"It doesn't matter to them if it's untrue. It's a higher
truth"
By
William Blum
November 5, 2011
"We came, we saw,
he died." ~ US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, giggling,
as she spoke of the alleged murder of Moammar Gaddafi.
Imagine Osama bin Laden
or some other Islamic leader speaking of 9-11: "We came, we saw, 3,000
died ... ha-ha."
Clinton and her
partners-in-crime in NATO can also have a good laugh at how they deceived the
world.
The destruction of Libya,
the reduction of a modern welfare state to piles of rubble, to ghost towns, the
murder of thousands ~ this tragedy was the culmination of a series of
falsehoods spread by the Libyan rebels, the Western powers, and Qatar (through
its television station, al-Jazeera) ~ from the declared imminence of a
"bloodbath" in rebel-held Benghazi if the West didn't intervene to
stories of government helicopter-gunships and airplanes spraying gunfire onto
large numbers of civilians to tales of Viagra-induced mass rapes by Gaddafi's
army.
This last fable was
proclaimed at the United Nations by the American Ambassador, as if young
soldiers needed Viagra to get it up! *1
The New York Times (March
22) observed:
... the rebels feel no loyalty to the truth in shaping their propaganda, claiming nonexistent battlefield victories, asserting they were still fighting in a key city days after it fell to Qaddafi forces, and making vastly inflated claims of his barbaric behavior.
The Los Angeles Times (April
7) added this about the rebels' media operation:
It's not exactly fair and balanced media. In fact, as [its editor] helpfully pointed out, there are four inviolate rules of coverage on the two rebel radio stations, TV station and newspaper:
1. No pro-[Qaddafi] reportage or commentary2. No mention of a civil war. (The Libyan people, east and west, are unified in a war against a totalitarian regime.)3. No discussion of tribes or tribalism. (There is only one tribe: Libya.)4. No references to Al Qaeda or Islamic extremism. (That's [Qaddafi's] propaganda.)
The Libyan government
undoubtedly spouted its share of misinformation, but it was the rebels' trail
of lies, both of omission and commission, which was used by the UN Security
Council to justify its vote for "humanitarian" intervention; followed
in Act Three by unrelenting NATO/US bombs and drone missiles, day after day,
week after week, month after month; you can't get much more humanitarian than
that.
If the people of Libya
prior to the NATO/US bombardment had been offered a referendum on it, can it be
imagined that they would have endorsed it?
In fact, it appears
rather likely that a majority of Libyans supported Gaddafi.
How else could the
government have held off the most powerful military forces in the world for
more than seven months?
Before NATO and the US
laid waste to the land, Libya had the highest life expectancy, lowest infant
mortality, and highest UN Human Development Index in Africa. During the first
few months of the civil war, giant rallies were held in support of the Libyan
leader. *2
For further discussion of
why Libyans may have been motivated to support Gaddafi, have a look at this
video:
If Gaddafi had been less
oppressive of his political opposition over the years and had made some
gestures of accommodation to them during the Arab Spring, the benevolent side
of his regime might still be keeping him in power, although the world has
plentiful evidence making it plain that the Western powers are not particularly
concerned about political oppression except to use as an excuse for intervention
when they want to; indeed, government files seized in Tripoli during the
fighting show that the CIA and British intelligence worked with the Libyan
government in tracking down dissidents, turning them over to Libya, and taking
part in interrogations. *3
In any event, many of the
rebels had a religious motive for opposing the government and played dominant
roles within the rebel army; previously a number of them had fought against the
United States in Afghanistan and Iraq. *4
The new Libyan regime
promptly announced that Islamic sharia law would be the "basic
source" of legislation, and laws that contradict "the teachings of
Islam" would be nullified; there would also be a reinstitution of
polygamy; the Muslim holy book, the Quran, allows men up to four wives. *5
Thus, just as in
Afghanistan in the 1980-90s, the United States has supported Islamic militants
fighting against a secular government. The American government has imprisoned
many people as "terrorists" in the United States for a lot less.
What began in Libya as
"normal" civil war violence from both sides ~ repeated before and
since by the governments of Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, and Syria without any
Western military intervention at all (the US actually continues to arm the
Bahrain and Yemen regimes) ~ was transformed by the Western propaganda machine
into a serious Gaddafi genocide of innocent Libyans.
Addressing the validity
of this very key issue is another video, "Humanitarian War in Libya: There is no evidence".
The main feature of the film is an interview with Soliman Bouchuiguir,
Secretary-General, and one of the founders in 1989, of the Libyan League for
Human Rights, perhaps the leading Libyan dissident group, in exile in Switzerland.
Bouchuiguir is asked
several times if he can document various charges made against the Libyan
leader.
Where is the proof of the many rapes?The many other alleged atrocities?The more than 6,000 civilians alleged killed by Gaddafi's planes?Again and again Bouchuiguir cites the National Transitional Council as the source.
Yes, that's the rebels
who carried out the civil war in conjunction with the NATO/US forces. At other
times Bouchuiguir speaks of "eyewitnesses": "little girls, boys
who were there, whose families we know personally". After awhile, he
declares that "there is no way" to document these things.
This is probably true to
some extent, but why, then, the UN Security Council resolution for a military
intervention in Libya? Why almost eight months of bombing?
Bouchuiguir also mentions
his organization's working with the National Endowment for Democracy in their
effort against Gaddafi, and one has to wonder if the man has any idea that the
NED was founded to be a front for the CIA. Literally.
Another source of charges
against Gaddafi and his sons has been the International Criminal Court.
The Court's Chief
Prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, is shown in this film at a news conference
discussing the same question of proof of the charges. He refers to an ICC
document of 77 pages which he says contains the evidence. The film displays the
document's Table of Contents, which shows that pages 17-71 are not available to
the public; these pages, apparently the ones containing the testimony and
evidence, are marked as "redacted". In an appendix, the ICC report
lists its news sources; these include Fox News, CNN, the CIA, Soliman
Bouchuiguir, and the Libyan League for Human Rights. Earlier, the film had
presented Bouchuiguir citing the ICC as one of his sources. The documentation
is thus a closed circle.
Historical footnote:
"Aerial bombing of civilians was pioneered by the Italians in Libya in
1911, perfected by the British in Iraq in 1920 and used by the French in 1925
to level whole quarters of Syrian cities. Home demolitions, collective
punishment, summary execution, detention without trial, routine torture ~ these
were the weapons of Europe's takeover" in the Mideast. *6
The
worldwide eternal belief that American foreign policy has a good side that can
be appealed to
On April 6, 2011 Moammar
Gaddafi wrote a letter to President Obama, in which he said:
"We have been hurt more morally than physically because of what had happened against us in both deeds and words by you. Despite all this you will always remain our son whatever happened. ... Our dear son, Excellency, Baraka Hussein Abu Oubama, your intervention in the name of the U.S.A. is a must, so that NATO would withdraw finally from the Libyan affair." *7
Before the American
invasion in March 2003, Iraq tried to negotiate a peace deal with the United
States. Iraqi officials, including the chief of the Iraqi Intelligence Service,
wanted Washington to know that Iraq no longer had weapons of mass destruction
and offered to allow American troops and experts to conduct a search; they also
offered full support for any US plan in the Arab-Israeli peace process, and to
hand over a man accused of being involved in the World Trade Center bombing in
1993. If this is about oil, they added, they would also talk about US oil
concessions. *8
Then came shock and awe!
In 2002, before the coup
in Venezuela that briefly ousted Hugo Chávez, some of the plotters went to
Washington to get a green light from the Bush administration. Chávez learned of
this visit and was so distressed by it that he sent officials from his
government to plead his own case in Washington. The success of this endeavor
can be judged by the fact that the coup took place shortly thereafter. *9
In 1994, it was reported
that the leader of the Zapatista rebels in Mexico, Subcommander Marcos, said
that "he expects the United States to support the Zapatistas once US
intelligence agencies are convinced the movement is not influenced by Cubans or
Russians." "Finally," Marcos said, "they are going to
conclude that this is a Mexican problem, with just and true causes." *10
Yet for many years, the
United States provided the Mexican military with all the training and tools
needed to crush the Zapatistas.
The Guatemalan foreign
minister in 1954, Cheddi Jagan of British Guiana in 1961, and Maurice Bishop of
Grenada in 1983 all made their appeals to Washington to be left in peace. *11
The governments of all
three countries were overthrown by the United States.
In 1945 and 1946,
Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh, a genuine admirer of America and the Declaration
of Independence, wrote at least eight letters to President Harry Truman and the
State Department asking for America's help in winning Vietnamese independence
from the French. He wrote that world peace was being endangered by French
efforts to reconquer Indochina and he requested that "the four
powers" (US, USSR, China, and Great Britain) intervene in order to mediate
a fair settlement and bring the Indochinese issue before the United Nations. *12
Ho Chi Minh received no reply.
He was, after all, some sort of communist.
AMERICA'S
PRESSTITUTES
Imagine that the vicious
police attack of October 25 on the Occupy Oakland encampment had taken place in
Iran or Cuba or Venezuela or in any other ODE (Officially Designated Enemy) ...
Page One Righteous Indignation with Shocking Photos.
But here's the Washington
Post the next day:
A three-inch story on page three with a headline: "Protesters wearing out their welcome nationwide"; no mention of the Iraqi veteran left unconscious from a police projectile making contact with his head; as to photos: just one ~ an Oakland police officer petting a cat that was left behind by the protesters.
And here's TV comedian
Jay Leno the same night as the police attack in Oakland: "They say Moammar
Gaddafi may have been one of the richest men in the world ... 200 billion
dollars. With all of the billions he had, he spent very little on education or
health care for his country. So I guess he was a Republican." *13
The object of Leno's
humor was of course the Republicans, but it served the cause of further
demonizing Gaddafi and thus adding to the "justification" of
America's murderous attack on Libya.
If I had been one of
Leno's guests sitting there, I would have turned to the audience and said:
"Listen people, under Gaddafi health care and education were completely free. Wouldn't you like to have that here?"
I think that enough
people in the audience would have applauded or shouted to force Leno to back
off a bit from his indoctrinated, mindless remark.
And just for the record, the 200 billion dollars is not money found in Gaddafi's personal bank accounts anywhere in the world, but money belonging to the Libyan state. But why quibble? There's no business like show business.
THE
IRAQI LULLABYE
On February 17, 2003, a
month before the US bombing of Iraq began, I posted to the Internet an essay
entitled "What Do the Imperial Mafia Really Want?"
concerning the expected war. Included in this were the words of Michael Ledeen,
former Reagan official, then at the American Enterprise Institute, which was
one of the leading drum-beaters for attacking Iraq:
If we just let our own
vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely, and we don't try to
be clever and piece together clever diplomatic solutions to this thing, but
just wage a total war against these tyrants, I think we will do very well, and
our children will sing great songs about us years from now.
After a year of the tragic
farce that was the American intervention in Iraq I could not resist. I sent Mr.
Ledeen an email reminding him of his words and saying simply: "I'd like to
ask you what songs your children are singing these days."
I received no reply.
Has there ever been an
empire that didn't tell itself and the world that it was unlike all other
empires, that its mission was not to plunder and control but to enlighten and
liberate?
The
United Nations vote on the Cuba embargo ~ 20 years in a row
For years American political
leaders and media were fond of labeling Cuba an "international
pariah". We don't hear that any more. Perhaps one reason is the annual
vote in the United Nations General Assembly on the resolution which reads:
"Necessity of ending the economic, commercial and financial embargo imposed by the United States of America against Cuba". This is how the vote has gone (not including abstentions):
1992 yes:
59, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
1993 yes:
88, no: 4, no votes: US, Israel, Albania, Paraguay
1994 yes:
101, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
1995 yes:
117, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Uzbekistan
1996 yes:
138, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Uzbekistan
1997 yes:
143, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Uzbekistan
1998 yes:
157, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
1999 yes:
155, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
2000 yes:
167, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands
2001 yes:
167, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands
2002 yes:
173, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands
2003 yes:
179, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands
2004 yes:
179, no: 4, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau
2005 yes:
182, no: 4, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau
2006 yes:
183, no: 4, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau
2007 yes:
184, no: 4, no votes: US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau
2008 yes:
185, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Palau
2009 yes:
187, no: 3, no votes: US, Israel, Palau
2010 yes:
187, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
2011 yes:
186, no: 2, no votes: US, Israel
Each fall the UN vote is
a welcome reminder that the world has not completely lost its senses and that
the American empire does not completely control the opinion of other
governments.
How it began: On April 6,
1960, Lester D. Mallory, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American
Affairs, wrote in an internal memorandum: "The majority of Cubans support
Castro ~ The only foreseeable means of alienating internal support is through
disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship.
~ every possible means should be undertaken promptly to weaken the economic
life of Cuba."
Mallory proposed "a line of action which ~ makes the
greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary
and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of
government."14 Later that year, the Eisenhower administration instituted
the suffocating embargo against its eternally-declared enemy.
NOTES
*1: Viagra: Reuters,
April 29, 2011
*3: The Guardian
(London), September 3, 2011
*4: Washington Post,
September 15, 2011, "Islamists rise to fore in new Libya"
*5: USA Today, October
24, 2011
*6: Rashid Khalidi,
professor of Arab studies, Columbia University, Washington Post, November 11,
2007
*7: Associated Press,
April 6, 2011, some obvious errors in the original have been corrected
*8: New York Times,
November 6, 2003
*9: New York Times, April
16, 2002
*10: Los Angeles Times,
February 24, 1994, p.7
*11: Guatemala: Stephen
Schlesinger and Stephen Kinzer, Bitter Fruit: The Untold Story of the American
Coup in Guatemala (1982), p.183; Jagan: Arthur Schlesinger, A Thousand Days
(1965), p.774-9; Bishop: Associated Press, May 29, 1983, "Leftist
Government Officials Visit United States"
*12: The Pentagon Papers
(NY Times edition, 1971), pp.4, 5, 8, 26; William Blum, Killing Hope, p.123)
*13: Washington Post,
October 26, 2011
*14: Department of State,
Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958-1960, Volume VI, Cuba (1991),
p.885
#
A friend tells me he now knows where the new Stormtroopers are being prepared by the ZioNazis to cause martial law in the U.S. - the Prisons, and the Neo-Nazi Skinheads are willingly, via their so-called white Aryan Identity 'Christianity,' worshipping the Jews racial identity Zionism of 'Eretz Israel' - it is past bizarre, but very real and dangerous. He paid dearly for this information. He said to tell you to take care always.
ReplyDeleteA frightening thought James. Recently we had the FBI warning that gangs are infiltrating the US military -
ReplyDelete"Gangs encourage members, associates, and relatives to obtain law enforcement, judiciary, or legal employment in order to gather information on rival gangs and law enforcement operations. Gang infiltration of the military continues to pose a significant criminal threat, as members of at least 53 gangs have been identified on both domestic and international military installations."
That seems to suggest some sort of supra-gang organisation or coordinating influence. A Freemasonry for the Underclass?
النازي الشيوعي النظام العالمي الجديد: تسبب مخدرات الغباء
ReplyDelete