Wednesday, February 28, 2007

CHAOS IN IRAQ NEOCON'S PLAN A SUCCESS

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BUSH NOT A SUPPORTER OF THE TROOPS

With the recent Expose` on the Walter Reed Hospital by the Washington Post there has been a lot of outrage expressed over the scandalous way the Bush administration is treating Iraq War Vets who are in need of medical care & especially those in need of long term care in Hospital or as outpatients whether they are physically wounded or suffer from long term psychological problems ie. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder .

The issue of inadequate Health Services for Iraq War Vets has been raised many times over the last few years . Bush has been cutting funding for Vets of earlier wars as well .So here are a few representative articles which show that the neglect of the troops in many areas besides healthcare has been on-going & is a fundamental strategy and policy of the Bush administration since it first came into power as a way to attempt to balance the budget or to appear to be fiscally responsible..

Anyway, only a week before the story broke in The Wasington Post Bush was talking about “ cutting funding for Veteran’s health care” :


By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer Mon Feb 12,2007
http://news.yahoo.com/


WASHINGTON - The Bush administration plans to cut funding for veterans' health care two years from now — even as badly wounded troops returning from
Iraq could overwhelm the system.

Bush is using the cuts, critics say, to help fulfill his pledge to balance the budget by 2012.

After an increase sought for next year, the Bush budget would turn current trends on their head. Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly — by more than 10 percent in many years — White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter.

The proposed cuts are unrealistic in light of recent VA budget trends — its medical care budget has risen every year for two decades and 83 percent in the six years since Bush took office — sowing suspicion that the White House is simply making them up to make its long-term deficit figures look better.

"Either the administration is willingly proposing massive cuts in VA health care," said Rep. Chet Edwards of Texas, chairman of the panel overseeing the VA's budget. "Or its promise of a balanced budget by 2012 is based on completely unrealistic assumptions."

Edwards said that a more realistic estimate of veterans costs is $16 billion higher than the Bush estimate for 2012.

And As far back as 2002 there were complaints about the treatment of veterans & their families of earlier wars i.e. Korea, WWII, & Vietnam let alone taking care of vets of Iraqi & Afghanistan war & their families :


For instance checkout this article in the Boston Globe in 2002 :
found at website COMMONDREAMS.ORG

December 22, 2002 by the Boston Globe
Frustrated Veterans Accuse Bush of Breaking Promise
by Wayne Washington


WASHINGTON - The leaders of America's most prominent veterans organizations say that President Bush is failing to honor past commitments to military men and women even as he prepares to send a new generation of soldiers and sailors into combat.

The administration's support for rescinding lifetime health benefits for World War II and Korean War veterans and continuing problems at veterans hospitals stand as proof, veteran leaders say, that America is more than willing to lean on its soldiers during times of war but tolerates them serving as political props in peacetime.

''I'm terribly frustrated and extremely angry,'' said retired Air Force Colonel George ''Bud'' Day, a Republican who won the Medal of Honor and was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam with Senator John McCain of Arizona.

Day said Bush is violating his oft-repeated campaign pledge to veterans: ''A promise made is a promise kept.''

''Obviously, he didn't know what that meant or he's too preoccupied to see that his word is kept,'' Day said.

Many veterans are particularly galled that the Bush administration has not backed away from a 1995 decision to rescind a promise of free lifetime health care benefits for soldiers, who from 1941 to 1956 had been told that if they signed up and served 20 years they and their dependents would get free care. The government stopped honoring that pledge in 1995, and many veterans 65 and older have been forced to pay for benefits through Medicare, which now costs about $60 a month and pays for 80 percent of medical care after a $100 deductible has been paid.

Officials from Disabled American Veterans, the American Legion, and the Veterans of Foreign Wars protested the decision.”

And in 2003:

March 28, 2003 by CommonDreams.org
Support the Warrior Not the War: Give Them Their Benefits!
by Ashley L Decker


“ The recent rally cry "Support Our Troops" seems to me little more than a perverted, propaganda ploy to "Support the War." But we can support our troops, without supporting the war, by rectifying some of the following conditions.

The House of Representatives have recently voted on the 2004 budget which will cut funding for veteran's health care and benefit programs by nearly $25 billion over the next ten years. It narrowly passed by a vote of 215 to 212, and came just a day after Congress passed a resolution to "SUPPORT OUR TROOPS." How exactly does this vote support our troops? Does leaving our current and future veterans without access to health care and compensation qualify as supporting them?

The Veteran's Administration, plagued by recent budget cuts, has had to resort to charging new veterans entering into its system a yearly fee of $250 in order for them to receive treatment. It is a sad irony that the very people being sent to fight the war are going to have to pay to treat the effects of it.

According to the Veteran's Administration, 28 million veterans are currently using VA benefits. Another 70 million Americans are potential candidates for such programs. This amounts to a quarter of the country's population. Veterans and their families will sadly begin finding that they have no place to turn for their medical treatment as V.A. hospitals across the country face closing their doors. With the budget shrinking, staff will be let go. This could mean the loss of over 19,000 nurses. Without these nurses, this leads to the loss of over 6.6 million outpatient visits. Approximately one out of every two veterans could lose their only source of medical care. That is, if they even realize help is available to them. The Bush Administration recently ordered V.A. medical centers to stop publicizing available benefits to veterans seeking assistance. This follows discontinued enrollments of some eligible veterans for healthcare benefits as of January, 2003. ”


And Bush’s lack of support for the troops goes back to the beginning of the Iraq War & goes beyond issues of health care , pensions & salaries as can be shown in this article from 2003 found at the website In These Times :


Dishonorable Discharge
Bush administration slashes veteran’s benefits
By Dave Lindorff | 11.26.03
http://www.inthesetimes.com/

“Over the last year and a half, President Bush has staged more than a third of his major public events before active military personnel or veterans. His rowdy “Hoo-ah”s and policy pronouncements—even when they have nothing to do with military matters—are predictably greeted with rabid applause.

Even more than his father, and Ronald Reagan before him, Bush is cutting budgets for myriad programs intended to protect or improve the lives of veterans and active-duty soldiers. Bush’s handlers have worked hard, through the use of snappy salutes and fly-boy stunts, to present the service-ducking former National Guardsman as the soldiers’ friend. But though Republicans enjoy widespread military support, Bill Clinton was the only president of the last four to cut weapons programs instead of veteran benefits.

Consider the following:

* With 130,000 soldiers still in the heat of battle in Iraq and more fighting and dying in Afghanistan, the Bush administration sought this year to cut $75 a month from the “imminent danger” pay added to soldiers’ paychecks when in battle zones. The administration sought to cut by $150 a month the family separation allowance offered to those same soldiers and others who serve overseas away from their families. Although they were termed “wasteful and unnecessary” by the White House, Congress blocked those cuts this year, largely because of Democratic votes.
* This year’s White House budget for Veterans Affairs cut $3 billion from VA hospitals—despite 9,000 casualties in Iraq and as aging Vietnam veterans demand more care. VA spending today averages $2,800 less per patient than nine years ago.
* The administration also proposed levying a $250 annual charge on all Priority 8 veterans—those with “non-service-related illnesses”—who seek treatment at VA facilities, and seeks to close VA hospitals to Priority 8 veterans who earn more than $26,000 a year.
* Until protests led to a policy change, the Bush administration also was charging injured GIs from Iraq $8 a day for food when they arrived for medical treatment at the Fort Stewart, Georgia, base where most injured are treated.
* In mid-October, the Pentagon, at the request of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, announced plans to shutter 19 commissaries—military-run stores that offer discounted food and merchandise that helps low-paid enlisted troops and their families get by—along with the possibility of closing 19 more.
* At the same time, the Pentagon also announced it was trying to determine whether to shutter 58 military-run schools for soldiers’ children at 14 military installations.
* The White House is seeking to block a federal judge’s award of damages to a group of servicemen who sued the Iraqi government for torture during the 1991 Gulf War. The White House claims the money, to come from Iraqi assets confiscated by the United States, is needed for that country’s reconstruction.
* The administration beat back a bipartisan attempt in Congress to add $1.3 billion for VA hospitals to Bush’s request of $87 billion for war and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan.
* In perhaps its most dangerous policy, the White House is refusing to provide more than 40,000 active-duty troops in Iraq with Kevlar body armor, leaving it up to them and their families to buy this life-saving equipment. This last bit of penny-pinching prompted Pentagon critic and Vietnam veteran Col. David Hackworth to point to “the cost of the extraordinary security” during Bush’s recent trip to Asia, which he noted grimly “would cover a vest for every soldier” in Iraq.

Woody Powell, executive director of Veterans for Peace and a veteran of the Korean War, says these White House efforts should be viewed as attacks against American soldiers. “I don’t think they see it as attacking them,” he says. “They see it as saving money. But it’s the wrong thing to be cutting, just like cutting education is a bad thing.”


ZNET
Bush, Veterans, & the Confederacy
By Kyle Tucker
http://zmagsite.zmag.org/
June 2004

* While soldiers are fighting in Iraq, Bush cut soldiers’ danger pay and family separation allowances, cancelled a Congress-proposed doubling of servicepeople’s life insurance benefits, and slashed GI Bill benefits. Most servicepeople now are too low-paid to receive Bush’s per-child tax credit and many live on food stamps.
* Bush cut $600 million from the Veterans Administration budget, although the VA is already under-funded by around $2 billion a year and now has over 200,000 new veterans to service—many of whom are already sick with Gulf War Syndrome, which has left over 270,000 Gulf War vets disabled and over 10,000 dead. There are also plans to cut $1.5 billion per year from the VA’s budget for each of the next ten years.
* Wounded National Guard and Army Reserves have returned home only to be placed in “medical hold” while the Army decides what medical treatment and benefits—if any—they should receive. Some soldiers have stated the Army has tried to claim their Iraq injuries/illnesses were “pre-existing conditions.” Soldiers are having to wait four to six months to receive medical care while their treatable ailments turn to permanent disability. At Fort Knox, more than 400 wounded soldiers lasted the Kentucky summer in a non-air conditioned, animal-infested barracks. At Fort Stewart (Georgia), over 600 wounded soldiers languish with no indoor plumbing and have to pay for food and lodging. On a re-election stop last fall, President Bush visited Fort Stewart, but refused to see the wounded soldiers.



also check out:

IRAQFORSALE The War Profiteers
Soldiers lack necessities, contractors earn huge profits
Added October 02, 2006
From bravenewfilms
at YOUTUBE OR at THE PEACE TRAIN.ORG

See You Later,
GORD.

Monday, February 26, 2007

MERCENARIES PROFIT FROM WAR IN IRAQ & OPERATE OUTSIDE THE LAW


POLITICAL CARTOON
FROM INFINITEJEST.org

















Anyway for another disturbing video from Iraq involving US Troops & IRAQI Goverment forces check out Baghdad Brutality:

Channel 4 News has obtained footage of brutality by mainly Shi'a troops in Iraq,
egged on by US soldiers.
We see a joint patrol of US and Iraqi troops in
Baghdad, where our camera captures the pretty brutal treatment meted out by the
newly trained Iraqi soldiers to three suspected insurgents caught in a car, all
to the accompaniment of laughter, whoops and egging on from the US soldiers who
watch from their Humvee.
Two journalists - embedded with the First Cavalry
division - witnessed suspected insurgents being viciously beaten and
abused.
The journalists were then threatened and held under armed guard by
the Americans - as troops attempted to seize their footage.
US Army commander
Lieutenant Colonel Dale C Kuehl told Channel 4 News he had taken administrative
action to include suspending the platoon sergeant.
Broadcast 01/24/07 Channel
4 - UK
http://channel4news.com/

VIDEO available at YouTube & at Channel4 news special reports.
The video is extremely disturbing & disheartening when we overhear soldiers cheering for the Iraqi soldiers & saying ' they are doing a Rodney king job on him 'you might think anyone would be repulsed by the brutality but no it appears many Americans think this is all ok ,if we take as representative of Americans those who left comments on the YouTube site of this video.

HERE is the video but it may be removed by YOUTUBE for copywrite reasons or its explicit violence or for being considered seditious or traitorous:



Or CLICK ON LINK BELOW FOR FILM:

BAGHDAD BRUTALITY CHANNEL 4
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Anyway I mentioned in my last post the presence & activities of Mercenaries & private security firms working in Iraq so here are some articles pertinent to this issue:

First going back to 2004:


from THE STAR
http://www.thestar.co.za/
Deaths of scores of mercenaries hidden from view
April 13, 2004 Edition -1
Robert Fisk and Patrick Cockburn

Baghdad - At least 80 foreign mercenaries - security guards recruited from the United States, Europe and South Africa and working for American companies - have been killed in the past eight days in Iraq.

from THE AGE.com
US hires mercenaries for Iraq role
By Jonathan Franklin
Santiago
March 6, 2004

The US is hiring mercenaries in Chile to replace its soldiers on security duty in Iraq.
A Pentagon contractor has begun recruiting former commandos, other soldiers and seamen, paying them up to $US4000 ($A5300) a month to guard oil wells against attack by insurgents.


Mercenaries 'R' Us
alternet.org/
By Bill Berkowitz, AlterNet. Posted March 24, 2004.

There are currently thousands of mercenaries serving in Iraq. Their high
salaries and shorter terms of employment will inevitably make a serious dent on
the military's budget -- and soldiers' morale.

With the casualty toll ticking ever upward and troops stretched thin on the ground, the Bush administration is looking to mercenaries to help control Iraq. These
soldiers-for-hire are veterans of some of the most repressive military forces in
the world, including that of the former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and
South Africa's apartheid regime.

In February, Blackwater USA, a NorthCarolina-based Pentagon contractor, began hiring former combat personnel in Chile, offering them up to $4,000 a month to guard oil wells in Iraq. The company flew the first batch of 60 former commandos to a training camp in North Carolina. These recruits will eventually wind up in Iraq where they will spend
six months to a year.
"We scour the ends of the earth to find professionals -- the Chilean commandos are very, very professional and they fit within the Blackwater system," Gary Jackson, the president of Blackwater USA...

While Blackwater USA is not nearly as well known as Halliburton
or Bechtel -- two mega-corporations making a killing off the reconstruction of
Iraq -- it nevertheless is doing quite well financially thanks to the White
House's war on terror. The company specializes in firearm, tactics and security
training and in October 2003, according to Mother Jones magazine, the company
won a $35.7 million contract to train more than 10,000 sailors from Virginia,
Texas, and California each year in 'force protection.'

Business has been
booming for Blackwater, which now owns, as its press release boasts, "the
largest privately-owned firearms training facility in the nation." Jackson told
the Guardian, "We have grown 300 percent over each of the past three years and
we are small compared to the big ones. We have a very small niche market, we
work towards putting out the cream of the crop, the best."
From to 2004 to the present the numbers of Mercenaries in Iraq has soared & the business is booming as the contract for Black Water has gone from 37 million to 300 million . War is after all supposed to be profitable for someone. For others of course it is just down right deadly . As the British of the Ninteenth century would argue Empire Building doesn't come cheap .

This is made apparent in the next article:

Our Mercenaries in Iraq
The president relies on thousands of private soldiers with little oversight, a disturbing example of the military-industrial complex.
by Jeremy Scahill
January 28, 2007
Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/
& at ZNET
http://www.zmag.org/

As President Bush took the podium to deliver his State of the Union address
Tuesday, there were five American families receiving news that has become all
too common: Their loved ones had been killed in Iraq. But in this case, the
slain were neither "civilians," as the news reports proclaimed, nor were they
U.S. soldiers. They were highly trained mercenaries deployed to Iraq by a
secretive private military company based in North Carolina — Blackwater USA. The
company made headlines in early 2004 when four of its troops were ambushed and
burned in the Sunni hotbed of Fallouja — two charred, lifeless bodies left to
dangle for hours from a bridge. That incident marked a turning point in the war,
sparked multiple U.S. sieges of Fallouja and helped fuel the Iraqi resistance
that haunts the occupation to this day.

Now, Blackwater is back in the
news, providing a reminder of just how privatized the war has become. On
Tuesday, one of the company's helicopters was brought down in one of Baghdad's
most violent areas. The men who were killed were providing diplomatic security
under Blackwater's $300-million State Department contract, which dates to 2003
and the company's initial no-bid contract to guard administrator L. Paul Bremer
III in Iraq. Current U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, who is also protected by
Blackwater, said he had gone to the morgue to view the men's bodies, asserting
the circumstances of their deaths were unclear because of "the fog of
war."

Bush made no mention of the downing of the helicopter during his
State of the Union speech. But he did address the very issue that has made the
war's privatization a linchpin of his Iraq policy — the need for more troops.
The president called on Congress to authorize an increase of about 92,000
active-duty troops over the next five years. He then slipped in a mention of a
major initiative that would represent a significant development in the U.S.
disaster response/reconstruction/war machine: a Civilian Reserve
Corps.

"Such a corps would function much like our military Reserve. It
would ease the burden on the armed forces by allowing us to hire civilians with
critical skills to serve on missions abroad when America needs them," Bush
declared. This is precisely what the administration has already done, largely
behind the backs of the American people and with little congressional input,
with its revolution in military affairs. Bush and his political allies are using
taxpayer dollars to run an outsourcing laboratory. Iraq is its Frankenstein
monster.
Already, private contractors constitute the second-largest "force"
in Iraq. At last count, there were about 100,000 contractors in Iraq, of which
48,000 work as private soldiers, according to a Government Accountability Office
report. These soldiers have operated with almost no oversight or effective legal
constraints and are an undeclared expansion of the scope of the occupation. Many
of these contractors make up to $1,000 a day, far more than active-duty
soldiers. What's more, these forces are politically expedient, as contractor
deaths go uncounted in the official toll.
xxxxxxxxxx
January 26th, 2007
Our Mercenaries in Iraq: Blackwater Inc and Bush's Undeclared Surge
Jeremy Scahill interviewed by Amy Goodman for DEMOCRACY NOW !
http://www.democracynow.org/

JEREMY SCAHILL: Blackwater is a company that began in 1996 as a private military
training facility in -- it was built near the Great Dismal Swamp of North
Carolina. And visionary executives, all of them former Navy Seals or other Elite
Special Forces people, envisioned it as a project that would take advantage of
the anticipated government outsourcing.
Well, here we are a decade later, and
it’s the most powerful mercenary firm in the world. It has 20,000 soldiers on
the ready, the world’s largest private military base, a fleet of twenty
aircraft, including helicopter gunships. It’s become nothing short of the
Praetorian Guard for the Bush administration's so-called global war on terror.
And it’s headed by a very rightwing Christian activist, ex-Navy Seal named Erik
Prince, whose family was one of the major bankrollers of the Republican
Revolution of the 1990s. He, himself, is a significant funder of President Bush
and his allies.

And what they’ve done is they have built a very frightening empire near the Great Dismal Swamp in North Carolina. They’ve got about 2,300 men actively deployed around the world. They provide the security for the US diplomats in Iraq. They’ve guarded everyone, from Paul Bremer and John Negroponte to the current US ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad. They’re training troops in Afghanistan. They have been active in the Caspian Sea, where they set up a Special Forces base miles from the Iranian border. They really are the frontline in what the Bush administration viewed as a necessary revolution in military affairs. In fact, they represent the life's work of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.

And for those who think mercenaries are a good thing if only they were a little cheaper well there are also the ' bargain basement' low rent barely trained mercenaries from third world countries who will work for a pittance bringing even greater profits to some security firms contracted out in Iraq :

Prensa Latina
Latin America News Agency
http://www.plenglish.com/
3,000 LatAm Mercenaries in Iraq
Geneva, Feb 23 (Prensa Latina) The UN Work Group on the Use of Mercenaries revealed on Friday that at least 3,000 Latin Americans are working as soldiers or in security for US and British companies in Iraq.

Spaniard Jose Luis Gomez del Prado listed Honduras, Ecuador, Chile, El Salvador
and Colombia as major contributors, but Peru ranks atop with 1,000.
The official said one in every ten soldiers working for the US in Iraq are
contracted by private companies that regularly violate their human
rights.
The vulnerability of Latin Americans spans from the lack of legal
protection, earning monthly salaries of 1,000 dollars compared to 10,000 to
British and US soldiers, through discrimination and humiliation.

The
Washington Post recently quoted the US Central Command as estimating 100,000
such contracted workers, four-fold the 2003 numbers, with such contracts
annually yielding a total 100 billion dollars, a figure expected to double by
2010.

And for those worried about UK troops leaving Iraq Mercenaries R US has the solution of course ; as we see in the following article.

The New Standard
Feb. 25, 2007
http://newstandardnews.net/

Mercenaries taking over for ‘successful’ UK troops in Iraq
UK officials are
negotiating multi-million-dollar contracts with mercenary companies to cover
some of the "gaps" to be created by British troop withdrawals from Iraq. Days
after PM Tony Blair revealed he will remove 1,600 soldiers from southern Iraq
within months – a move the White House hailed as a sign of success in the mostly
Shia region – it has emerged that UK ministers and cabinet officials want
private firms can make up some of the difference.
It has also been revealed
that nearly 800 civilian personnel working under contract with the Pentagon have
died and more than 3,300 wounded in Iraq since the invasion while doing jobs
normally handled by the US military. Though the Pentagon and media count each
official death of a US soldier, the deaths of mercenaries and other contractors
doing soldiers’ jobs are rarely noted and never added to the toll. That toll is
still dwarfed by estimates of Iraqi deaths in the same period, which range above
600,000.

And From Edmond Journal
http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/
Feb. 26, 2007
Poorly trained mercenaries not up to war zones
UN: 35,000 to 40,000 soldiers of fortune active in Iraq

GENEVA -- Methods used by private western security companies to recruit
mercenaries in poor countries and send them into dangerous areas like Iraq are
deeply worrying, according to a UN report to be presented next month
It's nice to know that the War on Terror is profiting other companies besides Haliburton.




bye for now,
GORD.
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Sunday, February 25, 2007

MERCENARIES IN IRAQ SHOOTING AT INNOCENT IRAQI CIVILIANS JUST FOR THE FUN OF IT




A site worth checking out which gives space to dissident voices in this age of conformity.






BANNER FOUND AT THE PEACE TRAIN .ORG SITE
It points to just one of the big problems in Iraq which is the use of tens of thousands of Mercenaries
& individuals working for private security firms or Militias who seem to answer to no one &
believe themselves above or outside the law & especially International Law. This is not surprising
since the Bush Regime does not recognize International Laws & agreements & has little use for the United Nations unless it agrees to Rubber Stamp American foreign policy.


BANNER FOR GLOBAL RESEARCH.CA
which is another great site for info. & critical analysis on the Iraq WAR & THE WAR ON TERROR & not just part of The Propaganda Machine which has rendered much of the media merely co-conspirators of the Neoconservatives & the Radical Religious Right.

Global Research CENTRE for Research on Globalization December 1, 2005
WayneMadsenReport.com
http://www.globalresearch.ca/

"A video has surfaced on the Internet showing private security
contractors
working for Aegis Defense Services "Victory" Group firing
indiscriminately at Iraqi civilian motorists in Baghdad."

And amazingly in 2005 this security outfit won an award:
AEGIS wins International Expertise Award
On 24 November 2005, AEGIS was named
Small Consultancy Firm of the Year in the British International Expertise Awards
held by the British Consultants and Construction Bureau for its Operation
Matrix, enabling reconstruction Iraq.
The video was made in 2005 but it is not old news because these mercenaries are still in Iraq working for the US government or other American interest like Haliburton & still seem to be out of control as is a large part of the official US Troops . Once you allow torture , kidnaping, & hits on enemy combatants & dissidents then you have opened Pandora's Box. But any action can be justified when you have Christ on your side , it seems.


Here is what Lt. Colonel Tim Spicer CEO of the company had to say about the video in a memo to his employees:

AEGIS IRAQ PSD TEAMS
From: Andrew Joscelyne
Sent: 12 October 2005

" I have today seen the new website - "Aegis Iraq PSD Teams", I have a number of
points I wish to make:

* I am fully in favour of good natured banter and a
light hearted view of life and its difficulties in Iraq .

* I encourage anything that takes the pressure off and improves motivation.

* I would not be in favour of a site if it was in any way libellous to anyone, down right
nasty or detrimental to anyone's morale.

* My major concern is one of OPSEC - either that of our clients or our own individuals - posting unblanked photos may not be so clever. Anything that is of use to AIF should not be allowed to
flourish.

* I am also concerned about media interest in this site and I
remind everyone of their contractual obligation not to speak to or assist the
media without clearing it with the project management or Aegis London. This site
could be construed in this way.

* I remind everyone that there is a proper chain of command for airing concerns, grievances etc.

* Please think twice about posting your happy snaps and whilst I am not concerned about this site as
yet, if it develops into something other than a light hearted pressure valve I will take a much greater interest.

* Remember that your job and those of your colleagues indirectly relies on the maintenance of our contract. Refrain from posting anything which is detrimental to the company since this could result in the loss or curtailment of our contract with resultant loss for everybody. "

Lieutenant Colonel Tim Spicer,
OBE
http://www.aegisiraq.co.uk/Message_Board.htm
Note that what Colonel Spicer is most concerned about is the fact that people outside his organization may view these videos on the internet. So it really comes down again to a Public Relations matter & not one of the morality or immorality of his security teams letting off a bit of steam by shooting up & killing innocent civilians since all Iraqis are fair game.

And further :

'Trophy' video exposes private security contractors shooting up Iraqi
drivers
By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent,
27/11/2005
The
Telegraph
A "trophy" video appearing to show security guards in Baghdad randomly shooting
Iraqi civilians has sparked two investigations after it was posted on the
internet, the Sunday Telegraph can reveal.
The video has sparked concern that
private security companies, which are not subject to any form of regulation
either in Britain or in Iraq, could be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of
innocent Iraqis.
Lt Col Tim Spicer is investigating the incident The video,
which first appeared on a website that has been linked unofficially to Aegis
Defence Services, contained four separate clips, in which security guards open
fire with automatic rifles at civilian cars. All of the shooting incidents
apparently took place on "route Irish", a road that links the airport to
Baghdad.
The road has acquired the dubious distinction of being the most
dangerous in the world because of the number of suicide attacks and ambushes
carried out by insurgents against coalition troops. In one four-month period
earlier this year it was the scene of 150 attacks.
In one of the videoed
attacks, a Mercedes is fired on at a distance of several hundred yards before it
crashes in to a civilian taxi. In the last clip, a white civilian car is raked
with machine gun fire as it approaches an unidentified security company vehicle.
Bullets can be seen hitting the vehicle before it comes to a slow stop.

The video can still be viewed on the Global Research website.
go to :
http://www.globalresearch.ca/

Bye for now,
GORD.
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Here is an interesting & informative site to check out
which deals with issues of PEACE



BELOW IS A STILL PHOTO FROM FILM CLIP
OF PRIVATE SECURITY PERSONNEL
LISTENING TO ELVIS & LAUGHING WHILE SHOOTING AT CIVILIAN VEHICLES
IN IRAQ FOR NO APPARENT REASON- JUST GOOD OLD BOYS HAVING FUN












AEGIS SECURITY FIRM OPERATING OUTSIDE THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT
WAR AMERICAN STYLE
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Saturday, February 24, 2007

TONY SNOW TRIES " SNOW JOB " ON THE PRESS BUT AMERICAN JOUNALISTS ARE BACK ??? ,AT LEAST, FOR THE DAY

WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY TONY SNOW TRIES SNOW JOB ON PRESS TUESDAY FEB. 21 CONCERNING " WALTER REED VETERANS' HOSPITAL SCANDAL"


BUT THIS TIME , SURPRISING
L
Y, THE PRESS ARE NOT BUYING IT



What is really interesting about The Washinton Post’s articles released a week ago about the Scandalous way in which returning wounded Vets of the Iraq War are treated ( which has been written about before but not noticed by a major Media outlet ) firstly that a major mainstream establishment media outlet actually published such a story after years of Kow Towing to the Bush administration - this in itself is remarkable & at the same time a bit too late-

What was even more remarkable as a Media Event was the way the Press were unrelenting of their treatment of White House Press Secretary at the Press conference last Tuesday - Its about time the Press started to do their job which is not just to repeat as " FACT or Gospel Truth" whatever the White House tells them. For far too long the Press has failed to do their job.

Whatever happened to such notions as " JOURNALISTIC ETHICS " ? How did we come to this point when the public is shocked when journalists ask the Hard Questions & not just take things at Face Value. When it comes to some celebrity getting into trouble the Journalist don’t seem at all reluctant to dig around but such stories are just bits of sensationalism & have no real benefit to the public at large - but GOSSIP does sell -

TONY SNOW - White House Press Secretary Press Conference
February 21, 2007,
One reporter states the case in his question plainly:
"
Q The administration's mantra for a long time has been "support the troops." What is the reaction, then, when you read this series of stories in The Washington Post about troops coming home from Iraq, Afghanistan and being treated so poorly, apparently, based on this long investigation? What's the President's reaction? "


MR. SNOW: " There are a couple of things. First, it's not a mantra. I would really choose words carefully. It's a commitment to support the troops. And the President, as you know, has visited the wounded many times at Walter Reed and we are concerned about it.

I can tell you that the President feels passionately about them, and you should have no doubt about it -- you've been at enough events where when he looks these people in the eye there is a commitment, a strong, profound emotional commitment to the people who serve this country. And it is one where the President is committed to doing right by the men and women who serve. There should be no doubt about that."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So what was Tony Snow saying ?

In the Press Conference he says Bush & others are aware of the problem or that they only became aware of these issues after the articles appeared in the Washington Post ( Tony is not really sure about this or just about anything else )or that it is not really a problem with the President but with The Department of Defense ( passing the buck ) or some other department -

Tony Snow reminds the Press that they have no right to question President Bush’s sincerity in his support of the Troops " if you see how he looks into the eyes of wounded soldiers" How in the world could this be construed as straight forward answer to a straight forward question ( Appearance is everything Photo Ops & a sentimental appeal to tug at the peoples heart strings ).

But surprisingly this time the Press doesn’t buy into all this " Non-Answering" & appeals to Bush’s character as someone who is sincere or that these are " actionable items which in due time will be acted upon or not if the Press lets up on this issue then its back to business as usual.

The problem is that Bush is not just some ordinary citizen but The President & as he says " The Decider "- yes he is " The Decider" til something goes wrong then Bush shifts the blame to someone else whether the Issue is inadequate medical treatment for Iraq War Vets or the Iraq War itself or the inaction during & after " Hurricane Katrina " & the millions which have gone unaccounted for or the " Valerie Plame affair " surely no one in the administration had anything to do with this or with the falsified Intel on Iraq prior to the war or the fact that the Taliban & Al Qeda were not severely damaged by the American invasion of Afghanistan or that Pakistan has been all along been supporting these groups through arms & money or , at least, benign neglect or the scandals surrounding the treatment of POWs at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo Bay or the Billions of dollars unaccounted for which were supposed to be spent in rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure roads, hospitals, police stations , schools & power stations –

So the concern at the moment of the Bush administration, as usual , is that the story about The Walter Reed Hospital or any other allegations about Vets not receiving adequate medical care is a Public Relations problem ( even if all the allegations are true)which is to be dealt with through " Equivocation" " PREVARICATION " " Beating about the Bush" as it were & creating new improved " Spin " & " Talking Points" & a lot of "Bureaucratize" like " actionable items" , "Known KNOWNS "Known Unknowns " & other bits of blather & Jargon, Legalize & our favorite " Memory Loss " " I don’t recall seeing a memo saying Al Qeda about to attack USA" etc. "(also known as lying but used by lawyers i.e. Condi Rice who don’t want to answer a straightforward question) & of course the old stand-by " Passing the Buck" &" the Blame Game " or questioning the "Motives" of those who ask difficult questions or who criticize the Bush Regime or who dare criticize a Great & Godly Man like President Bush .

Such critics are then portrayed by the Bush Regime & the Neocons & much of the Media as not being supportive of the troops or as traitors etc. Perception is more important to the Bush administration than truth or reality like the disappearing WMDs & the false allegations of Saddam Hussein being involved with Al Qeda & 9/11 .

The other method this Regime uses to distract people is to come up with a " NEW CRISIS" ie "The need to destroy Iran which has or is about to have or may sometime in the future build Nuclear Weapons to attack Israel & continental United States. Once the War with Iran begins the media will be distracted & will again become co-conspirators in this New War no matter how unjustified as they are bombarded by Propaganda about the spread of Islamo-Fascists & that Iran is part of some " Powerful Axis of Evil " & that this is all part of the Great Clash of Civilizations . And the public meanwhile will be mesmerized by the coverage on CNN of the war which again will be presented as if it were a " Video Game " & will stir up more fanatical mindless "Patriotic Zeal" .

That's it for now,
GORD.
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Thursday, February 22, 2007

RON KOVIC VIETNAM VET SPEAKS OUT ON BUSH's INDIFFERENCE TO THOSE WOUNDE IN IRAQ & THEIR STRUGGLING FAMILIES

US SOLDIERS WOUNDED IN IRAQI WAR
PILED INTO BUSES LIKE SARDINES???
THE CASUALTIES OF WAR WHICH ARE OFTEN HIDDEN OR GO UNACKNOWELEGED BY THE BUSH REGIME.



VIETNAM VET RON KOVIC AT ANTI-VIETNAM WAR RALLY
IN 1972















RON KOVIC IN 2005 AT ANTI-IRAQ WAR RALLY



Ron Kovic served two tours of duty as a U.S. Marine in the Vietnam War and was awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. In combat on Jan. 20, 1968, he suffered a spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed from the chest down. He became one of the best-known peace activists among the veterans of the war.

Here are some of his writings & speech which I believe important to relate at length given Bush's desire to escalate the War In Iraq & Afghanistan & his desire to attack Iran with an all out aerial bombing of "SHOCK & AWE " to destroy their Nuclear facilities & all military installations & much of the country's infrastructure including BUNKERBUSTER BOMBS aka NUCLEAR LITE. All this to prove that he is "the
DECIDER" & is on a Mission which will be shown by History , in his view, to be justifiable & righteous.

The Forgotten Wounded of Iraq
Ron Kovic
(author of BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY
DIG DIRECTOR

http://www.truthdig.com/


" Thirty-eight years ago, on Jan. 20, 1968, I was shot and paralyzed from my mid-chest down during my second tour of duty in Vietnam. It is a date that I can never forget, a day that was to change my life forever. Each year as the anniversary of my wounding in the war approached I would become extremely restless, experiencing terrible bouts of insomnia, depression, anxiety attacks and horrifying nightmares. I dreaded that day and what it represented, always fearing that the terrible trauma of my wounding might repeat itself all over again. It was a difficult day for me for decades and it remained that way until the anxieties and nightmares finally began to subside.


As I now contemplate another January 20th I cannot help but think of the young men and women who have been wounded in the war in Iraq. They have been coming home now for almost three years, flooding Walter Reed, Bethesda, Brooke Army Medical Center and veterans hospitals all across the country. Paraplegics, amputees, burn victims, the blinded and maimed, shocked and stunned, brain-damaged and psychologically stressed, over 16,000 of them, a whole new generation of severely maimed is returning from Iraq, young men and women who were not even born when I came home wounded to the Bronx veterans hospital in 1968.


I, like most other Americans, have occasionally seen them on TV or at the local veterans hospital, but for the most part they remain hidden, like the flag-draped caskets of our dead, returned to Dover Air Force Base in the darkness of night as this administration continues to pursue a policy of censorship, tightly controlling the images coming out of that war and rarely ever allowing the human cost of its policy to be seen.


Mosul, Fallouja, Basra, Baghdad, a roadside bomb, an RPG, an ambush, the bullets cracking all around them, the reality that they are in a war, that they have suddenly been hit. No more John Wayne-Audie Murphy movie fantasies. No more false bravado, stirring words of patriotism, romantic notions of war or what it might really mean to be in combat, to sacrifice for one’s country. All that means nothing now. The reality has struck, the awful, shocking and frightening truth of what it really means to be hit by a bullet, an RPG, an improvised explosive device, shrapnel, a booby trap, friendly fire. They are now in a life-and-death situation and they have suddenly come face to face with the foreign policy of their own nation. The initial shock is wearing off; the painful reality is beginning to sink in, clearly something terrible has happened, something awful and inexplicable."


And here is a
letter from Ron Kovic for the American people he contributed to the MY HERO website on Sept. 14, 2001.
http://www.myhero.com/


"Dear Friends,

My heart and soul weeps with everyone in America right now. I was deeply saddened by the terrible tragedy that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001. I didn't sleep much again last night, as it's been for me, and I'm sure so many others since Tuesday. I wonder if we will ever sleep "normally" again? I have thought about it a lot and I am deeply disheartened by the blind patriotism, hatred and desire for revenge that I see growing more and more in this country each day. Resorting to violence and warfare is a great mistake. The painful anguish resulting from this senseless act of violence stirs in all of us a desire for swift retribution. I strongly believe that to move in this direction will lead us into a terrible and disastrous war which we, as a people and a nation, may never recover from. It is a dark and dangerous time in America, and I, in good conscience, will never support such an act of madness!
We seem to have learned nothing from Vietnam, and those of us who have come to understand through great suffering the awful waste and deep immorality of war, are not being listened to. Those of us who have found that love and forgiveness are more powerful than hatred are not being heard. We remain invisible, isolated and alone, voices in the wilderness in a country that has truly gone mad. I encourage all of you to raise your voices on behalf of peace and non-violence everywhere. I love this country so much that I don't want to see it go through the senselessness and agony of war ever again.

With love and a sincere hope for peace!"

Ron Kovic

And during an interview with Joshua Scheer at TRUTHDIG January 9, 2007 He made these comments:
(Ron Kovic: Surging Past the Tipping Point )

"...that Americans this week have a patriotic and generation-defining duty to speak out against Bush’s proposal to escalate the war in Iraq with more U.S. troops.
Kovic: " I think President Bush plans to provoke an even wider war in the Middle East in the coming months. That’s my prediction. He is going to escalate the war by sending more troops to Iraq in a war that we cannot win—a war that is only going to cause more violence, make us even bigger targets of terrorist attacks.


Like many veterans of the Vietnam War, I’ve been in this wheelchair for almost 40 years. I’ve lived with the wounds of American foreign policy for almost four decades now. I saw American foreign policy firsthand, as did many others of my generation. And we learned the lessons of that war. I have serious doubts whether President Bush or the architects of this particular policy in the Middle East right now learned those lessons. And how many of those who are making the decision this week—how many of those talking heads, those so-called experts, who made the decision to have a troop surge, to escalate this war, to put more young men and women’s lives in harm’s way, to put more Iraqi civilians at risk—how many of them really served in a war, how many really understand the human cost of a war? How many really understand what it means to be wounded—whether you’re American or Iraqi? How many understand what it means to come home wounded? What it means to lose a son or daughter in a war? How many of them have been directly affected by this war? "


AND:

Kovic: " I don’t see how this administration is supporting the troops when they’re clearly cutting back the budgets of the veterans hospitals around the country. That is outrageous. That is unacceptable. How can you spend billions of dollars fighting a war in Iraq and not care for those who are wounded when they come back home?


I have opposed this war from the very beginning. I was speaking out against it before it began. I sensed we were being deceived just as we were deceived during the Vietnam War. I wasn’t going to let it happen again. I made one promise to myself in 1968 after I was shot and paralyzed in Vietnam. (During those years that I was involved with the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, so I was speaking not only for myself, but for many, many other Vietnam veterans like myself who opposed that war, who went to jail with me.) We said back then, "We’re never going to allow what happened to our generation to ever happen again.
" .... '


SEE YOU LATER,
GORD.

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US FORCES WOUNDED IN IRAQI WAR
PILED INTO BUSES LIKE SARDINES???






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BUSH 's SUPPORT FOR THE TROOPS HYPE, PHOTO- OPS EMPTY PROMISES & PROPAGANDA
















PHOTOS BY WAY OF PICASA


PRESIDENT BUSH & WOUNDED IRAQI VETERAN

IN THE ACT OF CASTING OUT DEMONS " IN THE NAME OF JESUSSS... COME OUT DEMONS "

HIS REGIME'S SOLUTION TO MASSIVE CUTS IN
MEDICAL TREATMENT
OF IRAQI WAR VETERANS - " FAITH HEALING "OR " JUST PRAY & ALL WILL BE WELL" -
SIMILAR TO THE WAY HE HAS CONDUTED THE WAR ON TERROR & THE WAR IN IRAQ -

BUSH’s Regimes Mythical Support For The Troops


see article in The Washington Post
Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration At Army's Top Medical Facility
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
By Dana Priest and Anne Hull
Sunday, February 18, 2007


At last the Washinton Post is acting as if it had some journalistic integrity & has a duty to the American Public & not just to the Bush Regime , the Neocons , & the Radical Religious Right & the Rich & Powerful.

Maybe there is some glimmer of hope for The America Media Establishment. This also became apparent when the Media grilled Tony Snow with relevant & passionate questioning while ignoring Snow's equivicating & trying to paint the Media as being unpatriotic in their daring to question the Bush Regimes policies or lack there of .

And given the poor state of medical care of Wounded Vets of the Iraqi WAR the Bush regime plans even more cut-backs , at least ,that is before the story became a source of embarassment for the Bush Regime & its Neo-Conservative agenda of fighting a war on different fronts & still attempt to balance the Budget.

GORD.
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Tuesday, February 20, 2007

US TROOPS ATTACK IRAQI SHEEP WITH GRENADES -TO KEEP THE WORLD SAFE FOR DEMOCRACY ??? -


US SOLDIERS IN HUMVEE TOSS EXPLOSIVES AT ' INSURGENT SHEEP '

"INSURGENT SHEEP"
BREAKING NEWS FROM WWW.ALTERNET.org
US Troops Attack Iraqi Sheep with Grenades [Video]
AT YOUTUBE

Posted by Jan Frel on February 18, 2007 at 10:58 PM.

" Ugh. Does it get any more depraved than this? How about a flash grenade thrown at a flock of sheep standing by the road while a US Humvee passes by.

You can hear the soldiers laugh as a couple dozen stunned and deafened sheep deal with the consequences. I couldn't catch anything grisly, so there's no disclaimer... "


This incident like others just show American soldiers indifference to Iraqis . In the video the sheep are being led by an Iraqi civilian who looks shocked but all kidding aside the Iraqi civilian could have been maimed or killed. The US soldiers don't even bother to stop to check out if the man is OK let alone worry about compensating him for the loss of his property.
Another incident showing US FORCES out of control; they believe they have been given Green Light to do whatever they like- blowing up sheep or people ; it's all the same to them !!!
Here they show that they have no respect for the Iraqi people so why should they have any respect for the American Occupying Forces ???
Bye for now,
GORD.

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US FORCES IN IRAQ FIGHTING " INSURGENT SHEEP " & AN EPIC FOR OUR TIME : A REQUIEM ,PART XII CAFE DREAMS # 2

' BLUE HIMALAYAN SHEEP 'ATTACKING U.S. FORCES IN IRAQ
INFAMOUS 'NORSK ATTACK SHEEP'
SECRET TRAINING CAMP FOR "ISLAMO-FASCIST -SHEEP"

'LEFTIST JOURNALIST ' INTERVIEWING INSURGENT ' GIANT SHEEP '
( Note All photos care of PICASA )

Yes, its true the new face of terror is the Infamous 'Norsk Attack Sheep ' & the Kamakazee 'BLUE HIMALAYAN SHEEP' who have become the hard core of the IRAQI TERRORISTS & the " ISLAMO-FASCISTS TERRORISTS NETWORKS" being trained in 'secret camps' as pictured above .American Forces spokesman says they the sheep are rather cunning hiding amongst the more passive native Iraqi Sheep who are often persuaded by the strong rhetoric & religious views of these 'FOREIGN SHEEP'.

Anyway here is another part of my poem ' AN EPIC FOR OUR TIME ':

An Epic For Our Time: A Requiem , PART XII: CAFÉ DREAMS # 2


anyway there we were among giants
as tall as mountains
each shares a tid bit here & there
til they come to their senses
and order more coffee
& light another cigarette
unable to make the transition
and the music they feasted on
crazy for folk &
rock & roll
crazy for jazz & classical
and now and again a piece of poetry
having found or lost love
having found or lost a friend or two
having found joy or despair
or a story about carnies
knife tossers freaks & geeks
fortune tellers & trapeze artists
& the Minotaur & the farmer’s daughter
& sad time- travelers in space ships
& maybe a little delusional at times
each an extension of each
impromptu meetings to organize
another reading in public
inviting writers unknown
to infuse new blood into our stream
of our body poetic
having become anemic
to see through new eyes
all the possibilities
to venture forth into unmapped streets
down dark unchartered alleyways
of a city unknown reborn
in the sacred places
in the city square
on the new improved boardwalk
along the edge of the harbor
in darkened cemeteries of the war dead

wandering the streets & cafes
searching for other lost souls
souls scrambling to crawl out of darkness
souls surrounded by their own light
needing nourishment
lest their light fade -

SEE YOU LATER,
GORD.



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Friday, February 02, 2007

BETWEEN VIOLENT REVOLUTION & ACQUIESCENCE THERE IS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

















See for instance :
WINNING THE (ANTI) WAR AND REBUILDING POLITICAL IMAGINATION
By Dan Berger, Andy Cornell, WireTap
Opinion: 'We are proposing a dramatic change in the strategy and
tactics of the anti-war movement.'
http://www.wiretapmag.org/warandpeace/42958/


GORD.
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" THE MAKING OF A REVOLUTIONARY "

" The Making of A Revolutionary "

in the making of a revolutionary
begin with a wide-eyed innocent
filled with hope & passion
a child without malice or jealousy
an idealist without envy
just mix in some injustice
toss in a little intimidation
add a pinch or two of torture
with a dollop of corruption
a shovelful of racism
a dash of humiliation
a truck load of greed
a shit load of hypocrisy
add a ton or two of lies
stir in a mountain of propaganda
add in some fear of God
and the poet face down in the crimson snow
leaving him for the ravenous wolves
digging up our gardens just for spite
killing what they do not understand
break the heart of the people a thousand times -

GORD.

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Thursday, February 01, 2007

BUSH's SECRET ADVISOR " ACME INC. "

THE ANSWER TO ALL OUR QUESTIONS ABOUT THE BUSH REGIME ANSWERED!
(cartoon found in local newspaper - The Cape Breton Post & also at Artizans.com )

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