entered a new stage in the tax-cut debate. Until now, the Bush administration and its allies haven't made any effort to explain how they plan to replace the revenues lost because of tax cuts. Now, however, party discipline is starting to crack: a few Republicans in the House and Senate, and many erstwhile supporters on Wall Street are beginning to notice how much we're looking like a banana republic. ...the list of cuts -- in child nutrition, medical care for children, child-care assistance and support for foster care and adoption (leave no child behind!) -- was clearly designed to suggest that the budget can be balanced on the backs of the poor... But back to the amazing spectacle of the war's opening, when the House voted to cut the benefits of the men and women it praised a few minutes earlier. What that scene demonstrated was the belief of the Republican leadership that if it wraps itself in the flag, and denounces critics as unpatriotic, it can get away with just about anything. And the scary thing is that this belief may be justified. ______________________________________________________________ 14 - While we're watching the War, WTO takes over... WASHINGTON, D.C. - Without approval by Washington's legislature or Gov. Gary Locke, the Bush administration plans to submit offers next week at the World Trade Organization (WTO) that could require the state to open public services to foreign, for-profit ownership and strictly curtail state regulation of banking, insurance, electricity, water systems, transportation, alcohol distribution and professional services, including those provided by doctors, lawyers and accountants. States would be required to conform their policies to global rules established as part of negotiations occurring under the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). The threat to numerous state laws and policies was revealed only weeks ago when the European Union's (EU) demands of the U.S. were leaked from secretive talks being held at the WTO's Geneva headquarters. ______________________________________________________________ 15 - Saddam: a career in service to the CIA Now comes a UPI story, based on interviews with various British and U.S. intelligence sources, claiming that from Jack Kennedy in the early 1960s on up to the first Persian Gulf War in 1991, Saddam was in the hands of the CIA. In his early twenties, Saddam was recruited to kill Iraqi prime minister Abd al-Karim Qasim Ever after, the CIA took care of Saddam, helping to spirit him out of Baghdad to Tikrit, and from there to Syria and Beirut, and on to Egypt. During the 1980s the CIA drew close to Saddam's Baathist party, currently reviled as a bunch of vicious killer thugs, but then warmly regarded as our allies against the wacko ayatollahs in Iran. The CIA was providing Iraq with battlefield intelligence gained from a Saudi AWACS plane. It was during this period that Rumsfeld visited the dictator to see if there was anything the U.S. could do to help out. ______________________________________________________________ 16 - Northern Ireland: British army aided paramilitaries BBC, April 17, 2003 Rogue elements within the police and army in Northern Ireland helped loyalist paramilitaries to murder Catholics in the late 1980s, the UK's most senior police officer has said. Alan Erwin, PA News, 17 April 2003 Rogue elements in the security forces were involved in a deadly plot with loyalist paramilitaries to carry out a series of sectarian murders in Northern Ireland, a devastating new report confirmed today. Following a four-year inquiry into allegations of widespread collusion between Special Branch, Army officers and Protestant terrorists, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Sevens concluded there was damning proof of the use of agents in assassinations and the withholding evidence. ______________________________________________________________ 17 - Meanwhile in Columbia: Bush funds the Death Squads George Monbiot Tuesday February 4, 2003 The Guardian Last week, on the day George Bush delivered his state of the union address, the Pentagon received a visitor. A few hours before the president told the American people that "we will not permit the triumph of violence in the affairs of men", General Carlos Ospina, head of the Colombian army, was shaking hands with his American counterpart. He had come to discuss the latest instalment of US military aid. According to Human Rights Watch, the fourth brigade, under Ospina's command, worked alongside the death squads controlled by the paramilitary leader Carlos Castaño..On October 25 1997, a force composed of Ospina's regulars and Castaño's paramilitaries surrounded a village called El Aro, in a region considered sympathetic to the country's leftwing guerrillas. The soldiers cordoned off the village while Castaño's men moved in. They captured a shopkeeper, tied him to a tree, gouged out his eyes, cut off his tongue and castrated him. The other residents tried to flee, but were turned back by Ospina's troops. The paramilitaries then mutilated and beheaded 11 of the villagers, including three children, burned the church, the pharmacy and most of the houses and smashed the water pipes. When they left, they took 30 people with them, who are now listed among Colombia's disappeared. This operation was unusual only in that it has been so well-documented... ______________________________________________________________ -- ============================================================================ cyberjournal home page: http://cyberjournal.org "Zen of Global Transformation" home page: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ QuayLargo discussion forum: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ShowChat/?ScreenName=ShowThreads cj list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=cj newslog list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=newslog subscribe addresses for cj list: •••@••.••• •••@••.••• ============================================================================
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