The 'War on Torture

President Barack Obama noted that he was of a mind to look forward not backwards. He must attend to the wrongs of the past eight years before he can ever concentrate on building trust with the American people and America's allies.

Documents confirm the US Department of Defence involvement in the CIA's "ghost" detention program, and the existence of secret prisons at Bagram air base in Afghanistan and in Iraq.

These documents confirm that Guantanamo prisoners who were scheduled to be sent home cannot do so and must wait another month and a half in order to avoid bad press.

The document from the transport division recommended "hold(ing) off on return flights for 45 days or so until things die down to avoid hero welcomes on their return.

An email issued round that time a UN report on Guantanamo had been released recommended transfer in a smaller, more discreet plane.

Documents also revealed that Defence had a policy not to register prisoners with the Red Cross for 14 days and sometimes for 30 days in the interests of collecting intelligence and that this policy was known to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Margaret Satterthwaite, director of New York University's International Human Rights Clinic said, "it is increasingly obvious that Defence officials engaged in legal gymnastics to find ways to co-operate with the CIA's activities."

A "truth commission" answerable to both chambers of Congress to investigate the actions of the Bush administration and departments has been established by Democrat Patrick Leahy, head of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Senator Leahy called his proposal a "middle ground" between those critics of the Bush administration seeking to prosecute officials, and others wishing to concentrate on the future as opposed to investigating the past.

The next 28 days will be crucial witness to Obama's integrity in dealing with the atrocities of the so called 'War on Terror'.

http://conservativesarecommunistss.blogspot.com/

Children of Iraq

Children of Iraq are malnourished, dying of treatable diseases and fearful of being injured or killed by bullets or bombs. Since the Gulf war a generation of children have been wiped out. This cannot and will not be ignored. Those who illegally (UK attorney general decision) invaded Iraq will eventually have to step up to the bench and confess their sins.

Too many innocent souls have been lost and we can never recover them.

Who will liberate Iraq from the United States

UN Resolution 1790 gives a firm date for a review in a statement that, ‘Decides further that the mandate for the multinational force shall be reviewed at the request of the
Government of Iraq or no later than 15 June 2008, and declares that it will terminate this mandate earlier if requested by the Government of Iraq.’

This resolution was pushed through the UN Security Council by Bush despite a clear majority by the Iraqi parliament in April 2007, demanding a timetable for withdrawal of all foreign forces from Iraq.

The resolution on December 18th 2007 thus violated the Iraq constitution which together with the policy of building up armed Sunni militias is already leading to Sunni divisions with Shi'ite groups, and with the Shi'ite dominated government.

"They must find it difficult...

Those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority." Gerald Massey

Benazir Bhutto said in an Frost interview Bin Laden is dead ... Bless her bravery

Bin Laden was reported to have been murdered in Pakistan in 2002. Gowani's report on Benazir's death - here

The attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan were portrayed as a response to 9/11. Yet the US and UK made extensive preparations for this "response" rapidly and decisively on a very large scale shortly before 9/11. How was this possible, unless they knew what was about to happen on 11 September 2001?

The war on terror began with a spectacular show of military strength. Britain suddenly deployed a huge "strike force" to the Middle East, the largest British deployment since the Falklands war of 1982. America launched the invasion of Afghanistan together with their allies from the Northern Alliance, rapidly taking the strategic town of Bamiyan. There is no doubt that the US and UK were "primed" for the conquest of Afghanistan, and ready "at any moment" for deployment to neighbouring Iraq.

The thing is, this all happened relatively quietly a few weeks BEFORE the 9-11 attacks!

When the planes crashed down on 9/11, the US and UK were surprisingly well prepared for their response. Conveniently, only weeks earlier, they had deployed troops to the very region where they would soon be required. They invaded Afghanistan to find Osama bin Ladin, but they never found him. Soon afterwards, they invaded Iraq to find the WMD, but they never found those either. Nevermind, it was still the right thing to do, or so we are encouraged to believe.

If you are just beginning to wonder what the "war on terrorism" is REALLY about, congratulations, you've just joined a growing number of people around the world who have woken up and decided to start thinking for themselves.

A Liberal Britain

What would a 'Liberal' Britain achieve?

Can we believe the words of Nick Clegg? He says:

(1) Putting British families back in control of their everyday lives will be at the heart of everything we stand for.

(2) In control of their time, not fighting to make space for family life between the demands of work and the burden of bills.

(3) In control of what their children are exposed to on TV, not constantly struggling to protect toddlers from the pressure of advertising.

(4) In control of their own privacy, not forced to submit personal information to a massive government identity database.

(5) Giving power and responsibility to families – of every shape and size, of every background – is the only way to make sure everyone has a fair chance in life.

(6) I will not tolerate a country in which the poorest people die 13 years sooner than the richest, lone parent families are twice as likely to get attacked or burgled, and the poorest pupils are twice as likely to fail their GCSEs.

Understanding 21st Century Terror

To understand terrorism it is critical to engage in dialogue with the terrorist to understand the cause. By understanding, it then becomes possible to reduce or even eliminate acts of terror.

From a British prospective we draw on our experience of terrorist acts by the Irish Republican Army, the IRA, whose cause was essentially political, a united Ireland separated entirely from British rule.

The history of the conflict serves to remind us that after the invasion, Irish men and women resisted British rule for 800 years and fought a military campaign against occupation. Ireland was eventually partitioned by an act of Parliament without the consent of the Irish people.

In Ireland we witnessed military intervention to quell riots and ‘internment without trial’ to round up trouble-makers in dawn raids. Religion also played a part because most republicans from southern Ireland were Catholic and many Unionists from the North, Protestant mainly because their ancestors were originally from Protestant British main-land. Religion however was a handy ‘tool’ to gain external support from the Catholic movement in America who provided finance and even weapons.

This was always a political war and death caused by hunger strikes was a weapon to garnish external support from Europe where the Human Rights Council ruled that interrogation techniques used on internees amounted to "inhuman and degrading" treatment.

We should take note however that peace was obtained by using Christianity as a common bond between two leaders (Paisley and Blair) to agree a truce and integration of opposing parties towards a common aim. Thus history is rewritten and the Irish terrorists became freedom fighters.

Knowing all this we can certainly draw parallels to our 21^st century ‘war on terror’, we understand the religious constructs, the military invasions, the internments (rendition), torture at Camp Delta and the British dawn raids on Muslims.

But how did this ‘war’ start and why is it called a ‘war between good and evil? How do ‘de facto’ governments like the Taliban suddenly become ‘terrorists’ and ‘terrorists’ become freedom fighters as they did in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union?

It was the ‘evil of communism’ obsessively promoted and advanced by western societies and the religious fervour that Russia was a ‘Godless’ society that promoted a ‘jihad’ or ‘holy war’ from sympathetic Muslims in surrounding regions as well as support from western governments, so the Afghan terrorist in the eyes of Russia became the mujaheddin or soldiers of the holy war.

But things change.

This was a war between good and evil and Muslim sympathy focused on atrocities against the people of Palestine by Israel. America was seen to support the Israeli actions and became ‘the Great Satan’, now a threat to Muslims world-wide. A dominating, hegemous America turned into a catalyst for ‘global jihad’, this war became asymmetric, jihad soldiers become ‘suicide bombers,’ deadly killers far removed from martyrs of IRA hunger strikes.

The Iraq war and the threat to Iran by America began to change world opinion and as this year closes we note a withdrawal of British forces from Iraq as again we resort to a common belief between leaders that peace must be achievable at all costs to prevent destruction of all we cherish in this world.