Editor’s
Note:
What makes each and every single one of us develop an
opinion? We all have access to the same information and
yet we believe different things. The Middle East tests
our abilities to process information.
Today we use another article by Robert Fisk, the
intrepid reporter of The Independent. Once you read
this, ask yourself, “Is he lying?” If he is, you will
believe one way. If he is telling the truth, you will
believe a different way.
Viewpoint takes the reality as Fisk expounds as the
major truth of the war. You need to make up your own
mind.
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Can't Blair See his Country is About to Explode?
–Robert Fisk
The Prime Minister has accused some journalists of
almost wanting a disaster to happen in Iraq. Robert
Fisk, who has spent the past five weeks reporting from
the deteriorating and devastated country, says the
disaster has already happened, over and over again.
The war is a fraud. I'm not talking about the weapons of
mass destruction that didn't exist. Nor the links
between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa'ida which didn't exist.
Nor all the other lies upon which we went to war. I'm
talking about the new lies.
For just as, before the war, our governments warned us
of threats that did not exist, now they hide from us the
threats that do exist. Much of Iraq has fallen outside
the control of America's puppet government in Baghdad
but we are not told.
Hundreds of attacks are made against US troops every
month. But unless an American dies, we are not told.
This month's death toll of Iraqis in Baghdad alone has
now reached 700 - the worst month since the invasion
ended. But we are not told.
The stage management of this catastrophe in Iraq was all
too evident at Saddam Hussein's "trial". Not only did
the US military censor the tapes of the event. Not only
did they effectively delete all sound of the 11 other
defendants. But the Americans led Saddam Hussein to
believe - until he reached the courtroom - that he was
on his way to his execution.
Indeed, when he entered the room he believed that the
judge was there to condemn him to death. This, after
all, was the way Saddam ran his own state security
courts. No wonder he initially looked "disorientated" -
CNN's helpful description - because, of course, he was
meant to look that way. We had made sure of that.
Which is why Saddam asked Judge Juhi: "Are you a lawyer?
... Is this a trial?" And swiftly, as he realized that
this really was an initial court hearing - not a
preliminary to his own hanging, he quickly adopted an
attitude of belligerence.
But don't think we're going to learn much more about
Saddam's future court appearances. Salem Chalabi, the
brother of convicted fraudster Ahmad and the man
entrusted by the Americans with the tribunal, told the
Iraqi press two weeks ago that all media would be
excluded from future court hearings. And I can see why.
Because if Saddam does a Milosevic, he'll want to talk
about the real intelligence and military connections of
his regime - which were primarily with the United
States.
Living in Iraq these past few weeks is a weird as well
as dangerous experience. I drive down to Najaf. Highway
8 is one of the worst in Iraq. Westerners are murdered
there. It is littered with burnt out police vehicles and
American trucks. Every police post for 70 miles has been
abandoned. Yet a few hours later, I am sitting in my
room in Baghdad watching Tony Blair, grinning in the
House of Commons as if he is the hero of a school
debating competition; so much for the Butler report.
Indeed, watching any Western television station in
Baghdad these days is like tuning in to Planet Mars.
Doesn't Blair realize that Iraq is about to implode?
Doesn't Bush realize this? The American appointed
"government" controls only parts of Baghdad - and even
there its ministers and civil servants are car-bombed
and assassinated.
Baquba, Samara, Kut, Mahmoudiya, Hilla, Fallujah, Ramadi,
all are outside government authority. Iyad Allawi, the
"Prime Minister", is little more than mayor of Baghdad.
"Some journalists," Blair announces, "almost want there
to be a disaster in Iraq." He doesn't get it. The
disaster exists now.
When suicide bombers ram their cars into hundreds of
recruits outside police stations, how on earth can
anyone hold an election next January? Even the National
Conference to appoint those who will arrange elections
has been twice postponed. And looking back through my
notebooks over the past five weeks, I find that not a
single Iraqi, not a single American soldier I have
spoken to, not a single mercenary - be he American,
British or South African - believes that there will be
elections in January. All said that Iraq is
deteriorating by the day.
And most asked why we journalists weren't saying so.
But in Baghdad, I turn on my television and watch Bush
telling his Republican supporters that Iraq is
improving, that Iraqis support the "coalition", that
they support their new US manufactured government, that
the "war on terror" is being won, that Americans are
safer.
Then I go to an internet site and watch two hooded men
hacking off the head of an American in Riyadh, tearing
at the vertebrae of an American in Iraq with a knife.
Each day, the papers here list another construction
company pulling out of the country.
And I go down to visit the friendly, tragically sad
staff of the Baghdad mortuary and there, each day, are
dozens of those Iraqis we supposedly came to liberate,
screaming and weeping and cursing as they carry their
loved ones on their shoulders in cheap coffins.
I keep re-reading Tony Blair's statement. "I remain
convinced it was right to go to war. It was the most
difficult decision of my life." And I cannot understand
it. It may be a terrible decision to go to war.
Even Chamberlain thought that; but he didn't find it a
difficult decision - because, after the Nazi invasion of
Poland, it was the right thing to do. And driving the
streets of Baghdad now, watching the terrified American
patrols, hearing yet another thunderous explosion
shaking my windows and doors after dawn, I realize what
all this means. Going to war in Iraq, invading Iraq last
year, was the most difficult decision Blair had to take
because he thought - correctly - that it might be the
wrong decision.
I will always remember his remark to British troops in
Basra, that the sacrifice of British soldiers was not
Hollywood but "real flesh and blood". Yes, it was real
flesh and blood that was shed - but for weapons of mass
destruction that weren't real at all.
"Deadly force is authorized," it says on checkpoints all
over Baghdad. Authorized by whom? There is no
accountability.
Repeatedly, on the great highways out of the city US
soldiers shriek at motorists and open fire at the least
suspicion. "We had some Navy Seals down at our
checkpoint the other day," a 1st Cavalry sergeant says
to me. "They asked if we were having any trouble. I
said, yes, they've been shooting at us from a house over
there. One of them asked: 'That house?' We said yes. So
they have these three SUVs and a lot of weapons made of
titanium and they drive off towards the house.
And later they come back and say 'We've taken care of
that'.
And we didn't get shot at any more."
What does this mean? The Americans are now bragging
about their siege of Najaf. Lieutenant Colonel Garry
Bishop of the 37th Armored Division's 1st Battalion
believes it was an "ideal"
battle (even though he failed to kill or capture Muqtada
Sadr whose "Mehdi army" were fighting the US forces). It
was "ideal", Bishop explained, because the Americans
avoided damaging the holy shrines of the Imams Ali and
Hussein. What are Iraqis to make of this? What if a
Muslim army occupied Kent and bombarded Canterbury and
then bragged that they hadn't damaged Canterbury
Cathedral? Would we be grateful?
What, indeed, are we to make of a war which is turned
into a fantasy by those who started it? As foreign
workers pour out of Iraq for fear of their lives, US
Secretary of State Colin Powell tells a press conference
that hostage-taking is having an "effect" on
reconstruction.
Effect! Oil pipeline explosions are now as regular as
power cuts. In parts of Baghdad now, they have only four
hours of electricity a day; the streets swarm with
foreign mercenaries, guns poking from windows, shouting
abusively at Iraqis who don't clear the way for them.
This is the "safer" Iraq which Mr. Blair was boasting of
the other day. What world does the British Government
exist in?
Take the Saddam trial. The entire Arab press - including
the Baghdad papers - prints the judge's name. Indeed,
the same judge has given interviews about his charges of
murder against Muqtada Sadr. He has posed for newspaper
pictures. But when I mention his name in The
Independent, I was solemnly censured by the British
Government's spokesman.
Salem Chalabi threatened to prosecute me. So let me get
this right. We illegally invade Iraq. We kill up to
11,000 Iraqis.
And Mr. Chalabi, appointed by the Americans, says I'm
guilty of "incitement to murder". That just about says
it all.
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More Selected Readings on the Middle East
UK’s MI-6 Asked UN Inspectors To Lie About WMDs
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=546966
Why Sudan May Be Next Target- Karen Kwiatkowski
http://www.lewrockwell.com/kwiatkowski/kwiatkowski87.html
Sharon Reneges On Pledge to US
http://www.maarivenglish.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=printArticle&articleID=10409
General Franks Saw Chaos Coming
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/217656p-187192c.html
Iraq’s Children Prisoners – Sunday Herald Over 100
children are in US custody, some as young as 10-
years-old. This is an investigative report from The
Sunday Herald.
http://www.sundayherald.com/43796
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