Ambassador Stevens

What Really Happened in Benghazi?

Americans (at least the ones who know where Libya is) are understandably confused and angry about the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack that killed US ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi. If they are looking to the current congressional hearings to clarify what really happened, they will be greatly disappointed.

Despite accusations by Republican leaders that Obama committed has treason and is trying to cover it up, they have no more interest than Democrats in bringing out the truth. No one wants the dirty little secret coming out that Stevens was involved in a covert CIA operation to funnel Libyan weapons and jihadists to Syria to fight the Assad regime.

The funding, arming and training of Al Qaeda terrorists for geopolitical ends is a well-established pillar of US foreign policy. (National Counterterrorism Center Report on Terrorism 2011). This isn’t a partisan issue, as CIA support for jihad has received equal levels of support from both Obama and his predecessor George W Bush.

The Road to Damascus Starts in Benghazi

The May 9^th Washington’s Blog provides a comprehensive summary of the factual details about September 2012 that have come out over the past eight months. Numerous official and mainstream sources confirm that Benghazi is a long time stronghold of Al Qaeda terrorists, who transferred their focus to Syria and the Assad regime after Gaddafi was overthrown. For example (specific sources shown in parentheses):

• The US-supported opposition which overthrew Libyan president Muammar Gadaffi was largely comprised of Al Qaeda terrorists (Telegraph interview with Libyan rebel commander).
• According to a 2007 report by West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center’s center, the Libyan city of Benghazi was one of Al Qaeda’s main headquarters and sent Al Qaeda fighters into Iraq prior to Gaddafi’s overthrow (West Point military academy).
• Al Qaeda is now largely in control of Libya, and the Libyan Provisional Government immediately ran up Al Qaeda flags at the Benghazi courthouse (the seat of their new government) after Gaddafi was overthrown (Daily Mail).
• Gaddafi, who always maintained Benghazi was an Al Qaeda stronghold, was on the verge of invading the city in 2011. However NATO planes stopped him, and protected Benghazi (Telegraph correspondent in Benghazi).
• CNN, the Telegraph, the Washington Times and many other mainstream sources confirm that since Gaddafi’s overthrow, Al Qaeda terrorists from Libya have been flooding into Syria to fight the Assad regime.
• Mainstream sources, such as the New York Times also confirm the Syrian opposition is largely comprised of Al Qaeda terrorists.
• Despite claims to the contrary, The U.S. has been arming the Syrian opposition since 2006. (Reuters, New York Times, Washington Post, CBC News).
• The post-Gaddafi Libyan government is also a top funder and arms supplier of the Syrian opposition. (Washington Post, Telegraph correspondent in Istanbul).

Was Stevens Running the Operation?

Mounting evidence suggests Stevens was assigned to run the covert CIA operation to funnel Libyan arms and jihadists to Syria via Turkey:

•  In 2011, Stevens was appointed to be the Obama administration’s liaison with the “budding Libyan opposition” (ABC News).

• Stevens and the State Department worked directly with Abdelhakim Belhadj of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, who has direct connections with Al Qaeda (Russia Today).
• The Wall Street Journal, Telegraph and other sources confirm that the US consulate (which wasn’t really a consulate but a “State Department Special Mission Compound”) in Benghazi was mainly being used for a secret CIA operation.
• Retired Lt. General William Boykin, former US Special Forces Commander and deputy defense undersecretary for intelligence (who worked with the CIA in the 1990s), stated in a January interview that it’s a “reasonable supposition” that Stevens was in Benghazi as part of an effort to arm the Syrian opposition. He draws this conclusion based on 1) the directive Stevens was given to support the Syrian rebels, 2) the logical assumption the Special Mission Compound would be the hub of that activity and 3) the absence lack of any other logical explanation for Stevens’ sudden reappearance in Benghazi on September 10, 2012 after a year’s absence. (CNS News)
• Egyptian security officials and US intelligence sources have confirmed Boykin’s hypothesis (WND Politics, CNBC)

Why Was Stevens Murdered?

 I have yet to see a plausible explanation anywhere for the terrorist attack on the Special Mission Compound or Stevens’ murder. Perhaps a genuine congressional investigation – in place of the soap operate we saw last week – could come up with some genuine leads. However so long as Congress refuses to examine the covert operation angle, they are unlikely to add much to what we already know.

I agree with Boykin that the Obama administration and Congress need to come clean, without necessarily revealing details, that Stevens was involved in a covert operation. The main problem (besides being illegal and morally bankrupt and undermining US standing internationally) with the existing US policy of covertly funding and arming jihadists is that it isn’t secret any more. This continuing duplicity on the part of the Obama administration and Congress only further undermines Americans’ confidence in government, as well as the major respect the United States used to enjoy abroad.

photo credit: Steve Rhodes via photopin cc

Reposted from Veterans Today

The following video by Storm Clouds Gathering provides an excellent summary of continuing Chinese efforts to chip away at the US dollar. These include a recent trade agreement between China and Australia to use the yuan and Australian dollar – rather than the US dollar – in bilateral trade. China entered into a similar trade agreement with Russia in 2010 and with Japan in 2011. Another major concern for the Obama administration is recent massive Chinese gold purchases, which suggest they may intend to create a gold-backed currency to rival the US dollar.

The film underlines the obvious build-up for war couched in US government’s increasing belligerence towards China, Syria, Iran and North Korea. The main intended target of this saber rattling is China, America’s main economic rival. However, for the most part, Obama’s true military intentions remain hidden from public view owing to proxy wars with China’s allies (Syria, Iran and North Korea). Historically the main purpose of such proxy wars has always been psychological – to overcome civilian resistance to military aggression.

The video also reminds us that the so-called war on terror is really a war about control of the international financial system. Up until the recent defection of China and its allies and now Russian, Japan and Australia, it was only possible to purchase oil in US dollars – which came to be known as petrodollars. For many years, all countries relying on imported oil were forced to keep reserves of US dollars. After the US abandoned first the gold and then the silver standard, the US dollar maintained its value by virtue of its relative monopoly on the buying and selling of oil. If the petrodollar dies, so does the US dollar does and with it the US economy.

Two of the most significant US military invasions of the last decade relate to threats against the petrodollar. The first occurred in 2003, after Saddam Hussein tried to set up an oil bourse that would trade oil in euros rather than dollars. The second occurred in 2010 when Gaddafi tried to introduce a new currency called the “gold dinar” to be used for Libyan oil purchases.

photo credit: Jonathan_W via photopin cc

Crossposted at Daily Censored

Below is a fascinating excerpt from Part 8 of Louis Farrakhan’s lecture series The Time and What Must Be Done. Farrahkan is the present leader of the Nation of Islam (NOI), best known for its most famous member Malcolm X.

It’s been more than ten years since I heard Farrakhan speak. He has made remarkable progress from his overt antisemitism and talk of white people as blue-eyed devils. I still have a slight problem with the “666” symbolism of the year 2013, which he links with the “beasts” (America, England, Germany and France).

Otherwise his analysis is remarkably similar to that of white economist, journalist and former Reagan official Paul Craig Roberts. The NOI leader is highly critical of Obama’s murderous policies in Libya and Syria and his use of drones for targeted assassinations, as well as his apparent willingness to support an Israeli-inspired war with Iran. He also condemns the President’s destruction of American democracy. He describes the US as an oligarchy leading the American people into fascism.

More information about the full 52 week series at Farrakhan promises god has execution planned for america

photo credit: A.Currell via photopin cc

Cross posted at Daily Censored

Retired General William G Boykin believes when he was assassinated in Benghazi, former ambassador Chris Stevens was working for the CIA running guns (or preparing to run them), via Turkey, to the  Syrian rebels. He explains his reasoning in an interview with CNSNews.com.

Boykin is the former commander of the U.S. Special Forces Command and the former deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, In the 1990s worked directly with the CIA.

As he reveals in the interview, he’s highly critical of Obama’s decision to support the Islamist groups fighting to overthrow the Assad regime

photo credit: Steve Rhodes via photopin cc

Crossposted at Daily Censored

Robert Fisk

Legendary Middle East reporter Robert Fisk, the first western eyewitness to enter the massacre town of Daraya, writes in the Independent about eyewitness reports that Syrian rebels, not government forces, are responsible for the mass killing of 245 Darayan men, women and children. This contrasts with the version being told in rest of the western media, which predictably blames President Assad for the deaths.

Fisk links the massacre to a failed prisoner exchange between the Free Syrian Army and the government army. Residents told him about the Free Syrian Army kidnapping a number of civilians and off-duty soldiers when they first seized Daraya (six miles from center of Damascus) – how both sides subsequently engaged in talks about exchanging them for prisoners in the army’s custody. According to the witnesses he spoke to, when talks broke down, the government army stormed the town to take it back from rebel control.

One woman Fisk spoke to insists the killings were carried out by armed insurgents wearing hoods while the rebels still held the town. A second witness, a man, talks about the rebels targeting off-duty conscripts and government workers for assassination. He describes the “Free Army” forces taking over the home of a friend to use as a base, smashing the family crockery, burning carpets and beds and tearing the parts out of laptops and TV sets in the home.

Maybe with a credible, non-embedded reporter like Fisk on location in Syria, the western world will finally learn the truth about what’s happening there. Unless, of course, the Saudi-funded CIA-trained rebels decide to take him out, too. A pity there were no reporters of Fisk’s caliber in Libya.

Read more here

Scene from "The Humanitarian War in Libya" by Julien Teil

George Washington has written a great post – Why Do Progressive Liberals Fall for Humanitarian War? – on Zero Hedge. It’s quite an an interesting site dedicated to “widening the scope of information available to the investing public.” All posts are submitted under fictitious names. In general the perspective offered contrasts drastically with the mainstream business press.

George Washington makes some great points, starting with reminders of warnings from US founding fathers regarding the tyranny of standing armies and from liberal economists (like Galbraith and Stiglitz) that large military budgets destroy our economy and help the rich at the expense of everyone else.

Among others:

• Suicide bombings have never been uniquely Islamic and more than 95% occur in response to foreign occupation.
• Regime change (in Iraq, Iran, Syria, etc) is a very old strategy pursued by the neoconservatives who wrote The Project for a New American Century.
• In Syria we are fighting on the same side as the al Qaeda terrorists who comprise the majority of the Syrian opposition.

He finishes off with a discussion of the role of the mainstream media – which starts back in 1917 with Edward Bernays, Woodrow Wilson and the birth of the public relations industry – in hoodwinking liberals into taking a position on foreign military intervention that is contrary to their basic value system.

The article is well researched and has extensive links to supporting documentation.

Read more here

Free Syrian Army (from Washington Post)

On June 21st, Fox News became the fifth major media outlet to report that CIA operatives in Turkey are “coordinating” arms shipments from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Islamic states to the Free Syrian Army (the Islamist branch of the Syrian resistance – aka the Muhammad Brigades). FBI whistle blower Sibel Edmonds has been reporting on covert US support for the armed Syrian resistance since last November. Interesting that the mainstream media has waited till now to pick the story up, highlighting Obama’s hypocrisy in condemning Putin for (legally) re-shipping helicopters to the Syrian government that have been to Russia for repairs.

The Washington Post was the first to report the story a full month ago (be sure to check this one out – the online comments are brilliant). It was a full three weeks before the Wall Street Journal covered it.  On the 21st articles appeared in the New York Times and the Christian Science Monitor (the latter offers the best historical context) – and on Fox News. And finally on the 22nd it appeared in Time magazine.

It’s anyone’s guess why this unsavory covert operation (in which the CIA is supplying arms to Islamic militants) has suddenly become mainstream news. Recently there has been a torrent of leaks coming out of the Obama administration. Looks like some disgruntled CIA analyst disagrees with turning Syria into another Islamic republic like Libya and leaked it to the Washington Post.

Former CIA asset Susan Lindauer describes how the Department of Homeland Security locked her up on a military base for 12 months and tried to detain her indefinitely without a hearing and drug her with Haldol and other psychotropic medication. Why? Because she possesses extensive documentary evidence that the CIA had foreknowledge of the 9-11 attacks as early as February 2001. This, along with other important documents related to the Lockerbie bombing and the US wars on Iraq and Libya, are published as an appendix in her new book Extreme Prejudice.

Prior to her arrest, Lindauer was the chief CIA asset in charge of Iraqi and Libyan back-channel communications. She was under indictment for five years. Eventually her late partner’s exhaustive efforts to publicize her case paid off and she was granted a hearing – and released.

Towards the end of her talk, she describes her late partner’s conversation with Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now! Amy’s flimsy excuses for refusing to cover the story, during a period when Lindauer was being held incommunicado at Caswell Air Force Base, aren’t at all surprising. Especially when you have a look at the CIA-funded foundations that finance Democracy Now! See Does the CIA Fund Both the Right and the Left?

Fast forward to 7:00 minutes, which is where Lindauer starts speaking. If video won’t play, there’s a free link at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68LUHa_-OlA&feature=related

If you read/hear it in the US media, assume it's a lie.

Anyone who has followed the war in Iraq is aware of the bitter religious and political rivalry between Sunni and Shia Muslims. Thus it’s pity that the mainstream corporate media fails to enlighten us about the major sectarian conflict underlying the civil war in Syria. Yes, civil war. For thirteen months, the Muslim Brotherhood, which claims to represent the majority Sunni population, has been fighting to overthrow the predominantly Shiite government of Bashar al-Assad. The US media, which continues to perpetuate the myth that Syria’s only problem is a ruthless dictator who likes shooting unarmed civilians, omits important historical facts essential to understanding the current military conflict:

1. This is the second attempt by Syrian Sunnis, led by the Muslim Brotherhood, to overthrow the Shiite government. The first uprising of Sunni Islamists occurred in 1976 -1982, against the regime of Hafez al-Assad (father of the current dictator Bashar al-Assad).
2. The civil war in Libya was also Sunni-led, which is the main reason the Muslim Brotherhood, which runs post-Gaddafi Libya, has instituted strict sharia law. The latter is notorious for extremely harsh penalties (including death) for blasphemy, homosexuality, theft, adultery and use of intoxicants.
3. Both the Libyan and Syrian rebels have received major financial support from Sunni Gulf States in the Arab League, most notably Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Qatar also provided the bulk of military aid to the Libyan rebels. Both countries have approved weapons shipments to the Free Syrian Army. However at the request of Secretary of State Clinton, they have postponed delivery to avoid undermining the Annan peace process. At the same time, it’s a matter of public record that Sunni Gulf states are supplying the funds for Free Syrian Army salaries See Gulf States Warned Against Arming Syria. In addition, many former Libyan rebels have relocated to Syria with their weapons.

Most of this background, about Syria’s sectarian divisions and the major support Syrian rebels receive from Sunni Gulf states (as well as CIA trainers and US special operations forces – see Why the US Wants Regime Change in Syria), receives fairly good coverage in the British and international press. In contrast, the US media merely functions as the propaganda arm of the Obama administration.

The Political Agenda of Wahhabi Sunnis

As Tariq Ali outlines in his book the Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity, the Sunni Wahhabism practiced in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait, is a conservative and austere form of Islam that insists on a literal interpretation of the Koran. Strict Wahhabis believe that Muslims who don’t practice their form of Islam are heathens and enemies. Part and parcel of Wahhabism is the belief that their religious doctrine must also have political expression. This translates into the view of many Sunnis that the only form of government acceptable to Allah is an Islamic state operating according to strict Sharia law.

Wahhabism’s explosive growth began in the 1970s when Saudi and United Arab Emirate (UAE) charities (and US intelligence) began funding Wahhabi schools (Madrassas) throughout the Islamic world. The US government strategically supported the rise of Wahhabism and the Muslim Brotherhood to counter the secular Arab leftists and nationalists who controlled most of the Middle East prior to 1967 (see Israel’s Role in Creating Hamas). The latter were understandably unsympathetic to the corporate interests of US oil companies who were heavily invested in the region.

The spread of Madrassas in Pakistan led to the gradual islamization of a state that was largely secular at the time of its separation from India (see Wikileaks: Saudi Arabia, UAE funded jihadi networks). This was accompanied by increasing religious intolerance and the creation of a jihadist mujaheddin army (funded and trained by the CIA) to repel the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. These CIA freedom fighters would later become the Taliban, who would come to occupy all of Afghanistan and enact an extremely oppressive version of Sharia law.

The US Role in Bringing Sharia Law to Libya

The US and NATO have recently been complicit in bringing a similar Wahhabi government to Libya. Owing to Syria’s close relationship with Iran’s Shia-led government, Obama is extremely gung-ho about pursuing a similar agenda in Syria. Fortunately, thanks to the refusal of China and Russia to go along with UN-sanctioned regime change, the truth about Syria’s civil war is gradually coming out (at least in the international media). Many Syrian civilians, especially Shias, Christians, Sufis and other minorities, are terrified of the Muslim Brotherhood coming to power and subjecting them to the same intense persecution these minorities experience in Saudi Arabia, Libya and other states governed by Whahhabi Sunnis.

Disunity in the Syrian Opposition

It has also come out that there are deep divisions in both the Syrian National Council (SNC) and the Free Syrian Army. Both veteran opposition leaders and a new generation of young activists are deeply critical of the lack of support they receive from the Muslim Brotherhood leaders and Syrian exiles who run the SNC. Many of the SNC’s critics are Sunni Muslims who see strong advantages to continuing secular rule in Syria. They just want to end the hereditary dictatorship of the Assad family.

Likewise, members of the Free Syrian Army who have defected from Assad’s forces feel that their military experience makes them the natural leaders of the rebel forces. Yet they are continually overruled by religious zealots who control the purse strings, thanks to their links to Sunni governments in Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

A few analysts have speculated that this disunity was the main rationale for the SNC’s urgent request for NATO support. Their leadership believes an international bombing campaign would serve to unify a hopelessly fragmented opposition, as it did in Libya.

(This is the second of two blogs about the covert US war against Syria. The case Obama is making for sanctions and “humanitarian” intervention in Syria is a total fabrication. The US goal in Syria is regime change. The people Assad is attacking aren’t unarmed protestors. They are Islamic militants that the US and NATO have been funding and training for at least ten months.)

The People of Syria Support Assad

According to John R Bradley, author of After the Arab Revolution and the only analyst to predict the Egyptian revolution, Saudi Arabia and Qatar are also providing arms and funding to the Free Syrian Army. In an interview with Russia Today, Bradley supports the prevailing view of Assad as a ruthless despot. However he also points out that Syria’s president is one of the last secular Arab leaders in the most ethnically diverse nation in the Middle East. At the moment, he enjoys wide popular support because many Syrians view him as the last bastion between them and a fundamentalist Islamic government, like the one just installed in Libya.

Recent callers from Homs (the Syrian city under siege) to the February 10, 2012 BBC Have Your Say seem to support this perspective. While none are big Assad fans, the growing strength of the Islamic resistance worries them. Moreover they see Assad’s secular administration as far preferable to Sharia Law.

The US Military Agenda in the Middle East

Michel Chossudovksy, who has also been writing for months on the covert US war in Syria, is more alarmed about its significance in the context of broader American objectives in the Middle East. He explains that the US has targeted Syria, both because of its strategic alliance with Iran and because of Pentagon’s underlying strategy of isolating and encircling Iran as a prelude to toppling its current government. In a recent interview on Guns and Butter, he describes how the US has systematically occupied and/or militarized nearly all the countries that border Iran. First you have US-occupied Afghanistan and Pakistan (the target of a second undeclared US war) on Iran’s eastern border. Then you have Iraq, which is still partially occupied, Kuwait (where the US deployed 15,000 troops in December), and Turkey, with its US airbases, on Iran’s western border. Finally you have Saudi Arabia (also host to major US military bases) and Qatar to the south. According to Chossudovksy, US military intervention in Syria will spill over and involve the Hezbollah in Lebanon, effectively neutralizing Iran’s last remaining allies.

In a disturbing article entitled When War Games Go Live , Chossoduvsky quotes from retired General Wesley Clark’s 2003 book Winning Modern Wars regarding the role of military intervention against Syria and Iran in the Pentagon’s grand Middle East strategy. According to Clark, the Pentagon has been making preparation to attack both countries since the mid-nineties. On page 130 of Winning Modern Wars, Clark states

“As I went back through the Pentagon in November 2001, one of the senior military staff officers had time for a chat. Yes, we were still on track for going against Iraq, he said. But there was more. This was being discussed as part of a five-year campaign plan, he said, and there were a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia and Sudan.”

The reliability of these predictions, despite a 2008 regime change from George Bush, the so-called neocon hawk, to Barack Obama, a supposed soft power advocate, is uncanny. The US persists in its occupation of Iraq, in addition to major military engagements in Somalia and Sudan. Presumably the military intervention in Libya is complete, now that the new US-friendly regime has agreed to privatize Libyan oil for the benefit of US oil companies.

According to Chossudovsky, countries such as Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Iran and Sudan became US military targets because they refused to play ball by allowing Anglo-American oil company unlimited access to their oil resources. In contrast, oil-poor countries like Syria and Lebanon are current targets because of strategic alliances with oil-rich Iran.