The Null Device

Read: Richard Neville on the ugly truth behind the war; not quite the first Good War since WW2, as consensus holds, but the usual filling of mass graves in the name of the almighty dollar.
These negotiations collapsed in August 2001, when the Taliban asked the US to help reconstruct Afghanistan's infrastructure and provide a portion of the oil supply for local needs. The US response was reportedly succinct: "We will either carpet you in gold or carpet you in bombs." The notes of this meeting, which took place only weeks before the strike on America, are now the subject of a lawsuit between Congress and the White House. Was the Taliban really destroyed for harbouring terrorists? Or was it for failing to further the ambitions of Texan millionaires?
Blum makes the point that Americans are taught it's wrong to murder, rob, rape and bribe, but that it's okay to topple foreign governments, quash socialist movements or drop powerful bombs on foreigners, so long as it serves the national interest. From plenty of examples which prove, despite the current rhetoric from the White House, that the West is not always on the side of the angels, these three capture the essence of much US foreign policy:
An early image of liberation was of Kabul's haggard residents watching TV, a seamless advertisement for freedom. Except, whose TV? The last US bomb on Kabul hit the studios of al-Jazeera, the independent voice of the Middle East. Funny, that. The Afghans may now need to settle for CNN and Fox, a victory, perhaps, for civilisation and US exports, as well as for the pipe dreams of Unocal. The Pentagon claims this "smart bomb" lost its bearings, as another one did over Belgrade in 1999, when it flattened Serbian TV, killing and maiming the staff.
Photos appeared on the Web showing bodies of those shot displaying white plastic wrist restrainers bearing the words "Made in USA". As pointed out by the US magazine The Nation, Article 23 of the Hague Convention forbids a warring party "to kill or wound an enemy who, having laid down his arms, or having no longer means of defence, has surrendered". General Tommy Franks, the head of the US Central Command, defended this apparent war crime: "I will not characterise it as a failure of any type."

There are 3 comments on "":

Posted by: serious for once http://www.geocities.com/you_have_some_sort_of_bug/war-links.htm Wed Apr 17 03:09:55 2002

I'd like to see someone fact-check this essay, and go to the "anti-antiwar" sites for the other side of the story... Just a few things I noticed:

1) Putin, "implicated in the Moscow apartment bombings" ... according to Boris Berezovsky, Russia's answer to Christopher Skase.

2) "1985, Lebanon. The CIA plants a truck bomb outside a mosque in Beirut, aiming to kill a Muslim cleric" ... who just happened to be the head of Hezbollah.

3) Marc Herold's figures have been questioned in many many places (but cited without comment in many more).

So it makes me wonder what else Neville doesn't know or doesn't tell us.

Posted by: acb http://dev.null.org Wed Apr 17 03:24:54 2002

Ah, that makes it OK then; if he was the head of Hezbollah, then using a big fucking bomb to kill him and take a few dozen innocent women and children with him is perfectly justifiable then. Thanks for clearing that up.

Posted by: as above http:// Wed Apr 17 05:08:06 2002

My point was that he's leaving the reader in the dark. He says nothing about the "Muslim cleric" being the head of a group which was believed to have already killed hundreds in similar fashion. He also doesn't acknowledge that the CIA itself denies having planted the bomb, and called off covert operations in its aftermath (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/target/etc/cron.html). I don't know the facts, but I doubt that he does either. He could have written "The CIA is *accused* of having planted a truck bomb", but that wouldn't serve his rhetorical purposes.

For all I know, when you do the math, the USA *does* end up being the Great Satan. I just don't think this article is very reliable.