Tag: ISIS

From ‘War on Terror’ to ‘War on Covid’ – Lessons to be Learned

01MAY2003 – GWB declares victory in the War on Terror (too soon Bush II, too soon as Kabul, Afghanistan experiences a Saigon, Vietnam moment here in 2021)

I know this is extremely OLD news, but remember when the US Deep State accused Bin Laden and his gang (of 50-200) in Afghanistan of orchestrating 9/11? Remember when GW Bush accused Saddam Hussein of possessing WMDs (WMDs that we gave Iraq during the Iraq-Iran War 1984-1988)?

The RESPONSE to these two lies was excessively over the top. The response COULD have been a strategic targeted CIA/SpecialForces mission that involved 50 men in both countries to CSI. But no, the US decides to sacrifice our troops (both physical and mental death/PTSD) in both of these countries over the next two decades, sacrifice the innocent people in these counties (their life, their livelihood making many refugees while eradicating Christianity) while spending trillions of US taxpayer’s money.

What do we have to show for all that sacrifice here in 2021? Nothing!

The greater good was never achieved. Bringing “democracy” to the Middle East only brought death, heartache, pain and poverty.

So the US elite says: “Let’s bring this to the homeland”

Now consider the War on Covid.

Headlines read: “15 Days to Flatten the Curve”, “Hospitals are Overwhelmed” and “Vaccines are Totally Safe”

The RESPONSE domestically has again been over the top. Beginning with masks which Tony Fauci rightfully said initially as being a “comfort” mechanism before he went political and suggested 2x, this crowd submission method was a placeholder until the mRNA vaccines could be delivered less than a year later (thanks “Father of the Vaccine” Trump SARCASM).

When we think of the phases toward mandating the “vaccine”, I can’t help but think of the pressure the US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan accomplished when freedom fighters in those countries were hard pressed, they became ever increasingly resistant and resilient. “Terror” groups morphed overnight sporting names like Al Qaeda, Taliban and more. Geographic boundaries meant nothing as ISIS spread from Iraq to Syria. The result was opposite the stated goals of the US Empire’s CIA/Pentagon/MIC complex.

But no one remembers years later.

So too with this latest war. Fighting an obscure enemy (COVID is ONLY a set of ever evolving symptoms that can come from SARS-CoV-1, SARS-CoV-2, and other respiratory viruses like the flu), allows the fighters to shift their efforts while propping up their narrative, the “noble lie” (think Plato) that validates their forced mandates.

Consider the 1984 statement in the DHHS Federal Register, Vol 49 No 107 from June 1, 1984 in reference to the final rules concerning polio vaccination campaigns in the U.S.:

…any possible doubts, whether or not well founded, about the safety of the vaccine cannot be allowed to exist in view of the need to assure the vaccine will continue to be used to the maximum extent consistent with the nation’s public health objectives.

This is why the following narrative (propaganda) is enforced on the public by government, media, big tech, big pharma and large US corporations:

  • Herd immunity is required to enable economic and social recovery
  • Vaccines are the only route to achieving herd immunity
  • COVID-19 vaccines are perfectly safe
  • COVID-19 vaccines provide protective, durable immunity

This excessive push of mandatory vaccines is counter-intuitive and has some scary long-term effects not even thinking about the vaccine’s adverse effects themselves.

Vaccine expert Geert Vanden Bossche explains:

As of the early days of the mass vaccination campaigns, at least a few experts have been warning against the catastrophic impact such a program could have on global and individual health. Mass vaccination in the middle of a pandemic is prone to promoting selection and adaptation of immune escape variants that are featured by increasing infectiousness and resistance to spike protein (S)-directed antibodies (Abs), thereby diminishing protection in vaccinees and threatening the unvaccinated

The “hard press” on the virus is fueling the variants.

The “hard press” on the ‘terrorists’ fueled the variants.

I guess when you have a hammer like government .. everything is a nail.

George Washington knew this first hand when he led 15,000 troops into Pennsylvania to put down the “Whiskey Rebellion” which he and Alexander Hamilton caused due to the heavy tax (8x higher than King George’s taxes on the American colonies) on whiskey that they themselves had authorized.

A reasonable approach to this “War on Covid” would be as mRNA inventor Robert W. Malone suggests:

  • Full and complete disclosure on the vaccines
  • Comprehension of risks that the vaccines bring
  • Full voluntary participation with no coercion and no enticement

A healthy approach would follow more like Sweden’s strategy that has resulted in ZERO deaths there from COVID in the past weeks. A balanced response that allows the virus to move through the healthy younger population while protecting the older more frail population.

  • Provide personal risk assessment tools/apps
  • Provide clear and complete data on vaccine trials
  • Offer vaccination to high risk individuals
  • Understand that COVID is complex with different stages which means that allowing physicians to practice evidence-based medicine guided by laboratory testing
  • Use sequence-independent stage-appropriate medicines like Ivermectin, Famotidine/Celecoxib, Fluvoxamine, Apixaban, Vitamin D, etc.
  • Emphasize treating patients as soon as they develop disease in outpatient stage
  • Stop censoring and blocking repurposed drug development

Only when a healthier medical-industrial complex emerges will public confidence in healthcare rebound:

  • Public campaigns should be positive, ethical, truthful and empathic
  • People should feel empowered when making health choices
  • In both actions and words it is important to steer clear of fear, coercion and questionable ethics
  • Obey the law and be transparent about risks while not circumventing time tested processes and ethics
  • Trust, educate and respect citizens right to choose
  • Avoid authoritarian demands, information censorship and psychological manipulation via big media and big tech

I am not holding my breath. It took 20 years to unravel the “War on Terror”, so how long will it be for the truth to emerge around the “War on Covid”?

-SF1

The US (Working on Behalf of Israel) Made War on Afghanistan and Iraq – Next Up: Armenia?

When I talk of a people group/religion being impacted by US foreign policy, I do so only to confront the myth that the US is a Christian nation. Now we may have a lot of Christians in this country, but the nation, the federal government and its policies are not currently setup to protect Christians from persecution. Of course the Bush II push into Iraq was designed to “protect our freedoms” as an American people, but even this is questionable in the long run.

So a little review is in order. Over the past 30 years since the US gave Saddam (who protected Iraqi Christians) the green light to invade Kuwait and then wagged war (Gulf War I) on him, putting him on lock-down and having the Clinton-era dear Madeleine Albright say to Leslie Stahl about the 500,000 Iraqi children deaths cause by the US’s actions against Iraq:

This was followed during the Bush II administration by blaming Iraq on 9/11, accusing them of having WMDs and while instead of having the CIA root out any possible 9/11 conspirators (they should have looked within their ranks first) in Afghanistan, the USA invaded both countries to the benefit on ONLY Israel and possibly Saudi Arabia.

The result is that Afghanistan no longer has ANY Christian churches and Iraq lost a million plus (1.4M in 1987 to under 200,000 recently) at least bringing those number now almost to the point of extinction. So much for “democracy” that allows freedom of religion. Oh, that is wrong, democracy is mob rule, so I guess that is what we have in Iraq and Afghanistan today with the expulsion of Christians from there homes. This is very similar to Israel’s policy, knowing that 65% of Israel is Atheist where as almost all the Christians in the lands that Israel ruthlessly controls are Palestinians.

But I digress ..

So what does that have to do with two countries that most Americans could not pick out on a world map? Well, the US allied with Israel, in partnership with Turkey is at it again. Azerbaijan, the most secular country on the planet is invading Armenia, the most Christian country on the planet (98% Christian).

In summary, the US favors both Turkey and Israel, and Azerbaijan has oil – and is also favored by Turkey and Israel. Of course, we know Israel’s view of Iran. Iran is not allowed to be seen as a positive force in any manner whatsoever. So this makes Armenia expendable as far as the US is concerned.

There is a major disconnect between the US’s proud Christian heritage and supporting never-ending wars in the Middle East that seem to always work towards persecution of the Christians. We have evangelical Christians in the US totally rooting for Israel and their ally Azerbaijan with the US helping (and infusing the region with its old friend ISIS, which a majority are secular as well).

Moon of Alabama connects the dots well in his article:

Turkey is supporting Azerbaijan by supplying it with Turkish drones and with ‘moderate Syrian rebel’ mercenaries from Syrian and Libya. All are flown in through Georgian air space. Other mercenaries seem to come from Afghanistan. Additional hardware comes by road also through Georgia. Another supporter of the attacker is Israel. During the last week Azerbaijani military transport aircraft have flown at least six times to Israel to then return with additional Israeli suicide drones on board. These Harop drones have been widely used in attacks on Armenian positions. An Israeli made LORA short range ballistic missile was used by Azerbaijan to attack a bridge that connects Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia. Allegedly there are also Turkish flown F-16 fighter planes in Azerbaijan.

The silver lining is that Russia holds the trump card and ends up ONE MORE TIME protecting innocent nations including their Christian populations (while the US has partnered with ISIS in both Iraq and Syria only to have Russia and Iran kick them to the curb in both countries while the US “claimed” to be fighting ISIS since the Obama administration. Pure BS. Pure lies.

The war seems already to be at a stalemate. Neither Armenia nor Azerbaijan can afford to use air power and ballistic missiles purchased from Russia without Russian consent.

This is some good news in a region where the US, Israel and Turkey would have all loved another war distraction. Iran and Russia PLUS Armenian Christians all stand to lose.

Here is proof of what they were really up to:

U.S. plans to ‘overextend Russia’ by creating trouble in the Caucasus just as it is now happening. Fort Russ notes:

The current director of the CIA, Gina Haspel, was doing field assignments in Turkey in the early stages of her career, she reportedly speaks Turkish, and she has history of serving as a station chief in Baku, Azerbaijan, in the late 1990s. It is, therefore, presumable that she still has connections with the local government and business elites.

The current Chief of the MI6, Richard Moore, also has history of working in Turkey — he was performing tasks for the British intelligence there in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. Moore is fluent in Turkish and he also served as the British Ambassador to Turkey from 2014 to 2017.

The intelligence chiefs of the two most powerful countries in the Anglosphere are turkologists with connections in Turkey and Azerbaijan. It would be reasonable to assume that a regional conflict of such magnitude happening now, on their watch, is far from being a mere coincidence.

Before President Trump stopped the program the CIA had used the Azerbaijani Silk Way Airlines in more than 350 flights to bring weapons from Bulgaria to Turkey to then hand them to ‘Syrian rebels’. Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, is not only a CIA station but also a Mossad center for waging its silent war against Iran.

So you see, our intervention abroad to spread democracy only causes despots at home and abroad. The US is a virus on the world stage:

Peace out.

-SF1

Is the US’s Future Boxed In? (Why Secession is Off Limits)

I think most people understand that secession is a bad word, because the last time that was attempted in the US it was to keep slavery intact, at least that is what our school books say. Even our socialist Pledge of Allegiance implicitly says that “one nation, indivisible”, which is a lie. The US Constitution never suggested that. In fact, the Articles of Confederation actually said that it was to be a “perpetual union” and yet it was disposed of rather quickly in secret in Philadelphia in 1787 when the convention was intended to “tweak” the articles.

I have said before that some of the northern states thought seriously about secession from 1796 to 1814 (Danbury Convention) but after they became a more powerful region in the 1830s they quietly quit talking about it. The southern states talked nullification in the 1830s and by the 1860s it became talk of legal, peaceful secession.

Do note, according to Lincoln’s first inaugural address in 1861 he outlined that as long as the southern states continued to pay tariffs (taxes), that nothing would happen. Lincoln also used the Corwin Amendment bait to tempt the 7 southern states to reenter the union to gain protection of their domestic institutions (slavery) forever, guaranteed by a new 13th amendment to the US Constitution that was already getting support in Congress consisting of the states that were still in the union at that time.

Legally is the way the southern gentlemen approached secession, as outlined by what was mentioned in the secession documents and what was not there. What was there was insecurity about their domestic institutions (which is why Lincoln, in a Trump like move, called them out on). What wasn’t there was the elephant in the room, the fact that a majority of collected tariffs, what the general (federal) government had for operating income (tax revenue), came from southern ports. Since the 1830s the northern dominated Congress had squeezed that income to fund its internal improvements, a majority of such took place in the northern states. Income redistribution was already a thing! However, this complaint is more difficult to prove in “divorce hearings”, so slavery, an issue that the abolitionists had been harping on for over a decade, would do. Data was easy to come by to prove their point.

Secession itself did NOT start the war between the states. Non-payment of tariffs was the trigger as promised by Lincoln in his early MAR1861 address. Note that in the weeks following Lincoln’s offer, the economics drove the fear and war-talk:

.. the VERY day after the Confederate Congress set their tariff rate at 2% to effectively become a free trade zone, Lincoln’s Congress UPPED their tariff to even 60% on some items ..

It was Lincoln’s REACTION to tariff non-payment that ended up being worse than the exit of seven southern states would have been if it could have remained peaceful.

.. Lincoln called up 75,000 troops WELL before he called Congress into secession on July 4th, 1861 to put down the “insurrection” as Lincoln never admitted that these states had legally seceded ..

Who would think that government REACTION to a perceived threat (Covid-19) could be worse than the disease itself. But I digress …

For years, decades and over a century has passed and the scars of keeping the “spouse” in an abusive marriage has taken its toll, not to mention the 750,000 young men dead, the economic destruction of the south and the war debt that resulted. Reconstruction following the war helped to set the stage for intense hatred that is used by political types ever since to stoke race wars.

The GOP run Union also introduced “total war” domestically before they did a road show (WWII Dresden, Japan & Korea & Vietnam & Iraq, etc)

List of towns burnt or pillaged by Confederate forces:

ZERO

List of towns burnt or pillaged by Union forces:

Osceola, Missouri, burned to the ground, September 24, 1861 – The town of 3,000 people was plundered and burned to the ground, 200 slaves were freed and nine local citizens were executed.
Platte City – December 16, 1861 – “Colonel W. James Morgan marches from St. Joseph to Platte City. Once there, Morgan burns the city and takes three prisoners — all furloughed or discharged Confederate soldiers. Morgan leads the prisoners to Bee Creek, where one is shot and a second is bayonetted, while the third is released. ”
Dayton, Missouri, burned, January 1 to 3, 1862
Columbus, Missouri, burned, reported on January 13, 1862
Bentonville, Arkansas, partly burned, February 23, 1862 – a Federal search party set fire to the town after finding a dead Union soldier, burning most of it to the ground
Winton, North Carolina, burned, reported on February 21, 1862 – first NC town burned by the Union, and completely burned to the ground
Bledsoe’s Landing, Arkansas, burned, October 21, 1862
Hamblin’s, Arkansas, burned, October 21, 1862
Donaldsonville, Louisiana, partly burned, August 10, 1862
Athens, Alabama, partly burned, August 30, 1862
Randolph, Tennessee, burned, September 26, 1862
Elm Grove and Hopefield, Arkansas, burned, October 18, 1862
Fredericksburg December 11–15, 1862 – town not destroyed, but the Union army threw shells into a town full of civilians
Napoleon, Arkansas, partly burned, January 17, 1863
Mound City, Arkansas, partly burned, January 13, 1863
Hopefield, Arkansas, burned, February 21, 1863 – “Captain Lemon allowed residents one hour to remove personal items, and the men then burned every house in the village.”
Eunice, Arkansas, burned, June 14, 1863
Gaines Landing, Arkansas, burned, June 15, 1863
Bluffton, South Carolina, burned, reported June 6, 1863 – ”
Union troops, about 1,000 strong, crossed Calibogue Sound and eased up the May River in the pre-dawn fog, surprising ineffective pickets and having their way in an unoccupied village. Rebel troops put up a bit of a fight, but gunboats blasted away as two-thirds of the town was burned in less than four hours. After the Yankees looted furniture and left, about two-thirds of the town’s 60 homes were destroyed.”
Sibley, Missouri, burned June 28, 1863
Hernando, Mississippi, partly burned, April 21, 1863
Austin, Mississippi, burned, May 24, 1863 – “On May 24, a detachment of Union marines landed near Austin. They quickly marched to the town, ordered all of the townpeople out and burned down the town.”
Columbus, Tennessee, burned, reported February 10, 1864
Meridian, Mississippi, destroyed, February 3 to March 6, 1864 (burned multiple times)
Washington, North Carolina, sacked and burned, April 20, 1864
Hallowell’s Landing, Alabama, burned, reported May 14, 1864
Newtown, Virginia, May 30, 1864
Rome, Georgia, partly burned, November 11, 1864 – “Union soldiers were told to burn buildings the Confederacy could use in its war effort: railroad depots, storehouses, mills, foundries, factories and bridges. Despite orders to respect private property, some soldiers had their own idea. They ran through the city bearing firebrands, setting fire to what George M. Battey Jr. called harmless places.”
Atlanta, Georgia, burned, November 15, 1864
Camden Point, Missouri, burned, July 14, 1864 –
Kendal’s Grist-Mill, Arkansas, burned, September 3, 1864
Shenandoah Valley, devastated, reported October 1, 1864 by Sheridan. Washington College was sacked and burned during this campaign.
Griswoldville, Georgia, burned, November 21, 1864
Somerville, Alabama, burned, January 17, 1865
McPhersonville, South Carolina, burned, January 30, 1865
Barnwell, South Carolina, burned, reported February 9, 1865
Columbia, South Carolina, burned, reported February 17, 1865
Winnsborough, South Carolina, pillaged and partly burned, February 21, 1865
Tuscaloosa, Alabama, burned, April 4, 1865

You wonder why the south remembers? Like ISIS only different, right? There are many nations in this world that remember the last time the USA tried to bring “democracy” to them!

So since the US government has now educated generations of Americans to believe somehow that secession in 1776 from the British Empire was honorable but that secession in 1861 from the Northern and Western united States was not, there seems to be no option in 2020 for secession, only nationalism or globalism.

This is extremely sad for future generations of Americans. Somehow, we are so “exceptional” that we can’t even achieve what the USSR did in 1991, to split into 15 republics PEACEFULLY!

The US just can’t do this, give up empire and lose the 5th largest economy (California alone) in the world when in 1861 it could not give up 70% of the federal government’s tax revenue. Plus, giving up the west coast means all those ports for US fleets, and you know Hawaii would go with California, Oregon and Washington State. The US has a character flaw.

The ramp-up on sanctions against Russia and China has been in preparation for this moment in the American Empire’s timeline to cover the excessive debt needed just to survive Covid-19, not to mention expanding the US Navy from 300 ships to 500 ships to meet the “threat” in the South China Sea. (Don’t ask me how this threatens Americans in the 50 states, because it doesn’t)

This kind of looks like the NATO encroachment on Russia the last 25 years:

Who is the aggressor here? But I guess empires are like that and we better get used to this kind of talk. The only talk anyone will NOT speak of is SECESSION apparently. No one really wants peace, except the people, who are but pawns in this game the oligarchs have going on.

I prefer federalism as perceived by Lincoln (in 1846, well before he flipped on that issue when he was president):

“Any people, anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right, a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit. More than this, a majority of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a minority, intermingled with, or near about them, who may oppose their movements.” ~ Lincoln January 12 1848, expressing the near-universally held Jeffersonian principle

I prefer Jefferson’s thoughts as well:

“Whether we remain in one confederacy, or form into Atlantic and Mississippi confederacies, I believe not very important to the happiness of either part.  Those of the western confederacy will be as much our children & descendants as those of the eastern, and I feel myself as much identified with that country, in future time, as with this; and did I now foresee a separation at some future day, yet I should feel the duty & the desire to promote the western interests as zealously as the eastern, doing all the good for both portions of our future family which should fall within my power.” ~ Letter from President Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Joseph Priestly, Jan. 29, 1804

These thoughts have been lost now that nationalism and globalism reign. We and our kids and grand-kids have lost much in 200 years.

Peace out.

-SF1

Gaining a Middle East Perspective, Apart from the Official US Empire/Media Narrative

Lebanese ‘Vision for Peace’ for a brighter future for the people in North America

Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
We don’t get fooled again
Don’t get fooled again
No, no!

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss

The Who – “Won’t Get Fooled Again”

By now, one has to understand that it really makes no difference who is president, except for maybe if one has the gift of eloquent speech, another a gift of making it to 3rd base with an intern, another a gift of “duh” while targeting countries that had nothing to do with 9/11, another the gift of racial equality and finally a politician that can create tweets on Twitter and trigger millions. We sure have made “progress”.

However, in the real world, the US Empire has been marching on from CIA assassinating other nation’s democratically elected presidents (1953, Iran) to open US military assassination of other nation’s #2 national leader and hero from his strategy to defeat ISIS (2020, Iran), nothing has halted the evil empire’s advance. Yes, I agree with Oliver Stone that the evil of the USSR in the 1980s has been replaced by the US Empire of the 2000s and beyond.

Things have changed a lot since then, at least for Stone. “Empires fall. Let’s pray that this empire, these evil things… because we are the evil empire,” he said in an interview to RT. “What Reagan said about Russia is true about us.” – Sputnik / Alexei Druzhinin

To get a real picture of what has evolved in the Middle East and how we (US Empire) are not helping, I believe that Eric Margolis’ experience is something that can be drawn on as a starting point where one can research for themselves from there. In his latest piece picked up by the Ron Paul Institute from Lew Rockwell, called “Grand Theft Property”, Eric outlines how this latest Trump “Peace Plan” is nothing more than continued theft of Palestinian land that will only serve to ensure continued violence in the region that the Military Industrial Complex (MIC) will love so that their profits are assured. Eric explains:

As they ask in my native New York City, “Is it good for the Jews?”, the answer is a resounding no! The Trump-Bibi theft of ancestral Arab lands condemns Arabs and Jews to another five decades of violence and hatred. The Promised Land was not supposed to be like this.

Ain’t that the truth. The fact is, visions do not create rights. They have no legal grounds. They do not convey legality to anything.

Don’t go away, for the backstory is even better. One needs to know the context and history that brought us to this point where it seems to be accepted that Israel and the US can decide how to partition up the Middle East:

In 1916, as World War I raged on, a British diplomat, Mark Sykes, met with his French counterpart from the Quai d’Orsay, Monsieur Picot, and signed an agreement to partition the Ottoman Empire once victory was achieved.

The heart of the Mideast – Palestine, Syria, and Iraq – was divided between Britain and France. Italy and Russia were offered other Ottoman lands: southern Turkey was promised to Italy and Constantinople to Russia. All this was top secret but was later revealed by the Bolsheviks after their 1917 revolution.

Do you see this? World powers, the empires, can just decide where to draw the lines, the benefits of wars go to the state while the cost of war is the burden that those who fought and sometimes died along with their families and the innocent civilians caught up in these great conflicts where life is never the same.

I have heard the term that bigger is better, however, when it comes to states, the bigger the state they more tyrannical they can be. This tyranny extends from the politicians who enable the state and give the state legitimacy, because politicians were “voted” in, all the way to all the people who follow orders blindly, from CIA assets, to the military all the way to the police, from the capital, to the states all the way to the local governments that are dependent on federal funding.

I agree with G.K. Chesterton who said:

“The men whom the people ought to choose to represent them are too busy to take the jobs. But the politician is waiting for it. He’s the pestilence of modern times. What we should try to do is make politics as local as possible. Keep the politicians near enough to kick them. The villagers who met under the village tree could also hang their politicians to the tree. It is terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged.”

That kind of local government could easily have prevented the following:

  • 70 million killed in China
  • 60 million killed in USSR
  • 4 million killed in Cambodia
  • 5 million killed in North Korea
  • 1 million killed in Yugoslavia
  • 1 million killed in Ethiopia
  • 1 million killed in Indonesia
  • 800,000 killed in Rwanda
  • 800,000 killed in US Civil War

Anyway, it appears that the US Empire train, similar to the USSR and Roman ones before it, will continue on down this track until it self destructs, no matter who is the president.

-SF1

Codependency: US Empire and Iraq

We cannot crusade against war without crusading implicitly against the State. And we cannot expect, or take measures to ensure, that this war is a war to end war, unless at the same time we take measures to end the State in its traditional form. The State is not the nation, and the State can be modified and even abolished in its present form, without harming the nation. – Randolph Bourne 1918

You might not have been taught this in your history class, but the United States has had its nose in Middle East affairs for over 70 years now. Specifically, there are a few dates that this relationship has in its timeline:

  • 1957 – The Ba’ath Party is a small, underground Arab nationalist group that supports the creation of a pan-Arab state and at age 20, Saddam Hussein joins the party.
  • 1959 – Saddam is selected by the Ba’ath Party to be part of seven-man hit squad to assassinate Iraqi leader Gen. Abdel Karim Kassem. The plot fails.  Saddam flees to Cairo and becomes caught up in Egypt’s own revolution under the charismatic Gamel Abdel Nasser, whose pan-Arabism Saddam finds appealing. Saddam also becomes a leader of the Ba’ath Party’s student cell in Cairo and reportedly regularly visits the U.S. embassy to meet with CIA agents interested in sparking Gen. Kassem’s overthrow.
  • 1963 – Kassem is assassinated by members of the Ba’ath Party and the CIA helps the Ba’athists by providing lists of suspected communists for the party’s hit squads, who kill an estimated 800 people. Saddam returns home to Iraq and rejoins the party as an interrogator, torturer and killer. Nine months later, the army overthrows the Ba’ath Party and Saddam is jailed.
  • 1968 -The Ba’ath Party seizes power in Iraq, this time under Ahmad Hassan Al Bakr, Saddam’s cousin. Bakr entrusts his 31-year-old relative Saddam with the most important job of all: running the state security apparatus to extinguish dissent both inside and outside the party. Within a year and a half, Saddam emerges as Bakr’s right hand man. CIA connections are intact.
  • 1970s – As Saddam’s power and influence grows, it is clear that he has designs on the presidency himself, but he also knows that Bakr has powerful support from the army. Saddam begins to plot against the military establishment and to systematically remove Bakr’s closest colleagues.
  • 1979 – Saddam stages a palace coup and President Bakr resigns for health reasons. Among Saddam’s first actions after assuming the presidency is purging the Ba’ath Party of any potential enemies.Several weeks into his presidency, Saddam calls a meeting of the Ba’ath Party leadership and insists it be videotaped. He announces there are traitors in their midst and reads out their names. One by one, the individuals are led out, never to be seen again. Tapes of the meeting are sent throughout the country, allowing Saddam to send a message to the Iraqi elite.
  • 22SEP1980 – With U.S. encouragement, Hussein invaded Iran and during this costly eight-year war, the CIA built up Hussein’s forces with sophisticated arms, intelligence, training and financial backing. This cemented Hussein’s power at home, allowing him to crush the many internal rebellions that erupted from time to time, sometimes with poison gas. In one of the largest ground assaults since World War II, Saddam sends 200,000 troops across the Iranian border, initiating what would become a bloody eight-year conflict.
  • 1981 – When Ronald Reagan becomes president, he endorses a policy aiming for a stalemate in the war so that neither side emerges from the war with any additional power. But in 1982, fearing Iraq might lose the war, the U.S. begins to help. Over the next six years, a string of CIA agents go to Baghdad. Hand-carrying the latest satellite intelligence about the Iranian front line, they pass the information to their Iraqi counterparts. The U.S. gives Iraq enough help to avoid defeat, but not enough to secure victory.
  • 1986 -The Iran-Contra scheme is conceived by Reagan administration officials. Iran had been running out of military supplies in its war with Iraq and Reagan is advised that the U.S. could strike a deal in which secret arms sales to Iran could lead to the release of U.S. hostages held by pro-Iranian terrorists in Lebanon. Public exposure of the plan — which also involved illegally diverting the proceeds from the arms sales to the U.S.-backed Contras in Nicaragua — leads to the end of the U.S. policy. However, when Saddam learns of America’s actions, he vows never to trust the U.S. again.
  • 1987 – U.S. supplied chemical weapons are used when Iraqi forces unleash a devastating gas attack in the town of Halabja, killing an estimated 5,000 Kurds.
  • 1988 – Iraq-Iran War Ceasefire
  • 02AUG1990 – (Sec. of State) James Baker has directed our official spokesmen to Iraq to emphasize that we should express no opinion on this issue and that the issue is not associated with America. Apparently, Saddam Hussein took those words as a green light to invade Kuwait.
  • 17JAN1991 – Gulf War I – one of the most egregious acts that the U.S. military committed against the Iraqis was to intentionally destroy civilian water and sewage treatment centers and electrical facilities.

  • 1994 – Clinton sanctions on Iraq most effective when massive water and sewage issues plague a country, diseases such as cholera, measles, and typhoid had led to hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths, and a skyrocketing infant mortality rate, with many more deaths by 2000.
  • 30JAN2002 – US President Bush labels Iraq as part of the “Axis of Evil”
  • 20MAR2003 – Based on a lie, that Iraq had WMDs, the US and their coalition partners invade Iraq. Why did we invade and occupy Iraq? We were told Iraq was strong and dangerous. We were told that sanctions were not working, and Saddam Hussein was not in compliance with the UN disarmament regime. We were told that Iraq was working on a viable chemical, biological and nuclear program, had many of these weapons already, and was also working with terrorists who targeted and would target the United States. It was suggested repeatedly in Presidential and Vice Presidential speeches, in statements by the Secretary of Defense and other administration mouthpieces that Saddam Hussein had something to do with the 9-11 attacks on the United States. While the Pentagon, CIA and State Department knew Iraq had no relationship with al Qaeda. Instead, we understood that they were competitors and adversaries on both governing and religious issues. Two things angered Osama bin Laden — US forces in Saudi Arabia, and a godless Ba-ath dictatorship in Iraq. We also knew that Iraq had nothing to do with 9-11!

  • 2007 – Iraq is a country that once had 26 million inhabitants, but two million have fled, two million more are internally homeless, and nearly a million have lost their lives since we invaded in 2003. The 80% who have homes remain huddled and fearful, often behind large walls that separate them from family and friend, in the name of ethnic purification, something that the U.S. military is actively pursuing because it tends to make for better statistics. Everyone in Iraq has been touched, and not in a good way, by our invasion and subsequent occupation.
  • 2008 – Iraqi power vacuum and Syrian regime change appears on CIA vision statements prompting the birth of ISIS
  • 2011 – ISIS grows during Arab Spring as CIA vision statements also talk about regime change in Libya
  • 2014 – US and other coalition troops re-enter Iraq to ‘battle’ ISIS in Iraq
  • 2020 – The US kills the Iranian general who was most effective against ISIS forces

Symptoms of codependency:

In its most basic terms, codependency occurs at one of the extremes of relationship dynamics – when two partners draw more from each other than from their own inner strength.
This is not a stable condition.
Codependency deepens as partner feedback tends to grow in importance and self-confidence steadily diminishes as a result.
The relationship becomes highly reactive and fraught, with mounting tensions. Invariably, one partner hits a limit and seeks a new source of sustenance.
This leaves the other feeling scorned, steeped in denial and blame, and ultimately with a vindictive urge to lash out in response.

Iraq, I ask you, are you there yet?

In Eric Margolis’ latest column he reminds us of what Osama bin Laden saw:

Before he was murdered, Osama bin Laden called this monster Baghdad embassy and its twin in Kabul, `crusader fortresses.’ That is indeed their role, and to serve as the nerve center for all Mideast operations by the US. Iraq enjoys some of the world’s largest oil reserves. Where the profit from Iraq’s mammoth oil exports go remains a closely guarded secret.

He goes on to talk about Iraq’s ‘rich’ history and experience going back 100 years even with the British when they were the imperialists of the day:

Imperial Britain ruled Iraq … using the RAF to smash all opposition to the British-installed puppet ruler in Baghdad. In the 1920’s Churchill even authorized the RAF to use poison gas against rebellious Iraqi Kurds (as well as Afghan Pashtun tribes).

True to form, the US abuses Iraq in a similar way:

Washington has imposed an air exclusivity zone there. Real control of flat, largely barren Iraq comes from the air. US war planes based there and in Qatar can blast anything that moves in Mesopotamia.

It is for the following reason that the US will not be quick to exit Iraq:

Iraq has become the central military base and inexhaustible oil reservoir for the US that was envisaged by the Bush administration and its neocons. That is a major step in the total US domination of the Mideast and its energy resources.

Iraq, have you hit your limit yet? To what degree will you go to remove the US from what should be your sovereign nation with the consent of the governed?

-SF1