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So unsavory is the Bush administration�s "intelligence" that Senator Jay Rockefeller, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, is calling for the FBI to investigate forged documents that the administration has used to justify war on Iraq.

Eleventh hour lies mount as war approaches

by Larry Chin

www.globalresearch.ca   17 March 2003

The URL of this article is: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/303A.html


With a demented fury and lawlessness never before seen in modern world history, the Bush administration continues to resort to desperate means and wildly grotesque propaganda to trigger the next and most violent phase of its 9/11 War of geostrategic conquest for control of the last remaining oil reserves on the planet.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/030703_us_intentions.html

http://energycrisis.org/de/lecture.html

http://onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/031303Heinberg/031303heinberg.html

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/dec2001_files/background_is_oil.html

Bush�s overt aggression is not about terrorism, "rogue dictators", nor "weapons of mass destruction" (all of which the American empire has long been the world�s foremost provider), but "the United States� vital interest in the region---uninterrupted, secure US/Allied access to Gulf oil", as bluntly laid out the President�s National Security Strategy. www.milnet.pentagon/centcom/chap1/stratgic.htm#USPolicy

As explained in a new report by Professor Peter Dale Scott, the hidden agenda behind a war on Iraq is, in the immediate term, a battle over petrodollars, OPEC and dollar hegemony.

http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/iraq.html

At the March 16 Iraq summit at the Azores (to which no undecided UN Security Council members were invited), the ruthless George W. Bush, who boasts that he "sleeps well at night", issued a new 24-hour ultimatum to Saddam Hussein to "leave Iraq" or face war. while bullying the UN Security Council for a new resolution authorizing war on Iraq.

Bush is leaving no doubt that the US intends to take Iraq, and "redraw the Middle East map" without UN backing. In a particularly sickening twist of irony, war criminal Bush, whose empire has already claimed the lives of tens of thousands of lives, claims that he intends to try top Iraqi officials for war crimes. Many of these crimes, including the alleged gassing and slaughter of Kurds, were directly and indirectly assisted and funded by the Reagan-Bush and Clinton administrations.

Even as the US military shifts into attack mode (http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/031703_rolling_start.html ), and Iraq prepares for the inevitable (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,81047,00.html ), the US media has continued to unleash a withering torrent of disinformation aimed at further misleading and confusing public opinion, and blunting opposition to its war agenda.

To the embarrassment of the Bush administration, many of the lies spewing from the White House have been exposed and shattered.

So unsavory is the Bush administration�s "intelligence" that Senator Jay Rockefeller, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, is calling for the FBI to investigate forged documents that the administration has used to justify war in Iraq. (http://news.findlaw.com/ap_stories/i/1107/3-14-2003/20030314123004_03.html )

(The significance of a Rockefeller scion voicing overt action against a Bush cannot be overlooked.)

A growing number of former CIA agents are coming forward to accuse the Bush administration of cooking the intelligence books. Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group of retired CIA officers led by Ray McGovern, is appealing to colleagues still inside CIA to go public with any evidence the Bush administration has slanted intelligence to support its case for war with Iraq. As revealed in an AP article by John J. Lumpkin ("Retired agents say data �cooked�, CIA colleagues urged to come clean on Iraq", March 14, 2003):

"Members of the group contend that the Bush administration has released information on Iraq that meets only its ends, while ignoring or withholding contrary reporting."

They also say the administration's public evidence about the immediacy of Iraq's threat to the United States and its alleged ties to al Qaeda is unconvincing and they accuse policymakers of pushing out some information that does not meet an intelligence professional's standard of proof . "It's been cooked to a recipe, and the recipe is high policy," said Ray McGovern, a 27-year CIA veteran who briefed top Reagan administration security officials before retiring in 1990. "That's why a lot of my former colleagues are holding their noses these days."

During his address to the UN Security Council, Secretary of State Colin Powell cited allegedly damning intelligence against Saddam Hussein, declaring, "These are not assertions. What we are giving you are facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence." His presentation did little to convince world leaders.

One intelligence report praised by Powell, and cited as a British intelligence paper http://www.channel4.com/news/home/z/stories/20030206/dossier.html , was plagiarized from a student paper posted on the Internet. (http://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/2002/issue3/jv6n3a1.html )

The plagiarism was so sloppy that the original writer�s typographical errors were repeated. Still other portions of Powell�s presentation have also been proven to be false or highly suspect.

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/RIT302A.html

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/feb2003/khur-f08.shtml

More Osama, more Al-Qaeda

In recent weeks, the Bush administration and its proxies have once again re-ignited the myth of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda, desperate to link Saddam Hussein�s Baghdad regime to Al-Qaeda and 9/11. The media has been mined with new and conveniently-timed sightings, tapes and arrests of bin Laden and bin Laden cohorts.

But in a joint Bush-Blair press conference in January 2003, Bush himself flatly denied a link between Baghdad, Al-Qaeda and the September 11 attacks (http://www.thememoryhole.com/war/no-saddam-qaeda.htm ):

Question: One question for you both. Do you believe that there is a link between Saddam Hussein, a direct link, and the men who attacked on September the 11th?

Bush: I can�t make that claim.

Blair: That answers your question.

None of Bush�s subsequent claims of links Baghdad to Al Qaeda and 9/11 have been supported by one shred of credible evidence.

At his UN presentation, Powell�s attempt to connect Baghdad to Al-Qaeda terrorists operating in northern Iraq has been exposed as a deception, and sourced to pro-US sources including members of Iraq Kurd opposition groups connected to Washington and the CIA (http://onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/Chin103102/chin103102.html . http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/DJ30Df01.html )

As explained by Professor Michel Chossudovsky ("Who is Behind the �Terror Network� in northern Iraq?", 2/15/03) http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO302B.html :

"Baghdad has no jurisdiction in the ethnic Kurd controlled region of Northern Iraq. In fact, the region is in the US sphere of influence."

"Northern Iraq ---which falls in "the no fly zone"-- is virtually a US protectorate. US military and intelligence observers stationed in the Kurdish region have turned a blind eye to the influx of Al Qaeda fighters from Afghanistan, as well as to the various acts of terrorism committed in the Kurdish region. According to one report �Al Qaeda affiliates coordinating the movement of people, money and supplies for Ansar al-Islam have been operating freely in the [regional] capital.� (Midland Independent, 6 February 2003). In all likelihood, Ansar al-Islam, which is also integrated by Afghan-Arabs, is supported through the same covert US intelligence channels as other Al Qaeda related organisations in Central Asia and the Middle East."

Firing up the mighty wurlitzer

Meanwhile, Bush-friendly corporate media vehicles continue to trumpet breathless new tabloid spy fiction that is long on drama and suggestion, vague on details, and devoid of context. Such stories invariably cite "unnamed sources", "anonymous sources", "and intelligence sources" (the CIA and CIA-affiliated agencies). Others quote "authoritative analysts", typically former intelligence and Pentagon officials or heads of thinktanks that are supportive of the Bush administration�s global agenda. This is what passes as news.

It is no surprise that a new rash of arrests of so-called Al-Qaeda (and their alleged involvement with the 9/11 attacks) has occurred in the midst of growing and increasingly harsh public opposition to an Iraq war.

The suspicious circumstances surrounding headline-grabbing arrests of alleged 9/11 "mastermind" Khalid Shiek Mohammed, involving Pakistan�s ISI (the CIA�s Central Asian "go-between" and virtual branch of Langley) serve to refocus attention squarely on the Bush administration and its ties to the ISI

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/Sept11/isicia.htm#2

http://www.hvk.org/articles/1001/432.html

and the relationship between the Bush administration and Al-Qaeda

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO303D.html

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO301B.html

The new arrest flies in the face of earlier reports from the Bush administration that Khalid Sheik Mohammed was killed a year ago.

http://www.thememoryhole.com/war/khalid-resurrection.htm . http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/DJ30Df01.html

Regardless of whether or not the story is true, the arrested man has apparently been secreted away to CIA facility in Afghanistan, safe from media scrutiny, where interrogations involving techniques "not subject to US rules of due process" are used.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=564&ncid=716&e=12&u=/nm/20030304/ts_nm/pakistan_qaeda_mohammed_dc

The important documented fact, which has remained tragically misunderstood by even so-called "anti-war activists" is that the CIA-ISI-terror nexus, and the "Islamic fundamentalism" created by the CIA and US administrations stretching back to the Carter era, has long functioned as a vital tool of US geostrategy in Central Asia, the Middle East, the Balkans, the Philippines (and other geostrategic hot spots with significant Muslim populations) since the 1970s (http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO111A.htmlhttp://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO109C.html )  and a likely participant in the 9/11 operation. This nexus remains active to this day.

Only with understanding of the link between Washington and "Islamic terrorism" can there be any real comprehension of the Bush war.

Incidents of "terrorism" that have occurred in the past year have almost exclusively served the geostrategic objectives of the United States, from the bombings in Bali and the Philippines. Moreover, there is evidence that the CIA had foreknowledge, if not direct involvement, in these operations. http://www.feralnews.com/issues/bali/bali_bombing_analysis.html

Meanwhile, in stark contrast to poorly written, ridiculous media reports, independent journalists and investigators continue to unmask the reality behind the "war on terrorism" and its pretext, 9/11. Dan Hopsicker ( www.madcowprod.com ) who has spend the past year tracking down the real truth behind the alleged 9/11 hijackers and their connections to CIA-connected flight schools in Florida. Hopsicker has found evidence that supposed lead hijacker Mohammed Atta was spotted regularly with flight school owner Rudi Dekkers until August 2001---refuting the assertion by the FBI that Atta left Florida prior to 9/11.

The Bush administration and the corporate media have been dead silent regarding the mounting evidence Hopsicker has uncovered, just as it continues to lie about 9/11---which remains uninvestigated, nearly two years after the fact.

"Go ahead and kill us"

In yet another typical example of Bush-era news, Newsweek magazine published a small article in its December 23, 2002 issue titled, "Go Invade My Space", intended to leave lazy and misinformed readers with the impression that Iraqis welcome their own slaughter.

Citing only a survey conducted conducted by the International Crisis Group, the Brussels-based think tank www.intl-crisis-group.org/about/board.cfm , Colin Soloway concluded that "almost everybody is against the war ---except the Iraqis" and "most Iraqis interviewed support the idea of an invasion, as well as a US occupation."

"Iraqis have had it with more than a decade of impoverishment, isolation and fear, says the study�s researcher who asked not be named," Soloway wrote. "�I found very few people who were against American intervention," the researcher says. �Those against intervention, she says, enjoyed privileges under the regime, or they feared Americans would call for a rising against Saddam, then abandon it (as in the aftermath of the Kuwait war in 1991).�"

Besides the highly questionable "unnamed researcher", and no analysis of how the ICG�s survey was actually conducted, Soloway�s article contains no information about the International Crisis Group itself.

To erase any doubts about the agenda of the ICG (described on its own web site as a "private advocacy organization" that "responds to crises by providing on-the-spot analysis of root causes and proposing practical solutions"), here are key members of its board of directors:

A large number of ICG directors are also members of the Balkan Action Counsel, American Peace in Chechnya, and other groups involved with post-USSR Central Asia. Clearly, what currently passes for news in the American corporate media is the voice of the US war lobby that has been lobbying for a "regime change" in Iraq for over a decade. (http://onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/Chin110702/chin110702.html ).

Preparing for the inevitable

Far from welcoming the US to "invade their space" as the Newsweek article concludes, Iraqi citizens, who have endured a decade of slow death, bombings and economic devastation at the hands of the US and CIA for over a decade, are preparing once again for death.

In fact, Middle East opinion of the Bush administration is uniformly negative.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,661807,00.html

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/1205-04.htm

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/pubs/exec/polexec.htm

A more accurate and current on-the-ground view from Iraq can be found in correspondent Jeremy Scahill�s Iraq Journal. (www.iraqjournal.org ).

A 3/16/03 report by Reuters correspondent Samia Nakhoul ("Jittery Iraqis prepare for war") offers the following views from ordinary Iraqis:

* "It looks we're in the last hour before the war. The mood of war is everywhere. It is all very depressing and sad. We just don't know what to do," said Souad Saleh, 42, a housewife.

* "This is a miserable life. We spent our whole life shopping for wars or hiding from bombs" said Ahmed, a driver.

* "Before he went to school my 10-year-old son asked me if Bush will attack today," said Ibrahim Khalaf, 42, who runs a shoe shop in Baghdad. "This is a question he asks often but after last night's news he heard us talking and this is the first thing he asked this morning. War has become the obsession of our children."

* "Our children get terrified when they hear thunderstorms so imagine what will happen to them when they hear the pounding of American bombers," said a woman who did not give her name.

Profiting from death

There, are, of course those who actually do welcome, and hunger for, the destruction of Iraq. They are the ones who stand to profit from lucrative contracts from exploiting and "rebuilding" what remains.

In an article titled "Cheerleaders of War" (http://sfweekly.com/issues/2003-01-22/bayview.html/1/index.html ), Iraqi exile John Kanno of the Assyrian National Congress, one of the US-backed anti-Saddam opposition groups, boasted that "General Electric will manufacture the turbines. Siemens and Westinghouse will be in on it. Twenty billion dollars will bring the electric system back up to pre-Gulf War level. It will be a gold mine."

Even before the bombs have dropped, the Bush administration has arrogantly solicited bids from five US companies to rebuild Iraq. Not surprisingly, the companies long connected to intelligence and Pentagon-related work, such as Halliburton and Bechtel. (http://www.saudia-online.com/news2003/newsmar03/news22.shtml ; http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7939-2003Mar10.html )

Crying havoc

As this report goes to press, the nation is preparing for another "momentous" speech by George W. Bush. Barring miracles, a war that will threaten the future of humanity will begin in earnest, within hours, led by a nihilist who is already the most brutal villain in world history.

I end this piece with quotes from Robert Payne�s book "The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler". (Appropriately, Hitler�s Third Reich was principally financed by none other than George W. Bush�s grandfather, Prescott Bush and the investment bank Brown, Brothers, Harriman):

"Once elected, or once he has seized power, he is in a position to pervert the wealth of the state to his own uses and to employ the weapons of propaganda to serve his own interests. His power is nearly absolute, for without much difficulty he can always convince the people that he is essential to their well being and that without him the state will dissolve into anarchy.

One does not expect the truth from politicians or from soldiers. By the very nature of their profession, they must lie to the hilt.

Even when he lied outrageously, and they knew he was lying, the�people preferred to believe his lies rather than face the consequences of truth.

Armed with the machinery of destruction, he embarked on conquests so daring that even his own general staff took fright and warned him against overextending his limited resources; and since he despised his own generals, he had no difficulty in rejecting their advice.

To enjoy power is to be damned, and to enjoy making war on other nations is to be utterly damned."


 Larry Chin is an Online Journal associate editor.Copyright Larry Chin  2003.  For fair use only/ pour usage �quitable seulement .


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