Ex-US President Indicts Obama As Assassin

By Bill Van Auken on World Socialist Web Site 27 June 2012

A column published Monday in the New York Times by Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States, constitutes an extraordinary indictment of the Obama administration for engaging in assassinations and other criminal violations of international law and the US Constitution.

Titling his column “A Cruel and Unusual Record,” Carter writes: “Revelations that top officials are targeting people to be assassinated abroad, including American citizens, are only the most recent, disturbing proof of how far our nation’s violation of human rights has extended.”

Referring to the infamous provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), signed into law by Obama on December 31 of last year, Carter writes: “Recent legislation has made legal the president’s right to detain a person indefinitely on suspicion of affiliation with terrorist organizations or ‘associated forces,’ a broad, vague power that can be abused without meaningful oversight from the courts or Congress.” He goes on to refer to “unprecedented violations of our rights” through warrantless wiretapping and electronic data mining.

Elaborating on the US drone strikes, the former president adds, “Despite an arbitrary rule that any man killed by drones is declared an enemy terrorist, the death of nearby innocent women and children is accepted as inevitable… We don’t know how many hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed in these attacks, each one approved by the highest authorities in Washington. This would have been unthinkable in previous times.”

Carter’s column appeared on the same day that Pakistan’s ambassador to the United Nations testified before the UN Human Rights Commission, denouncing US drone attacks on his country in which “thousands of innocent people, including women and children, have been murdered.” He said that in 2010 alone, 957 Pakistanis were killed.

Carter goes on to indict the administration for the continued operation of the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where, he notes, out of 169 prisoners “half have been cleared for release, yet have little prospect of ever obtaining their freedom,” and others “have no prospect of ever being charged or tried either.”

In the few cases where prisoners have been brought before military tribunals, he notes, the defendants “have been tortured by waterboarding more than 100 times or intimidated with semiautomatic weapons, power drills or threats to sexually assault their mothers.” He continues: “Astoundingly, these facts cannot be used as a defense by the accused, because the government claims they occurred under the cover of ‘national security.’”

Aside from moral qualms, and there is no reason to doubt that these play a significant role in Carter’s case, the former president expresses profound concerns that the brazen criminality of the actions carried out by the US government is undermining American foreign policy. Not only are these methods fueling popular hostility around the globe, they are depriving Washington of the ability to cloak its policies in the mantle of human rights and the defense of democracy, a method employed to significant effect by US imperialism since its advent at the end of the 19th century.

Carter himself played the “human rights” card prominently during his presidency, even as his administration sought to prop up the torture regime of the Shah in Iran, initiated the CIA-backed Islamist insurgency in Afghanistan, and affirmed—in the Carter Doctrine—America’s right to use military force to assure its domination of Persian Gulf oil supplies.

A former senior naval officer and submarine expert, Carter was brought into the White House in 1977 to restore the credibility and stature of the American presidency in the wake of US imperialism’s debacle in Vietnam and the criminality surrounding Watergate.

Yet, nearly four decades later, the extra-constitutional methods and criminality in the White House go far beyond anything done under Richard Nixon.

There is no question that Carter chose each word of his column carefully, avoiding hyperbole. Indeed, the name Obama does not appear. In the first word of the piece, however, he inserted a link to the lengthy New York Times article of June 1 documenting how Obama personally directs the preparation of “kill lists,” choosing victims and signing off on drone strikes when it is known that innocent civilians will be killed.

In this context, Carter’s use of the word “assassination” to describe the drone attacks has an unmistakable meaning. The president of the United States, this former president is saying, is guilty of war crimes and murder.

At the age of 88, Carter is a disinterested observer, concerned more with his legacy than any political gain. His testimony is all the more extraordinary in that he occupied the same office as Obama, is a member of the same party, and supported Obama’s election.

What could impel him, with little more than four months until the presidential election, to level such charges at his party’s candidate and the sitting president? He must believe that the political setup in America has descended so far into criminality and the threat of a police state is so great that it is imperative for him to speak out.

Carter makes the telling point that these criminal actions have been carried out with “bipartisan executive and legislative” support and virtually “without dissent.” Indeed, as if to prove his point, his own statements in the column—which have explosive political significance—have been largely passed over in silence by the mass media.

Twelve years after the stolen presidential election of 2000, the central lesson of that crucial episode in American political life has been driven home ever more forcefully: there exists within the US corporate and political establishment no significant constituency for the defense of democratic rights and constitutional methods.

The unprecedented gulf between a ruling financial oligarchy and the masses of working people—which has grown uninterruptedly throughout this period—is wholly incompatible with such rights and such methods.

Carter’s words are a warning. The threat of an American police state and the use of the murderous methods employed by US imperialism abroad against the working class at home is real and growing. The working class must prepare accordingly, mobilizing its independent political power against the capitalist profit system from which these threats arise.

MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières or Doctors Without Borders) has been providing medical and mental health support to Palestinians in need since 1989. MSF is committed to its presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, where the consequences of the military occupation continue to limit people's access to medical treatment and mental health care.

Confronting Trauma, was compiled from a nine part MSF video presentation. Those are subtitled "Symptom and symbol of the occupation", "Caring for people in need", "The suffering of children", "The strong man", "Violence close to home", "Children in detention and children exposed to violence", "Limited access to health care", and "Dealing with trauma - The challenge of mental health care"-

The original MSF collection is at http://www.msf.es/videogalerias/palestina-afrontar-el-trauma/en/index.html.

The posting here honors a companion in struggle, indispensible Further Left supporter, and friend who gave of herself doing what the film depicts.

The creators of Debtocracy, a documentary with two million views broadcasted from Japan to Latin America, analyze the shifting of state assets to private hands. They travel round the world gathering data on privatization in developed countries and search for clues on the day after Greece's massive privatization program.

09 Jun 2012

Barack Obama, who lots of deluded people not too long ago imagined was a man of peace, wants the American people to think of him as a cold killer. Violence-wise, the U.S. is the home of the depraved, says Black Agenda Reporteditor Margaret Kimberley, underscoring that recent revelations about the U.S. president’s personal prerogative to decide who will live and who will die have not made a dent in public opinion.

What can one say about people who continue to support war criminals among their elected representatives? It is easy to blame the presidents and the Congress and the media for endless war and rising body counts around the world. They are indeed responsible for promoting mass killing as an acceptable, indeed beneficial means of living among the world’s people.
It is true that Americans have far less input into their government’s decisions than they seem to think. They play a very small role in choosing elected officials, including the president. The power of money means that rich people and corporations call the shots to a greater extent than citizens of a so-called democracy are willing to admit.

But the people do still have the right to their own opinions. We can proclaim what we do and do not like. When the president feeds a story to the New York Timeswhich proclaims that he gladly accepts responsibility for killing people, he believes that said story will increase his support among voters.

That is what Barack Obama did last week. His advisers sat down with New York Times reporters in order to tell the world that he decides who will live and who will be blown to bits by drones in Afghanistan or Pakistan or Somalia.

The Obama marketing juggernaut knows that the killer president image can only be helpful in a country so certain of its right to be violent.

The anniversary of his assassination of Osama bin Laden was celebrated and turned into an argument for a second Obama term in office. Nor was the gloating limited to the president and his campaign team. His supporters were also beside themselves as they made the case for the killer president, using his navy seal hit as one more reason to love Barack Obama.

Condemnation should not just be directed towards Barack Obama and his henchmen and women, but at the American people too. Americans love to make war and revel in their nation’s military superiority. Politicians surmise, correctly, that being on the side of war is a surer path to victory than working for peace.

To be sure, there is better fundraising to be had for the hawk than for the dove, but there is also a visceral level of support for invasion, occupation and drone strikes. The oldest and strongest form of propaganda in this country is the belief that white America has the right to dominate everyone else on the earth, and as president Obama functions as the whitest man in the country.

The siren song of Manifest Destiny outlived the 19th century and is still alive now in the 21st. It has been called many things, anti-communism during the Cold War, and the war against terror now, but it all amounts to the same thing.

We are told to fear the communist, or militant Islam, or whatever the enemy du jour happens to be. The end result is the same from a people who are convinced of their own goodness and paradoxically their right to have their violent way in the world. It is never very difficult to get support for killing and maiming among people who think themselves morally superior.

If anything Americans are morally inferior to people in the rest of the world. Barack Obama was certain that news of his personal “kill list” would benefit his chances of being re-elected, and he was not wrong.

He solved the problems presented by Guantanamo by not taking any prisoners at all. He just kills people and any innocent bystander is labeled as a militant, all so that the president can look good and the people in his country can feel good. According to the well orchestrated story, the president even invokes theological theories of just war, as he pours over a “nominations” list of those marked for death.

These revelations did not cause outrage or inspire people to take to the streets. It was left to the usual suspects who are truly progressive and proudly leftist to point out the evil inherent in a president who thinks he should be judge, jury and executioner.

It seems that our president is a totally amoral psychopath, and the revelation of his condition has not hurt his popularity. Apparently the president governs psychopaths too, because too few of them will say or do anything to oppose his commitment to breaking the law, violating the Constitution, and the word of the god he claims to believe in.

The evil is not limited to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, but can be found on Main Street U.S.A. just as easily.
Obama is giving most Americans exactly what they want, a world living in fear of them.

Margaret Kimberley Black Agenda Report editor and senior columnist.

When they want something, the US and its allies will insist until they get it. That’s what they’re doing to Syria right now, where they NEED to give it a Libya-like treatment in order to further their Imperial Overdrive goals in the Middle East.

Just as rock star Freddy Mercury & Queen used to sing “we will, we will rock you!!”, today’s US/UK/EU/Israeli war cry mantra goes something like this: “We will, we will BOMB you!!”. And if they can’t do the bombing “officially” themselves or through NATO as they’ve done in Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, Serbia or Pakistan, then they’ll do the bombing through suitable proxies, especially their present favorite errand-boy Al-Qaeda.

We may be seeing examples of this in the horrendous attacks taking place inside Syria which the Western powers and media systematically blame solely on the Bashar al-Assad government, which from the very beginning of the “Arab Spring” warned his country and the world against Western covert operations and a powerful media PsyWar.

Common sense tell us that it would be monstrous and idiotic for al-Assad to purposely carry out such attacks that only play into the hands of the Western powers giving them further excuse for armed intervention. The Houla massacre came just as UN Special Envoy to Syria Kofi Annan was beginning his mission inside Syria; now the el-Quebeir killing comes just as Annan is about to submit his report to the UN Security Council. It makes no sense, so one must ask: who benefits from all this?

Clearly, the Annan Mission is being sabotaged and – oh, coincidence – his proposed plan is the only one that counts with Russian and Chinese support after these two countries blocked US, British and French attempts at imposing a Libya-like Resolution 1973 against Syria at the end of 2011 and early 2012, which would have predictably led to Libya-like results in Syria.

Annan proposes a six-point plan that includes cessation of hostilities and Syrian-led dialogue amongst ALL warring parties, unrestrained access of humanitarian aid, freedom for journalists to report what’s really happening and UN monitoring. Naturally, that does not please Hilary, Obama, Cameron, Hague, John MacCain, Joe Liberman and their controllers at AIPAC – American Israeli Public Affairs Committee – for it thwarts Western invasion plans against Syria.

So the Annan Plan MUST be sabotaged. And what better way to do that then to carry out covert dirty tricks false flag-like horrendous killings as we’ve seen in Houla, Hama, and now el-Quebeir, putting all the blame, naturally, on “the Assad regime’s repressive troops” giving it the goriest of Western media coverage?

But who are fighting inside Syria? We hear about a “Free Syrian Army”, “Local Coordination Committees”, a “Syrian National Council” and – most notably – good old Al-Qaeda. All wonderfully armed, trained, financed and supported by the Western Powers and Media and by groups like the UK-based “Syrian Observatory on Human Rights”, all suitably “appalled” and “outraged” over the killings and massacres.

What options does a country’s legitimate government such as Syria’s have when confronted with civil war? Basically, two: they either fight the imported armed insurrection or they surrender and give up their country to the US, UK, NATO military, together with their darlings at ExxonMobil, Goldman Sachs, Blackstone, and Halliburton… They call it “democracy”, and we’ve seen where that leads to in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.

So now the Western Powers are having a temper tantrum and want to see “regime change” in Syria one way or another. If Russia and China blocked NATO bombings, well then let’s just bring in the Al-Qaeda “SWAT” Team and other “freedom fighting” thugs so they can do the bombing for us.

Isn’t it strange that over the past two years Hilary Clinton has publicly admitted on FoxNews and CNN that it was the US who “created, trained and armed Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan to fight the Soviet invasion of the 80’s”, and that “once the Soviets left, we just washed our hands and left the Taliban, Muhadejeen and Al-Qaeda with all those Stinger missiles and arms” running around Afghanistan?

Wasn’t it Tony Blair’s Foreign Secretary Robin Cook who told The Guardian newspaper in June 2005 that “Al Qaeda was created by the US and the name means ‘the file’” – the CIA file containing lists of all those cute Al-Qaeda operatives? Too bad for big-mouth Robin as he promptly “died of a heart attack” just two months later in rather dubious circumstances…

Wasn’t it Jimmy Carter’s national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinksi – co-founder and ideologue of the Rockefeller/Rothschild Trilateral Commission – who told the French “Nouvelle Observateur” magazine in 1998 that he masterminded the CIA’s “Operation Cyclone” which in early July 1979 whipped-up Taliban fighters against the pro-soviet regime in Kabul, thus triggering the soviet invasion of Afghanistan; boasting with president Carter that the soviets now had their Vietnam War?. All trained, financed, armed and supported by the US, Saudi Arabia, UK, Pakistan and Israel?

So, is it any surprise that over the past year and a half of “Arab Spring”, we hear many times that Al-Qaeda is involved in the worst fighting, even raising their flag over a police facility in “liberated Libya”? Now we learn Al-Qaeda is working hard to “liberate” Syria…

How much of the horrific killing is attributable to them and their insurrection partners which, in the final instance all goes back to their original controllers at the CIA, MI6 and Mossad?

Is it a mere coincidence that during the secretive Bilderberg meeting earlier this month in Chantilly, Virginia (USA) that brought together key global power brokers and decision-makers of this world, they also invited Bassma Kodmani, member of the Executive Bureau and Head of Foreign Affairs at the Syrian National Council to attend?

Surely Mr Kodmani must have met and chatted with other Bilderberg attendees like Henry Kissinger, the “black prince” Richard Perle of Destroy-Iraq-fame, and key think-tank bosses like the Council of Foreign Relations’ Robert Rubin, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Hudson and Hoover institutes, the neo-con American Enterprise Institute and – oh, yes! – Thomas Donilon, Obama’s powerful national security advisor…

The message is clear, gentlemen: this is Total War. So, Syria, if we cannot bomb you to smithereens and impose regime change with UN and NATO backing as we did in Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, then we’ll use our proxies at the Syrian National Council and call in our Al-Qaeda Global SWAT team killers.

Either way, Hilary, Obama, Hague and Cameron will rock‘n’roll to the tune of “We will, we will BOMB you!!!

Who’s directing the orchestra you ask? I think I see Bibi Netanyahu and the AIPAC and ADL boys playing the strings there, behind the curtain…

Adrian Salbuchi for RT

Adrian Salbuchi is a political analyst, author, speaker and radio/TV commentator in Argentina. www.asalbuchi.com.ar

31.05.2012 Pravda.RU

The U.S. Department of State is not waiting on the Libyan authorities to investigate the extrajudicial execution of Muammar Gaddafi. Here is the image of today's reality: the legitimate leader of an independent country can be brutally killed after being tortured, buried like a dog, and the "world policeman," or rather, the guardian of democracy, will only nod: this is the way it should be, and there is nothing to investigate.

The other day, the U.S. State Department was engaged in its favorite activity - teaching the world democracy and human rights. However, this time it was done not through a habitual, bomb-throwing way, but only verbally. The Department of State presented to the public a progress report on the fascinating topic of "respect for human rights in the world in 2011," and I will tell you, the conclusions of this report are truly shocking for the untrained imagination.

The fact that Russia has traditionally been kicked in this report is no news. Rather, our planet would begin to spin in the opposite direction if the United States recognized the satisfactory situation of human rights in the Russian Federation. But it turns out that the situation with human rights has greatly improved in the countries swept by a whirlwind of the "Arab spring" - that is, Tunisia, Egypt, and, of course, Libya. Where else but in Libya one can expect flowering of democracy, tolerance and political correctness?

Print version Font Size Send to friendHowever, the review of the report was attended - apparently by some stupid mistake - by committed journalists who were not quite enlightened. It was they who started asking all sorts of stupid questions: what human rights in Libya? What about the investigation into the death of Muammar Gaddafi? Or, is it permissible nowadays to brutally kill the legitimate leader of an independent country? Why has the new Libyan authorities failed to investigate this unfortunate incident?

The U.S. Deputy Secretary of State "for democracy and human rights," Michael Posner answered by saying that he thought that the Libyan government had an extended agenda and that it would be unreasonable to expect that they were going to deal with every aspect of it. He had some difficulty finding the word to describe Gaddafi's death. It was not clear whether, out of human forgetfulness, he wanted to say "this crime", but stopped in time, or thought that it would not be appropriate to call it "this little thing." Nevertheless, the historic words were spoken: Tri-color Tripoli was fully and absolutely excused, and no longer even has to pretend to be bothered with an investigation of the extrajudicial execution of the leader. There are plenty of other things to do.

"Thousands of prisoners are still in prison, the militia has to be organized. But I plan to visit the country soon, and look into this matter ... I can give a better answer after going back and holding a series of meetings," said Posner.

We wish him good luck. The Deputy U.S. Secretary of State still has lot of interesting discoveries to make related to "human rights" in Libya. For example, he will miraculously have to believe in the fact that those in Libyan prisons are not in favor of the colonel and wish to return Jamahiriya. Not that long ago the new government of Tripoli passed a law whereby anyone who said that "it was better under Gaddafi" will respond to the fullest extent of the law, up to life imprisonment. No, in fact, behind the bars there are still the martyrs of the revolution, imprisoned by the evil Gaddafi. The government simply did not have time to let them go.

The comment about "organizing" militia would have been very funny had it not been so sad. Thinking back to the tragicomic Libyan war, one cannot but remember that the rebels looked nothing like combat troops. The ones who were fighting without rules and instilling fear on the civilians were Al-Qaeda militants. PNS has repeatedly admitted helplessness in the face of the "chicks" of Tripoli "mayor" Belhadj, an honorary veteran of this venerable terrorist organization. It will be interesting to see how the PNS (even with the help of the U.S.) will "organize" this "militia" and really - the most banal bandit gang.

However, discoveries and revelations did not end there. According to Posner, in Libya, preconditions for the formation of a democratic society were created, but the "new government" of the country had a lot of work to do. He expressed hope that in the coming months in the country led by the interim government elections will take place and the process of formation of state authorities will begin.

The United States "hopes" that in the bombed, smashed, shattered into dust by NATO bombs country scoured by bandit groups, finally (the United States, however, does not know when), the process of formation of a normal government will begin. Those in power in Tripoli today cannot be called government - it is a clique absolutely impotent, powerless before the ongoing civil war.

The same way Iraq has become a "showcase of democracy," Libya is becoming a real flower garden of "human rights". The U.S. is silent about the fertilizer that helps this garden grow: bones, flesh and blood of thousands and thousands of ordinary Libyans who were killed by NATO bombs and al-Qaida bandits. But now, it is much better than it was in 42 years under the tyrant, right? So let his mutilated corpse lie buried somewhere in the wilderness, let the "Libyan democracy" thrive on his bones. There should be no digging up in any event to avoid the excavation of the entire flower garden.

 Well, no one seems to intend to.

by Tony Cartalucci
Global Research, May 30, 2012

In the wake of the Houla massacre in Syria, and evidence exposing the West's initial narrative of Syrian troops "shelling to death" around 100 people to be categorically false, people are struggling to understand just what happened. The Guardian has chosen to post unverified witness accounts produced by the Free Syrian Army, seemingly custom tailored to refute evidence brought by Russia to the UN Security Council. The BBC has admitted that only "most" of the accounts they've received implicated what they "believe" were Syrian troops, or pro-government militias - and by doing so, imply that some did not and have told a different account.

As the window of opportunity closes for the West to exploit the bloodshed at Houla, the Western media is increasingly backpedaling, retracting, and being caught in a crossfire of their own lies and propagandizing. BBC was caught initially using years' old photos from Iraq for their Houla coverage, while papers and networks across the board have had to adjust their narratives entirely as each new piece of verified evidence emerges.

What is known is that Syrian troops were engaged with armed militants of the "Free Syrian Army" (FSA) in and around Houla. Syrian troops, as they have been doing throughout the conflict, were using artillery and tanks to target heavily fortified rebel positions from a distance. During or shortly after this exchange, militants began entering homes and killing families with knives and small arms fire. The FSA and Syrian opposition claim the militants were pro-government militias while the government claims they were foreign-backed Al Qaeda terrorists, known to be operating throughout the country. What they weren't, by all accounts, were Syrian troops.

A recent "editorial" out of the Globe and Mail claims that Russia's position that opposition forces were involved in the massacre is "laughable." However, this is divorced from not only reality, but also from a complete understanding of modern 4th generation warfare. From Venezuela to Thailand, Western backed opposition groups have triggered unrest and used it as cover to pick off members of their own movement, to then blame on the targeted government and compound any given conflict until a critical mass is reached, and a targeted government is toppled..

A Historical Example: Bangkok, Thailand 2010

Wall Street-backed former-Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a close associate of the Bush family with connections ranging from before, during, and after his term in office, was ousted from power in 2006 by nationalist forces for abuses of power. Thaksin had worked as a Carlyle Group adviser, sent Thai troops to aid in Bush's invasion of Iraq, attempted to implement a free trade agreement with Wall Street's Fortune 500 without parliamentary approval, hosted CIA torture facilities, and prosecuted a "war on drugs" that saw some 2,500 Thais extra-legally executed in the streets, most of whom were later determined to have nothing to do with the drug trade.

Since his ousting in 2006, he has received support from a myriad of prominent US lobbying firms including fellow Carlyle member James Baker and Baker Botts, Bush administration warmonger Robert Blackwill of Barbour Griffith & Rogers, and Neo-Conservative PNAC signatory Kenneth Adelman of Edelman.

With this backing, Thaksin has led an increasingly violent bid to return to power through a "red" color revolution constituting of a large political machine operating in Thailand's northeast provinces and a personality cult called the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD).

In April of 2010, Thaksin mobilized thousands of UDD members to paralyze Thailand's capital of Bangkok in retaliation to a court seizure of billions of his ill-gotten assets. On the night of April 10, 2010, when riot troops moved in to disperse the protesters, militants clad in black opened fire on Thai troops.

Page 62 of Human Rights Watch's "Descent into Chaos (.pdf)" report stated:
"As the army attempted to move on the camp, they were confronted by well-armed men who fired M16 and AK-47 assault rifles at them, particularly at the Khok Wua intersection on Rajdamnoen Road. They also fired grenades from M79s and threw M67 hand grenades at the soldiers. News footage and videos taken by protesters and tourists show several soldiers lying unconscious and bleeding on the ground, as well as armed men operating with a high degree of coordination and military skills."

HRW, an otherwise dubious organization, only conceded to this a full year after the events unfolded and only in the face of irrefutable photographic and video evidence captured and broadcasted by both professional and amateurs local and foreign journalists. This included videos and photos of militants armed with both AK-47's and M-16's. Previously, Thaksin's Western backers and his opposition leaders had tried to blame all deaths resulting from the M-16's 5.56mm rounds squarely on the Thai military, including the high-profile death of Reuters cameraman Hiro Muramoto. With proof that opposition militants were also firing 5.56mm rounds, this political leverage was negated.

However, the most chilling aspect of the April 10, 2010 violence was an incident involving the premeditated murder of a pro-Thaksin protester by Thaksin's own mercenaries - recorded on tape and extensively photographed, then shamelessly and relentlessly used as propaganda to this very day. The incident took place on April 10, 2010, the same night Reuters cameraman Hiro Muramoto was killed, and gives us immense insight into how Western-backed unrest will take advantage of chaos it itself creates to then purposefully kill both protesters and government troops to escalate tensions and violence while undermining the legitimacy of a targeted government.

“U.S. prestige and interests … are being affected materially at a time when the U.S. can ill afford problems in an area that has been traditionally accepted as the U.S. ‘backyard’.” - Declassified CIA document following the election of Chilean President Salvador Allende, November 12, 1970

From its earliest days, the United States has had designs on Latin America and has felt entitled to intervene in the affairs of sovereign nations south of the border.

The U.S. interventionist posture was made official in the Monroe Doctrine beginning in 1823 which stated that the Western Hemisphere was the United States “sphere of influence,” and that the U.S. would not tolerate other countries’ interference in its geopolitical affairs. The Doctrine provided the intellectual justification for the U.S.’ future interventions in the region. At the beginning of the Twentieth Century, President Theodore Roosevelt established the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, in which the United States claimed the right to intervene in any cases of “flagrant and chronic wrongdoing by a Latin American Nation.”

The U.S. acted on this policy with regular frequency, mounting no less than 55 military invasions or significant covert operations in the region between 1890 and 2004, usually overthrowing or undermining various Latin American and Caribbean governments through covert or overt means.

The Cold War

In the context of the Cold War (1945 – 1989) between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, the U.S. used military, counter-insurgency, and a variety of covert and overt means in countries around the world to undermine social movements, political parties, labor unions, peasant groups, and various popular organizations in the name of anti-communism. In these efforts, the U.S. allied with various brutal dictatorships – some of which it helped to bring to power – which in turn employed murder, torture, rape, terror, and repression to stamp out Left-leaning and popular movements and control the population. In Latin America, the U.S. supported repressive regimes in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Uruguay, Venezuela, and other countries.

Some scholars and analysts believe that in many cases the threat of communism was exaggerated, and that the real purpose of these U.S. interventions around the world was to maintain as much control as possible over political and economic developments to ensure favorable conditions for U.S. and multinational business.

The CIA

Throughout most of the Cold War, the key U.S. government agency engaged in these campaigns was the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The CIA, which was created following the end of World War II, employed (and continues to employ) numerous secret and covert tactics including assassinations, sabotage, torture, disinformation and manipulation of the media, the creation of and dissemination of propaganda, the funding of political parties and groups, and of course widespread surveillance and espionage. Various details of the CIA’s methods and activities came to light in the 1970’s with Congressional hearings led by Senator Frank Church and the publication of the book CIA Diary: Inside the Company by a former CIA officer, Philip Agee, who had been stationed in Ecuador, Uruguay, and Mexico. Another important government agency for advancing U.S. interests abroad has been the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which historically has made U.S. aid money conditional on foreign governments’ acceptance of various policy changes.

“Democracy Promotion”

In the early 1980’s, the U.S. Congress created a group of organizations to conduct some of the CIA’s previous activities in the open.[ii] These so-called “democracy promotion” groups include the National Endowment for Democracy, which in turn funds the Solidarity Center of the AFL-CIO, the Center for International Private Enterprise, and the National Democratic Institute and the International Republican Institute, which act as international arms of the Democratic and Republican parties, respectively.[iii] The NED and these other groups provide funding and/or training to numerous foreign political parties, trade unions, business groups, women’s groups and other minority groups in an attempt to gain control over political movements, prevent any undesirable revolutionary changes, and advance U.S. interests.

U.S.-Supported Coups d’etat

During the Cold War, the U.S. employed these various agencies and methods to support violent coups d’etat in Latin American and Caribbean nations. Two of the more infamous examples occurred in Guatemala in 1954 and in Chile in 1973.

Guatemala

The CIA engineered and assisted the Guatemalan military in carrying out a violent coup d’etat against the government of Jacobo Arbenz in 1954. The U.S. opposed Arbenz’s program of, as the CIA referred to it, “an intensely nationalistic program of progress colored by the touchy, anti-foreign inferiority complex of the ‘Banana Republic,”[v] which included land reforms and other policies opposed by the U.S.-based United Fruit Company (now known as Chiquita). Hundreds of Guatemalans were killed following the coup, and the coup paved the way for decades of successive dictatorships who are estimated to have killed over 100,000 civilians between 1954 and 1990.[vi] As is now known from declassified CIA documents the CIA helped to target individuals for assassination, and provided funds and weapons to do so. The CIA had planned to assassinate Arbenz himself prior to his resignation during the coup.

Chile

Following the election of Salvador Allende, a democratic socialist, to the presidency of Chile in 1970, U.S. President Richard Nixon “demanded a coup” in the words of scholar Peter Kornbluh.[vii] Nixon’s Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, and CIA Director Richard Helms responded, laying out plans for a coup d’etat. Nixon also vowed to “make the Chilean economy scream.” As it would later do to undermine the Aristide government in Haiti, the U.S. blocked loans to Chile from the World Bank and other international lenders.

On September 11, 1973, the Chilean military, led by General Augusto Pinochet, struck, seizing control of strategic parts of the country and attacking the presidential palace. Rather than be captured, Allende shot himself in the head. The new regime rounded up thousands of Allende supporters and suspected Leftists, many of whom it held in the national stadium where the regime interrogated and tortured them. In the weeks following the coup, 1,500 people had been killed, including over 320 whom the regime summarily executed.

The U.S. continued to support the Pinochet dictatorship for the next 18 years, even as the regime carried a campaign of terror and assassinations – called Operation Condor – in Argentina, Spain, Italy, and even the United States. In 1976, the Pinochet regime killed former Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier and his American assistant, Ronni Moffit, in a car bombing on Embassy Row in Washington, D.C. Prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, this incident had been considered to be one of the worst acts of foreign terrorism on U.S. soil.

Post-Cold War

The end of the Cold War brought few changes to U.S.-Latin American relations. The U.S. continued to undermine the Left and popular movements through a variety of means. The U.S. role in several coups d’etat over the past decades illustrates the continuity of policy.

Haiti:
In 1991, the Haitian military ousted Haiti’s first democratically-elected President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, in a coup d’etat. During the next few years, while Aristide remained in exile, armed paramilitary groups targeted his supporters, labor and peasant groups, and other popular movements, killing thousands and employing a campaign of rape as a weapon of repression. It later emerged that leaders of the key paramilitary group, FRAPH, were on the CIA payroll.[x] In 1994, the U.S. safeguarded Aristide’s return to Haiti, but only after he agreed to a series of economic and political policies known as the “Paris Plan.”

In 2004, during his second, non-consecutive term, Aristide was ousted again. This time, democracy promotion groups – especially the International Republican Institute – played a larger role in undermining Aristide, although at this time what role U.S. intelligence agencies might have played is not known.[xii] This undermining of Aristide was aided by a destructive U.S.-led aid embargo which prevented Aristide’s government from much-needed loans from the World Bank and other institutions. Inside Haiti, armed thugs – some of whom had been in FRAPH – provided the official pretext for Aristide’s departure from the country as they vowed – through the media – to attack the presidential palace. When Aristide refused to leave, the U.S. military put him on a plane and flew him to exile in the Central African Republic. Aristide claimed to have been the victim of a “kidnapping and under the cover of coup d’etat.” A U.S.-backed radio talk-show host from Florida, Gerard Latortue, was installed as the head of the new, unconstitutional, “interim” government. Over the next two years, 8,000 people were murdered and 35,000 women and girls raped,[xiv] and many Aristide government supporters and others were imprisoned on bogus charges.

Venezuela:
In April 2002, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was removed in a coup d’etat following violence and instability provoked by a violent protest movement that was aided by major television networks and other media that promoted the protests. Although the New York Times said “Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator,” the new regime, headed by Pedro Carmona, quickly dissolved the constitution, the Congress, and the Supreme Court. Chavez returned to power just two days later after thousands of people – supported by factions of the Venezuelan military – took to the streets and surrounded the presidential palace. Declassified U.S. government documents reveal that the U.S. had advanced knowledge of the coup, yet did nothing to warn the Venezuelan government of the plot. The U.S., through the NED and other groups, also funded and providing training for some of the individuals and organizations involved in the coup.

Honduras:
On June 30, 2009, the Honduran military ousted President Manuel Zelaya at gunpoint and sent him on a flight into exile. The Obama administration’s response to the coup fell far short of the condemnation expressed by Latin American countries, as it did not condemn the coup, and never officially determined that a military coup had occurred, which would have immediately required the cutting off of aid to Honduras. Over the next several months, U.S. officials undermined Latin American efforts to pressure the coup regime, and publicly criticized Zelaya for attempting to return to Honduras.[xvii] When Zelaya still had not been restored to power by scheduled elections in November, the U.S. praised the elections, despite election-day violence and despite that the electoral process was controlled by the Honduran military. The Obama administration led – and continues to lead – international efforts to have the new Honduran government of Pepe Lobo officially recognized by other nations. The U.S. response to the Honduran coup was widely seen as the first major test for U.S.-Latin American relations under Obama, and has led to continued U.S. alienation from Latin America.

Julian Assange talks to the President of Ecuador, Rafael Correa. Correa is a left wing populist who has changed the face of Ecuador. But unlike his predecessors he holds a Ph.D. in economics. According to US embassy cables, Correa is the most popular President in Ecuador's democratic history. But in 2010 he was taken hostage in an attempted coup d'etat. He blames the coup attempt on corrupt media and has launched a controversial counter-offensive. Correa says the media defines what reforms are possible and they take orders from the USA.

FoxNews.com

Usama bin Laden has died a peaceful death due to an untreated lung complication, the Pakistan Observer reported, citing a Taliban leader who allegedly attended the funeral of the Al Qaeda leader.
"The Coalition troops are engaged in a mad search operation but they would never be able to fulfill their cherished goal of getting Usama alive or dead," the source said.

Bin Laden, according to the source, was suffering from a serious lung complication and succumbed to the disease in mid-December, in the vicinity of the Tora Bora mountains. The source claimed that bin Laden was laid to rest honorably in his last abode and his grave was made as per his Wahabi belief.

About 30 close associates of bin Laden in Al Qaeda, including his most trusted and personal bodyguards, his family members and some "Taliban friends," attended the funeral rites. A volley of bullets was also fired to pay final tribute to the "great leader."

The Taliban source who claims to have seen bin Laden's face before burial said "he looked pale ... but calm, relaxed and confident."

Asked whether bin Laden had any feelings of remorse before death, the source vehemently said "no." Instead, he said, bin Laden was proud that he succeeded in his mission of igniting awareness amongst Muslims about hegemonistic designs and conspiracies of "pagans" against Islam. Bin Laden, he said, held the view that the sacrifice of a few hundred people in Afghanistan was nothing, as those who laid their lives in creating an atmosphere of resistance will be adequately rewarded by Almighty Allah.

When asked where bin Laden was buried, the source said, "I am sure that like other places in Tora Bora, that particular place too must have vanished."