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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
  
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Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report
« on: 2008-06-06 02:48:46 » |
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[Blunderov] Gosh. Who'da thunk? (Anybody who wanted to know could have simply checked in at Virus before, during and after.)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080605/pl_nm/iraq_usa_intelligence_dc
Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report By Randall Mikkelsen
Thu Jun 5, 1:23 PM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush and his top policymakers misstated Saddam Hussein's links to terrorism and ignored doubts among intelligence agencies about Iraq's arms programs as they made a case for war, the Senate intelligence committee reported on Thursday.
The report shows an administration that "led the nation to war on false premises," said the committee's Democratic Chairman, Sen. John Rockefeller of West Virginia. Several Republicans on the committee protested its findings as a "partisan exercise."
The committee studied major speeches by Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other officials in advance of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, and compared key assertions with intelligence available at the time.
Statements that Iraq had a partnership with al Qaeda were wrong and unsupported by intelligence, the report said.
It said that Bush's and Cheney's assertions that Saddam was prepared to arm terrorist groups with weapons of mass destruction for attacks on the United States contradicted available intelligence.
Such assertions had a strong resonance with a U.S. public, still reeling after al Qaeda's September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. Polls showed that many Americans believed Iraq played a role in the attacks, even long after Bush acknowledged in September 2003 that there was no evidence Saddam was involved.
The report also said administration prewar statements on Iraq's weapons programs were backed up in most cases by available U.S. intelligence, but officials failed to reflect internal debate over those findings, which proved wrong.
PUBLIC CAMPAIGN
The long-delayed Senate study supported previous reports and findings that the administration's main cases for war -- that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and was spreading them to terrorists -- were inaccurate and deeply flawed.
"The president and his advisors undertook a relentless public campaign in the aftermath of the (September 11) attacks to use the war against al Qaeda as a justification for overthrowing Saddam Hussein," Rockefeller said in written commentary on the report.
"Representing to the American people that the two had an operational partnership and posed a single, indistinguishable threat was fundamentally misleading and led the nation to war on false premises."
A statement to Congress by then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that the Iraqi government hid weapons of mass destruction in facilities underground was not backed up by intelligence information, the report said. Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon said Rumsfeld's comments should be investigated further, but he stopped short of urging a criminal probe.
The committee voted 10-5 to approve the report, with two Republican lawmakers supporting it. Sen. Christopher Bond of Missouri and three other Republican panel members denounced the study in an attached dissent.
"The committee finds itself once again consumed with political gamesmanship," the Republicans said. The effort to produce the report "has indeed resulted in a partisan exercise." They said, however, that the report demonstrated that Bush administration statements were backed by intelligence and "it was the intelligence that was faulty."
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said: "We had the intelligence that we had, fully vetted, but it was wrong. We certainly regret that and we've taken measures to fix it."
PUBLIC SUPPORT
U.S. public opinion on the war, supportive at first, has soured, contributing to a dive in Bush's popularity.
The conflict is likely to be a key issue in the November presidential election between Republican John McCain, who supports the war, and Democrat Barack Obama, who opposed the war from the start and says he would aim to pull U.S. troops out within 16 months of taking office in January 2009.
Rockefeller has announced his support for Obama.
The administration's record in making its case for Iraq has also been cited by critics of Bush's get-tough policy on Iran. They accuse Bush of overstating the potential threat of Iran's nuclear program in order to justify the possible use of force.
A second report by the committee faulted the administration's handling of December 2001 Rome meetings between defense officials and Iranian informants, which dealt with the Iran issue. It said department officials failed to share intelligence from the meeting, which Rockefeller said demonstrated a "fundamental disdain" for other intelligence agencies.
(Additional reporting by Andy Sullivan, Donna Smith)
(Editing by Frances Kerry)
[Blunderov] Obviously scared shitless at the looming consequences of not being in power anymore, the Bush administration and The Grinning Mountebank of Downing Street are claiming that the intelligence was "wrong" and that they made an honest mistake based on what they knew at the time. Ha fucking ha. Just how stupid do they think we are? We all remember "stovepiped" intelligence deliberately designed to bypass the scrutiny of intelligence professionals. We all remember The Downing Street Minutes. We all remember Colin Powell's mobile biowarfare laboratories. Retribution awaits. They shall smart for this.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0603/p04s01-wome.html
Why Australia is leaving Iraq
Prime Minister Rudd criticized the US justification for the 2003 invasion of Iraq as 550 Australian troops packed up to leave.
By Nick Squires | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
from the June 3, 2008 edition
Sydney, Australia - Australia's prime minister said Monday that the reasons used to justify joining the war in Iraq turned out to be false.
Labor leader Kevin Rudd made the remarks a day after ordering his country's 550 combat troops to head home after five years in Iraq.
As one of the United States' staunchest allies, Australia was quick to pledge military support for the US-led coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003. But that decision was made by conservative prime minister John Howard, whose 11 years in office came to an end in November's election.
Bringing home Australia's small but politically significant contingent of combat troops was one of Mr. Rudd's main election campaign pledges.
He dismissed one by one the reasons used by the Howard administration – and by association the Bush administration – to topple Saddam Hussein.
"Have further terrorist attacks been prevented? No, they have not been, as the victims of the Madrid train bombing will attest," Rudd told Parliament.
"Has any evidence of a link between weapons of mass destruction and the former Iraqi regime and terrorists been found? No.
"Have the actions of rogue states like Iran been moderated? No ... Iran's nuclear ambitions remain a fundamental challenge.
"After five years, has the humanitarian crisis in Iraq been removed? No, it has not."
Rudd said there had been a "failure to disclose to the Australian people the qualified nature of the intelligence. For example, the prewar warning that an attack on Iraq would increase the terrorist threat, not decrease it."
In response to Rudd's remarks, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters Monday that "we acted on the intelligence that we had.... No one else in the world, no other government, had different information and so we acted based on what was the threat that was presented to us."
Rudd, a former diplomat, also dismissed his predecessor's argument that Australia had been obliged to send troops to Iraq because of its longstanding alliance with the US. He said that while he valued the alliance, it did not mean that Canberra should automatically accede to US requests for military support.
Australia's defense minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, said that the country's military was overstretched with commitments in East Timor, Afghanistan, and Iraq. "Roughly half of our infantry and cavalry is somehow tied to those deployments. This is an unsustainable position," he said.
But Rudd said Australia would continue to keep its 1,000 troops now deployed in Afghanistan.
Brendan Nelson, leader of the opposition Liberal Party, said Australia's troops should stay in Iraq and continue their a training role. .
Australian troops helped train 33,000 Iraqi Army soldiers and did reconstruction and aid work.
Rudd said 27 Australian soldiers had been wounded in Iraq since 2003. None had been killed.
Australia will still have about 800 military personnel in and around Iraq, including a 110-strong diplomatic security detachment in Baghdad, sailors on warships in the Persian Gulf, and Royal Australian Air Force crew.
• Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.
[Blunderov] "Turned out" to be false? The cynical expediency of the exercise was always as immediately obvious as a corn plaster on a coal heap.
Meanwhile Australia continues to support the every bit as illegal war in Afghanistan. Many people seem to think that this was/is a legitimate war. As the Hermit has explained many times, this is very far from being the case. Australia, and everybody else, should withdraw from Afghanistan too.
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David Lucifer
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Enlighten me.
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Re:Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report
« Reply #1 on: 2008-06-07 12:31:06 » |
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By my reckoning anyone who leads a nation to war based on false premises is guilty of a crime 100,000 times worse than first degree murder (give or take an order of magnitude). It is difficult to imagine a just punishment for such a crime, but worse I doubt the perpetrators will get even a slap on the wrist.
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
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Re:Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report
« Reply #2 on: 2008-06-07 13:50:16 » |
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Quote from: David Lucifer on 2008-06-07 12:31:06 | <snip> I doubt the perpetrators will get even a slap on the wrist.</snip> |
[Blunderov] I fear Lucifer's prediction is likely to prove correct. But maybe not. Nobody knows what tomorrow may bring and we can make sure that the bastards have to sleep with one eye open for the rest of their wretched lives.
http://bellaciao.org/en/spip.php?article17025
June Thursday 5 2008 (23h05) :
PROTEST AGAINST GEORGE BUSH’S VISIT TO LONDON
When journalist George Monbiot was asked last week why he had tried to exercise a citizen’s arrest on neocon John Bolton - one of the prime instigators of the Iraq war - he replied, "We must ensure that people do not forget. This is not an ordinary political mistake which was committed in Iraq. This was the supreme international crime, which led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Those people were not killed in the ordinary sense; they were murdered.
And they were murdered by the authors of that war, who are the greatest mass murderers of the twenty-first century so far."
On Sunday 15 June, the mass murderer-in-chief George Bush will be visiting Britain to meet with Gordon Brown, who continues to collude obediently with Bush’s war crimes. Stop the War, in conjunction with CND, has called a demonstration on that day, which will assemble in Parliament Square at 1pm.
Our message will be, war criminals are not welcome here. We have not forgotten the monumental crimes against Iraq and its people, which — as Independent journalist Patrick Cockburn has revealed — Bush is planning to extend into perpetuity, by getting the puppet Iraqi government to rush through a law making the US occupation permanent. Under this law, US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity for any crimes they commit.
Leading political, legal and cultural figures are joining the campaign to say that George Bush is not welcome here and that he should be conducted to a war crimes tribunal that holds him to account for prosecuting an illegal war. They include playwright and Nobel Prize winner Harold Pinter, human rights lawyer Louise Christian, former Guantanamo detainee, Moazzam Begg, novelist Iain Banks and actor Roger Lloyd Pack. Excerpts from some of the statements, are given below.
George Bush should be left in no doubt that the majority of people in this country have always opposed his war policies and want the withdrawal of all British troops from Iraq now. We are calling on Gordon Brown to end the British government’s servile collusion with the "war on terror", which is in reality a war of terror waged across the world by American foreign policy.
Please publicise the 15 June demonstration as widely as possible. Leaflets and posters are available from the Stop the War office (tel 020 7278 6694). Some cities and towns outside London have already booked coaches and we expect the number to grow significantly over the next week.
GEORGE BUSH NOT WELCOME HERE
DEMONSTRATE SUNDAY 15 JUNE, 1.00PM
PARLIAMENT SQUARE, LONDON
Called by Stop the War Coalition and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
By : LONDON
June Thursday 5 2008
[Blunderov] Perhaps protestors could carry posters with pictures of nooses on them. Or maybe it would be simpler to just bring the real thing along. Some handy pointers about 'taking it to the streets' from Lenin's Tomb.
http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/05/just-about-gramsican-theory-of.html
Saturday, May 31, 2008
The just-about-Gramscian theory of successful rioting posted by Roobin
We live in a time when struggle is a war of position. Politics, economics and ideology in Britain have been relatively stable for the past 20-25 years. Just as where peace between states is only the time it takes to prepare for war, peace between classes only means the ruling class and the classes below it are fighting for best position from which to launch the next onslaught. The only difference is that capitalists are generally organised and conscious, whereas the other classes are generally not.
The job for any revolutionary organisation (any) is to shore up its position and its organisation before the advent of a revolution. This means using every available means to renew contact with its base.
In practice this means taking best advantage of each and every crack in mainstream consensus. In Britain we can only refer to the anti-war movement as the last significant, national break. The disintegration of the pro-war argument took place over the summer and autumn of 2002. A growing number of people became convinced a war with Iraq was being organised and that it should be stopped, the war drive was one egregious lie too far.
The fact that a (relatively) small number of people, in particular revolutionaries, took the time beforehand to fight for an organisation that could receive and give expression to this movement paid off. By the time the movement came to a head, provincial market towns and industrial cities in Britain could hold regular activist meetings of 50-100 people. Stop the War groups could call upon a wealth of human talent. One plausible estimate I remember from the height of the movement was 50,000 activists in 500 branches or affiliated organisations.
This number of people could successfully win the political battle amongst the wider population, against the mainstream parties and media (even pulling some in their wake, such as the Liberal Democrats or the Daily Mirror). They could call large local demonstrations, pull off successful direct action and, of course, build huge national marches as part of international demonstrations.
Though by no means permanent, the lasting benefits of the anti-war movement have been a generalised anti-imperialist consciousness, a suspicion of secretive, undemocratic government and a check on the racist backlash against Muslims. These gains must be defended.
When open class struggle with the serious prospect of social revolution breaks out, war of manoeuvre, the better organised a class is the more likely it will hold positions gained. A short example, one of the key reasons behind the bloody stalemate in Iraq is, all other things being equal, the Iraqi resistance simply isn’t united enough to provide a state alternative at the moment (which is not to deny the heroism or necessity of the resistance).
I want to illustrate the point about organization as a product of war of position in a slightly unusual way: through street encounters. The first physical line of defence for the ruling class is the police force. The moment when cohesion of the ruling class has weakened enough so the unity of the lower classes can come together, enough to set a significant portion of them into action, is when the police appear.
The bad news is the police will never be won to our side, not as a rule. They are handsomely paid for their jobs, very tightly controlled and ideologically marshalled by their superiors. Most importantly they are hardened by regular contact with the public. The moment the armed forces are set on the public is an intense psychic test for a revolution, as the members, especially the lower members, of the armed forces are simply not trained for the situation.
The good news is, given preparation (the opportunity for which, of course, is normally denied), the average citizen can match a police officer blow for blow. A police officer has access to hand arms, in particular clubs, but the ordinary citizen can get and/or easily improvise these. The same is true of body armour and self-defence. The police have roadblocks, the people barricades. The police can use sturdy, powerful vehicles, so can the public. The police can use tools such as water cannons to disperse a crowd but a resourceful crowd can use similar devices to reverse effect. The police can use small firearms. Even in Britain it is not impossible for a member of the public to get hold of some. Any weapons won from the police in battle can immediately be used against them.
The point is the police rely upon superior organisation and centralised control, not firepower. There are relatively few police officers in any country, never enough to deal with a general movement of people. This is one of the reasons why movements should be as numerous and broad as possible, to reduce the harm to life and limb to a minimum. When 2 million people are intent on using Hyde Park for a demonstration there is nothing the state can do to stop them (without seriously upping the ante).
When 125,000 miners go on strike (in albeit heightened circumstances), and are hung out to dry by union bureaucracy, the state is able to shift thousands of officers to mining areas to attack pickets and lay siege to villages, concentrating its all its power on its scattered, isolated opponent.
The key is to (1) prepare and organise as best you can, necessary but easier said than done, and (2) turn the tables and strike at their weak points. The police rely on organisation and co-ordination; do your best to break it.
For example, if the police are relying on you using a rigid set of tactics sell them a dummy and do the very opposite of what they want you to. During the anti-G8 demonstrations in Germany recently there was a very successful direct action that blocked the railway line to the summit resort. The police blocked every road route toward the resort. The marchers approached a blockade as a mass before raising a set of flags and dispersing in large, pre-organised groups into fields of shoulder high corn, following the flags. The police had not planned for this and could not cope with it; their organisation had been broken.
The point is there have been several years, and a huge variety of anti-capitalist mobilizations, from strikes to demos to blockades and so on. There is a shared anti-capitalist experience in Europe. On that particular day it became the organization of direct action. Current mass movements should be organized, their experience generalized so their achievements are not lost so when the big break happens we are not starting from zero again.
Labels: gramsci, police, war of position
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Fritz
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Re:Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report
« Reply #3 on: 2008-06-07 13:56:38 » |
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But; how do we break the long standing world wide tradition of giving 'Sociopaths' power over us. Education, larger middle class, technology, .... oh yes Democracy, nothing seems to be helping. Maybe Huxley was right; only .1 percent of the human race can actually think.
.... oh the 'Price is Right' is on TV got to go ....
Fritz 
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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Fritz
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Re:Bush misused Iraq intelligence: Senate report
« Reply #4 on: 2008-06-07 22:59:52 » |
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Quote:| [Blunderov] I fear Lucifer's prediction is likely to prove correct. But maybe not. Nobody knows what tomorrow may bring and we can make sure that the bastards have to sleep with one eye open for the rest of their wretched lives. |
[Fritz]Found this living memorial that under scored for me, why the lie continues. Scanning CoV it was reference by one of [Salamantis] posts, but in passing.
The systematic pounding of disinformation I don't think even Joseph Goebbels minister of propaganda for the German Third Reich could have envisioned. The extent to which the Memes are promulgated, insidiously, then activated when we least expect is disturbing to me.
Karma from Wiki : Through the law of karma, the effects of all deeds actively create past, present, and future experiences, thus making one responsible for one's own life, and the pain and joy it brings to him/her and others. The results or 'fruits' of actions are called karma-phala. In religions that incorporate reincarnation, karma extends through one's present life and all past and future lives as well. [Fritz] Amen
Happy Days
Fritz
PS: My vegetable garden is in and the mosquitoes have been fed, its 31C and humidX of 47C, and with thundershowers; grow babies grow.
=========================================================
Iraq Watch
http://www.iraqwatch.org/aboutus/index.htm
=========================================================
http://www.iraqwatch.org/wmd/hansirrelevant.htm
Hans the Irrelevant
By Gary Milhollin
The Wall Street Journal
January 28, 2003, p. A16.
=========================================================
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE0D6113EF937A15757C0A964958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2
Iraq's Bomb, Chip by Chip
Published: April 24, 1992
The U.S. Commerce Department licensed the following strategic American exports for Saddam Hussein's atomic weapon programs between 1985 and 1990. Virtually all of the items were shipped to Iraq; all are useful for making atomic bombs or long-range missiles. United Nations inspectors in Iraq are still trying to find most of them. The list is based on Commerce Department export licensing records; the dollar amount of each transaction is as claimed by the exporting company. It was compiled by Gary Milhollin, a law professor at the University of Wisconsin and director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, and Diana Edensword, a research analyst at the project. Atomic Bomb Builders Sales to: Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission, the main atomic research laboratory; Badr and Daura sites, where bomb fuel was made; Al Qaqaa site, where detonators were made.
Canberra Elektronik: computers for measuring gamma rays and fast neutrons -- $30,000
Cerberus Ltd.: computers -- $18,181
Hewlett Packard: computers; electronic testing, calibration and graphics equipment -- $25,000
International Computer Systems: computers useful for graphic design of atomic bombs andmissiles -- $1,600,000
Perkin-Elmer: computers and instruments useful for quality control of bomb fuels -- $280,000
TI Coating Inc.: equipment for coating metal parts, useful for bomb production -- $373,708 Atomic Bomb and Missile Builders
Sales to: Ministry of Industry and Military Industrialization, which ran the atomic bomb, missile and chemical weapon factories; Nassr state enterprise, where equipment for enriching atomic bomb fuel was made; Salah Al Din site, where electronic equipment for missiles and atomic bombs was made; Ministry of Defense, which oversaw missile and atomic bomb development.
Axel Electronics: capacitors -- $84,000
BDM Corporation: computers; computer-assisted design equipment -- $52,000
Canberra Elektronik: computers for computer-assisted design -- $21,552
Carl Zeiss: microcomputers for mapping -- $104,545
Consarc Corporation: computers to run machine tools capable of manufacturing atomic bomb parts (this sale was stopped by Presidential order in June 1990) -- $525,550
Data General Corporation: computers for mapping -- $324,000
Gerber Systems: computers to run machine tools capable of manufacturing atomic bomb and missile parts -- $367,428
Hewlett Packard: computers for making molds; frequency synthesizers and other equipment useful for operating secured military communications systems -- $1,045,500
Honeywell Inc.: computers -- $353,333
International Computer Systems: computers for manufacturing, tool design and graphics -- $4,497,700
International Computers Ltd.: computers -- $687,994
Leybold Vacuum Systems: computer controlled welder used by Iraqis to produce centrifuges for making atomic bomb fuel -- $1,400,000
Lummus Crest: Radio spectrum analyzers; design computers; computers for factories producing mustard gas ingredients -- $250,000
Rockwell Collins International: equipment for navigation, directional finding, radar communications or airborne communications -- $127,558
Sackman Associates: computers and instruments capable of analyzing metals and powders for atomic bomb and missile manufacture -- $60,000
Siemens Corporation: computers and instruments capable of analyzing metals and powders for atomic bomb and missile manufacture -- $78,000
Spectra Physics: lasers; detection and tracking equipment for lasers -- $19,000
Unisys Corporation: computers -- $2,600,000
Wild Magnavox Satellite Survey: computers for processing satellite images that are useful for military mapping and surveillance -- $270,000
Zeta Laboratories: quartz crystals for military radar -- $1,105,000 Missile Builders
Sales to: Saad 16, the main missile research site; State Organization for Technical Industry, the procurement organization for missile sites that bought most Scud missile parts and equipment.
BDM Corporation: computers; superconducting electronics -- $29,405
Carl Schenck: computers -- $10,228
EZ Logic Data: computers -- $27,800
Finnigan MAT: computers that U.N. inspectors believe monitored uranium enrichment for atomic bomb fuel -- $483,000
Hewlett Packard: electronic testing equipment; computers; frequency synthesizers; radio spectrum analyzers -- $599,257
International Computer Systems: computers -- $1,375,000
International Imaging Systems: computers for processing satellite data; infrared equipment capable of aerial reconaissance and military surveillance -- $988,000
Lummus Crest: computers to aid factory design -- $44,320
Perkin-Elmer: computers -- $24,560
Scientific Atlanta: equipment for producing radar antennas -- $820,000
Semetex Corporation: computers -- $5,155,781
Spectral Data Corporation: satellite data processing equipment -- $26,880
Tektronix: high-speed electronics useful in developing atomic bombs and missiles; radio spectrum analyzers for developing microwave equipment -- $102,000
Thermo Jarrell Ash Corporation: computers for testing materials -- $350,898
Unisys Corporation: computers for production control -- $7,796
Veeco Instruments Inc.: computers for factory design -- $4,640
Wiltron Company: equipment for making radar antennas -- $49,510
[fritz]I hope no one ever puts a list together of what I have bought over the years
======================================
Research Internship - Immediate opening
The Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control in Washington is currently seeking an intern to do research on the spread of weapons of mass destruction.
Interns will gain valuable experience in gathering information and conducting research for the Wisconsin Project’s Risk Report database and for the Iran Watch web site. They will also gain a close-up view of how foreign policy decisions are made in Washington. In addition to research, Interns will help carry out a project to convert the organization's extensive collection of proliferation-related materials into a searchable electronic archive.
Candidates should be adept in working with Windows, MS Office and Word Perfect, and in doing research on the Internet, using databases like Lexis-Nexis. Those with basic knowledge of html are strongly preferred. Previous scanning and electronic document conversion experience is not required. Proficiency in Farsi, Korean or Arabic would be helpful.
[fritz]Just in case anyone is looking for a new "posting ". 
The internship is a paid position.
The Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control
http://www.wisconsinproject.org/
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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