By Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Eiffel Tower has been sold a couple of times. So too have Platform #1 of the Patna Railway Station, and the Taj Mahal. We are struck by the audacity of a seller parlaying a public landmark into a private transaction. We laugh at the suckers who were so gullible to buy them. As usual, we laugh loudest at those who resemble us most.
A couple of days ago, there appeared an article about the privatization of water in India. Privatization of the commons is always cause for alarm, because its social consequences are always disastrous. Some time ago, I wrote that the single major differentiator between the First and Third Worlds was the faith in the Commons. The First world had huge investments in the public sphere. No less a luminary than John Kenneth Galbraith, Kennedy's ambassador to Nehru, wrote in his memoirs how he would find himself chuckling at the Indian government's boasts of socialism, gently reminding them that there was much more social investment in America than they could ever imagine in India (I paraphrase).
What does this all mean in terms of consciousness? When I was growing up in India, a family celebrating a wedding would think nothing of erecting a wedding tent in the middle of a public street. Blocking a major road meant that you had real clout. A religious bhajan would be blared out on loudspeakers, with no concern for those in the neighborhood. Ditto for the muezzin calling the faithful to prayer. People would complain when it was someone else doing it, but they would do the same in their turn. Now things have changed, as people are more conscious of the boundary between private and public.
Put differently, first world thinking means we do not presume upon public resources for private ends. When we begin to misuse public resources, the inevitable result is (a) greater layers of bureaucracy and (b) the deterioration all such public resources and (c) increased social tension and strife. Even the person who perpetrates this, if he continues to live in the same society, will eventually feel the ill-effects of this process.
One enduring contribution of the Reagan era has been the legitimization of the grab of the commons for private profit. Twenty five years after it commenced, we are still in Reagan's thrall, so much so that this mindset is no longer even questioned, although some stirrings may have commenced -- the latest evidence being a complaint by Field and Stream magazine that Bush and Cheney are terrible stewards of the wild.
Societies break down in strange ways when the commons is used for personal profit, or even perverse private fulfilment. Graffiti is shocking when it first appears on the stop sign near your home. A week later it shocks a lot less. A month later you're practically used to it. Respect for the law, too, is part of the commons. It works because everyone does it. Weird as it might seem, the simple expedient of standing in line is by no means universal. It is a tribute to American society that people do so. That so many people drive, and have a fair understanding of traffic rules, is nothing short of an American social engineering miracle.
What about illegal immigration? When I read impassioned speeches and writings about the rights of illegal immigrants, I wish I could ask these opponents of punishment for illegal immigration a simple question -- would you allow any illegal immigrant to stay in your home and support them 100%? Remember, 100% -- which means you have to pay for private schooling for their children, their health care, etc. -- forever (You cannot, after all, seek to benefit from a breaking of the law). I doubt there would be many takers. And this, it seems to me, is the basic infirmity of their position. They want to be charitable, and claim to be settling ancient scores, but all on the back of the Commons.
Call their attention to this, and there are angry responses about how America had done this or that atrocity, or how immigrants have built this country. That last is particularly unctious. Let us suppose I helped build a public park. Let us even ignore the fact that I was paid for it (as did any immigrant). Does that mean that I can, without permission, usurp it to throw a party? As with the Taj Mahal or the Eiffel Tower, I cannot dispose of something I do not own outright. If there are others involved, they must sign on too. In the case of the commons, those involved are the American people, most immediately those living along the Mexican border. Who has obtained their assent to allow foreigners to arbitrary cross into their towns, because some wise folk in Wall Street or Washington have concluded that immigration is a 'net plus'? And when their governments fail to protect them despite repeated pleas, why should anyone be surprised at the rise of bodies like the Minutemen?
One does not have to lose sight of America's numerous acts of omission and commission in and outside the USA. But that is no excuse for anyone to defend sneaking around the law, soaking up public resources in a manner never intended. After all, even if the official figures of 12 million illegal immigrants (which should, realistically, be revised upwards, being official statistics -- that's third world thinking) are true, that is a 4% population of illegal immigrants, encroaching upon the commons. A large figure in any circumstances, in an era when investment in the Commons is considered akin to heresy, it is a straw more than capable of felling the camel.
Niranjan Ramakrishnan can be reached at njn_2003@yahoo.com. His blog is at http://njn-blogogram.blogspot.com/.
8 comments:
What don't you understand about the word ILLEGAL?
british are and were the most numerous illegal immigrants to the usa and itis they and ther agents who are rasing hue and cry about non angloimmigrants as if thes british bastards own usa land.
get thse english parasites from iraq ,from australia from usa and pack them back to thier wet wisdy ugly worm like country england-a nation og pirates.
british are the biggest economic refugees int he world
August 2002
Mr. Mugabe does not want the english economic refugees to enjoy disproportionate amount of luxury while the rest of population is simpoly grinding to survive-so what is wrong with that thinking? It is wrong when it involves english parasites. These people had moved from Zimbawe to england soon after Independence bit when they found that englasih people live in shoe box sized houses with inflated trumped up prices and have much lower standard of living then thses colonialists moved back to zimbawe. oon after second world war america had forced Japan to do so called land reform(in order to break the power of japanese upper classes) and that was called reform. In many other countries like India the land reform was done for the sake of justice and that was hailed. Mr. Mugabe waited too long to do that sort of land reform and hwen he belatedly decided to do tthat then the english parasites and spes from english govet, to BBc and english media started barkinglike jackels. After all it is their people who are being affected this time. The english media ahd already neatralized elson mandela and installed a western stooge in south africa and made a lot of propganda agasint winnei mandela-simply becasue winnie had people;s suppoert-this is not wanted by the english meddlers. The similar thing they want everywhere-mr. Mugabe does not oblige them now so he is villain. their jeolosy about elections in other parts of world does not extend to U.s. a. or england-in fact their the false election of bush thru fraud and goonery it was the englsih media only (including bbc) which was very anxious that court does not overrule Bush election becasue as they siad bush was good for allies(read england) . no procession , no supprt for oppsiotion -on the contrary all englsh media was angry with m. gore for having pinpointed irrregularity in U.S. a. elction. all becasue the third rate country like england can live in reflected glory of Usa power.
In fact for last 20 years and more so in last 15 years the english have shown their true clour-after cold war it is clear that the impotent english have been trying to piggy back pon american strength(americans in majority are not anglosaxons)and thru america england treis to bully other nations-install dictators their and then those dictators without peoples supprt are asked to bring the money to england and buy house in london-that creates housing boom and this nation of plumbers(graduation from pirates to shopkeepers then plumbers now) feels very happy with inflated house prices and low qulaity housing and infrastructrue-the money from abroad comes to london stock exchange and fuels the stock price. The london stock price should be forced to be lowered to one fourth of its present price becasue the rest is all false pumped up price with no real value. wht does england produce that any country would want? the real indutrial nations of the worls -Japan, germany have been in recesssion for last 10years while this england has been booming after gulf war for no reason other than becasue it falsley persuaded other countries and their dicataors to bring money to london and starve the rest of worrld. For God' sake the english plumber does not even eat healthy food.--atleast not non infected.
As I said before the british and americans are the biggest illegal immigrants in the world-look at middle east and elsewhere-they have broken the law-so what punishment do you intend to give to the white americans and the bastrad parasite race called english.?
British bastards-real villains of The world and Evil number one.
MOSCOW. (Dr. Valentin Falin for RIA Novosti.) -- Myths are known to persist, as proved by Winston Churchill's speech in Fulton in 1946. To this day it is regarded as the "anti-communist manifesto" that unleashed the Cold War and encouraged Stalin to erect the "iron curtain," which cut off a half of Europe from the "free world."
How much of the above is true? Words in politics do not service truth or moral values, but somebody's interests, which are sometimes profane. This is why it would be useless to argue with Churchill. Instead, we should ask ourselves why Churchill was invited to read the last rites for the anti-Hitler coalition and to proclaim a U-turn in the Western policy. Seven months before Fulton, the British electorate refused to reelect Churchill because the British Conservatives and he personally proved unable to come to terms with the Soviet Union.
U.S. President Harry Truman saw Churchill's dislike of Moscow, his attempts to put spokes in the wheels of "Russian barbarians," sabotage of the Second Front idea, and, by the end of the war, open attempts to steal the fruit of common victory as the graduation diploma for the title of statesman. To him, Churchill was the best imaginable partner in the common pursuit of Russophobia, the lodestar of Truman's performance as senator and president.
By March 1946, Truman had made short shrift of the heritage left to him by Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He had pensioned off his predecessor's colleagues or deprived them of real influence on state affairs. But his personal prestige was not sufficient to bury Roosevelt's program of post-war world order. He needed a more respected politician to blacken his recent ally - the Soviet Union, which bore the brunt in the struggle against Nazism, - and to convince the American public that it had become an enemy overnight.
He needed a witness, a former member of the Big Troika who would hint at circumstances that had pushed Western democracies into the same boat with Moscow. But the boat had cast anchor in a safe haven and so the democracies could get rid of the "alien member" who resisted the Anglo-Saxon interpretation of the international rules of the game.
Winston Churchill was a champion of fooling the people in Britain or across the ocean. Rhetoric was his hobbyhorse. He was an unrivalled master of raping, distorting and ignoring facts. While trying to scare the public with a Soviet threat, the former prime minister, naturally, did not mention his conference with Roosevelt and their chiefs of staff in Quebec in August 1943, where he suggested collusion with Nazi generals for planning a war against the Soviet Union. The MI5 head, Sir Stewart Menzies, held a series of secret meetings with his German counterpart, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, in the unoccupied part of France to discuss making Germany a friend and the Soviet Union an enemy.
Churchill, who had a very good memory, "forgot" to mention the fact that in spring 1945, a few months before the capitulation of Germany, he had ordered the planning of Operation Unthinkable against the Soviet Union that involved "the re-equipment and re-organization of German manpower." The date for a third world war was set at July 1, 1945.
Nobody mentioned Churchill's other "feats," which prolonged the war in Europe for at least 18-24 months and claimed millions of lives that could have been saved.
Maybe the Soviet leaders wanted to trample over Europe and force their vision of "power by the people" on it? There has always been a shortage of political angels in Moscow. But here is what Lucius D. Clay, Deputy U.S. Military Governor of Germany, who cannot be suspected of pro-Soviet sentiments, reported to the State Department in April 1946.
He said the Soviet representatives in the Allied Control Council could not be accused of breaching the Potsdam Agreements. To the contrary, they are fulfilling them most honestly, demonstrating a sincere desire to be friendly with and respect for the United States, he said. We did not for a second believe in the possibility of a Soviet aggression, and we still do not believe it, he said.
This does not sounds at all like what Churchill said in Fulton.
The Kremlin had no time or money for "exporting the revolution," as it had to resurrect the Soviet Union from ruins, normalize life, rebuild industrial enterprises, tens of thousands of kilometers of railroad lines, and collective and state farms that had to feed the people. Moreover, Moscow did not envision a "socialist future" for Germany, the main cause of its plight.
Wilhelm Pieck, the leader of German Communists, wrote down in his diaries the recommendations he had received from Stalin during personal meetings in 1945-1952. "Do not attempt to create a mini-Soviet Union in East Germany or undertake socialist reforms. Your task is to carry through the 1848 bourgeois revolution, which Bismarck and then Hitler halted," Stalin told him.
Stalin thought the split of Germany contradicted the strategic interests of the Soviet Union, and saw resistance to the separatist trends encouraged by France, Britain and the U.S. as the basis for consolidating different political anti-fascist forces in Germany.
In 1946 and 1947, the Soviet Union offered the three Western allies to hold general free elections in Germany with a view to forming a national government, to sign a peace treaty with Germans, and to withdraw all foreign troops, including the Soviet ones, from the country. Germans were offered the freedom to choose of a social and economic regime. Moscow favored the Weimar variant.
What was Washington's reaction? "We have no reason to trust the democratic will of the German people," said the US Secretary of State.
Moscow was not happy with the Versailles-style sanitary cordons, with which Churchill and other "democrats" wanted to surround the Soviet Union. But it did not plan to trample down on anyone in 1945 or 1946. A vivid proof is Finland, which has benefited considerably from its commitment to neighborly relations with the Soviet Union. Unfortunately, very few countries followed its example. But it should be recalled that until 1947 or 1948, the governments in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania were led by bourgeois politicians Edward Benes, Ferencz Nagy and Petru Groza. Moreover, Hungary had inherited an effective bureaucratic and judicial system from the Horty regime.
"Popular fronts" in the Soviet Union's neighbors were the first victims of the Cold War engineered by Washington as a prelude to a hot war. The adequacy of the Kremlin's response measures can be argued, but objective researchers will agree that these were indeed response measures.
People sometimes ask if the Cold War ended with the demise of the Soviet Union. I don't think so. It is enough to read the resolutions of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on Russia to see that the spirit of the Fulton speech has not died. For centuries, hatred of Russia has distorted the world outlook and the actions of the West regarding the Russian nation, and it still poisons the minds of many "democrats."
President Boris Yeltsin, his Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev and other statesmen of the first post-Soviet years of Russia's modern history bruised their knees repenting Russia's real and imaginary sins, but Russia-haters are still not satisfied. But then, they are probably waiting for Russia to repeat the fate of Scythians, a nomadic tribe that ceased to exist in the first century BC.
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RIA Novosti is continuing to publish conversations between Valentin Falin, who has a Ph.D. in historical sciences, with the agency's military commentator Viktor Litovkin. They have spoken of the little known pages in World War II that were previously classified and sometimes had a decisive influence on the progress and outcome of the hostilities.
Question: World War II's modern historians have different opinions about its final stage. Some experts maintain that the war could have ended much earlier, as Marshal Chuikov wrote in his memoirs. Others argue that it could have dragged on for another year. Which of them is closer to the truth? And what is the truth? What is your personal opinion?
Answer: Modern historians are not the only ones who argue about this question. The war's length and end were even discussed during the war itself. They have been constant since 1942. Or, to be more exact, this question worried politicians and the military since 1941, when an overwhelming majority of statesmen, including Roosevelt and Churchill, did not believe that the Soviet Union would hold out for longer than four to six weeks. Only Benes believed and maintained that the Soviet Union would do what it did and finally defeat Germany.
Q.: As far as I remember, Eduard Benes was President of Czechoslovakia in exile. After the Munich deal of 1938 and the country's occupation, he was in Britain, right?
A.: Yes. Then, when these assessments and evaluations of our viability proved wrong, when Germany suffered its first strategic defeat under Moscow, the opinion changed drastically. The West began voicing concerns that the Soviet Union could emerge too powerful out of the war. And if it became too powerful it would determine the future face of Europe, according to Adolf Berle, the then US Assistant Secretary of State, who coordinated the work of American intelligence. This view was shared even by people around Churchill, including very respectable people who before and during the war worked on the doctrine of the British armed forces' operations and the overall British policy.
This, in large part, explains why Churchill was against opening the second front in 1942, although Lord Beaverbrook and Sir Richard Stafford Cripps in the British leadership and, especially, Dwight Eisenhower and other designers of US military plans believed that there were technical and other preconditions to defeating Germany in 1942. They took advantage of the fact that most German forces were deployed in the east and the 2,000-km coast of France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway and Germany itself was open for the allies' intervention. At that time the Nazis did not have any permanent defense facilities along the Atlantic coast.
Moreover, the American military insisted and tried to persuade Roosevelt (there are several memorandums written by Eisenhower on the issue) that the second front was necessary, it was possible and its opening would make the war in Europe short and would force Germany to capitulate if not in 1942, then in 1943 at the latest.
Yet this did not suit Britain and numerous conservative figures on the American Mount Olympus.
Q.: Who do you mean?
A.: Well, the whole State Department headed by Cordell Hall was extremely unfriendly towards the Soviet Union. This explains why Roosevelt did not take Hall to the Tehran Conference and the Secretary of State received the protocols from the Big Three meetings only six months after Tehran. The irony is that the Reich's political intelligence brought the same protocols to Hitler in three or four weeks. Life is full of paradoxes.
After the Battle of Kursk in 1943, where the Wehrmacht was defeated, American and British chiefs of staff, as well as Churchill and Roosevelt, held a meeting in Quebec on August 20. They discussed whether the United States and Britain should withdraw from the anti-Hitler coalition and unite with Nazi generals for a joint war against theSoviet Union.
Q.: Why?
A.: Because the ideology of Churchill and those in Washington who shared it maintained that "these Russian barbarians should be held up" as far as possible in the East, weakening the USSR as much as possible, if not defeating it, first of all, with German hands. This is how the task was set.
It was Churchill's very old plan. He developed the idea in his conversations with General Kutepov back in 1919. The Americans, British and French failed and could not suppress Soviet Russia, he said. This task should be given to the Japanese and Germans. He gave similar instructions to Bismarck, the first secretary of the German embassy in London in 1930. In the first world war the Germans behaved like idiots, he maintained. Instead of concentrating on destroying Russia, they began war on two fronts. If they dealt only with Russia, England would have neutralized France.
For Churchill it was not so much war against the Bolsheviks as it was the continuation of the Crimean war of 1853-1856 when Russia, for better or for worse, was trying to impede British expansion.
Q.: In Transcaucasia, Central Asia, and the oil-rich Middle East...
A.: Naturally. Consequently, talking about different variants of waging war against Nazi Germany, we should not forget about the different attitudes towards the allies' philosophy, towards England's and America's obligations to Moscow.
I will digress from the issue for a second. In 1954 or 1955, Ghent hosted a priests' symposium devoted to the question of whether or not angels kissed each other. After many days of debates, the symposium concluded that they did, but without passion. Relations within the anti-Hitler coalition were somehow similar to this whim of the angles, if not the kiss of Judas. The promises were given without commitments or, worse, to mislead the Soviet partner.
Let me recall that this tactics disrupted the talks between the Soviet Union, Britain and France in August 1939, when something still could have been done to contain the Nazi aggression. Yet they defiantly left no choice for the Soviet leaders, but to sign a non-aggression treaty with Germany. They left us exposed to the Nazi military machine, which was getting ready to strike. I can quote a directive formulated in Neville Chamberlain's office that said that if London could not avoid an agreement with the Soviet Union, the British signature should not mean that, if the Germans attacked the USSR, Britain would come to help the victim and declare war on Germany. He said that they should have an opportunity to say that Britain and the Soviet Union had different interpretations of facts.
Q.: There is a well-known historical example, that, when in 1939, Germany attacked Poland, the British ally, London declared war on Berlin, but did not take a single serious move to really aid Warsaw.
A.: In our case, not even a formal declaration of war was at issue. The Tories assumed that the German machine would go as far as the Urals, leveling everything on its way. And no one will be left to lament England's wile.
These ties between times and events existed during the war and gave food for thought. And I believe this thought was not all too optimistic for us.
Q.: Let's get back to 1944-1945. Could we have ended the war before May?
A.: Let's put the question this way: why was the allied landing planned for 1944? No one focuses on this issue. Yet the date was not randomly chosen. The West took into account our huge losses of soldiers, officers and weapons in Stalingrad. Losses in Kursk were also big. We lost more tanks than the Germans.
In 1944 the country was conscripting 17-year-olds. The villages were almost empty. Boys born between 1926-1927 were not drafted only if they worked at defense plants - their directors did not let them go.
The American and British intelligence assessed the outlook and agreed that by spring 1944, the Soviet Union would have exhausted its offensive potential. It would have run out of human resources and unable to deal the Wehrmacht a blow comparable to the battles of Moscow, Stalingrad and Kursk. It meant that by the time of the allied landing we would be stuck in confrontation with the Nazis and cede the strategic initiative to the United States and Britain.
Even conspiracy against Hitler was planned to coincide with the landing. The generals brought to power in the Reich were to dissolve the Western Front and allow the Americans and British to occupy Germany and "liberate" Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Austria... The Red Army was to be stopped within the 1939 borders.
Q.: I remember that America and Britain even made a landing in Hungary, near Balaton, in order to seize Budapest, but the Germans destroyed all of them...
A.: That was not so much a landing force, but more a contact group to establish connections with Hungarian anti-Nazi forces. However, this was not the only failure. Hitler survived the attempt on his life, Rommel was severely wounded and got out of the game, although the West had counted on him. Other generals lost their nerve. And what happened - happened. America did not get an easy march across Germany to triumphant music. They got involved in battles, sometimes intense ones, for example, the Ardennes operation. Nevertheless, they were progressing towards their goals. Sometimes very cynically.
Let me give you a specific example. U.S. troops approached Paris. A rebellion broke out there. The Americans stopped 30 km from the city and waited for the Germans to destroy the rebels, because most of them were Communists. The number of the victims there were from 3,000 to 5,000 people, according to different sources. But the rebels gained control and only then did the Americans take Paris. The same happened in the south of France.
But let us get back to the period we began with.
Q.: The winter of 1944-1945.
A.: Yes. In the autumn of 1944 several meetings took place in Germany, chaired by Hitler and then on his order by General Alfred Jodl and Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel. The main idea was as follows: if they could give the Americans a good whipping, the United States and Britain would become very interested in the talks that had been held secretly from Moscow in 1942-1943.
Berlin planned the Ardennes operation not to win the war, but to spoil relations between the West and the Soviet Union. The United States was to understand how strong Germany still was, how important it was for the Western powers in their confrontation with the Soviet Union. And that the allies did not have enough strength or will to stop the Red Army when it came close to German territory.
Hitler emphasized that no one would speak to a country in trouble, only when the Wehrmacht would have shown that it was powerful would talks begin.
Suddenness was the trump card. The allies took the winter quarters, believing that Alsace and the Ardennes mountains were a perfect place for a vacation and a bad one for hostilities. The Germans, however, intended to break through to Rotterdam and to cut the Americans off the Dutch ports. This circumstance was to determine the western campaign.
The launch of the Ardennes operation was postponed several times. Germany did not have enough forces. And it began in the winter of 1944, when the Red Army fought its hardest battles in Hungary, near Balaton and Budapest. At stake were the last sources of oil - in Austria and some in Hungary, which were controlled by Germany.
This was one of the reasons why Hitler decided to defend Hungary despite everything. And why in the thick of the Ardennes operation and immediately before the Alsace operation he in fact began withdrawing forces from the West and sending them to the Soviet-Hungarian front. The main force of the Ardennes operation, the SS 6th tank army, was withdrawn from the Ardennes and sent to Hungary...
Q.: To Hajmasker.
A.: In fact, the redeployment began even before Roosevelt's and Churchill's panicked address to Stalin, when they, if we translate the diplomatic language into common terms, begged: help, save us, we are in trouble!
And we have evidence that Hitler thought that if our allies had so often left us exposed and obviously waited to see whether Moscow would hold out and the Red Army survive, then we could do the same. In 1941 they waited for the Soviet capital to fall, in 1942 not only Turkey and Japan, but also the United States waited for us to surrender Stalingrad to reconsider their policies. The allies did not even share with us such intelligence information as the German plans of onslaught via the Don towards the Volga and on to the Caucasus, and so on.
Q.: If I'm not mistaken, we received this information from the legendary Rote Kapella.
A.: The Americans did not give us any information, although they even knew the dates and times, including the preparations of operation Citadel at the Kursk Bulge.
Of course, we had tangible reasons to see how our allies could wage a war, how much they wanted to wage it and how ready they were to promote their main plan for the operation on the continent, the plan called Rankin. It was not Overlord that was the main one, it was Rankin, which envisaged the establishment of British-American control over alloy Germany and all East European states in order not to admit us there.
When Eisenhower was appointed commander of the second front, he was ordered to prepare Overlord, but always bear Rankin in mind. If there were favorable conditions for Rankin, he was to cancel Overlord and send all forces to Rankin. The revolt in Warsaw was spurred in compliance with this plan, as were many other things.
In this sense, the end of 1944 and the beginning of 1945 were moments of truth. It was not a war on two fronts, but a war against two adversaries. Formally, the allies wereengaged in hostilities, which was very important for us as they did distract some part of the German forces. Yet their main scheme was to stop, if possible, the Soviet Union, as Churchill said or, as some American generals put it more rudely, "to stop the offspring of Genghiz Khan."
By the way, Churchill formulated this idea in an openly anti-Soviet way in October 1942, when our Nov. 19 counter-offensive under Stalingrand had not yet begun. "We should stop these barbarians as far as possible in the East."
When we talk of our allies, I in no way want to or can undermine the deeds of their soldiers and officers who fought as we did, knowing nothing about political intrigues and their leaders' schemes, they fought honestly and bravely. I am not undermining the help we got under the lend-lease, although we never were the main recipients of it. I am just trying to show how complicated, controversial and dangerous the situation was for us throughout the war till the victory salute. And how difficult it sometimes was to make a decision. We were not simply misled, but over and over left exposed to the enemy's blow.
Q.: Does this mean that the war could indeed have ended much earlier than May 1945?
A.: If I may be absolutely frank, it could have. Yet it is not our country's fault that it had not ended in 1943. It is not our fault. If our allies had been faithful to their allies' duty, if they had fulfilled the commitments to the Soviet Union in 1941, 1942 and in the first half of 1943... But they did not, and the war lasted for another one and a half or two years.
Most importantly, if it had not been for these delays with the opening of the second front, there would have been 10-12 million fewer victims among the Soviet people and the allies, especially in occupied Europe. There would not even have been Auschwitz, for it began working actively only in 1944...
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RIA Novosti continues the tale of secrets and hidden mechanisms of World War II, of events that influenced decisions made by Russia's political and military leadership, of a long and hard road to the Great Victory. Our guest this time is Dr. Valentin M. FALIN (History). He shares his thoughts with RIA Novosti military commentator Viktor Litovkin.
Viktor Litovkin: Today, on the eve of the celebration of the Great Victory, the debates around the Berlin operation conducted by the troops of the 1st Byelorussian Front at the final stages of WWII, have become the focus of increased attention again. Experts in the West continue to accuse the Soviet Union and Marshal Zhukov of sacrificing the lives of many Soviet soldiers for the sake of a questionable propaganda move - hoisting the Red Banner on top of the Reichstag. What do you think about that?
Valentin Falin: True, I have always tried to figure out whether the Berlin operation was worth sacrificing almost 120,000 Soviet troops? Were the losses suffered in order to capture Berlin justified? I could not find a clear answer pondering over this question. Although, after reading a series of authentic British documents declassified 5-6 years ago and comparing the information with the data I had come upon in the line of my work back in the 1950s, many pieces of the puzzle set in and the overall picture became clearer.
Behind the determination of the Soviet leadership to capture Berlin and reach the demarcation lines established during the 1945 Yalta conference attended by Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill was a task of great importance - to make all possible efforts to foil a political gamble envisioned by the British leader with the support of influential US circles, and to prevent the transformation of World War II into World War III, where our former allies would have turned into enemies.
Viktor Litovkin: How could it have been possible? After all, the anti-Nazi coalition was in the zenith of its glory and ability?
Valentin Falin: Unfortunately, life abounds with cataclysms. It is hard to find a last century's politician, who would match Winston Churchill's ability to bluff friends and foes alike. Secretary of War in the Franklin Roosevelt administration Henry Stimson characterized Churchill's methods as the most rampant variety of debauchery. The British Premier was especially keen on hypocrisy and crafty designs in relation to the Soviet Union, though.
In his messages to Stalin, he prayed that the Anglo-Soviet alliance would be a source of prosperity for both countries, for the United Nations and for the whole world, and wished "success to this honorable undertaking", meaning a full-scale Red Army offensive on the Eastern front in January 1945, which the Soviet Union was preparing hastily in response to desperate pleas of Washington and London to help the allied troops that had been trapped in Ardennes and Alsace. Those were empty words, though. In reality, Churchill considered himself free of any obligations before the Soviet Union and on the eve of the Yalta conference tried to convince President Roosevelt to confront Moscow. When his plan failed, the British Premier decided to act on his own.
It was at that time that Churchill ordered to store captured German weapons for possible future use against the Soviet Union and to intern German military personnel, placing surrendering Wehrmacht soldiers and officers on divisional basis in the territory of Schleswig-Holstein and Southern Denmark. The purpose of Churchill's treacherous scheme would become clear later.
Let us recall that since March 1945, the Second (Western) front formally and essentially had ceased to exist. German units either surrendered or retreated to the east without offering significant resistance to our allies. German tactics boiled down to the following: to hold the positions along the entire length of the Soviet-German front until the "virtual" Western and the "real" Eastern fronts merge, and the American and British troops take over from the Germans the task of repelling "the Soviet threat" hanging over Europe.
It is worth pointing out that the Western Allies could have advanced to the east faster than they did, if the headquarters of army groups commanded by Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, Dwight Eisenhower and Sir Harold Alexander (the Italian theater of operations) had planned their operations more carefully, had coordinated the deployment of their forces more skillfully, and had wasted less time on internal quarrels and the search for mutually acceptable solutions. While Roosevelt was still alive, Washington, for various reasons, was not in a hurry to end cooperation with Moscow. As for Churchill, he believed the Red Moor had done his bit and should leave the scene.
Let us ask ourselves a question: how was the Soviet leadership supposed to act after receiving information about Churchill's duplicity? Were they supposed to content themselves with the illusion that the "common victory" was near and each of the three powers would establish control over proper zones of responsibility established by prior agreements? Were they supposed to rely upon prior decisions on treatment of Germany and its satellites? Or was it still safer to consider more carefully the reliable information about treacherous designs devised by Churchill, who wanted to involve in them US President Harry Truman, his advisors William Leahy and George Marshall, head of US Office of Strategic Services William Donovan and the like?
Viktor Litovkin: It is a tough question.
Valentin Falin: The 1945 Yalta conference ended on February 11. The participants left in the first half of February 12. During the conference, they agreed, by the way, that the Air Forces of the three powers would respect clearly defined zones of operation. On the night of February 12, Allied bombers obliterated Dresden and later made a run over major production facilities inSlovakia, in the future Soviet zone of occupation in Germany, in order to prevent the Russians from capturing them in good condition. In 1941, Stalin suggested to the British and the Americans to conduct bombing raids from airfields in the Crimea on the oil fields in Ploesti. The Allies ignored the suggestion at the time. However, the Allied aviation conducted a series of bombing raids on Ploesti in 1944, when the Soviet troops were approaching this major oil production center, which had supplied the Third Reich with fuel throughout the entire course of war.
Viktor Litovkin: What about Dresden? How did it fit into Allied plans?
Valentin Falin: One of the major targets of Allied bombing raids on Dresden was bridges over the Elbe. Churchill and the Americans shared the plans to delay the advance of the Red Army and keep the Russians as far to the east as possible.
Viktor Litovkin: You mean, the destruction of the city was a "side effect," so to speak?
Valentin Falin: Yes, "the outlays of the war." There was another motive, though. Before the raids, British crews were instructed to demonstrate clearly to the Soviets the capabilities of the Allied bomber force. And so they did, on several occasions. In April 1945, they obliterated Potsdam and Oranienburg, informing the Soviet side that it was the pilots' mistake. The pilots were actually targeting Zossen, where the German Luftwaffe headquarters were located, but somehow missed. It was a classic "devious statement," which the Allies used on numerous occasions. Oranienburg was bombed on Marshall's and Leahy's orders because German uranium labs were located there. They turned the city into dust to prevent the labs, the personnel, the equipment and materials from falling into the Soviet hands.
Today, when we look closely at the events that took place during that hard period and attempt to understand why the Soviet leadership resorted to great losses at the final stages of the war, we realize that it simply did not have many alternatives. Aside from pressing military tasks, it had to deal with complex political and strategic prospects, including the planning of effective measures to counter Churchill's scheme.
Viktor Litovkin: Wasn't it easier to inform the Western Allies that we were aware of their plans and considered them inadmissible? Or to reveal the treacherous plans to the world community?
Valentin Falin: I do not think it would have had any effect. The Soviet leadership attempted to discourage the Allies from plotting against the Soviet Union by showing goodwill. That's what I learned from Vladimir Semyonov, a Russian diplomat. Stalin invited Andrei Smirnov, the head of the Third (European) department of the Soviet Foreign Ministry, who also held the post of foreign minister of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, to discuss, together with Smirnov, the plan of actions in the territories of the Soviet zone of control.
Smirnov reported that in Austria, the Soviet armies, pursuing the retreating enemy, crossed the demarcation lines established at the Yalta conference, and suggested to hold de-facto the new positions in order to test the US reaction in similar situations. Stalin interrupted him and said, "It is wrong. Write a telegram to the Allies." Then he started to dictate, "The Soviet troops, pursuing the retreating Wehrmacht units, had to cross the line we had agreed upon earlier. Hereby, I would like to reassure you that after the conclusion of military actions, the Soviet troops will be pulled back to the established occupation zones."
Viktor Litovkin: Were the telegrams sent to London and Washington?
Valentin Falin: I do not know where and to whom. Maybe they were sent by military channels, or political channels. I am just relaying the story I was told by the witness of those events. And I can assure you that Churchill was not impressed by the Soviet gesture. After Roosevelt's death (April 12, 1945), he continued to pressure Truman, trying to convince him that it was not necessary to respect the agreements reached in Tehran or Yalta. In his opinion, it was time to create new situations, which would necessitate new decisions. Which ones?
According to Churchill, the circumstances allowed Western powers to advance farther than expected toward the east and the "democracies" must hold there. Churchill spoke against the Potsdam conference or any other conference that would have recognized a great contribution of the Soviet people to the victory. According to his logic, the West had been given the opportunity to challenge the Soviet Union at the time when its resources were depleted, the communications at the rear overextended, the troops exhausted and equipment worn out, and demand that Moscow either yield to the Allies or face the hardships of another war.
I would like to stress that it is not an insinuation or an assumption, but a true fact, which even has a proper name. In the beginning of April 1945 (according to a different source - at the end of March), Churchill issued an order to plan urgently Operation Unthinkable. The new war was scheduled to start on July 1, 1945. American, Canadian, and British contingents in Europe, the Polish Expeditionary Corps and 10-12 German divisions (the ones that had not been disbanded and kept in Schleswig-Holstein and Southern Denmark) were supposed to participate in the operation.
Fortunately, President Truman did not support this, delicately speaking, Jesuitical idea. He had at least two reasons to reject Churchill's proposal. First, the American public was simply not ready to accept such a cynical betrayal of the common cause established by the very concept of the United Nations.
Viktor Litovkin: To be more precise, an unscrupulous perfidy.
Valentin Falin: Precisely. Although, it was not the major reason. The American generals managed to convince Churchill to continue collaboration with the Soviet Union untilJapan's surrender. Besides, the US military brass and their British colleagues realized it was easier to start the war against the Soviet Union than to finish it triumphantly. The risk was too great for them to bear.
I am going to ask you again how the Soviet Supreme Command Headquarters was supposed to act after receiving such worrisome information? If you want, the Berlin operation was the Soviet response to the Operation Unthinkable, and the sacrifices made by Russian soldiers and officers were a warning to Churchill and his colleagues.
Stalin was behind the political scenario of the Berlin operation. Georgy Zhukov worked out operational details and also took the bulk of criticism for excessive losses during a bloody battle at the approaches to Berlin and inside the German capital. The criticism was partially caused by emotional reasons. Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky's armies were closer to the capital of the Third Reich at the start of the operation, and he probably expected to become the recipient of its keys. The Supreme Command, though, assigned him a different task. Apparently, Stalin preferred a military leader with a tougher character. Marshal Ivan Konev was disappointed and felt he was cheated upon when he had been assigned a secondary role during the operation. I know it from my personal conversations with Konev.
Viktor Litovkin: Konev was closer to Berlin in April 1945 than Zhukov, as well...
Valentin Falin: In any case, the choice fell upon Zhukov, who was known as the right hand of the Supreme Commander. Accordingly, the future fall of Berlin was supposed to add luster to the "military glory" of Stalin, who "conducted" with his "right hand". Apparently, in those days Stalin still neglected the gossip of informers who attempted to put criticism of Stalin's grave mistakes during the war into Zhukov's mouth...
Viktor Litovkin: So, what did Berlin symbolize for the Russians?
Valentin Falin: The capture of Berlin and the hoisting of the Victory Banner over the Reichstag did not only symbolize the end of the war. Least of all they were a propaganda move. It was a matter of principle for the Soviet troops to enter the enemy lair and thus mark the end of the most difficult war in Russian history. The soldiers believed that the Nazi beast, which had brought enormous suffering upon the Soviet people, Europe and the whole world, originally crawled out of Berlin. The Red Army came to the Nazi capital to open a new chapter in the Russian history, in the history of Germany and mankind...
Let us have a closer look at the documents prepared on Stalin's orders in spring 1945 - in March, April and May. An objective researcher would immediately realize that it was not the thirst for revenge that determined the outlines of the future Soviet course. The Soviet leadership intended to treat Germany as a country that had suffered a defeat in the war, and the Germans as people who were responsible for starting this war. However...nobody thought of turning the German defeat into eternal punishment without a possibility of bright future for the German people. Stalin acted according to the thesis announced back in 1941: Hitlers come and go, but the German people and the German state go on.
Obviously, it was necessary to force the Germans to participate in the reconstruction of territories devastated by Nazi's "scorched land" policy. The entire wealth of Germany would not be enough to compensate Russia for material and human losses suffered in the war. To take all that was possible to take without burdening themselves with provision for Germans, "to plunder as much as possible," such was rather undiplomatic language Stalin used to instruct his subordinates on the issue of post-war reparations. Every single nail counted for raising Ukraine, Byelorussia and central Russia from the ruins. More than four-fifths of production facilities had been destroyed there. More than one-third of the population hadlost housing. The Germans demolished 80,000 kilometers of railroad tracks. They even destroyed railroad ties and blown up all bridges. 80,000 kilometers is more than the combined length of all German railroads before World War II.
At the same time, the Soviet commanders received strict orders to suppress any ill-treatment of local population, especially of women and children, that traditionally accompanied any wars. Abusers were subject to a trial by military tribunal. Still, there were plenty of maltreatment cases.
Simultaneously, Moscow demanded to take harsh measures against any riots or subversive actions on the part of "remaining incorrigible elements" that might have occurred in conquered Berlin and on the territory of the Soviet occupation zone. Meantime, there were quite a few of those who wanted to shoot at the back of triumphant victors. Berlin fell on May 2, but "sporadic skirmishes" continued in the capital for another 10 days. Ivan Zaitsev, who worked in the Russian Embassy in Bonn, mentioned in our conversation that he always had "bad luck" in that respect. The war officially ended on May 9, but he fought in Berlin until May 11. In Berlin, SS units from 15 countries were offering stiff resistance to Soviet troops. In addition to German fascists, Nazis from Norway, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemburg and God knows where else fought against Red Army soldiers there...
Viktor Litovkin: It took Soviet troops longer to capture Budapest, though.
Valentin Falin: Budapest is a different story. We are talking about Berlin now. The situation in Berlin brought constant headaches to Soviet commanders. The establishment of control over the entire city was a colossal task. As if it was not enough to break through seven heavily fortified German defensive positions on the Seelow Heights with great losses. In the outskirts of Berlin and on major city thoroughfares, Germans dug in tanks, turning them in armored pillboxes. For instance, when Red Army units approached the Frankfurter Allee, which led directly to the center of the city, they were met with massive barrage of gunfire and again suffered heavy casualties...
Viktor Litovkin: Is it true that the Frankfurter Allee used to be called the Hitler Strasse before the war?
Valentin Falin: That was its official name before May 1945. Enemy tanks were dug in at all key points of the street. Their crews fought with desperation of the doomed. They fired point-blank at the Soviet infantry, trucks and tanks. The Wehrmacht command planned to recreate the second Stalingrad on the streets of Berlin and the shores of the Spree.
I still keep wondering if it was better to close the encirclement around Berlin and wait for the city to surrender? Was it really necessary to hoist the Victory Banner over the Reichstag? Hundreds of Soviet soldiers died capturing the damned building.
It is hard, though, to judge either the victors or the defeated in retrospect. Strategic considerations apparently prevailed at the time. Obliterating Dresden, Western powers threatened Moscow with the potential of their bomber aviation. Stalin, in return, wanted to impress the plotters of Operation Unthinkable with the might of the Red Army, hinting at the fact that the outcome of the war is decided on the ground rather than in the skies or at sea.
Viktor Litovkin: Nevertheless, can we assert that the capture of Berlin stifled the temptation of London and Washington to start World War III?
Valentin Falin: One thing is certain. The battle for Berlin sobered up quite a few warmongers and, therefore, fulfilled its political, psychological and military purpose. Believe me, there were many political and military figures in the West who were stupefied by easy victories in Europe by the spring of 1945. One of them was US General George Patton. He demanded hysterically to continue the advance of American troops from the Elbe, through Poland and Ukraine, to Stalingrad inorder to finish the war at the place where Hitler had been defeated. Patton called the Russians "the descendants of Genghis Khan." Churchill, in his turn, was not overly scrupulous about the choice of words in his description of Soviet people. He called the Bolsheviks "barbarians" and "ferocious baboons." In short, the "theory of subhuman races" was obviously not a German monopoly.
Immediately after Roosevelt's death, the priorities of US foreign policy drastically changed. In his last address to the US Congress (March 1945), he warned, "We shall have to take the responsibility for world collaboration, or we shall have to bear the responsibility for another world conflict." Truman was apparently not troubled by the political will of his predecessor. During a meeting in the White House on April 23, he openly announced his course for the near future - Germany's surrender was a matter of days and from then on, the paths of the Soviet Union and the United States split in opposite directions; the balance of interests was the choice of the "softies." The Pax Americana had to become the keystone of US policy.
Truman was close to announce the immediate break of US alliance with Moscow. It could have happened if not for the opposition on the part of the US military. The break-up with the Soviet Union would have meant that the Americans had to fight against Japan on their own and, according to Pentagon estimates, would have had to sacrifice the lives of about 1-2 million "American GIs." In such a manner, the American generals, pursuing their own interests, actually prevented a political catastrophe in April 1945. Not for long, though.
"The offense on Yalta" was conducted indirectly. What followed was a staged performance of Germany's capitulation in Reims. It was, essentially, a separate deal that fitted into the Unthinkable plan. Another sign of the growing split within the Allied ranks after the fall of Berlin was the refusal of Eisenhower and Montgomery to participate in the joint Victory parade in the former capital of the Third Reich. Originally, they were supposed to review the parade together with Zhukov.
Viktor Litovkin: That is why the Victory Parade took place in Moscow?
Valentin Falin: No. The planned Victory parade in Berlin had still taken place, although Marshal Zhukov alone reviewed the parade. It was in July 1945. And the Victory Parade in Moscow, as you know, was held on June 24, 1945.
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Novosti)
Judgments can be reached through comparison, by strictly connecting cause and effect. Violence, except when it is used in self-defense, is evil. An aggression to seize and enslave whole nations is a thousand times more evil.
On June 22, 1941 Hitler started his "real war." This is how he defined the purpose of his campaign against the Soviet Union: To eradicate Jewish Bolshevism, reduce the Slavic population by ten times, seize property in the occupied regions and colonize them.
What price did the Soviet Union pay for the Nazi aggression? The death toll was 27,600,000. The number of people who were wounded or suffered war-related disorders exceeded 30 million. From 7 to 10 million Soviet citizens were forced into slave labor in Germany, where no fewer than a million and a half of them perished. Two thirds of the soldiers and officers taken prisoner by the Germans did not survive the war either.
History has rarely seen a country be given a suspended sentence after an international tribunal has found it guilty of perpetrating a global disaster. In fact, Germany could have lost even less had it not been for a bad joke played on it by Western democracies and their followers in Germany.
In late March 1945 Stalin reiterated the position he first made public on November 6, 1941: "Hitlers come and go, but Germany and the German people remain." At the Potsdam Conference he offered Truman and Churchill the chance to view Germany as a single whole, but the Americans and the British blocked these proposals. However, they refrained from making public their plans to split Germany into three or five different states and formally agreed to regard Germany as a certain economic community.
The French joined the Potsdam agreements with a reservation. They were against preserving German unity, while the British were playing up to De Gaulle on the sly. Truman adopted a wait-and-see attitude, trying to decide in which harbor to cast his anchor, which affected the performance of his Administration officials.
Secretary of State Byrnes reached an understanding with the Soviet leaders on virtually all questions discussed at the talks in December of 1945.
The "illusions" of Byrnes and his soul mates came to an end on January 5, 1946, when Truman summoned him and disavowed his position at the Moscow talks. The president defined the essence of the new line in U.S. policy as follows: no compromise with Moscow; from now on agreements with the USSR would only be justified if they were based on Soviet concessions without limiting U.S. freedom of action.
This day, January 5, 1946, launched the Cold War era, which meant a split of Germany, Europe and the whole world. Atomic diplomacy or, on a broader plane, atomic democracy dominated international affairs for half a century to come.
Moscow did not follow the Washington-dictated rules of co-existence right away. For years, Stalin adhered to his view that a split of Germany did not meet Soviet strategic interests. The task of anti-fascist forces was to complete the bourgeois-democratic revolution of 1848 that had been interrupted by Bismarck and Hitler. The Soviet example was not supposed to be copied.
The USSR proposed to the three powers that free pan-German elections be held on the basis of uniform law in order to form a German government. Moscow suggested holding a referendum in Germany so that the Germans could decide for themselves which social and economic system to choose and what political status their country should acquire. Secretary of State Marshall replied that the U.S. had no reason to trust the democratic will of the Germans.
Moscow repeatedly proposed holding talks with German participation to reach a peaceful settlement in Germany, which would provide for an end to the occupation and withdrawal of all foreign troops from Germany in the shortest time possible. The West rejected all these initiatives.
The moment of truth came in March 1947 when Hoover's report was published. It made it abundantly clear that the U.S. favored a partition of Germany and no longer wanted to implement in the Western sections the decisions that had been adopted by the Potsdam Conference and the Control Council.
Germany and Europe entered a new era. Politics became the continuation of war by other means.
What option did the Soviet Union have in view of this change? Until the summer and fall of 1947 the USSR refrained from efforts to put its proteges in power in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania. It did not press with a purge in the state machinery of Poland and tried to tone down, with the help of friends, the social discontent that was growing in France, Italy and Britain.
But the change in U.S. policy forced Stalin to parry the challenge. Once again he made one exemption as regards Germany. After the formation of the Federal Republic of Germany, reciprocated by the establishment of the German Democratic Republic, the Soviet leader made it clear to Wilhelm Pick that the task of restoring Germany along the lines of the Weimar Republic had not been abandoned.
The West sacrificed liberation for confrontation. This did not happen because the USSR posed a threat. The explanation was both more simple and alarming: a desire to be first among equals.
Why the British and Americans are parasites of the world.
The Anglo-American War of Terror: An Overview
by Michel Chossudovsky
December 21, 2005
GlobalResearch.ca
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Paper presented at the Perdana Global Peace Forum 2005
Putra World Trade Centre, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia,
14-17 December 2005
The debate regarding war and Militarization raises the broad issue of national sovereignty.
I am particularly gratified as an economist to participate in this important event in the Nation’s capital, in Malaysia, a country which at a critical moment in its history, namely at the height of the 1997 Asian crisis, took the courageous stance of confronting the Washington Consensus and the international financial establishment.
Under the helm of Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, carefully designed financial measures were taken to avoid the collapse of the ringgit, thereby foreclosing a scenario of economic dislocation, bankruptcy and impoverishment, as occurred in Thailand, Indonesia and South Korea.
These 1997 measures forcefully confronted the mainstream neoliberal agenda. In retrospect, this was a momentous decision, which will go down in the Nation’s history. It constitutes the basis for an understanding of what is best described as "economic and financial warfare".
Today we have come to understand that war and macro-economic manipulation are intertwined. Militarization supports economic warfare. Conversely, what is referred to euphemistically as "economic reform" supports a military and geopolitical agenda
Introduction
The World is at the crossroads of the most serious crisis in modern history. In the largest display of military might since the Second World War, the United States and its indefectible British ally have embarked upon a military adventure, which threatens the future of humanity.
An understanding of the underlying historical background is crucial. This war agenda is not the product of a distinct neo-conservative project. From the outset of the Cold War Era, there is a consistent thread, a continuum in US military doctrine, from the "Truman doctrine" to Bush's "war on terrorism".
Foreign Policy adviser George F. Kennan had outlined in a 1948 State Department brief what was later described as the "'Truman doctrine."
What this 1948 document conveys is continuity in US foreign policy, from "Containment" to "Pre-emptive" War. In this regard, the Neo-conservative agenda under the Bush administration should be viewed as the culmination of a post World War II foreign policy framework. The latter has been marked by a succession of US sponsored wars and military interventions in all major regions of the World. From Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan, to the CIA sponsored military coups in Latin America and Southeast Asia, the objective has been to ensure US military hegemony and global economic domination, as initially formulated under the "Truman Doctrine" at the outset of the Cold War.
Despite significant policy differences, successive Democratic and Republican administrations, from Harry Truman to George W. Bush have carried out this global military agenda.
Moreover, Kennan's writings pointed to the formation of an Anglo-American alliance, which currently characterizes the close relationship between Washington and London. This alliance responds to powerful economic interests in the oil industry, defense and international banking. It is, in many regards, an Anglo-American extension of the British Empire, which was officially disbanded in the wake of the Second World War.
The Truman doctrine also points to the inclusion of Canada in the Anglo-American military axis. Moreover, Kennan had also underscored the importance of preventing the development of a continental European power that could compete with the US.
With regard to Asia, including China and India, Kennan hinted to the importance of articulating a military solution:
"The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better"
Weakening the United Nations
From the outset of the Cold War, the objective was to undermine and ultimately destroy the Soviet Union. Washington was also intent upon weakening the United Nations as a genuine international body, an objective that has largely been achieved under the Bush administration:
The initial build-up of the UN in U.S. public opinion was so tremendous that it is possibly true, as is frequently alleged, that we have no choice but to make it the cornerstone of our policy in this post-hostilities period. Occasionally, it has served a useful purpose. But by and large it has created more problems than it has solved, and has led to a considerable dispersal of our diplomatic effort. And in our efforts to use the UN majority for major political purposes we are playing with a dangerous weapon which may some day turn against us. This is a situation, which warrants most careful study and foresight on our part. (Kennan 1948)
The Post Cold War
The wars in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq are part of the same "military road-map". Confirmed by military documents, the US war agenda not only targets Iran, Syria and North Korea, but also its former Cold War enemies: Russia and China.
We are dealing with a global military agenda characterized by various forms of intervention. The latter include covert military and intelligence operations in support of domestic paramilitary groups and so-called liberation armies. These operations are largely devised with a view to creating social, ethnic and political divisions within national societies, ultimately contributing to the destruction of entire countries, as occurred in Yugoslavia.
Meanwhile, the US sponsored "democratization" agenda consists in intervening in countries’ internal affairs, often with a view to destabilizing national governments and imposing sweeping "free market" reforms. In this regard, the illegal invasion of Haiti following a US sponsored military coup, which was also supported by Canada and France, is an integral part of Washington’s global military agenda.
War and Globalization
War and globalization are intimately related processes. Military and intelligence operations support the opening up of new economic frontiers and the remolding of national economies. The powers of Wall Street, the Anglo-American oil giants and the U.S.-U.K. defense contractors are indelibly behind this process.
Ultimately, the purpose of America’s "War on Terrorism" is to transform sovereign nations into open territories (or "free trade areas"), both through "military means", as well as through the imposition of deadly macro-economic reforms. The latter, implemented under IMF-World Bank-WTO auspices often serve to undermine and destroy national economies, precipitating millions of people into abject poverty. In turn, so-called "reconstruction programs" imposed by donors and creditors in the wake of the war contribute to a spiraling external debt.
In a twisted logic, "war reparations" financed by external debt are being paid to the US invader. Billions of dollars are channeled to Western construction conglomerates such as Bechtel and Halliburton, both of which have close links to the US Department of Defense.
Iran and Syria: Next Phase of the War
Confirmed in national security documents, a central objective of this war is the conquest and confiscation of Middle East oil wealth. In this regard, the broader Middle East – Central Asian region encompasses some 70 percent of the World’s oil and gas resources, more than thirty times those of the US.
The Anglo-American oil giants in alliance with Wall Street and the military-industrial complex are indelibly behind America’s war agenda.
The next phase of this war is Iran and Syria, which have already been identified as targets.
Iran is the country with the third largest oil and gas reserves (10%) after Saudi Arabia (25%) and Iraq (11%). The US is seeking with the complicity of the UN Security Council to establish a pretext for the bombing of Iran, which is presented as a threat to world peace.
Israel is slated to play a key role in launching the military operation against Iran.
This operation is in a state of readiness. Were it to occur, the war would extend to the entire Middle Eastern region and beyond. At the same token, Israel would become an official member of the Anglo-American military axis.
In early 2005, several high profile military exercises were conducted in the Eastern Mediterranean, involving military deployments and the testing of weapons systems. Military planning meetings were held between the US, Israel and Turkey. There has been a shuttle of military and government officials between Washington, Tel Aviv and Ankara.
Intense diplomatic exchanges have been carried out at the international level with a view to securing areas of military cooperation and/or support for a US-Israeli led military operation directed against Iran. The UN Security Council resolution regarding Iran’s nuclear program provides a pretext, which the US plans to use to justify military intervention.
Of significance is a November 2004 military cooperation agreement between NATO and Israel. A few months later, Israel was involved for the first time in military exercises with NATO, which also included several Arab countries.
A massive buildup in military hardware has occurred in preparation for a possible attack on Iran. Israel has taken delivery from the US of some 5,000 "smart air launched weapons" including some 500 BLU 109 'bunker-buster bombs.
Nuclear Weapons in Conventional War Theaters: "Safe for Civilians"
An attack on Iran using tactical nuclear weapons (mini-nukes) has also been contemplated. Tactical nuclear weapons with an explosive capacity between one third to 6 times a Hiroshima bomb have been cleared for use in conventional war theaters. .
The mini-nukes have been redefined as a defensive weapon, which is "safe for civilians" "because the explosion is underground". The Senate in a December 2003 decision, has authorized their use in conventional war theaters
Air strikes against Iran could contribute to extending the war to the broader Middle East Central Asian region. Tehran has confirmed that it would retaliate if attacked, in the form of ballistic missile strikes directed against Israel (CNN, 8 Feb 2005). These attacks could also target US military facilities in the Persian Gulf, which would immediately lead us into a scenario of military escalation and all out war.
In recent developments, Israel’s armed forces have been ordered by Prime minister Ariel Sharon, "to be ready by the end of March [2006] for possible strikes" on Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities (The Sunday Times, 11 December 2005).
Meanwhile, Iran is building its air defense capabilities. Russia has recently announced that it plans to sell to Iran some 29 Tor M-1 anti-missile systems.
The planned attack on Iran should also be understood in relation to the timely withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, which has opened up a new space, for the deployment of Israeli forces. The participation of Turkey in the US-UK-Israeli military operation is also a factor, following an agreement reached between Ankara and Tel Aviv.
Global Military Agenda
The war in the Middle East is part of a carefully defined military agenda. Formulated in September 2000, a few months before the accession of George W. Bush to the White House, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) published its blueprint for global domination under the title: "Rebuilding America's Defenses."
The PNAC is a neo-conservative think tank linked to the Defense-Intelligence establishment, the Republican Party and the powerful Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) which plays a behind-the-scenes role in the formulation of US foreign policy.
The PNAC's declared objectives are:
defend the American homeland;
fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars;
perform the "constabulary" duties associated with shaping the security environment in critical regions;
transform U.S. forces to exploit the "revolution in military affairs;"
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who now heads the World Bank, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, had commissioned the PNAC blueprint prior to the 2000 presidential elections.
The PNAC outlines a roadmap of conquest. It calls for "the direct imposition of U.S. "forward bases" throughout Central Asia and the Middle East "with a view to ensuring economic domination of the world, while strangling any potential "rival" or any viable alternative to America's vision of a 'free market' economy" (See Chris Floyd, Bush's Crusade for Empire, Global Outlook, No. 6, 2003)
Distinct from theater wars, the so-called "constabulary functions" imply a form of global military policing using various instruments of military intervention including punitive bombings, covert intelligence operations and the sending in of US Special Forces, etc.
New Weapons Systems
The PNAC’s "revolution in military affairs" (meaning the development of new weapons systems) consists of the "Strategic Defense Initiative", the concurrent weaponization of space and the development of a new generation of nuclear weapons:
"While it has long been a U.S. policy to use nuclear weapons in order to respond to a nuclear attack… the new policy allows the U.S. to use nuclear weapons against states that do not have nuclear weapons and for a host of new reasons, including rapid termination of a conflict on U.S. terms or to ensure success of the U.S. forces."
(statement of Jorge Hirsh, see Global Research,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=MCD20051101&articleId=1173
The National Defense Strategy
Since 2000, the basic premises of the PNAC have been reasserted in a number of national security documents. In March 2005, The Pentagon released its National Defense Strategy document. While the latter follows in the footsteps of the administration's "preemptive" war doctrine as detailed by the Project of the New American Century (PNAC), it goes much further in setting the contours of Washington's global military agenda.
It calls for a more "proactive" approach to warfare, beyond the weaker notion of "preemptive" and defensive actions, where military operations are launched against a "declared enemy" with a view to "preserving the peace" and "defending America".
The document explicitly acknowledges America's global military mandate, beyond regional war theaters. This mandate also includes military operations directed against countries, which are not hostile to America, but which are considered strategic from the point of view of US interests. Whereas the preemptive war doctrine envisages military action as a means of "self defense" against countries categorized as "hostile" to the US, the new Pentagon doctrine envisages the possibility of military intervention against countries, which do not visibly constitute a threat to the security of the American homeland.
The document outlines "four major threats to the United States":
- "Traditional challenges" are posed by well known and recognized military powers using "well-understood' forms of war."
- "Irregular threats" come from forces using so-called "unconventional' methods to counter stronger power."
- "The catastrophic challenge" pertains to the "use of weapons of mass destruction by an enemy."
"Disruptive challenges" pertains to "potential adversaries utilizing new technologies to counter U.S. advantages."
(See Michel Chossudovsky, From "Rogue States" to "Unstable Nations": America's New National Security Doctrine,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO504A.html)
Mammoth Defense Budget
This military blueprint outlines the contours of a project of global military hegemony. It is predicated on a massive increase in defense spending. The underlying objective consists in overshadowing, in terms of defense outlays, any other nation on earth including America's European allies.
The United States military this year [2005] will be larger than the next 25 countries put together.... So, you know, essentially if spending patterns hold, which is to say European defense spending is declining, American is rising, in about five years, the United States will be spending more money than the rest of the world put together on defense." (Council on Foreign Relations, Annual Corporate conference, 10 March 2005).
The defense budget estimated at 401.7 billion dollars (FY 2005) does not include the "emergency supplemental defense budget" earmarked for ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Neither is the DoD participation's in the "war on terrorism" included in the defense budget. (See http://64.177.207.201/static/budget/annual/fy05/) Nor does it include another 40 billion dollars allocated to America's intelligence apparatus, headed by John Negroponte. Approximately 80 percent of the intelligence budget, including America's system of spy satellite's, directly supports US military initiatives.
Extensive War Crimes
The economic and strategic objectives behind this war are rarely mentioned. This military project is presented to public opinion as part of the "global war on terrorism" in which Al Qaeda is unequivocally upheld, as the aggressor. The crimes of war including the torture of civilians are casually presented as "collateral damage".
In this regard, the military occupation of Iraq has resulted in the deaths of more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians (according to the Lancet, John Hopkins School of Public health study).
The routine application of torture, the setting up of numerous concentration camps is now fully documented, not to mention the kidnapping of civilians including children, who are dispatched to the Guantanamo concentration camp in Cuba.
Killing the messenger: US forces have also targeted and killing of independent journalists in Iraq, who do not report the lies and fabrications of the Anglo-American military axis.
While the international community focuses on Iran and North Korea’s nuclear program, the evidence suggests that the US led military coalition is routinely using prohibited weapons. It also plans to use nuclear weapons in the next phase of this war.
Napalm and white phosphorous bombs have been used in Iraq against civilians in densely populated urban areas. The Western media (specifically the BBC) has attempted to camouflage the use of these weapons systems.
Torture
Torture is an official US government policy. The orders to torture POWs in Iraq and Guantanamo emanated from the highest levels of the Bush Administration. Prison guards, interrogators in the US military and the CIA were responding to precise guidelines.
The US President had directly authorized the use of torture including "sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc."
(See ACLU at http://globalresearch.ca/articles/ACL412A.html ).
The secret CIA torture chambers and detention centers set up in a number of countries including the European Union are consistent with the Pentagon’s guidelines on the use of torture.
While torture is now accepted by the Bush administration, the controversy in the US pertains not to torture per se but to whether the information obtained from suspected terrorists through the application of torture can be used in a court of law to indict an alleged "terrorist".
The Criminalization of Justice
Despite the public outrage, the tendency is towards acquiescence and acceptance of the US torture agenda. The legitimacy of the war criminals in high office, who formally ordered these crimes is not questioned. "Legal opinions" drafted on the behest of war criminals are being used to "legalize" torture and redefine Justice.
War criminals legitimately occupy positions of authority, which enable them to redefine the contours of the judicial system and the process of law enforcement.
It provides them with a mandate to decide "who are the criminals", when in fact they are the criminals.
In other words, what we are dealing with is the criminalization of the State and its various institutions including the criminalization of Justice.
The truth is twisted and turned upside down. State propaganda builds a consensus within the Executive, the US Congress and the Military. This consensus is then ratified by the Judicial, through a process of outright legal manipulation.
Media disinformation instills within the consciousness of Americans that somehow the use of torture, the existence of concentration camps, extra judicial assassinations of "rogue enemies", all of which are happening, are "under certain circumstances" "acceptable" and perfectly "legal" because the Justice department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), says "it's legit".
The existence of an illusive outside enemy who is threatening the Homeland is the cornerstone of the propaganda campaign. The latter consists in galvanizing US citizens not only in favor of "the war on terrorism", but in support of a social order which upholds the legitimate use of torture, directed against "terrorists", as a justifiable means to preserving human rights, democracy, freedom, etc.
Racism and the Anti-Terrorist Legislation
Meanwhile, a wave of racism and xenophobia directed against Muslims has been unleashed throughout the western world. The arbitrary arrests and detention of Muslims on trumped up charges has become common practice.
"Anti-terrorist" legislation has been adopted in a number of western countries which allows for the arrest and detention without charge of alleged terrorists, including leaders of so-called ‘domestic radical groups" (meaning antiwar activists), who are now categorized as a threat to Homeland Security.
While "expressing concern" regarding human rights violations, the so-called international community has nonetheless accepted the legitimacy of "the war on terrorism". Moreover, in the wake of 9/11, a significant section of the antiwar movement, while condemning the US-led war, continues to uphold the legitimacy of the "war on terrorism".
In turn, the UN has endorsed the "war on terrorism". Under the disguise of peacekeeping, the United Nations, in violation of its own charter and the Nuremberg jurisprudence on war crimes, is collaborating with the US led military coalition.
War Propaganda
The underlying objective of the media disinformation campaign is provide a humanitarian mandate to the US led war, while galvanizing public opinion in support of America's "war on terrorism" agenda. Racism and Xenophobia, including the arbitrary arrest of alleged terrorists, are an integral part war propaganda.
One of the main objectives of war propaganda is to "fabricate an enemy". As anti-war sentiment grows and the political legitimacy the Bush Administration falters, doubts regarding the existence of this illusive "outside enemy" must be dispelled.
Propaganda purports not only to drown the truth but also to "kill the evidence" on how this "outside enemy", namely Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda was fabricated and transformed into "Enemy Number One". The entire National Security doctrine centers on the existence of an "outside enemy" which is threatening the Homeland.
Possessing a "just cause" for waging war is central to the Bush administration's justification for invading and occupying both Afghanistan and Iraq.
The "war on terrorism" and the notion of "preemption" are predicated on the right to "self defense." They define "when it is permissible to wage war": jus ad bellum.
Jus ad bellum also serves to build a consensus within the Armed Forces command structures. It also serves to convince the troops that they are fighting for a "just cause". More generally, the Just War theory in its modern day version is an integral part of war propaganda and media disinformation, applied to gain public support for a war agenda.
In October 2001, when Afghanistan was bombed and later invaded, several "Progressives" largely upheld the Administration's "just cause" military doctrine. The "self-defense" argument was accepted at face value as a legitimate response to 9/11, without examining the fact that the US administration had not only supported the "Islamic terror network", it was also instrumental in the installation of the Taliban government in 1995-96. Moreover, the invasion of Afghanistan had been planned well in advance of September 11, 2001.
In the wake of 9/11, the antiwar movement against the illegal invasion of Afghanistan was isolated. The trade unions, civil society organizations had swallowed the media lies and government propaganda. They had accepted a war of retribution against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Media disinformation prevailed. People were misled as to the nature and objectives underlying the invasion of Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden and the Taliban were identified as the prime suspects of the 9/11 attacks, without a shred of evidence and without addressing the historical relationship between Al Qaeda and the US intelligence apparatus. In this regard, understanding 9/11 is crucial in formulating a consistent antiwar position.
The "war on terrorism" is the cornerstone of the America’s propaganda and media disinformation campaign. In an utterly absurd logic Al Qaeda is presented as an upcoming super-power, capable of waging a nuclear attack against the US.
The "War on Terrorism"
Amply documented, the war on terrorism is a fabrication. Al Qaeda is a US sponsored "intelligence asset". Saudi-born Osama bin Laden is a creation of U.S. foreign policy. He was recruited during the Soviet-Afghan war "ironically under the auspices of the CIA, to fight Soviet invaders." During the Cold War, but also in its aftermath, the CIA — using Pakistan’s Military Intelligence apparatus as a go-between —played a key role in training the Mujahideen.
With the active encouragement of the CIA and Pakistan’s ISI [Inter Services Intelligence], who wanted to turn the Afghan Jihad into a global war waged by all Muslim states against the Soviet Union, some 35,000 Muslim radicals from 40 Islamic countries joined Afghanistan’s fight between 1982 and 1992. Tens of thousands more came to study in Pakistani madrasahs. Eventually more than 100,000 foreign Muslim radicals were directly influenced by the Afghan jihad. (Ahmed Rashid, The Taliban: Exporting Extremism, Foreign Affairs, November-December 1999)
Both the Clinton and Bush administrations have supported the so-called "Militant Islamic Base", including Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda, as part of their military-intelligence agenda. The links between Osama bin Laden and the Clinton administration in Bosnia and Kosovo are well documented by congressional records.
Ironically, the U.S. Administration’s undercover military-intelligence operations in Bosnia were fully documented by the Republican Party. A lengthy Congressional report by the Republican Party Committee (RPC) published in 1997 accused the Clinton administration of having "helped turn Bosnia into a militant Islamic base" leading to the recruitment, through the so-called "Militant Islamic Network", of thousands of Mujahideen from the Muslim world:
The Clinton administration’s ‘hands-on’ involvement with the Islamic network’s arms pipeline included inspections of missiles from Iran by U.S. government officials … the Third World Relief Agency (TWRA), a Sudan-based, phoney humanitarian organization … has been a major link in the arms pipeline to Bosnia. … TWRA is believed to be connected with such fixtures of the Islamic terror network as Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman (the convicted mastermind behind the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing) and Osama bin Laden, a wealthy Saudi émigré believed to bankroll numerous militant groups. (Congressional Press Release, Republican, Party Committee (RPC), U.S. Congress, Clinton-Approved Iranian Arms Transfers Help Turn Bosnia into Militant Islamic Base, Washington DC, 16 January 1997. The original document is on the website of the U.S. Senate Republican Party Committee (Senator Larry Craig), at
http://www.senate.gov/~rpc/releases/1997/iran.htm; emphasis added.
Counter-Terrorism
The CIA has created it own terrorist organizations including "Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia" which is led by Abu Musab Al Zarqawi.
And at the same time, it creates its own terrorist warnings concerning the terrorist organizations, which it has itself created. In turn, it has developed a cohesive multibillion dollar counterterrorism program "to go after" these terrorist organizations.
Counterterrorism and war propaganda are intertwined. The propaganda apparatus feeds disinformation into the news chain. The terror warnings must appear to be "genuine". The objective is to present the terror groups as "enemies of America."
The underlying objective is to galvanize public opinion in support of America's war on terrorism" agenda.
The "war on terrorism" requires a humanitarian mandate. The war on terrorism is presented as a "Just War", which is to be fought on moral grounds "to redress a wrong suffered."
To reach its foreign policy objectives, the images of terrorism must remain vivid in the minds of the citizens, who are constantly reminded of the terrorist threat.
The propaganda campaign presents the portraits of the leaders behind the terror network. In other words, at the level of what constitutes an "advertising" campaign, "it gives a face to terror."
Fabricating Intelligence
The propaganda campaign has been supported by an extensive fabrication of intelligence.
Revelations regarding the controversial Downing Street Memorandum and the forged Niger uranium dossier are but the tip of the iceberg.
Known and documented prior to the invasion of Iraq, the substance of Colin Powell’s presentation to the UN Security Council was not only fabricated, it was actually based, in what constitutes a clear case of plagiarism, on a student’s text which had been "lifted" (copy and paste) from the internet:
A close textual analysis of the British Intelligence report quoted by Colin Powell in his [February 5, 2003] UN Address suggests that its UK authors had little access to first-hand intelligence sources and instead based their work on academic papers, which they selectively distorted.
The authors of the dossier are members of Tony Blair's Press Relations Office at Whitehall. Britain's Secret Service (MI6), either was not consulted, or more likely, provided an assessment that did not fit in with the politicians' argument. In essence, spin was being sold off as intelligence.
The bulk of the 19-page document (pp.6-16) had been directly copied without acknowledgement from an article in last [2002] September's Middle East Review of International Affairs entitled "Iraq's Security and Intelligence Network: A Guide and Analysis". The author of the piece is Ibrahim al-Marashi, a postgraduate student at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. He has confirmed to me that his permission was not sought by MI6; in fact, he didn't even know about the British document until I mentioned it to him.
Concluding remarks
The so-called "War on Terrorism" is a lie.
Amply documented, the pretext to wage this war is totally fabricated.
Realities have been turned upside down. Acts of war are heralded as "humanitarian interventions" geared towards restoring ‘democracy’.
Military occupation and the killing of civilians are presented as "peace-keeping operations."
The derogation of civil liberties under the so-called "anti-terrorist legislation" is portrayed as a means to providing "domestic security" and upholding civil liberties.
Meanwhile, the civilian economy is precipitated into crisis; expenditures on health and education are curtailed to finance the military-industrial complex and the police state.
Under the American Empire, millions of people around the world are being driven into abysmal poverty, and countries are transformed into open territories.
U.S. protectorates are installed with the blessing of the so-called "international community." "Interim governments" are formed. Political puppets designated by America’s oil giants are casually endorsed by the United Nations, which increasingly performs the role of a rubber-stamp for the U.S. Administration.
Reversing the tide of war can not be limited to a critique of the US war agenda. Ultimately what is at stake is the legitimacy of the political and military actors and the economic power structures, which ultimately control the formulation, and direction of US foreign policy.
While the Bush administration implements a "war on terrorism", the evidence (including mountains of official documents) amply confirms that successive U.S. administrations have supported, abetted and harbored international terrorism.
This fact, in itself, must be suppressed because if it ever trickles down to the broader public, the legitimacy of the so-called "war on terrorism" collapses "like a deck of cards." And in the process, the legitimacy of the main actors behind this system would be threatened.
How does one effectively break the war and police state agendas? Essentially by refuting the "war on terrorism" which constitutes the very foundations of the US national security doctrine.
A war agenda is not disarmed through antiwar sentiment. One does not reverse the tide by asking President Bush: "please abide by the Geneva Convention" and the Nuremberg Charter. Ultimately a consistent antiwar agenda requires unseating the war criminals in high office as first step towards disarming the institutions and corporate structure of the New World Order.
To break the Inquisition, we must also break its propaganda, its fear and intimidation campaign, which galvanizes public opinion into accepting the "war on terrorism".
Michel Chossudovsky is the author of the international best seller "The Globalization of Poverty " published in eleven languages. He is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Center for Research on Globalization which hosts the critically acclaimed website: www.globalresearch.ca . He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
His most recent book is entitled: America’s "War on Terrorism", Global Research, 2005., http://www.globalresearch.ca/globaloutlook/truth911.html
Appendix A
There is vast body of documentary evidence on the role of al Qaeda, There is growing evidence from a number of recent disclosures that the US sponsored intelligence apparatus is behind the terrorists.
1. Operation Able Danger
Official Pentagon documents reveal that the 9/11 ringleader Mohammed Atta and 3 other hijackers were under close surveillance as part of a secret Pentagon operation more than a year prior to 9/11.
These documents largely refute the official US government narrative as presented by the 9/11 Commission.
For the past four years, we have been told by the administration of George Bush and by the official 9/11 Commission report of Chairman Thomas Kean and Executive Director Philip Zelikow that Egyptian extremist Mohammed Atta was the key player in the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks. Atta, according to the Kean report, was the "tactical leader of the 9/11 plot". He was the pilot who on that dreadful morning flew the first plane, American Airlines 11, into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York. It was Atta’s face, on television and in newspapers across the world, that became the symbol of Islamic terrorism. And it was Atta’s name - not the names of any of the 18 other hijackers allegedly lead by Atta on that day - that was cited by international security researchers. Atta was, as the Kean report stresses, "the tactical commander of the operation in the United States". According to both the Bush administration and the official 9/11 Commission report, he was working on the orders of Osama Bin Laden who, from remote Afghanistan, controlled the entire operation.
Now, almost exactly four years after 9/11, the facts appear to have been turned upside down. We now learn that Atta was also connected to a top secret operation of the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command (SOCOM) in the US. According to Army reserve Lieutenant-Colonel Anthony Shaffer, a top secret Pentagon project code-named Able Danger had identified Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers as members of an al-Qaida cell more than a year before the attacks.
Able Danger was an 18-month highly classified operation tasked, according to Shaffer, with "developing targeting information for al-Qaida on a global scale", and used data-mining techniques to look for "patterns, associations, and linkages". He said he himself had first encountered the names of the four hijackers in mid-2000.
(see Daniele Ganser, Able Danger adds twist to 9/11, 9/11 Ringleader connected to secret Pentagon operation,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20050827&articleId=867
2. The Bali 2002 Bombing: Recent Disclosure
In a recent interview, former president of Indonesia Abdurrahman Wahid admitted that the Indonesian military and police played a complicit role in the 2002 Bali bombing.
(See http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20051014&articleId=1085)
Other reports point to links between Indonesian intelligence (BIN) and the alleged terrorist organization Jemiah Islami (JI).
Asked who he thought planted the second bomb, Mr Wahid said: "Maybe the police ... or the armed forces."
"The orders to do this or that came from within our armed forces, not from the fundamentalist people," he says.
The [Australian SBS's Dateline] program also claims a key figure behind the formation of terror group Jemaah Islamiah was an Indonesian spy.
Former terrorist Umar Abduh, who is now a researcher and writer, told Dateline Indonesian authorities had a hand in many terror groups.
"There is not a single Islamic group either in the movement or the political groups that is not controlled by (Indonesian) intelligence," he said. (see the Australian, 12 October 2005)
3. The Basra September 2005 British Covert Operation
Two British undercover "soldiers" wearing wigs and dressed in Arab clothing, were driving a car loaded with weapons and ammunition, towards the center of Basra.
The two SAS Special Forces agents were arrested by the Iraqi police authorities They were subsequently "rescued" by British forces, in a major military assault on the building where they were being detained:
"British forces used up to 10 tanks " supported by helicopters " to smash through the walls of the jail and free the two British servicemen."
The incident, which resulted in numerous civilian and police casualties, has caused "political embarrassment".
Several media reports and eyewitness accounts suggested that the SAS operatives were disguised as Al Qaeda "terrorists" and were planning to set off the bombs in Basra's central square during a major religious event.
The citizens of Basra witnessed the arrest. Civilians were killed and injured when British forces under the command of Brig Lorimer led the military assault on the prison. Al Jazeera reported the circumstances of the arrest in an interview with Fattah al-Shaykh, member of the Iraqi National Assembly:
If you really want to look for truth, then we should resort to the Iraqi justice away from the British provocations against the sons of Basra, particularly what happened today when the sons of Basra caught two non-Iraqis, who seem to be Britons and were in a car of the Cressida type. It was a booby-trapped car laden with ammunition and was meant to explode in the center of the city of Basra in the popular market. However, the sons of the city of Basra arrested them. They [the two non-Iraqis] then fired at the people there and killed some of them. The two arrested persons are now at the Intelligence Department in Basra, and they were held by the National Guard force, but the British occupation forces are still surrounding this department in an attempt to absolve them of the crime. (Al Jazeera TV 20 Sept 2005).
Nobody in Basra believes that the two arrested SAS men were "working undercover against militants linked to Iran":
"The Iraqi police stopped a car with two foreigners dressed as Arabs, and full of weapons and explosives," he said. "There have been terrorist attacks and explosions in Basra - of course the police wanted to investigate.".... Mr Hakim dismissed as "propaganda" reports that the soldiers were working undercover against militants linked to Iran. Officials in Basra have called for an espionage trial for the two in an Iraqi court. British soldiers' legal immunity "does not apply when they are out of uniform", Mr Hakim said. (Mr. Hakim is a leading official in Iraq's largest Shia Muslim party, quoted in the Financial Times, 29 Sept 2005)
Thwarting the Investigation
In his capacity of Commanding Officer of the Special Investigation Branch of the Royal Military Police in Basra, Captain Ken Masters was responsible for investigating the circumstances of the arrest of two undercover elite SAS men, wearing Arab clothing, by Iraqi police in Basra. The investigation was not completed. Ken Masters died in unusual circumstances three weeks later.
Captain Ken Masters had a mandate to cooperate in his investigations, with the civilian Iraqi authorities. As part of his mandate he was to investigate "into allegations that British soldiers killed or mistreated Iraqi civilians". Specifically in this case, the inquiry pertained to the circumstances of the British assault on the prison on 19 September. The press reports and official statements suggest that the assault on the prison was authorized by the Ministry of Defense.
Was the British military blocking Captain Masters police investigation?
There were apparent disagreements between British military commanding officers and the military police officials dispatched to the war theater in charge of investigating the actions and behavior of military personnel. (The Independent 17 Oct 2005).
Was pressure put to bear on Captain Masters by the Ministry of Defense? According to Michael Keefer, the British Army led by Brig Lorimer was determined
"to remove these men from any danger of interrogation by their own supposed allies in the government the British are propping up—even when their rescue entailed the destruction of an Iraqi prison and the release of a large number of prisoners, gun-battles with Iraqi police and with Al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia, a large popular mobilization against the British occupying force, and a subsequent withdrawal of any cooperation on the part of the regional government—tends, if anything, to support the view that this episode involved something much darker and more serious than a mere flare-up of bad tempers at a check-point."
(See Michael Keefer, Were British Special Forces Soldiers Planting Bombs in Basra? 25 September 2005,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=KEE20050925&articleId=994 )
Selected References
This text is intended to provide an overview of the key issues underlying the US war agenda. Selected references and supporting documentation are indicated below.
A comprehensive archive of articles on different dimensions of the US War is available at the website of the Centre for Research on Globalization at www.globalresearch.ca
Niloufer Bhagwat, The Security Council Resolution on Syria is a pretext for the bombing and occupation of Syria, by, November 2, 2005, GlobalResearch.ca
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=BHA20051102&articleId=1175
Michel Chossudovsky, America’s "War on Terrorism", Second edition, Global Research, 2005, 387 p.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/globaloutlook/truth911.html
Michel Chossudovsky, Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran, May 1, 2005, GlobalResearch.ca,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=%20CH20050501&articleId=66
Michel Chossudovsky, Al Qaeda and the Iraqi Resistance Movement, September 18, 2005, GlobalResearch.ca,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=CHO20050918&articleId=967
CIA Uses German Bases to Transport Terrorists, Deutsche Welle, 27 november 2005
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20051127&articleId=1332
Thomas Eley, Did Big Oil participate in planning invasion of Iraq? December 11, 2005, wsws.org,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=ELE20051211&articleId=1444
Chris Floyd, Sacred Terror: The Global Death Squad of George W. Bush, December 10, 2005,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=FLO20051210&articleId=1434
Max Fuller, Crying Wolf: Media Disinformation and Death Squads in Occupied Iraq, November 10, 2005, GlobalResearch.ca
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=FUL20051110&articleId=1230
Daniele Ganser, Able Danger adds twist to 9/11, 9/11 Ringleader connected to secret Pentagon operation, GlobalResearch.ca, 27 August 2005
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20050827&articleId=867
Seymour Hersh, Where is the Iraq war headed next? December 10, 2005, The New Yorker,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=HER20051210&articleId=1436
Michael Keefer, Were British Special Forces Soldiers Planting Bombs in Basra? Suspicions Strengthened by Earlier Reports, Globalresearch.ca, 25 September 2005
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=KEE20050925&articleId=994 )
Uzi Mahnaimi and Sarah Baxter, Israel Readies Force to Strike on Nuclear Iran, December 11, 2005 , Sunday Times
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=MAH20051211&articleId=1446
Serendepity, Torture and the CIA, December 10, 2005, GlobalResearch.ca.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=SER20051210&articleId=1441
Eric Waddell, The Battle for Oil, December 14, 2004, GlobalResearch.ca,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=WAD20041214&articleId=311
Mike Whitney, Why Iran will lead to World War 3, GlobalResearch.ca, 9 August 2005
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=WHI20050809&articleId=825
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You should erase that long, illicitly copied diatribe from this comment section; it makes this post almost unreadable.
And this must be the first time I've heard someone complain about British illegal immigrants to the United States. Where are they? I've never met them. I've met dozens and dozens of illegal Latin Americans, however.
http://theopinionator.com
OK I HEARD ALL THE CRAP AND BLA BLA BLA BLA, ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS ARE BAD, MEXICANS ARE UGLY AND STINK, BUT EXPLAIN ME ONE DAMN THING, IF WE SOAKING RESOURCES-- soaking up public resources in a manner never intended -- HOW IN THE NAME OF EARTH USA HAS THE LOWEST LEVEL OF UNEMPLOYMENT ON EARTH? HOW?
HOW ON THE NAME OF EARHTH YOU DON'T SAY NOTHING ABOUT THE 900 000 BILLION DOLLARS THAT INMIGRANTAS CONTRIBUTE TO THIS COUNTRY EVERY YEAR???????
HOW IN THE NAME OF EARTH THE SOCAIL SECURITY CARD IS EXTREMELY EASY TO COUNTERFEIT WHEN AMERICANS HATE US SO MUCH, BUT UNDER THE TABLE FACILITATE US THE JOBS SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
STOP, THINK, CHANGE... YOU SHOULD READ MORE ABOUT MAHATMA GANDHI
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