Iraq

Rumsfeld: Why not another 9/11?

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In a newly-released tape of a 2006 neocon luncheon meeting featuring former War Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, attended by ex-military “message force multiplier” propaganda shills Lt. General Michael DeLong, David L. Grange, Donald W. Sheppard, James Marks, Rick Francona, Wayne Downing, Robert H. Scales and others, Rumsfeld declared that the American people lack “the maturity to recognize the seriousness of the ‘threats’” — and need another 9/11.

When DeLong complained about a “lack of sympathetic ears” in Congress, and a lack of interest among the general American public, Rumsfeld responded, “What’s to be done? The correction for that, I suppose, is another attack.”

This videotape clip is part of a one-hour tape declassified by the Department of Defense in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. The entire clip, and analysis of this damning new revelation, can be found here: “The Correction for that . . . is another attack” (Jason Linkins, Huffington Post, 5/13/08)

For an independent op-ed about the same information, see Rumsfeld’s Mind: If 9/11 worked, why not try it again? (Op-Ed News. It was also the topic of discussion on the May 14 broadcast of Nova M Radio’s Mike Malloy Program.

In the seven years since the day, exhaustive and still growing evidence proves beyond any reasonable doubt that the US government, spearheaded by the Bush administration, planned, orchestrated and executed the 9/11 false flag operation. As openly advocated by wide swaths of elites, from the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), of which Rumsfeld has been a member, to the likes of Zbigniew Brzezinski (in his The Grand Chessboard), only an attack “on the order of Pearl Harbor” would, in Brzezinski’s words, cause the American people to support an “imperial mobilization,” and a world war.

Sept. 11, and its resulting “war on terrorism” (in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, etc.), remains the Bush administration’s endless gift from hell, in large part courtesy of Rumsfeld.

Placing the new evidence against previously revealed 9/11-related acts on the part of Rumsfeld, his guilt is overt and obvious. Recall that it was Rumsfeld who enthusiastically penned the “Go Massive” memo, gleefully declaring the Bush administration finally had the green light to kill: “Not only UBL (Usama bin Laden). Go massive. Sweep it all up. Things related and not.”

As the Bush administration’s war ensued in earnest, Rumsfeld gloated to the New York Times that 9/11 provided “the kind of opportunities that World War II offered, to refashion the world.”

It is not for nothing that Donald Rumsfeld was described by legendary war criminal Henry Kissinger as “the most ruthless man I’ve ever known.”

By Larry Chin
May 16, 2008, 00:22

Source: Online Journal

Euro 2008 Attack Hype May Be Veiled Neo-Con Threat

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U.S. and Israel furious with Switzerland over Iran gas deal, Swiss opposition to Israeli treatment of Palestinians

Threatening to capsize a $2.1 billion injection into the European economy and making hundreds of thousands of people fear for their lives, authorities and the media today lent credence to an anonymous Internet posting that alleged Al-Qaeda were planning to attack the Euro 2008 soccer tournament.

Presumably disinterested in attacking “the Great Satan” of America the terrorist group are now apparently turning their attention to that other evil empire…..erm…..Switzerland.

That’s right, Al-Qaeda are targeting those bastions of evil Switzerland and Austria for devastation, according to Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News, despite the fact that both countries condemned the Iraq war.

“The Euro 2008 tournament is a target cited by the Islamist terrorist network,” federal police spokesman Juerg Buehler told Swiss newspaper La Liberte.

He said messages had been posted on Islamist websites and police were “following the situation very closely”.

One of the messages urges terrorists to “transform the safest countries in Europe to the hell seen in Iraq or Afghanistan”.

“The time has come for the fighters of the faith. They must make their voices heard,” said another.

Brushing aside the media’s ludicrous and transitory stupidity of accepting an anonymous Internet posting at face value and immediately broadcasting it as gospel, the contention that global terrorists’ enemy number one is the tranquil haven of Switzerland, a country that has not been to war since 1515, is beyond belief. However, the real reason behind the Swiss being threatened may have more to do with recent geopolitical developments than anything else.

Read moreEuro 2008 Attack Hype May Be Veiled Neo-Con Threat

Pentagon Says Army Pay Runs Out Unless Congress Acts

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May 6 (Bloomberg) — The U.S. Army won’t be able to pay soldiers beyond June 15 unless Congress approves $108 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan or authorizes a funds transfer, a Defense Department official said.

If the supplemental spending legislation isn’t enacted by then, the Pentagon will be forced to seek congressional authority to use money designated for other services to fund the Army payroll, department spokesman Geoff Morrell said.

Pentagon budget officials briefed congressional staffers about the funding crunch earlier today, and Defense Secretary Robert Gates addressed the issue in a letter to lawmakers yesterday, Morrell said at a Pentagon briefing.

“He is taking members, leaders, at their word that they will have this bit of business done by Memorial Day,” Morrell said. At the same time, Gates asked his budget personnel “to begin contingency planning for the possibility that the Congress does not meet its goal of passing a budget bill the president can sign” by that date.

If the measure isn’t approved, Morrell said, the accounts that fund military operations and equipment maintenance would last a little longer than the Army payroll account, “but not much more.”

Read morePentagon Says Army Pay Runs Out Unless Congress Acts

Iraq, U.S. move to avert Baghdad water shortage

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BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Baghdad’s crumbling roads, burst sewage pipes and chronic water shortages are casualties of war that get little attention amid the daily litany of gunfights, bombs and bloodletting in Iraq.

As summer approaches, the city is facing an acute shortage of drinking water despite the efforts of officials like Sadiq Shumari, its director of water services.

Temperatures are set to reach 50 Celsius (122 Fahrenheit) and demand for the precious commodity will outstrip supply.

“We have a huge task to rehabilitate the water system, which has been neglected for decades, but it’s a challenge with such poor security,” Shumari told Reuters on a trip to the eastern neighborhood of New Baghdad, one of the city’s poorest.

Read moreIraq, U.S. move to avert Baghdad water shortage

John Bolton: US should bomb Iranian camps

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John Bolton, America’s ex-ambassador to the United Nations, has called for US air strikes on Iranian camps where insurgents are trained for war in Iraq.

Mr Bolton said that striking Iran would represent a major step towards victory in Iraq. While he acknowledged that the risk of a hostile Iranian response harming American’s overseas interests existed, he said the damage inflicted by Tehran would be “far higher” if Washington took no action.

“This is a case where the use of military force against a training camp to show the Iranians we’re not going to tolerate this is really the most prudent thing to do,” he said. “Then the ball would be in Iran’s court to draw the appropriate lesson to stop harming our troops.”

Mr Bolton, an influential former member of President George W Bush’s inner circle, dismissed as “dead wrong” reported British intelligence conclusions that the US military had overstated the support that Iran was providing to Iraqi fighters.

Read moreJohn Bolton: US should bomb Iranian camps

Pentagon Targeted Iran for Regime Change after 9/11

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WASHINGTON, May 5 (IPS) – Three weeks after the 9/11 terror attacks, former U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld established an official military objective of not only removing the Saddam Hussein regime by force but overturning the regime in Iran, as well as in Syria and four other countries in the Middle East, according to a document quoted extensively in then Undersecretary of Defence for Policy Douglas Feith’s recently published account of the Iraq war decisions.

Feith’s account further indicates that this aggressive aim of remaking the map of the Middle East by military force and the threat of force was supported explicitly by the country’s top military leaders.

Feith’s book, “War and Decision”, released last month, provides excerpts of the paper Rumsfeld sent to President George W. Bush on Sep. 30, 2001 calling for the administration to focus not on taking down Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network but on the aim of establishing “new regimes” in a series of states by “aiding local peoples to rid themselves of terrorists and to free themselves of regimes that support terrorism.”

In quoting from that document, Feith deletes the names of all of the states to be targeted except Afghanistan, inserting the phrase “some other states” in brackets. In a facsimile of a page from a related Pentagon “campaign plan” document, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein regimes are listed as “state regimes” against which “plans and operations” might be mounted, but the names of four other states are blacked out “for security reasons”.

Gen. Wesley Clark, who commanded the NATO bombing campaign in the Kosovo War, recalls in his 2003 book “Winning Modern Wars” being told by a friend in the Pentagon in November 2001 that the list of states that Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz wanted to take down included Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Sudan and Somalia.

Clark writes that the list also included Lebanon. Feith reveals that Rumsfeld’s paper called for getting “Syria out of Lebanon” as a major goal of U.S. policy.

When this writer asked Feith after a recent public appearance which countries’ names were deleted from the documents, he cited security reasons for the deletion. But when he was asked which of the six regimes on the Clark list were included in the Rumsfeld paper, he replied, “All of them.”

Read morePentagon Targeted Iran for Regime Change after 9/11

Soldier suicides could trump war tolls: US health official

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Suicides and “psychological mortality” among US soldiers who served in Iraq and Afghanistan could exceed battlefield deaths if their mental scars are left untreated, the head of the US Institute of Mental Health warned Monday.

Of the 1.6 million US soldiers who have been deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, 18-20 percent — or around 300,000 — show symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression or both, said Thomas Insel, head of the National Institute of Mental Health.

An estimated 70 percent of those at-risk soldiers do not seek help from the Department of Defense or the Veterans Administration, he told a news conference launching the American Psychiatric Association’s 161st annual meeting here.

If “one just does the math”, then allowing PTSD or depression to go untreated in such numbers could result in “suicides and psychological mortality trumping combat deaths” in Iraq and Afghanistan, Insel warned.

More than 4,000 US soldiers have died in Iraq since the US invasion of 2003, and more than 400 in Afghanistan since the US led attacks there in 2001, of which some 290 were killed in action and the rest in on-combat deaths.

“It’s predicted that most soldiers — 70 percent — will not seek treatment through the DoD or VA,” Insel said at the meeting, at which the psychological impact of war is expected to top the agenda over the next four days.

Left untreated, PTSD and depression can lead to substance abuse, alcoholism or other life-threatening behaviors.

“It’s a gathering storm for the civilian and public health care sectors,” Insel said.

Read moreSoldier suicides could trump war tolls: US health official

United States is drawing up plans to strike on Iranian insurgency camp

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The US military is drawing up plans for a “surgical strike” against an insurgent training camp inside Iran if Republican Guards continue with attempts to destabilise Iraq, western intelligence sources said last week. One source said the Americans were growing increasingly angry at the involvement of the Guards’ special-operations Quds force inside Iraq, training Shi’ite militias and smuggling weapons into the country.

Despite a belligerent stance by Vice-President Dick Cheney, the administration has put plans for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities on the back burner since Robert Gates replaced Donald Rumsfeld as defence secretary in 2006, the sources said.

However, US commanders are increasingly concerned by Iranian interference in Iraq and are determined that recent successes by joint Iraqi and US forces in the southern port city of Basra should not be reversed by the Quds Force.

“If the situation in Basra goes back to what it was like before, America is likely to blame Iran and carry out a surgical strike on a militant training camp across the border in Khuzestan,” said one source, referring to a frontier province.

They acknowledged Iran was unlikely to cease involvement in Iraq and that, however limited a US attack might be, the fighting could escalate.

Read moreUnited States is drawing up plans to strike on Iranian insurgency camp

GLOBAL ELITE GATHER IN D.C.

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Trilateral Commission members want suffering U.S. taxpayers to shell out even more money

The Trilateral Commission-one of the three most powerful globalist groups in the world-held closed-door meetings right here in Washington, D.C. from April 25 to 28. True to form, those members of the media who knew about the meeting-or were themselves participants in the proceedings-refused to discuss what went on inside or report on the attendees. Luckily, AFP’s own editor, Jim Tucker, was on the scene to bust this clandestine confabulation wide open.By James P. Tucker Jr.

Luminaries at the Trilateral Commission meeting in Washington expressed confidence that they own all three major presidential candidates, who, despite political posturing, will support sovereignty-surrendering measures such as NAFTA and the “North American Union.”

“John has always supported free trade, even while campaigning before union leaders,” said one. “Hil and Barack are pretending to be unhappy about some things, but that’s merely political posturing. They’re solidly in support.”

He was referring to Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

Mrs. Clinton, they noted, held strategy sessions as first lady on how to get Congress to approve NAFTA “without changes.” As president, they agreed, she would do no more than “dot an i or cross a t.”

Candidate Obama has not denied news reports in Canada that his top economic adviser, Austan Goolsbee, assured Canadian diplomats that the senator would keep NAFTA intact and his anti-trade talk is just “campaign rhetoric.”

PETRIFIED ABOUT PAUL

While they are confident they can deal with any “potential president,” the Trilateralists paid huge tribute to Ron Paul in an equally large twist of irony, by expressing alarm that he is causing “significant future damage.”

They expressed concern that Paul’s rallies have attracted multitudes of young people who are getting “their political education.” They want Republicans to pressure Paul to drop out now and stop his education rallies. This assignment was given to Thomas Foley, former U.S. House speaker.

The reasons Paul’s “education campaign” strikes fear into Trilateral hearts are obvious. Paul would refuse to surrender an ounce of U.S. sovereignty to an international organization and TC wants world government.

Paul would immediately bring U.S. troops home from Iraq, Afghanistan and from 130 UN “peacekeeping” missions around the globe. TC wants to enjoy war profiteering and global power. Paul would abolish the federal income tax while the TC wants to pile on a global tax payable to the UN.

The formal agenda was loaded with everything Paul and American patriots detest: higher taxes, more foreign giveaways, more immigration, both legal and illegal, into the United States and “engaging Iran,” among others.

Read moreGLOBAL ELITE GATHER IN D.C.

Pentagon Expands Propaganda Reach With Foreign “News” Websites

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The Pentagon is expanding “Information Operations” on the Internet with purposefully set up foreign news websites that are designed to look like independent media sources but in reality are nothing more than direct military propaganda.

USA Today reports:

“The Pentagon is setting up a global network of foreign-language news websites, including an Arabic site for Iraqis, and hiring local journalists to write current events stories and other content that promote U.S. interests and counter insurgent messages.”

The websites at http://www.balkantimes.com, http://www.magharebia.com and http://mawtani.com are three of the said Pentagon run operations aimed at people in the Balkans, North Africa and Iraq.

The front pages of the sites appear to be populated with regionalized news stories, but the disclaimers buried within the sites and accessible only via small links at the bottom of the pages reveal that all three are run by the US Department of Defense.

See screenshots below for the disclaimers (click to link through):

The Mawtani.com disclaimer is in Arabic. It reads:

“(Mawtani.com is) sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense to support the resolution No. 1723 (of the) Security Council of the United Nations. (Mawtani.com) highlights and emphasizes the move towards greater regional stability through bilateral and multilateral cooperation … and the steps taken by governments towards stability in Iraq.”

Though Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England commented that the sites are “an essential part of (their) responsibility … to shape the security environment in their respective areas.”, other Pentagon spokesmen have claimed that the sites’ content is not intended as propaganda, but is “a counter to extremist propaganda … with truth.”

Michael Vickers, the assistant secretary of Defense in charge of special operations commented that the websites are designed to counter enemies on the internet who put out information that is not in keeping with the interests and goals of the U.S. military:

“It’s important to … engage these foreign audiences and inform,” Vickers said. “Our adversaries use the Internet to great advantage, so we have the responsibility of countering (their messages) with accurate, truthful information, and these websites are a good vehicle.”

Since when has the federal government and its war machine military been concerned with promoting the truth?

Read morePentagon Expands Propaganda Reach With Foreign “News” Websites

No End in Sight

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Chronological look at the fiasco in Iraq, especially decisions made in the spring of 2003 – and the backgrounds of those making decisions – immediately following the overthrow of Saddam: no occupation plan, an inadequate team to run the country, insufficient troops to keep order, and three edicts from the White House announced by Bremmer when he took over: no provisional Iraqi government, de-Ba’athification, and disbanding the Iraqi armed services. The film has chapters (from History to Consequences), and the talking heads are reporters, academics, soldiers, military brass, and former Bush-administration officials, including several who were in Baghdad in 2003.

Source: video.google

Drone attacks hit high in Iraq

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WASHINGTON — U.S. commanders in Iraq have ordered an unprecedented number of airstrikes by unmanned airplanes in April to kill insurgents in urban combat and to limit their ability to launch rockets at American forces, military records show.

The 11 attacks by Predators — nearly double the previous high for one month — were conducted as the Pentagon has intensified efforts to increase the use of drones, which play an increasingly vital role for gathering intelligence and launching attacks in Iraq. Last week, Defense Secretary Robert Gates prodded the Air Force to do more to rush drones to the war zone.


An AGM-114 Hellfire missile is unloaded from an MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicle after a mission in May at Balad Air Base, Iraq in this undated image.

The increase in Predator attacks coincided with a spike in fighting in Baghdad’s slum of Sadr City and in the city of Basra, where the Iraqi government mounted an offensive to root out militias there.

Commanders are expected to rely more on unmanned systems as 30,000 U.S. troops sent last year are withdrawn. The military has dozens of Predators in Iraq and Afghanistan. In all it operates 5,000 drones, 25 times more than it had in 2001.

“The Predator teams have just been doing unbelievable work down there (in Basra) and in Baghdad as well,” Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, said in a statement last week.

Read moreDrone attacks hit high in Iraq

Former workers accuse employees of improper activity, including the stealing of weapons, artwork and gold

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WASHINGTON — KBR employees working in Iraq stole weapons, artwork and even gold to make spurs for cowboy boots, two former company workers told Senate Democrats on Monday.

Appearing before a Democrats-only panel looking into allegations of contracting abuses in Iraq, the witnesses accused their former co-workers of widespread improper activity.


Linda Warren, former employee of KBR, shows the flag she brought back from Iraq during testimony on Capitol Hill on Monday. Warren said many of her colleagues stole numerous items while doing reconstruction work in Iraq.
SUSAN WALSH: ASSOCIATED PRESS

Read moreFormer workers accuse employees of improper activity, including the stealing of weapons, artwork and gold

DynCorp Manager Used Armored Car To Transport Hookers in Iraq

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Some explosive testimony this afternoon from a panel of whistleblowers testifying before the Senate’s Democratic Policy Committee on contractor abuse in Iraq.

A contractor died when a DynCorp manager used an employee’s armored car to transport prostitutes, according to Barry Halley, a Worldwide Network Services employee working under a DynCorp subcontract.

“DynCorp’s site manager was involved in bringing prostitutes into hotels operated by DynCorp. A co-worker unrelated to the ring was killed when he was travelling in an unsecure car and shot performing a high-risk mission. I believe that my co-worker could have survived if he had been riding in an armored car. At the time, the armored car that he would otherwise have been riding in was being used by the contractor’s manager to transport prostitutes from Kuwait to Baghdad.“

Other revelations:

– Kellogg Brown & Root contractors used to destroy countless quantities of still-usable equipment that was difficult to transport in “massive burn pits” that were “burning 24 hours a day.”

– KBR’s ice foreman “was cheating the troops out of ice at the same time that he was trading the ice for DVDs, CDs, food and other items at the Iraqi shops across the street.”

– When KBR whistleblower Frank Cassaday reported weapons looting, he was placed in a jail tent by KBR security.

– KBR employees looted Iraqi palaces for treasure to sell on eBay.

Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 5:04 pm

Source: Muckraked

Israel preparing to bomb Iran N-sites

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The commander of the Israeli Air Force says the regime’s decision makers have been preparing plans to take out Iran’s nuclear facilities.

General Eliezer Shkedi, who also heads the Israeli task force on Iran, made the remarks in an interview with “60 Minutes” on Sunday.

A large portion of Shkedi’s service has been dedicated to the preparation for a possible mission that was never discussed in public; an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, should international economic sanctions fail, Israeli daily Ha’aretz reported on Monday.

Shkedi spoke of a mission in 1981, when Israeli war planes attacked a nuclear reactor in Iraq.

He went on to say that today the Israeli decision makers are faced with a similar choice about Iran’s nuclear program.

Israeli and US officials accuse Iran of seeking nuclear bombs.

Iran, a member of the IAEA and a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), maintains that its nuclear activates are solely aimed at peaceful purposes.

Tehran has warned Tel Aviv of a crushing response, in case the regime launches an attack on the Islamic Republic.

JS/DT
Tue, 29 Apr 2008 05:06:54

Source: Press TV

Iraq WMD Evangelist’s New Crusade: Secret Ray Guns

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Dave Gaubatz is no stranger to controversy.

The former Air Force Office of Special Investigations agent maintains he found Saddam’s WMD bunkers, but that the U.S. military declined to follow up. His repeated allegations were picked up by a number of media outlets— and attracted the attention of prominent Congressmen, like then-Sen. Rick Santorum, then-Rep. Curt Weldon, and Rep. Peter Hoekstra. There hasn’t been any confirmation, however.

Lately, Gaubatz has been pushing another eye-opening assertion. Earlier this month, Gaubatz claimed that the Active Denial System, the military’s allegedly-nonlethal “heat ray,” is really a killer weapon, after all. It’s an allegation that, if true, would mean the entire public face of the program is a cover up of sorts. Gaubatz says he saw first hand the military testing the ray gun on… goats.

DANGER ROOM caught up with Gaubatz recently to quiz him a bit about his claims:

Read moreIraq WMD Evangelist’s New Crusade: Secret Ray Guns

Investigators: Millions in Iraq contracts never finished

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WASHINGTON – Millions of dollars of lucrative Iraq reconstruction contracts were never finished because of excessive delays, poor performance or other factors, including failed projects that are being falsely described by the U.S. government as complete, federal investigators say.

The audit released Sunday by Stuart Bowen Jr., the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, provides the latest snapshot of an uneven reconstruction effort that has cost U.S. taxpayers more than $100 billion. It also comes as several lawmakers have said they want the Iraqis to pick up more of the cost of reconstruction.

The special IG’s review of 47,321 reconstruction projects worth billions of dollars found that at least 855 contracts were terminated by U.S. officials before their completion, primarily because of unforeseen factors such as violence and excessive costs. About 112 of those agreements were ended specifically because of the contractors’ actual or anticipated poor performance.

In addition, the audit said many reconstruction projects were being described as complete or otherwise successful when they were not. In one case, the U.S. Agency for International Development contracted with Bechtel Corp. in 2004 to construct a $50 million children’s hospital in Basra, only to “essentially terminate” the project in 2006 because of monthslong delays.

Read moreInvestigators: Millions in Iraq contracts never finished

US navy fires at Iranian boats as tension rises in the Gulf

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The United States navy fired warning shots at two Iranian boats in the Gulf yesterday in the worst confrontation yet in the world’s busiest oil shipping lanes.

A US forces security team on a chartered transport ship used loudhailers, radios and flares to warn off two small Iranian boats acting in an “unclear” manner.

But the boats ignored the warning and the Americans opened fire, unleashing several bursts of live ammunition. The incident took place in the early morning near the international boundary in an area designated by the US navy as the Central Arabian Gulf.

Read moreUS navy fires at Iranian boats as tension rises in the Gulf

Joint Chiefs of Staff: US prepping military options against Iran

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Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that the Pentagon is planning “potential” military actions against Iran, reports The Washington Post.

Mullen criticized Iran’s “‘increasingly lethal and malign influence’ in Iraq,” writes Ann Scott Tyson for the Post.

Addressing concerns about the US military’s capability of dealing with yet another conflict at a time when forces are purportedly stretched thin, Mullen said war with Iran “would be ‘extremely stressing’ but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force,” Tyson notes.

“It would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability,” she quotes the U.S.’s top military leader at a Pentagon news conference.

Mullen’s assertion comes a day after American forces reportedly fired warning shots at Iranian speedboats in the Persian Gulf, a confrontation that Iran denies took place.

A prior incident involving U.S. forces in the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian speedboats in January of this year–which Republican White House candidates used (with the notable exception of Ron Paul) as a saber-rattling opportunity during a nationally-televised debate–was later discredited as a virtual fabrication.

Excerpts from the Post article, available in full here, follow…

#

…Mullen made clear that he prefers a diplomatic solution to the tensions with Iran and does not foresee any imminent military action. “I have no expectations that we’re going to get into a conflict with Iran in the immediate future,” he said.

Mullen’s statements and others by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates recently signal a new rhetorical onslaught by the Bush administration against Iran, amid what officials say is increased Iranian provision of weapons, training and financing to Iraqi groups that are attacking and killing Americans.

In a speech Monday at West Point, Gates said Iran “is hell-bent on acquiring nuclear weapons.” He said a war with Iran would be “disastrous on a number of levels. But the military option must be kept on the table given the destabilizing policies of the regime and the risks inherent in a future Iranian nuclear threat.”

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, who was nominated this week to head all U.S. forces in the Middle East, is preparing a briefing soon to lay out detailed evidence of increased Iranian involvement in Iraq, Mullen said. The briefing will detail, for example, the discovery in Iraq of weapons that were very recently manufactured in Iran, he said.

Source: The Raw Story

Senator Byron Dorgan – Out of Control Fraud

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Read about this here: US gave $300m arms contract to 22-year-old with criminal record

The Bush Family Business

For four generations now, the Bush family has been involved in supporting the country’s enemies (most notably the Nazi Party in Germany) and robbing the country blind.

The family was directly involved and profited from the Savings and Loan scandal of the 1980s and has participated in security fraud as well.

With this understanding as a background, the Iraq War can be viewed as their “masterpiece.”

The Bush family and its associates have stolen countless billions of dollars in the course of the war. In fact, one of their motivations for pushing the war in the first place was the opportunity for theft.

Chances are the destruction of World Trade Tower Seven, the home of crucial and now lost forever SEC and other federal law enforcement evidence and case files was carried out to cover their tracks.

Source: brasschecktv

(If you have watched this video and then you have also seen what Halliburton does.
Halliburton does not even pay taxes: Top Iraq contractor skirts US taxes offshore

And then take a look what happens at the stock market with Halliburton:
Halliburton stocks have risen about 50% since the end of January this year, in almost no time.

If you have this stock and are happy about the gain then realize that you are paying money to a corporation to cheat the American People and steal from all taxpayers.

JP Morgan, RBC Capital Markets, Merrill Lynch etc., they all say that Halliburton will outperform and yes it does, but it is you who pay for it.

Do not support Halliburton and alike companies take them down.
Sell these stocks and investment funds that support them.

Take your power back, that you have given to them, NOW. – The Infinite Unknown PS: The stock market will crash.)

Senator: VA lying about number of veteran suicides

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WASHINGTON — The Veterans Administration has lied about the number of veterans who’ve attempted suicide, a senator charged Wednesday, citing internal e-mails that put the number at 12,000 a year when the department was publicly saying it was fewer than 800.

“The suicide rate is a red-alarm bell to all of us,” said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. Murray also said that the VA’s mental health programs are being overwhelmed by Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, even as the department tries to downplay the situation.

“We are not your enemy, we are your support team, and unless we get accurate information we can’t be there to do our jobs,” Murray told Deputy Secretary of Veterans Affairs Gordon Mansfield during the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee hearing.

Read moreSenator: VA lying about number of veteran suicides

Army doubled felony waivers for recruits in year of Iraq surge

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The Army doubled the number of waivers it issued to allow convicted felons to enlist between 2006 and 2007, while felony waivers issued to Marine recruits increased by nearly 70 percent, according to newly released numbers from the Pentagon.

The House Oversight Committee released the Department of Defense statistics Monday, and requested more explanation for the increase in criminals who have been allowed into the military’s ranks. The Army issued 511 waivers in 2007, compared to 249 in 2006. The Marine Corps issued 350 waivers last year compared to 208 the year before.

According to the new data, the Army and Marines have allowed recruits who have been convicted of assault with a dangerous weapn, burglary, drug abuse, sexual assault; in a few instances recruits were cleared to join after convinctions on terrorism or bomb-threat related charges.

Read moreArmy doubled felony waivers for recruits in year of Iraq surge

PENTAGON CAMPAIGN: Retired officers have been used to shape terrorism coverage from inside the TV and radio networks

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A PENTAGON CAMPAIGN Retired officers have been used to shape terrorism coverage
from inside the TV and radio networks.

Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand

Correction Appended

In the summer of 2005, the Bush administration confronted a fresh wave of criticism over Guantánamo Bay. The detention center had just been branded “the gulag of our times” by Amnesty International, there were new allegations of abuse from United Nations human rights experts and calls were mounting for its closure.

The administration’s communications experts responded swiftly. Early one Friday morning, they put a group of retired military officers on one of the jets normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney and flew them to Cuba for a carefully orchestrated tour of Guantánamo.

To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

Read morePENTAGON CAMPAIGN: Retired officers have been used to shape terrorism coverage
from inside the TV and radio networks

The Police Disguises Cameras As Fire Hydrants

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It’s like something dreamed up by East Germany’s Stasi.

In Florida, Sheriff Sgt. Ken Sonier “watches those who don’t want to be seen,” according to News-Press. Of course, in a healthy, non-brainwashed society most us would not take kindly to being watched, no matter the reason, but in the post-9/11 world far too many of us have bought into the idea we are somehow obliged to surrender our privacy in order to combat the terrorists, never mind we don’t have a good idea who the terrorists are. Fox News now tells us they have blond hair and blue eyes.

Sonier and the Lee County cops are busy installing “custom-made cameras” in fire hydrants, on exit signs in apartment buildings, and metal underneath cars. “Citizens don’t know what we do,” bragged Lee County Sheriff Lt. Gary Desrosiers of the Technical Investigations Unit. “And that’s a good thing.” It was presumably a good thing in East Germany, too, or so the fascist control freaks who once ran that country no doubt believed.

“The annual budget for the TIU is about $10 million, but that includes salaries and maintenance on all the department’s cell phones, laptops and equipment. Most of the equipment purchased is with federal grants.” More specifically, Department of Homeland Security grants.

“In Cape Coral, police accepted a $50,000 grant from the Department of Homeland Security to purchase a Video Detective. It is capable of recording audio, video and stills from blocks away and can clean up images and sound recordings turned in as evidence. Now grainy footage of a bank robbery suspect becomes as clear as a yearbook photo.”

Read moreThe Police Disguises Cameras As Fire Hydrants

One in five US servicemen has brain injury

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The psychological toll of America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has touched one in five servicemen and its consequences will be long-lasting, a study suggested yesterday.

The Rand Corporation, a leading research operation, said that 320,000 soldiers suffered brain injuries on the battlefield, while more than 300,000 suffered mental disorders on returning home.

The report said that US veterans are incurring “invisible wounds” of war, most notably traumatic brain injury. A survey of 1,926 soldiers represented a statistically significant sample of the 1.6 million troops sent to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, Rand said.

Read moreOne in five US servicemen has brain injury