Log in

View Full Version : Sick strategies for senseless slaughter



Free Palestine
22nd June 2005, 08:46
Sick strategies for senseless slaughter

The murderous fools are not trying to end the war; they're trying to keep it going as long as they can

By John Kaminski

The cat is out of the bag now.

It happened quite by accident, as most revelations do. And it is seen by most of the world as the most revolting of the American/Israeli atrocities in the past few years, although it's hard to prioritize that claim because of the level and frequency of barbaric acts that are committed on a regular basis by those affluent automatons who call themselves the good guys.

Yet everyone but the comatose American populace — blinded by its Orwellian media and stupefied by its demented diet of physical and mental poisons — can see it.

So permit me to spell it out for those cowardly people who say they're living in the freest country on Earth, but absolutely refuse in their silent ignorance to see the blood they're spilling. No country that condones deliberate torture for any reason can ever be trusted.

The first hint came in Imad Khadduri's "A warning to car drivers" written in Arabic and posted on www.albasrah.net (http://www.albasrah.net) on May 11. The dispatch was quickly picked up by two of the most realistic and reliable news sites on the Web, www.uruknet.info (http://www.uruknet.info), which I try to read every day, and www.globalresearch.ca (http://www.globalresearch.ca), which I try to read every week, since it offers less breaking and more analytical news. I consider these two sites essential to keeping up with the real news of the world, and highly recommend that you monitor them, too.

Khadduri recounted a scam that opens up a clear window to seeing who is perpetrating all this inexplicable violence in Iraq. Beyond the American attempt to pacify an outraged and abused nation through demonic destruction, and beyond the Iraqi attempt to resist this totalitarian takeover by a foreign conqueror, there are more than numerous acts of violence that simply can't be understood by straightforward explanations.

I mean, when a mosque blows up and Americans blame Islamic terrorists, whether Sunni or Shiite, it makes no sense. Muslims never blow up their own houses of worship. Or when reporters sympathetic to either the Iraqi cause of freedom, or even just general principles of international justice, are suddenly assassinated and the blame is placed on often imaginary Islamic extremists whose perspective is supported by these writers, how can anyone believe that Muslims did it, even though this is what the Zionist American press and government continue to insist.

So who’s doing all these demented deeds? As if we didn’t know ....

Khadduri’s report went like this:

“A few days ago, an American manned check point confiscated the driver license of a driver and told him to report to an American military camp near Baghdad airport for interrogation and in order to retrieve his license. The next day, the driver did visit the camp and he was allowed in the camp with his car. He was admitted to a room for an interrogation that lasted half an hour. At the end of the session, the American interrogator told him: ‘OK, there is nothing against you, but you do know that Iraq is now sovereign and is in charge of its own affairs. Hence, we have forwarded your papers and license to al-Kadhimia police station for processing. Therefore, go there with this clearance to reclaim your license. At the police station, ask for Lt. Hussain Mohammed, who is waiting for you now. Go there now quickly, before he leaves his shift work”.

The driver did leave in a hurry, but was soon alarmed with a feeling that his car was driving as if carrying a heavy load, and he also became suspicious of a low flying helicopter that kept hovering overhead, as if trailing him. He stopped the car and inspected it carefully. He found nearly 100 kilograms of explosives hidden in the back seat and along the two back doors.

The only feasible explanation for this incident is that the car was indeed booby trapped by the Americans and intended for the al-Khadimiya Shiite district of Baghdad. The helicopter was monitoring his movement and witnessing the anticipated “hideous attack by foreign elements”.

The same scenario was repeated in Mosul, in the north of Iraq. A car was confiscated along with the driver’s license. He did follow up on the matter and finally reclaimed his car but was told to go to a police station to reclaim his license. Fortunately for him, the car broke down on the way to the police station. The inspecting car mechanic discovered that the spare tire was fully laden with explosives."

If this were the only example of this type I heard, I might have let it pass as just a story. But it wasn’t.

There was also the sorry tale of the Iraqi man who saw American soldiers plant a bomb which shortly thereafter exploded, and when he said so out loud for all to hear, he was hauled away, never to be seen again.

This story was reported on arguably the most authentic and riveting source of news from Iraq, the heart-rending "Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog from Iraq (http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/)," which is compiled by someone known only as Riverbend or Iraqi Girl . Again, recommended reading.

She recounts, "the last two weeks have been violent ....

The number of explosions in Baghdad alone is frightening. There have also been several assassinations — bodies being found here and there. It's somewhat disturbing to know that corpses are turning up in the most unexpected places. Many people will tell you it's not wise to eat river fish anymore because they have been nourished on the human remains being dumped into the river. That thought alone has given me more than one sleepless night. It is almost as if Baghdad has turned into a giant graveyard.

The latest corpses were those of some Sunni and Shia clerics — several of them well-known. People are being patient and there is a general consensus that these killings are being done to provoke civil war. Also worrisome is the fact that we are hearing of people being rounded up by security forces (Iraqi) and then being found dead days later — apparently when the new Iraqi government recently decided to reinstate the death penalty, they had something else in mind.

But back to the explosions. One of the larger blasts was in an area called Ma'moun, which is a middle class area located in west Baghdad. It’s a relatively calm residential area with shops that provide the basics and a bit more. It happened in the morning, as the shops were opening up for their daily business and it occurred right in front of a butcher’s shop. Immediately after, we heard that a man living in a house in front of the blast site was hauled off by the Americans because it was said that after the bomb went off, he sniped an Iraqi National Guardsman.

I didn’t think much about the story — nothing about it stood out: an explosion and a sniper — hardly an anomaly. The interesting news started circulating a couple of days later. People from the area claim that the man was taken away not because he shot anyone, but because he knew too much about the bomb. Rumor has it that he saw an American patrol passing through the area and pausing at the bomb site minutes before the explosion. Soon after they drove away, the bomb went off and chaos ensued. He ran out of his house screaming to the neighbors and bystanders that the Americans had either planted the bomb or seen the bomb and done nothing about it. He was promptly taken away.

The bombs are mysterious. Some of them explode in the midst of National Guard and near American troops or Iraqi Police and others explode near mosques, churches, and shops or in the middle of sougs. One thing that surprises us about the news reports of these bombs is that they are inevitably linked to suicide bombers. The reality is that some of these bombs are not suicide bombs — they are car bombs that are either being remotely detonated or maybe time bombs. All we know is that the techniques differ and apparently so do the intentions. Some will tell you they are resistance. Some say Chalabi and his thugs are responsible for a number of them. Others blame Iran and the SCIRI militia Badir.

In any case, they are terrifying. If you're close enough, the first sound is a that of an earsplitting blast and the sounds that follow are of a rain of glass, shrapnel and other sharp things. Then the wails begin — the shrill mechanical wails of an occasional ambulance combined with the wail of car alarms from neighboring vehicles… and finally the wail of people trying to sort out their dead and dying from the debris.

Then there was this one.

On May 13, 2005, a 64 years old Iraqi farmer, Haj Haidar Abu Sijjad, took his tomato load in his pickup truck from Hilla to Baghdad, accompanied by Ali, his 11 years old grandson. They were stopped at an American check point and were asked to dismount. An American soldier climbed on the back of the pickup truck, followed by another a few minutes later, and thoroughly inspected the tomato filled plastic containers for about 10 minutes. Haj Haidar and his grandson were then allowed to proceed to Baghdad.

A minute later, his grandson told him that he saw one of the American soldiers putting a grey melon size object in the back among the tomato containers. The Haj immediately slammed on the brakes and stopped the car at the side of the road, at a relatively far distance from the check point. He found a time bomb with the clock ticking tucked among his tomatoes. He immediately recognized it, as he was an ex-army soldier. Panicking, he grabbed his grandson and ran away from the car. Then, realizing that the car was his only means of work, he went back, took the bomb and carried it in fear. He threw it in a deep ditch by the side of the road that was dug by Iraqi soldiers in preparation for the war, two years ago.

Upon returning from Baghdad, he found out that the bomb had indeed exploded, killing three sheep and injuring their shepherd in his head. He thanked God for giving him the courage to go back and remove the bomb, and for the luck in that the American soldiers did not notice his sudden stop at a distance and his getting rid of the bomb.

"They intended it to explode in Baghdad and claim that it is the work of the 'terrorists', or 'insurgents' or who call themselves the 'Resistance'.

I decided to expose them and asked your reporter to take me to Baghdad to tell you the story. They are to be exposed as they now want to sow strife in Iraq and taint the Resistance after failing to defeat it militarily. Do not forget to mention my name. I fear nobody but God, as I am a follower of Muqtada al-Sadir."

The background and admission of guilt for such satanic shenanigans was clearly outlined in Frank Morales' piece on globalresearch.ca: "The Provocateur State: Is the CIA Behind the Iraqi 'Insurgents' — and Global Terrorism," by Frank Morales clearly demonstrates how Donald Rumsfeld said he was going to do exactly what these three sorry episodes show he actually did.

Morales writes:

Back in 2002, following the trauma of 9-11, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld predicted there would be more terrorist attacks against the American people and civilization at large. How could he be so sure of that? Perhaps because these attacks would be instigated on the order of the Honorable Mr. Rumsfeld. According to Los Angeles Times military analyst William Arkin, writing Oct. 27, 2002, Rumsfeld set out to create a secret army, "a super-Intelligence Support Activity" network that would "bring together CIA and military covert action, information warfare, intelligence, and cover and deception," to stir the pot of spiraling global violence.

We never got the full story on those ghastly beheadings of Nick Berg and others. Nor have we ever understood who killed the American mercenaries in Fallujah that eventually precipitated one of the great slaughters in history. Nor have we ever been able to discern if Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is actually a real person or just another bin Ladenesque boogeyman. Nor if the al-Qaeda website which claims responsibility for various atrocities is not really run by the CIA.

Provoking this type of violence also further conceals the sinister genocide the Israelis continue to perpetrate on the hapless Palestinians, which is exactly its point, as is the entire Iraq invasion and destruction, and as was the inside job mass murder on 9/11 in New York City. The purpose of all these despicable acts is to conceal what the Israelis and the Americans have been doing all along to the entire Arab world, namely enslaving and destroying it.

There is not now nor ever was an Arab terror threat. That was all invented by Rothschild, Rockefeller, Kissinger, Brzezinski, Bush, Cheney, Sharon, Zakheim, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith, Abrams and Warren Buffett. These people are all traitors to not only their countries but to humanity in general, and should all be slammed and RICOed into Guantanamo immediately.

And so should the government officials, media lackeys, and ordinary citizens who, by their complicity or their ignorance, support them.

The main point in understanding these deliberate provocations to prevent peace is to understand how the American capitalist system, now hijacked by billionaires with no trace of conscience, thrives on war and profits from the misery of others.

The neocon murder menace has been for months ratcheting up the hyperbole about why we need to invade Iran — which some predict will happen in June — and just this week, rumors of troop movements in the Caribbean and lockdowns at Florida military bases appear to augur an imminent invasion of oil-producing Venezuela.

The overall plan is to create hell on Earth, and we are succeeding. By our silent complicity and cowardly reluctance to oppose and stop this homicidal behavior in the name of profit, we are all accessories to mass murder and the destruction of human society, not to even mention the extinction of individual human freedom and the God-given right to be safe and secure in the homes of our choice.

So now that you know, what are you going to do about it? You know if you do nothing, these same things will one day happen to you.

__________________________________

John Kaminski is a writer who lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida. He is the author of two collections of essays, America's Autopsy Report and The Perfect Enemy, many of which have been published individually on hundreds of websites around the world. In addition, he has written The Day America Died: Why You Shouldn’t Believe the Official Story of What Happened on September 11, 2001, a 48-page booklet aimed at those who still believe the government’s highly questionable version of events. A second booklet, 9/11: The Manipulation of Reality, will be published before the end of 2004. For more information on John or to purchase these books, go to http://www.johnkaminski.com/

http://www.rudemacedon.ca/kaminski/05/0524-slaughter.html

Free Palestine
27th September 2005, 19:14
Two special-ops Brits in wigs, 'traditional Arab dress' – and a car full of explosives?

http://antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=7366 Thank you again Justin!

please see the link because it has pictures.


The closer we look at what happened in Basra the other day, the murkier and more suspicious the picture gets. Two British undercover operatives fired at the Iraqi police, killing one and injuring another, and were taken into custody, then "rescued" as British tanks laid siege to police headquarters. The incident culminated in a pitched battle between Iraqi and British forces, and in its aftermath a war of words is heating up that threatens to expose a widening chasm between these two ostensible "allies."

We are told that our enemy in Iraq is a shadowy network of al-Qaeda-affiliated suicide bombers who will do anything to disrupt that country's march toward "democracy," but instead we find coalition troops shooting at the very Iraqi police we are investing so much money, effort, and hope into.

What in blazes is going on?

The two sides do not agree on even the most basic facts. The Brits aver that the two arrested special ops soldiers – members of the Special Reconnaissance Regiment – were moved from the Basra jail to a private home during the negotiations for their release. After British tanks knocked down a wall, troops busted into the jail, held the Iraqi police at gunpoint until they revealed the soldiers' whereabouts, and the pair were freed.

The Iraqis, in the person of Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabr, say the soldiers never left the jail, were not handed over to a militia group, and that the whole incident was provoked by a "rumor" that the pair were about to be executed. The Iraqis, for their part, have their own version of what went down, as the Washington Post reports:

"Iraqi security officials on Monday variously accused the two Britons they detained of shooting at Iraqi forces or trying to plant explosives."

Of course, the two are not mutually exclusive: they could have been shooting at Iraqi forces – indeed, they killed at least one policemen, when he approached the pair – and trying to plant explosives. But never mind…

At any rate, the disagreements continue over what was found in the pair's possession. In spite of initial BBC Radio reports that the car the Brits were cruising around in was packed full of explosives, the BBC News site now avers that the Iraqis found nothing more untoward than "assault rifles, a light machine gun, an anti-tank weapon, radio gear, and medical kit. This is thought to be standard kit for the SAS operating in such a theater of operations."




An antitank weapon – standard operating equipment? That sounds rather doubtful. Look at this photo of what was recovered from the car, and you tell me if that haul seems rather a lot more than just your Spooks' Standard Issue spying kit. On the question of what was found in the car, Sheik Hassan al-Zarqani, a spokesman for the Mahdi Army, the organization headed up by firebrand Shi'ite leader Moqtada Sadr, had this to say:

"What our police found in their car was very disturbing – weapons, explosives, and a remote control detonator. These are the weapons of terrorists. We believe these soldiers were planning an attack on a market or other civilian targets, and thanks be to god they were stopped and countless lives were saved."

Furthermore, Sheik al-Zarqani says, the two Brits were not just in "traditional Arab dress," as several news reports aver, but were disguised in the uniform worn by members of the Mahdi Army. The Brits, says the Sheik, have some 'splaining to do:

"Why were these men dressed as Mahdi Army? Why were they carrying explosives and where were they planning to detonate their bomb?"

Good questions, all – and perhaps some context will give us at least a direction to go in for some answers. The Washington Post reports the latest attacks, attributed either to Sunni insurgents or to al-Qaeda and the network associated with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi:

"In continuing violence elsewhere in Iraq Monday, a car bomb exploded amid Shi'ite pilgrims marching and driving to the holy city of Karbala, killing five and wounding 12, said Capt. Muthanna Ahmed, a spokesman for Babil province police. Iraq's Shi'ites head to the holy city at this time in an annual ritual to mark the birthday of the Imam Mahdi.

"The car bombing occurred in Latifiya, an insurgent stronghold 25 miles south of Baghdad, and was followed 10 minutes later by mortar shells that wounded four more people, Ahmed said. One of those killed and four of the wounded belonged to the Mahdi Army, the Shi'ite militia led by Sadr, said Sahib Amiri, one of Sadr's aides in Najaf."

Okay, let's look at this timeline: On Sunday, a cleric associated with the local Sadrist group is arrested by the British, along with two others. On Monday a Mahdi Army militant is killed in a "terrorist" bombing, leaving four others injured. That same day, a Sadrist demonstration demanding the release of the cleric and his associates is held in the vicinity of the mayor's office: a white car containing two individuals who are "acting suspiciously," as one Iraqi police officer put it, turns out to be undercover British soldiers who fire on police when approached.

All very suspicious – almost comically so, given the context. Because suspicions of British involvement in terrorist attacks routinely attributed to Sunni militants and the Zarqawi network are nothing new for this area. In April of last year, Basra was the scene of a Sadrist-led demonstration in which hundreds were out in the streets blaming the British for a recent spate of bombings:

"'We have evidence that the British were involved in the attacks,' said Sadr spokesman Sheik Abdul Satar al-Bahadli. He did not elaborate.

"'You [British occupation troops] have failed to provide security, so leave it to the Iraqi police and militia to sort it out,' he told Agence France-Presse.

"Some 800 supporters of Sadr meanwhile gathered outside his office here to protest Wednesday's attacks.

"At least 68 people, including 20 children, were killed and about 100 others were wounded in the deadly series of coordinated suicide bomb attacks. Most of the dead were from almost simultaneous suicide car bombings outside three police stations in Basra, causing carnage in the busy streets as people headed to work."


The Sadrist demonstrators carried banners whose slogans sketched the general outlines of a tinfoil-hat conspiracy theory that attributes all the evils befalling them to "foreign occupiers":

"'The people and the police are hand in hand with our religious leaders and they will not bow to the occupiers.' 'The Iraqi people say that Al-Qaeda is not involved in the attacks, which must be blamed on the criminal Tony Blair,' or 'Al-Qaeda is a US deception to justify the occupation of Islamic countries,' others said."

With the discovery of two British spies decked out in dark wigs and trying to look like just a couple of ordinary jihadis, the Sadrists have been given plenty of grist for their mill: no wonder they are often described as gaining in popularity. Not without a little help from the Brits – and could that be what is really going on?

The followers of Moqtada al-Sadr are by no means pro-occupation, but they are equally anti-Iranian – militant nationalists who oppose the decentralism advocated by other Shi'ite factions, which would essentially create an autonomous region in the solid Shi'ite south of the country. Such a semi-independent republic in a loose federation would soon come under the dominating influence of Iran – which already is extending its influence at the federal as well as the local level via its sock-puppets in SCIRI, the Badr Organization, and the Da'wa Party. The only nationalistic counterweight to the pro-Iranian Shi'ite secessionists is Sadr and his Mahdi Army. By deliberately creating an incident that strengthens the Sadrist hand, the balance of power in the south is maintained, however precariously and momentarily.

This is, admittedly, far-fetched: but then so are the invasion of Iraq and the subsequent meltdown of the occupation, both of which strain the boundaries of probability, at least in a rational world. But we aren't living in a rational world anymore, not since the 9/11 terrorist attacks ripped a hole in the space-time continuum and we slipped into the Bizarro universe, where up is down, logic is illogic, and British authorities charged with keeping order in occupied Iraq deliberately provoke their charges into paroxysms of paranoia.

Alternatively, it could be that the Brits were targeting the Mahdi Army, which has fought occupation troops and is constantly causing trouble as far away as Baghdad. Perhaps, after all, they were just handing out candy to children…


It doesn't matter much in the end whether or not the Brits were engaged in some funny business in Basra: what matters is that they appear to have done so. That may be enough to plunge a heretofore relatively quiet region of Iraq into civil war and chaos.

A British contingent that was widely believed to have been on its way home will be indefinitely delayed: the rumored withdrawal canceled, because, you see, to leave now would just make things worse. Or so the story goes…

There is a lot of nonsense floating around about the circumstances surrounding this incident, not the least of which is the canard that the Iraqi police have been "infiltrated" by "insurgents" and that's why the two Brit spies were supposedly in danger and had to be "rescued." The reality is that the Mahdi Army, SCIRI, and all the other Muslim party-backed militias are part of the elected government of Iraq: their representatives sit in the National Assembly, where they have a majority when they vote as a bloc. They aren't "insurgents" – they're supposed to be our allies! As they stand up, George W. Bush tells us, America will stand down. So how are they suddenly "insurgents"?

The spectacle of Britain's defense minister, John Reid, calling on the Iraqi authorities demanding "answers" reflects a breathtaking arrogance. It is the Brits who have to come up with some answers, and quickly, before the situation on the ground degenerates any further. Already, the local government authorities in Basra, including the governor, have unanimously voted to cease all cooperation with the British occupiers.

No amount of spinning and outright lying – the British government initially denied there was even a confrontation, and claimed that the two were released as a result of "negotiations" – is going to let them wriggle out of this one. London has a full-scale rebellion on its hands, and if the Iraqis aren't sufficiently appeased, the revolt could soon spread northward, to the American sector, in which case it would become Washington's problem, too.

As I wrote in January 2004, when the U.S. was holding out in support of its "caucus" plan, which would have forbidden the Iraqis direct elections and instead imposed a system in which America's favored sock puppets would come out on top, a giant awakens in the form of rising Shi'ite political power:

"So far, the Shi'ites have stood on the sidelines, waiting for the chance to take advantage of their majority status and impose an Islamic 'republic' on the rest of the country. Centered in the south, which has not seen, up until now, the kind of guerrilla violence that regularly erupts in the infamous 'Sunni Triangle,' such groups as the pro-Iranian Badr Brigade and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), have been patient, and so far refrained from violence – except against Christian merchants who sell alcohol and other un-Islamic consumer items. The occupiers, up to this point, have had no serious trouble from SCIRI and allied groups. That could change rapidly, and dramatically, as the Ayatollah Sistani has pointed out, if the Americans insist on their caucus plan."

The Ayatollah Sistani – who still refuses to meet with the Americans, by the way – swept away the caucus plan with a single fatwa. Now the Americans are drawing another line in the sand and daring the Shi'ites to cross it. If they do – if they demand the return of real sovereignty – the occupiers will have to either back down or fight. The consequences of this are not hard to foresee, but may have been a bit less discernible over a year and a half ago, when I described this looming confrontation:

"So far, the Americans have come up against those they call 'Saddamists' – by which term is meant followers of Saddam Hussein, not Oscar Wilde. These 'holdouts' and 'dead enders' are the 'remnants' of the Ba'athist Party, we are confidently assured, as if the insurgency is petering out along with the effects of Saddam's reign. Yet attacks on occupation forces, in terms of ferocity, numbers, and geographical reach, are increasing. It hardly takes a strategic genius to see that the fuel of Shi'ite fury spread over this smoldering rebellion will stoke the fires of resistance – and quite possibly flare up into a regional conflagration that could bring in Iran, and possibly others."

A regional war, dragging Iran and quite possibly Syria into the Iraqi maelstrom, is precisely what some elements in the administration are hoping for. The seeds of a Middle Eastern conflagration were planted the moment U.S. and British troops set foot on Iraqi soil. Today, in Basra, we are reaping the whirlwind. --Raimondo