WHY DID U.S. SOLDIERS KILL EIGHT CIVILIANS IN SYRIAN ATTACK?

I caught a fragment of BBC Radio's interview of Richard Perle, notorious supporter of Bush's unwarranted invasion of Iraq, justifying the illegal U.S. incursion into Syria which left at least eight people dead, including one woman and four children.

Perle said it was "hot pursuit." Now "hot pursuit" is the legal doctrine that allows the police to follow someone into his home or onto his property after the police saw the person committing a crime. There is no need to first obtain a warrant.

How Perle thinks it is "hot pursuit" is beyond comprehension. Whomever the U.S. was looking for, that person was not running away. So some other justification for what appears an illegal violation of the U.N. charter and international law needs to be created.

Tell me, what is the difference between some jihadist exploding a bomb in a crowded Baghdad market and U.S. special forces entering tents in this Syrian town and shooting all the inhabitants? Are they not both terroristic acts?

The Syrians claim that the U.S. engaged in murder of unarmed civilians. A surviving Syrian young woman claims that the special forces opened fire on civilians in the tents before departing in their choppers. If the lady's account is true, then the United States engages in terrorism just as much as the crazed bomber in the market.

WATERBOARD BUSH & CHENEY - GOD WILL PROTECT THEM IF INNOCENT BUT NOT IF GUILTY

The Bush Administration is pulling out all the stops in its efforts to justify its use of waterboarding. Saying that the CIA administered this classic torture technique on only three high value prisoners, Bush and Cheney want it to seem that they are judicious and prudent in nearly drowning only three out of many suspected terrorists.

Yesterday Cheney said if it were a matter of national survival he would again order suspects to be waterboarded.

Since Cheney seems to feel that the information produced by those subjected to the torture is worth it, I have a suggestion. Let's subject both Bush and Cheney to waterboarding. Let's see what information we can gather from them. Let's suspect them of being in consort with the terrorists. If they are indeed innocent, surely they will pass the water test without doubt. God himself will protect them, assuming they are innocent.

This is the very same test administered to those thought to have committed some crime back in the Middle Ages. Some suspects had to undergo a water test, others a test of fire, still others the rack. If they were indeed innocent, God would protect them from the rigors and pain of the trial, but if they were truly guilty, they would confess before the test was finished.

What is the difference between Bush and Cheney ordering waterboarding for certain suspects and the trials by fire, water and the rack some 800 years ago? Answer: there is no difference, they are exactly the same. That's why Bush and Cheney and their whole gang should be subject to waterboarding. If they are innocent, God will be with them. But if they are indeed guilty, God will not protect them and they will scream out in fear and pain.

Anyone want to take bets?

U.S. MINIATURE FLYING DRONES PROMISE NEW WAY OF KILLING

The Washington Post runs a story today by Rick Weiss on flying drones armed with miniature cameras that look just like dragon flies. People have observed the drones flying above political events and demonstrations, leading to the suspicion that the U.S. government is using them to spy on participants. Bush and Cheney can justify anything in their "war on terror."

Reports Weiss quoting an observer:

""I'd never seen anything like it in my life," the Washington lawyer said. "They were large for dragonflies. I thought, 'Is that mechanical, or is that alive?' "

"That is just one of the questions hovering over a handful of similar sightings at political events in Washington and New York. Some suspect the insectlike drones are high-tech surveillance tools, perhaps deployed by the Department of Homeland Security."

The next thing to expect is that the government will arm these insect-like drones with miniature weapons and bombs. That has been the progression of flying machines since the Wright brothers. Take a new technology of flight and make it an instrument for killing your enemies. Arm the unsophisticated bi-plane with lethal cannon and drop fiery explosive devices on the enemy. What should benefit mankind is turned demonically by government leaders into a new way of killing others.

WHAT IS BARACK OBAMA SAYING ABOUT USING FORCE AGAINST PAKISTAN?

I don't understand Barack Obama. Now he wants to strike inside Pakistan. Has he ever heard of international law? Pakistan is a sovereign country. No other country, and that means the United States, has a legal right to send bombs and war planes crashing down into Pakistan without the permission of the sovereign.

I confess, I have contributed to Obama's campaign, just today, and now I am totally besides myself for contributing to someone who thinks that the problem of Islamic terrorism can be solved by mounting a "war" against the terrorists. This is Bush-think, and I still cannot understand or approve of Obama for being in favor of it.

Jeff Zeleny writes in The New York Times:

"Senator Barack Obama said today that the United States should shift its focus from the war in Iraq to a fight against terrorism in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He said that if the Pakistani government fails to eradicate terror operations inside its borders, the United States should withhold aid and should strike Al Qaeda targets there itself.

"Mr. Obama, an Illinois Democrat who is seeking his party’s presidential nomination, said the Bush administration’s Iraq policy has made America more vulnerable to attack, and has weakened the country’s position in pressing the president of Pakistan, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, to close down terrorist training camps.

"“If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act,” Mr. Obama said today, “we will.”"

Obama has gone off on the road on this one. How about getting the United Nations involved instead of antagonizing some 100 million Pakistanis by threatening their nation with U.S. armed action? If I want someone who recklessly makes use of American military power, I might as well support Bush. Obama needs to retract this uncalled-for and thoughtless threat against another sovereign nation.

GEORGE BUSH: VOLUNTEER TO UNDERGO "ENHANCED" INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES

I want to call attention of all bloggers and their readers to this important opinion article today in The Washington Post by P.X. Kelley and Robert F. Turner on "War Crimes and the White House." Kelley is a former Marine Corps. commandant and Turner is a lawyer formerly with the Reagan White House. Both of them strenuously object to the Bush Executive Order specifying what the CIA can do in interrogating prisoners suspected of being terrorists. They rightly point out that Bush allows all enhanced and harsh techniques provided that they are not done for the purpose of humiliation. So if the CIA wants to "water board" a suspect, that would be allowed provided its purpose is interrogation or securing information, other than "humiliating" the prisoner.

Write Turner and Kelley:

"In other words, as long as the intent of the abuse is to gather intelligence or to prevent future attacks, and the abuse is not "done for the purpose of humiliating or degrading the individual" -- even if that is an inevitable consequence -- the president has given the CIA carte blanche to engage in "willful and outrageous acts of personal abuse.""

Marty Lederman at Balkinization finds Bush's Executive Order to be "transparently implausible" when administration officials can say with a straight face that the U.S. would be complying with the Geneva Convention's prohibition of torture or violent acts directed at one's life or person.

Senator Durbin posed questions on Bush's interpretation of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention to Alberto Gonzales the other day. Would it be allowed for some government other than the United States, for purposes of securing information, to subject American suspects to "painful stress positions, threatening detainees with dogs, forced nudity, water boarding and mock execution?" Gonzales refused to answer the question, claiming his answer would give insight into clandestine CIA activities.

Of course the reason why Gonzales did not answer the question is that he cannot believe the president has enough executive authority and power to violate Common Article 3. But that is exactly what Bush is authorizing.

I have a question to Bush and Gonzales along the lines of Senator Durbin. If you think that water boarding or forced stress positions or deprivation of sleep or mock execution or threatening detainees with dogs is perfectly legal and in compliance with Common Article 3, would you be willing to be a test subject? In medical schools, students are often asked to volunteer to invasive procedures so that they will have a better conception of what the patient must endure. So too here, before Bush allows any of these procedures to be used on "suspects," he should himself undergo them, with nothing held back out of respect for his office. Then let's see if he believes these harsh methods comply with the Geneva Convention.

GEORGE BUSH DEFENDS THE WAR WITH A BIG LIE

George Bush certainly is single-minded. The whole world recognizes his adventure in Iraq to be a monumental failure and a human catastrophe. Yet here he is in Ohio yesterday defending the war and making all the same arguments that have proved to be completely hollow and without basis.

Michael Abramowitz writes in today's Washington Post:

"In his speech, Bush once again conflated two organizations, al-Qaeda in Iraq and the international network led by Osama bin Laden, saying that the same group that attacked the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, is responsible for much of the violence in Iraq. While the Iraq militants are inspired by bin Laden, intelligence analysts say the Iraqi group is composed overwhelmingly of Iraqis and does not take direction from bin Laden."

This is the lowest form of political pandering. Bush believes most Americans don't know the difference between bin Laden terrorists that attacked the U.S. on 9/11 and the various faces of Iraqi insurgency fighting the U.S. occupation today. To say that the insurgents in Iraq are the same group that attacked the U.S. on 9/11 is either to be totally in the dark about recent history or else to be totally immersed in the most blatant big lie.

Writes Abramowitz:

"They know we're kindhearted, decent people who value human life, and they understand that Americans will recoil from the violence on our TV screens," the president said in response to a question. "And I know, or I strongly believe, that if we recoil and leave the region with precipitous withdrawals or withdrawals not based upon conditions on the ground, it's going to get worse, not better."

So, according to Bush, the "evil" insurgents know "we're kindhearted, decent people . . ." How come only Americans are kind-hearted but the insurgents are malicious and evil-minded? This could only be from George W. Bush and his small mind.

MOST INSURGENCIES IN IRAQ ARE NOT "AL QAEDA"

I have blogged elsewhere that George Bush & Co. would like to paint all insurgents in Iraq as "Al Qaeda" or "related to Al Qaeda." This is a gross simplification. As Prof. Juan Cole points out today in his blog Informed Comment, there must be at least 50 different insurgent groups, all of whom want the foreigner to quit Iraq:

"The US military in Iraq is launching a "sustained" campaign against "al-Qaeda" in Iraq. Since presumably this is what they have been doing for four years, I suppose it means they will do so now in accordance with better counter-insurgency tactics than just 'search and destroy,' which alienates the local population. The problem I foresee is that the guerrilla resistance to the US military presence in Sunni Arab Iraq isn't just the Salafi Jihadis or what the US calls 'al-Qaeda.' There are 50 cells of all ideological stripes, including four Baath Parties. (Emphasis added). I don't think the Iraqi Sunnis want us there (I think in polling only 8% said they did, and then to protect them from the Shiites; even the tribes fighting 'al-Qaeda' in al-Anbar province have no love for the al-Maliki government, for the most part)."

By painting every insurgent group with the Al Qaeda colors, George Bush and henchmen can claim that Iraq is the main battleground in the "war on terror." In this way can Bush justify his disastrous and illegal war in Iraq.

WHERE IS BUSH'S FAMILY IN THE WAR ON TERROR?

Think Progress has the transcript and video between Tony Snow and Helen Thomas today over whether any member of the family of George Bush serves in the military in Iraq.

"Q: Are there any members of the Bush family or this administration in this war?
SNOW: Yeah, the President. The President is in the war every day.
Q: Come on, that isn’t my question –
SNOW: Well, no, if you ask any president who is a commander in chief –
Q: On the frontlines, wherever…
SNOW: The President."

First of all, this sounds like a rehearsed and canned answer to a question that Bush and Tony Snow would have anticipated. Second, it is totally non-responsive to answer, as Snow did, that the president serves in the war. We all know Bush has no desire personally to go to Iraq or Afghanistan. He much rather go to Albania and be cheered and mobbed by Albanians. He got out of military service with the Texas Air Guard thirty years ago. He just wants others to put their necks on the chopping block, but not his own neck.

If as Bush says military service is now the highest calling, where are his twins? How come Bush has not instilled in them a desire to sacrifice their pretty faces for the country? Where are his nieces and nephews? Where are the Walkers? Where are the Bushes?

In a previous post on June 4, 2007, based on a blog by Brian Tamanaha at Balkinization, I ask why George Bush himself is not leading the front lines in Iraq. Prior to the 17th Century, most monarchs led their armies into battle themselves. This was probably a good thing, because it had to lead many monarchs to think hard whether to declare war or not, given their heads were at risk, not only those of their soldiers.

I doubt George Bush would have been so quick to wage war against Iraq if he knew he would have to lead the tanks. Perhaps he would have settled on diplomacy and negotiation and allow the United Nations to do its job of inspecting for WMD if he knew that Jena and Barbara were to drive supply trucks along the dangerous Iraqi highways.

AL QAEDA IN IRAQ IS ONE OF MANY INSURGENT GROUPS

The AP has a story today by Charles J. Hanley, AP Special Correspondent, on the propensity of the U.S. military of naming every insurgent group in Iraq as "Al Qaeda" or "Al Qaeda-type." We hear the same thing in the daily spin from the White House, where Mr. Bush tries to falsely claim that Al Qaeda in Iraq dominates and controls the insurgency against the U.S. occupation.


"Nine out of 10 times, when it names a foe it faces, the U.S. military names the group called al-Qaida in Iraq. President Bush says Iraq may become an al-Qaida base to "launch new attacks on America."

"The U.S. ambassador here suggested this week al-Qaida might "assume real power" in Iraq if U.S. forces withdraw.

"Critics say this is overblown, and possibly a diversion.
"Such speculation is unrealistic," Amer Hassan al-Fayadh, Baghdad University political science dean, said of the U.S. statements."

Of course, this attempt to label all insurgent groups as Al Qaeda is total nonsense. There must be more than 10 different groups in Iraq fighting the U.S. and the U.S.-backed Al Maliki government. See my post on June 7, 2007, reporting that Juan Cole recognizes at least eight different wars now going on in Iraq. And yes, it is clear why the Bush people love to talk about Al Qaeda in Iraq, so that Americans will believe that this illegal and unjust war should continue.

LEBANON - STOP INDISCRIMINATE SHELLING OF PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMP

Why is it necessary for the Lebanese Army to shell a Palestinian refugee camp? This is akin to the carpet bombings of German cities during WWII by the British and American war planes, or to the Israel carpet bombing of southern Lebanon by the Israelis with cluster bombs in the conflict with Hezbollah last year.

It is nothing more than state-initiated terrorism. It is bombing and shelling civilians only as a terroristic tool to force the Palestinians in the camp into submission.

WITNESS WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE OF PADILLA TESTIFIES IN CASE

Abby Goodnough writes in today's The New York Times that the government's star prosecution witness, Yahya Goba, was one of the Lackawanna Six to plead guilty to attending a "terrorist training camp."

What this has to do with Jose Padilla is another matter. Mr. Goba did not know Mr. Padilla, was not at the camp with Mr. Padilla, and has no first-hand knowledge idea what happened to Mr. Padilla or what Mr. Padilla did when Padilla was in Pakistan.

“If we are not allowed to put this evidence in,” a government prosecutor, Brian Frazier, told Judge Cooke on Friday before the jury was brought in, “our knees are cut out from under us.”

"As the defense forcefully pointed out and as Judge Cooke agreed, Mr. Goba has no material connection to Mr. Padilla or his co-defendants, Adham Hassoun and Kifah Jayyousi, who are charged with recruiting Mr. Padilla for terrorist training.


“What Goba did is not relevant to anything in this case, period,” William Swor, a lawyer for Mr. Jayyousi, argued before the jury came in.

"Judge Cooke allowed Mr. Goba to describe just his experience at the camp and the form he filled out. To the government’s frustration, she instructed the jury not to draw any inference from Mr. Goba’s testimony that Mr. Padilla attended the camp."

So Mr. Goba is not testifying that he saw Jose Padilla at the camp. Goba has no first-hand knowledge that Padilla was, before or after his time, at the same camp. Goba does not know if or why Padilla travelled to Pakistan.

So where is the evidence of the prosecution that Mr. Padilla did anything wrong? Or that he did anything against the law of the United States or that attended a "terrorist training camp?"

The reporter in The New York Times adds:

"Mr. Goba has also testified for the government at trials of terrorism suspects in Australia, Idaho and New York.

"Under cross-examination, he testified that he expected to enter the witness protection program after his 10-year prison term. He conceded that “muhajid” means “brother who fights for Islam,” and does not necessarily connote physical fighting.

"He also said his training at the camp was not “terrorist training,” but, as Michael Caruso, a lawyer for Mr. Padilla, said, “strictly military training, similar to a boot camp.”"

CHENEY CONFLATES WAR ON TERROR WITH IRAQI INSURGENCY

Alissa J. Rubin writes today in The New York Times that Vice President Dick Cheney told the troops in Iraq that their fight was an integral part of the War on Terror.

"Mr. Cheney framed the troops’ efforts as part of the fight against global terrorism and made no promise that an end was in sight.

"“We’re fighting a war against terror,” the vice president said, according to the prepared text of his remarks. “We are here, above all, because the terrorists who have declared war on America and other free nations have made Iraq the central front in that war.” "

This is just more bluster and spin from one of chief architects of the worst foreign policy mistake in United States history. Cheney's wants so much to justify the administration's Iraq catastrophe that he illegitimately conflates bin Laden's Islamist campaign against the West with the Iraqi insurgency. Let's get this straight once and for all, Mr. V.P. There is no connection between Osama's tactics of terrorism and the Baathists fueling the insurgency that your guy Bremer threw out of the government and civil service.

Iraq is not part of the "global War on Terror." No amount of spin or outright lying can change this fundamental reality. Soldiers of the United States are currently occupying a proud Arab country, whose history and culture far surpass that of America. The reason Iraqis are trying to kill American soldiers has nothing to do with Bush and Cheney's War on Terror. It has everything to do with hatred of a foreign occupier and national pride.

U..S. CLAIMS IT KILLS INSURGENTS - MOST ARE REALLY ONLY CIVILIANS

Pamela Constable writes for the Washington Post Foreign Service that Afghan President Hamid Karzai is fed up with the number of Afghan civilian casualties resulting from U.S. forces waging their counter-insurgency campaign in Afghanistan.

Every time the U.S. reports so many insurgents or Taliban killed, I wonder how many civilians this number includes. As it turns out, a large number of the killed and wounded are innocent civilians. It seems that the U.S. military puts out an enemy casualty number to buttress George Bush and his deceptive campaign to convince Americans that he is making progress whether in Afghanistan or Iraq. The number of casualties is therefore always suspect.

If this is what the War on Terror means - killing innocent Afghan women, children, babies - then I say end this Reign of Terror. Winning hearts and minds cannot be done with bombs and war planes. We need a new strategy, a new direction, a new president.

INSURGENTS KILLED WERE REALLY CIVILIANS

Why is it that every time we hear reports from the military that U.S. troops have killed so many insurgents, it means that many of those "terrorists" killed are in fact civilians? The whole concept of "coalition forces" (or NATO forces) in Iraq and Afghanistan going after the insurgents or "terrorists" is abhorrent because it really means that civilians, I mean, women, children, non-combatants of every form, are being bombed, shot, burned and killed.

Here is a report from the BBC today and a similar report from Al Jazeera that NATO forces have killed over 30 civilians in one of their latest assaults in Afghanistan. This surely will make Afghans of every tribe and area hate the United States and all the other foreigners.

BUSH'S DISASTROUS MEDDLING IN SOMALIA

Today the BBC reports that the latest violence in Somalia between Ethiopian forces and Somalia's Islamists has left more than 60 people dead.

"Somalia's Elman Human Rights Organisation described the violence as the worst in recent years.
"I call on the both sides to stop the fighting and shelling without any condition," chairman Sudan Ali Ahmed said to Associated Press news agency.
One resident, Ali Haji, said: "Ethiopians are trying to kill me because I am Somali, and insurgents are not happy because I am not picking up a gun and fighting with them. I have lost all hope." "

In June 2006, the Union of Islamic Courts took over Mogadishu, Somalia's capital, and for the first time in about 16 years, there was relative peace and calm. According to a BBC report,

"Local Islamic courts were set up by businessmen who wanted someone to catch and punish thieves and people who do not respect their contracts.
Some of these courts joined to form the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) and their small groups of gunmen became Somalia's strongest fighting force. "

"After years of lawlessness, many Somalis are happy to have some kind of law and order. The prices of many basic foods have fallen because gunmen no longer extort money from lorries taking goods to markets."

Then this past December, Ethiopia invaded Somalia with its tanks and war planes. Ethiopia is mainly a Christian nation. Somalia is entirely Sunni Islamic. Washington and Bush secretly backed the Ethiopians and their push into Mogadishu. Since then, Mogadishu's peace and tranquillity have given way to street fighting, mayhem and civilian slaughter.

Bush obviously prefers this societal chaos to peaceful Islamic rule.

The United States, through Bush, has caused civilian casualties and civilian upheaval by its meddling, all because Bush sees everything through his simplistic "War on Terror" glasses.