Military – Page 193 – Public Intelligence Blog

Marcus-Aurelius-150x150 — Marcus Aurelius

After a decade of ‘mission creep'–into diplomacy, agriculture, even energy policy–the Department of Defense has become America's default tool for dealing with the world. Where does this leave the next president?

By Thanassis Cambanis

Boston Globe, May 27, 2012

When President Obama and Mitt Romney cross swords on defense policy, it can sound like a schoolyard fight: Who loves the military more? Who is tougher? Who would lead a more muscular America?

expanding pentagon — Click on Image to Expand

This is the way we expect candidates to talk about defense: in terms of power, force, even national pride. But increasingly, when it comes to the role the Department of Defense actually plays for the nation, it misses the point. Over the past decade, the Pentagon has become far more complex than the conversation about it would suggest. What “military” means has changed sharply as the Pentagon has acquired an immense range of new expertise. What began as the world's most lethal strike force has grown into something much more wide-ranging and influential.

Today, the Pentagon is the chief agent of nearly all American foreign policy, and a major player in domestic policy as well. Its planning staff is charting approaches not only toward China but toward Latin America, Africa, and much of the Middle East. It's in part a development agency, and in part a diplomatic one, providing America's main avenue of contact with Africa and with pivotal oil- producing regimes. It has convened battalions of agriculture specialists, development experts, and economic analysts that dwarf the resources at the disposal of USAID or the State Department. It's responsible for protecting America's computer networks. In May of this year, the Pentagon announced it was creating its own new clandestine intelligence service. And the Pentagon has emerged as a surprisingly progressive voice in energy policy, openly acknowledging climate change and funding research into renewable energy sources.

Continue reading “Marcus Aurelius: For the Record – DoD Eats Entire US Government”

2012/05/262012/05/26

David Swanson: Lies and Consequences Across 15 Wars

04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Media, Military

Lies and Consequences in Our Past 15 Wars

By David Swanson

“Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their peoples in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was their object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us.”–Abraham Lincoln

Continue reading “David Swanson: Lies and Consequences Across 15 Wars”

2012/05/212012/05/21

Eagle: An End to Blind US Jewish Support for Neo-Nazi Zionist Israeli Government?

06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Military

Cross Talk : Farewell Israel?

Veterans Today, 21 May 2012

Is the American-Jewish romance with Israel coming to an end?
Are the American Jews known for their liberal views distancing themselves from Israel?
Or is it simply an overstatement?
Do they support the current Israeli policies?
Does the Israeli lobby represent their views?
And do they have a strong connection to the Holy Land?
Cross Talk with Norman Finkelstein, Daniel Pollak and Mouin Rabbani.

cover knowing too much — Amazon Page Pending

Norman Finkelstein's new book on the American Jewish community has been both widely praised and criticized by influential writers. So is the American-Jewish romance with Israel coming to an end? Are the American Jews known for their liberal views distancing themselves from Israel? Or is it simply an overstatement? Do they support the current Israeli policies? Does the Israeli lobby represent their views? And do they have a strong connection to the Holy Land? CT-ing with Norman Finkelstein, Daniel Pollak and Mouin Rabbani.

Phi Beta Iota: Israel is not the only albatross around the neck of the USA, there are others, but Israel (its government, not its people) is the one that has most often committed atrocities and sabotaged the USA with espionage, corruption, and inducing US Jews to commit treason–we refer especially to all those holding Top Secret / Sensitive Compartmented Information clearances who are either publicly or in some cases silently dual-citizens. What has been done to the Palestinian peoples has been a long-running crime against humanity, right up there with undeclared wars that produce depleted uranium babies and destroy entire societies for no decent moral reason. The Zionization of US foreign policy–and the castration of US financial policy–are two great crimes against humanity that are directly linked to the Zionist state of Israel and its twin agents, Mossad and Goldman Sachs/AIG et al. The Israeli attack on the USS Liberty did it for us–we would have wiped out the originating airfield and expelled the Israeli Embassy, and then removed the building from the planet, sowing salt in the dirt and making it a memorial to the perfidy of “friends.” We favor a two state solution that restores the Palestinian lands back to Biblical times, tears down the walls that Joseph Stalin would have been proud to call his own, and makes Jerusalem an international open city with a multi-religious governing council that excludes all state claims on any part of Jerusalem.

2009 The Attack on the Liberty: The Untold Story of Israel's Deadly 1967 Assault on a U.S. Spy Ship

2007 The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy

2003 They Dare to Speak Out: People and Institutions Confront Israel's Lobby

2012/05/21

Chuck Spinney: The Afghanistan Exit – Looting the Useful Idiots to the Bitter End

04 Inter-State Conflict, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Idiocy, Military

When Alexander the Great decided to leave Afghanistan, his plan was to exit via the Khyber Pass and march though what is now Pakistan and thence into India. But the Khyber was blocked by a warring Pashtun tribe. Legend has it that Alex's exit strategy was to bribe another Pashtun tribe to open the door by attacking and driving off the first tribe. The gambit worked and he escaped with his forces largely intact, Alexander looked shrewd in the history books. But is that the whole story?

I have often wondered if old Alex was snookered by two tribes in cahoots in a scheme to extort money and divide the proceeds from an invader desperate to leave. Of course we will never know if this actually happened, but as the following report in yesterday's Sunday Times suggests, my speculation has a quintessential Pashtun flavor and is therefore not outside the realm of probability.

Chuck Spinney
Port Cogolin, France

Afghan Troops And Tailban In Pact To Loot NATO Convoys

Secret alliances threaten to undermine the West's strategy of handing more responsibility for security to local forces

By Miles Amoore and Christina Lamb, London Sunday Times, May 20, 2012

THE two men should be sworn enemies. One is a Taliban commander waging what he says is a holy war against foreign soldiers in Afghanistan. The other is an Afghan army officer trained and paid by Nato to fight the Taliban.

Yet rather than do battle, the two men have forged a secret alliance. In the area of Ghazni province where both are based, just an hour's drive south of Kabul, they collaborate to loot Nato supply convoys, dividing up the proceeds. They even share intelligence about military operations.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: The Afghanistan Exit – Looting the Useful Idiots to the Bitter End”

2012/05/202016/03/25

Who’s Who in Peace Intelligence: Col Ted Westhusing, USA (RIP)

09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Ethics, Government, Law Enforcement, Military, Officers Call

Colonel Theodore S. Westhusing (November 17, 1960 – June 5, 2005),^[1] a West Point professor of English and Philosophy, volunteered to serve in Iraq in late 2004 and died in Baghdad from an allegedly self-inflicted gunshot wound in June 2005. At the time he was the highest ranked American to die violently in Iraq since the start of the March 2003 United States-led invasion. He was 44 years old, married with three young children.

The following is the suicide note left by Col. Westhusing to his commanding officer General Petraeus. The note was featured in an article by Robert Pryce, published in the Texas Observer on March 8, 2007:^[9]

Thanks for telling me it was a good day until I briefed you. [Redacted name]—You are only interested in your career and provide no support to your staff—no msn [mission] support and you don’t care. I cannot support a msn that leads to corruption, human right abuses and liars. I am sullied—no more. I didn’t volunteer to support corrupt, money grubbing contractors, nor work for commanders only interested in themselves. I came to serve honorably and feel dishonored. I trust no Iraqi. I cannot live this way. All my love to my family, my wife and my precious children. I love you and trust you only. Death before being dishonored any more. Trust is essential—I don’t know who trust anymore. [sic] Why serve when you cannot accomplish the mission, when you no longer believe in the cause, when your every effort and breath to succeed meets with lies, lack of support, and selfishness? No more. Reevaluate yourselves, cdrs [commanders]. You are not what you think you are and I know it.

COL Ted Westhusing

Life needs trust. Trust is no more for me here in Iraq.

Works by Col Ted Westhusing

Ted Westhusing (2003). A Beguiling Military Virtue: Honor. Journal of Military Ethics 2 (3):195-212.

Ted Westhusing (2003). Taking Terrorism and ROE Seriously. Journal of Military Ethics 2 (1):1-19.

Ted Westhusing (2002). ‘Target Approval Delays Cost Air Force Key Hits': Targeting Terror: Killing Al Qaeda the Right Way. Journal of Military Ethics 1 (2):128-135.

Links to Specific Stories and Comment by Robert Steele Below the Line

Continue reading “Who's Who in Peace Intelligence: Col Ted Westhusing, USA (RIP)”

2012/05/192012/05/19

Mini-Me: Veteran’s Today Warns of False Flag Terror in US End of May — Russians Exercising in US Around NORTHCOM with Mission to Take and Hold Denver Airport…G-8 Moved to Camp David

06 Russia, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Blog Wisdom, Corruption, DHS, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Law Enforcement, Military, Officers Call

Huh?

U.S. False Flag Likely May 20-31, 2012

By Captain Eric H. May, Ghost Troop CO

The breaking news from Chicago, ‘NATO 3’ had targeted Obama campaign HQ, Rahm’s house, police stations, prosecutors say, concurs with the analysis below:

The United States is hosting the G8, NATO and the Bilderberg Group in a two-week span, during which elite Russian troops will be occupying key points near Northern Command (NORTHCOM), and it isn’t hard to imagine another 9/11 coming from such a sinister combination of brains and brawn.

Starting with the premise that a false flag attack by the end of May is more likely than not, I’ll present the odds for the top targets and most dangerous days, then evaluate the various entities and individuals likely to be involved.

The top U.S. targets are:

Continue reading “Mini-Me: Veteran's Today Warns of False Flag Terror in US End of May — Russians Exercising in US Around NORTHCOM with Mission to Take and Hold Denver Airport…G-8 Moved to Camp David”

2012/05/182012/05/18

Eagle: Excuse Me, But Israel Has No Right To Exist

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military

Excuse Me, But Israel Has No Right To Exist

Grow a new vocabulary of possibilities – the new state will be the dawn of humanity's great reconciliation. Muslims, Christians and Jews living together in Palestine as they once did.

by Sharmine Narwani

Veterans Today, 17 May 2012

The phrase “right to exist” entered my consciousness in the 1990s just as the concept of the two-state solution became part of our collective lexicon. In any debate at university, when a Zionist was out of arguments, those three magic words were invoked to shut down the conversation with an outraged, “are you saying Israel doesn’t have the right to exist??”

Of course you couldn’t challenge Israel’s right to exist – that was like saying you were negating a fundamental Jewish right to have…rights, with all manner of Holocaust guilt thrown in for effect.

Except of course the Holocaust is not my fault – or that of Palestinians. The cold-blooded program of ethnically cleansing Europe of its Jewish population has been so callously and opportunistically utilized to justify the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian Arab nation, that it leaves me utterly unmoved. I have even caught myself – shock – rolling my eyes when I hear Holocaust and Israel in the same sentence.

What moves me instead in this post-two-state era, is the sheer audacity of Israel even existing.

Continue reading “Eagle: Excuse Me, But Israel Has No Right To Exist”