US Invasion of Iraq-Updates

[gopher]

Halliburton quarterly profits up by 284 %:


http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0806-21.htm


Published on Saturday, August 6, 2005 by CommonDreams.org
Halliburton Secretly Doing Business with Key Member of Iran's Nuclear Team
by Jason Leopold

Scandal-plagued Halliburton, the oil services company once headed by Vice President Dick was secretly working with one of Iran’s top nuclear program officials on natural gas related projects and, allegedly, selling the officials' oil development company key components for a nuclear reactor, according to Halliburton sources with intimate knowledge into both companies’ business dealings.
Just last week a National Security Council report said Iran was a decade away from acquiring a nuclear bomb. That time frame could arguably have been significantly longer if Halliburton, which just reported a 284 percent increase in its fourth quarter profits due to its Iraq reconstruction contracts, was not actively providing the Iranian government with the financial means to build a nuclear weapon.

Now comes word that Halliburton, which has a long history of flouting U.S. law by conducting business with countries the Bush administration said has ties to terrorism, was working with Cyrus Nasseri, the vice chairman of the board of directors of Oriental Oil Kish, one of Iran’s largest private oil companies, on oil development projects in Tehran. Nasseri is also a key member of Iran’s nuclear development team.

“Nasseri, a senior Iranian diplomat negotiating with Europe over Iran's controversial nuclear program is at the heart of deals with US energy companies to develop the country's oil industry”, the Financial Times reported.

Nasseri was interrogated by Iranian authorities in late July for allegedly providing Halliburton with Iran’s nuclear secrets and accepting as much as $1 million in bribes from Halliburton, according to Iranian government officials.

It’s unclear whether Halliburton was privy to any of Iran’s nuclear activities. A company spokesperson did not return numerous calls for comment. A White House spokesperson also did not return calls for comment.

Oriental Oil Kish dealings with Halliburton became public knowledge in January when the company announced that it had subcontracted parts of the South Pars natural gas drilling project to Halliburton Products and Services, a subsidiary of Dallas-based Halliburton that is registered in the Cayman Islands.

Following the announcement, Halliburton announced the South Pars gas field project in Tehran would be its last project in Iran. The BBC reported that Halliburton, which took in $30-$40 million from its Iranian operations in 2003, "was winding down its work due to a poor business environment."

Halliburton, under mounting pressure from lawmakers in Washington, D.C., pulled out of its deal with Nasseri's company in May, but has done extensive work on other areas of the Iranian gas project and was still acting in an advisory capacity to Nasseri's company, two people who have knowledge of Halliburton's work in Iran said.

In attempt to curtail other U.S. companies from engaging in business dealings with rogue nations, the Senate approved legislation July 26 that would penalize companies that continue to skirt U.S. Law by setting up offshore subsidiaries as a way to legally conduct business in Libya, Iran and Syria, and avoid U.S. sanctions under International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The amendment, sponsored by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, is part of the Senate Defense Authorization bill.

"It prevents U.S. corporations from creating a shell company somewhere else in order to do business with rogue, terror-sponsoring nations such as Syria and Iran," Collins said in a statement.

"The bottom line is that if a U.S. company is evading sanctions to do business with one of these countries, they are helping to prop up countries that support terrorism - most often aimed against America," she said.

The law currently doesn’t prohibit foreign subsidiaries from conducting business with rogue nations provided that the subsidiaries are truly independent of the parent company.

But Halliburton’s Cayman Island subsidiary never did fit that description.

Halliburton first started doing business in Iran as early as 1995, while Vice President Cheney was chief executive of the company and in possible violation of U.S. Sanctions According to a February 2001 report in the Wall Street Journal, "Halliburton Products & Services Ltd. works behind an unmarked door on the ninth floor of a new north Tehran tower block. A brochure declares that the company was registered in 1975 in the Cayman Islands, is based in the Persian Gulf sheikdom of Dubai and is "non-American." But, like the sign over the receptionist's head, the brochure bears the company's name and red emblem, and offers services from Halliburton units around the world." Moreover, mail sent to the company’s offices in Tehran and the Cayman Islands is forwarded to the company’s Dallas headquarters.

Not surprisingly, in a letter drafted by trade groups representing corporate executives vehemently objected to the amendment saying it would lead to further hatred and perhaps incite terrorist attacks on the U.S and “greatly strain relations with the United States’ primary trading partners.”

"Extraterritorial measures irritate relations with the very nations the U.S. must secure cooperation from to promote multilateral strategies to fight terrorism and to address other areas of mutual concern," said a letter signed by the Coalition for Employment through Exports, Emergency Coalition for American Trade, National Foreign Trade Council, USA Engage, U.S. Council on International Business and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "Foreign governments view U.S. efforts to dictate their foreign and commercial policy as violations of sovereignty, often leading them to adopt retaliatory measures more at odds with U.S. goals.”

Still, Collins’ amendment has some holes. As Washington Times columnist Frank Gaffney pointed out in a July 25 story, “the Collins amendment would seek to penalize individuals or entities who evade IEEPA sanctions — if they are "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States."

“This is merely a restatement of existing regulations. The problem with this formulation is that, in the process of purportedly closing one loophole, it would appear to create new ones. As Sen. Collins told the Senate: "Some truly independent foreign subsidiaries are incorporated under the laws of the country in which they do business and are subject to that country's laws, to that legal jurisdiction. There is a great deal of difference between a corporation set up in a day, without any real employees or assets, and one that has been in existence for many years and that gets purchased, in part, by a U.S. firm. It is a safe bet that every foreign subsidiary of a U.S. Company doing business with terrorist states will claim it is one of the ones Sen. Collins would allow to continue enriching our enemies, not one prohibited from doing so.”

Going a step further, Dow Jones Newswires reported that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sent letters in June to energy corporations demanding that the companies disclose in their security filings any business dealings with terrorist supporting nations.

“The letters have been sent by the SEC's Office of Global Security Risk, a special division that monitors companies with operations in Iran and other countries under U.S. Sanctions, which were created by the U.S. Congress in 2004,” Dow Jones reported.

The move comes as investors have become increasingly concerned that they may be unwillingly supporting terrorist activity. In the case of Halliburton, the New York City Comptroller's office threatened in March 2003 to pull its $23 million investment in the company if Halliburton continued to conduct business with Iran.

The SEC letters are aimed at forcing corporations to disclose their profits from business dealings rogue nations. Oil companies, such as Devon Energy Corp., ConocoPhillips, Marathon Oil Corp. and Occidental Petroleum Corp. that currently conduct business with countries that sponsor terrorism, have not disclosed the profits received from terrorist countries in their most recent quarterly reports because the companies don’t consider the earnings “material.”

Devon Energy was until recently conducting business in Syria. The company just sold its stake in an oil field there. ConocoPhillips has a service contract with the Syrian Petroleum Co. that expires on Dec. 31.

Jason Leopold is the author of the explosive memoir, News Junkie, to be released in the spring of 2006 by Process/Feral House Books. Visit Leopold's website at www.jasonleopold.com for updates.

© 2005 Jason Leopold


************************************************************************************


Now you know what this criminal war is really all about!

 

[Ocean Breeze]

Tue Aug 9, 3:10 PM ET



WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Iran of allowing weapons to be smuggled across its border into Iraq, warning that "ultimately, it's a problem for Iran."

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US intelligence believes that a cache of newly manufactured Iranian bombs discovered about two weeks ago in northeastern Iraq came from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, a US intelligence official told AFP.

"It is true that weapons clearly, unambiguously from Iran have been found in Iraq," Rumsfeld told reporters.

He said he did not know whether there was official Iranian involvement in the weapons smuggling. But he added: "It's a big border and unhelpful for Iranians to be allowing weapons of those types to be crossing the border."

"It's a problem for the Iraqi government. It's a problem for the coalition forces. It's a problem for the international community. And ultimately, it's a problem for Iran," he said.

Pressed on what he meant, Rumsfeld said, "Well, they live in the neighborhood. The people in that region want this situation stabilized with exception of Iran and Syria," he said.

Rumsfeld and other senior administration officials have often attacked Syria for allowing Iraqi insurgents to move foreign fighters, money and arms across its borders.

But until now they had been more reserved about the role of Iran, whose Shiite regime has been viewed as more closely aligned to Iraq's Shiite majority than to an insurgency that has been drawn mainly from the country's Sunni minority.

The tougher line against Iran comes amid a spike in US casualties, including 14 marines and an interpreter who were killed last week when a triple decker mine went off under their amphibious assault vehicle.

General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that bomb was "a relatively small device place in the road that overturned the vehicle and when it did so, of course, there was no way out of the vehicle once it overturned."

The Iranian weapons found by US forces were reported to include more sophisticated "shaped" charges, which focus an explosions power in ways that can penetrate armor as thick as that of an M-1 tank.

"We believe they came from Iran's Revolutionary Guards," an intelligence official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity, adding that intelligence analysts had "fairly high confidence" in their conclusion.

The find is significant not only because of the Iranian connection but also because it indicates manufactured bombs are now being introduced in a conflict that has seen the widespread use of mainly improvised explosive devices.

"I think we believe there is more of them out there, that this is just the first cache we've actually obtained," the official said.

US commanders have warned of a surge in insurgent violence in the coming weeks as Iraqis draft and vote on a constitution, and then hold elections for a new government in December.

But they also are planning for a substantial reduction of the 138,000 US force in Iraq next spring and summer if those political milestones are met and Iraqi forces are strong enough to progressively assume responsibility for security.

Rumsfeld was emphatic, however, that any drawdown will depend on conditions on the ground, including the level of the insurgency.

Among the variables, he said, "are what are the Iranians doing? Are they going to be helpful or unhelpful? If they're increasingly unhelpful, then obviously the conditions on the ground are less advantageous.

"Same thing with the Syrians. Are they being helpful?" he said.

Asked how long it will take for the Iraqi security to take the lead in the fighting against insurgents, Myers said: "Nobody knows. It's event driven."

He said there were now 178,000 Iraqi security forces and they were coming on "at a certain rate with certain capabilities. We're not going to bet on that until we have that in hand."

hmm. Accusations : left and right. Can't have Iran interfering on the newly almost aquired US territory , (in reality, if not in name) now can we?? seems as per usual ,the only ones that take extensive liberties to meddle and now invade is the US..... anyone else try something similar and the US(G) screetches like a stuck pig.....

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9723.htm

on coffins and empires. :evil:

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://www9.sbs.com.au/theworldnews/region.php?id=117931&region=6


violence rages on, as death tolls rise.


( an aside and rather "curious"........ Seems in the current US of A....... it is deemed "unfavorable" to speak against presidential policies in a "time of war"..........yet it is just fine for said "prez" to take a prolonged vacation "in a time of war". Perhaps the difference is, that the US STARTED this mess. (with willful intent)

gets rather confusing to know the "etiquette" of these issues now... :?

 

[Ocean Breeze]

August 13, 2005

There is no longer any prospect of the United States winning the war in Iraq. Even Donald Rumsfeld has tacitly admitted that. Whatever opportunity there might have been following the initial invasion has been swept away by the abusive treatment of detainees, the wanton slaughter of civilians, and the systematic destruction of Iraqi society.

The war has entered a period of retrenchment; with both sides, firmly committed to their own objectives, doing whatever is required to win.

The news from Iraq is invariably tragic. The incidents of civilian deaths are up dramatically since the elections and there’s no sign of them relenting in the near future. Similarly, the militia violence and the massive detentions are trending upward and are likely to increase. Casualties among American servicemen have reached a new high at 1873 with the Marines taking the brunt of the losses. The Army Surgeon General reluctantly released a report confirming that 30% of the soldiers returning from Iraq are suffering from mental disorders. Also, the incidents of suicide among veterans are up markedly; a distressing omen of things to come. The US will harvest another generation of troubled veterans whose lives were ruined in a war of choice.

The number of suicide bombers has peaked in post-election Iraq, with hundreds, if not thousands of young Jihadis swarming to Iraq to fight the American occupation. It has become the cause celebre among Arab nationalists and is fueling a resurgence in Muslim unity. This revival, though still in its infant stage, will undoubtedly flourish as long as the United States occupies Iraq with combat troops and military bases.

Recent polls verify that the public fully grasps the connection between Iraq and the bombings in London. Since the subway attacks, reports from Chatham House, respected terror-experts, and even statements from one of the bombing suspects, confirm that Iraq has become the rallying cry for Islamic fighters. There’s no doubt that it will provide the primary breeding- grounds for the next generation of terrorists.

The “clash of civilizations” that both Bin Laden and George Bush so devoutly sought appears to be materializing. America’s unholy war has moved us all closer to a decades-long conflict and a reshaping of the geopolitical landscape.

The incidents of violence against Muslims in England are up 600% since 2004, and the Blair government and establishment media continue to fuel the public fear of radical Islam. It’s becoming increasingly clear that there’s a strategy to polarize the Muslim community and, in doing so, undermine long-held commitments to basic civil liberties. What is perceived to be a struggle between the West and Islam is, in fact, an attack on the fundamental protections and human rights afforded by the rule of law.

According to recent polls, Bush’s credibility on the issue of the war has dropped precipitously. A clear majority no longer believe that Bush is honest or has a clear plan to resolve the conflict. The majority of American’s also believe now that the war itself was a mistake. Mr. Bush’s personal handling of the war has slipped 19 percentage points in just two months; a telling indication of the public’s overall fatigue with the bad news from Iraq.

The Bush administration has tried to emphasize the importance of Iraq in the broader war on terror. It is a critical part of their public relations plan, but it is hopelessly flawed. For one thing, most Americans now believe that they are less safe from the threat of terrorism than they were before the war. The London bombings, and the very clear statement from bin Laden’s lieutenant al-Zawahiri, make it quite plain that Islamic extremists have been radicalized by the American invasion of Iraq and are prepared to strike back at civilian targets in the US and England.

Mr. Cheney’s original prediction of a “50 year war with terrorism” is looking to be astonishingly accurate. America’s conflict with the shadowy enemies of imperial policy is continuing in full force with no end in sight.

It’s a war that America cannot win.

Even if the Bush and Blair administrations continue on their present path of savaging civil liberties and militarizing their respective countries, their vision of the new world order is completely unrealistic. Critical oil pipelines are strung-across every continent. These are the empire’s arteries; the life’s-blood of the world economy. No army in the world can protect these crucial assets. With oil now surging at nearly 70 dollars per barrel these pipelines and facilities will become the natural target of terrorist attacks; thrusting the world towards economic Armageddon. The best strategy is the perhaps the most improbable; a negotiated settlement, redressing grievances, and a complete withdrawal of foreign troops from Muslim lands.

In other words, justice.

Reflective people will wonder in the days ahead, how the US detached itself from its basic principles and willfully engaged in this appalling crusade. Typically, we’re told that the driving forces behind the war were either oil, Israel, or the desire to project US military power into the Middle East. All of these are true to some extent, but they sidestep a more elemental point; the dramatic and fundamental imbalance in the distribution of power.

The pathological devotion to military strength among American elites has created a menacing colossus that endangers the entire world. It was only a matter of time before the lethal tools of the superpower would be put to use for destructive and self-aggrandizing purposes.

Iraq is the inevitable outcome of such awesome species-threatening power in the hands of a few men.

As American leaders now begin to brandish nuclear retaliation against Iran and promise to continue their disastrous strategy in Iraq, we can see the beginnings of a shift in the political sensibilities of the American people and in the world at large. The present paradigm, built on the exigencies of a gluttonous military, has plunged the world into chaos and threatened the species with environmental devastation. The US Military was built for aggressive war; a mission it has pursued almost without pause for the last 200 years. It is at the very center of our global malaise and dismantling it is everyone’s responsibility.

Absolutely Spot on.

 

[Ocean Breeze]

The American Iraqi-Constitution
Imad Khadduri, Free Iraq


August 13, 2005




"Driving toward a Monday deadline, Iraqi officials said U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad had presented to selected leaders Thursday a U.S. version of provisions of the new Iraqi constitution that remain in dispute.
"It's the full constitution but with the American points of view on the main points where we have differences," said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of Iraq's constitutional commission who is close to the Kurdish leadership.
Othman and other Kurds were awake at midnight going over the document.
Several versions of the constitution have been leaked over the past few weeks. One, drafted by the commission, largely reflects the thinking of Iraq's Shiite Muslims. Another was drafted by Kurds, and a third version included some Sunni proposals on the relative powers of the provinces and the central government.
"I guess you could say there's a Kurdish version, a Sunni [version], a Shiite [version] and an American one," said another person close to the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity."
Envoy Delivers U.S. Vision for Iraqi Constitution August 12, 2005

Guess which version (will) pass through, not so anonymously?
The answer is in the title above.

ahh.....Gee. No surprise here. And one can bet that the US military is there to stay .....um....indefinately. From fighting the "insurgents"......their role might be redefined into "protecting" the Iraqis. More twists and turns and lies as this travesty unfolds. End result. Bush gets what HE wanted.

 

[Ocean Breeze]

U.S. Lowers Sights On What Can Be Achieved in Iraq
Administration Is Shedding 'Unreality' That Dominated Invasion, Official Says

By Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 14, 2005; Page A01

The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad.

The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.



The remains of a bombed barber shop in Baghdad, where three people were killed, draw the interest of Iraqis in June. Islamic extremists, some of whom believe beards reflect religious piety, have been targeting the shops for attack and killing barbers. In response, barbers are posting signs stating that they do not shave men. (By Ceerwan Aziz -- Reuters)



News From Iraq
U.S. Lowers Sights On What Can Be Achieved in Iraq
Iraqi Sunnis Battle To Defend Shiites
Iraqi Chemical Stash Uncovered
Cindy Sheehan's Pitched Battle
U.S. Steps Up Role in Iraq Charter Talks
More News
"What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning."

Administration officials still emphasize how much they have achieved despite the chaos that followed the invasion and the escalating insurgency. "Iraqis are taking control of their country, building a free nation that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself. And we're helping Iraqis succeed," President Bush said yesterday in his radio address.

Iraqi officials yesterday struggled to agree on a draft constitution by a deadline of tomorrow so the document can be submitted to a vote in October. The political transition would be completed in December by elections for a permanent government.

But the realities of daily life are a constant reminder of how the initial U.S. ambitions have not been fulfilled in ways that Americans and Iraqis once anticipated. Many of Baghdad's 6 million people go without electricity for days in 120-degree heat. Parents fearful of kidnapping are keeping children indoors.

Barbers post signs saying they do not shave men, after months of barbers being killed by religious extremists. Ethnic or religious-based militias police the northern and southern portions of Iraq. Analysts estimate that in the whole of Iraq, unemployment is 50 percent to 65 percent.

U.S. officials say no turning point forced a reassessment. "It happened rather gradually," said the senior official, triggered by everything from the insurgency to shifting budgets to U.S. personnel changes in Baghdad.

The ferocious debate over a new constitution has particularly driven home the gap between the original U.S. goals and the realities after almost 28 months. The U.S. decision to invade Iraq was justified in part by the goal of establishing a secular and modern Iraq that honors human rights and unites disparate ethnic and religious communities.

But whatever the outcome on specific disputes, the document on which Iraq's future is to be built will require laws to be compliant with Islam. Kurds and Shiites are expecting de facto long-term political privileges. And women's rights will not be as firmly entrenched as Washington has tried to insist, U.S. officials and Iraq analysts say.

"We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic," said another U.S. official familiar with policymaking from the beginning, who like some others interviewed would speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. "That process is being repeated all over."

U.S. officials now acknowledge that they misread the strength of the sentiment among Kurds and Shiites to create a special status. The Shiites' request this month for autonomy to be guaranteed in the constitution stunned the Bush administration, even after more than two years of intense intervention in Iraq's political process, they said.

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4150160.stm


problems in bush's promise of "freedom ..blah , blah, blah....."

 

[Ocean Breeze]

August 16, 2005

US troops held five children as hostages to demand handover of insurgents near a northern Iraqi town on Tuesday, police said.

"The US forces surrounded the village of Mazraa near Baiji and detained five children under 10 years old, calling on the residents by loudspeakers to hand over several other children showed on TV channels celebrating the killing of US soldiers after roadside blast last week," a police source from Baiji told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

The US troops threatened to sweep the village by Wednesday morning to detain the other children and suspected insurgents, he said.

The US military, however, said they had no information about the incident.

Last week, four US soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a roadside bomb blast that hit their patrol near the northern oil refinery city of Baiji, some 200 km north of Baghdad.

An Iraqi police source in the nearby Tikrit city said insurgents struck the US patrol with several roadside bombs on a road in al-Mazraa village near Baiji before they attacked them with rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire.

Two US Humvees and a larger armored vehicle were also destroyed in the attack, said the police source.

(Source: xinhua)

:evil:

 

[Ocean Breeze]

American violence in Iraq: Necrophilia or savagery?
Part 1 of a 5-part series: Bully, cheat, kill, and conquer
Kim Petersen and B. J. Sabri, Online Journal Contributing writers


August 16, 2005



"As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead trying to kill me. They do not feel any enmity against me as an individual, nor I against them. They are only doing their duty, as the saying goes. Most of them, I have no doubt, are kind-hearted law-abiding men who would never dream of committing murder in private life. On the other hand, if one of them succeeds in blowing me to pieces with a well-placed bomb, he will never sleep any worse for it. He is serving his country, which has the power to absolve him from evil."—George Orwell
"War is necrophilia. And this necrophilia is central to soldiering, just as it is central to the makeup of suicide bombers and terrorists. The necrophilia is hidden under platitudes about duty or comradeship."—Chris Hedges
August 16, 2005—The strategic decision of US imperialism to use 9–11 as a pretext to re-introduce into the present era a defunct 15th-19th century barbaric colonialism is not only a monumental blunder portending cataclysmic disasters, but also an event that has already opened the gates for generalized future wars.

Two concomitant manifestations characterized that ill-fated decision: first, the open conversion of the US into a fascist, oppressive, and outlaw state; and second, the premeditated extreme violence and wanton destruction that US civilian and military commanders have been inflicting through their military on Afghanistan and Iraq to implement the hegemonic doctrines of Bush and the neocons.

In particular, considering the magnitude of that violence and its historical implications and consequences, the present authors decided to investigate it in the wider context of the ongoing US war against Iraq. The US is not alone in aggressing Iraq, but it is the kingpin; in fact, while it is technically correct to call Iraq's invasion, a US-UK invasion, such denomination dilutes the crucial US role as the sole chief engineer and the principal supplier of workforce and military hardware necessary to implement it.

On the other hand, although it is correct to state that Iraq's occupation is a multinational enterprise with the participation of many US-vassal states such as Australia, Italy, Poland, etc., the United States is the country that is directing the entire weight of the occupation. Consequently, and by all standards of judgment, Iraq is an American-occupied country. Without the US invasion, the domino effect of violence initiated by US President George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, and other neocons could have never happened in the first place.

Concentrating on the Iraq war is a fundamental prerequisite to the understanding of the new wars of colonialist conquests ushered in by the United States under Bush. To begin with, one cannot address the morally senseless American violence in the world, its application, and its rationales without considering all factors contributing to its emergence as the primary philosophy of the United States under President Bush. However, a basic approach to define the parameters of said violence resides in evaluating the environment in which the imperialist coalition executes its strategy for world domination.

Notice that, while George Orwell is celebrated for his views and elaborations in his novels such as Animal Farm and 1984, many people overlook the fact that he made those elaborations to describe an oppressive state in general; nevertheless, many readers uncritically identified such a state only with the former Soviet Union but never with the United States! This is odd. The US has been a police state since its inception, but too few people wish to consider it. Why is that? At one point, it was hard for many people who believed in the system to analyze its nature and policies, especially knowing that this system has adroitly mingled principles of manipulated democracy with manifest fascist ideology and police state attributes. McCarthyism is an example; America under Bush is another.

Did Orwell think that a so-called democratic state could exercise options that make totalitarian options pale by comparison? Orwell suggested such was possible, but what is certain is that he correctly framed the issue of violence and killing as exercised by professional state-paid killers, otherwise called enlisted or professional soldiers at the service of the system and its objectives.

On the other hand, war correspondent Chris Hedges forced the general issue of violence into the complicated psychological sphere of necrophilia. This is very debatable and does not reflect the objective-subjective situations where violence is the ultimate resolution for a conflict. Hedges did not define necrophilia as being specific to context; thus he equated all forms of necrophilia as one and interchangeable under the umbrella of "loving the dead." In addition, he loosely included in his term, soldiers, suicide bombers, and terrorists without bothering to ponder on specific human conditions that allowed such denominations to emerge and consolidate.

Yet Hedges touched on a sensitive subject. Is killing, especially in an environment of imperialist violence, a form of necrophilia? Despite its allure, this argument is fallacious at the origin. Consider all of the following: Does a drug dealer kill a police officer to avoid arrest or to enjoy killing? Does a soldier kill to defend himself, or to inflict death so he can achieve a predetermined political objective for his country? Does another soldier kill because he has a license to kill although he is not in mortal danger? Or does that same soldier kill out of sadism or because of racist anger? Does a so-called suicide bomber kill and get killed in the process to reverse the objective of an invading foreign soldier, or does he just kill to inflict death because he is seeking spiritual catharsis, as is claimed by certain imperialist thinkers and advocates of war?

Hedges then uses the term "terrorist" without due respect or clarity to the definition of the term. US troops killed over 2000 Fallujans under the criminal pretext that they were terrorists because they opposed the occupation of their city and country. So, hypothetically, if a Fallujan (in defending his life and that of his family) kills an American aggressor, would that killing constitute an act of necrophilia?

In addition, does the charge of necrophilia apply to a military commander, or better yet, to a commander-in-chief, when he launches a war of mass killing without provocation although he himself has never directly killed any one?

Still, despite the shortcomings in Hedges' argument, his definition of violence in a military setting as necrophilia has a merit, but not in the sense that he suggested. Bush and US Defense [sic] Secretary Donald Rumsfeld did not order the killing of tens-of-thousands of Iraqis because death and killing charm them or because they experience erotic arousal every time an American bomb chars beyond recognition the erstwhile living bodies of defenseless Iraqis.

The matter is very different. Bush and his fascist clique are psychopathic killers, shaped and nurtured through ideological indoctrination, although they may never have pulled a trigger. Bush and Rumsfeld did not order mass destruction because they enjoy it. They ordered killing to conquer countries and plunder their wealth for large corporations, the oil industry, military industry, and related service contractors, as well as to tinker with the dream of placing the world under the control of American power and its proxies. Killing and violence, therefore, are merely a means to an objective. Defining or trying to categorize this type of modern savagery is, however, another subject.

Regardless of "our" objection to the notion of necrophilia as it applies to the wars of American imperialism, there were a few situations where Hedges may have surmised it correctly. One instance is when (immediately after the invasion of Afghanistan) it was reported that George Bush told the Washington Post, each time a member of al-Qaeda network is killed, an "X" is put on a presidential scorecard. Not only that, but Bush added, "I'm a baseball fan. I want a scorecard." [1]

Without a doubt, Bush's deviant behavior is consistent with a seriously deranged personality that enjoys gratuitous death. In fact, how could Bush have known which al-Qaeda member was or was not devastated in Afghanistan by daisy cutters and possibly by nuclear tactical weapons, as many sources and foreign intelligence hint at? [2]

Stating that Bush experienced emotional pleasure from the death of people assumed to be al-Qaeda members without due process and without the minimum verification requirement of identity or culpability is easy to confirm by noting the following psychological status. Sport fans regularly go into ecstasy or even momentary delirium when their favorite team wins. The process whereby simple emotions transform from an ordinary response to an ecstatic demonstration of boiled emotions denotes a spasmodic internal pleasure. If, Bush can get his rapture from looking at a scoreboard on a baseball field or while sitting on a sofa in his home, then he can certainly experience similar pleasure when he sees a scorecard on the death and destruction he ordered. Is that necrophilia? You judge. Incidentally, although poignantly passed over in the media, Bush is the same president who pounded the air with his fist and chortled, "Feels good!" following his launching the invasion of Iraq. [3]

Further examination of the situation is revelatory. On the anniversary of granting fictitious sovereignty to the Iraqis, 30 June 2005, Bush definitely flirted with necrophilia when he stressed that all the killing and mayhem in Iraq is worth it. Former US Secretary of State Madeline Albright expressed the same genocidal feelings of the current war president; but before Albright, Truman epitomized the necrophilia paradigm when he said many years after the incineration of Hiroshima that, given the same circumstances, he would do it again.

The question now: How does George Bush translate and widen his lust for imperialist violence, be it necrophilic or otherwise?

With the following words, "And to those . . . who are considering a military career, there is no higher calling than service in our armed forces," the self-anointed war President Bush, mixing theological inferences and patriotic themes, implored young American citizens to join the armed forces of the United States. But the cause was not patriotism—this term is inapplicable to the wars of America that were never in self-defense or to ward off foreign powers that could threaten the US' existence. Rather, the purpose is to supply a fresh work force for the wars of civilization as envisioned by the imperialist and Zionist ideologues of the United States.

It is ludicrous that a man such as Bush makes an appeal like that, considering that he was one among many privileged Americans who circumvented the military draft by all means possible to avoid being shipped into America's aggression on Vietnam and nonetheless Bush deserted his post thereafter. [4] As expected, Bush employed the term "patriotism" and its conceptual force as a focal point of his call. Just what kind of force is patriotism, anyway?

Author Aldous Huxley illuminated the dark side of the force underlying "patriotism" in plain but powerful words: "One of the great attractions of patriotism, it fulfills our worst wishes. In the person of our nation, we are able, vicariously, to bully and cheat. Bully and cheat, what's more, with a feeling that we are profoundly virtuous."

Bully and cheat! But, was that not how the US of Bush and the UK of Prime Minister Tony Blair foisted their invasion and occupation first on Afghanistan and then on Iraq? If bullying and cheating were the tactics of choice to execute Bush's imperialist-colonialist project, the practical consequences produced by the occupation regime are dire in meaning and long-term effects, not only on the Iraqi people, but also on the occupiers themselves. By principle and logic, an aggressor has no right to claim victimization, as the aggressed can rightfully do.

Hence, resolutely, there should be no sympathy for any aggressor, or any empathy with the aggressor's pain and suffering. This is an important tenet of natural law that, by its force and logic, no one should deny or denigrate. Incidentally, the same tenet exists in many American courts, where a cold-blooded killer could receive a death sentence without regret.

How can the violence that the Bush-Blair Junta heaped on Iraq be framed in concrete terms? Aside from filling Iraq with depleted uranium, disease, and mass killing in the name of its imperialist dominance, what are the basic traits of its violence in Iraq?

In part two, this question shall be answered by citing first Human Rights Watch (HRW, a US NGO specialized in mitigating, for public consumption, the excesses of US violence, acting in effect as an apologist of US aggression). Notwithstanding this negative appraisal of HRW, this organization could not avoid but alluding to US atrocities in Iraq and elsewhere.

Furthermore, we shall discuss another aspect of US violence: ideological violence at home, and the confusion that reigns supreme over the minds of numerous Americans. In fact, while US physical violence in Iraq is occupying the center stage because of the continuing daily meat grinding of Iraqi citizens at the hands of the occupiers, a sizeable majority of the US population is still walking around like drugged-out zombies repeating a slogan impregnated with ignorance and permeated with support for violence: Support the troops!

ENDNOTES

[1] Toby Harnden, "Bush keeps photo hit-list of enemies," Telegraph, 4 February 2002

[2] Debka Intelligence Files, "Tactical nukes deployed in Afghanistan," WorldNetDaily.com, 7 October 2001

[3] Martin Merzer, Ron Hutcheson, and Drew Brown, "War begins in Iraq with strikes aimed at ﾑleadership targets,'" Knight Ridder Newspapers, 20 March 2003

[4] Ian Williams, author of Deserter: George Bush's War on Military Families, Veterans, and His Past (Nation Books, 2004), in a personal communication: "The evidence is clear that Bush used his personal family influence to secure a coveted slot in the Air National Guard—which protected him from conscription and posting to Vietnam. Then he moved to Alabama and did not turn up for duty at his Texas airbase, nor at the bases in Alabama, even while the war was continuing. At this time, lesser mortals who did the same thing were prosecuted and drafted. . . . As for how he got away with it . . . Firstly, there was a pruning of all records from the Texas Air National Guard, secondly, there were a lot of people who had colluded in the cover up and had a vested interest in keeping it quiet. . . . Secondly, there is an immense deference to authority in the American media, which predisposes editors against scrutiny of presidential behavior. . . . Finally, there is the gullibility of a faith based electorate. Time and again when speaking on radio in the heartland, I came across callers who sincerely believed that Bush was a veteran, not least because he kept appearing at Veterans' rallies and at military bases, usually in some form of military garb. There are millions of people in America who believe what is convenient for their faith systems."

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2005/081605.html


why withdrawl makes logical sense. (and why the fanatical extremists in Washington won't use logic)

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4158292.stm


Three explosions rock Baghdad.


( Bush has unleashed something , he might not be able to control anymore. .......and by choice, willfully and on a series of LIES.

Insanity .....personified as bush.


Nice going bush!! (NOT)....... people are being killed in YOUR g-damned war while you sit hiding on your ranch .......and don't even have the balls to face a grieving mother.......who's son died for YOUR stupid calculated and selfish war.

Now, if any of this makes any rational sense to anyone...... would sure like to hear it.

 

[Jo Canadian]

 

[Ocean Breeze]

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/coalition/2005/0803failed.htm


failure to "build a new Iraq"


( then again...... a "new" Iraq exists now---- just might not be the kind that the US (of war "geniuses"- (sarcasm intented)) had intended.

so many lives, so much destruction.......
.........Will the USG stand up and be held to account???

 

[Ocean Breeze]

The Trillion-Dollar War
By LINDA BILMES
Published: August 20, 2005
Cambridge, Mass.

THE human cost of the more than 2,000 American military personnel killed and 14,500 wounded so far in Iraq and Afghanistan is all too apparent. But the financial toll is still largely hidden from public view and, like the suffering of those who have lost loved ones, will persist long after the fighting is over.


The cost goes well beyond the more than $250 billion already spent on military operations and reconstruction. Basic running costs of the current conflicts are $6 billion a month - a figure that reflects the Pentagon's unprecedented reliance on expensive private contractors. Other factors keeping costs high include inducements for recruits and for military personnel serving second and third deployments, extra pay for reservists and members of the National Guard, as well as more than $2 billion a year in additional foreign aid to Jordan, Pakistan, Turkey and others to reward their cooperation in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill for repairing and replacing military hardware is $20 billion a year, according to figures from the Congressional Budget Office.

But the biggest long-term costs are disability and health payments for returning troops, which will be incurred even if hostilities were to stop tomorrow. The United States currently pays more than $2 billion in disability claims per year for 159,000 veterans of the 1991 gulf war, even though that conflict lasted only five weeks, with 148 dead and 467 wounded. Even assuming that the 525,000 American troops who have so far served in Iraq and Afghanistan will require treatment only on the same scale as their predecessors from the gulf war, these payments are likely to run at $7 billion a year for the next 45 years.

All of this spending will need to be financed by adding to the federal debt. Extra interest payments will total $200 billion or more even if the borrowing is repaid quickly. Conflict in the Middle East has also played a part in doubling the price of oil from $30 a barrel just prior to the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 to $60 a barrel today. Each $5 increase in the price of oil reduces our national income by about $17 billion a year.

Even by this simple yardstick, if the American military presence in the region lasts another five years, the total outlay for the war could stretch to more than $1.3 trillion, or $11,300 for every household in the United States.

Linda Bilmes, an assistant secretary at the Department of Commerce from 1999 to 2001, teaches budgeting and public finance at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

imagine the genuine good this amount of money could have done for the poor and under developed nations.......

 

[annabattler]

RE: US Invasion of Iraq-U

Why is it that just now,after one and a half terms in office,the American people are finally raising some questions about the "pre-emotive: strike?
Surely,American voters had the chance to get rid of Bush in 2004...and yet,they did not...blood lies on the hands of everyone who supported the Bush administration the second time round.

 

[jjw1965]

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/120604Madsen/120604madsen.html

 

[Ocean Breeze]

Apologists for Iraqi War Going BonkersAuthor
William Hughes
Date Created
21 Aug 2005
Ann Coulter is the Madame Defarge of the looney Right. She recently thrust her needle into Cindy Sheehan, accusing her of “engaging in Stalinist agitprop outside of President Bush’s Crawford ranch.” Then, the obviously unstable Robert Novak wrongly labeled supporters of Sheehan’s vigil as “extreme antiwar demonstrators.” As lies about the war are exposed and opposition to it grows, apologists for the Bush-Cheney Gang are collectively going bonkers.

"The unreal has about as much influence on them as the real..." Gustave Le Bon (1)

It is all in the realm of a collective madness! Apologists for the Iraqi War, a motley mob of sanctimonious Right Wing ranters, ranging from Ann Coulter, to Linda Chavez, to Robert Novak, and others, are going bonkers. (2) They are literally cracking up under the strain of seeing a war that they fully supported, which was based on a pack of deliberate lies, turning into a huge debacle. Their roles as shameless boosters for the Bush()-Cheney Gang in the failing scheme known by its dubious Pentagon-imposed title, “Operation Iraqi Freedom,” should forever darken their names and sully their reputations.

As their pro-War ship of bile continues to sink, these lackeys for the Establishment have targeted for abuse a prime symbol of the rising opposition in the country to the immoral conflict: Cindy Sheehan! They have also begun a malicious smear campaign against pro-Peace groups, like: Code Pink-Women for Peace, United for Peace and Justice and Veterans for Peace. The obviously unstable Robert Novak, on Aug. 20, 2005, even questioned the patriotism of the members of these fine organizations, who have showed up to support Sheehan at her vigil in Crawford, Texas, by wrongly labeling them as “extreme antiwar demonstrators.” (3)

Novak is an ultraconservative egomaniac. He recently walked off a CNN program, "Inside Politics, throwing a hissing fit and cussing on air, too, because questions about his sleazy role in the Valerie Plame affair might have been raised on the show. (4) One Capitol Hill insider suggested to me that the aging Novak’s bizarre conduct that evening might have had something to do with the fact that, despite Washington’s searing heat wave in early August, he stupidly persists "in wearing a suit, with a vest!"

This brings me to Ann Coulter, the Madame Defarge of the looney Right! I get the impression when I watch her ranting on the TV that she has just been released on a weekend pass from the local insane asylum. Coulter has been called everything from a "Neo-Nazi" to the "Antichrist" to someone with the "charm of a rattlesnake." (5) On August 18, 2005, she viciously accused Cindy Sheehan of "engaging in Stalinist agitprop outside President Bush's Crawford ranch. It's the strangest method of grieving I've seen since Paul Wellstone's funeral. Someone needs to teach these liberals how to mourn," she insensitively roared. (6) After the 9/11 tragedy, the whacky Coulter railed on Sept. 12, 2001, "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." (7) I wondered: "Did she ever work as an intern under the ex-NY Times editor, 'Mad Abe' Rosenthal?" (8) Later the mean spirited Coulter penned another racist, fascist-ringing creed for the Far Right "National Review," that babbled, "Congress could pass a law tomorrow requiring that all aliens from Arabic countries leave....We should require passports to fly domestically. Passports can be forged, but they can also be checked with the home country in case of any suspicious-looking swarthy males." That disgusting column was, mercifully, spiked by the editor of the NR and she was quickly dropped as one of its contributing editors. (7)

Another conservative incendiary, who is apparently losing his mind, too, is the pompous Tony Snow. He branded Sheehan as a "useful idiot." Then, he went on to falsely characterize her passionate supporters as: "A cadre of nostalgic malcontents, which includes septuagenarian ex-war protesters, a confirmed Beatnik and some people who regularly wear shoes. Their bodies are there, but alas, most of them abandoned their minds in 1968." (9)

Moving on to the mostly shrill Linda Chavez. She is a "Grade A" warmonger and a notorious basher of the Labor Movement. I remember seeing her at a pro-war rally on the National Mall, on April 12, 2003, in Washington, DC. When I noticed her standing next to that revolting Neocon and Chickenhawk, William Kristol, I wanted to throw up. Here is one of Chavez's falsehoods about Cindy, "Perhaps Mrs. Sheehan truly believes the Bush administration and its 'neo-con' -- read pro-Israel -- allies orchestrated the horrific deaths of 3,000 Americans in order to justify going to war with Iraq(), but if so, she's gone mad. More likely, she's spouting the lies fed her by conspiracy theorists who hate America and Israel in equal amounts." (10)

Finally-(and this is a very big if)-IF this were a just world, the rabid war hawks, like Novak, Coulter, Snow and Chavez, et al, would all be destined to be branded on their foreheads with a "W" for Warmonger. This would serve as both a punishment for their vile actions and as a reminder to their fellow citizens that there is a price the media pimps for the Iraqi War must pay for advocating using our military forces in a conflict that is based on a pack of lies. (11)

 

[Ocean Breeze]

Re: RE: US Invasion of Iraq-U

Why is it that just now,after one and a half terms in office,the American people are finally raising some questions about the "pre-emotive: strike?
Surely,American voters had the chance to get rid of Bush in 2004...and yet,they did not...blood lies on the hands of everyone who supported the Bush administration the second time round.

absolutely Spot on. !! Bravo. Maybe the "American people" are just too brainwashed and as a result are now slow learners , and very slow to realize the implications of their decisions. Maybe they did not care about the Iraqis as such.....and saw another power position for the US and an additional element to boast about. Just like millions world wide..... it was shocking to see the "Americans" re-elect this bimbo for another four long years . But what goes around , comes around....... and when they finally wake up to what they have done....and the consequences of all this...... it just might be too late. They are the author of their own misfortune and refuse to accept responsibility for this, or their role in the destruction on this plane today. Narcissism has its price.

 

[jimmoyer]

A small point but annabattler includes Novak as a war hawk, but if research was to be done on this matter, Novak along with Pat Buchannan were two conservatives who urged America not to go to war in Iraq and their consistency on this matter also included the Yugoslavian wars and Somalia.

Small point but true, and in the fervor of that post believing itself to be correct in every way, mistaken attributions are made.

Also this post along with many others has never considered the alternative in that all were sure Saddam in power would be better than what is going on now.

Guarrantees in either position are hard to find.