Robert Grenier – a 27-year veteran of the CIA’s Clandestine Service, and Director of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center from 2004 to 2006 – writes today: Events in the Middle East have slipped away from us. Having long since opted in favour of…
Posts Tagged ‘Saddam Hussein’
Former Director of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center: American Policy in the Middle East is Failing Because the U.S. Doesn’t Believe in Democracy
January 31st, 2011 |
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Biggest Terrorism Scaremongers Are THEMSELVES Promoting Terrorism
January 3rd, 2011 |
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The biggest scaremongers regarding the threat from terrorism are themselves promoting terrorism.Don’t believe me?Well, Pulitzer-prize winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh says that the Bush administration (and especially Dick Cheney) helped to …
The Big Lie: Governments Have to Save the Big Banks
November 28th, 2010 |
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Many of the world’s top economists and financial experts have said that the too big to fail banks are destroying the world economy, that they must be broken up in order to restore stability, and that small banks can easily pick up the slack and make al…
How to Persuade Stubborn People
November 17th, 2010 |
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As anyone who has tried to educate people with facts knows, it is very difficult to persuade stubborn people.New research sheds some light on this frustrating dynamic.As NPR noted in July:New research suggests that misinformed people rarely change thei…
Congratulations, America. Torture Has Led You On a Wild Goose Chase, Destroyed the Rule of Law and Made You Less Safe
November 9th, 2010 |
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There are numerous headlines this week about torture:Bush: “Damn right” I authorized waterboardingBush says waterboarding is legal “because the lawyer said it was legal”, even though the head of the 9/11 Commission – Thomas Keane – said they got legal …
Blood Tests Show Elevated Level of Toxic Hydrocarbons in Gulf Residents
September 7th, 2010 |
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A number of different chemists are finding elevated levels of toxic hydrocarbons in the bloodstream of Gulf coast residents.What is most disturbing about these results is that people who simply live near the water are showing higher than normal levels …
Dick Cheney’s Oily Dream
September 5th, 2010 |
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Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is currently saying that Dick Cheney’s vision of policy towards the Middle East after 9/11 was to re-draw the map:Vice-President Dick Cheney’s vision of completely redrawing the map of the Middle East following…
Final U.S. combat brigade leaves Iraq
August 19th, 2010 |
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The last American combat brigade has left Iraq, more than seven years after the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
The 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division crossed into Kuwait earlier than was widely expected. The Obama administration set a deadline of August 31 for the US combat mission to end.
A Guide To Evil Dictator Facial Hair
July 5th, 2010 |
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Dictators need facial hair. The way an ordinary person needs consistent sustenance, dictators must proclaim their superiority on their face, with hair.
Realpolitik returns
May 27th, 2010 |
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The National Security Strategy reveals a narrower view of what force can accomplish
EVERY incoming president is required to send Congress a National Security Strategy. Some of these documents are abstract and forgettable but others really do provide a clue to the future. One such was the document George W. Bush signed in 2002, which gave warning that America would act against foes seeking dangerous military technologies before such threats were fully formed. A year later the Bush administration cited precisely this doctrine to justify the invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam Hussein.
Barack Obama’s National Security Strategy, published on May 27th, has a different emphasis. Mr Obama opposed the invasion of Iraq. His document does not endorse Mr Bush’s doctrine of pre-emption. Nor, though, as the Iranians will doubtless note, is pre-emption explicitly disavowed. As a last resort, says the strategy, “the United States must reserve the right to act unilaterally,” albeit adhering to “standards that govern the use of force”. …
Disarmament and counter-proliferation: Old worry, new ideas
April 15th, 2010 |
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After some moral victories over nuclear matters, America’s hardest test looms
TO HEAR Barack Obama talk about the “unprecedented threat” that terrorists might one day set off a nuclear bomb, it would be easy to assume that little has changed since the days of George Bush. But having adopted his predecessor’s diagnosis, Mr Obama is proposing a different treatment. Where Mr Bush disliked arms treaties and favoured muscular unilateral action—he invaded Iraq on the grounds that he could not afford to wait for proof of Saddam Hussein’s (non-existent) banned weapons to come in the form of a “mushroom cloud”—Mr Obama is performing an intricate multilateral dance.
His introductory bow came in Prague last year, when the president set out his vision of a world free of nuclear weapons. Then, in September, he held out his hand to Russia by announcing a reconfiguration of America’s anti-missile defence system. The couple’s twirl concluded last month with an agreement to cut each side’s nuclear arsenal to 1,550 deployed warheads. …
Why Are We Still in Afghanistan?
March 10th, 2010 |
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Congress voted down a resolution to pull out of Afghanistan today.”Conventional wisdom” among many Americans – and congress members – is that we need to be in Afghanistan to protect our national security.Is it true?A Little HistoryBefore we discuss whe…
The week ahead
February 28th, 2010 |
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An election in deeply divided Iraq
• IRAQIS finally go to the polls on Sunday March 7th to vote in their long-delayed national elections. But with many candidates barred from standing because of former ties to Saddam Hussein’s Baath party, sectarian rivalries have once more come to the fore. It is far from certain that any single group will win enough votes to form a government, prompting fears that relations between Sunnis and Shias will deteriorate even further and threaten the country’s fragile recovery.
• A VOTE by the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday March 4th threatens to sour relations between America and Turkey. The congressional committee will consider whether to label the mass slaughter of Ottoman Armenians by Turkish forces in 1915 as a genocide. Previous similar resolutions never made it to a vote in the House of Representatives for fear of damaging relations with an important ally in the Middle East. But a House vote is more likely this time after Barack Obama’s election pledge to recognise the episode as genocide. …
Professor Auerbach Provides More Evidence of Fed’s Coverup Regarding Watergate and Iraq
February 26th, 2010 |
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Professor Robert Auerbach was kind enough to send me an email to let me know that Ron Paul read the following letter written by Auerbach into the Congressional record today: I would like to enter into the record…
More Evidence that the Fed Sent Money to Iraq
February 25th, 2010 |
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Yesterday, I quoted an economist with the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee for eleven years who assisted with oversight of the Federal Reserve to show that there might be some basis for Ron Paul’s questions to Ben Bernanke abo…
Iraqi secular coalition suspends campaigning over bans
February 13th, 2010 |
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A prominent secular coalition in Iraq has announced it will not campaign for general election The decision came after several of its candidates were disqualified for alleged ties to late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party.
Australian wheat exporter faces class action suit over corrupt payments to Saddam Hussein
February 10th, 2010 |
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Australia’s leading wheat exporter is facing a class-action lawsuit by nearly 1,000 shareholders who are demanding compensation for the millions of dollars they claim they lost through the company’s kickbacks to Saddam Hussein’s regime. The trial against the Australian Wheat Board began
Blair sticks to his guns over Iraq war
January 30th, 2010 |
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Former British prime minister Tony Blair has said he has no regrets about the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. He told an inquiry into the conflict that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the world who had to be disarmed or removed.