The War

[AFF]

I saw this on another thread and I thought that some of you might like it:

 

Letter to the Observer

 

Sunday January 26, 2003

The Observer

 

I'm really excited by George Bush's latest reason for bombing Iraq: he's running out of patience. And so am I! For some time now I've been really pissed off with Mr Johnson, who lives a couple of doors down the street.

 

Well, him and Mr Patel, who runs the health food shop. They both

give me queer looks, and I'm sure Mr Johnson is planning something nasty for me, but so far I haven't been able to discover what. I've been round to his place a few times to see what he's up to, but he's got everything well hidden. That's how devious he is. As for Mr Patel, don't ask me how I know, I just know - from very good sources - that he is, in reality, a Mass Murderer. I have leafleted the street telling them that if we don't act first, he'll pick us off one by one.

 

Some of my neighbours say, if I've got proof, why don't I go to the police? But that's simply ridiculous. The police will say that they need evidence of a crime with which to charge my neighbours. They'll come up with endless red tape and quibbling about the rights and wrongs of a pre-emptive strike and all the while Mr Johnson will be finalising his plans to do terrible things to me, while Mr Patel will be secretly murdering people.

 

Since I'm the only one in the street with a decent range of

automatic firearms, I reckon it's up to me to keep the peace. But until recently that's been a little difficult! . Now, however, George W. Bush has made it clear that all I need to do is run out of patience, and then I can wade in and do whatever I want!

 

And let's face it, Mr Bush's carefully thought-out policy towards

Iraq is the only way to bring about international peace and security. The one certain way to stop Muslim fundamentalist suicide bombers targeting the US or the UK is to bomb a few Muslim countries that have never threatened us. That's why I want to blow up Mr Johnson's garage and kill his wife and children. Strike first! That'll teach him a lesson.

 

Then he'll leave us in peace and stop peering at me in that totally unacceptable way. Mr Bush makes it clear that all he needs to know before bombing Iraq is that Saddam is a really nasty man and that he has weapons of mass destruction -! even if no one can find them. I'm certain I've just as much justification for killing Mr Johnson's wife and children as Mr Bush has for bombing Iraq. Mr Bush's long-term aim is to make the world a safer place by eliminating 'rogue states'

and 'terrorism'.

 

It's such a clever long-term aim because how can you ever know when you've achieved it?

 

How will Mr Bush know when he's wiped out all terrorists? When

every single terrorist is dead? But then a terrorist is only a terrorist once he's committed an act of terror. What about would-be terrorists? These are the ones you really want to eliminate, since most of the known terrorists, being suicide bombers, have already eliminated themselves.

 

Perhaps Mr Bush needs to wipe out everyone who could possibly be a

future terrorist? Maybe he can't be sure he's achieved his

objective until every Muslim fundamentalist is dead? But then some moderate Muslims might convert to fundamentalism. Maybe the only really safe thing to do would be for Mr Bush to eliminate all Muslims?

 

It's the same in my street. Mr Johnson and Mr Patel are just the

tip of the iceberg. There are dozens of other people in the street who I don't like and who - quite frankly - look at me in odd ways. No one will be really safe until I've wiped them all out. My wife says I might be going too far but I tell her I'm simply using the same logic as the President of the United States. That shuts her up.

 

Like Mr Bush, I've run out of patience, and if that's a good enough reason for the President, it's good enough for me. I'm going to give the whole street two weeks - no, 10 days - to come out in the open and hand over all aliens and interplanetary hijackers, galactic outlaws and interstellar terrorist masterminds, and if they don't hand them over nicely and say 'Thank you', I'm going to bomb the entire street to kingdom come.

 

It's just as sane as what George W. Bush is proposing - and, in

contrast to what he's intending, my policy will destroy only one

street

 

[CANV EFM]

pinko ;-)

[The Lyrical Tarantula]

Good letter, it about sums up this american administation as it looks to invade yet another country to add to the countless ones it already has over the years!

 

Can we have a comment from the pro-war among us like CZ!

[CANV EFM]

america is really a bit 'nationwide one' when it come to invading countries.. i mean grenada,er all the west bits of america and haiwai are about it... meanwhile in the premiership are countries like germany,spain,russia,japan and of course the undisputed king, good old england...

[EFM's Librarian]

This next quote is rather long, and I suspect most of you won't bother reading it, but it rather destroys the suggestion that the US does not invade, or impose its will, on other countries

 

"Dr. Robert M. Bowman, a retired Lieutenant Colonel from the USA Air Force, in an open letter to the USA President, George W Bush (2001):

 

"We are not hated because we practice democracy, freedom, and human rights. We are hated because our government denies these things to people in third world countries whose resources are coveted by our multinational corporations. And that hatred we have sown has come back to haunt us in the form of terrorism..."

 

"We are the target of terrorists because we stand for dictatorship, bondage, and human exploitation in the world. We are the target of terrorists because we are hated. And we are hated because our government has done hateful things. In how many countries have we deposed popularly elected leaders and replaced them with puppet military dictators who were willing to sell out their own people to American multinational corporations?"

 

"We did it in Iran when we deposed Mossadegh because he wanted to nationalize the oil industry. We replaced him with the Shah, and trained, armed, and paid his hated Savak national guard, which enslaved and brutalized the people of Iran. All to protect the financial interests of our oil companies. Is it any wonder there are people in Iran who hate us?"

 

"We did it in Chile when we deposed Allende, democratically elected by the people to introduce socialism. We replaced him with the brutal right-wing military dictator, General Pinochet. Chile has still not recovered."

 

"We did it in Vietnam when we thwarted democratic elections in the South which would have united the country under Ho Chi Minh. We replaced him with a series of ineffectual puppet crooks who invited us to come in and slaughter their people, and we did. (I flew 101 combat missions in that war....)"

 

"We did it in Iraq, where we killed a quarter of a million civilians in a failed attempt to topple Saddam Hussein, and where we have killed a million since then with our sanctions. About half of these innocent victims have been children under the age of five."

 

"And, of course, how many times have we done it in Nicaragua and all the other banana republics of Latin America? Time after time we have ousted popular leaders who wanted the riches of the land to be shared by the people who worked it. We replaced them with murderous tyrants who would sell out and control their own people so that the wealth of the land could be taken out by Domino Sugar, the United Fruit Company, Folgers, and Chiquita Banana."

 

"In country after country, our government has thwarted democracy, stifled freedom, and trampled human rights. That's why we are hated around the world. And that's why we are the target of terrorists."

 

"People in Canada enjoy better democracy, more freedom, and greater human rights than we do. So do the people of Norway and Sweden. Have you heard of Canadian embassies being bombed? Or Norwegian embassies? Or Swedish embassies. No. We are not hated because we practice democracy, freedom, and human rights."

 

"Instead of sending our sons and daughters around the world to kill Arabs so the oil companies can sell the oil under their sand, we must send them to rebuild their infrastructure, supply clean water, and feed starving children. Instead of continuing to kill thousands of Iraqi children every day with our sanctions, we must help them rebuild their electric power plants, their water treatment facilities, their hospitals; all the things we destroyed in our war against them and prevented them from rebuilding with our sanctions."

 

"Instead of seeking to be king of the hill, we must become a responsible member of the family of nations. Instead of stationing hundreds of thousands of troops around the world to protect the financial interests of our multinational corporations, we must bring them home and expand the Peace Corps. Instead of training terrorists and death squads in the techniques of torture and assassination, we must close the School of the Americas (no matter what name they use). Instead of supporting military dictatorships, we must support true democracy; the right of the people to choose their own leaders. Instead of supporting insurrection, destabilization, assassination, and terror around the world, we must abolish the CIA and give the money to relief agencies."

 

"In short, we do good instead of evil. We become the good guys, once again."

 

"The threat of terrorism would vanish. That is what the American people need to hear. We are good people. We only need to be told the truth and given the vision. You can do it, Mr. President. Stop the killing. Stop the justifying. Stop the retaliating. Put people first. Tell them the truth."

 

John Gerassi, USA citizen:

 

"I can't help crying. As soon as I see a person on TV telling the heart-rendering story of the tragic fate of their loved one in the World Trade Center disaster, I can't control my tears. But then I wonder why didn't I cry when our troops wiped out some 5,000 poor people in Panama's El Chorillo neighborhood on the excuse of looking for Noriega. Our leaders knew he was hiding elsewhere but we destroyed El Chorillo because the folks living there were nationalists who wanted the USA out of Panama completely."

 

"Worse still, why didn't I cry when we killed two million Vietnamese, mostly innocent peasants, in a war which its main architect, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, knew we could not win? When I went to give blood the other day, I spotted a Cambodian doing the same, three up in the line, and that reminded me: Why didn't I cry when we helped Pol Pot butcher another million by giving him arms and money, because he was opposed to "our enemy" (who eventually stopped the killing fields)?"

 

"To stay up but not cry that evening, I decided to go to a movie. I chose Lumumba, at the Film Forum, and again I realized that I hadn't cried when our government arranged for the murder of the Congo's only decent leader, to be replaced by General Mobutu, a greedy, vicious, murdering dictator. Nor did I cry when the CIA arranged for the overthrow of Indonesia's Sukarno, who had fought the Japanese World War II invaders and established a free independent country, and then replaced him by another General, Suharto, who had collaborated with the Japanese and who proceeded to execute at least half a million 'Marxists' (in a country where, if folks had ever heard of Marx, it was at best Groucho)?"

 

"I watched TV again last night and cried again at the picture of that wonderful now missing father playing with his two-month old child. Yet when I remembered the slaughter of thousands of Salvadorans, so graphically described in the Times by Ray Bonner, or the rape and murder of those American nuns and lay sisters there, all perpetrated by CIA trained and paid agents, I never shed a tear. I even cried when I heard how brave had been Barbara Olson, wife of the Solicitor General, whose political views I detested. But I didn't cry when the USA invaded that wonderful tiny Caribbean nation of Grenada and killed innocent citizens who hoped to get a better life by building a tourist airfield, which my government called proof of a Russian base, but then finished building once the island was secure in the US camp again."

 

"Why didn't I cry when Ariel Sharon, today Israel's prime minister, planned, then ordered, the massacre of two thousand poor Palestinians in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila, the same Sharon who, with such other Irgun and Stern Gang terrorists become prime ministers as Begin and Shamir, killed the wives and children of British officers by blowing up the King David hotel where they were billeted?"

 

"I guess one only cries only for one's own. But is that a reason to demand vengeance on anyone who might disagree with us? That's what Americans seem to want. Certainly our government does, and so too most of our media. Do we really believe that we have a right to exploit the poor folk of the world for our benefit, because we claim we are free and they are not?"

 

"So now we're going to go to war. We are certainly entitled to go after those who killed so many of our innocent brothers and sisters. And we'll win, of course. Against Bin Laden. Against Taliban. Against Iraq. Against whoever and whatever. In the process we'll kill a few innocent children again. Children who have no clothes for the coming winter. No houses to shelter them. And no schools to learn why they are guilty, at two or four or six years old. Maybe Evangelists Falwell and Robertson will claim their death is good because they weren't Christians, and maybe some State Department spokesperson will tell the world that they were so poor that they're now better off."

 

"And then what? Will we now be able to run the world the way we want to? With all the new legislation establishing massive surveillance of you and me, our CEOs will certainly be pleased that the folks demonstrating against globalization will now be cowed for ever. No more riots in Seattle, Quebec or Genoa. Peace at last."

 

"Until next time. Who will it be then? A child grown-up who survived our massacre of his innocent parents in El Chorillo? A Nicaraguan girl who learned that her doctor mother and father were murdered by a bunch of gangsters we called democratic contras who read in the CIA handbook that the best way to destroy the only government which was trying to give the country's poor a better lot was to kill its teachers, health personnel, and government farm workers? Or maybe it will be a bitter Chilean who is convinced that his whole family was wiped out on order of Nixon's Secretary of State Henry Kissinger who could never tell the difference between a communist and a democratic socialist or even a nationalist."

 

"When will we Americans learn that as long as we keep trying to run the world for the sake of the bottom line, we will suffer someone's revenge? No war will ever stop terrorism as long as we use terror to have our way. So I stopped crying because I stopped watching TV. I went for a walk. Just four houses from mine. There, a crowd had congregated to lay flowers and lit candles in front of our local firehouse. It was closed. It had been closed since Tuesday because the firemen, a wonderful bunch of friendly guys who always greeted neighborhood folks with smiles and good cheer, had rushed so fast to save the victims of the first tower that they perished with them when it collapsed. And I cried again."

 

"So I said to myself when I wrote this, don't send it; some of your students, colleagues, neighbors will hate you, maybe even harm you. But then I put on the TV again, and there was Secretary of State Powell telling me that it will be okay to go to war against these children, these poor folks, these USA haters, because we are civilized and they are not. So I decided to risk it. Maybe, reading this, one more person will ask: Why are so many people in the world ready to die to give us a taste of what we give them?"

 

George W Bush, USA president during the State of the Union address on 28 January 2003:

 

"Throughout the 20th century small groups of men seized control of great nations, built armies and arsenals, and set out to dominate the weak and intimidate the world."

 

I took this from http://www.krysstal.com/democracy_whyusa.html

There is a lot of other interesting well written stuff there as well. Apologies to anyone who accuses me of being boring or miserable, but you didn't have to read this.

[The Lyrical Tarantula]

That is exactually what i've been trying to tell people about the USA for a long time!

I'm afraid that they are the true enemy, not the people but the administration.

 

I have said on here a few times that the USA have invaded loads of countrys over the last 20 years, the above text highlights a fair few and if you didn't read it then do because this is fact, it's not suspision like we suspect Iraq has weapons, it's fact.

And next time all you pro-war [****!!****] harp on about murdering dictators and how they should be toppled then take a look at the amount that the USA have installed themselves, maybe they should look to overthrow these ones first!

 

[censored] WAR!

[censored] THE USA!

[CANV EFM]

yeah..and [censored] em for sending hundreds of thousands of soldiers over in world war two to stop germany dominating europe.. and [censored] em for being the only country in the world to be able to stop soviet russia dominating europe..

either of those two events may have made these conversations a bit trickier.. and [censored] corporate america as well with their macdonalds and dell and microsoft...

and dont forget the x files and fraiser as well

[CANV EFM]

as for canada, norway and sweden.. well you can apply the above crieteria about nazi germany and soviet russia to norway and sweden.. they have both been happy to spend many years under the u.s. military umbrella..at no cost to themselves financially.. canada is a great country, if a tad bland, and relies totally on the u.s. for its wealth/trade and again military protection...they dont fk other countries off because they dont have to..the u.s. does it for them, they are however happy for their own multinationals to hawk their wares around the globe..

chuck in anti war france who would rearm the middle east at the drop of a euro.. everyone is at it.. including us

 

[CANV EFM]

and once china starts throwing its weight around in the next 20 years or so, whose skirt is the 'free' world going to hide behind again..norways?

[EFM's Librarian]

I don't think anyone would dispute the importance of the US in the second world war, but just because someone was right once, it doesn't necesarily follow that they continue to be right in everything they say and do. The reason I put that rather long piece on here was because I find it a bit frustrating when everybody (particularly George W. Bush) talks about America as though they have the moral highground over everybody else, and have never done anything wrong. I agree that the point about Canada, Norway, etc was a bit weak, but I felt it was fairer to put the whole quote on.

[CANV EFM]

it is an excellent piece..well worth reading all the way through.. especially if you only read the sun and the mail

[Chubbhead EFM]

I've just finished reading 'Stupid White Men' by Michael Moore-very interesting it was too. All you have to do is read the first chapter and you're blood will be boiling (especially for all the Anti-George W.Bush people). I thoroughly recommend it!

[ESG]

totally agree....

 

hunt out Bill Hick's "American Scream" if you can

 

 

Power to the imagination.

Those who lack imagination cannot imagine what is lacking.

 

[Chubbhead EFM]

It's the first bit of 'proper' reading I've done for ages. Recently all I've read is fictional books like High Fidelity and stuff like that. I'm thinking of reading '1984' next but it could take a long time!

[ESG]

“The cause of all wars, riots and injustices is the existence of property.”

(St. Augustine)

[SteveP]

Quite true SSL, The US administration are a bunch of misguided hillbillies and are not a great deal better than Saddam. BUT the bottom line is that Iraq has one of the richest oil reserves in the world, yet not a penny is spent on its people, Saddam only invests in status symbols for himself and weapons.

 

I can't say I like the idea of war or that I like people dying for that cause, either Iraqi/American/British. The world would be a better place without Saddam, it can no longer just be left and it is better something is done now rather than waiting for more damage to be done, at what cost do you ignore Iraq?

 

But to lighten things up again, here's a little something from theonion.com:

 

PYONGYANG, NORTH KOREA—As the U.S. continues to inch toward war with Iraq, a jealous and frustrated North Korea is wondering what it has to do to attract American military attention.

 

"What does it take to get a few F-16s or naval warships deployed to the Yellow Sea?" North Korean president Kim Jong Il asked Monday. "In the past month and a half, we've expelled U.N. nuclear inspectors, withdrawn from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, restarted a mothballed nuclear complex capable of producing weapons-grade plutonium, and threatened to resume missile tests. You'd think that would be enough to get a measly Marine division or two on standby in the Pacific, but apparently not."

 

Kim said his nation is "way more deserving" of B-52 deployment than Iraq.

 

"Bush says his number one priority is eliminating weapons of mass destruction, but he sure doesn't act that way," Kim said. "Iraq may have weapons of mass destruction and may be developing more. The DPRK, on the other hand, does have weapons of mass destruction and isn't about to stop making them any time soon."

 

"Can I be any more clear?" Kim continued. "We have nuclear bombs and delivery methods. Kablooey! There goes Anchorage! But does Bush care? Nope—he just goes on about how we're 'a diplomatic issue, not a military one.' If he even mentions us at all, that is."

 

"It's like I don't even exist," Kim added.

 

In the nine years since coming to power, Kim has earned a reputation as a megalomaniac and tyrant, interring dissenters in camps, living in opulence while his citizens starve, and calling members of the North Korean navy "human bombs." In spite of such actions, he has failed to provoke the ire of the U.S.

 

After years spent trying to antagonize the U.S., relations between North Korea and America finally showed signs of deterioration in 2002, when, during his State of the Union address, President Bush accused the Asian nation of being part of an international "Axis of Evil." The provocative words, Kim said, sent his hopes of a military standoff with the U.S. skyrocketing.

 

"When Bush named us as part of his Axis of Evil, I was so happy," Kim said. "I thought to myself, 'This is it. We are finally going to have a military conflict with this two-faced hyena.' He'd been ignoring me so long, I really didn't think he cared."

 

Still, Kim's hopes for a U.S.-North Korea crisis quickly faded as Bush began to focus all of his energies on Axis of Evil member Iraq. In October 2002, Kim made yet another attempt to anger the U.S., admitting to enriching uranium in violation of a 1994 accord. The admission, however, did not produce the desired escalation in hostility.

 

Kim said he has not given up on attracting U.S. military attention, vowing to invade South Korea if necessary.

 

"I am by no means ready to quit, but this is very frustrating," Kim said. "I guess if your name's not Saddam, you're not worthy of America's hatred."

 

"Everyone in my country refers to me as 'Dear Leader.' Is that not disturbingly cultish?"Kim continued. "I do not understand why President Bush is so much more interested in Saddam than me. I'm a strange, despotic, unpredictable madman, too, you know."

 

 

[ESG]

very good!

...surely someone must be able to trip Saddam down some stairs, and avoid etc etc...

 

Happiness is a new idea.

The bourgeoisie has no other pleasure than to degrade all pleasures.

Going through the motions kills the emotions.

Constraints imposed on pleasure incite the pleasure of living without constraints.

 

 

[EFM's Librarian]

Quote:

totally agree....

hunt out Bill Hick's "American Scream" if you can


Power to the imagination.
Those who lack imagination cannot imagine what is lacking.

How coincidental, I was going to mention a section from Relentless by Bill HIcks in an earlier thread, but couldn't be bothered (it was about God putting dinosaur fossils on the earth just to test fundamental christians)

[EFM's Librarian]

Oooops, I meant Revelations, not Relentless. Has anyone ever heard Hicks' piece about 'The hooligans' ? Very funny.

Chubhead, if you're thinking about reading '1984' why not obtain a copy of the complete novels of George Orwell? This will mean you get hold of his best novel 'Keep the aspidistra flying' as well as the other 5, for about £15

[ESG]

aspidistra's, put me off them for life!

 

ever seen jerry sadowitz?

'moose fcukers' classic quote...

 

Camus, Suskind to name a couple