To Moammar Gaddahfi—An Elegy
They’ve killed you Brother / --No matter how you / Cooperated with Them / --They got you--Your problem was / That you became a / Traitor to yourself. /--You drowned your / Black brothers seeking / A better life / Helping Them to keep / Europe White. / --You dead now / They gloat, / I sorry. / --But, as usual / They’ve overplayed / Their hand. / --The French armed / Them / Mountain niggers— / Now they got to / DisarmThey protégés. / --A feat impossible. / Because Free/freed men have / A Right to bear arms~ / Another Vietnam?
Gadhafi Was Killed In Crossfire, Interim Prime Minister Says
October 20, 2011
Listen to the Story
SYKES-PICOT ADJUSTED FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
The Sykes–Picot Agreement of 1916 was a secret agreement between the governments of the United Kingdom and France,[1] with the assent of Imperial Russia, defining their respective spheres of influence and control in Western Asia after the expected downfall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I. It effectively divided the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire outside the Arabian Peninsula into areas of future British and French control or influence.[2] The agreement was concluded on 16 May 1916.[3] The terms were negotiated by the French diplomat François Georges-Picot and British Sir Mark Sykes.
Many sources report that this agreement conflicted with the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence of 1915–1916. It has also been reported that the publication of the Sykes–Picot Agreement caused the resignation of Sir Henry McMahon.[8] However, the Sykes-Picot plan itself stated that France and Great Britain were prepared to recognize and protect an independent Arab State, or Confederation of Arab States, under the suzerainty of an Arab chief within the zones marked A. and B. on the map.[9] Nothing in the plan precluded rule through an Arab suzerainty in the remaining areas. The conflicts resulted from the private, post-war, Anglo-French Settlement of 1–4 December 1918. It was negotiated between British Prime Minister Lloyd George and French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau and rendered many of the guarantees in the Hussein-McMahon agreement invalid. That settlement was not part of the Sykes–Picot Agreement.[10] Sykes was not affiliated with the Cairo office that had been corresponding with Sherif Hussein bin Ali, but he and Picot visited the Hedjaz in 1917 to discuss the agreement with Hussein.[11] That same year he and a representative of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs delivered a public address to the Central Syrian Congress in Paris on the non-Turkish elements of the Ottoman Empire, including liberated Jerusalem. He stated that the accomplished fact of the independence of the Hedjaz rendered it almost impossible that an effective and real autonomy should be refused to Syria.[12]
The greatest source of conflict was the Balfour Declaration, 1917. Lord Balfour wrote a memorandum from the Paris Peace Conference which stated that the other allies had implicitly rejected the Sykes-Picot agreement by adopting the system of mandates. It allowed for no annexations, trade preferences, or other advantages. He also stated that the Allies were committed to Zionism and had no intention of honoring their promises to the Arabs.[13]
Eighty-five years later, in a 2002 interview with The New Statesman, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw observed "A lot of the problems we are having to deal with now, I have to deal with now, are a consequence of our colonial past. The Balfour Declaration and the contradictory assurances which were being given to Palestinians in private at the same time as they were being given to the Israelis - again, an interesting history for us but not an entirely honorable one."[14]
BBC WORLD NEWShttp://www.bbc.co.uk/search/news/?q=french%20arm%20libyan%20rebels
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Europe / 30 June 2011… with reality". Mr Lavrov is due to meet French. Russia's foreign minister describes France's arms drop to Libyan rebels as a "crude violation"
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Africa / 30 June 2011… decision was reportedly taken after a meeting in April between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Chief of Staff of the Libyan rebels, Gen…
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Africa / 29 June 2011The French military are presenting their decision to parachute in weaponry to the Libyan rebels in the western Nafusa mountains as a response…
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Africa / 29 June 2011Libyan rebels was reportedly taken following a meeting in mid-April between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Chief of Staff of the Libyan…
- Africa / 13 June 2011
… people's revolution", changing the country's official name from the Libyan Arab Republic to the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriyah…
BBC WORLD NEWS
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13639789
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Africa / 3 June 2011… before launch. The helicopters can sit at a distance of up to five miles. The BBC's David Loyn in Misrata reports on how Libyan rebels hope the…
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Politics / 15 April 2011… bombing the eastern city of Ajdabiya to retake it from Libyan rebels. G8 foreign ministers meeting in Paris warn the Libyan leader he could face…
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Africa / 15 April 2011… collapsing or pulling back from besieged towns like Misrata, and the Libyan rebels show little ability to defeat their opponents - things become…
THE 1953 IRAN COUP D’ÉTAT REDUX 2011 UPDATE
The 1953 Iranian coup d’état (known in Iran as the 28 Mordad coup[3]) was the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh on 19 August 1953, orchestrated by the intelligence agencies of the United Kingdom and the United States under the name TPAJAX Project.[4] The coup saw the transition of Mohammad-RezÄÂÂÂÂ ShÄÂÂÂÂh Pahlavi from a constitutional monarch to an authoritarian one who relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979.[5]
The coup and CIA records
The coup was carried out by the U.S. administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower in a covert action advocated by Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and implemented under the supervision of his brother Allen Dulles, the Director of Central Intelligence.[58] The coup was organized by the United States’ CIA and the United Kingdom’s MI6, two spy agencies that aided royalists and royalist elements of the Iranian army.[59]
According to a heavily redacted CIA document[60] released to the National Security Archive in response to a Freedom of Information request, “Available documents do not indicate who authorized CIA to begin planning the operation, but it almost certainly was President Eisenhower himself. Eisenhower biographer Stephen Ambrose has written that the absence of documentation reflected the President’s style.”
FROM A GERMAN WAR PRIMER
When the leaders speak of peaceThe common folk knowThat war is coming.When the leaders curse warThe mobilization order is already written out.
Bertolt Brecht
BBC WORLD NEWS
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15412529
Gaddafi death transparency urged
Libya's authorities are urged to be transparent in determining the cause of ex-leader Col Muammar Gaddafi's death after he was captured alive.
POLICING THE MIDDLE EAST
America's 'Secret Campaign' Against Al-Qaida
August 16, 2011
After the Sept. 11 attacks, America responded immediately with a militarized strategy to defeat al-Qaida. But it quickly became clear to analysts in the Pentagon that using warfare alone couldn't counter the terrorist group. In 2005, a group of eclectic analysts at Central Command began looking for a broader, more holistic strategy they could use to target al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden.
Osama bin Laden (left) and his top lieutenant, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri, are seen at an undisclosed location in this television image broadcast Oct. 7, 2001. In Counterstrike, reporters Thom Shanker and Eric Schmitt say the United States tried to disrupt al-Qaida by attacking the organization's financiers and middlemen.
President Obama's Response
When President Obama was inaugurated in 2009, he continued to use many of the innovative tactics that the Bush administration found effective in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2007 and 2008, says Schmitt. Obama's administration also worked to counter citizens' perception of al-Qaida in the Middle East.
"[The idea was] to undermine its credibility and to point out, through credible voices in the Muslim community — not through American voices — that the vast number of causalities in suicide bombings in Iraq and Afghanistan were innocent men, women and children — Muslims themselves," says Schmitt. "So this became part of what is still an evolving counter-messaging strategy by the United States."
In addition, both the Bush administration and the Obama administration focused their attention on the Internet, where al-Qaida does its recruiting, fundraising, operational planning and propaganda.
"What the American military intelligence can do is forge the watermarks or certification of official al-Qaida postings," says Shanker. "American cyber technology is so advanced that they can have a near perfect re-creation of an al-Qaida message — and what they're doing from time to time is going on jihadi websites and posting conflicting and contradictory orders, statements that raise doubt about who the jihadist should follow and who is really in charge ... and the goal is to really disrupt the entire network by sowing dissent and confusion. We've been told they've had some great success at that."
As the terrorists' strategy continues to evolve, says Shanker, the United States must be ready to constantly change tactics in order to keep a step ahead.
"While there's still a desire for an attack with mass casualties like 9/11, and while terrorist networks are still seeking a weapon of mass destruction, they're changing to a strategy of multiple smaller attacks," he says. "Think of it as throwing pebbles into the cogs of the Western economic machine. If you throw enough pebbles, some will get through and those cogs will stick."
Thom Shanker is a correspondent for The New York Times covering the Pentagon. He has conducted numerous reporting trips to Iraq and Afghanistan. While a foreign editor at The Chicago Tribune, he covered the wars in the former Yugoslavia, NATO policy and nuclear smuggling.
http://www.npr.org/2011/08/16/139649619/americas-secret-campaign-against-al-qaida
Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker
LIBYA & THE UNITED STATES~A RELATIONSHIP THAT OUTLIVED ITS USEFULNESS
In Counterstrike: The Untold Story Of America’s secret Campaign Against Al Qaeda (2011), Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker write that Barack Obama was trapped by rhetoric of his Cairo Speech.
In June of that year, the new American president sought to counter that message and deter the spread of terrorist ideology with an even stronger narrative of his own: An African American named Barack Hussein Obama was standing on the podium in a Muslim capital as the leader of the United States. Obama came to Cairo on Jun4, 2009, pledging “a new beginning.” While America would continue to fight terrorism, he said, terrorism would no longer define America’s approach to the Muslim world.
“We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security—because we reject the same thing that people of all faiths reject: the killing of innocent men, women, and children,” Obama said, speaking in forceful tones. “And it is my first duty as president to protect the American people.” A few minutes later, Obama pivoted and took aim at Al Qaeda, signaling a shift in how the United States would confront it more directly and how America would frame a new narrative to chip away at Al Qaeda’s legitimacy in the eyes of Muslims while appealing to their broader interests. (152-3)
This speech trapped him into declaring an Arab Spring because the captured Sinjar records of Al Qaeda “offer(ed) an unrivaled insight into foreign fighters entering Iraq.” For the twelve months ending in August 2007, Saudi Arabia and Libya were starting points for almost two-thirds of all foreigners who came to Iraq to take up arms against the Bagdad government and its American supporters, especially those who dreamed of serving as suicide bombers. Saudi Arabia, a vital partner in the post-9/11 global counter-terrorist effort, and home to 41 percent of the would-be terrorists, and Libya was home to 19 percent; follow by Yemen on Libya’s border with 8 percent. (89) Thus when Gaddafi's protests that he was innocent of “killing his own people” had validity.
The turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa that erupted in January and February 2011 has complicated Obama’s accounting. The White House faced strong criticism from human rights groups for not backing the pro-democracy movements in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere sooner and more forcefully. Whether the populist uprisings help or hurt Al Qaeda’s brand appeal is still playing out. Al Qaeda and its affiliates played no role in the initial rebellions and were caught flat-footed by the tumult. Osama bin Laden was silent, and his Egyptian deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, issued only a handful of rambling statements.
The largely nonviolent, secular revolts in Egypt and Tunisia amounted to a rejection of Al Qaeda’s belief that murderous violence and religious fanaticism are necessary to topple the despots bin Laden denounced as puppets of the West and to replace them with an Islamic caliphate. “It’s a discrediting of Al Qaeda’s agenda,” said John Brennan, former CIA Station Chief and now a member of Obama's Kitchen Cabinet.
By late March, however, Al Qaeda appeared to have regained its propagandist footing. Its leaders claimed that Islamist extremists delighted in the success of protest movements against regimes they abhorred, and they exhorted the protesters not to let up. (159)
How Libya Will Move Forward Without Gadhafi
October 20, 2011
After more than 40 years in power, Libya's Moammar Gadhafi died Thursday, as his last stronghold crumbled. Forces aligned with the Transitional National Council finally gained control of the city of Sirte, Gadhafi's hometown. Guests talk about his death and the way ahead in Libya.
Zawahri urged Egyptians who had toppled President Hosni Mubarak to disdain the United States, reject democracy, and embrace Islam as the answer to their grievances. Whether Al Qaeda successfully exploits the chaos in Libya to set up bases in the thinly populated southern desert or in Yemen to expand AQAP’s influence is unclear. The long-term impact of these changes on Al Qaeda will depend partly on how leaders of the Middle East adapt. But if the underlying political and economic problems persist, Al Qaeda’s siren song may once again sound attractive to a small but potentially lethal group of extremists. (158-9)
The One Hundred Twelfth United States Congress is the current meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It convened in Washington, D.C. on January 3, 2011, and will end on January 3, 2013, close to the end of the presidential term to which Barack Obama was elected in 2008. Senators elected to regular terms in 2006 will complete those terms in this Congress. This Congress includes the last House of Representatives elected from congressional districts that were apportioned based on the 2000 census.
In the 2010 midterm elections, the Republican Party won the majority in the House of Representatives. While the Democrats kept their Senate majority, it was reduced from the previous Congress.[2] This is the first Congress in which the House and Senate are controlled by different parties since the 107th Congress of 2001–2003, and the first Congress to begin that way since the 99th Congress of 1985–1987. In this Congress, the House of Representatives has the largest number of Republican members, 242, since the 80th Congress (1947–1949).[3]
Occupy D.C. Learns To Like The Tea Party
by Peter Overby
October 22, 2011
The Occupy D.C. movement on K Street is getting itself educated. NPR's Peter Overby checked in this week as they held a teach-in with Harvard Law School's Lawrence Lessig, who said protesters can take their government back from the influence of big donors by forging an alliance with the Tea Party grassroots.
The 112th United States Congress is the most corrupt body since Reconstruction. In fact it is comparable to a Third World Parliament in its corruption. It has left the control of the American people and now both Houses belong to AIPAC, the American Enterprise Institute, various other Israel Lobbies, and Grover Norquist, to whom the Republicans have sworn allegiance, and disavowed the US Constitution.
Grover Glenn Norquist (born October 19, 1956) is president of a taxpayer advocacy group, Americans for Tax Reform. He has been described as "the driving force in pushing the Republican Party toward an ever-more rigid position of opposing any tax increase, of any kind, at any time."[9]
The 112th US Congress is more corrupt in its response to the wishes of the American people than the governing elites who ruled Tunisia were to the Tunisian people because as of yet, no one has officially outted them for their traitorous duplicity as reported by David Leigh and Luke Harding in WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War On Secrecy (2011).
Occupy Wall Street is unwittingly on to its duplicity. They just at this time do have the words to express it without being accused of anti-Semitism. The 112th Congress wants to serve two masters, but this is impossible because this is treason. Leigh and Harding write how the Tunisian Elites were outted. They posit that paradoxically the leaked comments by the US ambassador in Tunis, widely read across the region, played a major role in boosting Washington’s image on the Arab street. Ordinary Tunisians like the way in which the Americans—unlike the French—had so frankly highlighted corruption. They now wanted the US to support their on-going jasmine revolution [the only true revolution in the Arab world]. They asked Washington to exert pressure on neighboring Arab leaders, and prevent them from interfering.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had previously denounced the leak of the cables, because it had “undermined our efforts to work with other countries to solve shared problems.” But the same leak was now helping to repair American’s battered reputation in the Middle East, damaged by the Iraq war, and to advance the White House’s lofty goals of democratization and modernization [which began at the urging of PNAC]. Assange may have regarded the US as his enemy but in this case he had unwittingly helped restore American influence in a place where it had lost credibility. It was ironic. By increasing the amount of information in the system, WikLeaks had generated unpredictable effects. (248-9)
The Lobby and Norquist pushing their agenda will eventually enervate whatever economic and moral values that the US needs to survive as a major power into the center of the 21st century.
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David Biddle
jmac1949
Snowden
libbyliberalnyc
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Jimmy Zuma
Salon.com
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Happy Hollaween!