Thursday, June 16, 2005
Stop the Crime of the Century
by David Michael Green
On May 1, 2005, The Sunday Times of London published the 'smoking gun' memo, which proves that everything the Bush administration said about the Iraq invasion was a lie. The memo discloses, "...The intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."(the policy to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD)
Several days before their election, a patriot within the highest circle of British government leaked to the Times of London a memo. It is headlined in bold with this warning: "This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents." The memo provides minutes from a meeting of Tony Blair's most exclusive war cabinet, held in July of 2002. In the meeting, two of Blair's top officials report on discussions they had just held in Washington with officials at the top levels of the Bush administration.
It needs to be pointed out that nobody in the British government has denied to even the slightest degree the authenticity of this document. And, a highly placed American source has verified, off the record, that it is completely accurate in its recounting of the events described.
The main points in the memo are as follows:
* "Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action..." Later in the memo it notes that "It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action".
* As Foreign Secretary Jack Straw notes in the meeting, "But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran".
* Because the case was thin, the war would have to be "...Justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD".
* "...the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy".
* The British Attorney-General said, "the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action. There were three possible legal bases: self-defense, humanitarian intervention, or UNSC authorization [which was never ultimately obtained from the Security Council]. The first and second could not be the base in this case. Relying on UNSCR 1205 of three years ago would be difficult. The situation might change of course."
* "We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force". And, "The Prime Minister said that it would make a big difference politically and legally if Saddam refused to allow in the UN inspectors". And, "If the political context were right, people would support regime change".
* "US had already begun 'spikes of activity' to put pressure on the regime".
* "There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action".
This means the claims that the president did not have a war plan on his desk at that time are now proven lies. It means that the whole charade of going to Congress, going to the UN, sending over weapons inspectors, pulling them out before they could finish their work, requiring Iraq to report to the Security Council on its weapons of mass destruction, then immediately rejecting their report as incomplete and deceitful - all of this - was a completely counterfeit exercise conducted for public relations purposes only.
It also verifies the revelations of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and former terrorism czar Richard Clarke that Bush had planned to attack Iraq from the beginning. And, it proves that former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz wasn't kidding when he let slip that the weapons of mass destruction argument was decided on by the administration for "bureaucratic reasons", meaning a rationale that all the leading actors within the administration could agree on as the most effective public relations device for marketing the war.
Apart from 9/11, has there been a more important story in the last decade than that the president manufactured intelligence to dupe the American people into invading Iraq, which plunged the country into an illegal war which has alienated the rest of the world, lit a fire under the war's victims and the Islamic world generally, turning them into enemy combatants, locked up virtually all American land forces in a war without end in sight, cost $300 billion and counting, taken over 1600 American lives on top of more than 15,000 gravely wounded, and killed perhaps 100,000 Iraqis?
There could not be a bigger story! And, yet, it has been mostly censored from our press.
It appears that demanding that the government respect the will of the people is no longer enough in American democracy. We must now also carry the burden of demanding that the media do its job and cover developments which are disruptive to the corporate-political juggernaut of which these giant media corporations have become a part. The mainstream press which before the 'smoking gun' memo seemed only biased and intimidated, now appears entirely complicate. We cannot have a prayer of an informed public curbing the worst excesses of American government if, in fact, that public is not informed.
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by David Michael Green
On May 1, 2005, The Sunday Times of London published the 'smoking gun' memo, which proves that everything the Bush administration said about the Iraq invasion was a lie. The memo discloses, "...The intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."(the policy to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD)
Several days before their election, a patriot within the highest circle of British government leaked to the Times of London a memo. It is headlined in bold with this warning: "This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents." The memo provides minutes from a meeting of Tony Blair's most exclusive war cabinet, held in July of 2002. In the meeting, two of Blair's top officials report on discussions they had just held in Washington with officials at the top levels of the Bush administration.
It needs to be pointed out that nobody in the British government has denied to even the slightest degree the authenticity of this document. And, a highly placed American source has verified, off the record, that it is completely accurate in its recounting of the events described.
The main points in the memo are as follows:
* "Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action..." Later in the memo it notes that "It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action".
* As Foreign Secretary Jack Straw notes in the meeting, "But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran".
* Because the case was thin, the war would have to be "...Justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD".
* "...the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy".
* The British Attorney-General said, "the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action. There were three possible legal bases: self-defense, humanitarian intervention, or UNSC authorization [which was never ultimately obtained from the Security Council]. The first and second could not be the base in this case. Relying on UNSCR 1205 of three years ago would be difficult. The situation might change of course."
* "We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force". And, "The Prime Minister said that it would make a big difference politically and legally if Saddam refused to allow in the UN inspectors". And, "If the political context were right, people would support regime change".
* "US had already begun 'spikes of activity' to put pressure on the regime".
* "There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action".
This means the claims that the president did not have a war plan on his desk at that time are now proven lies. It means that the whole charade of going to Congress, going to the UN, sending over weapons inspectors, pulling them out before they could finish their work, requiring Iraq to report to the Security Council on its weapons of mass destruction, then immediately rejecting their report as incomplete and deceitful - all of this - was a completely counterfeit exercise conducted for public relations purposes only.
It also verifies the revelations of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and former terrorism czar Richard Clarke that Bush had planned to attack Iraq from the beginning. And, it proves that former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz wasn't kidding when he let slip that the weapons of mass destruction argument was decided on by the administration for "bureaucratic reasons", meaning a rationale that all the leading actors within the administration could agree on as the most effective public relations device for marketing the war.
Apart from 9/11, has there been a more important story in the last decade than that the president manufactured intelligence to dupe the American people into invading Iraq, which plunged the country into an illegal war which has alienated the rest of the world, lit a fire under the war's victims and the Islamic world generally, turning them into enemy combatants, locked up virtually all American land forces in a war without end in sight, cost $300 billion and counting, taken over 1600 American lives on top of more than 15,000 gravely wounded, and killed perhaps 100,000 Iraqis?
There could not be a bigger story! And, yet, it has been mostly censored from our press.
It appears that demanding that the government respect the will of the people is no longer enough in American democracy. We must now also carry the burden of demanding that the media do its job and cover developments which are disruptive to the corporate-political juggernaut of which these giant media corporations have become a part. The mainstream press which before the 'smoking gun' memo seemed only biased and intimidated, now appears entirely complicate. We cannot have a prayer of an informed public curbing the worst excesses of American government if, in fact, that public is not informed.
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