FINISHING OF WITH IRAN

The Plan -- according to U.S. General Wesley Clark (Ret.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXS3vW47mOE


Thanks BlackHawk706867

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x3316633

Help a Clarkie out :(

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/03/02/1440234

AMY GOODMAN: Now, let’s talk about Iran. You have a whole website devoted to stopping war.

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Www.stopiranwar.com.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you see a replay in what happened in the lead-up to the war with Iraq -- the allegations of the weapons of mass destruction, the media leaping onto the bandwagon?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Well, in a way. But, you know, history doesn’t repeat itself exactly twice. What I did warn about when I testified in front of Congress in 2002, I said if you want to worry about a state, it shouldn’t be Iraq, it should be Iran. But this government, our administration, wanted to worry about Iraq, not Iran.

I knew why, because I had been through the Pentagon right after 9/11. About ten days after 9/11, I went through the Pentagon and I saw Secretary Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. I went downstairs just to say hello to some of the people on the Joint Staff who used to work for me, and one of the generals called me in. He said, “Sir, you’ve got to come in and talk to me a second.” I said, “Well, you’re too busy.” He said, “No, no.” He says, “We’ve made the decision we’re going to war with Iraq.” This was on or about the 20th of September. I said, “We’re going to war with Iraq? Why?” He said, “I don’t know.” He said, “I guess they don’t know what else to do.” So I said, “Well, did they find some information connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda?” He said, “No, no.” He says, “There’s nothing new that way. They just made the decision to go to war with Iraq.” He said, “I guess it’s like we don’t know what to do about terrorists, but we’ve got a good military and we can take down governments.” And he said, “I guess if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail.”

So I came back to see him a few weeks later, and by that time we were bombing in Afghanistan. I said, “Are we still going to war with Iraq?” And he said, “Oh, it’s worse than that.” He reached over on his desk. He picked up a piece of paper. And he said, “I just got this down from upstairs” -- meaning the Secretary of Defense’s office -- “today.” And he said, “This is a memo that describes how we’re going to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.” I said, “Is it classified?” He said, “Yes, sir.” I said, “Well, don’t show it to me.” And I saw him a year or so ago, and I said, “You remember that?” He said, “Sir, I didn’t show you that memo! I didn’t show it to you!”

AMY GOODMAN: I’m sorry. What did you say his name was?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: I’m not going to give you his name.

AMY GOODMAN: So, go through the countries again.

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Well, starting with Iraq, then Syria and Lebanon, then Libya, then Somalia and Sudan, and back to Iran. So when you look at Iran, you say, “Is it a replay?” It’s not exactly a replay. But here’s the truth: that Iran, from the beginning, has seen that the presence of the United States in Iraq was a threat -- a blessing, because we took out Saddam Hussein and the Baathists. They couldn’t handle them. We took care of it for them. But also a threat, because they knew that they were next on the hit list. And so, of course, they got engaged. They lost a million people during the war with Iraq, and they’ve got a long and unprotectable, unsecurable border. So it was in their vital interest to be deeply involved inside Iraq. They tolerated our attacks on the Baathists. They were happy we captured Saddam Hussein.

whata plan! We must be working on Syria and Lebanon right now.

Somalia and Sudan now

...when he was campaigning for Democrats all across the nation for the 2006 mid-term elections, that it was absolutely critical that Democrats win at least one house of Congress to place some kind of check on U.S. military action against Iran, and that had a lot to do with why Wes Clark was driven to go anywhere he was needed to help Democrats get elected. Otherwise Clark believed that the odds favored a U.S. military strike against Iran by this Spring. Fortunately Democrats did take back Congress, which threw the neocons off balence and forced them to sacrifice Rumsfeld, but they have not given up on their plans.

They not only believe that war with Iran is inevitable and in the long term interests of the United States, they believe that the sooner we get in on the better; military and political circumstances are as good now as they are going to get, especially now while Republicans remain in power. They see history turning against American interests if the U.S. does not act boldly now to rearrange the chess board in our favor before the further rise of China.

Not only that, but I am convinced that they see hostilities with Iran as the key to Republicans remaining in power in the United States. On top of their long standing desire to take Iran's government down, now they need to use the threat of Iran to pump up national security hysteria to prop up the Republican Party. They increasingly can't point to "fighting the terrorists in Iraq so we don't have to fight them here", because the public now sees the futility of our efforts to fight terrorists inside Iraq. They see that we have instead created terrorists inside Iraq, and are incapable of turning the tide there now by sending more American troops. So now is the time to shift focus onto Iran, where the claim is made we don't have to send troops to protect America, only bombs.

They are playing on the frustration American's feel with our efforts to work with our Arab allies who supposedly make up Iraq's government. Wouldn't it just feel better to bomb the hell out of them arab murderers rather than get into a trench with them so they can stab us in the back? Who cares if Iranians are really persians, not Arabs, and that Iran is Shiite while Al Quaeda is Sunni? The right has shifted the anti-arab hate message onto Iran, and Democrats by and large are sitting by passively and letting them get away with it.

And our own peace movement is completely fixated on ending the war in Iraq, with little attention free to confront the chicken hawks over Iran. We are three moves behind on the chess board as the construction of the psychological framework needed to support an attack on Iran is nearing completion.

Thank God for Wes Clark and VoteVets.org and StopIranWar.com. They are virtually the only peace forces taking the offensive against the neocons regarding Iran, waging the battle for the hearts and minds of the American public against the neocons on Iran, urging real, sweeping, and non conditional diplomacy with Iran right now. Saying War is not the Answer. Please follow my graphic to their web site if you have not already done so.

"We're being set up again, just like we were with Iraq, and what I've found in my life is, generally that if you want a war, you can have one.

Most people are about equally brave, most people will fight. Most people love their families, they love their homes, they believe that whatever they believe in is the single one way to truth, reconciliation and the after life, and most people will fight for it. Most people are not philosophical about it, and whether you're walking into a bar in New York City after the Red Sox have played the Yankees, or whether you're dealing with the Bosnians and the Serbs, or whether you're talking about Christians and Iranians. People will fight for what they believe in.

So if we want a war with a billion Muslims, we can probably have one. I don't think we want one, we certainly don't need one, and we should do everything we can to prevent it. And that means this election is the crucial moment for doing that."

Democrats winning back Congress gives us a fighting chance to still stop this, but not if we as a party remain indifferent to saber rattling like Lieberman's. Lieberman's comments were a trial balloon from the neocons, to see how much if any opposition they would stir. The attempt is being made to set up a scenario under which Americans have been so brow beaten into thinking of Iran as a dangerous enemy that we will numbly accept the following, and fall in line behind our President. The above quote and the one that follows are from tape recordings I made of Clark in New Hampshire last Fall:

"I think that we're in a very dangerous position because not only is the clock ticking in North Korea, but the clock is ticking in Iran. The President has basically lined up his statements so that he can not live with the possibility of an Iranian nuclear weapon, and he has made a half hearted effort at diplomacy. We're not talking with Iran directly. He's made a half hearted effort at diplomacy, I believe, so that diplomacy will fail. And then, his plan is, sometime in the Spring of 2007, which is not so far away, he's going to come on Television, he's going to say:

'My fellow Americans. For 5 years we've watched the evil empire of Iran struggle to prepare nuclear weapons. Although our intelligence is not perfect, we have enough information to assure us that they're making progress.

As I told, and promised you, we will not allow the worst weapons to fall into the hands of the worst people. Iran is a state that supports Terrorists. For the good of humanity they can not be permitted to have nuclear weapons. We've asked our Allies to help, we've gone to the United Nations, we've asked the Iranians to forbear, nothing has worked. There is no option remaining, but to use America's military superiority to address this growing and gathering threat.

As I speak to you tonight, the first bombers are over Tehran. We will not falter, we will not fail, we will not be denied, and America will prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons.

Thank You my fellow Americans".



Again, Democrats retaking control of Congress set back new war plans temporarily, which is what Clark said he hoped we could achieve if we elected enough Democrats in November. But we didn't derail them permanently. Neocons never gave up on attacking Iraq again after Desert Storm and they are not giving up on attacking Iran. The real danger is that, because of a misguided belief that threatening Iran is supporting Israel, too many Democrats are willing to go passive now instead of countering this psychological preperation for war.

Our Democratic majority in Congress didn't even have the backbone to leave language in the Iraq War funding legislation that would force Bush to get a vote from Congress before attacking Iran.

The House Democratic Caucus agreed to strip that wording from their bill because they did not want to tie Bush's hands on Iran.

Thank you SLAD. K & R

The link http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/03/02/1440234

are our friends in preventing this outcome.

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2001/2001534.pdf

96.5%of the American population is mediocre to illiterate where deciphering print is concerned
The National Adult Literacy Survey represents 190 million U.S. adults over age sixteen with an average school attendance of 12.4 years. The survey is conducted by the Educational Testing Service of Princeton, New Jersey. It ranks adult Americans into five levels. Here is its 1993 analysis:

Forty-two million Americans over the age of sixteen can’t read. Some of this group can write their names on Social Security cards and fill in height, weight, and birth spaces on application forms.


Fifty million can recognize printed words on a fourth- and fifth-grade level. They cannot write simple messages or letters.


Fifty-five to sixty million are limited to sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade reading. A majority of this group could not figure out the price per ounce of peanut butter in a 20-ounce jar costing $1.99 when told they could round the answer off to a whole number.


Thirty million have ninth- and tenth-grade reading proficiency. This group (and all preceding) cannot understand a simplified written explanation of the procedures used by attorneys and judges in selecting juries.


About 3.5 percent of the 26,000-member sample demonstrated literacy skills adequate to do traditional college study, a level 30 percent of all U.S. high school students reached in 1940, and which 30 percent of secondary students in other developed countries can reach today. This last fact alone should warn you how misleading comparisons drawn from international student competitions really are, since the samples each country sends are small elite ones, unrepresentative of the entire student population. But behind the bogus superiority a real one is concealed.


Ninety-six and a half percent of the American population is mediocre to illiterate where deciphering print is concerned. This is no commentary on their intelligence, but without ability to take in primary information from print and to interpret it they are at the mercy of commentators who tell them what things mean. A The National Adult Literacy Survey represents 190 million U.S. adults over age sixteen with an average school attendance of 12.4 years. The survey is conducted by the Educational Testing Service of Princeton, New Jersey. It ranks adult Americans into five levels. Here is its 1993 analysis:

Forty-two million Americans over the age of sixteen can’t read. Some of this group can write their names on Social Security cards and fill in height, weight, and birth spaces on application forms.


Fifty million can recognize printed words on a fourth- and fifth-grade level. They cannot write simple messages or letters.


Fifty-five to sixty million are limited to sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade reading. A majority of this group could not figure out the price per ounce of peanut butter in a 20-ounce jar costing $1.99 when told they could round the answer off to a whole number.


Thirty million have ninth- and tenth-grade reading proficiency. This group (and all preceding) cannot understand a simplified written explanation of the procedures used by attorneys and judges in selecting juries.


About 3.5 percent of the 26,000-member sample demonstrated literacy skills adequate to do traditional college study, a level 30 percent of all U.S. high school students reached in 1940, and which 30 percent of secondary students in other developed countries can reach today. This last fact alone should warn you how misleading comparisons drawn from international student competitions really are, since the samples each country sends are small elite ones, unrepresentative of the entire student population. But behind the bogus superiority a real one is concealed.


Ninety-six and a half percent of the American population is mediocre to illiterate where deciphering print is concerned. This is no commentary on their intelligence, but without ability to take in primary information from print and to interpret it they are at the mercy of commentators who tell them what things mean. A working definition of immaturity might include an excessive need for other people to interpret information for us.


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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/04/03/MN306918.DTL

On Wednesday, CNN didn't deny that it knew anything about the war's start date, but a network official, speaking only on condition of anonymity, said picking the 19th was merely a good guess. The official said CNN's reporters have a lot of good government contacts and various dates had been tossed around.

Other networks were also making guesses -- a source at CBS said the news department was convinced it was March 20 -- but those musings began roughly two weeks after CNN's "guess" and just before the war started. If your memory can rush back through the fog of war, you'll recall that on March 4, it was diplomacy -- or faltering diplomacy -- that dominated the headlines. It wasn't until more than a week later, when the British suddenly proposed March 17 as a drop-dead date for U.N. Security Council bickering and Iraqi compliance, that a start date was even imaginable.

After that, President Bush announced his now famous 48-hour deadline and, when the 48 hours ran out -- on Wednesday, March 19 -- war started.



War and Globalization
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3117338213439292490&q=Hijacking+Catastrophe&total=29&start=20&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=7


Hijacking Catastrophe:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SltOy_F6ZII&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YlcpXBFOXA&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwZaWh0cJPQ&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8S_vOZqJbE&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GT7ti8LZ6A&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkOtqGNJ8qI&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8C02QHS0D44&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YlcpXBFOXA&mode=related&search
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kBX00TR-aA&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jghh00bn_DA&mode=related&search=


“Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic.”


She's present in our country right now, just waiting to make her - to carry out her divine mission



http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/27/1454229

CHALMERS JOHNSON: Nemesis was the ancient Greek goddess of revenge, the punisher of hubris and arrogance in human beings. You may recall she is the one that led Narcissus to the pond and showed him his reflection, and he dove in and drowned. I chose the title, because it seems to me that she's present in our country right now, just waiting to make her -- to carry out her divine mission.

By the subtitle, I really do mean it. This is not just hype to sell books -- “The Last Days of the American Republic.” I’m here concerned with a very real, concrete problem in political analysis, namely that the political system of the United States today, history tells us, is one of the most unstable combinations there is -- that is, domestic democracy and foreign empire -- that the choices are stark. A nation can be one or the other, a democracy or an imperialist, but it can't be both. If it sticks to imperialism, it will, like the old Roman Republic, on which so much of our system was modeled, like the old Roman Republic, it will lose its democracy to a domestic dictatorship.

I’ve spent some time in the book talking about an alternative, namely that of the British Empire after World War II, in which it made the decision, not perfectly executed by any manner of means, but nonetheless made the decision to give up its empire in order to keep its democracy. It became apparent to the British quite late in the game that they could keep the jewel in their crown, India, only at the expense of administrative massacres, of which they had carried them out often in India. In the wake of the war against Nazism, which had just ended, it became, I think, obvious to the British that in order to retain their empire, they would have to become a tyranny, and they, therefore, I believe, properly chose, admirably chose to give up their empire.

As I say, they didn't do it perfectly. There were tremendous atavistic fallbacks in the 1950s in the Anglo, French, Israeli attack on Egypt; in the repression of the Kikuyu -- savage repression, really -- in Kenya; and then, of course, the most obvious and weird atavism of them all, Tony Blair and his enthusiasm for renewed British imperialism in Iraq. But nonetheless, it seems to me that the history of Britain is clear that it gave up its empire in order to remain a democracy. I believe this is something we should be discussing very hard in the United States.

the "Hijacking Catastrophe". Many thanks to you for all the efforts to keep us informed. :patriot: