Insurgents Capture US General --Beat, Suffocate to Death

26th January, 2006

A U.S. military spokesperson has condemned Iraqi insurgents as "barbaric thugs," after the scarred body of a senior U.S. military officer was discovered today in a house in Baghdad.

The apparently badly beaten remains are those of Maj. Gen. Geoffrey R. Wilkinson, Columbus, Oh. of the 18th Airborne Division, who disappeared with two other soldiers four days ago in Baghdad.

The two soldiers captured with him are now free after a routine house search patrol in the city caused the insurgents to abandon their captives and flee. According to the soldiers accounts, Maj. Gen. Wilkinson was badly beaten over a number of days, before being asphyxiated, as insurgents attempted to elicit from him details of U.S. security structures, operational plans and procedures.


BARBARIC THUGS

The three had become separated from fellow members of a patrol over the weekend, after being lured into a courtyard by the apparent sight of an Iraqi woman caught in a distressing childbirth. They were quickly overpowered by around a dozen insurgents who sprang from hiding places. Under a news blackout, search parties had been scouring the north-west of the city for days before an unrelated routine patrol scared off their captors.

"We utterly condemn the brutal actions of the barbaric thugs who murdered Maj. Gen. Wilkinson," US military spokesman Tim Keefe said in the capital, Baghdad. "They respect neither human dignity nor any civilized code of wartime military conduct. A loyal officer had been killed in cold blood by mere low criminals."

The U.S. military say a preliminary examination revealed many large bruises all over general's body and at least five broken ribs, which would have been painful and would have made walking and even breathing very difficult. Marks consistent with cords were found on his wrists, ankles and around the neck. A formal autopsy had yet to determine cause of death, but the accounts of the soldiers indicate the general was suffocated during the course of his last interrogation by insurgents.


HUNG OFF ROOF

The two soldiers recounted the harrowing details of their incarceration to journalists in a briefing held in the fortified Green Zone earlier today. Both were physically assaulted a number of times during their captivity, but neither was badly injured. They were held in the same room as the general at many times, but they say the insurgents had focused their attention of the senior officer.

"They would come in and hold Maj. Wilkinson down while two or three of them beat him about the body," Staff Sgt. Dennis Smith told reporters. "It would last a few minutes and they would return a few hours later and do it again. "I think it was the second or third day he said to me he thought they were going to kill him," Smith said.

"He was naturally quite scared," he said. "I could see the fear in his eyes. They had taken him up on the roof earlier and he told me they hung him over the edge and threatened to drop him off."

"They put him through a living hell," said Smith, who had to pause a number of times during the briefing, distraught and unable to continue.

The other soldier held with Maj. Gen Wilkinson, Spc. Peter Scott confirmed the grueling ordeal of the captured officer.

"They took him into another room for the serious beatings," he said. "I could hear his screams and thuds, then silence."

"He told me they had tied him up and put a sack over his head", said Scott. "Then two or three of them would sit on him and they would cover his mouth so he could not breathe."

"When the patrol found us, we discovered him like that in the next room." Scott said. "He was dead. I can't imagine what it must be like for him, or for his family now. My heart goes out to them. The way he died will haunt them forever. Nobody deserves to die like that"


JUSTICE UNLIKELY

US forces are still engaged in house to house enquiries in the area where the three were held, in an effort to track down or identify the captors. They fled just minutes before the patrol arrived at the three-storied house where the U.S. general meet his death. But so far their enquiries have been fruitless.

"It's very unlikely that the people who carried out these inhuman acts will ever be brought to justice", admitted US military spokesman Tim Keefe. "But we are leaving no stone unturned in our efforts to find them and make them fully accountable for their brutality."

A White House spokesperson reiterated that commitment, but declined to elaborate in detail.

"Out of respect for the family of the deceased we will not be commenting at length, said Scott McClellan. "But, I think that the facts in this case speak volumes about what is really going on in Iraq and why we will be there for quite some time to come."

NOTE:
The above fictional account of the capture and brutal treatment of a senior US officer is based on the published allegations of the circumstances and death of Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush, formerly of the Iraqi Army. The details of the interrogation of the US officer are based on the treatment of this former senior Iraqi officer at the hands of the US military. Our "photograph" of Wilkinson is a constructed photo montage.

The purpose of writing the above article was to enable us to view the actions of the U.S. military in Iraq without judging them through the cultural lens of our own bias. I hope it makes clear the barbarity of U.S. policies --which are not excused in any way by the actions of "enemy" forces. The same logic applies as aplied to inhuman acts by any of the participants in World War II.

I hope this also makes clear why such acts --which sow the seeds of a longer conflict costing needless lives lost on both sides-- are in truth ultimately counterproductive and represent a failure of military and civilian command.

26th January, 2006

Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush, shown with his grandson in a family photo, died last November in American custody in Iraq.

Denver Post staff columnist, Jim Spencer has written the best mainstream media account of the nature and implications of these events and the ludicrous sentence handed down to Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer Jr. That penalty: a derisory recommended forfeiture of $6,000 in salary and confinement to barracks except to work and worship.

If torture is standard, we're in for it
By Jim Spencer, Denver Post Staff Columnist

Every American should be forced to see the autopsy pictures of Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush now on display at the trial of Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer Jr.

Welshofer is charged with murdering the Iraqi general during a November 2003 interrogation. But what's playing out in a Fort Carson courtroom is a nation's shame, not just an individual's.... http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3412267

'Black Ops' Implicated in Jill Carroll Kidnapping

12 January, 2006 14:00GMT

There are clear signs that the kidnapping of the still-missing American journalist, Jill Carroll was a political act closely tied to U.S. interests relating to the Sunni opposition in Iraq.

The 28-year-old freelancer for The Christian Science Monitor was ambushed by gunmen in Baghdad last Saturday morning. Her Iraqi interpreter, who carried press ID was killed during the incident. No group has claimed responsibility.

On the face of it just another of Iraq's many kidnappings. But when we examine the timing, location and events subsequent to the abduction, they point to collusion involving the U.S. --or worse still, an American-inspired 'Black Ops' gambit.

The very day Jill Carroll was taken, President Jalal Talabani said that Iraq's political groups could form a coalition government within weeks. Forming a government including Sunnis is a key American goal because it could rob the resistance of political support. But the Association of Muslim Scholars(AMS), which is the intellectual backbone of the Iraqi resistance, is a significant impediment to the formation of such a government.

The following day, Sunday morning, before dawn and ahead of a meeting between Talibani and Adnan al-Dulaimi, the leader of the largely Sunni Iraqi Accordance Front, U.S. troops raided the Umm al-Qora mosque complex, headquarters of the AMS. They used explosive charges used to blow out door locks, smashed windows, arrested half a dozen people and ransacked offices.

Later that Sunday, following that high-level meting with President Talibani, al-Dulaimi said significant progress had been made in their efforts to form a government of national unity. "Talabani and I have an identical point of view regarding the formation of a national unity government based on consensus,'' al-Dulaimi said.

To one AMS suporter, the motivation for the raid was clear.

"This crime came as punishment for the association's position on the occupation and its position on the latest elections," said Sheik Younis al-Ekaidi.

But the U.S. military told Agence France Presse that the raid was linked to the hunt for Jill Carroll.

Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman, said the raid was ordered "as a direct result of a tip by an Iraqi civilian that activities related to the kidnapping were being carried out inside the mosque."

However, giving the lie to this U.S. claim, as Aljazeera reported, on the same Sunday morning U.S. and Iraqi forces raided villages in Abu Ghraib area west of Baghdad. The villages are the home of the Zowba tribe to which Shaikh Harith al-Dhari, who heads the Association of Muslim Scholars belongs.

The AMS have always been a significant player in Iraqi resistance politics, and a thorn in the side of U.S ambitions in Iraq. BreakForNews.com was the only Western media outlet to report that in January, 2004 then US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte met with AMS leader Dr. Al-Dhari, to discuss Iraqi security and the upcoming elections to which the AMS was opposed. The account of their meeting was carried in an interview with Al-Dhari by Mohamed Al-Anwar, published in the Jan 20-26 edition of Cairo's Al-Ahram.

Al-Dhari said the meeting had been arranged through French diplomats at Negroponte's request. He confirmed that his group offered to reverse its position on the election, once given a timetable for an American forces withdrawal.

That meeting is a sign of the pivotal role of the AMS, and opens up another possibile motivation for last Sunday's U.S. raids. That they were part of a 'carrot and stick' strategy to pressure al-Dhari and the AMS, while simultaneously hacking a deal with al-Dulaimi's wing of Sunni political expression.

And that the claimed search for Jill Carroll was the convenient pretext on which to raid the mosque.

Which raises the question of who exactly abducted the reporter, with such exquisite political timing.


THE PERFECT AMBUSH

The kidnapping of Jill Carroll took place within yards of the office of Adnan al-Dulaimi, whom Carroll had been scheduled to interview at 10 a.m. Saturday, according to her driver.

Mr. al-Dulaimi, however, never showed up for the interview. After 25 minutes, Carroll and her interpreter left. They were waylaid as they drove away from his offices.

"It was very obvious this was by design," said the driver. "The whole operation took no more than a quarter of a minute. It was very highly organized. It was a setup, a perfect ambush."

One kidnapper pulled the driver from the car, jumped in, and drove away with others crammed into the rear of the vehicle around Carroll and her interpreter. "They didn't give me any time to even put the car in neutral," the driver said.

The body of the interpreter, Allan Enwiyah, 32, was later found in the same neighborhood. He had been shot twice in the head. He was discovered by one of the guards stationed outside Dulaimi's office, who told AFP he heard nearby gunshots and rushed to find the body.

Media reports say Jill Carroll's car was stopped about 300 yards from al-Dulaimi's office. But the Washington Post is likely more correct to put the distance at a few hundred feet. The driver said he hadn't gone far enough to shift the car beyond third gear, and that he initially thought the men were guards clearing the route for a convoy going to or from the office of al-Dulaimi.

So what if the kidnappers were indeed connected to al-Dulaimi?

AFP reports that al-Dulaimi himself told the agency he had no appointment to meet a Western journalist. But who better to arrange the false meeting which lured the journalist to the site of the kidnapping than some al-Dulaimi staffer? And once in the web, she would never leave the environs of al-Dulaimi's offices.

Of course, one could argue that all this may have been an idea concocted by al-Dulaimi or his associates. And that the alleged tipoff to U.S. foces which led to the raid on the AMS headquarters was another ploy by the same elements.

But, U.S. commanders are unlikely to be so dumb as to fall for a transparent smear, and then mount a high-profile raid on the politically-sensitive AMS mosque --all without realizing they were being made dance to someone else's political tune.

Plus there is the matter of the simultaneous U.S. raid on the AMS leader's home village.

It looks like either the U.S. was willingly used, or because it suited their agenda anyway, that more likely some Black Ops element of U.S. forces were in on the upcoming abduction from the start.

Either way, it doesn't look good for Jill Carroll, who has been kidnapped in the same part of Baghdad where Margaret Hassan, an aid official, was abducted in 2004. Hassan has never been released and is believed killed by her abductors. A great friend to ordinary Iraqis, Hassan's abduction has been tainted by similar suspicions about U.S. Black Ops involvement.

It's not a good omen.


A VERY HUMAN REPORTER

Jill Carroll herself authored two articles for the Christian Science Monitor in April of last year, which are tragically ironic in retrospect.

One entitled "Iraq's rising industry: domestic kidnapping" was about the discovery of the bodies of 50 alleged kidnapping victims in the Tigris River.

She quoted one victim of a kidnapping by extremist Sunnis, who told her: "I could never imagine some day I will face such a tragedy."

They are words she might well use herself today -if she is still alive.

She also wrote an article about Californian Marla Ruzicka, the head of an NGO who died with her Iraqi driver when their car was caught between a suicide car bomber and a US military convoy. In the article she revealed personal feelings which belie the image of a hard-nosed journalist oblivious to danger:

"One of my favorite memories of her was when I was sitting in the middle of the Palestine Hotel lobby in Baghdad, surrounded by a confusing swirl of soldiers, officials, and reporters. Fear swept over me. What was I doing here? I had come as a freelancer, with no experience covering a war. Just as I was quietly freaking out, Marla appeared in the dusty, harried scene. She was the picture of calm in a perfect French braid and long blue dress. She was like a breeze blowing through, so tranquil, so clean.

Later in the fall of 2003 when I moved here and was despairing of my sputtering freelance work she would always say, "Jill, good for you. You're working so hard. I'm so proud of you."...

My friend Scott... said no one had heard from Marla since about 2 o'clock that afternoon. The other journalists and I all feared a kidnapping. Then we got a call from the US military saying a woman fitting her description had been in an accident, ....they said the woman was dead on arrival.

The only thing we can say now is at least she died doing what she wanted, doing what she really, really believed in."

"All I ever wanted to be was a foreign correspondent," Carroll wrote last year in the American Journalism Review. She too was doing what she wanted.

I never knew her. But as a journalist I can only echo Marla's words to her:

"Jill, good for you. You're working so hard. I'm so proud of you."


References:
http://www.breakfornews.com/articles/NegroponteMeetsResistanceScholars.htm
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D398BD63-B112-4FB4-BA87-EFA94D6B8243.htm
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001809093
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ article/2006/01/09/AR2006010902078_pf.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5532085,00.html
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0110/p01s04-woiq.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060107/wl_afp/iraq_060107130813
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0422/p06s01-woiq.html
http://www.alternet.org/story/21780/

Sharon's Hospital Exit Photo Was Faked

Take a good look at the news photo of Ariel Sharon allegedly leaving hospital on the 20th December, 2005 --after a mild stroke. According to most sources Sharon is 5’7” tall and weighs 255 lbs.

Compare the official photo and our edit showing the Prime Minister at his actual height. Looks like the photoshop boys inserted a much too tall Sharon into the official picture.

In other words --it's a FAKE!

As if you couldn't figure that out anyway from that single lonely microphone held out. The original photo before fakery showed only an open door and the hospital sign. The background inside the door was darkened, then Sharon and the news mike were added.

Compare the photo of Sharon exiting the hospital with a photo of the Hadassah hospital Director Shlomo Mor-Yosef --standing before the same type of sign.

Now check Mor-Yosef in another photo, beside someone of around Sharon's height.

Work out the photo angles for yourself.

No matter which way you compute it --Sharon is clearly way too tall in the official photo. Which throws doubt over not only that photo, but other photos showing Sharon supposedly working away after that first stroke on December 18th, 2005.

Now read our Full Story about what's really going on...

Read: Has Ariel Sharon Been Dead Since December, 2005?


[Ed. Note: There is another larger sign in use by the hospital for media photos. And here is the same hospital Director, Mor-Yosef standing in front of it. It's a taller sign, and wider.

Don't let that confuse you. Our comparison uses only photos of the standard sign -not the this larger one.

Has Ariel Sharon Been Dead Since December, 2005?

UPDATE Monday 9th Jan: Doctors now claim that Sharon is breathing unaided and responding to pain stimuli, but as the Sharon stroke saga continues, it seems to be driven more by politics than medicine. The politics are transparent if you read between the lines of this Reuters report:

"The death or incapacity of Sharon..., would create a void in Israeli politics... Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, also Israel's finance minister, projected a message of business as usual.... World leaders have pledged support for Olmert as he stands in for Sharon. Doctors plan to begin rousing Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon from a medically induced coma on Monday...

"We are all impressed by how strong he is and how much he is fighting," said Hadassah neurosurgeon Jose Cohen. "He is just a real warrior, it is his nature."

That last comment is not a medical statement --it's a political spin. But, brain dead or vegetative -was Sharon first incapacitated in December? -Fintan

by Fintan Dunne, Editor, BreakForNews.com
Friday 6th January, 2006. 22:00GMT

Ariel Sharon may already be clinically dead for weeks --ever since his first reported stroke on December, 18th, 2005.

Having reviewed a number of fishy circumstances around the "sudden" second brain injury allegedly just suffered by the Israeli prime minister, I am unable to eliminate that this is exactly what has happened.

Even as the "Israeli Insider" reports that Sharon is brain dead from the second collapse [6], I have been examining the possibility that international governments have hushed up the December, 2005 incapication of Sharon to buy themselves time, also to ease the shock to the Israeli people and to smooth the political transition.

Here's what may well have happened. Sharon suffered a massive stroke on Sunday 18th December. He was rushed to hospital, where in a serious condition he was within hours judged likely to be all but brain-dead. Stories of his conversations with two reporters were immediately planted in two Israeli newspapers --as a holding action.

High level contacts were made with the U.S. government and likely some others. It was determined that having Sharon suddenly die would be an unacceptable risk to the management of Israeli public opinion. Furthermore, having him die at the year end --heading into a festive season in Israel and around the world, would create an unacceptable political vaccum. Yet the same festive season would also enable his death to be kept quiet for weeks. Enough time to prepare politically behind the scenes.

Sharon had just launched the Kadima party. Elements of the so-called 'international community' would have been foursquare behind this move to isolate the Israeli political right now opposing the peace process. The prospect of the right --unnerved by the death of Sharon-- becoming newly resurgent before the Kadima party could even get off the ground, would have been in their eyes an unacceptable outcome.

Wheras by managing the "death", Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert could buy time in which to look "leader-like," and time to salvage the Kadima project.

COVERUP PLAN

Assuming this scenario, the following happened:

On the basis of "national security" key Israeli newspapers were recruited to the plan to conceal his brain death. A whole series of stories were floated over the following weeks to show a prime minister, resting and/or buzy with the business of setting up his new party. In truth, Sharon was now being kept alive on a respirator.

The story of Sharon being prescribed the blood-thinner Heparin was invented to give credence to "second" stroke which would be announced in the New Year. In actual medical practice, doctors prescribing Heparin at a dosage likely to be dangerous would have insisted on close monitoring in hospital.

On the basis that doctors had asked Sharon to shorten his work hours and rest, meetings were canceled and the lack of public appearances were easily explained away. A deception campaign showed Sharon in photographs apparently in his office, and at cabinet meetings.

Then, just hours before his scheduled "second" collapse, a damaging news story on police inquiries into a $3 million briibery scandal was leaked to provide a smokescreen of possible cause for a second "stress-related" collapse.

An operation was scheduled to supposedly fix a hole in Sharon's heart --thus providing a cover of medical competence and making it easier to explain his "emergency" evacuation to the hospital which had first treated him.

And the story was floated that in the event Sharon would be placed under anesthesia during the procedure, Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would assume the role of acting prime minister. [13]

To muddy the waters further, a controversial "decision" to drive Sharon to the distant Jerusalem hospital instead of one nearer his ranch was yet another "smokescreen" causation ploy.

Finally the "second" collapse took place and the news was soon leaked that Sharon might be brain-dead. At the same time he was "intentionally" placed in a coma --such news easing the transition to a subsequent announcement of what has been a reality since December 18th, 2005: Ariel Sharon is brain dead or vegetative.

But he has been so for weeks.

GILDING THE LILLY

One of the key problems I have with the alleged "second" stroke is the congruence of too many incidents.

The unmonitored blood-thinner; the $3million dollar bribery scandal just the day before; the second surgery scheduled for the day after; the illadvised departure from Jerusalem; the transportation of the PM back to the city by car. It's too many and all too convenient.

But also, in retrospect, much about the saga of Sharon's illness is consistent with a cover-up.

Following the Sunday, December 18th stroke, Sharon was admitted "lying on a stretcher" [1]. He was kept in hospital for two nights. But for Sharon, the last few weeks have "reportedly" been a bundle of laughs, it seems.

The Haaretz daily reported that one of its reporters spoke to Sharon late on the Sunday night on which he first collapsed. "I'm fine," Haaretz quoted Sharon as saying. "Apparently I should have taken a few days off for vacation. But we're continuing to move forward," he said, making a play on the name of his party, Kadima, which means "forward." [4]

And the Maariv daily newspaper said one of its reporters also spoke to Sharon on Sunday. "I hear there's already talk about an acting prime minister," the paper quoted Sharon. "Well, maybe it's too early. I'm still here."

However, in Gaza, Palestinians were firing guns in the air, screaming "Sharon is dead" [4]

His spokesman, Ra'anan Gissin, said that on the Monday morning after that collapse, Sharon got his usual briefings from top aides, who turned his hospital room into a temporary office. Gissin, said he found the prime minister in "high spirits and jovial." [2]

And although the Prime Minister's Office, was slow Sunday night in responding to inquires [2], on Monday top aide Dov Weisglass was similarly upbeat about Sharon's condition. "His spirits are high, he feels and looks good and tomorrow he will leave the hospital," Weisglass told Channel 2. "He feels excellent, is functioning excellently and it is as if it all didn't happen." [2]

But despite those alleged Sunday night conversations, Sharon did not speak to the media Monday [10].

Chief neurologist Tamir Ben-Hur, reportedly proclaimed that "he could say unequivocally that the incident 'will not leave any damage or residual effects,' adding that there was 'an excellent chance it won't repeat itself.' [2]

On Tuesday Sharon "reportedly" looked "bright and cheerful" [3] leaving Jerusalem's Hadassah-Ein Kerem hospital. He even reportedly held a press conference, and thanked the medical staff for their devoted care.

The Jerusalem Post recounted: "It seems that you have missed me," a smiling 77- year-old Sharon told reporters at Jerusalem's Hadassah University Hospital at Ein Kerem in his first public appearance since falling ill on Sunday night. [8] The newspaper published photos apparently showing Sharon leaving hospital and working at his home. [Photos 1 & 2]

Sharon said he "was touched by concern Israelis have shown over my health." He said he would take it easy for the next few days before resuming his usual grueling schedule. [9]

After leaving the hospital, Sharon headed to his Jerusalem residence, where he was "reportedly" briefed on affairs of state, and took calls from well-wishers, including US President George W. Bush. It was again, yet more jovial fun.

Bush "reportedly" told Sharon, "I hope that when I see you in two months, you will be a lot thinner after the diet you will begin. Allow me to give you some pointers," the president noted, "first, eat healthy. Second, work out, and third, after reading your busy schedule, I must tell you, please spread it out." [9]

Staying in Jerusalem would have been a good idea for medical reasons of proximity to the hospital --especially if taking a blood thinner known to raise the risk of brain bleeding. But, Sharon returned to his ranch on Thursday night with permission from his doctors. [12]

His aides pre-announced Sharon would on the following Saturday invite former Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Avi Dichter to come to the Negev ranch to discuss political issues [12].

Sharon also "reportedly" met with Vice Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Justice Minister Tzipi Livni that Thursday to rebuke them for infighting over their position in the new Kadima party. "Stop arguing, shut your mouths, stop dealing with yourselves and focus on your work," an apparently forceful Sharon said --according to aides. [12]

And the comical mood returned. On December 25th, Sharon was back to a full schedule, and "reportedly" met with ministers and gave them a tongue-in-cheek warning about overeating during the eight-day Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. Sharon says that he hopes they will "all eat doughnuts and potato pancakes," but that he recommends that they "don't overdo it." [11]

Faking such cabinet meetings and Sharon's claimed meetings with top colleagues would be relatively easy. And faking the photos of the PM at work easier still.

[See our story: Sharon's Hospital Exit Photo Was Faked]

Less easy to dismiss is the Prime Minister's Office ceremony on Wednesday 4th Jan, 2006 [14] marking the transfer of Bank Leumi shares from state to private hands. There is even a photo of Sharon accepting a large cheque from the investors. Yet three different news reports leave it unclear whether the PM appeared at the press conference --not just the claimed cheque-handover photo opportunity [14 15 16]. Wearing his hat as Finance Minister, Ehud Olmert was certainly there.

But in this case also, it would have not been impossible to secure the cooperation of these investors in a deception. J. Ezra Merkin, managing partner of the Gabriel Capital Group(which won the tender for the bank) at the press conference reportedly said: "The well-being of Israel is no small matter for my partners and me." Cooperation from such a party would be no real problem.

Bear in mind that the full national security interests of the United States, the EU and Israel would be brought to bear on such a situation. That kind of geopolitical clout buys a lot of intelligence agency deception power.

And so, I can't rule out Sharon's brain-death on December, 18th, 2005.

Fintan Dunne, 6th Jan, 2006.

Photos:
Supposedly Sharon still working.

Exit hospital. Very fake-looking photo.

Accepting Bank Leumi investment?

Story References: HERE

Get ready for Financial Hurricane Katrina

By Fintan Dunne, BreakForNews.com 28 Dec., 2005

"In November, 2005, the Fed mysteriously announced with little comment and no palatable justification that they will hide the main staple of money supply measurement(M-3), effective March 2006. So what's been happening to M-3 since then? For the raw figures, fasten your seat belt. M-3 was increased $58.7 billion last week, a 30% annual rate of growth. Over the past 6 weeks it is up $192.9 billion, a 16.7 percent Banana Republic hyperinflationary pace. This is nuts, folks - unless there is an incredible risk out there we are not being told about."

So writes Robert McHugh in a recent financial article (in full below). And it's an article that has been getting some traffic on the CIA Fakes.

One of the advantages of knowing about the CIA fakes is that when you see them promote an article, you know it must be well worth wondering WHY?

One of the key factors McHugh cites for the M-3 madness is the forthcoming Euro-denominated trading of oil on the new Iranian bourse in March, 2006. And there has been much nudge-nudge comment among the self-same CIA Fakes about the U.S. hostility to Iran (not to mention Iraq) having been based on their desire to prevent this disastrous outcome for the U.S.

Bulls**t. The US/EU elite long ago decided this new Dollar-Euro policy between them. It's a planned development as part of the financial elite's rebalancing of global dependance on the dollar. And the U.S. elite is totally at one with their European counterparts on this shift.

It's a desperately needed shift.

The inflationary Clinton legacy was always going to be but a short-term panacea for U.S. economic woes. The Clinton stock bubble shifted to the Bush housing bubble. And all this vapor-prosperity took place despite no significant gains in productivity; increasing foreign competition; inflation; wages stagnation; and the diversion of productive capital into both federal white elephants and, of course, the military budget/oughtright theft.

It's a no-brainer that this eventually leads to financial collapse.

Which is why, in anticipation of such an eventual outcome, the military got a bonanza payoff from 9/11, and why the economic policy of destroy/rebuild allowed a similar bonanza accrue to Haliburton et al, in Iraq and in New Orleans. It's called looking after your pals in tough times.

The United States is being reinvented as a low-wage economy with a high-tech military-industrial-technological froth atop --sustained by a Homeland Security repression apparatus to keep the stunned peasants in check.

So, given that momentum, there is no alternative to dollar deflation in the longer term. The dollar is going down. And the Euro is there to take up the slack.

The Fed's unrevealed M-3 fund will be used as it has in the past --to hand over the freshly-printed dollars which allow key banks to speculate in the markets and thwart the true market forces from exerting their corrective effect.

It will cause stagflation. A stagnant economy with escalating inflation in all areas except wages.

The M-3 fund will be used to massage the economy until after the 2006 elections. Bush is already being lined up to take the political heat for the later colllapse. The Iranians and their oil trading bourse will also be blamed. As will Bush's costly foreign war. In truth, the economic problems of the U.S. are much more directly the result of international capital's globalization project.

And the spew of resignations among the members of the Feb Board over the last few years is not because, as McHugh speculates, they don't want to oversee bad economic planning.

It's because they don't want to be around when the dollar hits the fan; the housing bubble pops; and the economy tanks. And with Alan Greenspan gone from the Fed, the new appointment of Ben Bernanke is akin to the appointment of Michael D. Brown to head FEMA.

The Fed's 'Mr. Fall Guy' has been wheeled into place.

Get ready for Financial Hurricane Katrina.

What's the Fed Up To With the Money Supply?

by Robert McHugh, December 23, 2005

....M-3 has a direct but lagging impact on financial markets. Look at the chart at the top of the prior page. Whenever M-3 rises, the Dow Industrials rise. Whenever M-3 is flat or declines, the Dow Industrials decline. The Dow Industrials are a bellwether for the economy. If we can monitor M-3, we can better monitor the future path of equities and the economy. It is wrong for the Fed to stop its disclosure for this very reason. Investors need to know in a free market economy, because M-3 infusion is centrally planned intervention into a free market system. Investors need to know when the Master Planners have decided to intervene. Our buy/sell signals were designed to pick up the scent of Master Planner intervention by analyzing supply and demand forces underlying the markets. So with or without a fully disclosed M-3, we will be able to continue to identify coming multi-week trends.

Should be a fascinating storm in 2006.

The recent rise in Gold catalogued 74 points over about a month, a 16 percent rally from precisely the day the Fed announced it would hide M-3 from taxpayers and citizens of this great nation. That is no coincidence. Gold sees hyperinflation, monetization of debt, and intervention into free markets. Gold is telling us it expects Ben Bernanke to be an inflationist. [Full Article]

Why the CIA Is Lying about Syria

Former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri

The G8 plan to demonize Syria is in disarray after the discrediting of two key witnesses central to a U.N. report on the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri. That's bad news for their goal of the imperial destruction of Arab nations.

Which has left the schemers in rather a tight fix. The solution: kill somebody else to raise tensions again and act as a smokescreen, and meanwhile lie hard to cover-up the truth.

And when it comes to lying, you know you can rely on UPI. So here goes:

U.N.: Syria slows Hariri probe

By LAUREN MACK, UPI
The U.N. commission investigating the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri [has] reviewed the investigative report by Detlev Mehlis, head of the International Independent Investigation Commission which is investigating Hariri's assassination.

Since the identity of confidential source, Hussam Taher Hussam, has been disclosed, he has withdrawn his testimony which implicated high-level Syrian officials in the assassination....

"Mr. Hussam is being manipulated by the Syrian authorities..." said the report. [link]

For barefaced lying by omission, it's hard to beat that.

Mr. Hussan has not simply "withdrawn his report", as UPI states. He says that Lebanese officials tortured him to present false testimony against Syria to the U.N. commission. He says he was held by supporters of Saad Hariri, the son of the former prime minister, and offered $1.3 million if he would lie about senior Syrian officials. They wanted him to present false evidence implicating Maher Assad, the younger brother of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, and Asef Shawkat, the president's brother-in-law, in the Hariri's killing.

This UPI report appeared in a section called "International Intelligence". It should really have been called "International CIA Intelligence Propaganda".

So, with the U.N. report going down in flames, the G8 schemers had to move fast. Thus it became expedient to murder again in order to create a smokescreen.

Just days ago, Gibran Tueni, editor of the An-Nahar newspaper and an MP, was murdered by a car bomb along with two others, as his motorcade drove through the industrial suburb of Mkalles. Mr Tueni played a prominent role in the mass demonstrations against Syria following the killing of Hariri, and was an outspoken critic of the Damacus regime.

Hold on a second, you say. You mean to tell us that they would kill one of their own main anti-Syrian allies simply to whip up a frenzy among his fellow anti-Syrians and to divert from the holes in the U.N. report??

Well... Yes!

I mean, which part of totally ruthless don't you get?

After all, they are playing for high stakes. This article on Al Basrah sums it up best. But please be warned that if you have been exposed to too much CIA/Mossad propaganda, this may cause you to feel just a bit sick. Actually, even if you haven't, you will probably feel ill anyway after reading the following:

The Threats Against Iraq and Syria and the Option of Resistance

"In fact, the Melhis Report is nothing but a dirty propaganda campaign seeking to incite public opinion against the Syrian government in preparation for what could turn into an aggression and an occupation of Syria.

We also believe the US plan in Syria may be to induce regime change, ...via comprador and sectarian elements after economic sanctions are imposed and Syria is regionally encircled in an effort to weaken the grip of the Syrian leadership.

In the long run, the plan is to set the stage for the break-up of Syria just like the stage was set for the break-up for Iraq.... So, all resistance movements in Lebanon, Palestine and Syria must remain on the alert, as being potentially targeted and as we anticipate "Israel's" covert and possibly overt involvement in the campaign against Syria. In the meantime, we believe Syria's number one priority should be to prepare its citizens for guerilla warfare to simultaneously send a message to US Imperialists that it shall be a burial ground for the invading forces and their local allies.

It is paramount to realize that the Zio-imperialist plan in the Arab World today does not only involve changing regimes. It involves changing geo-political maps, breaking up Arab states, and eradicating the Arab identity of the land to make way for fragmentation and hegemony. [link]

Given that the G8 objective is to destroy Arab nations and turn them into colonial dependencies, you can see why the propaganda war is essential to prevent the somnolent Western masses from realizing the full Earth-destroying capacity of their own leaders.

The devil, they say, is the prince of liars.

He could take lessons from these guys.

Another Tiananmen: Civillians Massacred in China

International media are still downplaying the scale of last week's massacre of civillians in China's Guangdong province, putting the number of dead between two and twenty. But local reports set the toll far higher.

On December 6, Chinese authorities in the rural village of Shanwei deployed 3,000 paramilitary police with tanks and machine guns, who have killed in all between 50 and 70 protesting villagers --the greatest anti-civillian use of used military force since the June 4, 1989 Massacre in Tiananmen Square.

By the 8th of December, 33 residents had been killed and several dozen were missing say local reports. The villagers had been protesting for proper compensation after corrupt officials had expropriated farmers' land for a power plant. Protests against corruption, pollution and land seizures have become increasingly common in rural China.

In a damage limitation exercise, the authorities in China have arrested a police commander who ordered officers to open fire, media reports say.

Shanwei Enforces Martial Law,
Relatives Beg to Claim Bodies

One villager told news media: "As of now, the authorities do not simply arrest and then sentence people, but shoot them at will. A villager was shot dead in public yesterday afternoon."

The villagers say that the Shanwei city government told victims' family members not to tell the outside world that the victims were shot, and the city government will give them welfare, etc. With people being shot in the streets, villagers were isolated from each other. Phone services were also cut off.

A 70-year-old farmer said that he had never seen such a terrible thing in his lifetime. "When the Chinese Communist Party kills people, it is even scarier than when the Japanese army attacked the town or than bandits and gangsters. The villagers of Dongzhou are honest people who can endure hardship. How could the CCP fire on such decent citizens?!"

Another villager said that the authorities attempted to destroy the corpses. After the massacre on the night of December 6, the authorities cremated some of the bodies and sent others to the seashore for disposal. Some residents wanted to take back the corpses but were prevented from doing so. According to a report by Radio Free Asia, villagers saw police putting police uniforms on three villagers' bodies and taking photos.

The armed police and riot teams cleared the scene in front of the power plant where they had fired on the villagers. Villagers burned incense and knelt down before the police, begging to get the bodies of their family members back.


Phones Cut Off and Reporters Denied Information

When questioned by Agence France Presse (AFP), officials and police of Shanwei City said that they knew nothing of such an event and refused to make further comments.

The telephone interviews of overseas reporters were often cut off right in the middle. Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported that the cell phones and telephones belonging to the town's representatives who had informed RFA of the situation had all been cut off.

There are still thousands of armed police and public security men guarding the entrance to the town and no one is allowed to leave. Police have arrested three representatives of the town, claiming it was a narcotics-related investigation.

The television news reports from Shanwei City stated that the villagers opened fire first. One villager said angrily, "How can common people have guns? The government owns all the guns!"


Background Leading to the Incident

All this stems from a dispute in Donzhou Town, Shanwei City, over land compensation. The municipal authorities, in order to build a power plant, appropriated a large section of the farmers' land and also forbid villagers from catching or raising fish in a nearby lake. Some villagers said that they were not opposed to the new power plant, but that their compensation money from the central government had been taken by corrupt officials, so they did not receive just compensation for the land.

The farmers appealed to the authorities this past May, asking them to solve the compensation problem, but no one from the government took care of it. As a result, the villagers began on September 21 to block the road on which the power plant's transportation vehicles made their way to the plant.

On December 5, authorities in Shanwei, Guangdong Province, sent about 100 riot police to the power plant. When some representatives from Donzhou Town went to see the situation, they were immediately arrested. More than 3000 Donghzhou residents went to the plant to ask the police to release these representatives, but the police fired tear gas, then shot and killed villagers.



From agency reports and Epoch Times. The photos shown were taken on
the morning of December 9 by Epoch Times reporters in China. Link Link

FEMA Chief Worked for McVeigh's Lawyer

by Fintan Dunne, BreakForNews.com, 10 Sept 2005

Disgraced FEMA chief, Michael Brown once worked for Stephen Jones, the prominent Oklahoma lawyer who was the lead defense attorney in the Timothy McVeigh case.

And Jones is someone with a very interesting background himself. He has represented many ex- and retired spies, and previously worked for Richard Nixon, Nelson Rockefeller and Donald Rumsfeld.

Jones has acted for former employees of the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and the National Security Council staff.

But that's just the workaday rountne of a carreer mired in state security issues. He has defended cases involving allegations of terrorism, domestic subversion, espionage, electronic surveillance, wiretapping, and computer surveillance.

His bio states:

He was also involved in consulting work with various targets, defendants, or persons of interest to the Federal Government for alleged acts of terrorism in the Philippines, the Far East, and September 11. He has also represented individuals accused of disloyalty to the United States and/or the unauthorized disclosure of confidential government information or classified government information.

Of topical interest is that Jones was once a legislative assistant to Congressman (now Secretary of Defense) Donald Rumsfeld. And back in the last century, Jones was a personal research assistant to Richard M. Nixon, and represented Nelson Rockefeller's political Interests in Oklahoma. He also worked on Rockefeller's 1964 and 1968 national campaigns for the presidency.

It's an impressive biography. It must have made Timothy McVeigh feel that with representation like that, he had absolutely nothing to worry about.

Big mistake.

Almost as big a mistake as appointing Mike Brown to be head of FEMA.

If it was truly a mistake --and not just a clever contrivance, the more skeptical of you might say.

Because, in retrospect, Jones is now scathing of Brown's talents when working for him. He told Time magazine:

"He did mainly transactional work, not litigation," says Jones.
"There was a feeling that he was not serious and somewhat shallow."

Ouch.

Jones sang a similar song to the St Petersburg Times:

"He was average. Maybe that's the best way to put it."

Brown was pleasant enough, if a bit opportunistic, Jones said, but he did not put enough time and energy into his job. "He would have been better suited to be a small city or county lawyer," he said. Jones was surprised Brown was being considered for job at FEMA but figured it wasn't impossible he could have risen high enough in local and state government to be considered for a job directing FEMA operations in Oklahoma.

The agents quickly corrected him. This was a national post in Washington, deputy director of FEMA, the arm of the federal government that prepares for and responds to disasters around the United States.

Jones looked at the agents, "You're surely kidding?"

With ex-employers like that --who needs enemies. Not Brown.

Now I know that you 'conspiracy theorists' will be also saying to yourself that Stephen Jones might be a safe pair of hands for such a sensitive case as McVeigh's. Not to mention being safe hands for the many cases involving national security he has handled. You probably reckon he must be pretty well connected -where it matters.

Here's an example of this thinking:

Gerry Spence, one of the best criminal lawyers in the country, [and] Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz [have] also been highly critical of Jones' abysmal defence. One defence lawyer said he's seen lengthier defences for drunken driving.

Jones was paid, or paid off, somewhere in the region of ten million dollars by the government to "defend" McVeigh. A strong incentive not to rock the boat.

So you might well be suspicious of the motives behind what he is saying about Brown.

And I'll bet you've got him marked as some kind of a Rockefeller stooge too.

I knew you would. It's very naughty of you.

But maybe you figure that all this helps you understand why it was that Michael Brown got the unenviable job of being the pre-arranged fall guy for Katrina.

And maybe it does.

New Orleans Residents Face Down Evacuation Bid

Despite tough talk from New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, and scare stories about disease and toxins from the US Centers for Disease Control, residents determined to stay seem to have successfully stalled implementation of forced evacuations.

Local reports indicate Louisiana State Police troopers and National Guard units in New Orleans are unwilling to participate in forced evacuations. But FEMA are still blocking aid in a policy some locals have dubbed "trying to starve us out."

Declare Martial Law on Big Oil Looters

It's time to declare martial law on oil company looting,
says Derrick Z. Jackson in the Boston Globe.

In a thinly disguised attempt to act as if it cared about the people wading in the water, Chevron has pledged $5 million to relief efforts. ExxonMobil and Shell have pledged $2 million apiece. British Petroleum and Citgo have pledged $1 million each.

This is nothing next to their wealth. Of the world's seven most profitable corporations, four are ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, and Chevron. The [four] had combined profits last year of $72.8 billion...

And that was last year. A month ago, ExxonMobil, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips announced record second-quarter profits of $7.6 billion, $3.7 billion, and $3.1 billion, respectively. Royal Dutch Shell's quarterly profits were up by 34 percent.... Continue

Zarqawi Hails Katrina's 'Divine Strike' on US

Reputed Al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has hailed the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina as beginning of the end for the United States.

"It is the start of its collapse," said an unverified Internet statement purportedly from the Al-Qaeda chief.

"America has been hit by a divine strike. The curses of the oppressed have been fulfilled," the Zarqawi statement said Sunday. "God is on the lookout (to punish) the oppressors."

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS

But 'Zarqawi' is not alone thinking it's the beginning of the end. US talk radio host , George Noory believes the hurricane is clear evidence that civilization is now in the "End Times" described in the Bible.

"I always wonder," he mused aloud during a show last week. "Why did this have to happen now? ...I mean why would divine Providence want this to happen to us now?"

Maybe he should ask George Bush --who has a hotline to the Almighty.

Maybe he should ask the DIA and CIA. 'Zarqawi' is long discredited as a construction of US propaganda. His internet statements are designed to give the western public the impression that foreign Al-Qaeda fighters --rather than local Iraqi resistance-- are the opposition to the US occupation of Iraq.

And Noory's Coast to Coast was recently named by us in our CIA Fakes list. Noory too, follows an agenda dictated by the same behind-the-scenes US intelligence interests.

This agency-created "end times" hoopla has been a useful way of roping in Bush's wilder fundamentalist supporters in the US. Noory's clearly now remarketing the same nonsense to an audience more used to aliens than stigmata. With Zarqawi chiming in for effect.

Looks like the CIA have everybody firmly "on message".

AP Sanitizes Headline Faulting Bush

Enlarge

A BreakForNews snapshot of the
Google News listing for the AP story
-with the original headline.

It states Bush had admitted fault for the
hurricane response. The headline was
rewritten later Friday.

Click image to view

Associated Press have altered the headline of their story about President Bush's comments on the New Orleans disaster.

The first version of the story carried the headline:

• Bush Admits Fault on Hurricane Response

But by 7:20pm Friday this had changed to:

• Bush Admits Katrina Response 'Not Enough'

In the text of the story, journalist Jennnifer Loven had written: "Bush has been loath to admit errors throughout his presidency."

Sure. And the media has been just as loath to report them.

Cannibalism in New Orleans

WagNews Comments: The cannibalism reports have already become
a political football at a national level in the US, but are still hard to nail down
to any specifics. But it's not only a national-level spin. These reports are also
on local channels. As a BFN correspondent writes:

BFN Correspondent: The effects of Katrina are really bad and much worse than is being reported! I have been watching the unedited local news feeds off my cable system. The number of dead bodies is uncountable and there are reports of cannibalism .... yes I did say that. :-(

Mainstream media footage shows few if any corpses, but local channels depict many bodies in the flood waters. The first case of cholera has been found. By the way, rather than survivors shooting at helicopters, they are simply shooting to attract the atention of rescue aircraft.

The mainstream media is not even close to describing what is going on in New Orleans. Keep an eye on the internet for the real news, especially this time around because the "spin" is f***ing intolerable and inpenetrable."

• Latest From New Orleans (Kathy on BFN Forum)
• 'Bush Admits Fault' -(Headline Later Altered)
  
• Civil-rights leader claims cannibalism
• National Geographic article predicted disaster
  
• Shipping Lines Suspend Cargo

Is "Peak Oil" a Fraud?

The issue of renewable oil is not the only reason that Peak Oil is a con, but a good summary has just been published on energy analysis website 321energy.com. - Fintan

If hydrocarbons are renewable-
then is "Peak Oil" a fraud?

by Joel Bainerman 31 Aug, 2005

The question is critical due to the enormous amount of coverage the issue of "Peak Oil" is receiving from the mainstream press. If the supply of hydrocarbons is renewable- then the contrary to the conventional wisdom being touted throughout the mainstream press today- the world is NOT running out of oil.

Professor Emmanuil Chekaliuk told the conference on Petroleum and Petroleum Geology in Moscow that:

"Statistical thermodynamic analysis has established clearly that hydrocarbon molecules which comprise petroleum require very high pressures for their spontaneous formation, comparable to that required for diamond...

To suggest that hydrocarbon molecules spontaneously evolve in the regimes of temperature and pressure characterized by the near-surface of the Earth, which are the regimes of methane creation and hydrocarbon destruction, does not even deserve consideration."

Contrarily, the statistics of the international petroleum industry establish that, far from diminishing, the net known recoverable reserves of petroleum have been growing steadily for the past fifty years. Those statistics show that, for every year since about 1946, the international petroleum industry has discovered at least five new tons of recoverable oil for every three which have been consumed....

As Professor P. Odell of the London School of Economics has put it, instead of "running out of oil," the human race by every measure seems to be "running into oil".... Continues

Ellsberg, Sibel Edmonds & The Secret Team

by Fintan Dunne, BreakForNews.com
30 Aug, 2005

No decoding of an intelligence operation such as 9/11 is complete without analysing the intelligence agencies themselves. Uncovering their lies today depends on understanding their lies in the past.

New lies instruct us about old lies. And vice versa.

For those still coming to terms with the scope of our CIA Internet Fakes list, an extract from L. Fletcher Prouty's "The Secret Team" gives some indication of the lengths to which a secret intelligence service will go to cover it's tracks.

Even without necessarily endorsing Prouty, the issues he raises illuminate the real world subtleties of how intelligence services work.

One chapter has some stimulating stuff on Ellsberg that seems quite relevant:

The tremendous pressures in this country that have built up during the long tragic years of the conflict in Indochina are driving researchers, politicians, and other concerned Americans to search for the origins and sources of responsibility for that disaster.... This pressure is now forcing Agency and ST (Secret Team) supporters to begin a serious program of rewriting history, in a massive effort to protect and shield the Agency while shifting the search into other avenues.

We have already said that the work of Daniel Ellsberg and the number of people who helped him may have been the first major step in this effort. The released Pentagon Papers do much to portray the CIA as it is supposed to be, while doing all it can to shift any censure of the CIA as an organization primarily concerned with clandestine operations, to the military, the National Security Council, and the White House.

Read more in the Forum here. It's a valid criticism of Ellsberg, no matter what your attitude to Prouty. All the more relevant because this Vietnam-era issue has modern echoes in relation to 9/11, as the agency dons a public cloak of ineptitude to cover it's much-suspected culpability.

But, this time there's too much blame to shift. Some must be taken on board -even if under the guise of incompetence.

In that light it hardly seems surprising that a man who --unwittingly or not-- shifted blame from the agency's reputation in the past, has teamed up with a lady who is today helping to spread yet more blame away from the agency.

In one fell swoop Sibel Edmonnd has offloaded blame from the CIA --and spread it across the FBI, the State Department; an unnamed (i.e. Mossad) foreign intelligence operation; and a non-terrorist criminal network.

Quite a feat.

In an interview with me (her first recorded interview, by the way), Edmonds alleged that the US State Department had blocked investigations showing links between criminal drug trafficking networks and the attacks on 9/11.

"Certain investigations were being quashed, let's say per State Department's request, because it would have affected certain foreign relations [or] affected certain business relations with foreign organizations," she said. (Interview)

Edmonds also said the pre-9/11 US intelligence system had been penetrated by a drug-linked, semi-legitimate criminal intelligence network, operating with seeming impunity inside the FBI. She claimed a fellow translator with top security clearance tried to recruit her, but when Edmonds reported the recruitment approach to her superiors she was fobbed off.

The post-9/11 intelligence 'failures' she said, included the willful quashing by the government, of investigations tracing those criminal networks.

At the time, I wrote:

If that's a limited hangout, God help us. The truth must be awful.

The "limited hangout" was, of course, 100% pure LIHOP. But with a twist. Edmonds was publicly all LIHOP, but assured everyone that her private, gagged testimony went much further. Either way, Ellsberg seemed convinced by Edmonds, as he too hammered home the LIHOP.

"I'm not an expert on all this," he told me. "But I am increasingly open to the explanation that people in the administration did see this coming... and may have indeed reduced some obstacles.., or opened the door, in effect. I haven't been absolutely convinced on that, but it does seem to me to be an open question that deserves investigation."

"Now beyond that... it seems to me quite plausible that --plausible, that's all I'd say-- that Pakistan was quite involved in this, and that many Saudis were well informed on this," said Ellsberg in a recorded interview.

"And to say that. To say Pakistan-- is to me, to say C.I.A. Because I think the relations between the Pakistan I.S.I. [intelligence service] and CIA were very close from the beginning. And it's hard to say that the I.S.I knew something that the CIA had no knowledge of... But, I wouldn't say that I have been yet been thoroughly convinced by any alternative." (Interview)

In those prevarications, Ellsberg both has his cake and eats it. Smearing with one hand and wiping away with the other.

Between them, Ellsberg and Edmonds spread the blame across the Saudis, the Pakistanis, the CIA, the State Dept., the FBI, the Mossad, a drug-linked criminal gang and the implicit villians: Al-Qaida.

Soon, from miles away in Florida, Daniel Hopsicker, with help from Atta's girlfriend Amanda Keller was insisting that Edmonds' story dovetailed with his discoveries of a drug network linked to 9/11. His list of Florida-based villians is as exhaustive as that of the dynamic duo in D.C..

If you buy that whole array of LIHOP spins, then buy it.

I didn't buy it then or now, but I kept my convictions to myself as I reported her tale. I was playing dumb and playing the long game for a bigger payoff: the whole truth on 9/11.

You can't get anywhere investigation 9/11 from web material alone. I figured that some misdirection of my own would get me closer to the truth.

It did. And then some.

Those interviews with Edmonds and Ellsberg led me to further interviews with many of the well known 9/11 skeptics -on our BreakForNews netradio shows. As the jigsaw pieces came together, person by person, website by website, the big picture emerged.

WHAT FLAVOR CONSPIRACY YOU WANT?

One big corner of that overall 9/11 picture is formed by four disparate-seeming individuals: a veteran whistleblower, an attractive novice whistleblower, a campaigning journalist and a reputed lingerie model; jigsaw peices called Ellsberg, Edmonds, Hopsicker and Keller. Ellsberg supports Edmonds, confirmed by Hopsicker --backed by eyewitness accounts from Keller. But they're all telling different flavors of the same story.

To specify which story that is, let's take a look at the popular tales of 9/11. The notorious main division is between LIHOP and MIHOP. But it's much more detailed than that. Explanations come in a full range of flavors --starting with the official story:

A. Official story:

CIA/FBI were incompetent; Bush and/or Clinton were complacent.

B. Official Lame Conspiracy:

CIA/FBI were incompetent; Bush/Cheney maybe let it happen; Israelis Knew.

C. Official LIHOP Conspiracy:

CIA/FBI were compromised; Bush/Cheney did let it happen; Israelis Helped.

D. Official LIHOP Wild Conspiracy:

CIA/FBI compromised; Bush/Cheney/Neocons let it happen; Israelis Did It.

E. Official LIHOP Tinfoil Conspiracy:

Israelis/Neocons/Bush/Cheney Did It; CIA/FBI looked the other way.

F. Official MIHOP 'Serious' Conspiracy:

Israelis/Neocons/CIA/FBI/Bush/Cheney/Military-Industrial-Complex Did It.

G. Official Loony Conspiracies:

Rothschilds and/or Rockefellers and/or CFR and/or Bildebergers did it.
Globalists who want to run everything in a World Government did it.
Jews and Jewish bankers -who already run everything- did it.
Satanists, Opus Dei or Reptilians did it.

It's a terrific variety of theories.
It plays out something like this:

• The mainstream media push version A; hint at B; sneer at G.
• The controlled right/intellectual media pushes version B.
• The controlled left/intellectual media pushes version C.
• The 'moderate' Fake internet sites push versions C and D.
• The 'softcore' Fake internet sites push versions D and E.
• The 'independent' Fake internet sites push version F.
• The 'loony' Fake interent sites push variations of version G.

But every single one, from A to G are OFFICIAL versions, sanctioned and promoted by the 9/11 intelligence coverup operation and their CIA Fakes network. They have a flavor for every market.

The creation of this multiplicity of explanations is a core element of the coverup. Left to their own devices, people on the Internet might have figured out the truth themselves. But with this circus in action, there is always plenty of distraction and lots of division in opinion.

The intelligence coverup is not trying to stop 9/11 conspiracy theories on the internet. It's creating them. Then playing off supporters of the different theories against each other. That's a classic Cointelpro-style tactic.

The perpetrators knew that a sizeable segment of people were going to be pretty sure 9/11 was not as it seems. They don't mind that, for now. The immediate objectives are first, to to stop these skeptical views from gaining hold in mainstream opinion. Second, to prevent a coherent view forming which could convinve a much broader number of people -particularly those on the political left.

Ellsberg, Edmonds, Hopsicker, Keller are clearly advocates for Version C. They are not the only ones.

Soon after our interview with Sibel Edmonds, Antiwar.com began carrying her story and have been her strongest promoters ever since. The Edmonds comments about a "certain" intelligence agency, sit well on that website, where lead Antiwar.com columnist Justin Raimondo, is just now yet again pushing the "Israelis Knew/Did It" angle on 9/11.

Many other CIA Fakes are heavily promoting this line, because it's a key part of what the coverup hopes will forever be the main vaguely-hinted, but unproven conspiracy theory on 9/11: Bush, Cheney, and Mossad let it happen on purpose.

The truth is far worse. But we are getting closer to it, step by step.

COMING NEXT: The Pod People and the CIA

Fintan Dunne 1st Sept, 2005

Read the extract from Prouty's "The Secret Team"
Requires actual thinking. More in an update here soon.

THE SECRET TEAM

The CIA and Its Allies in Control of
the United States and the World
L. FLETCHER PROUTY Col., U.S. Air Force (Ret.)

Chapter 8
CIA: The "Cover Story" Intelligence Agency
and the Real-Life Clandestine Operator

THE CIA LIKES TO PUBLICIZE ITSELF AS IT WISHES TO be seen; it tries consistently to maintain its cover story. These facts would not be publicly admitted by the agency; but they are facts. It is only fitting to note that when Allen Dulles died, he was writing a book about "Communism and Subversion". This was his first love, as it was J. Edgar Hoover's. This was his occupation. Intelligence was his avocation. When he was writing about Communism and subversion, he was writing, of course, about the real work of the CIA. He liked to write about the CIA and he liked to see that others wrote about the CIA... Continues here

Positive Email Responses to CIA Fakes article

Here's a selection of the positive responses we have
had by email about the CIA Internet Fakes article.

Read the full emails in the Forum here

---

Dear, dear Fintan

Your 'CIA Fake' analysis is absolutely spot on. Bravo: You - and Kathy - deserve a media award, though of course that would indicate your selling out ala Bob Geldof, KBE. Watch this space: Bonio will be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize as soon as you can say G8 puppet, mark my words.

Keep going, get stronger; alienate yourself from these Muppets - stand alone. I always knew you were closing in on the fakers; call it male intuition (yes Kathy, us men get it too)....

---

Hi Kathy & Fintan,

Thanks for that clarification interview. Fintan, speaking for myself, I think sometimes you get too far ahead of the game and assume that others are also up to speed, though I’m sure many are....

---

Hi Fintan,

You certainly have something, Fintan, but backing your theories with fact is essential. Here's something to help you:

The Lincoln Group, psyops specialist, just linked forces with powerful lobbyist BKSH (headed by Charlie Black, ex-spokeman to Bush I, work in Iraq (Chalabi, INC), Iran (Radio Voice Iran), the EU, Yukos (Russian Oil Co) etc.)....

---

Hello Fintan,

I've just been exploring your website and audio for the last several
days, having discovered it in the wake of the London bombings. Great
stuff, very intelligent and provocative....

---

Hello and Greetings Fintan…

I have to say I was very impressed with your honest analysis on current
events (The London 7/7 bombs) and I have also taken time to go over several
of your postings and articles. The reason why I say "impressed…" was that I
have been reading a lot of the postings (internet fakes) from the other
sites on and off for the past few years....

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Kathy/Fintan... Yo,

Yeoman enterprise you're doing, for which the planetary birth of cosmic youth smiles, however infantilely... :-} If you are correct in identification of Jeff Rense, in particular, as a CIA-gent, then you'll want to pay particular attention to the Thursday August 25th program. All three hours devoted to Greg Szymanki's *find* Janet Parker.....

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Fintan:

I noticed that Steve Quayle's site was missing from your list of "CIA Fakes." Maybe he deserves a category of his own. Every time he appears with Noory on Coast to Coast my roses grow three feet......

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Hello Fintan,

Found your site last night off Cryptome. At first I was alittle taken aback. I have supplied Mike Rivero material since before 911. And ya, Alex is a dip nuts in Austin. Although I have contacts there that have had run ins with spooks. I have also had an "interview" by the Secret Service back in 2003.....

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CIA internet fakes ?!

You guys have a lot of courage. I have suspected many of these, but others are a complete surprise to me. WOW !!!.... I am also surprised that YOWUSA.com is not on your list. It certainly is difficult to discern who you can trust.

'Tipping Point' on Iraq is a Media Con

"We may be getting close to a tipping point in terms of support
for the Iraq war." - Alan Bock AntiWar.com 26 Aug, 2005

"Has the 'Tipping Point' on Iraq Been Reached?"
- Jim Lobe AntiWar.com 19 Aug, 2005

"The Iraq war 'tipping point' ?"
- Tom Regan csmonitor.com 22 Aug, 2005

by Fintan Dunne,
BreakForNews.com 27 Aug, 2005

Mainstream and alternative media are being extremely misleading with talk of a "tipping point" in U.S. support for Bush's policies in Iraq.

Tipping point?? Among those with strong opinions, almost two and a half times as many are against Bush policies, as for them!

The key development of the last three months is not the overall figures, but the collapse in support among strong backers of the Bush administration's Iraq policies.

As measured by an Ipsos/AP poll, strong support has crashed from a quarter of the U.S. population to one fifth, in the period June to August, 2005.

Iraq is an issue on which over 70% of people hold hardened views, compared to 26% with mild opinions. That makes the fall in strong support highly significant. Yet the Associated Press reports:

"Overall attitudes about the war — while negative — haven't changed
dramatically through the summer." - Will Lester SFGate.com 26 Aug, 2005

THE 50/50 LIE

"Tipping point" is when things are finely balanced. Like say, 50 -50. Like say, an anti-war mother versus a pro-war mother. Whom do you back? 50 -50. That's the cunning spin.

But back in June those strongly opposed already outnumbered backers of Bush policies by 45% to 26%. Now they eclipse them by 46% to 20%, almost two and a half to one.

In truth, the tipping point is long, long past.

We now have a meltdown of core Bush support.

Remember the misleading media maps of the presidential election outcome. Supposedly the U.S.A. was awash with red Republican votes. Supposedly, the 'fundies' had redrawn U.S. politics for GW. But, those maps -like the rest of Bush's "victory"- were just an illusion. The truth was much less Red.

The states where George Bush did well, have huge land areas but few people. Adjusting for actual population and stolen votes shows a Purple America where legions of fundamentalist Bush supporters are merely a myth.

Now, the latest poll shows core Bush backers on Iraq at only 20%. That's much more like the measure of the Bush bedrock support -a far cry from a majority. Tough luck cowboy.

Don't let the media away with the "tipping point" lie. They helped steal the election, now they're sealing the public's true opinions. Email this article to antiwar activists. The electronic 'Bush' telegraph is vital. After all, your friends won't be hearing this from the media. Not even the alternative media, it seems.

Article URL:
http://wagnews.blogspot.com/2005/08/tipping-point-on-iraq-is-media-con.html