Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author
Faced by protests against their war plans involving millions of people worldwide, the Bush administration and the US media are increasingly employing one of the “big lie” techniques notoriously employed by the likes of Hitler and Stalin: accusing their enemy of the crimes they are about to commit.
International humanitarian agencies are warning that the coming US assault on Iraq could cause half a million civilian casualties and create two million refugees. But the White House and Pentagon, joined by a complicit media, are seeking to shift the blame for the impending slaughter to the Iraqi government.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ramped up the propaganda effort at a February 19 Pentagon press briefing where, without offering the slightest evidence, he accused Saddam Hussein of preparing to use civilians as “human shields” against US attacks.
According to Rumsfeld: “It is a practice that reveals contempt for the norms of humanity, the laws of armed conflict, and, I am advised, Islamic law, practice and belief.”
He declared that those responsible would be treated as war criminals. “These are not tactics of war, they are crimes of war. Deploying human shields is not a military strategy, it’s murder, a violation of the laws of armed conflict, and a crime against humanity, and it will be treated as such.”
In a chilling performance, Rumsfeld sought to prepare American and world public opinion for the widespread civilian deaths that will inevitably be caused by the Pentagon’s “shock and awe” plan to unleash more than 3,000 missiles on Iraq in the first 48 hours of the invasion.
He charged that Saddam Hussein “deliberately constructs mosques near military facilities, uses schools, hospitals, orphanages and cultural treasures to shield military forces, thereby exposing helpless men, women and children to danger.” This can only mean that mosques, schools, hospitals, orphanages, cultural treasures and other civilian sites are on the Pentagon’s target lists.
Not one journalist at the Pentagon briefing challenged Rumsfeld to substantiate his allegations.
In effect, the Bush administration is accusing Baghdad of using the entire Iraqi population as “human shields.” Washington is preparing to commit war crimes of monumental proportions by launching an unprovoked war, inflicting terrible civilian casualties, and then depicting the Iraqi leaders as the war criminals.
The Iraqi leadership is not the only target of this truly Orwellian logic. Rumsfeld’s threats followed reports that hundreds of peace activists from Britain, the United States and other countries are assembling in Baghdad with the intention of camping near power stations, water plants and other civilian facilities that the US and its allies bombed during the 1991 Gulf War.
One group, the Iraq Peace Team, includes US veterans from the Vietnam War. They have been hanging banners on bridges and power plants that say a US bombardment of these sites would amount to a war crime. Another group, known as Human Shields, has stated that its aim is to prevent a US attack.
Rumsfeld, flanked by General Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, indicated that these anti-war volunteers could also be accused of war crimes. “Those who follow his [Saddam’s] orders to use human shields will pay a severe price for their actions,” Rumsfeld declared.
Myers added: “It is a violation of the law of armed conflict to use noncombatants as a means of shielding potential military targets—even those people who may volunteer for this purpose.... Therefore, if death or serious injury to a noncombatant resulted from these efforts, the individuals responsible for deploying any innocent civilians as human shields could be guilty of grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions.”
The truth is that Rumsfeld and Myers, along with President Bush, are guilty of preparing a war of aggression—the very crime for which Hitler’s henchmen were tried at Nuremburg. Their war will flagrantly breach a series of international laws and conventions going back to the Declaration of St. Petersburg in 1868 that require armed forces to minimize harm to civilians during battles.
The people of both Iraq and the Balkans have already experienced Washington’s use of the “human shields” lie as a cover for war crimes. During the 1991 Gulf war, the White House and the Pentagon consistently blamed Saddam Hussein for the civilian casualties of US bombing, including the killing of 288 people in Baghdad’s Al-Amariya bomb shelter.
In one of the most infamous atrocities of the 1999 bombardment of Serbia, US aircraft bombed a refugee convoy. Initially, US and NATO officials claimed that the vehicles were military. When investigations by reporters confirmed it was a line of civilian refugees, NATO insisted that Serb military forces and equipment had infiltrated the convoy as a setup.
As for Rumsfeld, he is politically complicit in war crimes in Afghanistan, including the killing of as many as 800 captured Taliban prisoners in November 2001 at Mazar-i-Sharif. Rumsfeld vetoed a proposal by Northern Alliance General Khan Daoud to grant foreign Taliban fighters safe passage out of Afghanistan and gave the green light for a killing spree, saying “My hope is that they will either be killed or taken prisoner.” [See “US war crime in Afghanistan: Hundreds of prisoners of war slaughtered at Mazar-i-Sharif”]
One government in the Middle East has admitted to forcing innocent civilians to act as human shields, resulting in numerous Palestinian deaths. Israel’s Sharon government, however, is fiercely protected by the Bush administration. Last May, after Israeli human rights groups sought a Supreme Court order barring the practice following its widespread use during the army’s assaults on Jenin and other West Bank cities, the military admitted the policy was illegal and pledged it would stop. But media reports have confirmed that soldiers are still routinely using Palestinian men as live shields.
Major US media outlets consistently retail the official line that the Bush administration and the military top brass are determined to do everything in their power to minimize civilian casualties, through the use of precision-guided “smart bombs.” But of late, the media has supplemented such claims with elaborations on the government theme of Iraqi human shields and other alleged Iraqi war crimes. At the same time, it is gingerly preparing US public opinion for images and reports of Iraqi civilian victims of US bombs, knowing in advance it will be unable to totally suppress evidence of the impending carnage.
On February 5, for example, the Washington Post reported that Saddam Hussein had armed 1 million Iraqi civilians with rifles and grenade launchers as a last line of defense against an American invasion. The next day, General Myers announced that Washington would consider such people to be combatants.
On February 18, the day before Rumsfeld’s latest Pentagon briefing, an article listing a number of American alibis-in-advance appeared in the New York Times. The piece was obviously based on handouts from the Pentagon and the White House. Under the headline, “War Planners Speak of the Risks,” senior writers David Sanger and Thom Shanker reported that Rumsfeld “has a four- to five-page, typewritten catalog of risks that senior aides say he keeps in his desk drawer.”
Sanger and Shanker let it be known that the document warned of “Saddam Hussein hiding weapons in mosques or hospitals or cultural sites, and using his citizenry or captured foreign journalists as human shields.” The authors made no pretence of substantiating these claims. Rumsfeld’s other concerns, they informed their readers, included neighboring states being attacked, and the use of Iraqi “weapons of mass destruction” across the region.
President Bush, the article added, was preparing the United States for “what one senior official calls ‘the very real possibility that this will not look like Afghanistan,’ a military victory that came with greater speed than any had predicted, and with fewer casualties.”
Perhaps the most revealing comment quoted in the article came from an unnamed senior official who cautioned that despite months of internal studies, advance planning and the insertion of CIA officers and Special Operations forces into Iraq, “We still do not know how US forces will be received. Will it be cheers, jeers or shots? And the fact is, we won’t know until we get there.”
In other words, the White House and its trusted journalists are attempting to prepare public opinion for American forces being greeted with hostility as murderers and colonial-style conquerers, rather than liberators. The scale of the terror, death and destruction being planned will only intensify such hatred.
Sanger and Shanker are conscious of their own
role as conduits for the administration’s black propaganda. They acknowledge
that “such cautionary notes from the White House, the Pentagon and intelligence
officials may well have a political purpose ... the administration may feel
it is better to warn the American public of these dangers in advance.”
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/feb2003/lies-f24.shtml
Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author
The Bush administration’s buildup to war has reached the stage where top officials feel compelled to arm themselves with alibis for the coming slaughter of thousands of Iraqi civilians.
That is the significance of Bush’s speech February 12 in Nashville, warning that the Iraqi regime is preparing to use its civilian population as “human shields” in the event of a US invasion. He said that Iraq’s president Saddam Hussein intends to deploy the country’s military forces among civilians “in order to shield his military and blame coalition forces for civilian casualties that he has caused.” As always, Bush presented no evidence to back these assertions.
“America views the Iraqi people as human beings who have suffered long enough,” Bush told a conference of Christian broadcasters. The address, dripping with the kind of hypocrisy that is the stock-in-trade of his audience, constituted a transparent attempt to blame the Iraqis for the massive destruction that the US military is preparing to unleash against their country.
The argument is that if Iraqi soldiers attempt to defend the country’s capital and largest city from conquest by invading US troops, they are responsible for civilians killed by American bombs, missiles and gunfire. This particular species of lying is by no means an innovation. During the last Persian Gulf war, the White House of Bush senior and the Pentagon routinely blamed civilian casualties on Iraqi positioning of military forces and even—absurdly—on anti-aircraft fire falling short.
The single most atrocious attack of that war, the bombing of the Al-Amariya bomb shelter in Baghdad, was first dismissed as “Iraqi propaganda” and then defended. The 288 civilians killed by American bombs, including 91 children, were said to be proof that the Iraqi regime “does not share our value for the sanctity of human life.”
Bush’s comments on “human shields” were supplemented by testimony delivered the same day by Vice Admiral Lowell Jacoby before the Senate Armed Services Committee. “If hostilities begin,” he said, “Saddam is likely to employ a ‘scorched earth’ strategy, destroying food, transportation, energy and other infrastructure, attempting to create a humanitarian disaster significant enough to stop a military advance.”
Jacoby went on to say that the Iraqi regime would likely unleash weapons of mass destruction on its own citizens in order to blame the US for war crimes.
There is without question a “scorched earth” strategy for Iraq; the Pentagon has prepared it. Plans leaked to the press earlier this month for a “shock and awe” campaign call for bombardment of the country with 3,000 to 4,000 cruise missiles and smart bombs in the first 48 hours of a US attack, more explosive power than was used during the entire Persian Gulf War a decade ago.
This air assault will be aimed at killing Iraqi civilians. The idea is to inflict sufficient casualties to shock the entire population into submitting to the US invaders. One of the architects of the plan, Harlan Ullman, currently an analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, compared it to the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. “The Japanese quit because they couldn’t appreciate that one bomb could do what 500 planes did in a night. That was shock,” he said. “Now, can you take that level of shock and apply it with conventional weapons? We thought you could.”
Nuclear bombs, however, have by no means been ruled out, as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld made clear once again on Thursday. “Our policy ... has been generally that we will not foreclose the possible use of nuclear weapons if attacked,” he told the Senate Armed Services Committee. The claim that Iraq is prepared to use weapons of mass destruction against its own people is designed to provide a cover for the Pentagon’s own contingency plans for the use of such weapons.
As for plans to destroy the country’s infrastructure, the American ruling elite and military have much expertise in this field. Much of Iraq’s economic and social infrastructure was destroyed in the US bombing campaign in 1991, which knocked out power grids, sewage treatment plants, water purification facilities and hospitals. This devastation, followed by a decade of punishing economic sanctions maintained by Washington, has caused the deaths of over one million Iraqis.
As for Jacoby’s charge that the Iraqi regime is planning to create a “humanitarian disaster,” there have been multiple reports issued by the United Nations and relief agencies warning that US military action will accomplish precisely that without any assistance from Saddam Hussein. One physicians’ group has predicted that more than a quarter of a million will be killed, while a conservative UN estimate foresees half a million people requiring treatment for wounds and injuries suffered in the war.
Up to 16 million Iraqis depend on a government food relief system that is certain to collapse with US military action. Millions more will be turned into refugees by an invasion. Air strikes on power plants will wipe out the already ravaged water and sanitation systems, creating the conditions for new epidemics.
The attempt to blame such death and devastation in advance on Iraqi “scorched earth” or “human shield” tactics is the hallmark of officials who are preparing massive war crimes.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/feb2003/shld-f14.shtml
http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=3492
Posted: Monday, February
24, 2003
By: Kay Onefeather
Only in Venezuela
Only in Venezuela
Would 'some' Citizens Cry "Rogue State"
After Plotting to Kill its Democratically
ELECTED President,
Deliberately Crippling the Economy,
Spreading Malicious Rumors and Lies,
Nationally televised,
And Still Protest the Arrest
Of One of its Rogues-Self Made,
Bought and Paid
For, Member of the Real "Rogue" State.
Not in the USA
Would such Things be Tolerated..
Not for a Minute!! You'd be "Hauled Away"
For "Reckoning" with Government Agents!!
And, That IS AS IT SHOULD BE
IN ANY DEMOCRACY!
Kay Onefeather
kaonefeather@aol.com
*******************************************************
US warns it is 'time for action' against SaddamNew UN resolution will say Iraqi dictator is in 'material breach' of disarmament rulesBy Andrew Buncombe in Washington and Marie Woolf24 February 2003
Colin Powell, the American Secretary of State, suggested that a war against Iraq could be launched within three weeks as he insisted yesterday that it was "time to take action" against Saddam Hussein. With Britain and America due to table a second resolution in the United Nations Security Council today or tomorrow, Downing Street said a vote on the text of the resolution would take place in "early to mid March". Itis expected to say that Iraq is in "material breach" of resolution 1441 and will face "serious consequences" if President Saddam does not comply with the terms of that text, which demanded that he provide immediate and full co-operation to the UN arms inspectors. Iraq says it is "studying" an order from the inspectors for missiles to be destroyed under UN supervision, starting by Saturday. The al-Samoud-2 missiles exceed the 150km (93-mile) range permitted by the UN. Iraq's response is seen as a crucial test of President Saddam's willingness to co-operate on disarming. General Powell dropped the clearest hints yet on America's likely timetable in any conflict with Iraq, saying the UN needed to take vital decisions quickly, once the weapons inspectors had reported to the Security Council on 7 March. Speaking in Beijing, where he is to press Chinese leaders against vetoing a second resolution, General Powell said: "It is time to take action. The evidence is clear. They are guilty ... We are reaching that point where serious consequences must flow." Earlier, General Powell warned in Tokyo: "It isn't going to be a long period of time from the tabling of the resolution until a judgement is made as to whether the resolution is ready to be voted on or not. Iraq is still not complying and time is drawing to a close when ... the Security Council must show its relevance by insisting that Iraq disarm or that Iraq be disarmed by a coalition of forces that will go in and do it." The Pentagon has long made clear it would prefer to launch any strike before April, when temperatures in Iraq begin to soar. Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, said last week that the 150,000 US troops in the Gulf region were "ample" for the task. Whether America and Britain will obtain the resolution is far from clear. The French Foreign Minister reiterated yesterday that France remained opposed to a second resolution. The former Russian prime minister Yevgeny Primakov visited Baghdad yesterday on a mission for President Vladimir Putin. Mr Primakov, a long-time friend of President Saddam, undertook a similar mission before the Gulf War in 1991. Mr Blair believes the gap between the tabling of the second UN resolution this week and the Security Council vote will be President Saddam's final chance to avoid war. "The Prime Minister believes this is the last push for peace," his official spokesman said. Yesterday John Major, who led Britain into the 1991 war, warned that a strike on President Saddam could provoke him to unleash "Armageddon". The Iraqi leader might try to drag the whole Middle East into a conflagration by launching an attack on Israel or Saudi Arabia and setting alight Iraq's oil wells, Mr Major said on the Breakfast with Frost programme on BBC1. Countdown to war? Today/tomorrow Draft UN resolution tabled Tomorrow Blair gives emergency statement to Commons Wednesday Debates in Parliament Friday Blix reports to UN Saturday UN deadline for start of destruction of al-Samoud-2 missiles Friday, 7 March Blix report to UN 7-14 March UN vote on resolution?
|
24 February 2003 14:46 We apologise for the absence of our search, pending technical developments. Printable Story
|
