The 'exploits' of an Australian death squad, operating until 2013 in Afghanistan are currently the subject of a major Sydney Morning Herald investigation. Central to the story is an officer known only as 'Leonidas', "who cannot be named for legal reasons." If 'Leonidas' isn't proof that Hollywood is far more than a US Weapon of Mass Distraction (as if that were not bad enough) but a form of spiritual pollution which plays havoc with the minds of the cretins who flock to its juvenile productions, I don't know what is:
"At the time (2009), he was part of an SASR [Special Air Service Regiment] patrol that was increasingly dividing the regiment. A warrior culture was being embraced by some special forces troops but loathed by others. It involved tattoos and a devotion to the Hollywood movie 300, which glorifies the fighting prowess of the ancient Spartans, and whose climactic moment involves an enemy soldier being kicked off a ridge. Several former SASR officers say this rock-star ethos emboldened certain soldiers to test the elasticity of the rules of engagement - rules that govern when a soldier can take a life. 'The regiment over time prided itself on being an organisation that broke the rules but not the law,' explains one former officer... 'What happened, though, was during the Afghan campaign, there was a group of individuals who believed they were immune from the law'... [In] the patrol Leonidas belonged to... sources say, junior members were pushed to kill rather than detain." (SAS's day of shame: war crime allegations: bound detainee kicked off cliff and executed, Nick McKenzie & Chris Masters, 9/6/18)
As a SMH reviewer wrote of 300 back in 2007: "Welcome to the new double-speak. Sparta as a metaphor for America, courtesy of Warner Bros, in which the politics of eugenics is reborn amid one of the most sickeningly violent and mindless films of the new millennium. Adolf Hitler would have been pleased: he may have lost the war, but his ideas live on in mystical, military propaganda like this, aimed at spotty boys in need of heroes. God help us. Of course, latent fascism isn't new in American military movies. It's just that it's rarely as politically naive as it is in 300. That's me being charitable. It's just possible the filmmakers intended it to be as inflammatory as it is. These are strange times and 300 fits the mood of a part of the West that would like to see the Middle Eastern barbarians bathed in their own blood. This is their kind of movie, complete with references to 'barbarians' and 'Asian hordes'. Perhaps the Klan has become a new demographic for Hollywood." (In the name of freedom, Paul Byrnes, 6/4/07)
The 'genius' behind this filth, director Zack Snyder, was quoted at the time as saying, "My feeling is if a movie's not sexy and fucking violent and fucking cool, then why go sit in the theatre? I look at the screen and half the time I'm like, 'I'm going to fall asleep. Somebody's going to have to kill somebody. Or fuck somebody.' A movie should kick you in the face." (Sympathy for the Spartans, Stephen Applebaum, The Australian, 21/3/07)
And guess what? Snyder's 'movie' did just that - to an innocent, handcuffed, Afghan shepherd, Ali Jan:
"[A] junior soldier described a scene he'd witnessed which was haunting him. It involved an irate and frustrated Leonidas grabbing one of the PUCs [Persons Under Confinement] and walking him to the edge of a cliff... Leonidas gave himself a short run-up then kicked the detainee. As he plunged, his face smashed into rocks. Then the injured man was executed, the junior soldier told his superiors. A second witness... has corroborated that story. He says he saw Leonidas kicking 'the hell' out of an Afghan detainee. The witness says this incident mirrored the climactic 'kick' scene from the Spartan movie, 300."
I really don't think I can take too much more of this Western Civilisation shit.
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Monday, June 11, 2018
Monday, August 28, 2017
One to Avoid
Paul Monk's review of Douglas Murray's book The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam tells us more about the Islamophobia of the Monks and Murrays of this world than it does about either contemporary Europe, the Middle East or Islam. (Murray, BTW, is an associate editor of the Spectator.)
Here's Monk's hilarious opening paragraph:
"Douglas Murray was born in London in July 1979, putting him midpoint between Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's January flight from Paris to Tehran to lead the Shia Muslim revolution, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December, which triggered a global Sunni Muslim jihadist reaction." (Resisting Europe's Muslim tide, The Australian, 26/8/17)
No hint here that the Iranian revolution was a popular revolt against the repressive US client regime of the Shah, which emerged as the result of a CIA-engineered coup against the democratically-elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953. Just a "Shia" brainsnap on Khomeini's part, apparently.
Likewise, there's no hint that Monk's grand "global Sunni Muslim jihadist reaction" was kicked off in Afghanistan by the US, which funded, trained and armed Sunni Arab jihadis such as bin Laden for use against the Russian-backed secular government of Afghanistan.
IOW, poor old Murray had the terrible misfortune to be born at a time when those fiendish Muslims, both Sunni and Shia, experienced a sudden rush of blood to the head, which caused them to drop everything, and plot the forced Islamification of Europe, while theimperialist West, both the US and its European clients, was just innocently standing by, minding its own business as usual.
"In short, this journalist, author and political commentator has lived all his life against a background of Muslim insurgency and terrorism, as well as massive and now all-but-unrestricted Muslim immigration into Europe."
Of course, what prompted said "massive" Muslim immigration into Europe just may have had something to do with US/US client regime-change wars in Libya and Syria, but hush, we don't want to go there, it might spoil the story.
"Against that background, he reflects on the angry last writings of the great Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci, denouncing what she saw as the betrayal of the West and the capitulation of its leaders to Iranian and Sunni jihadist intimidation."
"Great"? Totally unhinged, actually.
Monk concludes his review with his own (and - what a coincidence! - Murray's) "uncomfortable" reflection on "the Gothic and other Germanic migrations into the Roman Empire," and "the Arab migrations of the 7th and 8th centuries that swamped the southern and eastern littorals of the Roman world and overran the Persian and Turkish worlds."
So the Arabs are the new Goths and Vandals, and the Turks, who did not appear on the scene until the 11th (Seljuqs) and 13th (Othmanlis) centuries were rolled (swamped!) by the Arabs in the 7th and 8th centuries? Right...
Here's Monk's hilarious opening paragraph:
"Douglas Murray was born in London in July 1979, putting him midpoint between Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's January flight from Paris to Tehran to lead the Shia Muslim revolution, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December, which triggered a global Sunni Muslim jihadist reaction." (Resisting Europe's Muslim tide, The Australian, 26/8/17)
No hint here that the Iranian revolution was a popular revolt against the repressive US client regime of the Shah, which emerged as the result of a CIA-engineered coup against the democratically-elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953. Just a "Shia" brainsnap on Khomeini's part, apparently.
Likewise, there's no hint that Monk's grand "global Sunni Muslim jihadist reaction" was kicked off in Afghanistan by the US, which funded, trained and armed Sunni Arab jihadis such as bin Laden for use against the Russian-backed secular government of Afghanistan.
IOW, poor old Murray had the terrible misfortune to be born at a time when those fiendish Muslims, both Sunni and Shia, experienced a sudden rush of blood to the head, which caused them to drop everything, and plot the forced Islamification of Europe, while the
"In short, this journalist, author and political commentator has lived all his life against a background of Muslim insurgency and terrorism, as well as massive and now all-but-unrestricted Muslim immigration into Europe."
Of course, what prompted said "massive" Muslim immigration into Europe just may have had something to do with US/US client regime-change wars in Libya and Syria, but hush, we don't want to go there, it might spoil the story.
"Against that background, he reflects on the angry last writings of the great Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci, denouncing what she saw as the betrayal of the West and the capitulation of its leaders to Iranian and Sunni jihadist intimidation."
"Great"? Totally unhinged, actually.
Monk concludes his review with his own (and - what a coincidence! - Murray's) "uncomfortable" reflection on "the Gothic and other Germanic migrations into the Roman Empire," and "the Arab migrations of the 7th and 8th centuries that swamped the southern and eastern littorals of the Roman world and overran the Persian and Turkish worlds."
So the Arabs are the new Goths and Vandals, and the Turks, who did not appear on the scene until the 11th (Seljuqs) and 13th (Othmanlis) centuries were rolled (swamped!) by the Arabs in the 7th and 8th centuries? Right...
Friday, April 14, 2017
Positively Presidential
"Trump drops 21,000 pound $310million bomb on the world's poorest people in Afghanistan. 'Liberals' of the world unite in perfect silence." (George Galloway tweet, 14/4/17)
Another case of X being in inverse proportion to the size of Y?
Another case of X being in inverse proportion to the size of Y?
Friday, March 31, 2017
History Repeating Itself
In his account of the massacre of the Palestinian Arab inhabitants of Surafend (Sarafand) by ANZACs in December 1918 (following the death of a New Zealand trooper at the hands of an Arab thief), the Australian war correspondent and historian, Henry Gullett wrote as follows:
"In fairness to the New Zealanders, who were the chief actors, and to the Australians who gave them hearty support, the spirit of the men at that time must be considered. They were the pioneers and the leaders of a long campaign. Theirs had been the heaviest sacrifice. The three brigades of Anzac Mounted Division had been for almost three years comrades in arms... The war task was now completed and they... were going home. To them the loss of a veteran comrade by foul murder, at the hands of a race they despised, was a crime that called for instant justice. They were in no mood for delay. In their movement against Surafend, therefore, they felt that, while wreaking vengeance on the Arabs, they would at the same time work off their old feeling against the bias of the disciplinary branch of General Headquarters, and its studied omission to punish Arabs for crime. They were angry and bitter beyond sound reasoning. All day the New Zealanders quietly organised for their work in Surafend, and early in the night marched out many hundreds strong and surrounded the village. In close support and full sympathy were large bodies of Australians. Good or bad, the cause of the New Zealanders was theirs. Entering the village, the New Zealanders grimly passed out all the women and children and then, armed chiefly with heavy sticks, fell upon the men and at the same time fired the houses. Many Arabs were killed, few escaped without injury; the village was demolished. The flames from the wretched houses lit up the countryside, and Allenby and his staff could not fail to see the conflagration and hear the shouts of the troops and the cries of their victims. The Anzacs, having finished with Surafend, raided and burned the neighbouring nomad camp, and then went quickly back to their lines." (Quoted in Paul Daley's Beersheba: A Journey Through Australia's Forgotten War, 2009, pp 343-44)
A comment on my 15/10/12 post Time to Revisit the ANZAC's Sarafand Massacre indicates that bayonets were also used:
"I first heard about this event from the son of a NZ soldier who was there (I think) name of Gainfort and he was in 2000 one of the last survivors of WW 1 being nearly 100 years old. I was told the story after I mentioned a sickly lamb I had, had died. I said it had not been worth treating... and was told 'not worth a bullet'. His father told him they bayonetted the Arabs as they were not worth a bullet. Tough men in those days."
My reason for returning again to this subject, is the appearance of a new book, Hit & Run, by New Zealanders Nicky Hager and John Stephenson. The book's blurb runs:
"In August 2010, a New Zealand soldier died in a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan. In retaliation, the New Zealand SAS led a raid on two isolated villages in search of the fighters they suspected were responsible. They all knew the rules. Prior to firing weapons, their freshly issued orders said, 'the commander approving the strike must determine that no civilians are present.' If they could not assess whether civilians were present, firing was prohibited. But it all went horribly wrong. None of the fighters were found but, by the end of the raid, 21 civilians were dead or wounded. Most were children or women, including a three-year-old girl who was killed. A dozen houses had been burnt or blown up. The operation was personally approved by the prime minister via phone from New Zealand. More missions against the group of fighters and more potential crimes of war followed, including the beating and torture of a prisoner. Afterwards no one took responsibility. The New Zealand military denied the facts and went to great lengths to cover things up. This book is the story of those events. It is, at heart, about the meaning of honour; about who we want to be and what we believe in as New Zealanders."
What we have here is an uncanny similarity to the events of December 1918 in Palestine. It seems that the only appreciable differences between the two war crimes are that, in the case of Afghanistan, the go-ahead came directly from the prime minister of the day, John Key, and not even the women and children were spared. (That is, if, with respect to the latter, Gullett's account is correct.)
"In fairness to the New Zealanders, who were the chief actors, and to the Australians who gave them hearty support, the spirit of the men at that time must be considered. They were the pioneers and the leaders of a long campaign. Theirs had been the heaviest sacrifice. The three brigades of Anzac Mounted Division had been for almost three years comrades in arms... The war task was now completed and they... were going home. To them the loss of a veteran comrade by foul murder, at the hands of a race they despised, was a crime that called for instant justice. They were in no mood for delay. In their movement against Surafend, therefore, they felt that, while wreaking vengeance on the Arabs, they would at the same time work off their old feeling against the bias of the disciplinary branch of General Headquarters, and its studied omission to punish Arabs for crime. They were angry and bitter beyond sound reasoning. All day the New Zealanders quietly organised for their work in Surafend, and early in the night marched out many hundreds strong and surrounded the village. In close support and full sympathy were large bodies of Australians. Good or bad, the cause of the New Zealanders was theirs. Entering the village, the New Zealanders grimly passed out all the women and children and then, armed chiefly with heavy sticks, fell upon the men and at the same time fired the houses. Many Arabs were killed, few escaped without injury; the village was demolished. The flames from the wretched houses lit up the countryside, and Allenby and his staff could not fail to see the conflagration and hear the shouts of the troops and the cries of their victims. The Anzacs, having finished with Surafend, raided and burned the neighbouring nomad camp, and then went quickly back to their lines." (Quoted in Paul Daley's Beersheba: A Journey Through Australia's Forgotten War, 2009, pp 343-44)
A comment on my 15/10/12 post Time to Revisit the ANZAC's Sarafand Massacre indicates that bayonets were also used:
"I first heard about this event from the son of a NZ soldier who was there (I think) name of Gainfort and he was in 2000 one of the last survivors of WW 1 being nearly 100 years old. I was told the story after I mentioned a sickly lamb I had, had died. I said it had not been worth treating... and was told 'not worth a bullet'. His father told him they bayonetted the Arabs as they were not worth a bullet. Tough men in those days."
My reason for returning again to this subject, is the appearance of a new book, Hit & Run, by New Zealanders Nicky Hager and John Stephenson. The book's blurb runs:
"In August 2010, a New Zealand soldier died in a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan. In retaliation, the New Zealand SAS led a raid on two isolated villages in search of the fighters they suspected were responsible. They all knew the rules. Prior to firing weapons, their freshly issued orders said, 'the commander approving the strike must determine that no civilians are present.' If they could not assess whether civilians were present, firing was prohibited. But it all went horribly wrong. None of the fighters were found but, by the end of the raid, 21 civilians were dead or wounded. Most were children or women, including a three-year-old girl who was killed. A dozen houses had been burnt or blown up. The operation was personally approved by the prime minister via phone from New Zealand. More missions against the group of fighters and more potential crimes of war followed, including the beating and torture of a prisoner. Afterwards no one took responsibility. The New Zealand military denied the facts and went to great lengths to cover things up. This book is the story of those events. It is, at heart, about the meaning of honour; about who we want to be and what we believe in as New Zealanders."
What we have here is an uncanny similarity to the events of December 1918 in Palestine. It seems that the only appreciable differences between the two war crimes are that, in the case of Afghanistan, the go-ahead came directly from the prime minister of the day, John Key, and not even the women and children were spared. (That is, if, with respect to the latter, Gullett's account is correct.)
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
Meet 'Mad Dog' Mattis
Say what you will about Donald ('Grab Them by the Pussy') Trump, we can at least take some courage from the fact that that he'll be advised by some of the best and brightest (not to mention feminist) minds America has to offer. For example:
"General James Mattis, who retired in 2013 after a 44-year career, met Mr Trump yesterday at the president-elect's golf club... A senior commander in Afghanistan and Iraq, he fell out of favour during the Obama administration for his tough stance on Iran. The selection of General Mattis as defence secretary would cap a national security team that is strikingly more bellicose and uncompromising than that of Mr Obama.
"General Mattis, 66, nicknamed 'Mad Dog', attracted controversy and admiration in 2005 when he said shooting Taliban fighters was fun and mocked their sexual potency. 'You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,' he said. 'You know guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. Actually it's quite fun to fight them, you know. It's a hell of a hoot. It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up there with you. I like brawling.'
"A year earlier he had commanded US marines in the battle of Fallujah. During the Iraq invasion, a young platoon commander was shocked to find General Mattis, then a brigadier-general, in a fighting hole with a sergeant and a lance corporal. General Mattis used the dictum: 'Be polite, be professional but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.' He was also nicknamed the 'warrior monk' and is said to own more than 7000 books. He impressed on his troops the need to be culturally sensitive and stressed that humanitarian actions would undermine the Islamist enemies." (Carter & Clapper seek to oust admiral eyed by new president, AFP, The Sunday Times/ The Australian, 21/11/16)
7,000 books? Check out these li'l beauties from LtGen James Mattis' Reading List, Small Wars Journal (5/6/07):
Israel's Lebanese War, A Preliminary Assessment - Dr. Martin van Creveld, The RUSI Journal, October 2006
The Crisis of Islam: Holy War & Unholy Terror - Bernard Lewis
What Went Wrong?: The Clash Between Islam & Modernity in the Middle East - Bernard Lewis
From Beirut to Jerusalem - Thomas Friedman
Hatred's Kingdom - Dore Gold
The Arab Mind - Raphael Patai
A Peace to End All Peace - David Fromkin
The Arab Israeli Wars - Chaim Herzog
No nasty Edward Said stuff there...
"General James Mattis, who retired in 2013 after a 44-year career, met Mr Trump yesterday at the president-elect's golf club... A senior commander in Afghanistan and Iraq, he fell out of favour during the Obama administration for his tough stance on Iran. The selection of General Mattis as defence secretary would cap a national security team that is strikingly more bellicose and uncompromising than that of Mr Obama.
"General Mattis, 66, nicknamed 'Mad Dog', attracted controversy and admiration in 2005 when he said shooting Taliban fighters was fun and mocked their sexual potency. 'You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,' he said. 'You know guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. Actually it's quite fun to fight them, you know. It's a hell of a hoot. It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up there with you. I like brawling.'
"A year earlier he had commanded US marines in the battle of Fallujah. During the Iraq invasion, a young platoon commander was shocked to find General Mattis, then a brigadier-general, in a fighting hole with a sergeant and a lance corporal. General Mattis used the dictum: 'Be polite, be professional but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.' He was also nicknamed the 'warrior monk' and is said to own more than 7000 books. He impressed on his troops the need to be culturally sensitive and stressed that humanitarian actions would undermine the Islamist enemies." (Carter & Clapper seek to oust admiral eyed by new president, AFP, The Sunday Times/ The Australian, 21/11/16)
7,000 books? Check out these li'l beauties from LtGen James Mattis' Reading List, Small Wars Journal (5/6/07):
Israel's Lebanese War, A Preliminary Assessment - Dr. Martin van Creveld, The RUSI Journal, October 2006
The Crisis of Islam: Holy War & Unholy Terror - Bernard Lewis
What Went Wrong?: The Clash Between Islam & Modernity in the Middle East - Bernard Lewis
From Beirut to Jerusalem - Thomas Friedman
Hatred's Kingdom - Dore Gold
The Arab Mind - Raphael Patai
A Peace to End All Peace - David Fromkin
The Arab Israeli Wars - Chaim Herzog
No nasty Edward Said stuff there...
Tuesday, November 17, 2015
'You Reap What You Sow'
Some "home truths" on the Islamic State phenomenon from Bruce Hearn Mackinnon (senior lecturer in the Department of Management at Deakin University) in yesterday's Age. While Mackinnon's opinion piece is inadequate in certain respects, it is probably the best commentary on the subject to have appeared thus far in the Australian ms press. Here's just the gist:
"First, the US and its allies armed, trained and supported Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorist organisation in its dirty war, first against the leftist government in Afghanistan, and then against the Soviet Union who intervened in a doomed attempt to prop up the collapsing regime, which was at war with the Islamists, backed by Pakistan. This ultimately led to the September 11 attacks on the US itself. The Taliban today continues to be trained, financed and supported by forces within the Pakistan security and military establishment.
"Second, the West's support for Israel in its continued occupation of Palestinian territory and its constant and growing humiliation of Palestinian people, has been a festering sore, breeding resentment, frustration anger not only from Palestinians but the wider Muslim community, particularly in the Arab world. As if this wasn't bad enough, let's not forget that Israel was also happy to secretly fund and encourage the terrorist organisation, Hamas, in its early years, as a means of undermining the secular mainstream PLO, led by Yasser Arafat.
"Third, the US (supported by Australia) invasion and destruction of Iraq, justified by the lie about (we now know, non-existent) weapons of mass destruction, resulting in about half a million deaths, was the direct catalyst for for the formation of the Islamic State terrorist organisation - whose current military leaders are former generals from saddam Hussein's then predominantly secular Baathist regime.
"Fourth, the West's eagerness to destroy the largely secular Gaddafi regime has left Libya as a failed state, allowing criminals and terrorists a free rein to engage in violence on a mass scale.
"Fifth, the West's support for violent opposition to the Assad regime in Syria has left his country in ruins and allowed Islamo-Fascism to become the military opposition. All the talk about supporting 'moderate' opposition forces has been exposed as a lie. Syria is in the grip of a full-on sectarian war between the Shia-backed regime and the Sunni extremists, including IS and al-Nusra (al-Qaida). The West's support for the opposition in Syria has taken the form of support for Islamo-Fascism on the ground in Syria.
"Finally, the Islamo-Fascist movement, whether operating in Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Iraq or elsewhere, is known to have received financial, ideological, religious and military support from the West's key allies in the Middle East, the brutal Islamo-Fascist regimes of Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
"You reap what you sow." (After the Paris attacks: How to confront this Islamo-Fascist plague, 16/11/15)
"First, the US and its allies armed, trained and supported Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorist organisation in its dirty war, first against the leftist government in Afghanistan, and then against the Soviet Union who intervened in a doomed attempt to prop up the collapsing regime, which was at war with the Islamists, backed by Pakistan. This ultimately led to the September 11 attacks on the US itself. The Taliban today continues to be trained, financed and supported by forces within the Pakistan security and military establishment.
"Second, the West's support for Israel in its continued occupation of Palestinian territory and its constant and growing humiliation of Palestinian people, has been a festering sore, breeding resentment, frustration anger not only from Palestinians but the wider Muslim community, particularly in the Arab world. As if this wasn't bad enough, let's not forget that Israel was also happy to secretly fund and encourage the terrorist organisation, Hamas, in its early years, as a means of undermining the secular mainstream PLO, led by Yasser Arafat.
"Third, the US (supported by Australia) invasion and destruction of Iraq, justified by the lie about (we now know, non-existent) weapons of mass destruction, resulting in about half a million deaths, was the direct catalyst for for the formation of the Islamic State terrorist organisation - whose current military leaders are former generals from saddam Hussein's then predominantly secular Baathist regime.
"Fourth, the West's eagerness to destroy the largely secular Gaddafi regime has left Libya as a failed state, allowing criminals and terrorists a free rein to engage in violence on a mass scale.
"Fifth, the West's support for violent opposition to the Assad regime in Syria has left his country in ruins and allowed Islamo-Fascism to become the military opposition. All the talk about supporting 'moderate' opposition forces has been exposed as a lie. Syria is in the grip of a full-on sectarian war between the Shia-backed regime and the Sunni extremists, including IS and al-Nusra (al-Qaida). The West's support for the opposition in Syria has taken the form of support for Islamo-Fascism on the ground in Syria.
"Finally, the Islamo-Fascist movement, whether operating in Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Iraq or elsewhere, is known to have received financial, ideological, religious and military support from the West's key allies in the Middle East, the brutal Islamo-Fascist regimes of Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
"You reap what you sow." (After the Paris attacks: How to confront this Islamo-Fascist plague, 16/11/15)
Monday, October 19, 2015
Tony Blair Just Couldn't Wait for Iraq War
Sensational revelations on Tony Blair and Iraq appeared in yesterday's MailOnline.
Typically, there was NOTHING about them on this morning's (6.30) ABC news*, so here are the MailOnline headlines and opening paragraph:
Smoking gun emails reveals Blair's 'deal in blood' with George Bush over Iraq war was forged a YEAR before the invasion had even started - despite claiming he wanted peace
*Leaked White House memo shows former PM's support for war at summit with US President in 2002
*Bombshell document shows Blair preparing to act as spin doctor for Bush, who was told 'the UK will follow our lead'
*Publicly, Blair still claimed to be looking for diplomatic solution - in direct contrast to email revelations
*New light was shed on Bush-Blair relations by material disclosed by Hilary Clinton at the order of US courts
"A bombshell White House memo has revealed for the first time details of the 'deal in blood' forged by Tony Blair and George Bush over the Iraq War. The sensational leak shows that Blair had given an unqualified pledge to sign up to the conflict a year before the invasion started. It flies in the face of the Prime Minister's public claims at the time that he was seeking a diplomatic solution to the crisis. He told voters: 'We're not proposing military action - in direct contrast to what the secret email now reveals." (Glen Owen & William Lowther, 18/10/15)
You can read it all at dailymail.co.uk. For now, here's the data from their useful graphic:
Secret: Memorandum to the President
From: Colin L. Powell, 28/3/02
Subject: Your meeting with UK PM Tony Blair, April 5-7, 2002 at Crawford
1. Powell starts his memo by outlining the intimate nature of the upcoming meeting between Blair and Bush at the President's Crawford ranch in Texas.
*"Tony Blair is looking forward to the time he and his family will spend with you at Crawford to deepen their personal relationship with you and Laura [Bush's wife]. Buckingham Palace's approval of the trip despite The Queen Mother's death attests to the importance the British government ascribes to Blair's meeting with you. Blair will want to discuss: Afghanistan; Iraq; the Middle East; Russia and Nato enlargement; and trade and development.'
2. He says Blair will back him on Iraq and present 'public affairs lines' as Bush's global spin doctor.
* "Blair continues to stand by you and the US as we move forward on the war on terrorism and on Iraq. He will present to you the strategic, tactical and public affairs lines that he believes will strengthen global support for our common cause."
3. Powell then says that Blair eagerly proved his loyalty to Bush by sending British troops to Afghanistan even though UK military chiefs warned it was a risk.
* "Blair and the UK are in Afghanistan with us for the long haul. He readily committed to deploy 1,700 commandos, even though his experts warn that British forces are overstretched."
4. Again, he stresses Blair was already committed to Iraq War - even though he had not told MPs, the Cabinet or British voters.
* "On Iraq, Blair will be with us should military operations be necessary."
5. Powell says only TWO of Blair's cabinet ministers backed the war, Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw - at the time Blair claimed they all did. And he denied most Labour MPs and voters opposed him.
* "Aside from his foreign and defence secretaries, however, Blair's Cabinet shows signs of division, and the Labour Party and the British public are unconvinced that military action is warranted now."
6. Smooth-talking Blair would persuade sceptics that flimsy claims that Saddam had WMDs were 'credible' and brush off claims that UN backing was needed. The UN is dismissed with contempt.
* "Blair may suggest ideas on how to make a credible public case on current Iraqi threats to international peace... [and] handle calls for a UNSC [Security Council] blessing."
7. Blair would say the Allies would prevent bloody chaos in Iraq 'the day after' Saddam fell. They did no such thing, there was bloody chaos.
* "[Blair will] demonstrate that we have thought through 'the day after'."
8. Loyal Blair would spare Bush's blushes by not making a public fuss about a US decision on import tariffs which had devastated Britain's steel industry.
* "We do not expect Blair to dwell on the steel decision."
9. 'Arrogant' Blair desperately needed Bush's endorsement because his domestic policies were failing in Britain.
* "Blair hit some domestic turbulence. Blamed at home for failing to fix inadequate public services, his (unpublished) poll numbers have fallen to below 50%. He is sharply criticised by the media for being too pro-US, too arrogant and 'presidential' (not a compliment in the British context) and too insensitive on issues of concern to voters."
10. Bush had to pretend Blair was his equal to enable him to convince sceptical British voters he was not America's poodle.
* "Blair knows he may have to pay a political price for supporting us on Iraq, and wants to minimise it. Nonetheless, he will stick with us on the big issues. His voters will look for signs that Britain and America are truly equity partners in the special relationship."
[* However, an item on the recreation of the 1915 'Coo-ee March' from Gilgandra to Sydney to suck Australians into joining the army to fight for Britain in World War I was broadcast.]
Typically, there was NOTHING about them on this morning's (6.30) ABC news*, so here are the MailOnline headlines and opening paragraph:
Smoking gun emails reveals Blair's 'deal in blood' with George Bush over Iraq war was forged a YEAR before the invasion had even started - despite claiming he wanted peace
*Leaked White House memo shows former PM's support for war at summit with US President in 2002
*Bombshell document shows Blair preparing to act as spin doctor for Bush, who was told 'the UK will follow our lead'
*Publicly, Blair still claimed to be looking for diplomatic solution - in direct contrast to email revelations
*New light was shed on Bush-Blair relations by material disclosed by Hilary Clinton at the order of US courts
"A bombshell White House memo has revealed for the first time details of the 'deal in blood' forged by Tony Blair and George Bush over the Iraq War. The sensational leak shows that Blair had given an unqualified pledge to sign up to the conflict a year before the invasion started. It flies in the face of the Prime Minister's public claims at the time that he was seeking a diplomatic solution to the crisis. He told voters: 'We're not proposing military action - in direct contrast to what the secret email now reveals." (Glen Owen & William Lowther, 18/10/15)
You can read it all at dailymail.co.uk. For now, here's the data from their useful graphic:
Secret: Memorandum to the President
From: Colin L. Powell, 28/3/02
Subject: Your meeting with UK PM Tony Blair, April 5-7, 2002 at Crawford
1. Powell starts his memo by outlining the intimate nature of the upcoming meeting between Blair and Bush at the President's Crawford ranch in Texas.
*"Tony Blair is looking forward to the time he and his family will spend with you at Crawford to deepen their personal relationship with you and Laura [Bush's wife]. Buckingham Palace's approval of the trip despite The Queen Mother's death attests to the importance the British government ascribes to Blair's meeting with you. Blair will want to discuss: Afghanistan; Iraq; the Middle East; Russia and Nato enlargement; and trade and development.'
2. He says Blair will back him on Iraq and present 'public affairs lines' as Bush's global spin doctor.
* "Blair continues to stand by you and the US as we move forward on the war on terrorism and on Iraq. He will present to you the strategic, tactical and public affairs lines that he believes will strengthen global support for our common cause."
3. Powell then says that Blair eagerly proved his loyalty to Bush by sending British troops to Afghanistan even though UK military chiefs warned it was a risk.
* "Blair and the UK are in Afghanistan with us for the long haul. He readily committed to deploy 1,700 commandos, even though his experts warn that British forces are overstretched."
4. Again, he stresses Blair was already committed to Iraq War - even though he had not told MPs, the Cabinet or British voters.
* "On Iraq, Blair will be with us should military operations be necessary."
5. Powell says only TWO of Blair's cabinet ministers backed the war, Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw - at the time Blair claimed they all did. And he denied most Labour MPs and voters opposed him.
* "Aside from his foreign and defence secretaries, however, Blair's Cabinet shows signs of division, and the Labour Party and the British public are unconvinced that military action is warranted now."
6. Smooth-talking Blair would persuade sceptics that flimsy claims that Saddam had WMDs were 'credible' and brush off claims that UN backing was needed. The UN is dismissed with contempt.
* "Blair may suggest ideas on how to make a credible public case on current Iraqi threats to international peace... [and] handle calls for a UNSC [Security Council] blessing."
7. Blair would say the Allies would prevent bloody chaos in Iraq 'the day after' Saddam fell. They did no such thing, there was bloody chaos.
* "[Blair will] demonstrate that we have thought through 'the day after'."
8. Loyal Blair would spare Bush's blushes by not making a public fuss about a US decision on import tariffs which had devastated Britain's steel industry.
* "We do not expect Blair to dwell on the steel decision."
9. 'Arrogant' Blair desperately needed Bush's endorsement because his domestic policies were failing in Britain.
* "Blair hit some domestic turbulence. Blamed at home for failing to fix inadequate public services, his (unpublished) poll numbers have fallen to below 50%. He is sharply criticised by the media for being too pro-US, too arrogant and 'presidential' (not a compliment in the British context) and too insensitive on issues of concern to voters."
10. Bush had to pretend Blair was his equal to enable him to convince sceptical British voters he was not America's poodle.
* "Blair knows he may have to pay a political price for supporting us on Iraq, and wants to minimise it. Nonetheless, he will stick with us on the big issues. His voters will look for signs that Britain and America are truly equity partners in the special relationship."
[* However, an item on the recreation of the 1915 'Coo-ee March' from Gilgandra to Sydney to suck Australians into joining the army to fight for Britain in World War I was broadcast.]
Friday, September 18, 2015
Shit Happens
Andrew (Blazing Barrels) Hastie, desperately seeking the West Australian seat of Canning for the Libs in tomorrow's by-election, said in today's Australian:
"The biggest thing that was missing for 6 years under Labor was serious intellectual engagement with soldiers on the ground about how to best prosecute the war in Afghanistan." ('Labor MPs put Diggers at risk', Andrew Burrell, 18/9/15)
But what does former SAS captain Hastie mean by serious intellectual engagement?
Something along the lines of Tony Abbott's sage observation, in Tarin Kowt in 2011, to US commander James Creighton on the death of Australian soldier, Lance Corporal MacKinney?
Just to jog your memory:
"It's pretty obvious that, well, sometimes shit happens, doesn't it?"
Now top that, if you can, for serious intellectual engagement!
Here's an idea: seeing Andrew's big on serious intellectual engagement, if, perish the thought, Canning voters do the dirty on him in tomorrow's by-election, what better valedictory than 'Well, sometimes shit happens, doesn't it?' could he possibly come up with?
"The biggest thing that was missing for 6 years under Labor was serious intellectual engagement with soldiers on the ground about how to best prosecute the war in Afghanistan." ('Labor MPs put Diggers at risk', Andrew Burrell, 18/9/15)
But what does former SAS captain Hastie mean by serious intellectual engagement?
Something along the lines of Tony Abbott's sage observation, in Tarin Kowt in 2011, to US commander James Creighton on the death of Australian soldier, Lance Corporal MacKinney?
Just to jog your memory:
"It's pretty obvious that, well, sometimes shit happens, doesn't it?"
Now top that, if you can, for serious intellectual engagement!
Here's an idea: seeing Andrew's big on serious intellectual engagement, if, perish the thought, Canning voters do the dirty on him in tomorrow's by-election, what better valedictory than 'Well, sometimes shit happens, doesn't it?' could he possibly come up with?
Thursday, November 21, 2013
Follow the Thread...
So who was behind the latest suicide bombings at the Iranian Embassy in Beirut?
The Al-Qaida-linked Abdullah Azzam Brigade, we are told in press reports.
And who is/was Abdullah Azzam?
Azzam was the CIA's right arm in its jihad against the Russians in Afghanistan in the 1980s:
"Azzam traveled the globe under CIA patronage. He appeared on Saudi television and at rallies in the United States. A CIA asset who appeared as the embodiment of of the holy warrior and 'toured the length and breadth of the United States in the early and mid-1980s recruiting for holy war, ostensibly only in Afghanistan." (Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, & the Roots of Terror, Mahmood Mamdani, 2004, p 127)
He was also the teacher of the CIA's star recruit in its Afghan jihad, a wealthy Saudi contractor by the name of Osama bin Laden.
So was Azzam a Saudi?
No. He was a Palestinian, born in the West Bank. He was part of the refugee exodus into Jordan during the Israeli conquest and occupation of the West Bank in June, 1967.
So who was ultimately responsible for the latest bloody Beirut bombing?
If the phrase 'the big picture' has any meaning, Israel and the CIA.
Just follow the thread...
The Al-Qaida-linked Abdullah Azzam Brigade, we are told in press reports.
And who is/was Abdullah Azzam?
Azzam was the CIA's right arm in its jihad against the Russians in Afghanistan in the 1980s:
"Azzam traveled the globe under CIA patronage. He appeared on Saudi television and at rallies in the United States. A CIA asset who appeared as the embodiment of of the holy warrior and 'toured the length and breadth of the United States in the early and mid-1980s recruiting for holy war, ostensibly only in Afghanistan." (Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, & the Roots of Terror, Mahmood Mamdani, 2004, p 127)
He was also the teacher of the CIA's star recruit in its Afghan jihad, a wealthy Saudi contractor by the name of Osama bin Laden.
So was Azzam a Saudi?
No. He was a Palestinian, born in the West Bank. He was part of the refugee exodus into Jordan during the Israeli conquest and occupation of the West Bank in June, 1967.
So who was ultimately responsible for the latest bloody Beirut bombing?
If the phrase 'the big picture' has any meaning, Israel and the CIA.
Just follow the thread...
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
In the Name of Afghanistan
Making no attempt to escape, Michael Adebolajo stands at the scene of his crime outside a London army barracks, a blood-streaked meat cleaver in his hand, the mutilated corpse of soldier Lee Rigby at his feet, and explains exactly why he's done what he's done, on camera:
"The only reason we have killed this man today is because Muslims are dying daily by British soldiers... it's an eye for an eye... By Allah, we swear by almighty Allah, we will never stop fighting until you leave us alone." (DIY terror, Deborah Snow & Nick Miller, Sydney Morning Herald, 25/5/13)
Could he have made his motive any clearer? And yet the Australian media's just not listening. All you ever hear is the refrain: in the name of religion/ in the name of Islam.
But this murder really isn't about religion. Adebolajo didn't say: Islam made me/us do it.
It's about British war crimes against his co-religionists in Afghanistan and elsewhere:
"Britain's military police... have started at least 126 investigations into incidents in which British troops are alleged to have killed or injured Afghan civilians since January 2005... The Guardian has calculated that around 90 civilians, including women and children, were killed or wounded in the investigations and prosecutions listed here. However the actual number of casualties at the centre of the 126 investigations is likely to be much higher as the MoD has kept secret details of more than half the investigations." (Afghanistan: list of investigations & prosecutions of British troops, DataBlog, Rob Evans, The Guardian, 30/3/12)
No historical parallel is exact but I'm reminded here of the case of the young Polish-German Jew, Herschel Grynszpan. In 1938, Grynszpan shot dead the German diplomat Ernst vom Rath in Paris. Crucially, he made no attempt to get away, explaining that he'd acted to avenge persecuted German Jews. A postcard in his pocket read:
"With God's help. My dear parents, I could not do otherwise, may God forgive me, the heart bleeds when I hear of your tragedy and that of the 12,000 Jews.* I must protest so that the whole world hears my protest, and that I will do. Forgive me. Hermann [his German name]."
[*Herschel was referring to the deportation by the Nazis of Jews of Polish origin. The Poles refused to accept them, leaving them stranded on the border.]
The German press, of course, spun the murder as an attack by "the Jews on the German people," and it was used as a pretext for the massive anti-Jewish pogrom of Kristallnacht ('Night of Broken Glass').
Now we know why the Nazis got the murder of vom Rath wrong. But why are we getting the murder of Lee Rigby wrong?
[NB: All my data on Grynszpan, including the quotations, comes from Wikipedia.]
"The only reason we have killed this man today is because Muslims are dying daily by British soldiers... it's an eye for an eye... By Allah, we swear by almighty Allah, we will never stop fighting until you leave us alone." (DIY terror, Deborah Snow & Nick Miller, Sydney Morning Herald, 25/5/13)
Could he have made his motive any clearer? And yet the Australian media's just not listening. All you ever hear is the refrain: in the name of religion/ in the name of Islam.
But this murder really isn't about religion. Adebolajo didn't say: Islam made me/us do it.
It's about British war crimes against his co-religionists in Afghanistan and elsewhere:
"Britain's military police... have started at least 126 investigations into incidents in which British troops are alleged to have killed or injured Afghan civilians since January 2005... The Guardian has calculated that around 90 civilians, including women and children, were killed or wounded in the investigations and prosecutions listed here. However the actual number of casualties at the centre of the 126 investigations is likely to be much higher as the MoD has kept secret details of more than half the investigations." (Afghanistan: list of investigations & prosecutions of British troops, DataBlog, Rob Evans, The Guardian, 30/3/12)
No historical parallel is exact but I'm reminded here of the case of the young Polish-German Jew, Herschel Grynszpan. In 1938, Grynszpan shot dead the German diplomat Ernst vom Rath in Paris. Crucially, he made no attempt to get away, explaining that he'd acted to avenge persecuted German Jews. A postcard in his pocket read:
"With God's help. My dear parents, I could not do otherwise, may God forgive me, the heart bleeds when I hear of your tragedy and that of the 12,000 Jews.* I must protest so that the whole world hears my protest, and that I will do. Forgive me. Hermann [his German name]."
[*Herschel was referring to the deportation by the Nazis of Jews of Polish origin. The Poles refused to accept them, leaving them stranded on the border.]
The German press, of course, spun the murder as an attack by "the Jews on the German people," and it was used as a pretext for the massive anti-Jewish pogrom of Kristallnacht ('Night of Broken Glass').
Now we know why the Nazis got the murder of vom Rath wrong. But why are we getting the murder of Lee Rigby wrong?
[NB: All my data on Grynszpan, including the quotations, comes from Wikipedia.]
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Sgt. Bales: Scholar & Gentleman
"Every American soldier I've known... has been a very fine human being and I can tell you that on a number of occasions in south-east Asia in tsunamis in Aceh and all over the world where the happiest sight on the horizon is a US soldier." Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, Q&A, 12/4/10
OK, so he may have blown 16 sleeping Afghan men, women and children to kingdom come, but you know what, Staff Sergeant Robert Bales is not only the kind of gentleman you'd expect to find in the US army, but a Middle East scholar as well:
"Army comrades described him as a model soldier who was polite, professional and exceptionally cool under fire. A student of Middle Eastern history and customs, he often admonished younger GIs to treat non-combatants with courtesy and respect. 'Some guys have a pretty negative attitude, but Bales wasn't like that at all', said Captain Chris Alexander, who served with Bales in Iraq. 'He said there was no need to be a jerk. Be polite, be professional, and have a plan to kill everyone if you need to'..." (Model soldier's growing stress over cash crisis, Joby Warrick, Washington Post/Daily Telegraph/ New York Times/ Sydney Morning Herald, 19/3/12)
His Middle East studies taught him that Middle Easterners, whether Iraqis or Afghans, may variously be described as 'sand niggers', 'rag heads', 'dune coons', or 'terrorist shits who deserve to die'. They also made him fluent in such languages as Arabic and Pashto, with words such as 'habibs' and 'hajjis' tripping off his tongue. But that's not all. Bales' studies have really honed his capacity for critical thought, resulting in the following piercing insights:
"Bales offered his own insights on the war in Iraq after he fought in a battle in Najaf in 2007 in which 250 enemy fighters died, in clashes described by some as 'apocalyptic'. 'I've never been more proud to be a part of this unit than that day', he said afterwards in a testimony collected for a military training college. 'We discriminated between the bad guys and the non-combatants and then afterwards we ended up helping the people that 3 or 4 hours before were trying to kill us. That's the real difference between being an American as opposed to being a bad guy, someone who puts his family in harm's way like that'." (ibid)
Move over, Alan Dershowitz!
OK, so he may have blown 16 sleeping Afghan men, women and children to kingdom come, but you know what, Staff Sergeant Robert Bales is not only the kind of gentleman you'd expect to find in the US army, but a Middle East scholar as well:
"Army comrades described him as a model soldier who was polite, professional and exceptionally cool under fire. A student of Middle Eastern history and customs, he often admonished younger GIs to treat non-combatants with courtesy and respect. 'Some guys have a pretty negative attitude, but Bales wasn't like that at all', said Captain Chris Alexander, who served with Bales in Iraq. 'He said there was no need to be a jerk. Be polite, be professional, and have a plan to kill everyone if you need to'..." (Model soldier's growing stress over cash crisis, Joby Warrick, Washington Post/Daily Telegraph/ New York Times/ Sydney Morning Herald, 19/3/12)
His Middle East studies taught him that Middle Easterners, whether Iraqis or Afghans, may variously be described as 'sand niggers', 'rag heads', 'dune coons', or 'terrorist shits who deserve to die'. They also made him fluent in such languages as Arabic and Pashto, with words such as 'habibs' and 'hajjis' tripping off his tongue. But that's not all. Bales' studies have really honed his capacity for critical thought, resulting in the following piercing insights:
"Bales offered his own insights on the war in Iraq after he fought in a battle in Najaf in 2007 in which 250 enemy fighters died, in clashes described by some as 'apocalyptic'. 'I've never been more proud to be a part of this unit than that day', he said afterwards in a testimony collected for a military training college. 'We discriminated between the bad guys and the non-combatants and then afterwards we ended up helping the people that 3 or 4 hours before were trying to kill us. That's the real difference between being an American as opposed to being a bad guy, someone who puts his family in harm's way like that'." (ibid)
Move over, Alan Dershowitz!
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Hit the Road, Jack!
Here's what passes for plain speaking in the US media. It comes from CNN's Jack Cafferty, 13/3/12:
"How much is enough? The US has been in Afghanistan for more than 10 years. President Obama insists we will remain in Afghanistan until the end of 2014. Why? What's going to be accomplished by staying in that godforsaken hellhole for another 20 months that hasn't been accomplished in 10 and a half years?"
Yes, I agree, Jack. Get out of Afghanistan NOW! But what's this godforsaken hellhole business? Has CNN and the rest of the corporate media pack played no role in helping Bushama turn Afghanistan into a GFH? Jack? Oh, I see, you've got SFA to say about that. And anyway, if Afghanistan's a godforsaken hellhole, maybe it's because the Great Satan's taken up residence there, what do you think?
"Events are beginning to conspire against the US mission there. We had pictures of US marines urinating on dead bodies. We had the accidental burning of the copies of the Koran which further inflamed the hatred of the American presence there. And now we have the US soldier allegedly massacring 16 Afghan civilians, including women and children."
I understand. It's not the US "mission" that's been screwing Afghanistan and its people, it's "events" that have been screwing the US "mission." Right. Damn events! And shouldn't that have been accidentally or allegedly urinating on dead bodies?
"The Taliban are threatening to begin beheading US soldiers in response to this latest outrage, yet the Obama Whitehouse is out with the statement insisting that none of this will deter us from our mission. Which is what exactly? I have no idea what the hell we're still doing there anymore. Isn't Osama Bin Laden dead? The Karzai government is a puppet regime barely friendly to our government and the rest of the country hates our guts not unlike how we might feel if an army of occupation had taken up residence here in the US and begun desecrating our dead, burning our Bibles, and massacring our women and children."
At last, an insight! But why not call a spade a spade, Jack? What's this mission crap? What we've got over in Afghanistan ain't no mission! It's a regular, jackbooted army of occupation! And as such it's generated a stiff resistance, aka the Taliban. Face it, Jack, the Taliban's an own goal. But what's that you're telling me? Oh I see, you don't want to upset the viewers.
"Not to be cynical, but it's my nature. The one thing is if President Obama's election campaign is in trouble by Labor Day, suddenly, with a second term in doubt, my guess is he might decide to move up the timetable for bringing our troops home. Hey, whatever it takes. I don't know about you. I've had a bellyfull of Afghanistan."
And you know what, Jack? Afghanistan's had more than a bellyfull of your bullets, your drones and your colossal yankee arrogance.
"How much is enough? The US has been in Afghanistan for more than 10 years. President Obama insists we will remain in Afghanistan until the end of 2014. Why? What's going to be accomplished by staying in that godforsaken hellhole for another 20 months that hasn't been accomplished in 10 and a half years?"
Yes, I agree, Jack. Get out of Afghanistan NOW! But what's this godforsaken hellhole business? Has CNN and the rest of the corporate media pack played no role in helping Bushama turn Afghanistan into a GFH? Jack? Oh, I see, you've got SFA to say about that. And anyway, if Afghanistan's a godforsaken hellhole, maybe it's because the Great Satan's taken up residence there, what do you think?
"Events are beginning to conspire against the US mission there. We had pictures of US marines urinating on dead bodies. We had the accidental burning of the copies of the Koran which further inflamed the hatred of the American presence there. And now we have the US soldier allegedly massacring 16 Afghan civilians, including women and children."
I understand. It's not the US "mission" that's been screwing Afghanistan and its people, it's "events" that have been screwing the US "mission." Right. Damn events! And shouldn't that have been accidentally or allegedly urinating on dead bodies?
"The Taliban are threatening to begin beheading US soldiers in response to this latest outrage, yet the Obama Whitehouse is out with the statement insisting that none of this will deter us from our mission. Which is what exactly? I have no idea what the hell we're still doing there anymore. Isn't Osama Bin Laden dead? The Karzai government is a puppet regime barely friendly to our government and the rest of the country hates our guts not unlike how we might feel if an army of occupation had taken up residence here in the US and begun desecrating our dead, burning our Bibles, and massacring our women and children."
At last, an insight! But why not call a spade a spade, Jack? What's this mission crap? What we've got over in Afghanistan ain't no mission! It's a regular, jackbooted army of occupation! And as such it's generated a stiff resistance, aka the Taliban. Face it, Jack, the Taliban's an own goal. But what's that you're telling me? Oh I see, you don't want to upset the viewers.
"Not to be cynical, but it's my nature. The one thing is if President Obama's election campaign is in trouble by Labor Day, suddenly, with a second term in doubt, my guess is he might decide to move up the timetable for bringing our troops home. Hey, whatever it takes. I don't know about you. I've had a bellyfull of Afghanistan."
And you know what, Jack? Afghanistan's had more than a bellyfull of your bullets, your drones and your colossal yankee arrogance.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Beautiful Sets of Figures
Hanging with the big boys doesn't come cheap:
"Each of the 1550 Diggers on the ground in Afghanistan is costing Australian taxpayers $1 million. That was the figure for Australia's war effort last financial year - and it is only going to get bigger. Taxpayers will be hit with a new bill of more than $1 billion next year to fund the war in Afghanistan as the government struggles to conjure up a promised May budget surplus. The cost of the war hit $1.6 billion for the past financial year. By June 2013, the overall outlay for the Afghanistan campaign will reach more than $7.4 billion..." (Million-dollar Diggers: What each soldier in Afghanistan costs taxpayers, Ian McPhedran, Daily Telegraph, 18/1/12)
"Australia's spies now cost more than $1 billion a year to run ... according to a landmark review of the country's intelligence community... ASIO alone grew by 471% between 2001 and 2010 and this year will occupy new headquarters in Canberra worth $590 million..." (Soaring cost of spy force passes $1b, Dylan Welch, Sydney Morning Herald, 26/1/12)
Taxpayer? How stupid are you?
"Each of the 1550 Diggers on the ground in Afghanistan is costing Australian taxpayers $1 million. That was the figure for Australia's war effort last financial year - and it is only going to get bigger. Taxpayers will be hit with a new bill of more than $1 billion next year to fund the war in Afghanistan as the government struggles to conjure up a promised May budget surplus. The cost of the war hit $1.6 billion for the past financial year. By June 2013, the overall outlay for the Afghanistan campaign will reach more than $7.4 billion..." (Million-dollar Diggers: What each soldier in Afghanistan costs taxpayers, Ian McPhedran, Daily Telegraph, 18/1/12)
"Australia's spies now cost more than $1 billion a year to run ... according to a landmark review of the country's intelligence community... ASIO alone grew by 471% between 2001 and 2010 and this year will occupy new headquarters in Canberra worth $590 million..." (Soaring cost of spy force passes $1b, Dylan Welch, Sydney Morning Herald, 26/1/12)
Taxpayer? How stupid are you?
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Life Imitates Art
(Or Marquez imitates Diaz.)
Comic genius Tracey Ullman was born to send up the rest of us, in particular the Americans who walk among us.
From her State of the Union series, Tracey does ditzy/effervescent (take your pick) actress Cameron Diaz:
Voiceover: At an independent film festival in Portland, Oregan, Cameron Diaz talks about her latest movie.
Compere: We're talking to Cameron Diaz who stars in a new movie, That Terrible Time of the Month, a film about female genital mutilation.
Diaz (skolling coke and repeatedly burping): I'm sorry... I can just do that!
-Cameron, welcome.
Diaz (burps again, laughing hysterically)
- Cameron, welcome. Thankyou for talking to us.
Diaz: Hello, thankyou, thankyou.
-So what got you interested in female genital mutilation?
Diaz: Well, I was buying these amazing jeans from Fred Segal and it got me thinking that, like, African girls they can't even wear jeans because of their painfully mutilated geni-als, and that's just so sad and amazing because this is really like... the... golden age of American blue jeans so...
-So is it true that rock star Bono made you into more of an activist [Diaz burps] on this cause?
Diaz (laughs hysterically, crushing coke can): Who told you this? [Throws crushed can on floor] Um, yeah. We were on Larry David's plane and Bono took me into the bathroom, which is like amazing, like surrounded by, like Tibetan prayer flags and stuff, and he showed me where they do the actual circumcision. [Opening legs wide] It's like in here and they just -tshh- take it all out and then it was really sad and amazing [laughs].
-Let's see a clip from That Terrible Time of the Month which is creating Oscar buzz.
Diaz: Oh no, just stop! Just stop.
Diaz, brandishing rifle, bursts into African mud hut, screaming at off camera clitorodectimist: Just stop right now! Drop that clitoris! OK, Togo, c'mon [African girl runs to her as Diaz backs out still training her rifle on off camera clitorodectimist] You are really sad [burps] and... not amazing [farts].
OK, that's the 'art', now here's 'life'. Tracey'd love it:
"While [US] Department of Defense... policies still restrict women from serving in combat units, the soldiers selected from this group [of female trainees] will serve alongside the Army's most elite units on the battlefield. The Army has never selected women to do a mission because of their sex, until now. It is recruiting female soldiers to work closely with Special Forces teams and Ranger units during raids. Because women and children are often held in a separate room while soldiers search the compound, these teams go into villages in Afghanistan to build rapport with women, as it is culturally inappropriate for male soldiers to talk with them... The teams are trained to have a deeper understanding of Afghan culture and to connect with women in the villages to gather information on enemy activities. The teams aim to create a dialogue between US forces and Afghan women, which can help in medical clinics or building governance...
"The Soldier Urban Reaction Facility (SURF) was created to focus on building rapport in a foreign culture. Using cameras, the instructors can watch how the soldiers might handle different worst-case scenarios, staged in each of the 4 rooms. Built out of wood with faux arches and a crescent hanging over the opening, it looked like a cheap, rundown amusement park, but it is intended to resemble the Middle East. Rugs covered the floors. Pillows lined the walls of one room. In the center of the third room was a low table covered by a maroon cloth.
"When the test started, [Sgt Janiece] Marquez knocked softly on the door and was greeted by 7 female soldiers posing as 'villagers'. 'How is everyone?' Marquez asked, taking a seat on the floor and laying her rifle nearby. The 'villagers' started speaking at once. Their husbands beat them. One said she didn't want to be a sex slave around only to make babies. The 'villagers' demanded education. Freedom. Equality. The pleas were lost in a shrill wall of sound. 'Ladies, I can only speak to one of you at a time', Marquez said calmly. But before the meeting could get going, two soldiers acting as husbands burst into the room. Screaming and waving an AK-47 rifle, the men chased their wives into a back room. Marquez, startled, jumped up and snatched her rifle. Holding it in both hands, she backed away from the men, who were huge, compared with her. 'Why are you in my house?' demanded Spc David Atkinson. 'Who let you in here? Which one?' As Atkinson yelled, his partner, Staff Sgt. Mike Ward, started hauling the women out. Holding the women by the hair and 'slapping' them, Ward screamed at Marquez. She raised her rifle and ordered the men to get on their knees. 'Are you here to execute us?' Atkinson screamed. 'Lay down', Marquez said, grabbing Atkinson's AK-47, which had been dropped in the commotion. The men acted stunned, but they complied. After kneeling and stretching their arms out across the table, they began to yell at Marquez. 'Why are you in my house?' 'I am here to listen to your concerns', Marquez said, her rifle still trained on them. 'This is how you help people?' Atkinson screamed. 'By coming into my house and making me get on the floor? You want to keep disrespecting us?' Her training as an interrogator kicked in. 'Right now, you're under an insurgency', she told them. 'We fear for not only you but your wives. I am here to help people'." (In a new elite army unit, women serve alongside Special Forces, but first they must make the cut, Kevin Maurer, The Washington Post, 28/10/11)
Oh, and 'saving' brown (Afghan) women from brown (Afghan) men doesn't come cheap: $444 billion in the past decade to be exact.
Comic genius Tracey Ullman was born to send up the rest of us, in particular the Americans who walk among us.
From her State of the Union series, Tracey does ditzy/effervescent (take your pick) actress Cameron Diaz:
Voiceover: At an independent film festival in Portland, Oregan, Cameron Diaz talks about her latest movie.
Compere: We're talking to Cameron Diaz who stars in a new movie, That Terrible Time of the Month, a film about female genital mutilation.
Diaz (skolling coke and repeatedly burping): I'm sorry... I can just do that!
-Cameron, welcome.
Diaz (burps again, laughing hysterically)
- Cameron, welcome. Thankyou for talking to us.
Diaz: Hello, thankyou, thankyou.
-So what got you interested in female genital mutilation?
Diaz: Well, I was buying these amazing jeans from Fred Segal and it got me thinking that, like, African girls they can't even wear jeans because of their painfully mutilated geni-als, and that's just so sad and amazing because this is really like... the... golden age of American blue jeans so...
-So is it true that rock star Bono made you into more of an activist [Diaz burps] on this cause?
Diaz (laughs hysterically, crushing coke can): Who told you this? [Throws crushed can on floor] Um, yeah. We were on Larry David's plane and Bono took me into the bathroom, which is like amazing, like surrounded by, like Tibetan prayer flags and stuff, and he showed me where they do the actual circumcision. [Opening legs wide] It's like in here and they just -tshh- take it all out and then it was really sad and amazing [laughs].
-Let's see a clip from That Terrible Time of the Month which is creating Oscar buzz.
Diaz: Oh no, just stop! Just stop.
Diaz, brandishing rifle, bursts into African mud hut, screaming at off camera clitorodectimist: Just stop right now! Drop that clitoris! OK, Togo, c'mon [African girl runs to her as Diaz backs out still training her rifle on off camera clitorodectimist] You are really sad [burps] and... not amazing [farts].
OK, that's the 'art', now here's 'life'. Tracey'd love it:
"While [US] Department of Defense... policies still restrict women from serving in combat units, the soldiers selected from this group [of female trainees] will serve alongside the Army's most elite units on the battlefield. The Army has never selected women to do a mission because of their sex, until now. It is recruiting female soldiers to work closely with Special Forces teams and Ranger units during raids. Because women and children are often held in a separate room while soldiers search the compound, these teams go into villages in Afghanistan to build rapport with women, as it is culturally inappropriate for male soldiers to talk with them... The teams are trained to have a deeper understanding of Afghan culture and to connect with women in the villages to gather information on enemy activities. The teams aim to create a dialogue between US forces and Afghan women, which can help in medical clinics or building governance...
"The Soldier Urban Reaction Facility (SURF) was created to focus on building rapport in a foreign culture. Using cameras, the instructors can watch how the soldiers might handle different worst-case scenarios, staged in each of the 4 rooms. Built out of wood with faux arches and a crescent hanging over the opening, it looked like a cheap, rundown amusement park, but it is intended to resemble the Middle East. Rugs covered the floors. Pillows lined the walls of one room. In the center of the third room was a low table covered by a maroon cloth.
"When the test started, [Sgt Janiece] Marquez knocked softly on the door and was greeted by 7 female soldiers posing as 'villagers'. 'How is everyone?' Marquez asked, taking a seat on the floor and laying her rifle nearby. The 'villagers' started speaking at once. Their husbands beat them. One said she didn't want to be a sex slave around only to make babies. The 'villagers' demanded education. Freedom. Equality. The pleas were lost in a shrill wall of sound. 'Ladies, I can only speak to one of you at a time', Marquez said calmly. But before the meeting could get going, two soldiers acting as husbands burst into the room. Screaming and waving an AK-47 rifle, the men chased their wives into a back room. Marquez, startled, jumped up and snatched her rifle. Holding it in both hands, she backed away from the men, who were huge, compared with her. 'Why are you in my house?' demanded Spc David Atkinson. 'Who let you in here? Which one?' As Atkinson yelled, his partner, Staff Sgt. Mike Ward, started hauling the women out. Holding the women by the hair and 'slapping' them, Ward screamed at Marquez. She raised her rifle and ordered the men to get on their knees. 'Are you here to execute us?' Atkinson screamed. 'Lay down', Marquez said, grabbing Atkinson's AK-47, which had been dropped in the commotion. The men acted stunned, but they complied. After kneeling and stretching their arms out across the table, they began to yell at Marquez. 'Why are you in my house?' 'I am here to listen to your concerns', Marquez said, her rifle still trained on them. 'This is how you help people?' Atkinson screamed. 'By coming into my house and making me get on the floor? You want to keep disrespecting us?' Her training as an interrogator kicked in. 'Right now, you're under an insurgency', she told them. 'We fear for not only you but your wives. I am here to help people'." (In a new elite army unit, women serve alongside Special Forces, but first they must make the cut, Kevin Maurer, The Washington Post, 28/10/11)
Oh, and 'saving' brown (Afghan) women from brown (Afghan) men doesn't come cheap: $444 billion in the past decade to be exact.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
In Like Flynn
"Australian special forces soldiers have been serving in highly secretive US and British hit squads in Afghanistan, and some have served with the US unit whose troops killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan this week. The Herald has confirmed that since 2001, Australians from the SAS and commando regiments have successfully served on 'third country deployments' alongside some of the most highly-classified, best-trained and well-resourced combat troops in Afghanistan. Crucially, the Australian troops have been refused permission to participate in cross-border raids into Pakistan... Australian soldiers deployed with [US- and British-led 'capture-or-kill' squads] go through a legal process allowing them to operate under another country's flag while ensuring their status as members of the ADF." (Diggers linked to US unit that killed bin Laden, Rafael Epstein, Sydney Morning Herald, 5/5/11)
On why we just can't wait to tag along with the big boys, see my 28/7/10 post 'A Mature Democracy'?.
On Australia and Israeli spooks tiptoeing through the tulips together, see my 28/3/10 post Up to Our Necks.
On why we just can't wait to tag along with the big boys, see my 28/7/10 post 'A Mature Democracy'?.
On Australia and Israeli spooks tiptoeing through the tulips together, see my 28/3/10 post Up to Our Necks.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Our Boofhead in Afghanistan
Take up the White Man's burden
Send forth the best ye breed
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk & wild
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil & half-child.
Rudyard Kipling, 1899
"A neo-Nazi organiser from Victoria has been working as a private military contractor in Afghanistan, mocking locals and holding secret ceremonies commemorating the deaths of German soldiers in World War II. Kenneth Stewart, 36, has worked as a military-trained paramedic, accompanying aid workers around Afghanistan. His Facebook page shows a swastika flag in his room in Kandahar, and another picture shows him surrounded by Afghans he refers to as 'my nignogs' with a friend adding the comment 'it's lovely to see a white man back in control of the subhuman'. On Stewart's Facebook page he regularly makes disparaging comments about Afghans, Aborigines, Jews and others... In Melbourne, he helps recruit white supremacists to the local branch of the Southern Cross Hammerskins, an international neo-Nazi group. He described himself on one internet forum as a 'skinhead, mercenary, pork-eating viking; not bad just misunderstood'." (Victorian neo-Nazi as medic in Afghanistan, Staff Reporter, The Age, 23/3/11)
Send forth the best ye breed
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk & wild
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil & half-child.
Rudyard Kipling, 1899
"A neo-Nazi organiser from Victoria has been working as a private military contractor in Afghanistan, mocking locals and holding secret ceremonies commemorating the deaths of German soldiers in World War II. Kenneth Stewart, 36, has worked as a military-trained paramedic, accompanying aid workers around Afghanistan. His Facebook page shows a swastika flag in his room in Kandahar, and another picture shows him surrounded by Afghans he refers to as 'my nignogs' with a friend adding the comment 'it's lovely to see a white man back in control of the subhuman'. On Stewart's Facebook page he regularly makes disparaging comments about Afghans, Aborigines, Jews and others... In Melbourne, he helps recruit white supremacists to the local branch of the Southern Cross Hammerskins, an international neo-Nazi group. He described himself on one internet forum as a 'skinhead, mercenary, pork-eating viking; not bad just misunderstood'." (Victorian neo-Nazi as medic in Afghanistan, Staff Reporter, The Age, 23/3/11)
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Go Figure
"The Australian Defence Force has spent $252 million on aid in Afghanistan over the past 4 years - but only $37 million of that money has gone into actual projects such as schools, hospitals, clinics and wells. And the $37 million that was spent directly on such projects included more than $6 million used to build and maintain patrol bases and other military and security facilities used by the Afghan forces or shared with them." (Military spends $215m to give $37m in aid to Afghanistan, Brendan Nicholson, The Australian, 8/3/11)
Friday, January 21, 2011
Desperate & Dateless Aussies
"Australia and NATO coalition allies made a desperate bid to convince a disillusioned and divided Dutch government to keep its troops in Afghanistan, WikiLeaks cables reveal. But the reluctant Dutch believed there was no 'coherent, winnable, game plan' for creating a stable democratic government in Kabul, classified US diplomatic cables, dating from 2007, show... Efforts to boost the coalition contribution in Oruzgan in the wake of the looming Dutch withdrawal had modest success. A joint Dutch-Australian approach to Singapore resulted in a field hospital but a request for military support from Indonesia had resulted in an offer of 'one policeman'." (Canberra, NATO 'pleaded' with Dutch to stay in Afghanistan', The Australian, Mark Dodd, 20/1/11)
I had no idea the Indonesians had such a wicked sense of humour.
I had no idea the Indonesians had such a wicked sense of humour.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Australia First!
"US sick of asking Australia for troops," runs the front page headline in today's Sydney Morning Herald, citing "US officers." "Any discussion on [Australia taking the] leadership [in Oruzgan] [province, Afghanistan] is quickly terminated by Australian politicians," according to a "third source."
This, of course, is your run-of-the-mill stonewalling. But isn't that just a little old hat these days? Really, it's time to move on to an entirely new way of dealing with the US.
Now it's not as if we have to start from scratch, mind you. All we need do is take a leaf from Israel's book, and ask, What's in it for us? And I don't just mean what's in it for us? I mean what's really in it for us?
We should begin by demanding a $3 billion+ annual subsidy - the sort of thing Israel takes for granted, for example. To justify this our Washington lobby (and we will need to work on this) should bang on endlessly about Australia being America's strategic asset in the Asia/Pacific area. After all, it works with Israel in the Middle East. That nonsense of the PM's about Australia being America's best maaate in the region. I mean, that's sooo throw-a-shrimp-on-the-barbie, isn't it? Downright embarrassing! It's really got to go.
We should become the Asia/Pacific's mad dog, barking (mad) and lunging at every available opportunity. New Zealand our Judea! PNG our Samaria! (Plenty of Lost Tribes there.)
We should deem the entire region an existential threat and market ourselves as the only dinky-di democracy within cooee. Why, we could even grant all of Fred Nile's Christmases at once and declare ourselves 'the Christian state'... but I digress. Let's get back to the question of what could be in it for Oz in Oruzgan. Plenty... if Israel's our paradigm!
Now if, in exchange for a piddling 90-day halt to Israel's current rate of settlement metastasization in the West Bank, the US has to fork over $3 billion worth of stealth fighters and promise to shield Israel from adverse UN Security Council resolutions (for as long as they both shall live?), for a few more boots on the ground in Afghanistan, why the hell can't we get armed to the teeth for free just like Israel does?
Way to go!
This, of course, is your run-of-the-mill stonewalling. But isn't that just a little old hat these days? Really, it's time to move on to an entirely new way of dealing with the US.
Now it's not as if we have to start from scratch, mind you. All we need do is take a leaf from Israel's book, and ask, What's in it for us? And I don't just mean what's in it for us? I mean what's really in it for us?
We should begin by demanding a $3 billion+ annual subsidy - the sort of thing Israel takes for granted, for example. To justify this our Washington lobby (and we will need to work on this) should bang on endlessly about Australia being America's strategic asset in the Asia/Pacific area. After all, it works with Israel in the Middle East. That nonsense of the PM's about Australia being America's best maaate in the region. I mean, that's sooo throw-a-shrimp-on-the-barbie, isn't it? Downright embarrassing! It's really got to go.
We should become the Asia/Pacific's mad dog, barking (mad) and lunging at every available opportunity. New Zealand our Judea! PNG our Samaria! (Plenty of Lost Tribes there.)
We should deem the entire region an existential threat and market ourselves as the only dinky-di democracy within cooee. Why, we could even grant all of Fred Nile's Christmases at once and declare ourselves 'the Christian state'... but I digress. Let's get back to the question of what could be in it for Oz in Oruzgan. Plenty... if Israel's our paradigm!
Now if, in exchange for a piddling 90-day halt to Israel's current rate of settlement metastasization in the West Bank, the US has to fork over $3 billion worth of stealth fighters and promise to shield Israel from adverse UN Security Council resolutions (for as long as they both shall live?), for a few more boots on the ground in Afghanistan, why the hell can't we get armed to the teeth for free just like Israel does?
Way to go!
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Burqa Rage
"Andrew White (Letters, October 22) says he 'shook with rage' watching Adam Bandt and Andrew Wilkie deliver their emotional speeches. Doesn't anyone feel that same rage when they see burqa-clad Afghan women or when they hear of girls having acid thrown in their faces for wanting to go to school? That people are willing to ignore these conditions in Afghanistan makes me shudder." Alice Khatchigian*, Ermington, Sydney Morning Herald, 23/10/10
OK, Alice, off you go! Rip off those bloody burqas! Stand between the acid throwers and their victims! No, writing a letter on such a subject isn't enough. Action speaks louder than words. Oh, so that's what our troops are there for? To save brown women from brown men? Well, why doesn't the PM just say so?
[See my 3/12/09 post Revolted]
OK, Alice, off you go! Rip off those bloody burqas! Stand between the acid throwers and their victims! No, writing a letter on such a subject isn't enough. Action speaks louder than words. Oh, so that's what our troops are there for? To save brown women from brown men? Well, why doesn't the PM just say so?
[See my 3/12/09 post Revolted]
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