This is an e-mail archive of John's analysis and observations on "news" specific to the crimes against humanity committed on 11 September 2001.
(See also Web Reference Links High-Lighted by John Judge for other analysis.)
NOTE: Please let me know if you find that a link to a news story is no longer valid. I will make a local copy here to keep this archive complete.--ratitor
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- Subject: Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war
2 Mar 2003There's no dirtier trick than war, and this is how they play to win one.
Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war
Secret document details American plan to bug phones and emails of key Security Council members
by Martin Bright, Ed Vulliamy and Peter Beaumont, The Observer, 2 March 2003
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4616550-102275,00.html- Subject: `Friendly Fire'--Allies Depleted Uranium weaponry knows no bounds
3 Mar 2003They have also reintroduced use of prygistimine bromide, a chemical still not tested on humans, used as a prophylactic against one type of nerve gas, but believed by many to be one source of the Gulf War Syndrome. When does GI (government issue) get seen for what it means, troops are expendable.
`Friendly Fire' - Allies Depleted Uranium weaponry knows no bounds
by Scott Taylor, Brattleboro Reformer, February 22-23, 2003
friendlyFire.html- Subject: [911commission] PALAST on 9/11: See No Evil: What Bush Didn't
4 Mar 2003Palast lets Bush off the hook, and by implication his whole administration and the intelligence agencies. He is carefully anti-conspiratorial whenever I have talked to him, but an effective self promoter. I have warned before about hanging any hat on what Bush knew, since the better question would be, When was he told and how soon did he forget it? Foreknowledge and forewarnings still can bear fruitful ground, especially warnings about not flying that day.
See No Evil: What Bush Didn't (Want To) Know About 9/11
by Greg Palast, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy excerpt, 1 March 2003
http://www.gregpalast.com/printerfriendly.cfm?artid=195- Subject: The Gap, the Seam and the Core - Globalism stripped bare
4 Mar 2003Will the real agenda please stand up? After 9/11 I said that the new paradigm and the new Axis was a lineup of the Global Corporate states, their neoliberal extensions and the newly wannabe nations of Russia and China jumping into the "free market". What remained were the vastly impoverished and underdeveloped countries and the pockets of resistance within the neoliberal countries and the homeland. Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer. Do we need more lebensraum, or just some lubrication?
The Pentagon's New Map
It Explains Why We're Going To War, and Why We'll Keep Going To War.
by Thomas P.M. Barnett, U.S. Naval War College
http://www.nwc.navy.mil/newrulesets/ThePentagonsNewMap.htm- Subject: Make sure Pres. Bush publicly answers some questions on Iraq
4 Mar 2003An important new bill and a set of questions all supporters of war need to answer.
New House Resolution Asks for Some Answers about the War on Iraq; It Needs Our Support!
Center on Conscience & War, 3 March 2003
iraqWarQs.html- Subject: Taking back our moral proxies--Serve Life, now
4 Mar 2003The tide begins to turn, time to put our intellects, hearts and shoulders against the wheel.
Taking back our moral proxies--Serve Life, now
by Dave Ratcliffe, rat haus reality press, 3 March 2003
http://www.ratical.org/co-globalize/serveLife.html- Subject: Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science
5 Mar 2003This debate might tell us something.
Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science
by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. publishers
www.biosecurityjournal.com- Subject: Taking Aim--with Ralph Schoenman and Mya Shone
5 Mar 2003Ralph's incisive analysis on 9/11 and other topics.
Taking Aim With Ralph Schoenman and Mya Shone
Tuesdays 5:00-6:00 p.m. on WBAI-NY-99.5 FM and www.wbai.org
www.takingaim.info- Subject: Evidence of an Establishment Split on Bushite Unilaterialism
7 Mar 2003[John Judge's response to Vincent Salandria's message below]
Vince,
There is and has been, without any doubt, a split in the ruling class over not just this war but the entire neo-conservative doctrine of Pax Americana as against the neo-liberal Global Corporatization and World Bank/IMF structural adjustment of post-colonial control. Just as the split existed at the time of the Kennedy assassination in regard to both domestic and foreign issues.
The nativist, America First entrepreneur coalition wants to take the glove off the fist both at home and abroad. The internationalist, globalist investor coalition wants to maintain the illusion of democracy and UN-based fair play while controlling everything behind the scenes financially.
"History, to be successful, must be negotiated in absolute secrecy" said Henry Kissinger. This argument is now going so deep that previous long-time loyalists in the Pentagon, State Department and even covert operations are balking at the blatant and uncontrolled aggression demonstrated in the White House junta following the legal coup.
I have never seen dissent this widespread and this deep, nationally and across the globe. This is the final crossroads, now, the juncture of human history. We either put our shoulder against the wheel or it crushes us in its genocidal path towards global war and destruction. It even makes the higher-ups nervous.
A year ago, Iraq switched over to the Euro, and OPEC threatened to follow, separating the petro dollar from the US dollar, an unacceptable economic coup. "A war that will not end in our lifetime" said Cheney. War without end instead of a war to end all war. Permanent war economy, the wet dream of the old MIC and the new money of the southern rim economy. A global economic slump, a ruined dollar and economy at home, and now war, the perennial health of the state. But only if there is not enough infrastructure in place, so that maintining the war actually creates jobs.
This bloated war machine does not need a labor base, it only needs technicians. It will not create jobs or social benefits. It will only be the health of the ruling elite, the 2% that control 89% of the wealth. There is only one thing in their way, despite their bickering. The American people and the curtain they held up for so long labelled democracy. We might just make it real.
John
Vincent J. Salandria wrote:Dear Friends,
The New York Times INTERNATIONAL, Thursday, March 6, 2001, p. A5
By Christopher Marquis"WASHINGTON, March 5 - Richard N. Haass, the State Department's director of policy planning, is expected to leave government to become the next president of the Council on Foreign Relations, associates said today. . . .
"Mr. Haass, whose big-picture post at the State Department required him to ponder America's role in a post-Communist, terrorism-rattled world, has been a voice for `intergration' with other nations, which he sees as fighting common, transnational threats.
"His best-known book on foreign policy, The Relucatant Sheriff -- The United States After the Cold War, made the centrist case that the United States should exert its military power sparingly, in coalition, while focusing on two major tasks: halting aggression between nations and defending free trade.
"In a speech on foreign policy last year, Mr. Haass said the United States should pursue a new doctrine based on deepening its ties around the globe.
"`In the 21st century, the principal aims of American foreign policy is to integrate other countries and organizations into arrangements that will sustain a world consistent with U.S. interests and values, and thereby promote peace, prosperity and justice as widely as possible,' he said.
"It was unclear whether Mr. Haass was frustrated as the Bush administration moves toward war in a way that has alienated several traditional allies . . ."
Compare the above, wherein the Council on Foreign Relations accepts Haass as its President, although he is out of step with Bush, with what happened following the assassination of President Kennedy. After the CIA-military coup which fired President Kennedy in Dealey Plaza, the Council on Foreign Relations hired William McBundy to head up its publication, Foregin Affairs. Bill McBundy, George McBundy's brother, had spent the major part of his career in the CIA.
George McBundy had been in charge of the Situation Room of the White House on the afternoon of November 22, 1963. He was responible for notifying the Presidential party on Air Force One and the people on the Cabinet plane that Oswald was the assassin, and that there was no conspiracy. When George McBundy sent that message, there was no evidence against Oswald as the assassin of President Kennedy and the Secret Service agents in the motorcade were busy filing their affidavits which demonstrated from first-hand expert eye-witness accounts that the assassin was the work of multiple gunmen.
So, the American establishment following the Kennedy assassination joined hands with the murderers. There was no split. With regard to the impending invasion of Iraq sans UN support, the American establishment is apparently taking some issue.
Vince
- Subject: From Michael Klare on war in Iraq starting soon
7 Mar 2003Three remaining possibilities for ending it:
- HJR 20 and SJR 32, bills in process in the Congress that call for a repeal of Bush's use of force doctrine. HJR 2 calls for a discussion of the same, and HJR 24 asks key questions about war on Iraq. The first two have the actual potential of disarming Bush.
- The UN Security Council votes down the US. This may not stop the war, but it will deligitmize it even further. Alternately if the Security Council approves it, the Assembly of the UN can override it in just this instance, to prevent a war of aggression.
- The American people, and others across the globe, resist it in every way possible. 200 a day are going AWOL, one-third of the British reserves called up opted out. Massive student and worker strikes are pending as soon as it starts. The dissent is already so widespread and the war has not even started. There is no international consensus. Remember the old slogan, "What if they gave a war and nobody came?"
On the other side of the equation is the fact that the US after 9-11 has created a real Axis of Evil, a global alignment of the rich, the globalized neo-liberal countries and the wannabees Russia and China against the remaining undeveloped resource areas and the pockets of resistance in the neo-liberal economies, their own ruling countries, and the US. The juggernaut will ignore the UN, which was created to stop just this scenario of world domination and pre-emptive war that Hitler had tried to enforce. Also on the other side is the unimagninable destructive force of the weapons of mass murder that we control and are ready to use, which do not depend on ground troops or very much human decision making. War should be obsolete in the 21st Century, instead they are trying to perfect its final and most genocidal stage.
However, I refuse to be cynical in this time. We are so far ahead of the curve compared to Vietnam, and the legacy we left is in place. There is such a thing as a bad war, and a right to say no to it. We are now in the same position as the German people in 1939, and we have exactly the same responsibility for the holocaust that is looming. But, we can decide to create democracy, end war, and oust this system of control in favor of a sustainable world where all can prosper with much less work and with a healthy planet. That is the crossroad we are standing at, and it is time to choose.
Dear friends and colleagues:For what it's worth: I was scheduled to do a taping today for a CNN show on oil to air this Sunday; but I was just called to be informed that the show has been cancelled to make way for intensified war coverage, as CNN expects the war to break out soon, as early as next week.
I myself am not sure about the onset of war, but if I were to hazard a guess, I would say the week after next, when many colleges and universities are on spring break (and so cannot be sites of protest). But if you learn that UN inspectors are pulling out of Baghdad, you can be sure that the war is hours away.
Regretfully, I cannot think of what ele we can do to stop the war. I was so heartened yesterday to go to Northampton HS, where about 300 students skipped classes to attend a student-run rally against war -- one of dozens of events like it at high schools and colleges in this region. But obviously, our protests aren't being listened to.
Now, I fear, we have to plan for what to do AFTER the fighting starts, when we can expect a rally-round-the-flag hysteria. We must raise the long-term consequences of war: increased terrorism, anti-Americanism, and the self-destructive folly of assuming an imperial role in the Middle East.
I wish you all my best in these dark times.
(Prof.) Michael Klare
-Michael
Five College Program in Peace & World Security Studies
Hampshire College, Amherst, MA 01002 USA
- Subject: Agent Who Saw 9/11 Lapses Still Faults F.B.I. on Terror
7 Mar 2003This decade's Dan Ellsberg? I hope she's more honest than Ellsberg.
Agent Who Saw 9/11 Lapses Still Faults F.B.I. on Terror
by Philip Shenon, New York Times, 6 March 2003
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0306-06.htm- Subject: Bush would be guilty at Nuremburg
7 Mar 2003Will their defense be that the Nazis taught them how to do it?
Bush would be guilty at Nuremburg
by Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, 3 March 2003
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=10427&mode=&order=0- Subject: 9-11 Flies into Conflict of Interest
7 Mar 2003CBS News just had an Eye on America segment on the CBS Evening News about possible conflicts of interest among members of the Independant Commission. The conflicts pertain to members being involved with the airlines. They didn't however touch Keans relationship with the oil business.
I taped the segment for archival purposes. Not bad...I got this message out less than fifteen minutes after the segment aired and that includes looking up the article on the internet!
Conflicts Of Interest On Sept. 11 Panel?
CBS, 5 March 2003
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/03/05/eveningnews/printable542868.shtml- Subject: Billboards
7 Mar 2003My friend Jim Costanza developed these billboard icons, and if you are in the NY area, go see the board and help him get more of them up.
WHITE BOARDS
SPONSORED BY WHITE BOX
A BILLBOARD IN NEW JERSEY NEAR THE HOLLAND TUNNEL
TO BE EXHIBITED BY ARTIST JIM COSTANZOFEBRUARY 26 THROUGH MARCH 23, 2003
Jersey City, NJ - Artist Jim Costanzo will unveil a billboard mounted outside the Holland Tunnel from February 24 through March 23, 2003, in conjunction with White Box, the Chelsea-based gallery. The 10 x 22 foot work, FREEDOM uses images that have been photographed from television footage of the war in Afghanistan.
The billboard's text is designed to be seen at a distance with the meaning shifting as the viewer draws closer to the billboard. The viewer first encounters the word FREEDOM and upon approaching the billboard, additional text becomes visible:
F R E E D O M
1 Iraqi = 1 American = 1 Afghan
1 Israeli = 1 Palestinian
1 Muslim = 1 Christian = 1 Jew
1 World = 1 People
"The billboard is an attempt to engage the public in a discussion about human rights and the basic principles upon which this country was founded," notes Costanzo. "Historically the U.S. has been divided over who is entitled to `unalienable rights.' Because of the government's response to recent events both at home and abroad, it seems clear that those who hold true to the best of this country's original ideals must be heard."
FREEDOM is the first in a series of three billboards to be created by Costanzo, who envisions additional billboards entitled PEACE and JUSTICE placed throughout the metropolitan area and nationally.
Jim Costanzo is a New York-based artist who has shown his work in the U.S. and in Europe. He is a founding member of REPOhistory, an artist collective that makes site-specific public artwork based on issues of race, gender, class and sexuality. Last fall Costanzo created a multimedia installation titled datamap_2001.2 that dealt with the social and political climate of the last two years and was shown at the Annex, New York, which is affiliated with White Box. He teaches at Pratt Institute, Parsons School of Design and the International Center of Photography.
The billboard is located on Truck Route # 1 & 9 Southbound at Mead Street in Jersey City, near the intersection of Broadway.
Additional information is available at the website www.jimcostanzo.us
WHITE BOX
525 West 25 Street, New York, NY 10001
212.714.2347
www.whiteboxny.org
- Subject: Who is Zalmay Khalilzad, US Envoy to Afghanistan and the Iraqi Opposition?
7 Mar 2003The footprints come clearer. Thanks to Jared Israel and Beatrice
Beatrice writes:If you go to the links, below, it's a very good analysis. However, the question of "oil" is VERY MUCH a part of the story. Why Unocal "was told to pull out," by the US gov't, from sources that I recall reading, is extremely interesting, and, as I well imagine, was, more likely than not, if we were every privy to classified materials, a time when the plans or a plan were made for something like 9/11 and the subsequent military invasion of Afghanistan, and, then, Iraq, et. al.
Khalilzad is NOT going to PUBLICLY talk about this for obvious reasons, as one of the footnotes quotes. He will, naturally, NOT link Unocal, oil, those events, etc., anymore than is noted publicly by this Administration in its reasons for Iraq.
As for Khalilzad being "just" an oil rep, well, that's ridiculous, for the same reason it isn't "just" about OUR oil consumption. It's WELL KNOWN, thruout the oil industry, that oil/CIA/intelligence links are synonymous. They're one and the same, a revolving door. Anybody whose worked in that area can tell you that. The Taliban certainly wanted a pipeline. But, it seems, Osama and his supporters had in mind an Afghan version of Saudi Arabia, an Afghan National Oil Co, under Osama's control. This would have given him (them) enormous powers. It's clear, from all that preceeded, the jockeying for power in this region was enormous, and still is. Bhutto, Bridas, etc...
Actually, I hadn't thought about it before, but, now that Khalilzad's background is mentioned, all the more reason, I'm wondering, if it were not he who advised Unocal to back out, aside from reason enuf that Unocal did NOT accept the TERMS that the Taliban was offering under Osama. Remember, Brida's terms were ALOT better. Altho Unocal is not, at the moment, in Afghanistan, they have indicated, once again, that "conditions" are not quite stable and so, they say, they have no interest. However, there ARE agreements happening for international funding, etc -- I've e-mailed them from gasandoil.
Once things stabilize, Unocal will either be in the front or the back door, again. They may very well create a "new" company, just as an example. There are many ways to do this, outside of the obvious ones. The very fact that there are mutual agreements being made, now, and international funding terms are sufficient to indicated what will happen once things are really "stabilized."
There are a few aspects to the Afghan/Unocal/Taliban story, however, that have really intrigued me, much related to timing and subsequent events. Unocal's "sudden" pullout "upon advise," continued CIA activity with Osama and plans for 9/11. The Taliban continued to "try" to get international funding, but, it was thwarted. They lobbied, as well, and hired people in the US. Attempts were made to get rid of Osama. Some people have suggested the CIA was "still" trying to deal with him, up to the last minute, regarding the pipeline. This makes no sense to me, since Unocal had been "told" to pull out, previously.
So, were they "stringing him on," in order to be useful to their 9/11 plans? It took time to plan and set up the "trail" for the hijackers -- the flight schools, etc. I've wondered about that alot. As for Clinton's attempts at Osama, he said he had lousy intelligence, and, I believe he did, intentionally.
Osama and his Taliban connections had to go, clearly. But, I really wonder if THAT presented an opportunistic situation to create the 9/11 scenario, get rid of Osama's influence and justify everything that has flowed since. This was a military/intelligence coup, using other military/intelligence operatives and networks -- Saudi, Pak, etc. So...What did Unocal know, and, possibly, thru/with Khalilzad and when did they know it? An interesting timeline. Anyway, read the links, below, and, come back to this and it might make more sense to you.
Who is this U.S. Official in Charge of Afghanistan and the Iraqi Opposition?
Zalmay Khalilzad - Envoy for Islamic Terror
Compiled with comments by Jared Israel, Emperor's Clothes, 1 March 2003
http://emperors-clothes.com/archive/khalilzad-facts.htm- Subject: clever disinformation
12 Mar 2003I send this with a great deal of skepticism about its actual source and about what it claims. Remote control dogfighting would require some sort of visual sheparding above ground level, and I have seen no evidence of this at the Pentagon or elsewhere. Note how the unnamed author identifies himself:
I am a National Security Agency trained Electronic Warfare specialist, and am qualified to say this. My official title: MOS33Q10, Electronic Warfare Intercept Strategic Signal Processing/Storage Systems Specialist, a highly skilled MOS which requires advanced knowledge of many communications methods and circuits to the most minute level. I am officially qualified to place severe doubt that ordinary cell phone calls were ever made from the aircraft.Is this supposed to make him credible in my eyes?
I do know, for instance that at least one person on the plane, a good friend of the airline attendant I know well, called on her cell phone and spoke to her mother during the flight of American #77 and told her mother there were "6 of them" aboard, the official version is 5. So, the phones worked. I will wait to see what my friend says about the rest of these allegations concerning the planes, but I think this is clever disinformation.
9-11 Smoking Gun? Two 911 Jetliners EXCEEDED Their Software Barriers
http://www.trufax.org/news/stories.html
jetliners.html- Subject: Take the War-on-Iraq IQ Test
17 Mar 2003Except for the one about Saddam gassing the Kurds, most of these are right on target. Iran gassed those Kurds in retaliation for Saddam gassing their Kurds.
Take the War-on-Iraq IQ Test
by Charles Sheketoff, Oregon Center for Public Policy
http://www.casi.org.uk/discuss/2003/msg00821.html- Subject: Oil depletion: knowledge bank
17 Mar 2003Jeremy Rifkin has just written a book on the post-oil economy, suggesting all will improve soon, but not if the oil and water wars dominate the scene instead.
Oil (& gas) depletion knowledge bank
a brief guide to online information and bibliography
by GlobalPublicMedia.com
http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/SECTIONS/ENERGY/oil.depletion.php- Subject: Iraq Debt Debate Already Under Way
20 Mar 2003Maybe they could just give all the weapons back and save the dough?
Iraq Debt Debate Already Under Way
by David Chance, Reuters, 19 March 2003
IraqDebtDbte.html- Subject: Congressional reaction varies on Iraqi strike - Mar. 20
20 Mar 2003The war begins. Congress squanders its chance to repeal Bush's illegal war powers. The news shows us footage of 40 cruise missiles taking off from a cruiser, supposedly fired to take out one bunker containing Saddam Hussein and his sons. How can we know how many were fired or where they are hitting? An emergency response will take place here at 5:00 pm at Dupont Circle with losts of local groups, speakers and music. Win Without War wants to do a candlelight vigil as well.
35 un-named countries are reportedly cooperating. Wonder if the list will be forever classified? Bush admits the war "could be longer and more difficult than some admit". Has he been listening to his own PR or something? Well, now's the time to work for democracy in the new century. Not the phony neolibleralism and corporate globalism Bush wants to export, but real democracy. It used to be indigenous and our rights are inalienable, at least as long as we don't live under tyrants. Welcome to 1939. Are you a Good German?
Congressional reaction varies on Iraqi strike
CNN, 20 March 2003
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/03/19/sprj.irq.congress.reax/- Subject: Duck Tape
25 Mar 2003Everyone prepared?? For those of us who need further clarification on what to do in these troubled times.......
Dear Sirs:I am writing to you for further instructions as to what the next step is for me to take in protecting my family from possible attacks by terrorists.
I have my duck taped....now what?
m- Subject: When Democracy Failed: The Warnings of History
26 Mar 2003The parallels are too close to ignore. Fascism is a final stage in monopoly capitalism and it involves world war, holocausts and domestic repression based on a false external threat. $78 billion supplemental has just been asked for the war and security. What is the greatest threat to humanity now, poverty? hunger? AIDS? war? miseducation? or Saddam Hussein? Which one cannot be solved with $78 billion? In fact, all but one can be. Do we choose the nightmare path of war that we and the rest of humanity cannot survive in this century or turn toward real democracy and the use of surplus to benefit all of us and the planet?
Our choice is not only to resist fascism, but to build a better world in its place. Fascism survived 1945 by hiding behind anti-communism. Now it hides behind corporate globalism and anti-terrorism and fear. Yet, we have the only power it fears, that of the American people in whose name its excesses will be remembered or in whose honor its final end in human history will be accomplished by a choice of democracy over empire.
The intellectual thread that links 1933 to 2003 follows directly from Hitler's leading jurist who wrote the emergency legislation that followed the Reichstag fire and curtailed liberties allowing fascism to flourish. His philosophy was that society and law are based, as is all of politics, on a dichtomomous world made up of friends and enemies. "I know two types of law because I know two types of men, those who are with us and those who are against us" - Hermann Goering, 1936.
Bush is creating a dual legal system currently, in which justice is revenge, special courts and laws strip certain people of all rights and eventually citizenship itself. Hitler's jurist, the intellectual author of the law of the Reich had as his protege a man who came to the United States before Hitler took power. His protege became a leading professor at the University of Chicago and was the teacher and mentor for the new wave of neo-conservatives who now run this country out of the Bush White House, such as Wolfowitz, Pearl and Cheney. They carry forward the ideas of the divided society that marked Nazi Germany, and they are building it here in a time of crisis. Anyone know what the White Rose was? Time for a new one to bloom.
When Democracy Failed: The Warnings of History
by Thom Hartmann, CommonDreams.org, 16 March 2003
http://www.ratical.org/co-globalize/whenDemFaild.html- Subject: Invading Iraq: Dire Mistake
31 Mar 2003Even the old hands are shaking their heads.
Former CIA analyst: US `conned into war'
Robert Baer charges that the American-led invasion is a `dire mistake'
Lebanonwire, 29 March 2003
direMistake.html
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