Siah
12-09-04, 20:29
Falluja: An Iraqi Beslan
By Mike Whitney
Al-Jazeerah, September 12, 2004
“Everybody talks about mercy, But they don’t know the meaning of the word.” Mose Allison
Falluja is an Iraqi Beslan. The only difference is that the cameras aren’t rolling.
The city of 500,000 is being held hostage by an American leadership who doesn’t mind shedding the blood of innocent civilians to achieve their broader political goals. That is the very definition of terrorism.
Since, the Marines were rebuffed last April in a three week siege that killed an estimated 650 Iraqis, the military has repeatedly bombed sections of Falluja using the spurious claim of targeting terrorist “safe houses.” Every incident involved the wanton destruction of personal property and the loss of innocent life.
These attacks are part of larger “psy-ops” (psychological operation) strategy that requires the long-term terrorizing of the population to make them more compliant to American wishes. Certainly, the Chechen rebels should be taking notes if they want to truly grasp the subtleties of a well-managed terrorist procedure.
If terrorism is not recorded on video, it doesn’t exist. This is the “great lesson” that the Dept of Defense gleaned from our involvement in Vietnam. Nothing was learned about the moral depravity of killing 3 million people and poisoning their land in a blatant act of aggression. No, the lesson of Vietnam was simply to keep the killing and maiming off American TVs.
As a result, Iraq has become a war on information every bit as much as a war for vital resources. The reporting has been so meticulously sanitized that it bears no resemblance to the real horror we are unleashing against a defenseless civilian population.
It should surprise no one that Al Jazeera was expelled from Iraq. Their coverage has been a major departure from the Pentagon narrative that fills the pages of the New York Times and Washington Post. Rather than provide apologetics for the hostilities, they have focused their gaze on the suffering of normal people; people living without power or clean water, people dealing with the daily struggle of living in a war zone, people digging their family members out of the ruins of a smoldering building.
This level of truth is anathema to the objectives of the empire. As Beslan proves, it is impossible to carry on a campaign of terror under the scrutiny of a camera lens.
Besides, America doesn’t perpetrate terrorism. Our efforts in Iraq are purely altruistic. We have come to “liberate”; to bring democracy to unwashed natives of a primitive third world backwater and remove the scourge of WMD from a crazed tyrant.
Nonsense. The fear that engulfed Beslan, now cuts a wide swath through Iraq enveloping everyone within its vice-like grip. Falluja is just the most recent chapter in this campaign of terror
Iraqis celebrate around a burning U.S. armored vehicle, following heavy clashes in the center of Baghdad, September 12, 2004. More than a dozen explosions shook central Baghdad at dawn on Sunday and heavy gunfire erupted in a street at the heart of the city
By Mike Whitney
Al-Jazeerah, September 12, 2004
“Everybody talks about mercy, But they don’t know the meaning of the word.” Mose Allison
Falluja is an Iraqi Beslan. The only difference is that the cameras aren’t rolling.
The city of 500,000 is being held hostage by an American leadership who doesn’t mind shedding the blood of innocent civilians to achieve their broader political goals. That is the very definition of terrorism.
Since, the Marines were rebuffed last April in a three week siege that killed an estimated 650 Iraqis, the military has repeatedly bombed sections of Falluja using the spurious claim of targeting terrorist “safe houses.” Every incident involved the wanton destruction of personal property and the loss of innocent life.
These attacks are part of larger “psy-ops” (psychological operation) strategy that requires the long-term terrorizing of the population to make them more compliant to American wishes. Certainly, the Chechen rebels should be taking notes if they want to truly grasp the subtleties of a well-managed terrorist procedure.
If terrorism is not recorded on video, it doesn’t exist. This is the “great lesson” that the Dept of Defense gleaned from our involvement in Vietnam. Nothing was learned about the moral depravity of killing 3 million people and poisoning their land in a blatant act of aggression. No, the lesson of Vietnam was simply to keep the killing and maiming off American TVs.
As a result, Iraq has become a war on information every bit as much as a war for vital resources. The reporting has been so meticulously sanitized that it bears no resemblance to the real horror we are unleashing against a defenseless civilian population.
It should surprise no one that Al Jazeera was expelled from Iraq. Their coverage has been a major departure from the Pentagon narrative that fills the pages of the New York Times and Washington Post. Rather than provide apologetics for the hostilities, they have focused their gaze on the suffering of normal people; people living without power or clean water, people dealing with the daily struggle of living in a war zone, people digging their family members out of the ruins of a smoldering building.
This level of truth is anathema to the objectives of the empire. As Beslan proves, it is impossible to carry on a campaign of terror under the scrutiny of a camera lens.
Besides, America doesn’t perpetrate terrorism. Our efforts in Iraq are purely altruistic. We have come to “liberate”; to bring democracy to unwashed natives of a primitive third world backwater and remove the scourge of WMD from a crazed tyrant.
Nonsense. The fear that engulfed Beslan, now cuts a wide swath through Iraq enveloping everyone within its vice-like grip. Falluja is just the most recent chapter in this campaign of terror
Iraqis celebrate around a burning U.S. armored vehicle, following heavy clashes in the center of Baghdad, September 12, 2004. More than a dozen explosions shook central Baghdad at dawn on Sunday and heavy gunfire erupted in a street at the heart of the city