We did infamously get the then-outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton snarling, "What difference does it make!" to the Senate Committee questioning her about Benghazi. If you missed that performance by Ms. Clinton before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in January, you can refer to the community coverage: C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" and "Iraq snapshot,," Ava's "20 are still at risk says Hillary in an aside (Ava)," Wally's "Facts matter, Hillary (Wally)," my "Like watching Richard Nixon come back to life," Kat's "Can she not answer even one damn question?" and "The Drone War and Kerry's confirmation hearing"
Today Brad Michelson (Global Research) reports:
The CIA was smuggling weapons from Libyan weapons depots to the Syrian rebels during the 2012 attack on the US embassy in Benghazi. According to a report by CNN, an unnamed source has leaked that the alleged cover-up of the circumstances around the attack is to hide the reality of the smuggling, which occurred before the escalation of the Syrian civil war. This shows that the CIA has been arming the Syrian rebels since at least September 2012. The agents were running the operation out of the Benghazi “annex,” which has been reported as a secret safehouse of the CIA in the city, not far from the embassy.
This development emerges just one day after reports of CIA intimidation on employees and foreign ground assets.
In an exclusive published by CNN, a source has revealed an “unprecedented” effort to keep anyone with information on the Benghazi embassy attack from speaking with the media or Congress. Survivors of the attack were asked to signed non-disclosure agreements, reports Fox News.
I believe that. July 11th, there was a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. The State Department's
Victoria Nuland testified. C.I. covered the hearing in "Iraq snapshot" and I covered it in "Nuland and Benghazi" and "Victoria Nuland indirectly confirms CIA arming 'rebels' out of Benghazi." Two Sundays ago in Dona's "Report on Congress," she asked me, "Ruth, the big takeaway?"
Ruth: That the CIA was arming the rebels. In the hearing, Senator Rand Paul asked her specifically about that. Her answer? She would not answer. She stated that she would if they went into a closed hearing. She apparently did not realize what her answer was confirming. So now we know.
Earlier in that report, Dona and I had discussed Benghazi as well:
Dona: The answers are still murky, you note. Ruth, your best guess on the attack?
Ruth: We are less than six weeks away from the anniversary of the attack so I will go ahead and guess. My best guess is that the CIA was running arms from Libya to the so-called rebels in Syria and that the attack was blowback for that. I think the State Department failed to provide proper security and that the administration failed in multiple ways including the refusal to publicly address the terrorist attack. When Ronald Reagan secretly armed the contras it was considered a crime -- and not just as a result of the Boland Amendment. I think the White House intentionally lied about the incident for a number of reasons. That would be my best guess.
What difference does it make? It makes a big difference and it demonstrates arrogance and deceit on the part of the administration and that includes Ms. Clinton.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Monday, August 5, 2013. Chaos and violence continue, we review the
Memorandum of Understanding the US government signed with the Iraqi
government last December, the US troops that never left as well as the
ones that returned to Iraq, how the SOFA came not to be renewed in 2011,
Bradley Manning, Glenn Greenwald and more.
Iraq War veteran and whistle-blower Bradley Manning gets defended by his family and gets a some-time spot-on analysis from Michal Ratner and a some-time ridiculous one. The analyis is provided on this week's Law and Disorder Radio, an hour long program that airs Monday mornings at 9:00 a.m. EST on WBAI (except during pledge drives) and around the country throughout the week. It's streamable at the Law and Disorder Radio, website and the program is hosted by attorneys Heidi Boghosian, Michael S. Smith and Michael Ratner (Center for Constitutional Rights).
If I controlled the world, every episode of Law and Disorder would be perfection and I'd only ever offer positive criticism. I don't control the world. So today we have to deal with claims made on it regarding Iraq. We'll get to it. First the basics.
Monday April 5, 2010, WikiLeaks released military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh. Monday June 7, 2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. Leila Fadel (Washington Post) reported in August 2010 that Manning had been charged -- "two charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The first encompasses four counts of violating Army regulations by transferring classified information to his personal computer between November and May and adding unauthorized software to a classified computer system. The second comprises eight counts of violating federal laws governing the handling of classified information." In March, 2011, David S. Cloud (Los Angeles Times) reported that the military has added 22 additional counts to the charges including one that could be seen as "aiding the enemy" which could result in the death penalty if convicted. The Article 32 hearing took place in December. At the start of this year, there was an Article 32 hearing and, February 3rd, it was announced that the government would be moving forward with a court-martial. Bradley has yet to enter a plea. The court-martial was supposed to begin before the November 2012 election but it was postponed until after the election so that Barack wouldn't have to run on a record of his actual actions. Independent.ie added, "A court martial is set to be held in June at Ford Meade in Maryland, with supporters treating him as a hero, but opponents describing him as a traitor." February 28th, Bradley admitted he leaked to WikiLeaks. And why.
Bradley Manning: In attempting to conduct counter-terrorism or CT and counter-insurgency COIN operations we became obsessed with capturing and killing human targets on lists and not being suspicious of and avoiding cooperation with our Host Nation partners, and ignoring the second and third order effects of accomplishing short-term goals and missions. I believe that if the general public, especially the American public, had access to the information contained within the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A tables this could spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general as [missed word] as it related to Iraq and Afghanistan.
I also believed the detailed analysis of the data over a long period of time by different sectors of society might cause society to reevaluate the need or even the desire to even to engage in counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations that ignore the complex dynamics of the people living in the effected environment everyday.
For truth telling, Brad was punished by the man who fears truth: Barack Obama. A fraud, a fake, a 'brand,' anything but genuine, Barack is all marketing, all facade and, for that reason, must attack each and every whistle-blower. David Delmar (Digital Journal) points out, "President Obama, while ostensibly a liberal advocate of transparency and openness in government, and of the 'courage' and 'patriotism' of whistleblowers who engage in conscientious leaks of classified information, is in reality something very different: a vindictive opponent of the free press willing to target journalists for doing their job and exposing government secrets to the public." Tuesday, July 30th, Bradley was convicted of all but two counts by Colonel Denise Lind, the military judge in his court-martial.
Before we get to Michael Ratner's analysis, Heidi Boghosian has a wording in her introduction (we'll include it in a second) that probably could be worded better. That's not a slam on Heidi, it is a slam on me. I doubt Heidi's been repeatedly speaking about Brad to groups. I have and I've used the same wording. We've been respectful of Denise Lind, the military colonel over Brad's court-martial, here and at all community sites because, honestly, I was told that she would be negatively influenced by personal attacks (and the military is following the coverage on websites -- not just at news outlets). Denise Lind has gotten it easier than anyone except the man who ruled in Ehren Watada's Article 32 hearing (whom I was told would hit the roof on personal attacks).
That influenced my wording (it may have influenced Heidi's as well, what I know about Lind isn't exactly secret knowledge). But in the early stages, I was wrong to treat this or refer to it as a courtroom, for example. Military 'justice' is not justice. That would be true even with a military jury determining guilt or innocence (but I would have had more respect for a military jury verdict). Heidi's wording is minor (and she may not feel it was a mistake -- if so, she may be right). Mine were not minor. I have called the court-martial a "trial" and done so at times to avoid being repetitive (having "court-martial" used over and over). For me, that was wrong. It's not a trial and it's not a courtroom. A "military courtroom" would be better. But I don't have respect for so-called military 'justice' and shouldn't have used terms that give it credence. A court-martial, by its very nature, is not a trial as we understand it. So I've made many mistakes and errors in the last months in describing Brad's court-martial. I started grasping a lot of it on Saturday (too late to make a difference) and today in Heidi's introduction when she used "courtroom" (which I am not slamming her for and which she may not see as a mistake). Michael Ratner makes many strong points. He also makes points that have to be called out because we cover Iraq here and what he's saying is not correct. That happens when you don't pay attention to Iraq and -- sorry, Michael Ratner -- he hasn't paid any attention to Iraq in a long time.
Here's a section. The plan was to include two sections. That's not possible due to what we have to go over to backup our points. We'll return to Michael tomorrow as well. And, by the way, Heidi Boghosian's new book Spying on Democracy: Government Surveillance, Corporate Power and Public Resistance is in bookstores Tuesday. We're noting it now because there may not be time or room later. Now for the excerpt from Law and Disorder.
Heidi Boghosian: Michael, from the inception, you've been one of the few individuals who've followed every aspect of the Bradley Manning case -- making multiple trips to Fort Meade to be in the courtroom, making analysis on Law and Disorder and many other outlets. And now we have a verdict. Military judge Denise Lind found Bradley Manning not guilty on charges of aiding the enemy, for releasing hundreds of thousands of documents to WikiLeaks for publication on the internet. But she convicted Manning of six counts of violating The Espionage Act. What do you make of this verdict?
Michael Ratner: Heidi, thanks for the introduction. This is Michael Ratner and, as you said, Heidi, I've been going back and forth to the trial and, of course, represent Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. And Bradley Manning, according to his own testimony, was one of the main sources of documents for WikiLeaks -- some 700,000 documents that were uploaded to Wikleaks I've been doing a lot of media lately on this issue, getting into debates about it, whether Bradley Manning should be prosecuted, etc. I take a very firm position here: He should never have been tried in the first place -- not for espionage or aiding the enemy. He shouldn't have been tried for anything. He's a hero. He's a whistle-blower. And anyone who says otherwise is ignoring the criminality of the United States and the secrecy that it keeps about that criminality. And there's a legal basis for me saying that. He is a whistle-blower. He publicly exposed the truths about the nature of this country -- particularly its human rights violations, its criminality and its corruption. That constitutes a whistle-blower and whistle-blowing is a legal defense to whatever kind of crimes the United States wanted to try him. He was an idealistic soldier. He saw horrible things. He acted on his conscious and that's a whistle-blower in the classic sense of the word. What's really disturbing about this is the public debate about this. The public debate -- even from a lot of liberals -- are, "Well, yeah, he acted on his conscious, he was idealistic, but he took a risk, he knew what he was doing and he should at least get some punishment. We can't just have people going around revealing classified information." Even liberals say that. They simply say that government shouldn't have been as harsh about prosecuting him. So you see the New York Times saying he shouldn't get such a heavy sentence, you have other people saying he shouldn't be prosecuted for espionage but, in fact, my position, and the right position, I believe, is that he shouldn't have been prosecuted at all. Let's look for a second at why I say that -- not only because he was a whistle-blower, but look at what he revealed. First, we've all seen -- I hope we have -- the Collateral Murder video: The killing of two Reuters journalists and I believe 10 civilians shot with a gung-ho blood lust, as Bradley Manning described it. Those crimes were never really investigated, no one was prosecuted for them and yet it was cold-blooded murder taking place from an Apache helicopter on the streets of Baghdad. Then think about what the Iraq War Logs revealed -- all this material from Bradley Manning to WikiLeaks. The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
Great job on many thing in the above including Michael backing up his opinion, And I agree with him that Brad never should have been prosecuted. By the way, "Brad" or "Bradley" or "Ed" when we discuss Ed Snowden? That's what the left should be doing. "Manning"? Are we the damn military? WTF? Attorneys know (or damn well should) that you personalize. That's how you make your client (a) less the scary monster that the prosecution paints him/her as and (b) how you get people to start seeing your client as an average person. Brad should not have been prosecuted. I would add that it is cowardly of the New York Times especially since they, and others, only gave a damn in the first place due to the 'aiding the enemy' charge and their fears that it could have effected them.
This is wrong:
The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status Of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status Of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
It's wrong in a manner of oversimplification and Michael might argue he had to condense. Possibly so. But it's wrong in that The Iraq War Logs revelation of an additional 20,000 Iraqis killed didn't result in the SOFA not being signed. Many other things impacted. Dropping back to the Monday, September 17, 2007 snapshot:
AMY
GOODMAN: We have this breaking news out of Iraq today: The Iraqi
government says it's pulling the license of the US security company
Blackwater over its involvement in a fatal shooting in Baghdad on
Sunday. Interior Ministry spokesperson Abdul-Karim Khalaf said eight
civilians were killed and thirteen wounded, when security contractors
believed to be working for Blackwater USA opened fire in a predominantly
Sunni neighborhood of western Baghdad. Khalaf said, "We have canceled
the license of Blackwater and prevented them from working all over Iraqi
territory. We will also refer those involved to Iraqi judicial
authorities." It was not immediately clear if the measure against
Blackwater is intended to be temporary or permanent. Naomi Klein, take
it from there.
When the US judge tossed the lawsuit on this massacre aside (because of agreements the State Dept had made with the contractors to get testimony -- agreements the State Dept knew would get the case tossed out and agreements that were not at all necessary), the rage over the US forces and contractors and the issue of accountability moved from and center in Iraq.
That was part of the issue as well.
But the main thing was the ongoing protests, Moqtada al-Sadr and other prominent Iraqis saying it wouldn't happen and the United Nations mandate.
In 2006, Nouri al-Maliki became prime minister. The United Nations provided no mandate for the start of the illegal war. After the war started, the UN did provide a mandate for foreign forces to be on the ground in Iraq. In the fall of 2006, Nouri renewed the mandate causing huge outrage among Iraqi politicians because the Parliament was opposed to it and not consulted (they were supposed to be consulted). To ease tensions, Nouri lied. He said that next time he would let the Parliament vote. The UN mandate was an annual mandate. As 2007 drew to a close, Nouri did what he did in 2006, extended it without consulting the Parliament. (In both years, as he and the US government knew, if the agreement went before the Parliament it would not be renewed.)
The UN mandate could not be renewed again. It would be Nouri's head if, at the end of 2008, he approved it. He knew it, the US government and the British government knew it. So both countries began negotiating their own agreements with the Iraqi government.
For the US government, the thing was that the agreement not be an annual one. It was hurting Nouri too much, having to extend it yearly. So they went with a three year term in the Status Of Forces Agreement. At the end of the three years, the agreement could be renewed (as Barack Obama's administration tried), be replaced with a new form of agreement (as Barack did and we'll get to that -- Michael Ratner has no clue about this -- if he did, Law and Disorder Radio would have done a program on it in the last 8 months) or the US could just pull most forces (which is what they did) or all forces out of Iraq.
There was no support for allowing US forces to stay in Iraq. That had been the case for at least five consecutive years before 2011. Nouri was urged (by then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta) to ram a new SOFA through without Parliament's permission. (Nouri was specifically told that he could argue Parliament had their input when they voted for the 2008 SOFA and that a renewal did not require their agreement.) But the Arab Spring or 'Arab Spring' (depending on your view) was sweeping the region and Nouri had faced massive protests in February 2011 -- protests that continued but that had grown smaller (a) because Moqtada told his followers to stop participating (renewing the SOFA would have meant Moqtada would have ordered his supporters back into the streets) and (b) because Nouri was having protesters attacked and arrested. Those massive protests could come back at any minute (and would in December 2012), as Nouri fully knew.
Did the Iraq War Logs have an impact? Yes. But they were part of a series of events and, among those events, they were not the main part.
To all of the above, Michael Ratner can respond, "I was condensing for time." And for some websites, that would be correct. We cover Iraq here and you can't condense and leave out the elements that we went over above.
Michael Ratner: Then think about what the Iraq War Logs revealed -- all this material from Bradley Manning to WikiLeaks. The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
The only way to read those statements is that the Iraq War Logs caused the US military to withdraw from Iraq. I would "think about how important that is" were it true. But it's not true. It wasn't true in December 2011, as Ted Koppel noted on Rockcenter With Brian Williams.
Let's go to the Decmeber 10, 2012 snapshot to extract a few things. First:
December 6, 2012, the Memorandum of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department Defense of the United States of America was signed. We covered it in the December 10th and December 11th snapshots -- lots of luck finding coverage elsewhere including in media outlets -- apparently there was some unstated agreement that everyone would look the other way.
General [Martin] Dempsey's August 21, 2012, visit focused on the security deterioration, as well as the Iranian overflights to Syria discussed above, according to press reports. Regarding U.S.-Iraq security relations, Iraq reportedly expressed interest in expanded U.S. training of the ISF, joint exercises, and accelerated delivery of U.S. arms to be sold, including radar, air defense systems, and border security equipment. [. . .]
After the Dempsey visit, reflecting the Iraqi decision to reengage intensively with the United States on security, it was reported that, at the request of Iraq, a unit of Army Special Operations forces had deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence, presumably against AQ-I. (These forces presumably are operating under a limited SOFA or related understanding crafted for this purpose.) Other reports suggest that Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) paramilitary forces have, as of late 2012, largely taken over some of the DOD mission of helping Iraqi counter-terrorismf orces (Counter-Terrorism Service, CTS) against AQ-I in western Iraq. Part of the reported CIA mission is to also work against the AQ-I affiliate in SYria, the Al Nusrah Front, discussed above.
Reflecting an acceleration of the Iraqi move to reengage militarily with the United States, during December 5-6 2012, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy James Miller and acting Under Secretary of State for International Security Rose Gottemoeller visited Iraq and a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed with acting Defense Minister Sadoun Dulaymi. The five year MOU provides for:
* high level U.S.-Iraq military exchanges
* professional military education cooperation
* counter-terrorism cooperation
* the development of defense intelligence capabilities
* joint exercises
The MOU appears to address many of the issues that have hampered OSC-I from performing its mission to its full potential. The MOU also reflects some of the more recent ideas put forward, such as joint exercises.
On the violence, last night, we noted:
In Baghdad, Ayad al-Tamimi (Al Mada) reports trenches are being dug in the Green Zone around Saddam Hussein's former palace and other buildings to protect them and their inhabitants, that security measures are so huge that those living in the Green Zone are assuming it's just not safe to leave the Green Zone. In addition, Iraqis are complaining as more money goes to secure the Green Zone while everyone else lives it at huge risk. Another thing that is taking place is mass arrests. NINA notes 183 people arrested in Baghdad alone today. For those not paying attention, mass arrests are among the reasons for the ongoing protests.
NINA reports today that over 300 people have been arrested in Baghdad in the last 24 hours. These arbitrary arrests -- usually targeting Sunnis -- do little to ease tensions and most likely will only increase the tension.
Finally, turning to the topic of the ongoing, unconstitutional spying (the US government -- Barack -- spying on American citizens), Amy Goodman (Democracy Now! -- link is audio, video and text) interviewed the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald today. Excerpt.
AMY GOODMAN: The timing of the embassy closings comes at a time of heated debate in Washington over the powers of the National Security Agency. It was two months ago today when Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian newspaper published his first article revealing the existence of a secret court order for Verizon to hand over the telephone records of millions of Americans to the NSA.
Since then, The Guardian has published a trove of articles detailing the NSA’s vast surveillance powers based on documents leaked by Edward Snowden. Just last week, Greenwald exposed a secret program called XKeyscore that gives NSA analysts real-time access to, quote, "nearly everything a typical user does on the internet," including emails, chats and browsing history. In his latest article, Greenwald reports members of Congress have been repeatedly thwarted when attempting to learn basic information about the NSA and the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
To talk more about these developments, Glenn Greenwald joins us now from his home in Brazil.
iraq
wbai
law and disorder radio
michael s. smith
heidi boghosian
michael ratner
the daily mail
nic north
john naughton
the associated press
sameer n. yacoub
national iraqi news agency
alsumaria
all iraq news
xinhua
democracy now
amy goodman
the guardian
glenn greenwald
Iraq War veteran and whistle-blower Bradley Manning gets defended by his family and gets a some-time spot-on analysis from Michal Ratner and a some-time ridiculous one. The analyis is provided on this week's Law and Disorder Radio, an hour long program that airs Monday mornings at 9:00 a.m. EST on WBAI (except during pledge drives) and around the country throughout the week. It's streamable at the Law and Disorder Radio, website and the program is hosted by attorneys Heidi Boghosian, Michael S. Smith and Michael Ratner (Center for Constitutional Rights).
If I controlled the world, every episode of Law and Disorder would be perfection and I'd only ever offer positive criticism. I don't control the world. So today we have to deal with claims made on it regarding Iraq. We'll get to it. First the basics.
Monday April 5, 2010, WikiLeaks released military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh. Monday June 7, 2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. Leila Fadel (Washington Post) reported in August 2010 that Manning had been charged -- "two charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The first encompasses four counts of violating Army regulations by transferring classified information to his personal computer between November and May and adding unauthorized software to a classified computer system. The second comprises eight counts of violating federal laws governing the handling of classified information." In March, 2011, David S. Cloud (Los Angeles Times) reported that the military has added 22 additional counts to the charges including one that could be seen as "aiding the enemy" which could result in the death penalty if convicted. The Article 32 hearing took place in December. At the start of this year, there was an Article 32 hearing and, February 3rd, it was announced that the government would be moving forward with a court-martial. Bradley has yet to enter a plea. The court-martial was supposed to begin before the November 2012 election but it was postponed until after the election so that Barack wouldn't have to run on a record of his actual actions. Independent.ie added, "A court martial is set to be held in June at Ford Meade in Maryland, with supporters treating him as a hero, but opponents describing him as a traitor." February 28th, Bradley admitted he leaked to WikiLeaks. And why.
Bradley Manning: In attempting to conduct counter-terrorism or CT and counter-insurgency COIN operations we became obsessed with capturing and killing human targets on lists and not being suspicious of and avoiding cooperation with our Host Nation partners, and ignoring the second and third order effects of accomplishing short-term goals and missions. I believe that if the general public, especially the American public, had access to the information contained within the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A tables this could spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general as [missed word] as it related to Iraq and Afghanistan.
I also believed the detailed analysis of the data over a long period of time by different sectors of society might cause society to reevaluate the need or even the desire to even to engage in counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations that ignore the complex dynamics of the people living in the effected environment everyday.
For truth telling, Brad was punished by the man who fears truth: Barack Obama. A fraud, a fake, a 'brand,' anything but genuine, Barack is all marketing, all facade and, for that reason, must attack each and every whistle-blower. David Delmar (Digital Journal) points out, "President Obama, while ostensibly a liberal advocate of transparency and openness in government, and of the 'courage' and 'patriotism' of whistleblowers who engage in conscientious leaks of classified information, is in reality something very different: a vindictive opponent of the free press willing to target journalists for doing their job and exposing government secrets to the public." Tuesday, July 30th, Bradley was convicted of all but two counts by Colonel Denise Lind, the military judge in his court-martial.
Before we get to Michael Ratner's analysis, Heidi Boghosian has a wording in her introduction (we'll include it in a second) that probably could be worded better. That's not a slam on Heidi, it is a slam on me. I doubt Heidi's been repeatedly speaking about Brad to groups. I have and I've used the same wording. We've been respectful of Denise Lind, the military colonel over Brad's court-martial, here and at all community sites because, honestly, I was told that she would be negatively influenced by personal attacks (and the military is following the coverage on websites -- not just at news outlets). Denise Lind has gotten it easier than anyone except the man who ruled in Ehren Watada's Article 32 hearing (whom I was told would hit the roof on personal attacks).
That influenced my wording (it may have influenced Heidi's as well, what I know about Lind isn't exactly secret knowledge). But in the early stages, I was wrong to treat this or refer to it as a courtroom, for example. Military 'justice' is not justice. That would be true even with a military jury determining guilt or innocence (but I would have had more respect for a military jury verdict). Heidi's wording is minor (and she may not feel it was a mistake -- if so, she may be right). Mine were not minor. I have called the court-martial a "trial" and done so at times to avoid being repetitive (having "court-martial" used over and over). For me, that was wrong. It's not a trial and it's not a courtroom. A "military courtroom" would be better. But I don't have respect for so-called military 'justice' and shouldn't have used terms that give it credence. A court-martial, by its very nature, is not a trial as we understand it. So I've made many mistakes and errors in the last months in describing Brad's court-martial. I started grasping a lot of it on Saturday (too late to make a difference) and today in Heidi's introduction when she used "courtroom" (which I am not slamming her for and which she may not see as a mistake). Michael Ratner makes many strong points. He also makes points that have to be called out because we cover Iraq here and what he's saying is not correct. That happens when you don't pay attention to Iraq and -- sorry, Michael Ratner -- he hasn't paid any attention to Iraq in a long time.
Here's a section. The plan was to include two sections. That's not possible due to what we have to go over to backup our points. We'll return to Michael tomorrow as well. And, by the way, Heidi Boghosian's new book Spying on Democracy: Government Surveillance, Corporate Power and Public Resistance is in bookstores Tuesday. We're noting it now because there may not be time or room later. Now for the excerpt from Law and Disorder.
Heidi Boghosian: Michael, from the inception, you've been one of the few individuals who've followed every aspect of the Bradley Manning case -- making multiple trips to Fort Meade to be in the courtroom, making analysis on Law and Disorder and many other outlets. And now we have a verdict. Military judge Denise Lind found Bradley Manning not guilty on charges of aiding the enemy, for releasing hundreds of thousands of documents to WikiLeaks for publication on the internet. But she convicted Manning of six counts of violating The Espionage Act. What do you make of this verdict?
Michael Ratner: Heidi, thanks for the introduction. This is Michael Ratner and, as you said, Heidi, I've been going back and forth to the trial and, of course, represent Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. And Bradley Manning, according to his own testimony, was one of the main sources of documents for WikiLeaks -- some 700,000 documents that were uploaded to Wikleaks I've been doing a lot of media lately on this issue, getting into debates about it, whether Bradley Manning should be prosecuted, etc. I take a very firm position here: He should never have been tried in the first place -- not for espionage or aiding the enemy. He shouldn't have been tried for anything. He's a hero. He's a whistle-blower. And anyone who says otherwise is ignoring the criminality of the United States and the secrecy that it keeps about that criminality. And there's a legal basis for me saying that. He is a whistle-blower. He publicly exposed the truths about the nature of this country -- particularly its human rights violations, its criminality and its corruption. That constitutes a whistle-blower and whistle-blowing is a legal defense to whatever kind of crimes the United States wanted to try him. He was an idealistic soldier. He saw horrible things. He acted on his conscious and that's a whistle-blower in the classic sense of the word. What's really disturbing about this is the public debate about this. The public debate -- even from a lot of liberals -- are, "Well, yeah, he acted on his conscious, he was idealistic, but he took a risk, he knew what he was doing and he should at least get some punishment. We can't just have people going around revealing classified information." Even liberals say that. They simply say that government shouldn't have been as harsh about prosecuting him. So you see the New York Times saying he shouldn't get such a heavy sentence, you have other people saying he shouldn't be prosecuted for espionage but, in fact, my position, and the right position, I believe, is that he shouldn't have been prosecuted at all. Let's look for a second at why I say that -- not only because he was a whistle-blower, but look at what he revealed. First, we've all seen -- I hope we have -- the Collateral Murder video: The killing of two Reuters journalists and I believe 10 civilians shot with a gung-ho blood lust, as Bradley Manning described it. Those crimes were never really investigated, no one was prosecuted for them and yet it was cold-blooded murder taking place from an Apache helicopter on the streets of Baghdad. Then think about what the Iraq War Logs revealed -- all this material from Bradley Manning to WikiLeaks. The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
Great job on many thing in the above including Michael backing up his opinion, And I agree with him that Brad never should have been prosecuted. By the way, "Brad" or "Bradley" or "Ed" when we discuss Ed Snowden? That's what the left should be doing. "Manning"? Are we the damn military? WTF? Attorneys know (or damn well should) that you personalize. That's how you make your client (a) less the scary monster that the prosecution paints him/her as and (b) how you get people to start seeing your client as an average person. Brad should not have been prosecuted. I would add that it is cowardly of the New York Times especially since they, and others, only gave a damn in the first place due to the 'aiding the enemy' charge and their fears that it could have effected them.
This is wrong:
The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status Of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status Of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
It's wrong in a manner of oversimplification and Michael might argue he had to condense. Possibly so. But it's wrong in that The Iraq War Logs revelation of an additional 20,000 Iraqis killed didn't result in the SOFA not being signed. Many other things impacted. Dropping back to the Monday, September 17, 2007 snapshot:
Turning to the issue of violence, Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reported
Sunday that a Baghdad shooting (by private contractors) killed 9 Iraqi
civilians and left fifteen more wounded. Later on Sunday, CNN reported,
"In the Baghdad gun battle, which was between security forces and
unidentified gunmen, eight people were killed and 14 wounded, most of
them civilians, an Interior Ministry official said. Details were
sketchy, but the official said witnesses told police that the security
forces involved appeared to be Westerners driving sport utility
vehicles, which are usually used by Western companies. The clash
occurred near Nisoor square, in western Baghdad. CBS and AP report that
Abdul-Karim Khalaf, spokesperson for the Interior Ministry, announced
"it was pulling the license of an American security firm allegedly
involved in the fatal shooting of civilians during an attack on a U.S.
State Department motorcade in Baghdad," that "it would prosecute any
foreign contractors found to have used excessive force" in the slaughter
(eight dead, 13 wounded) and they "have canceled the liscense of
Blcakwater and prevented them from working all over Iraqi territory."
The news was addressed today on Democracy Now!:
NAOMI
KLEIN: Well, that's an extraordinary piece of news. I mean, this is
really the first time that one of these mercenary firms may actually be
held accountable. You know, as Jeremy Scahill has written in his
incredible book Blackwater: The Rise of the [World's] Most Powerful Mercenary Army,
the real problem is, there haven't been prosecutions. These companies
work in this absolute gray zone, and, you know, they're either boy
scouts and nothing has going wrong, which completely doesn't mesh with
what we know about the way they're behaving in Iraq and all of the sort
of videos that we've seen online of just target
practice on Iraqi civilians, or the lawlessness and the immunity in
which they work has protected them. So, you know, if this is -- if the
Iraqi government is actually going to kick Blackwater out of Iraq, it
could really be a turning point in terms of pulling these companies into
the law and questioning the whole premise of why this level of
privatization and lawlessness has been allowed to take place.
The
mercenary corportation Blackwater has not only made a lot of money in
Iraq, it's had a lot of friends in the US White House (and members of
Congress who looked the other way). So it's little surprise that Aseel Kami (Reuters) reports
US Secretary of State and Anger Condi Rice plans a firm phone call to
puppet of the occupation Nouri al-Maliki in which she will "make it
clear" that the US is "investigating this incident" -- no doubt in the
usual look-the-other-way manner the US government has "investigated"
other incidents. No word on whether she plans to use/haul her favorite
false line out of mothballs, "No one could have guessed . . ."
When the US judge tossed the lawsuit on this massacre aside (because of agreements the State Dept had made with the contractors to get testimony -- agreements the State Dept knew would get the case tossed out and agreements that were not at all necessary), the rage over the US forces and contractors and the issue of accountability moved from and center in Iraq.
That was part of the issue as well.
But the main thing was the ongoing protests, Moqtada al-Sadr and other prominent Iraqis saying it wouldn't happen and the United Nations mandate.
In 2006, Nouri al-Maliki became prime minister. The United Nations provided no mandate for the start of the illegal war. After the war started, the UN did provide a mandate for foreign forces to be on the ground in Iraq. In the fall of 2006, Nouri renewed the mandate causing huge outrage among Iraqi politicians because the Parliament was opposed to it and not consulted (they were supposed to be consulted). To ease tensions, Nouri lied. He said that next time he would let the Parliament vote. The UN mandate was an annual mandate. As 2007 drew to a close, Nouri did what he did in 2006, extended it without consulting the Parliament. (In both years, as he and the US government knew, if the agreement went before the Parliament it would not be renewed.)
The UN mandate could not be renewed again. It would be Nouri's head if, at the end of 2008, he approved it. He knew it, the US government and the British government knew it. So both countries began negotiating their own agreements with the Iraqi government.
For the US government, the thing was that the agreement not be an annual one. It was hurting Nouri too much, having to extend it yearly. So they went with a three year term in the Status Of Forces Agreement. At the end of the three years, the agreement could be renewed (as Barack Obama's administration tried), be replaced with a new form of agreement (as Barack did and we'll get to that -- Michael Ratner has no clue about this -- if he did, Law and Disorder Radio would have done a program on it in the last 8 months) or the US could just pull most forces (which is what they did) or all forces out of Iraq.
There was no support for allowing US forces to stay in Iraq. That had been the case for at least five consecutive years before 2011. Nouri was urged (by then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta) to ram a new SOFA through without Parliament's permission. (Nouri was specifically told that he could argue Parliament had their input when they voted for the 2008 SOFA and that a renewal did not require their agreement.) But the Arab Spring or 'Arab Spring' (depending on your view) was sweeping the region and Nouri had faced massive protests in February 2011 -- protests that continued but that had grown smaller (a) because Moqtada told his followers to stop participating (renewing the SOFA would have meant Moqtada would have ordered his supporters back into the streets) and (b) because Nouri was having protesters attacked and arrested. Those massive protests could come back at any minute (and would in December 2012), as Nouri fully knew.
Did the Iraq War Logs have an impact? Yes. But they were part of a series of events and, among those events, they were not the main part.
To all of the above, Michael Ratner can respond, "I was condensing for time." And for some websites, that would be correct. We cover Iraq here and you can't condense and leave out the elements that we went over above.
Michael Ratner: Then think about what the Iraq War Logs revealed -- all this material from Bradley Manning to WikiLeaks. The Iraq War Logs: 20,000 more civilians killed in Iraq than the United States [government] has said were killed. That alone, that fact -- apart from the terrible tragedy of those civilians being killed -- that fact caused the government of Iraq to not sign another Status of Forces Agreement with the United States, because a Status of Forces Agreement would have given immunity to US troops. And after all of these killings of civilians, Iraq said we're not going to do it. Because there was no immunity for US troops, the US said we're not staying in Iraq. Think about how important that is.
The only way to read those statements is that the Iraq War Logs caused the US military to withdraw from Iraq. I would "think about how important that is" were it true. But it's not true. It wasn't true in December 2011, as Ted Koppel noted on Rockcenter With Brian Williams.
Let's go to the Decmeber 10, 2012 snapshot to extract a few things. First:
How many US troops remain in Iraq? December 12, 2011, Ted Koppel filed an important report on Rock Center with Brian Williams (NBC)
about what was really taking place in Iraq -- what 'reporters' insisted
on calling a 'withdrawal' but what the Pentagon had termed a
"drawdown." Excerpt.
MR.
KOPPEL: I realize you can't go into it in any detail, but I would assume
that there is a healthy CIA mission here. I would assume that JSOC may
still be active in this country, the joint special operations. You've
got FBI here. You've got DEA here. Can, can you give me sort of a, a
menu of, of who all falls under your control?
AMB. JAMES JEFFREY: You're actually doing pretty well, were I authorized to talk about half of this stuff.
US forces never left Iraq. That's why the military brass repeatedly
used the term "drawdown" and not "withdrawal." In addition to the
forces Koppel noted, there were approximately 200 'trainers.' Back to
the December 12, 2012 snapshot:
As September drew to a close, Tim Arango (New York Times) reported that the US had just sent in a Special-Ops division into Iraq. Yesterday Press TV reported:
Over
3,000 US troops have secretly returned to Iraq via Kuwait for missions
pertaining to the recent developments in Syria and northern Iraq, Press
TV reports.
According to our correspondent, the US troops have secretly entered Iraq in multiple stages and are mostly stationed at Balad military garrison in Salahuddin province and al-Asad air base in al-Anbar province.
According to our correspondent, the US troops have secretly entered Iraq in multiple stages and are mostly stationed at Balad military garrison in Salahuddin province and al-Asad air base in al-Anbar province.
Noting those 3,000 troops going into Iraq, The Voice of Russia adds today, "Another 17,000-strong force is preparing to cross the Kuwait-Iraq border over time, Iraqi press says."
Tim Arango's report was ignored by everyone but Tom Hayden and sites in this community. That's because it was the Times
reporting as outlined by Gore Vidal long ago. You have to go far into a
story -- around the 13 paragraph -- to get any truth from the New York Times'
reporting. In this case, Tim Arango was reporting on Syria and tucked
in the middle of his report was some key information on Iraq and the
US. We'll go to this year's April 30th Iraq snapshot:
December 6, 2012, the Memorandum of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department Defense of the United States of America was signed. We covered it in the December 10th and December 11th snapshots -- lots of luck finding coverage elsewhere including in media outlets -- apparently there was some unstated agreement that everyone would look the other way. It was similar to the silence that greeted Tim Arango's September 25th New York Times report which noted, "Iraq and the United States are negotiating an agreement that could result in the return of small units of American soldiers to Iraq on training missions. At the request of the Iraqi government, according to [US] General [Robert L.] Caslen, a unit of Army Special Operations soldiers was recently deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence."
December 6, 2012, the Memorandum of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department Defense of the United States of America was signed. We covered it in the December 10th and December 11th snapshots -- lots of luck finding coverage elsewhere including in media outlets -- apparently there was some unstated agreement that everyone would look the other way. It was similar to the silence that greeted Tim Arango's September 25th New York Times report which noted, "Iraq and the United States are negotiating an agreement that could result in the return of small units of American soldiers to Iraq on training missions. At the request of the Iraqi government, according to [US] General [Robert L.] Caslen, a unit of Army Special Operations soldiers was recently deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence."
That's Tim Arango's key details on Iraq extracted. Again, they're in
the middle of an article on Syria. We have noted Tim Arango's report
repeatedly here. At one point in 2007, the most noted piece of writing
here was Naomi Klein's "Baghdad Year Zero" for Harper's magazine.
Since we noted Tim's article back in September, it's become the most
noted and cited piece -- there's not a week that goes by where we don't
note it at least once and, most weeks, we note it multiple times. In the
not-yet year since it was first published, we have noted it in at least
136 entries at this site.
Why hasn't Law and Disorder? Because they don't know about it.
They should. Not only did 'all' US forces not leave but, in September,
more US forces were sent in.
And before we get to Tim Arango from the April 30th snapshot, we've got
that MOU (and links to our coverage). Has any news outlet reported on
the MOU even now?
Hell no. I'm referring to the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Al Jazeera, etc. They've all stayed silent.
December 6, 2012, the Memorandum of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department Defense of the United States of America was signed. We covered it in the December 10th and December 11th snapshots -- lots of luck finding coverage elsewhere including in media outlets -- apparently there was some unstated agreement that everyone would look the other way.
We covered it December 6th when the Defense Department issued a press
release on it. And, if you go that snapshot, not only will you find the
DoD press release, you'll find that Iraqi news outlets considered it
news and were reporting on it.
Though they announced it on the 6th, they did not release it the 6th
(this despite the press release offering a link for you to read the memo
at). We picked up on December 10th (when it was finally available) and
I explained that it allowed for joint-patrols -- the US and Iraq -- in
Iraq. I noted other things as well but the pushback from visitors was
on the joint-patrols.
You are wrong! You are dead wrong! You are a liar! Bitch, stop lying! If this was true, it would be reported!
That's an accurate characterization of over 10,000 e-mails that came in
following the December 10th Iraq snapshot where I went over the Memo Of
Understanding which is why we returned to the topic the next day. From
the December 11th snapshot:
In yesterday's snapshot, we covered the Memorandum
of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of
Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department of Defense of the
United States of America. Angry,
dysfunctional e-mails from Barack-would-never-do-that-to-me criers
indicate that we need to go over the Memo a little bit more. It was signed on Thursday and announced that day by the Pentagon.
Section two (listed in full in yesterday's snapshot) outlines that the
two sides have agreed on: the US providing instructors and training
personnel and Iraq providing students, Iraqi forces and American forces
will work together on counterterrorism and on joint exercises. The
tasks we just listed go to the US military being in Iraq in larger
numbers. Obviously the two cannot do joint exercises or work together
on counterterrorism without US military present in Iraq.
This shouldn't be surprising. In the November 2, 2007 snapshot
-- five years ago -- we covered the transcript of the interview
Michael R. Gordon and Jeff Zeleny did with then-Senator Barack Obama who
was running in the Democratic Party's primary for the party's
presidential nomination -- the transcript, not the bad article the paper
published, the actual transcript. We used the transcript to write "NYT: 'Barack Obama Will Keep Troops In Iraq'"
at Third. Barack made it clear in the transcript that even after
"troop withdrawal" he would "leave behind a residual force." What did
he say this residual force would do? He said, "I think that we should
have some strike capability. But that is a very narrow mission, that we
get in the business of counter terrorism as opposed to counter
insurgency and even on the training and logistics front, what I have
said is, if we have not seen progress politically, then our training
approach should be greatly circumscribed or eliminated."
This
is not withdrawal. This is not what was sold to the American people.
Barack is very lucky that the media just happened to decide to take that
rather explosive interview -- just by chance, certainly the New York Times
wasn't attempting to shield a candidate to influence an election,
right? -- could best be covered with a plate of lumpy, dull mashed
potatoes passed off as a report. In the transcript, Let-Me-Be-Clear
Barack declares, "I want to be absolutely clear about this, because
this has come up in a series of debates: I will remove all our combat
troops, we will have troops there to protect our embassies and our
civilian forces and we will engage in counter terrorism activities."
So
when the memo announces counterterrorism activies, Barack got what he
wanted, what he always wanted, what the media so helpfully and so
frequently buried to allow War Hawk Barack to come off like a dove of
peace.
For those who still can't grasp what I outlined in December of last
year, starting in the spring of this year, the Congressional Research
Service began noting these same details in Kenneth Katzman monthly
report on Iraq. Those reports are prepared for members of Congress.
While Law and Disorder should have covered these facts a long time ago,
they have the excuse that they were not headline news -- hey, where's
our Project Censored award! -- so they didn't know about it. But why
are members of the US Congress silent about this? Are they (or their
aides) not reading the Congressional Research Service reports or are
they complicit in keeping the truth from the American poeple? This is
the from the Arpil version of "Iraq: Politics, Governance, and Human Rights" but it's also included in subsequent monthly "Iraq: Politics, Governance, and Human Rights" reports:
General [Martin] Dempsey's August 21, 2012, visit focused on the security deterioration, as well as the Iranian overflights to Syria discussed above, according to press reports. Regarding U.S.-Iraq security relations, Iraq reportedly expressed interest in expanded U.S. training of the ISF, joint exercises, and accelerated delivery of U.S. arms to be sold, including radar, air defense systems, and border security equipment. [. . .]
After the Dempsey visit, reflecting the Iraqi decision to reengage intensively with the United States on security, it was reported that, at the request of Iraq, a unit of Army Special Operations forces had deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence, presumably against AQ-I. (These forces presumably are operating under a limited SOFA or related understanding crafted for this purpose.) Other reports suggest that Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) paramilitary forces have, as of late 2012, largely taken over some of the DOD mission of helping Iraqi counter-terrorismf orces (Counter-Terrorism Service, CTS) against AQ-I in western Iraq. Part of the reported CIA mission is to also work against the AQ-I affiliate in SYria, the Al Nusrah Front, discussed above.
Reflecting an acceleration of the Iraqi move to reengage militarily with the United States, during December 5-6 2012, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy James Miller and acting Under Secretary of State for International Security Rose Gottemoeller visited Iraq and a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed with acting Defense Minister Sadoun Dulaymi. The five year MOU provides for:
* high level U.S.-Iraq military exchanges
* professional military education cooperation
* counter-terrorism cooperation
* the development of defense intelligence capabilities
* joint exercises
The MOU appears to address many of the issues that have hampered OSC-I from performing its mission to its full potential. The MOU also reflects some of the more recent ideas put forward, such as joint exercises.
We'll come back to Michael Ratner tomorrow to provide more of his commentary on Brad. Susan Manning is Brad's mother. Nic North (Daily Mail) quotes
her stating, "Never give up hope, son. I know I may never see you
again, but I know you will be free one day. I pray it is soon. I love
you, Bradley, and I always will." His aunt Sharon Staples states, "If
anyone was going to get themselves arrested for leaking hundreds of
thousands of secret documents and end up jail for it, it was going to be
our Bradley. He just seemed to have a burning sense of wanting to
right any injustice from such a young age." John Naughton (Guardian) offers this perspective:
Just to put that in perspective, cast your mind back to 16 March 1968, when a platoon of US soldiers led by Second Lieutenant William Calley entered the hamlet of My Lai in what was then South Vietnam. They rounded up between 70 and 80 villagers and then shot them dead. In all, between 347 and 504 My Lai civilians were murdered that day by US troops.
Eventually, there was a court martial, just like the one organised for Manning. Despite claiming that he was following orders from his commanding officer, Calley was convicted on 29 March 1971 of premeditated murder for ordering the shootings and was given a life sentence. Two days later, President Nixon ordered that he should be released, pending an appeal against his sentence, which was later reduced. Calley eventually served three and a half years under house arrest at an army base.
So: three and a half years house-arrest for ordering and participating in the premeditated murder of scores of unarmed civilians. And potentially 136 years for downloading stuff – including compelling video evidence of a war crime by US forces – and giving it to WikiLeaks. Makes you think, doesn't it?
Just to put that in perspective, cast your mind back to 16 March 1968, when a platoon of US soldiers led by Second Lieutenant William Calley entered the hamlet of My Lai in what was then South Vietnam. They rounded up between 70 and 80 villagers and then shot them dead. In all, between 347 and 504 My Lai civilians were murdered that day by US troops.
Eventually, there was a court martial, just like the one organised for Manning. Despite claiming that he was following orders from his commanding officer, Calley was convicted on 29 March 1971 of premeditated murder for ordering the shootings and was given a life sentence. Two days later, President Nixon ordered that he should be released, pending an appeal against his sentence, which was later reduced. Calley eventually served three and a half years under house arrest at an army base.
So: three and a half years house-arrest for ordering and participating in the premeditated murder of scores of unarmed civilians. And potentially 136 years for downloading stuff – including compelling video evidence of a war crime by US forces – and giving it to WikiLeaks. Makes you think, doesn't it?
In Iraq, the US embassy and consulates are open. All Iraq News reports,
"The US embassy in Baghdad and its Consulates in the Iraqi prvoinces
resumed its activities on Monday after it was suspended on last Sunday
for security concerns." The US State Dept issued the following late
yesterday:
Press Statement
Press Statement
Jen Psaki
Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
August 4, 2013
Given
that a number of our embassies and consulates were going to be closed in
accordance with local custom and practice for the bulk of the week for
the Eid celebration at the end of Ramadan, and out of an abundance of
caution, we've decided to extend the closure of several embassies and
consulates including a small number of additional posts.
This is not an indication of a new threat stream, merely an indication of our commitment to exercise caution and take appropriate steps to protect our employees including local employees and visitors to our facilities.
Posts in Abu Dhabi, Amman, Cairo, Riyadh, Dhahran, Jeddah, Doha, Dubai, Kuwait, Manama, Muscat, Sanaa, Tripoli, Antananarivo, Bujumbura, Djibouti, Khartoum, Kigali, and Port Louis are instructed to close for normal operations Monday, August 5 through Saturday, August 10.
The following posts that are normally open on Sunday, but were closed on Sunday, August 4, are authorized to reopen for normal operations on August 5: Dhaka, Algiers, Nouakchott, Kabul, Herat, Mazar el Sharif, Baghdad, Basrah, and Erbil.
This is not an indication of a new threat stream, merely an indication of our commitment to exercise caution and take appropriate steps to protect our employees including local employees and visitors to our facilities.
Posts in Abu Dhabi, Amman, Cairo, Riyadh, Dhahran, Jeddah, Doha, Dubai, Kuwait, Manama, Muscat, Sanaa, Tripoli, Antananarivo, Bujumbura, Djibouti, Khartoum, Kigali, and Port Louis are instructed to close for normal operations Monday, August 5 through Saturday, August 10.
The following posts that are normally open on Sunday, but were closed on Sunday, August 4, are authorized to reopen for normal operations on August 5: Dhaka, Algiers, Nouakchott, Kabul, Herat, Mazar el Sharif, Baghdad, Basrah, and Erbil.
Today Iraq came up during the US State Dept press briefing moderated by spokesperson Marie Harf.
QUESTION: Marie?
MS. HARF: Yes, Said.
QUESTION: There’s been prison breaks – there were many, but the most prominent were two in Iraq, at Taji and Abu Ghraib.
MS. HARF: Mm-hmm.
QUESTION: Are you satisfied that – the Iraqis have not been able to round up except maybe a handful since the break. Are you satisfied with their conduct, the conduct of the security forces in Iraq?
MS. HARF: Well, we have encouraged – I know there have been a number of prison breaks in different places. Clearly, they’re concerning to us, and that’s why I think you saw the Interpol notice go out this weekend. Clearly, we call – we’ve called on the Government of Iraq to continue to try to find people that have escaped. Again, it’s a tough process to do so. And we remain concerned by the fact, yes.
QUESTION: So – but the prison breaks in Iraq in particular, they were conducted in a very sophisticated military operation, and it shows that they have really reconstituted their presence in Iraq. Aren’t you concerned that after so many years of training and spending so much money on the Iraqis that they have failed to do at least that?
MS. HARF: Well, we do remain very concerned about the terrorist activity that we see in Iraq today. I think I’ve made clear that it’s important to remember that both the majority of the Iraqi people have rejected this violence and that it really is being perpetrated by terrorists in Iraq, and also that the government and the political leadership has taken steps in the last few months to come together to fight this threat together. They’ve been talking about it and meeting about it in a way that we hadn’t seen previously. So we’re going to continue working with Iraq to help them fight this threat that they’re facing.
QUESTION: How are the U.S. Government’s working with Interpol or the Iraqis or the Pakistanis or the Libyans, wherever these prison breaks occurred, to assist in tracking these escapees? I assume in Iraq a lot of these prisoners were people we put behind bars because they killed Americans.
MS. HARF: I don’t have more details on who’s working with them on that in each of the cases. I’m happy to look into it and get you some more information. I just don’t have that in front of me.
MS. HARF: Yes, Said.
QUESTION: There’s been prison breaks – there were many, but the most prominent were two in Iraq, at Taji and Abu Ghraib.
MS. HARF: Mm-hmm.
QUESTION: Are you satisfied that – the Iraqis have not been able to round up except maybe a handful since the break. Are you satisfied with their conduct, the conduct of the security forces in Iraq?
MS. HARF: Well, we have encouraged – I know there have been a number of prison breaks in different places. Clearly, they’re concerning to us, and that’s why I think you saw the Interpol notice go out this weekend. Clearly, we call – we’ve called on the Government of Iraq to continue to try to find people that have escaped. Again, it’s a tough process to do so. And we remain concerned by the fact, yes.
QUESTION: So – but the prison breaks in Iraq in particular, they were conducted in a very sophisticated military operation, and it shows that they have really reconstituted their presence in Iraq. Aren’t you concerned that after so many years of training and spending so much money on the Iraqis that they have failed to do at least that?
MS. HARF: Well, we do remain very concerned about the terrorist activity that we see in Iraq today. I think I’ve made clear that it’s important to remember that both the majority of the Iraqi people have rejected this violence and that it really is being perpetrated by terrorists in Iraq, and also that the government and the political leadership has taken steps in the last few months to come together to fight this threat together. They’ve been talking about it and meeting about it in a way that we hadn’t seen previously. So we’re going to continue working with Iraq to help them fight this threat that they’re facing.
QUESTION: How are the U.S. Government’s working with Interpol or the Iraqis or the Pakistanis or the Libyans, wherever these prison breaks occurred, to assist in tracking these escapees? I assume in Iraq a lot of these prisoners were people we put behind bars because they killed Americans.
MS. HARF: I don’t have more details on who’s working with them on that in each of the cases. I’m happy to look into it and get you some more information. I just don’t have that in front of me.
What was in front of Iraqis today was more violence. Sunday was the fourth day of the month and, through Sunday, Iraq Body Count counts 80 violent deaths so far this month -- that averages out to 20 deaths a day so far. Today, National Iraqi News Agency reports a Mosul roadside bombing killed 4 Iraqi soldiers, 1 contractor was shot dead in Mosul, 1
"power genartor's owner and his son were killed by gunmen with
silenceer in the early morning today [. . .] in Al-Jaarh area south of
Baghdad" and the same assailants then shot dead another person, and late last night a 13-year-old boy was kidnapped outside his Kirkuk home. All Iraq News notes a Mosul bombing claimed the life of 1 police officer. Xinhua reports, "In Iraq's eastern province of Diyala, gunmen in a car
shot dead a government-backed Sahwa paramilitary group member and his
relative in the city of Maqdadiyah, about 40 km northeast of the
provincial capital city of Baquba, a provincial police source said." Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) terms
a bombing targeting a bakery "the deadliest attack" today and notes 4
people were killed while fourteen more were left injured. In addition, NINA notes a Raweh bombing injured one person, an armed attack on a Baghdad bus left nine people injured (including seven police officers), a Mosul car bombing has left 2 people dead and sixteen more injured, 2 men were shot dead in Hilla, and 2 Sahwa were shot dead in downtown Hawija (Kirkuk Province).
On the violence, last night, we noted:
In Baghdad, Ayad al-Tamimi (Al Mada) reports trenches are being dug in the Green Zone around Saddam Hussein's former palace and other buildings to protect them and their inhabitants, that security measures are so huge that those living in the Green Zone are assuming it's just not safe to leave the Green Zone. In addition, Iraqis are complaining as more money goes to secure the Green Zone while everyone else lives it at huge risk. Another thing that is taking place is mass arrests. NINA notes 183 people arrested in Baghdad alone today. For those not paying attention, mass arrests are among the reasons for the ongoing protests.
NINA reports today that over 300 people have been arrested in Baghdad in the last 24 hours. These arbitrary arrests -- usually targeting Sunnis -- do little to ease tensions and most likely will only increase the tension.
Finally, turning to the topic of the ongoing, unconstitutional spying (the US government -- Barack -- spying on American citizens), Amy Goodman (Democracy Now! -- link is audio, video and text) interviewed the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald today. Excerpt.
AMY GOODMAN: The timing of the embassy closings comes at a time of heated debate in Washington over the powers of the National Security Agency. It was two months ago today when Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian newspaper published his first article revealing the existence of a secret court order for Verizon to hand over the telephone records of millions of Americans to the NSA.
Since then, The Guardian has published a trove of articles detailing the NSA’s vast surveillance powers based on documents leaked by Edward Snowden. Just last week, Greenwald exposed a secret program called XKeyscore that gives NSA analysts real-time access to, quote, "nearly everything a typical user does on the internet," including emails, chats and browsing history. In his latest article, Greenwald reports members of Congress have been repeatedly thwarted when attempting to learn basic information about the NSA and the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
To talk more about these developments, Glenn Greenwald joins us now from his home in Brazil.
Glenn, welcome back to Democracy Now!
Since we’ve spoken to you, Edward Snowden has been granted temporary
asylum in Russia for a year. It’s not known where he is right now in
Russia. Have you spoken to him? Do you know?
GLENN GREENWALD:
I have, and he’s doing very well. He’s obviously happy that his very
strange situation of being in this kind of no-person’s land in the
airport has been resolved. He now is able to be safe, or at least
relatively safe, for the next year from persecution by the United
States. And he is most interested, whenever I talk to him, in talking
not about his own situation, but about the really extraordinary debate
that he helped provoke, both in the United States and around the world,
about privacy, surveillance and Internet freedom.
AMY GOODMAN:
What Russia has done, giving him temporary asylum, has infuriated the
U.S. government, leading to questions about whether actually President
Obama will be going on a planned trip to Russia next month. Your
comments on the U.S.’s fury?
GLENN GREENWALD:
Well, first of all, it’s really kind of amazing if you try and count
the number of countries at whom the United States has directed its fury
and threatened over the last two months in connection with the Snowden
affair. They began with the government of Hong Kong, followed that up
with the government of China, then moved to Latin America and threatened
countries including Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua over
whether he would be granted asylum. They’ve threatened Cuba over giving
him the right to refuel. So it seems like the list of countries that the
United States is threatening and expressing their fury at, which now
includes Russia, is almost getting to be longer than the list of
countries at which they’re not. I mean, you can’t go around the world
beating your chest and threatening everybody for very long without
starting to appear rather ridiculous. And I think one of the things that
the United States has done is really kind of showed the world what its
character is in—over the last two months, through its really extreme and
radical behavior. I mean, I can tell you here in Latin America what was
really event-shifting was when they caused the plane Evo Morales to be
downed in Austria by blocking airspace rights over their European
allies.
You know, and I think the final point to note
about this is, everyone in the world knows, probably except for
Americans, that the United States routinely refuses to extradite all
sorts of people accused of horrible crimes. I mean, in Bolivia, the
ex-president, who’s accused of all sorts of war crimes and was protected
and propped up by the CIA, is living
comfortably in the United States, which refuses to turn him over. And
that’s been true of other Latin Americans who have been accused of
serious crimes of terrorism. So, I think when the United States pretends
to be outraged that they don’t get what they want in extradition,
everyone in the world knows that they frequently do the same thing in
much more extreme cases.
iraq
wbai
law and disorder radio
michael s. smith
heidi boghosian
michael ratner
the daily mail
nic north
john naughton
the associated press
sameer n. yacoub
national iraqi news agency
alsumaria
all iraq news
xinhua
democracy now
amy goodman
the guardian
glenn greenwald
