| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Harry Hope" |
| Date: |
14 Jun 2005 06:09:58 AM |
| Object: |
Web of cold-blooded lies |
From The Toronto Sun, 6/12/05:
http://torontosun.canoe.ca/News/Columnists/Margolis_Eric/2005/06/12/1083345-sun.html
Web of cold-blooded lies
By ERIC MARGOLIS
PARIS --
In July 2002, the head of MI-6, Britain's secret intelligence service,
briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair and his cabinet on U.S. plans to
attack Iraq.
Sir Richard Dearlove ("M" to James Bond fans) reported that U.S.
President George Bush had decided to invade oil-rich Iraq in March
2003, in a war "to be justified by the conjunction of terrorism and
weapons of mass destruction. The intelligence and facts are being
fixed around the policy."
Translation:
The U.S. and British governments would concoct charges against Iraq to
justify war.
After Britain's attorney general warned that unprovoked invasion of
Iraq would violate international law, Dearlove opined with oily
cynicism, "If the political context were right, people would support
regime change."
Translation:
Use propaganda and scare tactics to whip up war fever.
British and U.S. intelligence agencies were ordered to produce
"evidence" to justify a war.
In the U.S., faked "evidence" and grotesque lies were fed to the
frightened public by pro-war neo-conservatives and frenzied national
media.
The U.S. Congress clapped for war like trained seals.
In October 2002, Bush actually claimed in a national speech that Iraqi
"drone" aircraft were poised to shower germs and poison gas on
America.
Vice-President ***** Cheney insisted this absurd allegation was the
"smoking gun" that justified invading Iraq.
Blair ordered his cabinet to support the invasion.
Bush, in his subsequent State of the Union speech, warned that Iraq
was importing uranium from Niger to build nuclear weapons aimed at the
U.S.
This ludicrous claim was based on a forged document.
The forgery was back-channelled to the Pentagon through neo-fascists
in Italian military intelligence.
And so it went.
Lie after lie.
Scare upon scare.
Fakery after fakery, trumpeted by the tame media that came to resemble
the lickspittle press of the old Soviet Union.
Ironically, in the end, horrid Saddam Hussein turned out to be telling
the truth all along, while Bush and Blair were not.
MI-6's smoking-gun memo, revealed for the first time last month in
London by the Sunday Times, would have forced any of Europe's
democratic governments to resign in disgrace.
But not Bush and Blair.
Far from it.
Though hounded over his Iraq lies by Britain's media, Blair squeaked
through a tight election thanks only to the pathetically inept
opposition Conservatives, who also backed the Iraq war.
By contrast, U.S. mass media amply confirmed charges of bias and
politicization levelled against them by first ignoring the MI-6 memo
story, then grudgingly devoting a few low-key stories to the dramatic
revelation.
Front pages, meanwhile, featured outing of the Nixon era's "Deep
Throat," who, it turned out, was part of a cabal of Nixon-haters
rather than a selfless patriot.
In retrospect, former president Richard Nixon's misdeeds appear
trivial compared to Bush's illegal, unnecessary and catastrophic war
against Iraq, which has so far killed some 100,000 Iraqis and
Americans, cost $275 billion US, and made America's name mud around
the globe.
But as Nazi bigwig Herman Goering observed correctly, a government can
get away with anything provided it scares its citizens enough.
France and Germany both knew from their own intelligence services that
the Anglo-U.S. accusations against Iraq were nonsense and Saddam was
no threat to anyone save his own miserable people.
That is why they refused to join the war in spite of U.S. threats and
tempting offers of oil concessions in postwar Iraq.
Britain readily accepted.
The U.S. ordered its intelligence services to shut their eyes, toe the
White House party line and accept as genuine patently false reports
about the Mideast from known disinformers and self-serving sources
that wanted to see Iraq destroyed.
But don't just blame Bush and Blair. VP Cheney, CIA boss George Tenet
(aka "Dr. Yes"), Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and other senior
administration officials who promoted falsehoods over Iraq and war
fever were just as guilty of deceiving and misleading the American
people and Congress.
Kudos go to Blair's former foreign secretary, Robin Cook, who refused
to be party to the lies and resigned.
No senior U.S. official had the guts or ethics to follow Cook's
admirable example.
_______________________________________________________________
'Nuff said.
Harry
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