Operation Northwoods, Downing Street and Peak Oil
RICHARD BABB
6/26/2005 1:07:50
AMDaily Journal
It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government. – Thomas Paine
Back in 1963, as a well-scoured six-year-old preacher's kid, I spent much time playing in the dirt at the ramshackle home of my friend, Gary Lloyd. There I was introduced not only to the fine art of cussing, but also to Gary's sisters who somehow managed to freely frolic outside sans clothing. All of this occurred under the approving and watchful eye of Mrs. Loyd who always sat placidly and Buddha-like on the front porch with an unbuddha-like cigarette and drink.
At the same time that Gary and his sisters seemed intent on leading me down the road to a Mississippi Methodist Hell, the military leaders of the United States were planning to unleash another kind of hell, an attack on a country: it's own, the United States of America. According to released classified documents, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had concocted a plan in which the military would attack its own citizens and then fix the blame on Cuba and Fidel Castro. The plan, Operation Northwoods, included the indiscriminate killing of American citizens, hijacking of airliners, and even sabotaging the flight of Astronaut John Glenn as he rocketed into space.
Invasion pretext
The plan was presented to the Secretary of Defense and President Kennedy, both of whom rejected the operation as a bit too hare-brained, even though all of the medal-larded, and ribbon-befitted Joint Chiefs had signed off on it.
I thought about Operation Northwoods when I read of the recent death of Col. David Hackworth, the most decorated veteran of Vietnam, and in my opinion, a great American. Hackworth was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery on May 31, having died of bladder cancer which some believe was caused by a chemical defoliant sprayed during the Vietnam daze.
I didn't know of Hackworth until I saw him a few years ago on a news show. He was being interviewed the same night a peopled airliner had mysteriously dropped from the sky into the ocean outside New York. Several witnesses claimed they had seen a ground-to-air missile strike the plane, a proposition that had been immediately rejected by a government apparatchik. In response to the official's position, the bluntly-spoken Hackworth rejoined, "Well I haven't trusted the United States government since 1963," meaning of course that the colonel was stating on national television he was more likely to believe anonymous witnesses on the ground, rather than the mouthpiece for the government.
Honest skepticism
As a child of the 50's, 60's and 70's, I have come honestly to my dark scepticism about governments and maybe that is the reason I liked Col. Hackworth. He wasn't afraid to tell unpleasant truths even about the most sacrosanct of institutions. And it is a shame that he is no longer among the quick, because it appears that we now are headed once again into a collision with more governmental unpleasantness: questions about the war in Iraq.
A top secret document, leaked in England and known as the Downing Street Memo, maintains that the case for military action against Iraqi Dictator Saddam Hussein was "thin." The memo, which is actually minutes of a July 23, 2002 meeting with Great Britain's Prime Minister Blair, shows that the U.S. didn't believe that the threat from Iraq was greater than other nations, and therefore the intelligence had to be "fixed" in order to sell the war to the American people.
Of course, if the memo be true, and Bush knew there was not enough reason to justify the war, we are left with the numbing question: Why then did we go to Iraq? To that question, there has been presented more than one answer. Polls show that 40 percent of the people believe Saddam Hussein was behind 911. Another idea is that we invaded Iraq because Saddam Hussein had threatened to kill President Bush's father. Some argue that Bush went to Iraq not so much to avenge his father, but to complete the unfinished business of the first Gulf War. Most of these theories have been be rebutted if not outright, at least by common sense.
Occam's Razor is a theorem which holds that among the many plausible answers to a vexing question, the best answer is usually the simplest. Perhaps the simplest explanation for the war is to be found in a little-noted news release from the Exxon Corporation in which it has estimated that in five years cheap available oil production will have peaked in non-OPEC oil sites. Obviously, that would mean an increased emphasis on oil production in OPEC sites in the Middle East. Since America consumes 20 million barrels a day, and China is now demanding more oil, then staking out the second largest oil reserves in the world in Iraq might have been considered essential. Or to ask the hard, hard question: Would we have gone to war if Iraq possessed the world's second largest reserve of figs, rather than oil?
Richard Babb is an attorney in Ripley. Hemay be reached at rjbabb56 at yahoo dot com.
6/26/2005 1:07:50
AMDaily Journal
It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government. – Thomas Paine
Back in 1963, as a well-scoured six-year-old preacher's kid, I spent much time playing in the dirt at the ramshackle home of my friend, Gary Lloyd. There I was introduced not only to the fine art of cussing, but also to Gary's sisters who somehow managed to freely frolic outside sans clothing. All of this occurred under the approving and watchful eye of Mrs. Loyd who always sat placidly and Buddha-like on the front porch with an unbuddha-like cigarette and drink.
At the same time that Gary and his sisters seemed intent on leading me down the road to a Mississippi Methodist Hell, the military leaders of the United States were planning to unleash another kind of hell, an attack on a country: it's own, the United States of America. According to released classified documents, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had concocted a plan in which the military would attack its own citizens and then fix the blame on Cuba and Fidel Castro. The plan, Operation Northwoods, included the indiscriminate killing of American citizens, hijacking of airliners, and even sabotaging the flight of Astronaut John Glenn as he rocketed into space.
Invasion pretext
The plan was presented to the Secretary of Defense and President Kennedy, both of whom rejected the operation as a bit too hare-brained, even though all of the medal-larded, and ribbon-befitted Joint Chiefs had signed off on it.
I thought about Operation Northwoods when I read of the recent death of Col. David Hackworth, the most decorated veteran of Vietnam, and in my opinion, a great American. Hackworth was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery on May 31, having died of bladder cancer which some believe was caused by a chemical defoliant sprayed during the Vietnam daze.
I didn't know of Hackworth until I saw him a few years ago on a news show. He was being interviewed the same night a peopled airliner had mysteriously dropped from the sky into the ocean outside New York. Several witnesses claimed they had seen a ground-to-air missile strike the plane, a proposition that had been immediately rejected by a government apparatchik. In response to the official's position, the bluntly-spoken Hackworth rejoined, "Well I haven't trusted the United States government since 1963," meaning of course that the colonel was stating on national television he was more likely to believe anonymous witnesses on the ground, rather than the mouthpiece for the government.
Honest skepticism
As a child of the 50's, 60's and 70's, I have come honestly to my dark scepticism about governments and maybe that is the reason I liked Col. Hackworth. He wasn't afraid to tell unpleasant truths even about the most sacrosanct of institutions. And it is a shame that he is no longer among the quick, because it appears that we now are headed once again into a collision with more governmental unpleasantness: questions about the war in Iraq.
A top secret document, leaked in England and known as the Downing Street Memo, maintains that the case for military action against Iraqi Dictator Saddam Hussein was "thin." The memo, which is actually minutes of a July 23, 2002 meeting with Great Britain's Prime Minister Blair, shows that the U.S. didn't believe that the threat from Iraq was greater than other nations, and therefore the intelligence had to be "fixed" in order to sell the war to the American people.
Of course, if the memo be true, and Bush knew there was not enough reason to justify the war, we are left with the numbing question: Why then did we go to Iraq? To that question, there has been presented more than one answer. Polls show that 40 percent of the people believe Saddam Hussein was behind 911. Another idea is that we invaded Iraq because Saddam Hussein had threatened to kill President Bush's father. Some argue that Bush went to Iraq not so much to avenge his father, but to complete the unfinished business of the first Gulf War. Most of these theories have been be rebutted if not outright, at least by common sense.
Occam's Razor is a theorem which holds that among the many plausible answers to a vexing question, the best answer is usually the simplest. Perhaps the simplest explanation for the war is to be found in a little-noted news release from the Exxon Corporation in which it has estimated that in five years cheap available oil production will have peaked in non-OPEC oil sites. Obviously, that would mean an increased emphasis on oil production in OPEC sites in the Middle East. Since America consumes 20 million barrels a day, and China is now demanding more oil, then staking out the second largest oil reserves in the world in Iraq might have been considered essential. Or to ask the hard, hard question: Would we have gone to war if Iraq possessed the world's second largest reserve of figs, rather than oil?
Richard Babb is an attorney in Ripley. Hemay be reached at rjbabb56 at yahoo dot com.
posted by Grace Reid at 5:45 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home