Letter Never SentTell me when to go.

Why did we attack Iraq during the Gulf War? Why are we about to attack them now? I know why the Bush gang wants to and I know the crass justifications they give, but what I really want to know is why are people rolling over to take this? The US wants to maintain coercive influence in the Mideast because we need more and more oil to prop up our extravagence. Everyone knows this, but they pretend like the real reason has to do with some threat posed by Iraq’s dictator. Our dictator and their dictator don’t get along too well, and this spells trouble for the people living in Iraq and the people who will be sent to slaughter and be slaughtered. The Bushes and the Husseins of the world don’t care one bit about things like that. In fact, they delusionally believe they are doing what’s right. We need to shake these parasites off.

Ok, the rant is over here’s why I posted in the first place (via Projecte Censored):

When the U.S. military took on Saddam Hussein in 1991, American planes strategically obliterated Iraq’s water system. Then, with the war over and the water system in ruins, the United States imposed sanctions barring the importation of water purification equipment. The combined effect of this one-two punch was the slow death of thousands of Iraqis – something not unexpected by the U.S. military.

Reporting for the Progressive magazine, Thomas J. Nagy unearthed the Defense Intelligence Agency documents detailing all of this. In fact, Nagy’s scoop showcases, yet again, the laziness of mainstream media: the now declassified documents are online, at an official government Web site, www.gulflink.osd.mil.

Here’s a sample from a January 1991 document titled, “Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities”: “Iraq depends on importing specialized equipment and some chemicals to purify its water supply, most of which is heavily mineralized and frequently brackish to saline. With no domestic sources of both water treatment replacement parts and some essential chemicals, Iraq will continue attempts to circumvent United Nations Sanctions to import these vital commodities. Failing to secure supplies will result in a shortage of pure drinking water for much of the population. This could lead to increased incidences, if not epidemics, of disease.”

One commodity Iraq was banned from importing was chlorine, a chemical used for both chemical weapons and water sanitization. The Defense Department knew a shortage of chlorine would kill – and has kept the ban in place for the past decade. “Unless the water is purified with chlorine, epidemics of such diseases as cholera, hepatitis, and typhoid could occur,” the brief noted.

Ten years on, the U.N. estimates 500,000 children have died as a result of the sanctions, and Hussein remains, for the moment anyway, in power.

Thomas J. Nagy, the Progressive, September 2001.

I was talking to my Uncle once (he’s a Master Sergeant in the Army and a Gulf War veteran) and he said that he didn’t have a problem fighting Iraq if for no other reason than it keeps gasoline cheap. People in the service know why we fight who we do. It’s not about someone attacking America or Americans. It’s power and money.

Even with the story of the sneak attack of the ‘treacherous japs’ at Pearl Harbor there now comes evidence that the US fired the first shots and sunk Japanese submarines up to an hour prior to the attack of Pearl Harbor. Information has already come out that the US government had prior knowledge of a Japanese attack and, indeed, hoped to goad the Japanese into attacking to provide the government with the means to whip Americans into war fever.

From here:

Upon the death of her brother, King Kalakauam, Liliuokalani ascended the throne of Hawaii in January 1891. When Liliuokalani became Queen the islands were experiencing a sharp recession. In reaction to pressure from domestic sugar growers the U.S. government passed the McKinley Tariff in 1890 that eliminated the duty-free status on sugar enjoyed by Hawaiian sugar planters. As a result Hawaii’s wholesale sugar prices dropped forty percent. American interests in Hawaii began to consider annexation for Hawaii to reestablish a competitive position for sugar. Queen Liliuokalani sought to empower herself and Hawaiians by overturning the so-called Bayonet Constitution, passed in 1887, that limited the power of the monarch and the political power of native Hawaiians. Through a new constitution, the Queen desired to quash any attempt of U.S. annexation.

The American planters, faced with ruin, sought to overthrow the monarchy. Led by Sanford Dole, the takeover began in January 1894 and was openly supported by John L. Stevens, U.S. minister to Hawaii. Stevens called for troops to take control of government buildings including the executive building at Iolani Palace. The coup was successful in deposing the Queen and Stevens cabled Washington, D.C., proclaiming “The Hawaiian pear is now fully ripe, and this is the golden hour for the United States to pluck it.” However, the American government was not ready to pluck the pear just yet. …

Cleveland replaced Stevens with Albert Willis as American minister to Hawaii. Willis offered the crown back to the Queen on the condition that she pardon and grant amnesty to those who had dethroned her. She at first refused and asserted that if restored to power, she would behead those who had conspired against her, but then changed her mind and offered leniency. Queen “Lil” had attracted a sentimental following in the U.S. but this delay compromised her position. and President Cleveland released the entire issue of the Hawaiian revolution to Congress for debate. Immediately Dole and his following of annexationists lobbied Congress to set up a Republic of Hawaii. On July 4, 1894, the Republic of Hawaii was established and Sanford Dole (of Dole Pineapple) proclaimed president.

During his administration, Dole worked tirelessly to gain U.S. annexation and to block efforts to a counterrevolution aimed at restoring the monarchy. The ex-Queen herself was arrested in 1895 when a supply of weapons was found in the gardens of her home in Washington Place. She denied any knowledge of this cache or of any endeavor to restore her to the throne. In 1896 she was released and returned to her home at Washington Place where she remained for the next twenty years.

Via whatreallyhappened.com:

On October 7, 1940, Lieutenant Commander Arthur McCollum of the Office of Naval Intelligence submitted a memo to Navy Captains Walter Anderson and Dudley Knox (whose endorsement is included in the following scans). Captains Anderson and Knox were two of President Roosevelt’s most trusted military advisors. The memo, scanned below, detailed an 8 step plan to provoke Japan into attacking the United States. President Roosevelt, over the course of 1941, implemented all 8 of the recommendations contained in the McCollum memo. Following the eighth provocation, Japan attacked. The public was told that it was a complete surprise, an “intelligence failure”, and America entered World War Two.

Remember Pearl Harbor was a military base and Hawaii was not even a part of the United States, but essentially a colony of American business interests. So, is this that hard to believe?

The Order of Assassins was a branch of the Ismaili sect of Islam, founded by Hassan ibn Sabbah (The Old Man of the Mountain). In 1090, the hill fortress of Alamut was constructed by Hassan in central Persia, and several other forts were built in the hills of that country. Although they were heavily persecuted, pressure on other Muslim states from first the Crusaders and then the Mongols (along with the obligatory program of political assassination), saved the Assassins from destruction. The Assassins expanded into Syria, often cooperating with the Christians against local Muslim rulers. The Mongols pushed the Assassins out of Persia in 1256. The Order survived in Syria until 1272, when the Mamluk Sultan Baybars destroyed their last stronghold. (Footnotes to history) …

Hassan’s devoted followers were prepared to follow his orders unquestioningly, even when this would result in their own certain deaths. He frequently sent them on missions to kill hostile princes, the generals of armies sent to oppose him, and anyone else of whom he disapproved. His fanatical, highly-trained and highly-disciplined killers would blend with the enemy population disguished as merchants or soldiers, awaiting their opportunity. They would then sneak into their target’s encampment or palace, and dispatch him with their long daggers. They were known as Hashishin from their habit of smoking hashish, either to generate visions of paradise or to give themselves courage before their (usually fatal) missions. This is the origin of the English word “assassin”.

• Lincoln, Abraham (president of U.S.): Shot April 14, 1865, in Washington, D.C., by John Wilkes Booth; died April 15.

• Seward, William H. (secretary of state): Escaped assassination (though injured) April 14, 1865, in Washington, D.C., by Lewis Powell (or Paine), accomplice of John Wilkes Booth.
• Garfield, James A. (president of U.S.): Shot July 2, 1881, in Washington, D.C., by Charles J. Guiteau; died Sept. 19.
• McKinley, William (president of U.S.): Shot Sept. 6, 1901, in Buffalo by Leon Czolgosz; died Sept. 14.
• Roosevelt, Theodore (ex-president of U.S.): Escaped assassination (though shot) Oct. 14, 1912, in Milwaukee while campaigning for president.
• Cermak, Anton J. (mayor of Chicago): Shot Feb. 15, 1933, in Miami by Giuseppe Zangara, who attempted to assassinate Franklin D. Roosevelt; Cermak died March 6.
• Roosevelt, Franklin D. (president-elect of U.S.): Escaped assassination unhurt Feb. 15, 1933, in Miami.
• Long, Huey P. (U.S. senator from Louisiana): Shot Sept. 8, 1935, in Baton Rouge by Dr. Carl A. Weiss; died Sept. 10.
• Truman, Harry S. (president of U.S.): Escaped assassination unhurt Nov. 1, 1950, in Washington, D.C., as 2 Puerto Rican nationalists attempted to shoot their way into Blair House.
• Kennedy, John F. (president of U.S.): Shot Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, Tex., allegedly by Lee Harvey Oswald; died same day. Injured was Gov. John B. Connally of Texas. Oswald was shot and killed two days later by Jack Ruby.
• Malcolm X, also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (black activist): Shot and killed in a New York City auditorium, Feb. 21, 1965; his killer(s) were never positively identified.
• King, Martin Luther, Jr. (civil rights leader): Shot April 4, 1968, in Memphis by James Earl Ray; died same day.
• Kennedy, Robert F. (U.S. senator from New York): Shot June 5, 1968, in Los Angeles by Sirhan Bishara Sirhan; died June 6.
• Wallace, George C. (governor of Alabama): Shot and critically wounded in assassination attempt May 15, 1972, at Laurel, Md., by Arthur Herman Bremer. Wallace paralyzed from waist down.
• Ford, Gerald R. (president of U.S.): Escaped assassination attempt Sept. 5, 1975, in Sacramento, Calif., by Lynette Alice (Squeaky) Fromme, who pointed but did not fire .45-caliber pistol. Escaped assassination attempt in San Francisco, Calif., Sept. 22, 1975, by Sara Jane Moore, who fired one shot from a .38-caliber pistol that was deflected.
• Jordan, Vernon E., Jr. (civil rights leader): Shot and critically wounded in assassination attempt May 29, 1980, in Fort Wayne, Ind.
• Reagan, Ronald (president of U.S.): Shot in left lung in Washington by John W. Hinckley, Jr., on March 30, 1981; three others also wounded.

The quotation below attributed to Julius Caesar is good, but as an astute visitor pointed out to me, it is most probably erroneous, a fake. I have not been able to find the source for it anywhere from anyone.

Wikipedia possesses the same quotation and this was last edited in February 2002 which is the earliest I have seen it appear.

• From Kuro5hin.org on this quotation.
• Someone at Mojo’s Daily Grind reports it as first appearing in October of 2001.

In the 1950′s the US developed chemical and biological weapons designed to destroy Russia’s wheat crop and thereby cause a famine which could result in the megadeath of millions of Russian people. Better add a new country to the Axis of Evil.

Found here with posters from Vietnam and Cuba via Fark. This one is my favorite:

This one is my second favorite. Short and sweet:

This song was so popular in 1915 that it topped the charts as the #2 best selling piece of sheet music.

Ten million soldiers to the war have gone
Who may never return again;
Ten million mothers’ hearts must break
For the ones who died in vain.
Head bowed down in sorrow,
In her lonely years,
I heard a mother murmur through her tears:

Chorus
“I didn’t raise my boy to be a soldier
I brought him up to be my pride and joy;
Who dares to place a musket on his shoulder
To shoot some other mother’s darling boy?
Let nations arbitrate their future troubles,
It’s time to lay the sword and gun away;
There’d be no war today,
If mothers all would say,
‘I didn’t raise my boy to be a soldier.’ ”

2nd verse
What victory can cheer a mother’s heart
When she looks at her blighted home?
What victory can bring her back
All she cared to call her own?
Let each mother answer
In the years to be,
“Remember that my boy belongs to me!”