Did CIA create Osama bin Laden & fostered fanaticism? For those who never knew it already, Chomsky says, yes.

"A sensible person would try to ascertain Bin Laden’s views, and the sentiments of the large reservoir of supporters he has throughout the region. Bin Laden became a militant Islamic leader in the war to drive the Russians out of Afghanistan. He was one of the many religious fundamentalist extremists recruited, armed, and financed by the CIA and their allies in Pakistani intelligence to cause maximal harm to the Russians-quite possibly delaying their withdrawal-though whether he personally happened to have direct contact with the CIA is unclear, and not particularly important. Not surprisingly, the CIA preferred the most fanatic and cruel fighters they could mobilize. The end result was to “destroy a moderate regime and create a fanatical one, from groups recklessly financed by the Americans” (according to London Times correspondent Simon Jenkins).

Source: Interview on Radio B92, Belgrade Sep 18, 2001

Well, of course there are huge amount of apparent human beings just so opposed to everything Chomsky says! And equally sad, the way the secret operatives have been normalized, instead of being questioned.

So, I thought in the age of Fox TV and all accompanying television shortcuts, let's watch this short video of the secretive CIA.

Tags: Saswat, War, Terrorism, Media, USA

“Beyond the Frame-Alternative perspectives on the war on terrorism” is a compilation of interviews with Seth Ackerman, Belquis Ahmadi, Joan Blades, Maliha Chishti, Noam Chomsky, Jo Commerford, Kevin Danaher, Cynthia Enloe, Henry Giroux, Janine Jackson, Robert Jensen, Sut Jhally, Darryl Kimball, Michael Kimmel, Mhahsa Khanbabai, Naomi Klein, Manning Marable, Mark Crispin Miller, Bernie Sanders, Ritu Sharma, Vandana Shiva, and Alisa Solomon.

The video brought out by Media Education Foundation deals with issues such as media’s role, women & the Afghan war, homeland security, war resistance, democracy and war, the Iraq war & growing militarism. The only down-side: the price. Too expensive. Gives me reasons for wondering why certain progressive materials need to be so expensively priced? One of the answers I conceive is it works in two ways: either because they don’t own it, and because owing to paucity of funds, they are eventually owned by 20th Century Fox and the others! Heads we lose, tails they win.

Tags: Saswat, Film, Terrorism, Media

By Saswat Pattanayak

It’s only fair that the ironies played out once again.

The Guantanamo Bay is just one of the contradictions. The “land of the free” after 200 years of systematic discriminations and unjust warfare that continues even to this day, has shined at the Bay.

Over 9,500 US troops are stationed in this sole U.S. base on a Communist soil. And the detainees are not told whether they are to be treated as prisoners of war, or common criminals.

Cuban President Castro has refused to view the American lease on Cuban land as legitimate. Yet, the prisoners (some of whom were handed over by Afghan tribesmen in exchange of cash) from Camp X-Ray, Camp Delta and Camp Echo are dumped on this land for confinement. The tortures of the prisoners would have never come to light unless some European detainees were to speak! Hence, when three British prisoners released in 2004 without charge deliberated on the atrocities committed by US troops in forms of torture, sexual acts, forced drugging and religious persecution it got some coverage, however scant. They also accused the British authorities of turning blind eye to the situation of which they were well aware. The 115 page dossier has been subsequently supported by French, Swedish and Australian prisoners too.

In this round of irony, although the sovereignty of Guantanamo Bay resides with Cuba eventually, the exclusive control over it rests with US. And naturally enough the prisoners who have no access to press conferences are forever struggling with their fates.

A 1903 declaration between The Republic of Cuba and US stated that the land, among others, was to be leased to US “for the time required for the purposes of coaling and naval stations, the areas of land and water situated in the Island of Cuba.” Many things have of course changed over the course of time, including the revolution led by Castro. But the terms still apply as it is and unilateral disagreement is not proving fruitful. And the area is being used for the purpose of detaining political prisoners.

In the meantime the tortures continue as though it were normal. In the most recent incident, the official report reads that 52 detainees are on hunger strike against the treatments they are being meted out with.

And the story could be framed by the media only after two weeks of their hunger strikes! The reality is that the strike started even before that. And the number was well over 100. One hundred people have been protesting non-violently with hunger strikes against the continued torture of an oppressive government, and its subjects who vote the leaders to power, do not even come to know of it until long after. Not mentioning the series of tortures over the years which have by far created protests of no significant nature.

What have the media roles been reduced to? Janet Jackson’s left breast, I am sure. In the era of the model human rights western democracy, the leaders cause illegal tortures not just inside but also outside their territories. Out of 562 prisoners, four have been charged of anything. Rest of them languish with web of tortures for no counts. This is called the Rule of Law!

Tags: Saswat, Cuba, USA, Terrorism

By Saswat Pattanayak

Part of fighting terrorism, the British realize, is refusing to change a way of life, writes Andrew Sullivan, and he calls it the “Quiet Power of the Stoic” in the Time Magazine this week.

Well, one will wonder why I stoop to quote Sullivan on the same page where I quote Neruda. Not quite unreasonable considering that today’s media provide the sort of inspirations like Sullivan’s pieces, for a scribe like me to think as deep as Neruda to ruminate over problems which have only proliferated since. Hence instead of the painstaking love ballads, I have to create the apt rebuttal for the reactionary stoicisms.

How do I react to the reactionaries? To the politically correct? To the timely interventionists? To the anti-terrorism conscience keepers? To the crusaders against illegal aliens? To the wise interpreters of Islam?

To begin with, one of the most popular bloggers of all time, Sullivan sure knows the vulnerabilities of the print media like Time. First, in times of crises like the London Blasts, its easier to express popular sentiments, and two, in places like Time, he cannot expect immediate responses. Its another matter that with all the trumpets being blown by bloggers about the grassroots media being one where there is a scope for the readers to correct the blogger via comments, Sullivan is out of comments on his site!

In any case who expects contrary comments when the bomb blasts in London is the only political incident today in the world and standing by the aggrieved is the only politically correct thing to do. So Sullivan writes:

The English, as Orwell once observed, celebrate their freedom in small ways: gardening, sports, pets, pubs, stamps, crossword puzzles. Part of this is now patriotic mythology. But part is also the enculturated national DNA to see these things not as trivial but as integral to the life of a free people. These things didn't stop, even during the Blitz, when thousands lived through night after night with the prospect of being incinerated by bombs from the sky. Part of fighting the war, the Brits realized, was military. But part was also a refusal to change a way of life, however small its detail, however petty its peeves.

---

As long as some maniac wants to kill himself and others in a subway or supermarket, we will not be able to stop him. And so stoicism matters. Getting on with our lives matters. Spelling bees, college football, celebrity gossip, high school proms: the simple continuance of these things is integral to the meaning of freedom.

Or so the British have long proved. Their small-c conservatism can lead to errors of complacency--like appeasing Hitler in the 1930s. But it is also a deep strength, as self-effacing as it is unmovable.

I am rendered speechless and I do not know where to post comments. But here is what I thought Sullivan said and half meant.

Basically, do anything. Support Hitler. Gossip celebrity. Prom high schools. Invade Iraq. Stay conservatives. Let Tony Blair comment on how some Muslims got Islam wrong. Allow him to pass a stricter law now so that illegals can be filtered out. Call people maniacs, systems perfect and the celebrate indifference. Don’t reflect on actions, don’t contextualize. Just get going with life, as usual. Stay stoic. Don’t change yourself.

What Orwell forgot to mention was that the English celebrated their freedom in other small ways too: invaded the natives, raped their women, killed their ables, subjugated their economies, dried their resources, came back home peacefully without any damage, when they needed cheap workforce they got the natives to work as cobblers and slaves, treated them as dogs disallowing them to enter into restaurants, promoted racism, and when the natives forgot their language and became Englicised, refused them equal pay. After keeping them illiterate in their own cultures, got the natives to pay tuitions to study in English traditions, and when the students applied for jobs, asked them to go back home with a debt, and when few natives played by their rules and ran their industries and wrote their stories, they got them knighted so that they became to be known as English, not natives anymore.

If these are not exercise of unbridled freedom on part of the English, then I do not know what these are. And now what again so conveniently was forgotten by Sullivan was that alongwith the college football, the Brit ruling class has been perfectly innocently content about their sense of superior freedom when it comes to the debt trap they lead Africa into (some countries there have paid thrice the original debt only to suffer for the rest of the civilization trying to pay the guilt-ridden interests), about their realization of peace at inflicting deaths by the hundreds to the civilians in the middle east, over the Palestine crisis and the Iraq fiasco. When British personnel were exposed for prison torture, the English were at peace with themselves over such “small issues” too.

Who can afford to stay stoic? I cannot. I am enraged at the bombings. I am enraged at the bombings, yes prime minister, over the same bombings which killed Muslims too. I am enraged at the stoic take on the heinous bombings that killed ordinary lives, the British working class lives which never agreed with the Queen’s stance on Diana and Blair’s stance on Iraq. I am enraged at this whole thing about “Pakistani descent”, when all of the alleged bombers were British citizens. I am enraged at the whole lectures of the PM about Islamic extremism when it is partly a case of British security failure. I am enraged about the way its being dismissed as individual acts of terrorism, whereas the main bomb makers are largely amiss, their motives overtly unknown. Instead of looking at it as a social byproduct of modern capitalism, I am enraged at the way the narrative speaks only of the religious bigotry (itself a product of modern capitalism). I am enraged about the way distinction is being done among people of faiths basing on this incident which has to do more than religious sentiment.
Clearly no religion preaches violence. Why should the Muslims be singled out? When a Christian lobbyist cheats the Congress, does one blame Christianity and tries to dig its textual interpretations? Or when Mandela suffered for 27 years in the islands, was Christianity revisited?

Stoicism, my dear Andrew, is the opium of the British. And the ruling class of Britain wants it to stay. So that they can now tighten the immigrations a little more and claim to have solved the case with four dead men as providing evidence. And in the process the bigger questions will be purged: Who harbored the criminal intents? Who encouraged the situation? Whose education called for social distrust among promising youths? Who were they born and brought up amidst the British neighborhoods?

From nationalists in the 1850s, to being called patriots in the 1920s, to announced radicals in the 1960s, to call terrorists in the Bush era, individuals have been branded. Sullivan dismisses them as maniac individuals this time. The issues have changed, the enemies have changed, the causes have been reversed. Yet the violence persists. When the state machineries have gone violent, we have called them war, when individuals have chosen violence they are now suicide bombers. We do not know why these people have behaved this cowardly as they did now. One thing for sure, we know that many people all over the world have been converted into suicide bombers since at least three decades now. To dismiss their acts as manic acts of random nature would be to stay stoic and fail to bridge the gaps that exist between us humans. For one, going by the massive protests at all the meetings of world leaders (and we do not see many Muslims at all, remember!), we know that the rulers are not very much welcome by the ruled and their principles or lack of them are being vehemently opposed. What we need is a deep appreciation of contrary interests and constructive dialogues to understand the oppositional chords rather than being violent (which is easy for a police state anywhere to cause and generate), being stoic (which is easy for the i-pod generations and Disney theme park visitors in the developed world to enjoy and mock with), being dismissive and accusatory (which is easy considering the might and the wealth of the developed economies which never hears of the bombs in the quarrelling poor nations but goes deafeningly reactionary when any singular incident takes place and attributes religious and international tones to it to vitiate the atmosphere further).

With time, we shall know what circumstances we have created in a world we no more love, which have led many youths astray—from being socially productive, and individually progressive, to emerge as self-obsessed reflections of a warring imperialistic individualistic world divided by flags, religions and countries.

Between the mad people and the scared people (and scared people don’t remain stoic, remember), the situation may not be managed well. But by taking pride in a stoic citizenry instead of encouraging them to become alert international human beings, we are taking steps backwards.

Tags: Saswat, Media, Terrorism, War, Christianity, Philosophy

By Saswat Pattanayak

Is not the war on terror actually a war on freedom?

As more and more countries join the camp, and try to outdo each other to bring American attention to their solidarity against this so-called war on terror, the obvious question is one of agenda. What, and who is served in the pursuit?

Primarily, the anti-people lobbies. With the dawn of the end of territorial imperialism, there was widespread significance attached to sovereignty of states, and in effect, its people. Sovereignty entailed that there was going to be no more subjugation and in fact, the freedom granted to people could act as the greatest proof of that.

After 9/11, we have seen an institutionalization of sovereignty erosion. Blatantly acting against the interest of the intrinsic sovereign freedom, states have passed different laws to contain any prospects of popular resentments.

In phony politically democratic societies (wide majority of the world) where the state either acts as instrument of terror and/or indifference by the corporate and administrative elites, there have been vehement oppositions to the system of misgovernance. From time to time, people have resorted to different methods of airing frustrations. To gross apathy towards social welfare, there have been ineffective mass demonstrations. To individual harassments by the police states, there have been reciprocal community reactions. But within a political framework, which thrives on sustaining necessary and illusory world of vague/abstract and abused freedom (such as speech, opportunity, dignity, security etc), its only natural that large majority remains discontent.

But another illusory method to combat discontentment since the last century has been not one of suppression (that was left to state communisms so that they could be attacked logically), but one of sustainable law and order systems. The mass media was used to make heroes out of the police and the detectives and the judiciary, to reinforce popular faiths in these systems, without letting the public know that these were indeed the very instruments that the ruling elites utilize to maintain a stronghold.

Hence, whenever the system of callous administration produced petty thieves, the individuals were required to be punished by the society which reveled in the glory of smart detectives who caught the criminal! Gradually the people were made to believe that the systems of oppressions were working for their own interests, whereas the abominably low proportion of people who rose up against the ways of the unjust world, were the traitors. This false and dangerous distinction between people who were actually working against the interest of society and who were serving their interests were still furthered with reinforcement of another wing of normalization: religion.

Religions and Law, mostly guided the norms that the society was compelled to live by or else! The people acting against the norms, because they most rationally thought of doing so to combat sustained injustice in the society, were naturally enough proved to be abnormal, and hence relegated to the prisons, that most systematically neglected byproduct of oppressive political system.

Instead of focusing on the system that thrives on numbing the anger in a meritocracy (by definition, a flawed anti-people term), the people were given occasional (once in five years?) reminders that they were able to decide their futures, with political freedom to “choose”!

Now that the small minority of people who chose to oppose the conventions has grown to a larger number with the apparent contradictions of so-called democracies, and their resentments have been expressed more vehemently, leading ways to formation of several hundreds of Independent media to expose the agents of draconic democracies, the rulers have now gone back to religions and legal experts to effect changes. If they don’t listen to “love-thy-class-enemy” sermons of religions, then pass some laws (like POTA or Patriot ) to restrict their freedoms.

Even while doing this, the democratic leaders, as expected, resort to sly methods of calling the spade. They call it now a war on terror, instead of war on freedom. After all, what are they so terrified of? If they can shred the 9/11 papers to disprove their involvement in traditional assault on innocent civilians…

Tags: Saswat, Terrorism, Capitalism, Philosophy

People who want peace at any cost are increasingly becoming rare. This, notwithstanding an inherent human necessity for survival. Possibly because of the way, “war” as a word has been normalized by the media as not one aberration, but one natural everyday process, that folks don’t pay much attention to necessity for survival.

Well, yet another war story, depending on where one comes from. For those of us who can’t stand war, its not just inhuman, but grossly unacceptable. Let not the protests begin after a thousand American working class youths are murdered on the front. The protest has to begin now. Not to “bring the boys back home”. But not to send them at the first place to the frontiers of war. We have seen enough of the sadistic pleasures of cowardice heads of the states. And now we got to show them (the global allies of imperialistic defense manufacturers) the might of resistant and organized peaceniks. Read More...

Tags: Saswat, Activism, Iran, War, Terrorism, USA, Imperialism

Straight from the preachers of death penalty! Trust the organized religions to expose themselves!

Although not relevant to the legal application of the death penalty in the United States, religious issues are a significant thread within the moral debate.
Read More...

Tags: Saswat, USA, Christianity, Philosophy, Terrorism

We live in not only uncertain times but also dangerous ones. And the democracy is full of, as Chomsky would say, “necessary illusions”.
Reinforcing one sustained illusion, almost half of all Americans think the federal government should limit the civil rights of Muslims as part of the nation’s fight against terrorism, according to a survey released by Cornell University today.
Shocking? read more by clicking here

Tags: Saswat, Islam, USA, Terrorism

By Saswat Pattanayak

"...We only wish we had more cameras to show the world their true defeat...." The Iraqi Resistance speech videotaped on December 13 2004 has been released, titled Title: Communiqué Number 6. I do not know how many of you saw the video or read the transcript, but I am certain that the knowledge of it will help.
The dangers of not acknowledging that things as terrible as inflicted by American administration on Iraq can also happen to American people, is one of no less magnitude. Comfortable psychological numbness has its temporary relief. But not to pay heed to the Resistance Speech may result only in the great disbelief. I wonder why the mainstream press would not publish the transcript in detail. And when the press here talk about the resistance movement in Iraq, why the interpretation is to the effect that ‘we’ are now under a threat of terrorism and hence we need to deploy more forces.
Elsewhere I had brought up the news of sending more troops. I will talk about the perils in another piece. But for now, every American and the world citizen has a right to know what the resistance speech contains.
The perception that certain speech can cause problems for the American people is like claiming that certain television shows are the cause behind all the crimes. Quite the contrary I believe the average American has to be sensitized enough by the knowledge that the plot is thickening now and hence will be either more prepared to send the children to warfront or resist the war itself.
In doing the resistance, the speech here may not inspire, but for sure inform that there is a need here to stop the ongoing war for good.
We need to panic more. The proud administrators who claim that there has not been an attack on America after 9/11, obviously do not believe that the thousands of deaths of young Americans on Iraqi soil is not the staging of the video games, but a reality that the attack on Americans is going on. Only this time, we know for sure who has ordered the attack. You are right, not Iraq.

Here is excerpts from the speech...(so that we all panic a bit more. and put a stop to this madness called war. And yes, war will not end war like it almost used to. Because unlike ever before in history this time, we-the United States at least, have the weapons of mass destruction—And mass weapon knows no nationalities. The illusion is that some children–not our children, or at least not us (sic!)–are dying to make us safe in our land. But the reality is the struggle going on in that far away land to declare otherwise. Excerpts from what Islamic Jihad Army claims:

"It is our duty, as well as our right, to fight back the occupying forces, which their nations will be held morally and economically responsible; for what their elected governments have destroyed and stolen from our land.
We have not crossed the oceans and seas to occupy Britain or the U.S. nor are we responsible for 9/11. These are only a few of the lies that these criminals present to cover their true plans for the control of the energy resources of the world, in face of a growing China and a strong unified Europe . It is Ironic that the Iraqi’s are to bear the full face of this large and growing conflict on behalf of the rest of this sleeping world.
We do not require arms or fighters, for we have plenty.
XXX
We ask you to form a world wide front against war and sanctions. A front that is governed by the wise and knowing. A front that will bring reform and order. New institutions that would replace the now corrupt.
Stop using the U.S. dollar, use the Euro or a basket of currencies. Reduce or halt your consumption of British and U.S. products. Put an end to Zionism before it ends the world. Educate those in doubt of the true nature of this conflict and do not believe their media for their casualties are far higher than they admit.
XXX
The enemy is on the run. They are in fear of a resistance movement they can not see nor predict.
We, now choose when, where, and how to strike. And as our ancestors drew the first sparks of civilization, we will redefine the word “conquest.“
This conflict is no longer considered a localized war. Nor can the world remain hostage to the never-ending and regenerated fear that the American people suffer from in general.
We will pin them here in Iraq to drain their resources, manpower, and their will to fight. We will make them spend as much as they steal, if not more
And to the American soldiers we say, you can also choose to fight tyranny with us. Lay down your weapons, and seek refuge in our mosques, churches and homes. We will protect you. And we will get you out of Iraq , as we have done with a few others before you.
XXX
Go back to your homes, families, and loved ones. This is not your war. Nor are you fighting for a true cause in Iraq .
And to George W. Bush, we say, “You have asked us to ‘Bring it on’, and so have we. Like never expected. Have you another challenge?” XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

If this does not make people conscious of the perils of war in general, nothing ever will. Its time to take a stand. And the stand cannot be for indifference. We cannot be indifferent any more, as I have discussed,the numbness will not help.

Tags: Saswat, Iraq, USA, Terrorism, War, Imperialism

Here is another news one can use.

Brenda Norrell (Southwest Staff Reporter/Indian Country Today) writes on how U.S. tortures elicit painful memories in Indian country.

American Indians said apologies would not erase the tortures in Iraq and President Bush should be held responsible for leading America into a groundless war.

"It seems like white people are the worst savages," said Bessie Taylor, Navajo from Ch'ooshgai Mountain on the Navajo Nation in New Mexico.

After viewing the photograph of a female soldier holding a leash tied around the throat of a naked Iraqi, Taylor said the female soldier should be dragged in the same manner. "She probably doesn't know what it feels like to be tortured."

After Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld apologized for the abuses in Iraq, Taylor said, "An apology is nothing. What does an apology do for you - nothing."

Taylor said Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld should be held responsible for the tortures in Iraq. "They were so eager for this war, now look what has happened. President Bush is responsible for leading America into this war. He is responsible for this. This war was about oil and making Bush's friends rich."
Read More...

Tags: Saswat, Indigenous, Iraq, USA, Bush, War, Terrorism, History

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POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act) review has begun in India. Finally. Does it make life easier. Hardly. Following suits of the Patriot Act, India’s fascination to tackle terrorism has led different people in jails, on political grounds. Same old. We have heard of such normal political misuse of power.

What’s new? Only five of the 14 states gave any shit to the request of the Union Govt to furnish papers. Bravo! What happens to the review. Mainstream press will not bother to know any longer. The news is over. And out.

Tags: Saswat, India, News, Terrorism

Thanks to 9/11 and the global fight against repressed people.

The Ministry of Defense in India has planned to setup an elaborate network of electronic warfare (EW) systems in Jammu and Kashmir and the northeast to help the security forces fight the terrorist threat.

The government say the idea is to equip the security forces with improved and upgraded communications infrastructure to counter the advanced communications systems being used by terrorist groups.

Already some systems have been established in Jammu and Kashmir and performing to expectations and, much bigger projects — Rikki-II and Rikki-III are underway.

Tags: Saswat, India, Terrorism