Text
by Michel Chossudovsky
September 9, 2010
from GlobalResearch Website
This article summarizes earlier writings by the author on 9/11 and the role of Al Qaeda in US foreign policy.
For further details see Michel Chossudovsky, America’s “War on Terrorism“, Global Research, 2005
“The United States spent millions of dollars to supply Afghan schoolchildren with textbooks filled with violent images and militant Islamic teachings….The primers, which were filled with talk of jihad and featured drawings of guns, bullets, soldiers and mines, have served since then as the Afghan school system’s core curriculum. Even the Taliban used the American-produced books…”
(Washington Post, 23 March 2002)
“Advertisements, paid for from CIA funds, were placed in newspapers and newsletters around the world offering inducements and motivations to join the [Islamic] Jihad.”
(Pervez Hoodbhoy, Peace Research, 1 May 2005)
“Bin Laden recruited 4,000 volunteers from his own country and developed close relations with the most radical mujahideen leaders. He also worked closely with the CIA, … Since September 11, [2001] CIA officials have been claiming they had no direct link to bin Laden.”
(Phil Gasper, International Socialist Review, November-December 2001)
Highlights
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Osama bin Laden, America’s bogyman, was recruited by the CIA in 1979 at the very outset of the US sponsored jihad. He was 22 years old and was trained in a CIA sponsored guerilla training camp.
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The architects of the covert operation in support of “Islamic fundamentalism” launched during the Reagan presidency played a key role in launching the “Global War on Terrorism” in the wake of 9/11.
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President Ronald Reagan met the leaders of the Islamic Jihad at the White House in 1985
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Under the Reagan administration, US foreign policy evolved towards the unconditional support and endorsement of the Islamic “freedom fighters”. In today’s World, the “freedom fighters” are labeled “Islamic terrorists”.
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In the Pashtun language, the word “Taliban” means “Students”, or graduates of the madrasahs (places of learning or coranic schools) set up by the Wahhabi missions from Saudi Arabia, with the support of the CIA.
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Education in Afghanistan in the years preceding the Soviet-Afghan war was largely secular. The US covert education destroyed secular education. The number of CIA sponsored religious schools (madrasahs) increased from 2,500 in 1980 to over 39,000.
The Soviet-Afghan war was part of a CIA covert agenda initiated during the Carter administration, which consisted in actively supporting and financing the Islamic brigades, later known as Al Qaeda.
The Pakistani military regime played from the outset in the late 1970s, a key role in the US sponsored military and intelligence operations in Afghanistan. In the post-Cold war era, this central role of Pakistan in US intelligence operations was extended to the broader Central Asia- Middle East region.
From the outset of the Soviet Afghan war in 1979, Pakistan under military rule actively supported the Islamic brigades. In close liaison with the CIA, Pakistan’s military intelligence, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), became a powerful organization, a parallel government, wielding tremendous power and influence.
America’s covert war in Afghanistan, using Pakistan as a launch pad, was initiated during the Carter administration prior to the Soviet “invasion”:
“According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahideen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul.
And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.”
(Former National Security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, Interview with Le Nouvel Observateur, 15-21 January 1998)
In the published memoirs of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who held the position of deputy CIA Director at the height of the Soviet Afghan war, US intelligence was directly involved from the outset, prior to the Soviet invasion, in channeling aid to the Islamic brigades.
Robert Gates
With CIA backing and the funneling of massive amounts of U.S. military aid, the Pakistani ISI had developed into a,
“parallel structure wielding enormous power over all aspects of government”.
(Dipankar Banerjee, “Possible Connection of ISI With Drug Industry”, India Abroad, 2 December 1994).
The ISI had a staff composed of military and intelligence officers, bureaucrats, undercover agents and informers, estimated at 150,000. (Ibid)
Meanwhile, CIA operations had also reinforced the Pakistani military regime led by General Zia Ul Haq:
“Relations between the CIA and the ISI had grown increasingly warm following [General] Zia’s ouster of Bhutto and the advent of the military regime… During most of the Afghan war, Pakistan was more aggressively anti-Soviet than even the United States. Soon after the Soviet military invaded Afghanistan in 1980, Zia [ul Haq] sent his ISI chief to destabilize the Soviet Central Asian states. The CIA only agreed to this plan in October 1984.”
(Ibid)
The ISI operating virtually as an affiliate of the CIA, played a central role in channeling support to Islamic paramilitary groups in Afghanistan and subsequently in the Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union.
Acting on behalf of the CIA, the ISI was also involved in the recruitment and training of the Mujahideen. In the ten year period from 1982 to 1992, some 35,000 Muslims from 43 Islamic countries were recruited to fight in the Afghan jihad. The madrassas in Pakistan, financed by Saudi charities, were also set up with US support with a view to “inculcating Islamic values”.
“The camps became virtual universities for future Islamic radicalism.”
(Ahmed Rashid, The Taliban)
Guerilla training under CIA-ISI auspices included targeted assassinations and car bomb attacks.
“Weapons’ shipments “were sent by the Pakistani army and the ISI to rebel camps in the North West Frontier Province near the Afghanistan border. The governor of the province is Lieutenant General Fazle Haq, who [according to Alfred McCoy] allowed “hundreds of heroin refineries to set up in his province.”
Beginning around 1982, Pakistani army trucks carrying CIA weapons from Karachi often pick up heroin in Haq’s province and return loaded with heroin. They are protected from police search by ISI papers.”
(1982-1989: US Turns Blind Eye to BCCI and Pakistani Government Involvement in Heroin Trade See also McCoy, 2003, p. 477) .
Front row, from left: Major Gen. Hamid Gul, director general of Pakistan’s
Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI), Director of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
Willian Webster; Deputy Director for Operations Clair George; an ISI colonel; and senior CIA official,
Milt Bearden at a mujahedeen training camp in North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan in 1987.
(source RAWA)
Osama Bin Laden
Osama bin Laden, America’s bogyman, was recruited by the CIA in 1979 at the very outset of the US sponsored jihad. He was 22 years old and was trained in a CIA sponsored guerilla training camp.
During the Reagan administration, Osama, who belonged to the wealthy Saudi Bin Laden family was put in charge of raising money for the Islamic brigades. Numerous charities and foundations were created.
The operation was coordinated by Saudi intelligence, headed by Prince Turki al-Faisal, in close liaison with the CIA. The money derived from the various charities were used to finance the recruitment of Mujahieen volunteers. Al Qaeda, the base in Arabic was a data bank of volunteers who had enlisted to fight in the Afghan jihad.
That data base was initially held by Osama bin Laden.
The Reagan Administration supports “Islamic Fundamentalism”
Pakistan’s ISI was used as a “go-between”.
CIA covert support to the Mujahideen in Afghanistan operated indirectly through the Pakistani ISI, – i.e. the CIA did not channel its support directly to the Mujahideen. In other words, for these covert operations to be “successful”, Washington was careful not to reveal the ultimate objective of the “jihad”, which consisted in destroying the Soviet Union.
In December 1984, the Sharia Law (Islamic jurisprudence) was established in Pakistan following a rigged referendum launched by President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.
Barely a few months later, in March 1985, President Ronald Reagan issued National Security Decision Directive 166 (NSDD 166), which authorized “stepped-up covert military aid to the Mujahideen” as well a support to religious indoctrination.
The imposition of The Sharia in Pakistan and the promotion of “radical Islam” was a deliberate US policy serving American geopolitical interests in South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. Many present-day “Islamic fundamentalist organizations” in the Middle East and Central Asia, were directly or indirectly the product of US covert support and financing, often channeled through foundations from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States.
Missions from the Wahhabi sect of conservative Islam in Saudi Arabia were put in charge of running the CIA sponsored madrassas in Northern Pakistan.
Under NSDD 166, a series of covert CIA-ISI operations was launched.
The US supplied weapons to the Islamic brigades through the ISI. CIA and ISI officials would meet at ISI headquarters in Rawalpindi to coordinate US support to the Mujahideen.
Under NSDD 166, the procurement of US weapons to the Islamic insurgents increased from 10,000 tons of arms and ammunition in 1983 to 65,000 tons annually by 1987.
“In addition to arms, training, extensive military equipment including military satellite maps and state-of-the-art communications equipment”
(University Wire, 7 May 2002).
Ronald Reagan meets Afghan Mujahideen Commanders
at the White House in 1985 (Reagan Archives)
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With William Casey as director of the CIA, NSDD 166 was described as the largest covert operation in US history:
The U.S. supplied support package had three essential components-organization and logistics, military technology, and ideological support for sustaining and encouraging the Afghan resistance….
U.S. counterinsurgency experts worked closely with the Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in organizing Mujahideen groups and in planning operations inside Afghanistan.
…But the most important contribution of the U.S. was to… bring in men and material from around the Arab world and beyond. The most hardened and ideologically dedicated men were sought on the logic that they would be the best fighters.
Advertisements, paid for from CIA funds, were placed in newspapers and newsletters around the world offering inducements and motivations to join the Jihad.
(Pervez Hoodbhoy, Afghanistan and the Genesis of the Global Jihad, Peace Research, 1 May 2005)
Religious Indoctrination
Under NSDD 166, US assistance to the Islamic brigades channeled through Pakistan was not limited to bona fide military aid.
Washington also supported and financed by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the process of religious indoctrination, largely to secure the demise of secular institutions:
… the United States spent millions of dollars to supply Afghan schoolchildren with textbooks filled with violent images and militant Islamic teachings, part of covert attempts to spur resistance to the Soviet occupation.
The primers, which were filled with talk of jihad and featured drawings of guns, bullets, soldiers and mines, have served since then as the Afghan school system’s core curriculum. Even the Taliban used the American-produced books,..
The White House defends the religious content, saying that Islamic principles permeate Afghan culture and that the books “are fully in compliance with U.S. law and policy.” Legal experts, however, question whether the books violate a constitutional ban on using tax dollars to promote religion.
…AID officials said in interviews that they left the Islamic materials intact because they feared Afghan educators would reject books lacking a strong dose of Muslim thought.
The agency removed its logo and any mention of the U.S. government from the religious texts, AID spokeswoman Kathryn Stratos said.
“It’s not AID’s policy to support religious instruction,” Stratos said. “But we went ahead with this project because the primary purpose… is to educate children, which is predominantly a secular activity.”
… Published in the dominant Afghan languages of Dari and Pashtun, the textbooks were developed in the early 1980s under an AID grant to the University of Nebraska -Omaha and its Center for Afghanistan Studies. The agency spent $ 51 million on the university’s education programs in Afghanistan from 1984 to 1994.”
(Washington Post, 23 March 2002)
The Role of the NeoCons
There is continuity. The architects of the covert operation in support of “Islamic fundamentalism” launched during the Reagan presidency played a key role in launching the “Global War on Terrorism” in the wake of 9/11.
Several of the NeoCons of the Bush Junior Administration were high ranking officials during the Reagan presidency.
Richard Armitage, was Deputy Secretary of State during George W. Bush’s first term (2001-2004). He played a central key role in post 9/11 negotiations with Pakistan leading up to the October 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. During the Reagan era, he held the position of Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy.
In this capacity, he played a key role in the implementation of NSDD 163 while also ensuring liaison with the Pakistani military and intelligence apparatus.
Richard L. Armitage
Meanwhile, Paul Wolfowitz was at the State Department in charge of a foreign policy team composed, among others, of Lewis Libby, Francis Fukuyama and Zalmay Khalilzad.
Wolfowitz’s group was also involved in laying the conceptual groundwork of US covert support to Islamic parties and organizations in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Paul Wolfowitz
Zalmay Khalilzad.
Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, who now serves the Obama administration, was also involved in setting the groundwork for CIA covert operations.
He was appointed Deputy Director for Intelligence by Ronald Reagan in 1982, and Deputy Director of the CIA in 1986, a position which he held until 1989. Gates played a key role in the formulation of NSDD 163, which established a consistent framework for promoting Islamic fundamentalism and channeling covert support to the Islamic brigades.
He was also involved in the Iran Contra scandal.
The Iran Contra Operation
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Richard Gates
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Colin Powell
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Richard Armitage,
…among others, were also involved in the Iran-Contra operation.
Armitage was in close liaison with Colonel Oliver North. His deputy and chief anti-terrorist official Noel Koch was part of the team set up by Oliver North. Of significance, the Iran-Contra operation was also tied into the process of channeling covert support to the Islamic brigades in Afghanistan.
The Iran Contra scheme served several related foreign policy:
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Procurement of weapons to Iran thereby feeding the Iraq-Iran war
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Support to the Nicaraguan Contras
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Support to the Islamic brigades in Afghanistan, channeled via Pakistan’s ISI
Following the delivery of the TOW anti-tank missiles to Iran, the proceeds of these sales were deposited in numbered bank accounts and the money was used to finance the Nicaraguan Contras and the Mujahideen:
“The Washington Post reported that profits from the Iran arms sales were deposited in one CIA-managed account into which the U.S. and Saudi Arabia had placed $250 million apiece. That money was disbursed not only to the contras in Central America but to the rebels fighting Soviet troops in Afghanistan.”
(US News & World Report, 15 December 1986).
Although Lieutenant General Colin Powell, was not directly involved in the arms’ transfer negotiations, which had been entrusted to Oliver North, he was among,
“at least five men within the Pentagon who knew arms were being transferred to the CIA.”
(The Record, 29 December 1986).
In this regard, Powell was directly instrumental in giving the “green light” to lower-level officials in blatant violation of Congressional procedures.
According to the New York Times, Colin Powell took the decision (at the level of military procurement), to allow the delivery of weapons to Iran:
“Hurriedly, one of the men closest to Secretary of Defense Weinberger, Maj. Gen. Colin Powell, bypassed the written ”focal point system” procedures and ordered the Defense Logistics Agency [responsible for procurement] to turn over the first of 2,008 TOW missiles to the CIA., which acted as cutout for delivery to Iran”
(New York Times, 16 February 1987)
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was also implicated in the Iran-Contra Affair.
The Golden Crescent Drug Trade
The history of the drug trade in Central Asia is intimately related to the CIA’s covert operations. Prior to the Soviet-Afghan war, opium production in Afghanistan and Pakistan was directed to small regional markets. There was no local production of heroin. (Alfred McCoy, Drug Fallout: the CIA’s Forty Year Complicity in the Narcotics Trade. The Progressive, 1 August 1997).
Alfred McCoy’s study confirms that within two years of the onslaught of the CIA operation in Afghanistan, “the Pakistan-Afghanistan borderlands became the world’s top heroin producer.” (Ibid) Various Islamic paramilitary groups and organizations were created.
The proceeds of the Afghan drug trade, which was protected by the CIA, were used to finance the various insurgencies:
“Under CIA and Pakistani protection, Pakistan military and Afghan resistance opened heroin labs on the Afghan and Pakistani border. According to The Washington Post of May 1990, among the leading heroin manufacturers were Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an Afghan leader who received about half of the covert arms that the U.S. shipped to Pakistan.
Although there were complaints about Hekmatyar’s brutality and drug trafficking within the ranks of the Afghan resistance of the day, the CIA maintained an uncritical alliance and supported him without reservation or restraint.
Once the heroin left these labs in Pakistan’s northwest frontier, the Sicilian Mafia imported the drugs into the U.S., where they soon captured sixty percent of the U.S. heroin market. That is to say, sixty percent of the U.S. heroin supply came indirectly from a CIA operation.
During the decade of this operation, the 1980s, the substantial DEA contingent in Islamabad made no arrests and participated in no seizures, allowing the syndicates a de facto free hand to export heroin. By contrast, a lone Norwegian detective, following a heroin deal from Oslo to Karachi, mounted an investigation that put a powerful Pakistani banker known as President Zia’s surrogate son behind bars. The DEA in Islamabad got nobody, did nothing, stayed away.
Former CIA operatives have admitted that this operation led to an expansion of the Pakistan-Afghanistan heroin trade.
In 1995 the former CIA Director of this Afghan operation, Mr. Charles Cogan, admitted sacrificing the drug war to fight the Cold War.
“Our main mission was to do as much damage to the Soviets. We didn’t really have the resources or the time to devote to an investigation of the drug trade,” he told Australian television. “I don’t think that we need to apologize for this. Every situation has its fallout. There was fallout in terms of drugs, yes, but the main objective was accomplished. The Soviets left Afghanistan.”
(Alfred McCoy, Testimony before the Special Seminar focusing on allegations linking CIA secret operations and drug trafficking-convened February 13, 1997, by Rep. John Conyers, Dean of the Congressional Black Caucus)
Lucrative Narcotics Trade in the Post Cold War Era
The drug trade has continued unabated during the post Cold war years.
Afghanistan became the major supplier of heroin to Western markets, in fact almost the sole supplier: more than 90 percent of the heroin sold Worldwide originates in Afghanistan. This lucrative contraband is tied into Pakistani politics and the militarization of the Pakistani State.
It also has a direct bearing on the structure of the Pakistani economy and its banking and financial institutions, which from the outset of the Golden Crescent drug trade have been involved in extensive money laundering operations, which are protected by the Pakistani military and intelligence apparatus:
According to the US State Department International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (2006),
“Pakistani criminal networks play a central role in the transshipment of narcotics and smuggled goods from Afghanistan to international markets. Pakistan is a major drug-transit country. The proceeds of narcotics trafficking and funding for terrorist activities are often laundered by means of the alternative system called hawala…
“Repeatedly, a network of private unregulated charities has also emerged as a significant source of illicit funds for international terrorist networks,” the report pointed out… “
The hawala system and the charities are but the tip of the iceberg.
According to the State Department report,
“the State Bank of Pakistan has frozen more twenty years, a meager $10.5 million belonging to 12 entities and individuals linked to Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda or the Taliban”.
What the report fails to mention is that the bulk of the proceeds of the Afghan drug trade are laundered in bona fide Western banking institutions.
The Taliban Repress the Drug Trade
A major and unexpected turnaround in the CIA sponsored drug trade occurred in 2000.
The Taliban government which came to power in 1996 with Washington’s support, implemented in 2000-2001 a far-reaching opium eradication program with the support of the United Nations which served to undermine a multibillion dollar trade. (For further details see, Michel Chossudovsky, America’s War on Terrorism, Global Research, 2005).
In 2001 prior to the US-led invasion, opium production under the Taliban eradication program declined by more than 90 percent.
In the immediate wake of the US led invasion, the Bush administration ordered that the opium harvest not be destroyed on the fabricated pretext that this would undermine the military government of Pervez Musharraf.
“Several sources inside Capitol Hill noted that the CIA opposes the destruction of the Afghan opium supply because to do so might destabilize the Pakistani government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf. According to these sources, Pakistani intelligence had threatened to overthrow President Musharraf if the crops were destroyed…
‘If they [the CIA] are in fact opposing the destruction of the Afghan opium trade, it’ll only serve to perpetuate the belief that the CIA is an agency devoid of morals; off on their own program rather than that of our constitutionally elected government'”.
Since the US led invasion, opium production has increased 33 fold from 185 tons in 2001 under the Taliban to 6100 tons in 2006. Cultivated areas have increased 21 fold since the 2001 US-led invasion. (Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, 6 January 2006)
In 2007, Afghanistan supplied approximately 93% of the global supply of heroin. The proceeds (in terms of retail value) of the Afghanistan drug trade are estimated (2006) to be in excess of 190 billion dollars a year, representing a significant fraction of the global trade in narcotics. (Ibid)
The proceeds of this lucrative multibillion dollar contraband are deposited in Western banks. Almost the totality of the revenues accrue to corporate interests and criminal syndicates outside Afghanistan.
The laundering of drug money constitutes a multibillion dollar activity, which continues to be protected by the CIA and the ISI. In the wake of the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan.
In retrospect, one of the major objectives of the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan was to restore the drug trade.
The militarization of Pakistan serves powerful political, financial and criminal interests underlying the drug trade. US foreign policy tends to support these powerful interests. The CIA continues to protect the Golden Crescent narcotics trade.
Despite his commitment to eradicating the drug trade, opium production under the regime of Afghan President Hamid Karzai has skyrocketed.
The Assassination of General Zia Ul-Haq
In August 1988, President Zia was killed in an air crash together with US Ambassador to Pakistan Arnold Raphel and several of Pakistan’s top generals. The circumstances of the air crash remain shrouded in mystery.
Following Zia’s death, parliamentary elections were held and Benazir Bhutto was sworn in as Prime Minister in December 1988. She was subsequently removed from office by Zia’s successor, President Ghulam Ishaq Khan on the grounds of alleged corruption. In 1993, she was re-elected and was again removed from office in 1996 on the orders of President Farooq Leghari.
Continuity has been maintained throughout.
Under the short-lived post-Zia elected governments of Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, the central role of the military-intelligence establishment and its links to Washington were never challenged.
Both Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif served US foreign policy interests. While in power, both democratically elected leaders, nonetheless supported the continuity of military rule.
As prime minister from 1993 to 1996, Benazir Bhutto,
“advocated a conciliatory policy toward Islamists, especially the Taliban in Afghanistan” which were being supported by Pakistan’s ISI.
Benazir Bhutto’s successor as Prime Minister, Mia Muhammad Nawaz Sharif of the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) was deposed in 1999 in a US supported coup d’Etat led by General Pervez Musharraf.
The 1999 coup was instigated by General Pervez Musharaf, with the support of the Chief of General Staff, Lieutenant General Mahmoud Ahmad, who was subsequently appointed to the key position of head of military intelligence (ISI).
From the outset of the Bush administration in 2001, General Ahmad developed close ties not only with his US counterpart CIA director George Tenet, but also with key members of the US government including Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, not to mention Porter Goss, who at the time was Chairman of the House Committee on Intelligence.
Ironically, Mahmoud Ahmad is also known, according to a September 2001 FBI report, for his suspected role in supporting and financing the alleged 9/11 terrorists as well as his links to Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Concluding Remarks
These various “terrorist” organizations were created as a result of CIA support. They are not the product of religion. The project to establish “a pan-Islamic Caliphate” is part of a carefully devised intelligence operation.
CIA support to Al Qaeda was not in any way curtailed at the end of the Cold War. In fact quite the opposite. The earlier pattern of covert support took on a global thrust and became increasingly sophisticated.
The “Global War on Terrorism” is a complex and intricate intelligence construct.
The covert support provided to “Islamic extremist groups” is part of an imperial agenda. It purports to weaken and eventually destroy secular and civilian governmental institutions, while also contributing to vilifying Islam. It is an instrument of colonization which seeks to undermine sovereign nation-states and transform countries into territories.
For the intelligence operation to be successful, however, the various Islamic organizations created and trained by the CIA must remain unaware of the role they are performing on the geopolitical chessboard, on behalf of Washington.
Over the years, these organizations have indeed acquired a certain degree of autonomy and independence, in relation to their US-Pakistani sponsors. That appearance of “independence”, however, is crucial; it is an integral part of the covert intelligence operation.
According to former CIA agent Milton Beardman the Mujahideen were invariably unaware of the role they were performing on behalf of Washington.
In the words of bin Laden (quoted by Beardman):
“neither I, nor my brothers saw evidence of American help”.
(Weekend Sunday (NPR); Eric Weiner, Ted Clark; 16 August 1998)
“Motivated by nationalism and religious fervor, the Islamic warriors were unaware that they were fighting the Soviet Army on behalf of Uncle Sam. While there were contacts at the upper levels of the intelligence hierarchy, Islamic rebel leaders in theatre had no contacts with Washington or the CIA.”
(Michel Chossudovsky, America’s War on Terrorism, Chapter 2).
The fabrication of “terrorism” – including covert support to terrorists – is required to provide legitimacy to the “war on terrorism”.
The various fundamentalist and paramilitary groups involved in US sponsored “terrorist” activities are “intelligence assets”. In the wake of 9/11, their designated function as “intelligence assets” is to perform their role as credible “enemies of America”.
Under the Bush administration, the CIA continued to support (via Pakistan’s ISI) several Pakistani based Islamic groups.
The ISI is known to support,
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Jamaat a-Islami, which is also present in South East Asia
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Lashkar-e-Tayyaba
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Jehad a-Kashmiri
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Hizbul-Mujahidin
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Jaish-e-Mohammed
The Islamic groups created by the CIA are also intended to rally public support in Muslim countries.
The underlying objective is to create divisions within national societies throughout the Middle East and Central Asia, while also triggering sectarian strife within Islam, ultimately with a view to curbing the development of a broad based secular mass resistance, which would challenge US imperial ambitions.
This function of an outside enemy is also an essential part of war propaganda required to galvanize Western public opinion.
Without an enemy, a war cannot be fought. US foreign policy needs to fabricate an enemy, to justify its various military interventions in the Middle East and Central Asia. An enemy is required to justify a military agenda, which consists in “going after Al Qaeda”.
The fabrication and vilification of the enemy are required to justify military action.
The existence of an outside enemy sustains the illusion that the “war on terrorism” is real. It justifies and presents military intervention as a humanitarian operation based on the right to self-defense. It upholds the illusion of a “conflict of civilizations”. The underlying purpose ultimately is to conceal the real economic and strategic objectives behind the broader Middle East Central Asian war.
Historically, Pakistan has played a central role in “war on terrorism”. Pakistan constitutes from Washington’s standpoint a geopolitical hub. It borders onto Afghanistan and Iran.
It has played a crucial role in the conduct of US and allied military operations in Afghanistan as well as in the context of the Pentagon’s war plans in relation to Iran.
by Mike Marion
July 19, 2014
from PressTV Website
U.S. military troops and bases around the world
It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when it happened, but clear evidence can be seen at least in the aftermath of World War II.
Some trace the origins back to 1898 and the Spanish-American War, or even earlier to the War of 1812. And still others would say that imperial ambitions were even on the minds of some of the Founding Fathers.
Regardless, there can be no doubt that today the United States of America is an ’empire‘. It is probably safe to assume that most Americans do not think of their country as an empire.
As a conservative in my younger years, I might have even labeled the suggestion as anti-American, rationalizing to myself:
Sure, we may have strategic military bases around the world and we may use force at times, but it is only for benevolent purposes.
We get the bad guys, give the country back to the good guys, and we leave. The U.S. does not try to rule the world.
I was wrong…
While it has indeed expanded its borders through conquest in the past, the modern United States exercises its global hegemony in a different way than the old colonial empires:
through a worldwide network of military bases.
This network is so vast that there is probably not one single individual who knows precisely how many bases exist at any given time, but even the Pentagon acknowledges that the number is over 600, and with an honest assessment the total would surely be much higher than that, possibly over 1,000.
The fact is that America’s unique empire is the most expansive in all of history, covering 6 of 7 continents and nearly 150 countries, and including what are essentially 10 floating bases (or is it 19?) capable of establishing a military presence in any ocean on earth.
There are currently about 160,000 U.S. soldiers officially deployed overseas, along with many more tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of individuals such as spies, technicians and civilian contractors. This comes at an enormous cost, measurable in many different ways.
Among these are the cost in blood, the price in dollars, and the impact on American society.
Blood
Just since WWII, the American Empire has sacrificed the lives of over 100,000 of its soldiers.
The bulk of this number is accounted for in the Vietnam War and the Korean War, both undeclared and unnecessary wars. The remainder is mostly made up of deaths in the so-called War on Terror in both Afghanistan and Iraq – 6,822 to be exact, but the War on Terror is perpetual by its own definition and by design, so this number is most certainly not final.
On top of this number – which is already more than double the deaths on 9/11 – are many tens of thousands wounded.
The battlefield is not the only place where the blood of soldiers is spilled. A shocking twenty-two U.S. veterans commit suicide every single day, with nearly one active duty soldier suicide per day. This means that there are currently more soldiers taking their own lives than being killed on the battlefield.
The common diagnosis of this epidemic is the inadequate treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
However, as the Future of Freedom Foundation’s Jacob Hornberger suggests, the root cause may be more accurately identified as,
“guilt-massive unresolved guilt over the wrongful killing of other human beings” in unjust wars like Iraq.
The cost in the blood of innocent civilians has been astronomically higher than that of soldiers – well into the millions.
The Vietnam War alone saw the deaths of two million civilians. Throughout the 1990s and following the first war on Iraq by the first president Bush, the U.S. caused the deaths of as many as half a million children with its crippling sanctions aimed at punishing former U.S. ally Saddam Hussein, a price that the Clinton administration said was “worth it” (not just once, but twice).
In 2003, the second president Bush again invaded Iraq, and for reasons that were demonstrated to be lies.
There were over 133,000 individually recorded civilian deaths due to direct violence, but this number is known to be very low. It is estimated that the total count of Iraqi deaths, both civilians and fighters, due to the U.S. invasion could be over 650,000 and possibly even over a million.
Over 11 years later, people continue to die daily as a result of the violence that consumes the country.
In addition, between 1.5 and 4.5 million people have been displaced from their homes, surely never to return. Further, post-war Iraq has been plagued with a dramatic increase in cancer and birth defects – likely the result of the U.S. military’s use of depleted uranium and white phosphorus.
In Afghanistan, the number of children dying from unexploded ordnance left behind by the U.S. military is rising.
American forces have removed munitions from only 3 percent of the,
“800 square miles of land littered with undetonated grenades, rockets and mortar shells”.
Although military officials say they intend to clean up the munitions left behind, other former U.S. warzones remain deadly to this day, including Vietnam where bombs continue to kill civilians over 40 years after the last American soldier left the country.
The latest trend of U.S. Empire-imposed death on foreigners (as well as four American citizens) is through drone strikes.
President Obama has heavily increased the use of drones throughout the world, and there has been much evidence showing a high rate of civilian deaths. In an effort to distort the numbers of civilian drone victims, Obama has redefined the word “militant” to mean any military-aged male killed within a blast radius.
In other words, he has redefined “civilian” to not include any male above the age of 18 regardless of whether he is actually a civilian.
The Obama administration has even routinely and intentionally targeted first responders to the scene of drone attacks in “double tap” strikes (which the U.S. considers “terrorism” if done by others), in addition to striking multiple wedding parties in what it claims were mistakes.
Treasure
The official budget for the Department of Defense is about $500 billion.
However, this does not give an accurate picture of what the U.S. actually spends on militarism. The official figures exclude significant expenditures that are spread throughout the Federal government.
For 2015, this includes,
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$157 billion in veterans’ benefits
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$83 billion in non-veteran military benefits
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$19 billion to maintain the U.S. nuclear arsenal (categorized under the Department of Energy)
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$41 billion for the Department of Homeland Security
The official numbers also exclude the interest on the national debt from past military spending, which is conservatively estimated to be over $185 billion annually, and some estimate to be up to $364 billion for fiscal year 2015.
When taking into account these and other non-Department of Defense expenditures, the annual cost of the Empire easily tops $1 trillion.
To understand how expensive the U.S. Empire’s wars are, consider the recent War on Iraq. The cost to date is over $1.7 trillion with an additional $490 billion in veteran benefits that must be paid. That price tag is jaw dropping as it is, particularly in light of the Bush administrations absurdly low predictions in the $50 billion to $60 billion range.
But the true costs when accounting for interest over the next four decades could be a staggering $6 trillion.
In addition to the direct costs, there is enormous opportunity cost as a result of the massive government expenditure on militarism. This cost is incalculable, since it is impossible to know the productive uses to which capital may have been put had it not been squandered by the government and diverted to destructive purposes.
But it is reasonable to expect that regardless of where the money went, it would have been more productive than building weapons to blow up people and property in aggressive wars of choice.
Soul
Perhaps the most insidious effect of imperialism is that which it has on the society that lives under it.
The family is subordinated to the State as soldiers leave their loved ones behind to go fight in wars ostensibly to defend freedom and keep Americans safe, but which in reality have little to do with these reasons and are instead primarily about fighting for the interests of the Empire.
Fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, sons and daughters are killed, maimed and psychologically scarred for life. Thousands of orphans and widows are created, and the impact is felt throughout generations.
Sporting events and other recreational activities prominently feature the military and have become celebrations of war, many of them complete with soldiers in uniform marching with guns and fighter jets flying overhead. Many Americans have been convinced that it is necessary for the U.S. to maintain a prison camp in Cuba (of all places!) where inmates are held indefinitely without trial in abhorrent conditions and even in spite of many having long been cleared for release.
Actions that would have been abominable to most people in any other circumstance – such as torture – are gradually accepted.
Even many churches are overcome with nationalism and abandon their religious teachings of peace.
“Support the troops” becomes the highest virtue, supplanting The Golden Rule and “blessed are the peacemakers”.
Constant imperial aggression seems to have a conditioning effect on a society.
People who live under empire grow to accept similar treatment as those on the receiving end of their government’s foreign violence.
Mark Twain identified this phenomenon when he predicted in 1909 the eventual results of imperialism following the U.S. conquest of the Philippines:
Lust of conquest had long ago done its work; trampling upon the helpless abroad had taught her, by a natural process, to endure with apathy the like at home; multitudes who had applauded the crushing of other people’s liberties, lived to suffer for their mistake in their own persons.
This sentiment is put even more succinctly by the inimitable Scott Horton who paraphrases the late American author and professor Chalmers Johnson by saying:
“You either give up your empire or you live under it.”
Evidence of the truth of these statements can be seen in the way Americans are treated domestically by government forces.
The U.S. has the largest prison population in the world, with half of inmates imprisoned for drug offenses. There are over 100 SWAT team raids per day in this country, many of them no-knock raids conducted in the middle of the night with disastrous consequences to totally innocent victims.
In post-9/11 America, it has become commonly accepted that one must submit to either a full body scan or an intrusive pat down at the hands of a government employee before boarding an airplane. Americans live under the largest surveillance apparatus in world history.
The NSA collects billions of phone calls, emails and cell phone location records every month without a warrant or even probable cause. The notion of being secure in one’s person and property from government intrusion is virtually a thing of the past.
Ultimately, the justifications given for a global U.S. military presence are false.
As a result of the Empire, Americans are less free, and they are also less safe due to the hatred that their government’s actions throughout the world engender. Americans are immeasurably poorer as a result of massive government spending and debt.
And as subjects of the U.S. Empire, many Americans sacrifice a part of their humanity and even begin to view people outside of their country the same way their government does, and are gradually finding themselves treated similarly at home as well.
The price of the Empire – in blood, treasure and soul – is simply too high to tolerate.
by Michael Kane
January 18, 2005 (FTW)
from FromTheWilderness Website
In an argument of over 600 pages and 1,000 footnotes, Crossing the Rubicon makes the case for official complicity within the U.S. government and names Dick Cheney as the prime suspect in the crimes of 9/11. Since the publication of this book (to which I had the privilege of contributing a chapter), many people have asked to hear the case against Cheney argued “short & sweet.”
I will make it as short as possible, but it can never be sweet.
There are 3 major points made within this book that are crucial to proving Cheney’s guilt. I shall first list them and then go on to prove each point as laid out in Crossing the Rubicon.
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Means – Dick Cheney and the Secret Service: Dick Cheney was running a completely separate chain of Command & Control via the Secret Service, assuring the paralysis of Air Force response on 9/11. The Secret Service has the technology to see the same radar screens the FAA sees in real time. They also have the legal authority and technological capability to take supreme command in cases of national emergency. Dick Cheney was the acting Commander in Chief on 9/11. (Click here for a summary of these points)
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Motive – Peak Oil: At some point between 2000 and 2007, world oil production reaches its peak; from that point on, every barrel of oil is going to be harder to find, more expensive to recover, and more valuable to those who recover and control it. Dick Cheney was well aware of the coming Peak Oil crisis at least as early as 1999, and 9/11 provided the pretext for the series of energy wars that Cheney stated, “will not end in our lifetime.” (Click here for a summary of these points)
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Opportunity – 9/11 War Games: The Air Force was running multiple war games on the morning of 9/11 simulating hijackings over the continental United States that included (at least) one “live-fly” exercise as well as simulations that placed “false blips” on FAA radar screens. These war games eerily mirrored the real events of 9/11 to the point of the Air Force running drills involving hijacked aircraft as the 9/11 plot actually unfolded. The war games & terror drills played a critical role in ensuring no Air Force fighter jocks – who had trained their entire lives for this moment – would be able to prevent the attacks from succeeding. These exercises were under Dick Cheney’s management. (Click here for a summary of these points)
Here is the supporting documentation as laid out in Crossing the Rubicon, making a legal case against Dick Cheney for the crimes of 9/11.
MEANS: Dick Cheney and the Secret Service
As the 9/11 plot unfolded, it has been reported that Secret Service whisked Dick Cheney into an underground presidential bunker at 9:03.1 This establishes that the Secret Service was in the loop giving orders by at least 9:03, and almost certainly much earlier, as we will show.
Former counter-terrorism advisor Richard Clarke writes in Against All Enemies:
“Secret Service had a system that allowed them to see what FAA’s radar was seeing.”
The Kean Commission (also known as the 9/11 Commission) would have us believe that the chain of command on 9/11 was a complex web, but in reality the Secret Service had the authority to communicate presidential and vice presidential orders directly to fighter pilots in the air. 2
In Air War Over America, a book commissioned by the Air Force documenting the morning of 9/11, it is stated that the FAA contacted Otis Air Force base informing them Flight 11 was headed to Manhattan and had lost its identification signal by 8:30.3 This indicates Secret Service was in the loop by the same time, or shortly thereafter, since they are able to see FAA radar screens in real time and FAA is reaching out to the military. There is no question that by 8:45 at the absolute latest, likely much earlier, Secret Service is in the decision-making loop.
They were most likely in the loop after 8:15 when flight 11 turned its transponder off.
National Special Security Event
It is the Secret Service who has the legal mandate to take supreme command in case of a scheduled major event – or an unplanned major emergency – on American soil; these are designated “National Special Security Events.” The Atlanta Olympic Games and the Republican & Democratic National Conventions are notable examples of NSSE’s. In preparation, the Secret Service runs training initiatives of simulated attacks and field exercises for such events. 4
The Secret Service works with state and local authorities as well as the military to coordinate security efforts; it has the best communication system of any agency in the country; and its personnel are always present with both the President and Vice President – making it the perfect agency to take supreme command in case of a major emergency on American soil. 5
When 9/11 occurred, the legal framework was in place to allow the Secret Service to take supreme command over any and all American agencies, including the Air Force. 6
Richard Clarke writes in Against All Enemies:
“I was amazed at the speed of the decisions coming from Cheney and, through him, from Bush.” 7
This is to be expected. Everything was in place for the Commander in Chief to be calling all the shots as the 9/11 plot unfolded, but Bush was in an elementary school reading about goats with Secret Service agents right beside him.
Bush’s Secret Service detail was in real-time communication not only with the FAA, but also the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center), into which Dick Cheney had reportedly been whisked by the Secret Service. While Bush continued his elementary school photo-op after being told,
“America is under attack,” Ari Fleischer – according to the Washington Times, 10/7/02 – caught the president’s eye and held up a handwritten sign that said “DON’T SAY ANYTHING YET.” 8
Bush was intentionally being kept out of the decision-making loop during the critical moments of 9/11. The Vice President has no place in the official military chain of command.9
Thus far we have established that:
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Secret Service was the supreme command on 9/11.
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Bush was not in the role of Commander in Chief at critical times on 9/11.
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The acting Commander in Chief as the 9/11 plot unfolded was Dick Cheney.
MOTIVE: Peak Oil
By definition, world hydrocarbon (oil and gas) production peaks when half the planet’s reserves have been used up. After that point, every barrel of oil will be harder to find, more expensive to obtain, and more valuable to whoever controls it. Many of the world’s foremost experts place that peak between 2000 and 2007.
We live in a global economic system based on endless growth, and that growth is only possible with endless hydrocarbons to burn. Demand for oil and gas is increasing at staggering rates; after peak, there will be demand that simply cannot be met, and energy prices will rise inexorably.
The resulting economic catastrophe may see oil hit $100 per barrel before the end of this decade. Oil not only keeps us warm and moves our cars, it is used to make all plastics and is, together with natural gas, the most important ingredient keeping modern agriculture afloat. It is a little known fact that for every 1 calorie of food energy produced, 10 calories of hydrocarbons are consumed. 10
We eat oil.
Without cheap oil, billions of people will freeze or starve and unfortunately, there is no combination of renewable energy sources that can replace oil and gas consumption without massive conservation efforts that are nowhere in sight.
Cheney knew about this.
There are no national plans for conservation in America. As Dick Cheney has stated,
“The American way of life is not negotiable.”
Over-consumption is as American as apple pie. Many industry experts have been speaking to the reality of Peak Oil for some time. One of those experts – perhaps the most prominent in the world – was in Dick Cheney‘s National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG).
Just four days after Dick Cheney became Vice President he convened the NEPDG. 11 Among the experts whose opinion Cheney paid for (with taxpayer dollars) was Matthew Simmons, one of the most respected energy investment bankers in the world. Simmons has been speaking out about Peak Oil for years, and there is no question that the urgent story of Peak Oil is what he told Cheney’s NEPDG.
The content of the NEPDG documentation has been illegally withheld from the American public with a rubber stamp of approval from the Supreme Court. FTW has always contended that the deepest, darkest secrets of 9/11 are in those documents. That’s why they’ve been guarded so tightly.
Cheney knew about Peak Oil in 1999 as CEO of Halliburton, long before was Vice President. A speech he gave at the London Institute of Petroleum demonstrates this clearly. 12
As stated in Crossing the Rubicon,
“By way of confirmation, people in and close to the oil industry are reporting that increased drilling is not resulting as yet in significantly increased supply.” 13
A crisis of this magnitude required a crisis plan, something the Neo-Liberals didn’t have. The Neo-Conservatives, including Dick Cheney, had such a plan: manufacture a crisis – one that had long been imagined as necessary by elite planners inside the national security state14 – and use it to maintain permanent war to steal the world’s last remaining hydrocarbons and temporarily stave off the Peak Oil crisis.
OPPORTUNITY: 9/11 War Games – a perfect “match”
On May 8, 2001 – four months prior to 9/11 – the president placed Dick Cheney in charge of,
“[A]ll federal programs dealing with weapons of mass destruction consequence management within the Departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Justice, and Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and other federal agencies…”
This included all “training and planning” which needed to be “seamlessly integrated, harmonious and comprehensive” in order to “maximize effectiveness.” This mandate created the Office of National Preparedness in FEMA, overseen by Dick Cheney. 15
Dick Cheney was placed directly in charge of managing the seamless integration of all training exercises throughout the entire federal government and all military agencies. On 9/11 Cheney oversaw multiple war games and terror drills, including several exercises of NORAD, the Air Force agency whose mandate is to “watch the sky.”
The evening before September 11th, 2001, the National Security Agency (NSA) intercepted a communication between Khalid Shaikh Muhammad and the alleged ringleader of the 9/11 attacks, Mohammed Atta.
The communication stated,
“The match is about to begin.”
Were they “matching” their activities to the war games? Was the attack a rigged “match” between the defenders on one side, and the attackers with their accomplices on the other?
The Whitehouse was so infuriated when this communication leaked from the Senate Intelligence Committee that they threatened Senators with polygraphs and office searches for disclosing classified information. This leak struck a nerve within the Whitehouse.
We know multiple Air Force war games were running on the morning of 9/11, as documented extensively in the mainstream press. 16 What Crossing the Rubicon has documented conclusively is that there was a live-fly drill taking place on 9/11 titled Vigilant Warrior. Richard Clarke disclosed the name of this drill on page 4 of his book, but it was Major Don Arias of NORAD who confirmed the definition of the title “Warrior” to Mike Ruppert via email.
Warrior = JCS/HQ NORAD sponsored FTX, or field training exercise (live-fly). 17
That means that the Vigilant Warrior drill conducted by the Joint Chiefs of Staff involved at least one real commercial aircraft in the skies, intended to simulate exactly the kind of airliner hijack emergency presented on 9/11.
Coincidence?
This was further supported by an April 18 2004 USA Today article titled, “NORAD had drills of jets as weapons.” The report cited NORAD officials who confirmed live-fly drills were conducted using hijacked airliners originating from the continental United States used as weapons crashing into targets including the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The specific drill USA Today referred to was “planned in July [2001] and conducted later” – likely on 9/11 itself. 18
Remember, on 9/11 the Bush administration claimed it had “no idea” aircraft would be used as weapons. Then why were they drilling such scenarios before and during 9/11? The Whitehouse dodged this by saying it wasn’t aware of these drills but that is a transparent lie. The drills took place in the Whitehouse! 19
Secret Service runs simulated attack field exercises – exactly what Vigilant Warrior was. This Joint Chiefs of Staff drill was likely being run through Secret Service lines of communication by a central command under Cheney’s control. 20
Additional war games on 9/11 included Northern Vigilance, an exercise that pulled Air Force fighters from the east coast of the United States up into Canada and Alaska simulating an attack out of Russia. All of those fighters were rendered useless as the 9/11 plot unfolded – too far away to respond.
One of the components of this drill included “false blips” (radar injects simulating aircraft in flight) placed on FAA radar screens. 21 At one point FAA head Jane Garvey said they suspected up to 11 hijackings on 9/11. Was she saying they couldn’t determine which were real, which were simulated, and which were live-fly military exercises?
Regardless, all of this rendered Air Force response on 9/11 useless.
In Air War Over America it is documented that General Arnold of NORAD didn’t pull out of the war game titled Vigilant Guardian until reports of flight 93 being hijacked were coming in. That was at 9:16, a total of 54 minutes after it was known that flight 11 was a hijacking. 22 What took so long? Were there still “false blips” on FAA radar screens at this time?
There were likely false blips on screen even after 9:16. The Kean Commission’s report introduced “phantom flight-11” as being reported by the FAA at 9:25 on 9/11. The FAA reported flight 11 was heading to Washington D.C. at that time when in fact it had already struck the World Trade Center. The Kean Commission’s report stated they were “unable to locate the source of the mistaken FAA information.” 23
“Phantom flight-11” was a false blip, but since the war games are classified, specific information on “false blips” and other details can’t be reported.
Now imagine being an air traffic controller with both real planes and “false blips” simulating hijackings on your screens when suddenly there are real, multiple, hijackings. Where do you send the few Air Force fighters that you have? You can’t guess wrong, you don’t have enough assets for that. The FAA doesn’t even make that decision, the military does. The Kean Commission managed to scapegoat the FAA in their report, but the Air Force itself confirmed the FAA did its job properly on 9/11 in Air War Over America. 24
There were more 9/11 war games including Northern Guardian, Northern Denial (recently confirmed by an Assistant Editor at Harper’s magazine) and an unnamed National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) drill for a plane crashing into NRO headquarters at precisely the time of an actual crash in New York.
Another coincidence?
War games, terror drills and exercises are run by the military quite frequently. In this case, they mirrored the real attacks of 9/11 with such shocking congruence as to be beyond the realm of coincidence.
This is made clear when we consider the warnings that had flooded U.S. Intelligence prior to 9/11, indicating that terrorists were planning to hijack aircraft and crash them into American targets on the ground during the week of September 9th, 2001. 25 With that type of information, who in their right mind would then schedule war games that would leave New York and Washington D.C. completely undefended?
We’ve already shown that the man in charge of managing all such programs was Dick Cheney. Among the central decision-makers for the scheduling of so many simultaneous exercises would be Dick Cheney and Ralph Eberhart, head of NORAD.
It certainly was a perfect “match.”
The Maestro
The most important revelation made about the 9/11 war games comes again from Major Don Arias of NORAD. With multiple war games running, there had to be someone coordinating them.
“Yes, there is an exercise maestro,” said Don Arias in a phone interview. 26
So who was the maestro?
Mike Ruppert called every relevant military and government office looking for an answer to this question and received no response. At the final 9/11 Commission hearing on June 17, 2004, I asked General Ralph Eberhart – the man in charge of NORAD on 9/11 – who was in charge of coordinating the war games that day. His only response was, “No comment.” None of the commissioners, including Chairman Kean, could answer this question. 27
FTW’s research has concluded the maestro was either Dick Cheney, Ralph “Ed” Eberhart, or both. Whoever the maestro was, he was certainly under Cheney’s management as per the May 2001 presidential mandate.
Additionally, Tripod II was a bio-terror exercise being set-up on the west side of lower Manhattan, reportedly scheduled to begin the next day. This exercise was being coordinated with FEMA and the Department of Justice – two of the agencies placed directly under Cheney’s control in May of 2001 by presidential mandate.
Another coincidence?
There is no question that Cheney would be responsible for managing this exercise. The Tripod II drill became the command & control emergency response center on 9/11. The command center in WTC 7 was reportedly evacuated by 9:30 on 9/11, but Tripod II provided a new command center organized just as the original was. 28 How convenient.
The Air Force war games ensured the air attack would be successful, and Tripod II assured Cheney would have control of the response to the crisis of his making. Matching the war games with hijackings – or hijacking the war games – was the opportunity for Cheney to help ensure the 9/11 attacks would be successful, justifying what he calls, “The war that will not end in our lifetimes.” The “war on terror” is actually a war for the world’s last remaining hydrocarbon reserves.
This energy war is a response to a coming energy crisis that Cheney was well aware of at least as early as 1999.
Conclusion
Crossing the Rubicon demonstrates much more than is presented here. The book goes into,
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the failures of the 9/11 Commission
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9/11 insider trading
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the curtailing of civil liberties
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coming economic crisis
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biological warfare
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the real history of the Osama bin Laden
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and many other issues critical to an understanding of today’s historical reality
Crossing the Rubicon also looks into the evolution of PROMIS software, a well-documented artificial intelligence and data-mining program whose current descendants played an integral role in the crimes of 9/11. As Dick Cheney was running a separate chain of command via the Secret Service, he also had the capability to intervene in the functions of the FAA through an evolution of PROMIS software developed and sold by Ptech, Inc. – a company funded by Saudi terrorist financier Yassin Al Qadi.
Al Qadi claims he met Dick Cheney in Jeddah before he was Vice President, a claim Cheney hasn’t publicly refuted. FTW will soon be releasing an in-depth report on Ptech and its role in the crimes of 9/11.
What we have placed in front of you here is the legal case against Dick Cheney and other persons of interest within the U.S. government. Such evidence should constitute the foundation for articles of impeachment and criminal prosecution against George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and their accomplices.
Review the documentation for yourself.
References
1 Crossing the Rubicon, page 435
2 Ibid, 428 – 429
3 Ibid, 444
4 Ibid, 431 – 432
5 Ibid, 427 – 436
6 Ibid, 433
7 Ibid, 592
8 Ibid, 435
9 http //www.dtic.mil/jcs/core/overview.html
10 Ibid, 24
11 Ibid, 109
12 Ibid, 47
13 Ibid, 38
14 Ibid, 40, 575
15 Rubicon, 333
16 Ibid, chapter 19, 333 – 356
17 Ibid, 368
18 Ibid, 345
19 Ibid 346
20 Ibid, 433
21 Ibid, 339
22 Ibid, 444
23 Ibid, 400
24 Ibid, 443
25 Ibid, chapter 13, 225 – 237
26 Ibid, 367
27 Ibid, 394 – 399
28 Ibid, 406
The following is a synopsis of the case against Dick Cheney who was named as the prime suspect in the crimes on 9/11 by Michael C. Ruppert in Crossing the Rubicon.
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Cheney was Commander in Chief on 9/11 calling the shots via Secret Service.
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Secret Service has the legal authority to take supreme command over all agencies in the United States in time of a national emergency on U.S. soil. Even the Air Force recognizes Secret Service supremacy.
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Secret Service has the highest technological communication systems of any agency in the U.S. – as it should.
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On 9/11 Secret Service had the technology to see FAA radar screens in real time.
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Secret Service was in the decision-making loop as early as 8:15am on 9/11, no later than 8:45am.
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Everything was in place on 9/11 for the Commander in Chief to have full supreme control of the Air Force via the Secret Service communication systems and legal mandate to take supreme command.
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However, Bush was reading about goats in Booker Elementary School. Secret Service was within arms’ reach, and they chose to keep him there as the 9/11 plot unfolded. Bush’s Secret Service detail was in full communication with Cheney’s Secret Service agents in the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center) as the 9/11 plot unfolded.
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Dick Cheney was the acting Commander in Chief on 9/11 and Secret Service was the supreme command.
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The world is about to start running out of oil.
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Half of the world’s oil has been, or is about to be, exhausted.
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Once that midpoint is crossed, every barrel of oil will be harder to find, and more expensive, as demand grows. Controlling the last remaining oil reserves is the key to controlling the world.
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Almost everything in modern society – vehicles, buildings, bridges, weapons, consumer products, and much more – consumes oil in its manufacture, its operation, or both.
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Cheap and abundant hydrocarbon energy keeps the industrial world warm and cooks our food. Most houses are heated with natural gas.
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We “eat” oil and natural gas: For every 1-calorie of food energy produced, 10 calories of hydrocarbon energy is consumed.
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Four days after becoming Vice President, Dick Cheney convened his National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG) in which he received extensive information on Peak Oil from world-renowned experts. He has refused to release the documents from those hearings to Congress or the American people. FTW has always contended that the deepest, darkest secrets of 9/11 lie in those documents.
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Dick Cheney knew about Peak Oil at least as early as 1999. He knows the economic impact of oil depletion and the catastrophic effects that will result.
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9/11 made possible what Dick Cheney called, “The war that won’t end in our lifetimes.” This is a war that is chasing the last remaining hydrocarbons across the globe. The “war on terror” is in reality an energy war and 9/11 was its pretext.
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Cheney was managing multiple war games and terror drills on 9/11 that paralyzed U.S. Air Force response.
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In May of 2001 Dick Cheney was placed directly in charge of managing the “seamless integration” of all training exercises throughout the federal government and military agencies by presidential mandate.
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The morning of 9/11 began with multiple training exercises of war games and terror drills which Cheney, as mandated by the president, was placed in charge of managing.
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War games & terror drills included live-fly exercises with military aircraft posing as hijacked aircraft over the United States, as well as simulated exercises that placed “false blips” (radar injects indicating virtual planes) on FAA radar screens. One exercise titled NORTHERN VIGILANCE pulled Air Force fighters up into Canada simulating a Russian air attack, so there were very few fighters remaining on the east coast to respond. All of this paralyzed Air Force response ensuring that fighter jocks couldn’t stop 9/11.
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An unknown individual or command center referred to by Major Don Arias of NORAD as the “maestro” coordinated the war games. It is possible there was more than one maestro, but no one will name names. FTW has asked this question of everyone in relevant government and military positions, to no avail. Our investigation has found the maestro was either Dick Cheney, General Ralph “Ed” Eberhart, or both.
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Whoever was coordinating the Air Force war games was under the management and direction of Dick Cheney, who was also in charge of managing a terror drill being set up on the West Side of downtown New York on 9/11 titled Tripod 2. This exercise set up a command and control center on 9/11 that was configured exactly like the one lost that morning in WTC 7. It was the perfect command center to respond to the crisis, and it was under Dick Cheney’s management before the hijackings occurred. How convenient.
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Dick Cheney was one of the main government officials deciding that such extensive war games would take place on 9/11. This was when American intelligence had collected dozens of warnings from governments and intelligence agencies indicating that terrorists were planning to hijack civilian aircraft and crash them into American targets on the ground during the week of September 9th, 2001.