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US and Iraq, and the US Mafioso Racket by Elson Boles 12 March 2002 14:43 UTC |
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Today's New York Times reported: "Western officials said after the meeting between Mr. Cheney and Mr. Blair that the British leadership agreed with the American assessment of the Iraqi threat and also that the removal of Mr. Hussein would be the surest way to eliminate it." When we speak of the US Mafioso Racket, and how the US creates regional instabilities that seemingly justify US military presence everywhere, justify US military industry and arms sales to allies, justify protection payments from allies, and brings in foreign capital to the safe shores of US financial markets -- Iraq is a good example. Today the US can convince some of its allies, at least Blair, that Hussein is the bad guy and gain their financial and military support for a US attack on Iraq. But this despite the fact that the US was arming Iraq in the 1980s (recall the dual-use issue), had fought with Iraqi forces against Iran in a war which in 1987 US special operations sunk half of Iran's navy while Iraqi forces launched an offensive on Iran with US tactical aid. All that and more was uncovered following the investigation of the shooting down of an Iranian airliner by the US Vincennes, killing some 200 civilians on board, while the ship was engaged in offensive maneuvers against Iranian naval forces in *Iranian waters.* All top US officials, from Bush down blatantly lied about the incident, falsified documents, keep records secret, and claimed that the Vincennes was in international waters and protecting itself. It was amazing to hear Ted Koppel say, "We know the US government lies to us sometimes. Tonight's broadcast is about the cover up of..." Policy maker Armitage called these events, "playing one wolf off of another." And then came the ambivalence of the US position regarding Iraq's intentions to invade Kuwait in which the US indicated that it would not interfere in any military confrontation with Kuwait (recall the famous meeting between Hussein and US Ambassador Glaspie in 1990). It would appear that the US saw that as an opportunity was developing in which it would have the opportunity to launch an offensive against Iraq and thus have not only a considerably weakened Iraq and Iran, but also, as long as Hussein and a fundamentalist regime in Iran were in place, a situation in which the occupation of US forces and sales of weapons to Saudi Arabia that would continue for the foreseeable future. So when the US talks about the perils of rogue states as part of the current war on terrorism, one wonders who the bad guy really is, and how the culmination of these strategies add up to deliberate policy that is nothing other than a Mafioso protection racket.
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