Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
War on Terrorism Over?
Last week, shortly after being inaugurated, President Barack Obama ended the "global war on terror" (GWOT). Or so The Washington Post reported. The new president countermanded the Bush administration's extralegal approaches by mandating the closure of Guantánamo within a year, outlawing the use of torture in interrogations, and putting the CIA out of the secret prisons business. Obama announced that he wanted to "send an unmistakable signal that our actions in defense of liberty will be as just as our cause."
Sounds good. But the Post's declaration might be just as premature as President George W. Bush's infamous "mission accomplished" speech on the USS Lincoln that signaled the "end" of the Iraq War. On the civil liberties front, for instance, the administration retains the right to use renditions, by which the CIA secretly abducted suspects and transferred them to third countries without trial. "I think it's a glaring hole," Vincent Warren of the Center for Constitutional Rights said last week on Democracy Now! "I think that one way that the Obama administration could have dealt a more decisive blow to the illegal Bush policies and even the rendition policy, which originated under Bill Clinton, is to specifically reference this and to say that we are going to disavow this."
Also, the inmates at the Bagram air base in Afghanistan, which holds more prisoners than Gitmo, and the thousands held in Iraq won't get the case-by-case review accorded to their counterparts in Cuba. Non-military agencies like the CIA, after a six-month review, might get "additional or different guidance" on interrogations -- and who knows what that means. And, as Politico points out, the guy in charge of the 30-day review of Gitmo is the same fellow who was in charge for the last two years -- Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. That's not exactly a recipe for reform.
But even if Obama holds to his word on torture, closes Guantánamo within the year, applies the same yardstick to detainees at Bagram and in Iraq, and eliminates the Clinton-era policy on extraordinary rendition, the death of the "global war on terror," as Mark Twain once said of his own prematurely published obituary, is greatly exaggerated. Indeed, on the day after it published GWOT's obituary, The Washington Post reported on two U.S. unilateral air strikes in Pakistan that killed 20 suspected terrorists. Although it observed an uncharacteristic silence over these strikes, the Pakistani government has previously expressed outrage at these violations of its sovereignty.
Then there's Afghanistan, which will be the new epicenter of U.S. counterterrorism strategy. Here's the relevant excerpt from the official White House statement on foreign policy: "Obama and Biden will refocus American resources on the greatest threat to our security -- the resurgence of al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan. They will increase our troop levels in Afghanistan, press our allies in NATO to do the same, and dedicate more resources to revitalize Afghanistan's economic development." Why does Obama believe that he can escape the same outcome in Afghanistan that Bush faced in Iraq? As former Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern argued in a recent appeal for a five-year "time-out" on war, "In 2003, the Bush administration ordered an invasion of Iraq, supposedly to reduce terrorism. But six years later, there is more terrorism and civil strife in Iraq, not less. The same outcome may occur in Afghanistan if we make it the next American military conflict."
So, is this a kinder, gentler GWOT? Certainly the new Obama administration is more concerned about observing international law. It's more prudent in its willingness to use diplomacy over force. But so far at least, the new president still treats terrorism as a war to be won rather than an endemic problem to be dealt with patiently and largely by law enforcement agencies. We're still at war in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and for the time being in Iraq. We're still selling arms to Indonesia, Israel, and Colombia as part of an overall counterterrorism approach. The Pentagon's new Africa Command (AFRICOM) still looks at counter-terrorism through a military lens.
Sounds to me like we haven't seen the last of GWOT quite yet.
- Posted in
39 Comments so far
Show All"Afghanistan must become "the central front" in the war on terror, Barack Obama said" (July '08)
The US military awards a 'Global War on Terrorism Service Medal'.
The 4th fleet has been re-established in the Caribbean. "The head of the US Southern Command, Adm James Stavridis, told Congress in March ('08) that he supported plans for a fleet to back counter-terrorism operations".
"The U.S. military expects to have 20,000 uniformed troops inside the United States by 2011 trained to help state and local officials respond to a nuclear terrorist attack..."
Last year's attack into Syria was aimed at 'foreign fighters linked to al-Qaeda'.
Missile attacks into Pakistan are aimed at 'top Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders'.
Air strikes into Somalia were aimed at nebulous groups such as 'Islamic extremists linked to al-Qaeda'.
-- This war is expanding, not disappearing. It is a global war with victory conditions that cannot be achieved. It is a never-ending conflict whose insanity is never discussed, except by me.
Let's once again review how we got here --
After 9/11, Congress enacted Public Law 107-40, authorizing the President to use military force against those responsible for 9/11 (enemies to be named later).
Bush announced "our war on terror begins with al-Qaeda". He also said that the Taliban would be treated the same way.
The goal of this military effort is 'preventing future terrorism' by these groups, which nobody has ever defined or explained how to achieve.
America is stuck, stuck, stuck in this insane and unwinnable war that the government and military are waging and the people ignoring as best they can.
Sorry to all those who have read these words repeatedly. As soon as this war ends I will find something else to say. I don't expect that to be soon, though.
Al Qaeda and bush are making love in my toilet bowl and I keep bombarding them ( sorry couldn't resist).
What we have witnessed before and since 9/11 is a War of Terror, as there was never any terrorism to start with; rather, there was a legitimate counterattack made on US Imperial interests. The so-called GWOT is no more than the GWOC (Global War On Communism) that came before and needed a replacement.
Until writers start examining the US Empire and admit that it's brutal and illegal actions generate legitimate counteractions, we will never come anywhere close to solving the core nature of our current dilemma.
The Empire MUST DIE to save the republic.
This article is completely idiotic. First, you cannot have a war on terror. Somebody please tell this author that WAR CREATES TERROR and afterwards, once you start a war, you have already lost the war on terror. Besides, the author never deals with the fact that even more than Israel/Palestine, the biggest casualties of terrorism have been in Afghanistan, India, and even within Pakistan these last few decades alone.
The execrable legislation that Congress passed in 2001 was labeled 'AUMF' (Authorization to Use Military Force). Not a very good name, but the enemy hadn't even been identified yet.
A more descriptive title would be 'War against the supporters of the attackers of 9/11'.
Another possible name would be 'War against al-Qaeda and the Taliban'.
'War on Terror' is the re-packaged title given by Bushco in order to make it both more palatable for American consumerism and less descriptive (to hide it more effectively from the American public - which is working brilliantly, as even progressives cannot agree on what to call this insanity).
The US government is fighting a 'War on Terror'. The US military is waging a 'War on Terror', with al-Qaeda and the Taliban as our enemies. These are the words they use.
How do we expect to end this madness if we don't even speak the same language?
That's what I hate about it all. I'm not so sure that speaking their language does anything other than drag us into their troubles. As for Congress, the leadership was corrupt but then so too were the rank-and-file for letting them have it and the phoney bailouts just last year prove what a fraud Congress has become.
Darlin', I'm sure the author of this article knows that a "war on terror" is a specious term. It's being used to stand for the conglomerate of violent acts and assumptions of power that the past administration committed in its name.
We are the terroist - Terrorism is "the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion
I hate to tell all those smart folks this, but someone has to.
Borat, of all people, real or fictitious, got it right when he told those flag waving rodeo fans he supported Bush's "War of Terror".
http://davedubya.com
There will always be a boogieman, invented or fabricated, to assure the flow of money and power upward. Right now, the US is engaged in Obama's war against the women & children of South Asia. Peace is just not an option for any US president. Makes him look timid, don't you know?
Hopefully, since the Empire is about to run out of money, the problem will soon solve itself.
The GWOT is over and Osama Bin Laden has won. His stated goal was the bankruptcy of the United States. He succeeded. We should just accept defeat and go home.
The Patriot allows the US Gov. to label anybody an "enemy combatant" and take away their right to habeas corpus. Eliminating the Patriot Act will be the first step in ending the war on terrorism that the neocons hope will be an eternal war with an eternal revenue stream for the military industrial media complex.
One good way to answer the question in or of the title of the article is the following article, which is a speech, paraphrased, at Cambridge U. and by Craig Murray, former UK ambassador to Uzebekistan and a man who apparently or evidently learned much while serving there, as well as since.
"America's War in Central Asia
Speech to Students Occupying Cambridge University Law Faculty"
by Craig Murray, Jan 28 2009
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=12057
"War on Terrorism Over?", the title of the piece by John Feffer reads. The answer? LIKELY NOT over. The people and corporations behind the WoT, from making it happen to keeping it going ever since, surely aren't ready to relent and they're powerful people with many high-level connections, ruthless as hell, etcetera. And Obama has made it clear that he's not ready to give up the WoT, having instead said he'll be escalating it in Afghanistan and having threatened to really take this over into Pakistan. The strike there with a U.S. drone plane over the past week happened on his watch and I've read that he also authorised this.
LIKELY NOT, and we can certainly understand that we should not count on it, the WoT, being over. The above article on Craig Murray's speech explains enough; it's short enough, so it is not extensive in details, but says enough to answer the question, "War on Terrorism Over?".
So what's the solution?
Not fight terrorism?
The real solution to all our problems is a thinking electorate, one that emerses themselves in the issues and seeks honest and rational answers. Every citizen that professes a love for her nation is obligated by that professed love to think long and hard on issues and to avoid simply jumping on a bandwagon or blindly following leaders.
The solution to terrorism is to understand its nature and its goals, its real goals and not those handed to you by the Bush/Cheney folks who used the fear of terrorism to usurp power to which they were not entitled. The word itself is pretty silly actually, and the so-called war on terror is like the war on drugs or the war on anything else, just plain dumb.
Each group that resorts to violence to gain its aims was brought to such means by forces that are readily available to ones research, should one take the time to actually do research of course. Mr. Hope, the truth is out there and should you continue to seek answers from others you will never truly learn anything.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so. Bertrand Russell
Whoah, whoah, whoah, let me get this straight, you support the attacks of 911?!?
They were a "legitimate counterattack made on US Imperial interests"?
Are you insane?
3000 dead people are not "Imperial interests" they are human beings.
You are sick. Get help.
I thought you agreed with Karloff's statement that the attacks were "legitimate".
Do you?
Joehope, start thinking for yourself, and maybe you won't have to ask all these silly questions. Or else, stick around and maybe you'll learn a thing or two, providing you're willing to question your basic assumptions.
Here are some questions for you:
What do you think would happen if instead of spending trillions of dollars on the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and "fighting terrorism" all over the world, the United States used the money to provide foreign aid?
Do you think that there is a chance that 9/11 might have been "pre-empted" if we had "killed them with kindness", and provided desperately poor people with food instead of weapons, when they were hungry?
How come terrorists never attack countries like Norway, Sweden, or Switzerland, to name a few?
Ponder that for a while.
"Do you think that there is a chance that 9/11 might have been "pre-empted" if we had "killed them with kindness", and provided desperately poor people with food instead of weapons, when they were hungry?"
No. The reasons you give had nothing to do with why we were attacked. Bin Laden attacked us for our decadence, our support for Israel, the Iraq sanctions, and our support for Saudi Arabia.
"How come terrorists never attack countries like Norway, Sweden, or Switzerland, to name a few?"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_Sweden
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/19/AR2006071901795.html
http://islamineurope.blogspot.com/2008/03/norway-first-terrorism-trial-opens.html
Joe, these links do not address the question asked of you, did you read them?
The question was ,"why are certain nations not attacked" and you post articles referring to arrests done at the behest of Great Britain and Spain, and the last to an arrest of a criminal gang leader who had committed no act of terrorism nor plotted one as far as is known.
This seems a bit silly, Joe, and the question remains unanswered still.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so. Bertrand Russell
For everyone not Joe Hope:
Once again the outcome of factual refutation of his rather simplistic politics results in his absence from the field. It is very common for Joe to post stuff and , once common sense and linking refutes his contentions, for him to do his vanishing act only to show up elsewhere spouting the same trite and empty rhetoric...
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
collateral damage
dual-use targets
Consider this, written just after 9/11:
"Many people believed at the time that the trauma of 9/11 would change the world. My feeling was that our American response would be far more crucial. The President, after all, did not have to declare war. He could have called the terrorists mass murderers, their deeds crimes against humanity. He could have said to the American people and the world,
"'We will respond, but not in kind. We will not seek to avenge the death of innocent Americans by the death of innocent victims elsewhere, lest we become what we abhor. We refuse to ratchet up the cycle of violence that brings only ever more death, destruction and deprivation.
“'What we will do is build coalitions with other nations. We will share intelligence, freeze assets and engage in forceful extraditions of terrorists if internationally sanctioned. I promise to do all in my power to see justice done, but by the force of law only, never by the law of force.'
"It was a ripe moment--to educate the soul of the nation, to improve the quality of our suffering. We had lost our sense of invulnerability and superpower invincibility, but as these were only illusions, we should not have grieved their passing. Other nations too had been unfairly hurt, many of them, and far worse than we. But instead of deepening our kinship with the world's suffering, the President chose to invoke an almost unlimited sense of entitlement to pursue in our own way what he termed a struggle "to rid the world of evil."
"As a result we squandered the widely felt sympathy that was ours on 9/11, symbolized by the headline in Le Monde the following day: Nous sommes tous Américains. We also squandered the near-record budget surplus that could have helped victims abroad as well as the homeless and hungry in the United States, where poverty is a tragedy that great wealth makes a sin. Finally, ironically and predictably, the Bush doctrine of unilateralism and preventive war has recruited more terrorists than it has cowed. Clearly the past two years have been morally and politically disastrous."
Clips from
“Despair Is Not an Option”
The Nation, 1/12/04 issue, William Sloane Coffin
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1226-08.htm
===
Coffin, in case you don’t recognize his name, was one of the great religious leaders who stood with Martin Luther King in opposition to that other unspeakable horror - Viet Nam.
You apparently feel that war is a legitimate part of foreign relations. A lot of us think this viewpoint is quite simply insanely wrong [self-defense excepted] and in all recent instances here in the U.S., unconstitutional - not to mention immoral.
I am a retired Air Force officer from the Southwest Pacific in WWII and from Rome ARDC in the Korean War. I am a member of Veterans for Peace; our organization’s purposes include: abolition ‘... of war as an instrument of national policy.” A brother organization, Iraq Veterans Against War, stands with us.
Coffin spoke for us.
We will not seek to avenge the death of innocent Americans by the death of innocent victims elsewhere, lest we become what we abhor. We refuse to ratchet up the cycle of violence that brings only ever more death, destruction and deprivation. ... to act by the force of law only, never by the law of force.'
Fusion
Here's how you win the "War on Terrorism".
Close all our military bases around the world.
Cut our defense budget in half immediately.
Shut down the IMF and World Bank.
Clamp down on corporations that try to con, trick or steal the wealth of poor defenseless nations.
Build a few hospitals, libraries and infrastructure projects around the world.
--------------
That's it. Terror attacks on American soil would become as rare as asteroid strikes.
When Biden cracked BHO would be tested his first year, he projected another attack on American soil by Terrorists. And by the same crew too. Those cool dudes who brought us 9-11.
Nothing Succeeds Like Success. Of course they will go back to the well. But this time vicious freedom hating Iranians will be best.
Take-Two coming to a City or two Soon.
azjoe.
Ah, say it ain't so azjoe.
Cassandra (5:31)is on to something. OBL is a winner in the GWOT. So were Bush/Cheney. One could say the Bush/bin-Laden axis of evil were the winners.
They got everything they wanted from it.
OBL proudly watches the empire crumble.
The Bush Cartel won Re-election, expanded power, and billions of our tax dollars to their KBR cronies and Blackwater mercenaries.
If one side were to be declared the winner of the war of terror, I guess you'd have to say Bush won. He killed waaay more people than Osama ever could.
War is never over unless we want it. Instead, we have allowed the worst authoritarians among us to wage their endless (or at least until we're bankrupt) war for profit.
http://davedubya.com
Stop the “War on Terror” Now:
(1)
By:Farhat Maquami
You cannot hope for change and a desire for Peace with the murderous mind frame of Bush.
Change cannot be realized with terror. Lets be clear you cannot terrorize the world to achieve peace. We have to declare to the world that we are using a new perspective, new vision and new paradigm! Regardless of our illusion of self-rightfulness, the world has branded us a mad terrorist, who has employed the “ war on terror” as an smoke screen to justify its lies, its brutal torture, its violation of human rights to terrorize the world.
PARADIGM SHIFT
We have to start admitting that one and a half billion Muslims in the world were not responsible
for any act of terror on us. Therefore, Obama must declare unequivocally that the Crusade against Peace loving Muslims under the Banner of “War on terror” has ended. If he ever wants to reverse the economic downturn this is the magic word.. The effect of this Executive Order or even simple declaration in a speech would be much stronger on the American Psyche than any misguided economic stimulus which is taking us nowhere.
He should declare to the world that Bush’s War on Terror is over and from now on we would pursue a “Mission for Peace and Prosperity” with all peace loving nations.
He should declare that he would get out of Iraq; but as we have no business of staying in Afghanistan. We are not a colonial and we do not have resources to wage a war simply because we want to have military readiness. Let everybody know that our Paradigm has shifted and our prosperity depends in the world acceptance of our rehabilitation.
He has to declare that change cannot materialize if we keep the conceptual framework inherited from a hate mongering administration who alienated the whole world, we cannot march toward a peaceful future. The false concept of “War on terror” has been internalized by many Americans that they cannot accept any idea of peace unless the most powerful man in the world declare the war is over and we have to think Peace! Bush’s propaganda machine governs by scaring people, scaring people from riding bus, taking a train, smallpox, flying plane, going to courts, walking to federal offices, scaring from making phone calls or surf the internet. Psychologically scared people obey authority and succumb to its omnipotent rein of terror who rules them by scaring them into the total submission.
Why the misnomer “War on Terror” should be over? War on terror not only actually terrorized the world, Muslim World in particular; but also forced us to internalized the concept in every day life. We see the world through the dark glasses that Bush, Cheney, and all who wrote “The Project for New American Century “ for us way before 911 and declared that we need an “accident like Pearl Harbor” to make American follow their scheme.
Obama simply can not accomplish change unless make his declaration of Independence from Bush’s war on terror. If he does not declare the end of the War on Terror, there would be millions who follow the hate mongers like Sean Hannity, Glen Back, Rush Limbogh and the host of talk radio and Fox news who would use this out dated concept to derail any and all his policies.
How to stop Bush's “War on Terror”?
(2)
by:FARHAT MAQUAMI
We have to declare to the world that we are sorry that the previous administration lied to the public to advance its agenda of Invading Iraq. Collin Powel lied blatantly to the United Nation about weapons of mass destruction. More than four thousands Americans have lost their lives in addition to more than 30 thousands seriously injured all for a lie. We are still in Afghanistan killing Resistance Front and naming them Taliban. Nobody has ever asked what these guys ever did to us. So far as the world knows there were never an Afghans on the 911 list of supposed Muslim on the planes! Why are we in Afghanistan ? Why are we killing Pakistanis, they never attacked the American soil. But, we do it under the Bush’s Flag of the “War on Terror”.
War on Terror Hoax!
War on Terror is an abstract concept, it is not a nation that we are at war; but we are fighting a fabricated concept that is why Obama must end it now otherwise we would be chasing the shadow that we created and indoctrinate our children to believe in, for ever. We must tear down this misguided conceptual framework of “ War on terror” if we want peace and prosperity for ourselves and the world. You must ask yourself The answer seems to be no for an increasing number in the West who are weary over Afghanistan and Iraq or complacent from the absence of a major attack on the scale of 9/11.
The British Foreign Office has scrapped the phrase "war on terror" as inexact, inflammatory and counterproductive. U.S. Central Command has just dropped the term "long war" to describe the fight against radical Islam. Zbigneiw Brezizinsky , has called it a false idea. In reality the whole thing is a “make-believe” world that Bush administration fabricated so the public accept his plan invasion of Iraq! No one has ever confessed, or systematically related to the 911 after five years are torture we still do not know what happened in 911, who plan it how it was financed, where and how these men communicated and finally how they executed it! Just like the normal crime investigation who planned it and who was the beneficiary of the crime! For all we know the beneficiary of the crime were the owner of World trade center, who pulled down the building number 7, Israeli Security and X-Ray machine industries, the US Military and Cheney’s Halli- burton, Carlyle, Black Cat , every body else was a loser.
The Crime of the Century remain the least investigated crime in history which except the fabricated utterances of Bush administration we have no evidence, no confession, no claim and no conviction on the real criminals who conspired and executed such a well organized special Ops plan.
The People who are being held in Gitmo, are still being held without charges that can withstand even a military defense attorney‘s cross-examination. All those who tortured the hostages in Gitmo must now face the full force of international law for crime against humanity. As Obama declared we don’t torture and consequently his justice department must prosecute the criminals who ordered torture.
Prosecuting the torturers would clean our souls from crime against humanity ‘ would restore our international stature and would declare the end of War on Terror. It is by facing this realization that we finally leave the rein of terror alone and start a new era of peace and prosperity.
An influential book making the rounds - "Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them" - argues that the threat from al-Qaida is vastly exaggerated.
How many Plane Al Quaeda has hijacked? none. How many time its agents were caught boarding planes?, None! How many times, they have attacked us in the US? None!
How many Islamic charities that we banned did actually worked for Al Queada? None!
How many times we caught anyone in our Courtrooms entrances by X-Ray ? None!
Nobody has come to our soil and attacked us recently! If we research the internet we find thousands of well researched hypothesis that outsider attacked our soil before. It all happened in the criminal mind of those who wanted to scare us and the world by acts of terror.
Then, instead of waging “War on Terror” we should prosecute any and all persons who violated the law and forced us to believe that torture is right, Pre-emptive strike is correct and lying to invade Iraq was juts fine! These are the criminals who have destroyed our economy by an illegal war and brought shame to America, not Muslims who loved us and Islam that is a religion of peace.
One simple declaration would be a giant step toward the return of sanity to the world!
"joehope January 29th, 2009 2:03 am
"Do you think that there is a chance that 9/11 might have been "pre-empted" if we had "killed them with kindness", and provided desperately poor people with food instead of weapons, when they were hungry?"
No. The reasons you give had nothing to do with why we were attacked. Bin Laden attacked us for our decadence, our support for Israel, the Iraq sanctions, and our support for Saudi Arabia."
SURE, and like he supposedly attacked the U.S. because the Islamic radicals hate the U.S. and its population due to the freedom in the U.S., purportedly found in the U.S., that is.
There is NO proof that Usama Bin Ladin attacked the U.S., that is, had responsibility in this, and while he did reverse his initial statement in this regard, the first being early following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, while the second, the reversal, was in either Nov. or Dec. 2001, I believe; well, he first denied responsibility. Counterterrorism experts I read about on this denial from UBL said that this would be very, very unusual of a terrorist organisation, for real ones claim responsibility for their acts in order to make sure that the world understands that the underlying grievances are being ignored, disrespected, so the related injustices continue, instead of being stopped. Iow, the real terrorism is for the purpose of getting grievances or issues resolved and to send a strong signal that if they're not resolved, then the group committing the terrorism will continue to commit violent acts, until finally achieving their objective or a just settlement.
In any case, it's more likely that the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were far more of the needed "New Pearl Harbor" that one or more U.S. govt officials, perhaps Zbigniew Brzezinski, among (maybe) others, not recalling precisely which ones; well, the NPH they said would be needed in order for the U.S. govt to drive up enough national support for war to be able to command the country's forces into war without causing too much friction, say, in the U.S. It'd then be their NPH false flag incident of a severity that'd be enough to certainly be like guaranteed to obtain all the national support needed for "cruising" the forces to war.
Much has been written about this and extensively enough, but Craig Murray provides a quick insight in the article I linked in a post early in this page at CD. The GWoT is for NATURAL RESOURCES, and Central Asia's targeted particularly for the very, very rich resources of oil and natural gas in the Caspian Sea or Caspian (whichever) region.
Former USMC Major General Smedley Butler was certainly right when he wrote the book, ['War IS A Racket']! Always, for the U.S. anyway!
And if the 9-11 attacks were a false flag incident, then it certainly wouldn't be the first in U.S. history. Plenty of people have written about this topic and doing a Web search on "false flag" in quotes, perhaps combined additional search terms, like "U.S." or "United States", f.e., will turn up plenty of links. The notorious U.S. "Operation Gladio" in Europe consisted of plenty of false flag incidents, too; but those were in Europe, even if the U.S. was behind them. It's very related to the "game" of [deception], deceiving populations, and to manipulate them without their knowing or realing it. When you want people to support you, your plans, but know you can't tell them what the actual plans are, then you do what? Well, if you're corrupt, then you work to deceive.
I don't like Bush. I am also deeply skeptical of the motives of any "liberal" who bemoans the damage Bush & Co have done to America's image.
I am happy that the rot is exposed to the wider world for what it is and was, but at what an accelerated human cost!
Will things "change" under Obama's stewardship? Maybe not. Why should the robber barons change their methods that have worked so well for century's? It's obvious to anyone with a modicum of awareness that ordinary people are expendable, usable and abusable. Even the populations in the North are kept in step with carefully crafted misinformation. I look at the Northern media where I reside and I despair, I look at Gaza and the Pashtun and I know that nothing has changed.
One comparison that will be made by many people of the South; Osama lived or lives simply in a cave, while Obama lives in the plushest excess that a capitalist driven society can afford and that same society funds and supports some of the worst dictators and murderous strongmen that can be found on the planet.
While this is so, any talk of "freedoms" & "democracy", any talk about the end of TWOT is an insult to intelligence.
Good day.
Many who posted in this page write about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks having been committed like solely by foreigners angry over U.S. hegemony, and so on, and the U.S. causing great poverty and therefore despair; and these people are NOT thinking more broadly than the Bush administration would want. The Bush adm. would accept such "theories" on 9-11, for these actually help to cover up a very nasty probability of ... [false flag] terrorism and by certain people in the U.S. govt, high up and very capable.
The WoT is about natural resources, and wherein Afghanistan and Iraq are considered, then we don't have to think very long to realise what these resources are; vast amounts of oil and natural gas.
See the brief article by Craig Murray linked in my first post in this page. As said in my second post in this page, plenty of people have written very well on this topic; the WoT being really for the natural resources. It's another racket war by the U.S. and its coalition allies.
Economics is the underlying factor, but not like many said in posting in this page. It's not vengence over unjust poverty. It's not because populations of other countries have govts that have very corrupt relations with the U.S. govt and the rich of the West, and subsequently commit related oppression. It's for the economics, business, of natural resources that are very profitable.
An extra economics-related bonus is referred to by Craig Murray, the international heroin trade.
Anyone who refuses to read his short article doesn't have any opinions worthy of consideration, really.
Obama speaks of not sacrificing ideals for security, and then he turns to Afghanistan to worship at the alter of sacrifice? Oh I get it, this is the battle between the Democrats ideals and the Republican ideals. How could I have ever mistaken one for the other?
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
"Why does Obama believe that he can escape the same outcome in Afghanistan that Bush faced in Iraq?"
A more honest way of stating this might be, 'Why did President Obama's supporters think that they can escape the same outcome in Afghanistan that Bush faced in Iraq?'
I voted for Nader, he does not see furthering war to end war.
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
they have too much invested in this terror war. the mic would not like it if this new enemy of the ages went away. same ol same oil.
OBAMA: MORE OF THE SAME WITHOUT SHAME
BY:FARHAT MAQUAMI
Obama who got elected on the platform of Change is failing in every respect. He said he would get rid of Lobbyists, then he tried to appoint three Lobbyists and he failed. He promised to change Washington and now he pushes the Congress to accept the Lobbyists spending Package! He promised to defend America and now his administration is devoted to Israeli Lobby more than any other President.He has not permitted any Aid to Gaza Refugees who are victims of Ethnic Cleansing.Their economic strangulation continues without shame!
He is scaring the country of economic Catastrophe without stopping the drainage of useless Military Expenditure and Bribery to Israel, Egypt, Turkey,Pakistan, sugar coated as Foreign Aids. If we are in the Verge of an Economic Tsunami then why as a first step we don't stop the wasteful expenditure in War and Aid. How can we give Foreign Aid or finance a war when we are begging to sell our treasury Bonds for Cash? Obama does not answer these questions!
1. In economic front instead of thinking America he is helping the Bankers. Instead of letting Capitalism self-correct itself he has become the prime advocate of Socialism for the Rich! He is borrowing trillions and calls it "taxpayers money" because he has no clue that taxpayers don't have any money! He is sitting on top of a National Debt volcano singing prosperity!
2. On Guantanamo Bay Detainee, who after 6 years of torture, are being held without charges he has issued contradictory orders so No Change and more of the same!
3. Regarding torture, he does not understand it that Bush Administration Violated international Laws, Treaty Obligations, violated human rights and therefore must be prosecuted for Torture. Its victims are now Government Witnesses, like it or not. Anybody who does not prosecute them would be an accomplice to the Crime against humanity. Obama's failure to recognize this fact declares to the world that we have not changed and no one would trust more of the same!
4. He declares to the world that the US is advancing Peace but he orders CIA to continue extraordinary rendition i.e. kidnapping for torture ! It is more of the same?
5. He declares to the world that the Crusade against Islam is over; yet he continues to violate Pakistan sovereignty by killing people with Drones! Making enemies is not change it is more of the same!
6. He is sending 30 thousands more soldiers and probably 20000 extra hired mercenaries, helpers, contractors and suppliers to Afghanistan. Therefore, Afghanistan is Obama's War and it would be his Vietnam. Obama does not understand that in the middle of this Depression, we cannot throw money in an imperialistic War. We cannot burn the money we borrow in Afghanistan to fight Resistance to foreign occupation and establish a Narco-state! Empires fought wars to bring treasures home. Obama is taking us to a war without end in the midst of an economic disaster.
Obama is shamelessly borrowing to redistribute it to the Lobbyists and pursue Bush's war on Terror!
Republicans have recognized his emptiness and vacillations and would attack him from all possible directions and make him responsible for every ill that Bush created for America, as he foolishly becomes the custodian of Bush's heritage!