Part I
by Andrew Gavin Marshall
Introduction
As the 9th anniversary of 9/11 nears, and the war on terror continues to be waged and grows in ferocity and geography, it seems all the more imperative to return to the events of that fateful September morning and re-examine the reasons for war and the nature of the stated culprit, Al-Qaeda.
The events of 9/11 pervade the American and indeed the world imagination as an historical myth. The events of that day and those leading up to it remain largely unknown and little understood by the general public, apart from the disturbing images repeated ad nauseam in the media. The facts and troubled truths of that day are lost in the folklore of the 9/11 myth: that the largest attack carried out on American ground was orchestrated by 19 Muslims armed with box cutters and urged on by religious fundamentalism, all under the direction of Osama bin Laden, the leader of a global terrorist network called al-Qaeda, based out of a cave in Afghanistan.
The myth sweeps aside the facts and complex nature of terror, al-Qaeda, the American empire and literally defies the laws of physics. As John F. Kennedy once said, “The greatest enemy of the truth is not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest – but the myth – persistent, pervasive, and unrealistic.”
This three-part series on “The Imperial Anatomy of Al-Qaeda” examines the geopolitical historical origins and nature of what we today know as al-Qaeda, which is in fact an Anglo-American intelligence network of terrorist assets used to advance American and NATO imperial objectives in various regions around the world.
Part 1 examines the origins of the intelligence network known as the Safari Club, which financed and organized an international conglomerate of terrorists, the CIA’s role in the global drug trade, the emergence of the Taliban and the origins of al-Qaeda.
The Safari Club
Following Nixon’s resignation as President, Gerald Ford became the new US President in 1974. Henry Kissinger remained as Secretary of State and Ford brought into his administration two names that would come to play important roles in the future of the American Empire: Donald Rumsfeld as Ford’s Chief of Staff, and Dick Cheney, as Deputy Assistant to the President. The Vice President was Nelson Rockefeller, David Rockefeller’s brother. When Donald Rumsfeld was promoted to Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney was promoted to Chief of Staff. Ford had also appointed a man named George H.W. Bush as CIA Director.
In 1976, a coalition of intelligence agencies was formed, which was called the Safari Club. This marked the discreet and highly covert coordination among various intelligence agencies, which would last for decades. It formed at a time when the CIA was embroiled in domestic scrutiny over the Watergate scandal and a Congressional investigation into covert CIA activities, forcing the CIA to become more covert in its activities.
In 2002, the Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Turki bin Faisal gave a speech in which he stated that in response to the CIA’s need for more discretion, “a group of countries got together in the hope of fighting Communism and established what was called the Safari Club. The Safari Club included France, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Iran [under the Shah].”[1] However, “The Safari Club needed a network of banks to finance its intelligence operations. With the official blessing of George H.W. Bush as the head of the CIA,” Saudi intelligence chief, Kamal Adham, “transformed a small Pakistani merchant bank, the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), into a world-wide money-laundering machine, buying banks around the world to create the biggest clandestine money network in history.”[2]
As CIA director, George H.W. Bush “cemented strong relations with the intelligence services of both Saudi Arabia and the shah of Iran. He worked closely with Kamal Adham, the head of Saudi intelligence, brother-in-law of King Faisal and an early BCCI insider.” Adham had previously acted as a “channel between [Henry] Kissinger and [Egyptian President] Anwar Sadat” in 1972. In 1976, Iran, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia formed the Safari Club “to conduct through their own intelligence agencies operations that were now difficult for the CIA,” which was largely organized by the head of French intelligence, Alexandre de Marenches.[3]
The “Arc of Crisis” and the Iranian Revolution
When Jimmy Carter became President in 1977, he appointed over two-dozen members of the Trilateral Commission to his administration, which was an international think tank formed by Zbigniew Brzezinski and David Rockefeller in 1973. Brzezinski had invited Carter to join the Trilateral Commission, and when Carter became President, Brzezinski became National Security Adviser; Cyrus Vance, also a member of the Commission, became Secretary of State; and Samuel Huntington, another Commission member, became Coordinator of National Security and Deputy to Brzezinski. Author and researcher Peter Dale Scott deserves much credit for his comprehensive analysis of the events leading up to and during the Iranian Revolution in his book, “The Road to 9/11”,* which provides much of the information below.
Samuel Huntington and Zbigniew Brzezinski were to determine the US policy position in the Cold War, and the US-Soviet policy they created was termed, “Cooperation and Competition,” in which Brzezinski would press for “Cooperation” when talking to the press, yet, privately push for “competition.” So, while Secretary of State Cyrus Vance was pursuing détente with the Soviet Union, Brzezinski was pushing for American supremacy over the Soviet Union. Brzezinski and Vance would come to disagree on almost every issue.[4]
In 1978, Zbigniew Brzezinski gave a speech in which he stated, “An arc of crisis stretches along the shores of the Indian Ocean, with fragile social and political structures in a region of vital importance to us threatened with fragmentation. The resulting political chaos could well be filled by elements hostile to our values and sympathetic to our adversaries.” The Arc of Crisis stretched from Indochina to southern Africa, although, more specifically, the particular area of focus was “the nations that stretch across the southern flank of the Soviet Union from the Indian subcontinent to Turkey, and southward through the Arabian Peninsula to the Horn of Africa.” Further, the “center of gravity of this arc is Iran, the world’s fourth largest oil producer and for more than two decades a citadel of U.S. military and economic strength in the Middle East. Now it appears that the 37-year reign of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi is almost over, ended by months of rising civil unrest and revolution.”[5]
With rising discontent in the region, “There was this idea that the Islamic forces could be used against the Soviet Union. The theory was, there was an arc of crisis, and so an arc of Islam could be mobilized to contain the Soviets. It was a Brzezinski concept.”[6] A month prior to Brzezinski’s speech, in November of 1978, “President Carter named the Bilderberg group’s George Ball, another member of the Trilateral Commission, to head a special White House Iran task force under the National Security Council’s Brzezinski.” Further, “Ball recommended that Washington drop support for the Shah of Iran and support the fundamentalist Islamic opposition of Ayatollah Khomeini.”[7] George Ball’s visit to Iran was a secret mission.[8]
Throughout 1978, the Shah was under the impression that “the Carter administration was plotting to topple his regime.” In 1978, the Queen and Shah’s wife, told Manouchehr Ganji, a minister in the Shah’s government, that, “I wanted to tell you that the Americans are maneuvering to bring down the Shah,” and she continued saying that she believed “they even want to topple the regime.”[9] The US Ambassador to Iran, William Sullivan, thought that the revolution would succeed, and told this to Ramsey Clark, former US Attorney General under the Johnson administration, as well as professor Richard Falk, when they were visiting Sullivan in Iran in 1978. Clark and Falk then went from Iran to Paris, to visit Khomeini, who was there in exile. James Bill, a Carter adviser, felt that, “a religious movement brought about with the United States’ assistance would be a natural friend of the United States.”[10]
Also interesting is the fact that the British BBC broadcast pro-Khomeini Persian-language programs daily in Iran, as a subtle form of propaganda, which “gave credibility to the perception of United States and British support of Khomeini.”[11] The BBC refused to give the Shah a platform to respond, and “[r]epeated personal appeals from the Shah to the BBC yielded no result.”[12]
In the May 1979 meeting of the Bilderberg Group, Bernard Lewis, a British historian of great influence (hence, the Bilderberg membership), presented a British-American strategy which, “endorsed the radical Muslim Brotherhood movement behind Khomeini, in order to promote balkanization of the entire Muslim Near East along tribal and religious lines. Lewis argued that the West should encourage autonomous groups such as the Kurds, Armenians, Lebanese Maronites, Ethiopian Copts, Azerbaijani Turks, and so forth. The chaos would spread in what he termed an ‘Arc of Crisis,’ which would spill over into the Muslim regions of the Soviet Union.”[13] Further, it would prevent Soviet influence from entering the Middle East, as the Soviet Union was viewed as an empire of atheism and godlessness: essentially a secular and immoral empire, which would seek to impose secularism across Muslim countries. So supporting radical Islamic groups would mean that the Soviet Union would be less likely to have any influence or relations with Middle Eastern countries, making the US a more acceptable candidate for developing relations.
A 1979 article in Foreign Affairs, the journal of the Council on Foreign Relations, described the Arc of Crisis, saying that, “The Middle East constitutes its central core. Its strategic position is unequalled: it is the last major region of the Free World directly adjacent to the Soviet Union, it holds in its subsoil about three-fourths of the proven and estimated world oil reserves, and it is the locus of one of the most intractable conflicts of the twentieth century: that of Zionism versus Arab nationalism.” It went on to explain that post-war US policy in the region was focused on “containment” of the Soviet Union, as well as access to the regions oil.[14] The article continued, explaining that the most “obvious division” within the Middle East is, “that which separates the Northern Tier (Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan) from the Arab core,” and that, “After World War II, Turkey and Iran were the two countries most immediately threatened by Soviet territorial expansionism and political subversion.”[15] Ultimately, “the Northern Tier was assured of a serious and sustained American commitment to save it from sharing the fate of Eastern Europe.”[16]
While Khomeini was in Paris prior to the Revolution, a representative of the French President organized a meeting between Khomeini and “current world powers,” in which Khomeini made certain demands, such as, “the shah’s removal from Iran and help in avoiding a coup d’état by the Iranian Army.” The Western powers, however, “were worried about the Soviet Union’s empowerment and penetration and a disruption in Iran’s oil supply to the west. Khomeini gave the necessary guarantees. These meetings and contacts were taking place in January of 1979, just a few days before the Islamic Revolution in February 1979.”[17] In February of 1979, Khomeini was flown out of Paris on an Air France flight, to return to Iran, “with the blessing of Jimmy Carter.”[18] Ayatollah Khomeini named Mehdi Bazargan as prime minister of the Provisional Revolutionary Government on February 4, 1979. As Khomeini had demanded during his Paris meeting in January 1979, that western powers must help in avoiding a coup by the Iranian Army; in that same month, the Carter administration, under the direction of Brzezinski, had begun planning a military coup.[19]
Could this have been planned in the event that Khomeini was overthrown, the US would quickly reinstate order, perhaps even place Khomeini back in power? Interestingly, in January of 1979, “as the Shah was about to leave the country, the American Deputy Commander in NATO, General Huyser, arrived and over a period of a month conferred constantly with Iranian military leaders. His influence may have been substantial on the military’s decision not to attempt a coup and eventually to yield to the Khomeini forces, especially if press reports are accurate that he or others threatened to withhold military supplies if a coup were attempted.”[20] No coup was subsequently undertaken, and Khomeini came to power as the Ayatollah of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
As tensions increased among the population within Iran, the US sent “security advisers” to Iran to pressure the Shah’s SAVAK (secret police) to implement “a policy of ever more brutal repression, in a manner calculated to maximize popular antipathy to the Shah.” The Carter administration also began publicly criticizing the Shah’s human rights abuses.[21] On September 6, 1978, the Shah banned demonstrations, and the following day, between 700 and 2000 demonstrators were gunned down, following “advice from Brzezinski to be firm.”[22]
The US Ambassador to the UN, Andrew Young, a Trilateral Commission member, said that, “Khomeini will eventually be hailed as a saint,” and the US Ambassador to Iran, William Sullivan, said, “Khomeini is a Gandhi-like figure,” while Carter’s adviser, James Bill, said that Khomeini was a man of “impeccable integrity and honesty.”[23]
The Shah was also very sick in late 1978 and early 1979. So the Shah fled Iran in January of 1979 to the Bahamas, allowing for the revolution to take place. It is especially interesting to understand the relationship between David Rockefeller and the Shah of Iran. David Rockefeller’s personal assistant, Joseph V. Reed, had been “assigned to handle the shah’s finances and his personal needs;” Robert Armao, who worked for Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, was sent to “act as the shah’s public relations agent and lobbyist;” and Benjamin H. Kean, “a longtime associate of Chase Manhattan Bank chairman David Rockefeller,” and David Rockefeller’s “personal physician,” who was sent to Mexico when the shah was there, and advised that he “be treated at an American hospital.”[24]
It is important to note that Rockefeller interests “had directed U.S. policy in Iran since the CIA coup of 1953.”[25] Following the Shah’s flight from Iran, there were increased pressures within the United States by a handful of powerful people to have the Shah admitted to the United States. These individuals were Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, John J. McCloy, former statesman and senior member of the Bilderberg Group, Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations, who was also a lawyer for Chase Manhattan, and of course, David Rockefeller.[26]
Chase Manhattan Bank had more interests in Iran than any other US bank. In fact, the Shah had “ordered that all his government’s major operating accounts be held at Chase and that letters of credit for the purchase of oil be handled exclusively through Chase. The bank also became the agent and lead manager for many of the loans to Iran. In short, Iran became the crown jewel of Chase’s international banking portfolio.”[27]
The Iranian interim government, headed by Prime Minister Bazargan, collapsed in November of 1979, when Iranian hostages seized the US Embassy in Teheran. However, there is much more to this event than meets the eye. During the time of the interim government (February, 1979 to November, 1979), several actions were undertaken which threatened some very powerful interests who had helped the Ayatollah into power.
Chase Manhattan Bank faced a liquidity crisis as there had been billions in questionable loans to Iran funneled through Chase.[28] Several of Chase’s loans were “possibly illegal under the Iranian constitution.”[29] Further, in February of 1979, once the interim government was put in power, it began to take “steps to market its oil independently of the Western oil majors.” Also, the interim government “wanted Chase Manhattan to return Iranian assets, which Rockefeller put at more than $1 billion in 1978, although some estimates ran much higher,” which could have “created a liquidity crisis for the bank which already was coping with financial troubles.”[30]
With the seizure of the American Embassy in Iran, President Carter took moves to freeze Iranian financial assets. As David Rockefeller wrote in his book, “Carter’s ‘freeze’ of official Iranian assets protected our [Chase Manhattan’s] position, but no one at Chase played a role in convincing the administration to institute it.”[31]
In February of 1979, Iran had been taking “steps to market its oil independently of the Western oil majors. In 1979, as in 1953, a freeze of Iranian assets made this action more difficult.”[32] This was significant for Chase Manhattan not simply because of the close interlocking of the board with those of oil companies, not to mention Rockefeller himself, who is patriarch of the family whose name is synonymous with oil, but also because Chase exclusively handled all the letters of credit for the purchase of Iranian oil.[33]
The Shah being accepted into the United States, under public pressure from Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski and David Rockefeller, precipitated the hostage crisis, which occurred on November 4. Ten days later, Carter froze all Iranian assets in US banks, on the advice of his Treasury Secretary, William Miller. Miller just happened to have ties to Chase Manhattan Bank.[34]
Although Chase Manhattan directly benefited from the seizure of Iranian assets, the reasoning behind the seizure as well as the events leading up to it, such as a hidden role for the Anglo-Americans behind the Iranian Revolution, bringing the Shah to America, which precipitated the hostage crisis, cannot simply be relegated to personal benefit for Chase. There were larger designs behind this crisis. So the 1979 crises in Iran cannot simply be pawned off as a spur of the moment undertaking, but rather should be seen as quick actions taken upon a perceived opportunity. The opportunity was the rising discontent within Iran at the Shah; the quick actions were in covertly pushing the country into Revolution.
In 1979, “effectively restricting the access of Iran to the global oil market, the Iranian assets freeze became a major factor in the huge oil price increases of 1979 and 1981.”[35] Added to this, in 1979, British Petroleum cancelled major oil contracts for oil supply, which along with cancellations taken by Royal Dutch Shell, drove the price of oil up higher.[36] With the first major oil price rises in 1973 (urged on by US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger), the Third World was forced to borrow heavily from US and European banks to finance development. With the second oil price shocks of 1979, the US Federal Reserve, with Paul Volcker as its new Chairman, (himself having served a career under David Rockefeller at Chase Manhattan), dramatically raised interest rates from 2% in the late 70s to 18% in the early 80s. Developing nations could not afford to pay such interest on their loans, and thus the 1980s debt crisis spread throughout the Third World, with the IMF and World Bank coming to the “rescue” with their Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs), which ensured western control over the developing world’s economies.[37]
Covertly, the United States helped a radical Islamist government come to power in Iran, “the center of the Arc of Crisis,” and then immediately stirred up conflict and war in the region. Five months before Iraq invaded Iran, in April of 1980, Zbigniew Brzezinski openly declared the willingness of the US to work closely with Iraq. Two months before the war, Brzezinski met with Saddam Hussein in Jordan, where he gave support for the destabilization of Iran.[38] While Saddam was in Jordan, he also met with three senior CIA agents, which was arranged by King Hussein of Jordan. He then went to meet with King Fahd in Saudi Arabia, informing him of his plans to invade Iran, and then met with the King of Kuwait to inform him of the same thing. He gained support from America, and financial and arms support from the Arab oil producing countries. Arms to Iraq were funneled through Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.[39] The war lasted until 1988 and resulted in over a million deaths.
This was the emergence of the “strategy of tension” in the “Arc of Crisis,” in particular, the covert support (whether in arming, training, or financing) of radical Islamic elements to foment violence and conflict in a region. It was the old imperial tactic of ‘divide and conquer’: pit the people against each other so that they cannot join forces against the imperial power. This violence and radical Islamism would further provide the pretext for which the US and its imperial allies could then engage in war and occupation within the region, all the while securing its vast economic and strategic interests.
The “Arc of Crisis” in Afghanistan: The Safari Club in Action
In 1978, the progressive Taraki government in Afghanistan managed to incur the anger of the United States due to “its egalitarian and collectivist economic policies.”[40] The Afghan government was widely portrayed in the West as “Communist” and thus, a threat to US national security. The government, did, however, undertake friendly policies and engagement with the Soviet Union, but was not a Communist government.
In 1978, as the new government came to power, almost immediately the US began covertly funding rebel groups through the CIA.[41] In 1979, Zbigniew Brzezinski worked closely with his aid from the CIA, Robert Gates (who is currently Secretary of Defense), in shifting President Carter’s Islamic policy. As Brzezinski said in a 1998 interview with a French publication:
According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahadeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise: Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.[42]
Brzezinski elaborated, saying he “Knowingly increased the probability that [the Soviets] would invade,” and he recalled writing to Carter on the day of the Soviet invasion that, “We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.” When asked about the repercussions for such support in fostering the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, Brzezinski responded, “What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?”[43]
As author Peter Dale Scott pointed out in, The Road to 9/11:*
For generations in both Afghanistan and the Soviet Muslim Republics the dominant form of Islam had been local and largely Sufi. The decision to work with the Saudi and Pakistani secret services meant that billions of CIA and Saudi dollars would ultimately be spent in programs that would help enhance the globalistic and Wahhabistic jihadism that are associated today with al Qaeda.[44]
Hafizullah Amin, a top official in Taraki’s government, who many believed to be a CIA asset, orchestrated a coup in September of 1979, and “executed Taraki, halted the reforms, and murdered, jailed, or exiled thousands of Taraki supporters as he moved toward establishing a fundamentalist Islamic state. But within two months, he was overthrown by PDP remnants including elements within the military.”[45] The Soviets also intervened in order to replace Amin, who was seen as “unpredictable and extremist” with “the more moderate Barbak Karmal.”[46]
The Soviet invasion thus prompted the US national security establishment to undertake the largest covert operation in history. When Ronald Reagan replaced Jimmy Carter in 1981, the covert assistance to the Afghan Mujahideen not only continued on the path set by Brzezinski but it rapidly accelerated, as did the overall strategy in the “Arc of Crisis.” When Reagan became President, his Vice President became George H.W. Bush, who, as CIA director during the Ford administration, had helped establish the Safari Club intelligence network and the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) in Pakistan. In the “campaign to aid the Afghan rebels … BCCI clearly emerged as a U.S. intelligence asset,” and CIA Director “Casey began to use the outside – the Saudis, the Pakistanis, BCCI – to run what they couldn’t get through Congress. [BCCI president] Abedi had the money to help,” and the CIA director had “met repeatedly” with the president of BCCI.[47]
Thus, in 1981, Director Casey of the CIA worked with Saudi Prince Turki bin Faisal who ran the Saudi intelligence agency GID, and the Pakistani ISI “to create a foreign legion of jihadi Muslims or so-called Arab Afghans.” This idea had “originated in the elite Safari Club that had been created by French intelligence chief Alexandre de Marenches.”[48]
In 1986, the CIA backed a plan by the Pakistani ISI “to recruit people from around the world to join the Afghan jihad.” Subsequently:
More than 100,000 Islamic militants were trained in Pakistan between 1986 and 1992, in camps overseen by CIA and MI6, with the SAS [British Special Forces] training future al-Qaida and Taliban fighters in bomb-making and other black arts. Their leaders were trained at a CIA camp in Virginia. This was called Operation Cyclone and continued long after the Soviets had withdrawn in 1989.[49]
CIA funding for the operations “was funneled through General Zia and the ISI in Pakistan.”[50] Interestingly, Robert Gates, who previously served as assistant to Brzezinski in the National Security Council, stayed on in the Reagan-Bush administration as executive assistant to CIA director Casey, and who is currently Secretary of Defense.
The Global Drug Trade and the CIA
As a central facet of the covert financing and training of the Afghan Mujahideen, the role of the drug trade became invaluable. The global drug trade has long been used by empires for fuelling and financing conflict with the aim of facilitating imperial domination.
In 1773, the British colonial governor in Bengal “established a colonial monopoly on the sale of opium.” As Alfred W. McCoy explained in his masterful book, The Politics of Heroin:
As the East India Company expanded production, opium became India’s main export. [. . . ] Over the next 130 years, Britain actively promoted the export of Indian opium to China, defying Chinese drug laws and fighting two wars to open China’s opium market for its merchants. Using its military and mercantile power, Britain played a central role in making China a vast drug market and in accelerating opium cultivation throughout China. By 1900 China had 13.5 million addicts consuming 39,000 tons of opium.[51]
In Indochina in the 1940s and 50s, the French intelligence services “enabled the opium trade to survive government suppression efforts,” and subsequently, “CIA activities in Burma helped transform the Shan states from a relatively minor poppy-cultivating area into the largest opium-growing region in the world.”[52] The CIA did this by supporting the Kuomintang (KMT) army in Burma for an invasion of China, and facilitated its monopolization and expansion of the opium trade, allowing the KMT to remain in Burma until a coup in 1961, when they were driven into Laos and Thailand.[53] The CIA subsequently played a very large role in the facilitation of the drugs trade in Laos and Vietnam throughout the 1960s and into the 1970s.[54]
It was during the 1980s that “the CIA’s covert war in Afghanistan transformed Central Asia from a self-contained opium zone into a major supplier of heroin for the world market,” as:
Until the late 1970s, tribal farmers in the highlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan grew limited quantities of opium and sold it to merchant caravans bound west for Iran and east to India. In its decade of covert warfare against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the CIA’s operations provided the political protection and logistics linkages that joined Afghanistan’s poppy fields to heroin markets in Europe and America.[55]
In 1977, General Zia Ul Haq in Pakistan launched a military coup, “imposed a harsh martial-law regime,” and executed former President Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (father to Benazir Bhutto). When Zia came to power, the Pakistani ISI was a “minor military intelligence unit,” but, under the “advice and assistance of the CIA,” General Zia transformed the ISI “into a powerful covert unit and made it the strong arm of his martial-law regime.”[56]
The CIA and Saudi money flowed not only to weapons and training for the Mujahideen, but also into the drug trade. Pakistani President Zia-ul-Haq appointed General Fazle Haq as the military governor of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), who would “consult with Brzezinski on developing an Afghan resistance program,” and who became a CIA asset. When CIA Director Casey or Vice President George H.W. Bush reviewed the CIA Afghan operation, they went to see Haq; who by 1982, was considered by Interpol to be an international narcotics trafficker. Haq moved much of the narcotics money through the BCCI.[57]
In May of 1979, prior to the December invasion of the Soviet Union into Afghanistan, a CIA envoy met with Afghan resistance leaders in a meeting organized by the ISI. The ISI “offered the CIA envoy an alliance with its own Afghan client, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,” who led a small guerilla group. The CIA accepted, and over the following decade, half of the CIA’s aid went to Hekmatyar’s guerillas.[58] Hekmatyar became Afghanistan’s leading mujahideen drug lord, and developed a “complex of six heroin labs in an ISI-controlled area of Baluchistan (Pakistan).”[59]
The US subsequently, through the 1980s, in conjunction with Saudi Arabia, gave Hekmatyar more than $1 billion in armaments. Immediately, heroin began flowing from Afghanistan to America. By 1980, drug-related deaths in New York City rose 77% since 1979.[60] By 1981, the drug lords in Pakistan and Afghanistan supplied 60% of America’s heroin. Trucks going into Afghanistan with CIA arms from Pakistan would return with heroin “protected by ISI papers from police search.”[61]
Haq, the CIA asset in Pakistan, “was also running the drug trade,” of which the bank BCCI “was completely involved.” In the 1980s, the CIA insisted that the ISI create “a special cell for the use of heroin for covert actions.” Elaborating:
This cell promoted the cultivation of opium and the extraction of heroin in Pakistani territory as well as in the Afghan territory under Mujahideen control for being smuggled into Soviet controlled areas in order to make the Soviet troops heroin addicts.[62]
This plan apparently originated at the suggestion of French intelligence chief and founder of the Safari Club, Alexandre de Marenches, who recommended it to CIA Director Casey.[63]
In the 1980s, one program undertaken by the United States was to finance Mujahideen propaganda in textbooks for Afghan schools. The US gave the Mujahideen $43 million in “non-lethal” aid for the textbook project alone, which was given by USAID: “The U.S. Agency for International Development, [USAID] coordinated its work with the CIA, which ran the weapons program,” and “The U.S. government told the AID to let the Afghan war chiefs decide the school curriculum and the content of the textbooks.”[64]
The textbooks were “filled with violent images and militant Islamic teachings,” and “were filled with talk of jihad and featured drawings of guns, bullets, soldiers and mines.” Even since the covert war of the 1980s, the textbooks “have served since then as the Afghan school system’s core curriculum. Even the Taliban used the American-produced books.” The books were developed through a USAID grant to the “University of Nebraska-Omaha and its Center for Afghanistan Studies,” and when the books were smuggled into Afghanistan through regional military leaders, “Children were taught to count with illustrations showing tanks, missiles and land mines.” USAID stopped this funding in 1994.[65]
The Rise of the Taliban
When the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, the fighting continued between the Afghan government backed by the USSR and the Mujahideen backed by the US, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, so too did its aid to the Afghan government, which itself was overthrown in 1992. However, fighting almost immediately broke out between rival factions vying for power, including Hekmatyar.
In the early 1990s, an obscure group of “Pashtun country folk” had become a powerful military and political force in Afghanistan, known as the Taliban.[66] The Taliban “surfaced as a small militia force operating near Kandahar city during the spring and summer of 1994, carrying out vigilante attacks against minor warlords.” As growing discontent with the warlords grew, so too did the reputation of the Taliban.[67]
The Taliban acquired an alliance with the ISI in 1994, and throughout 1995, the relationship between the Taliban and the ISI accelerated and “became more and more of a direct military alliance.” The Taliban ultimately became “an asset of the ISI” and “a client of the Pakistan army.”[68] Further, “Between 1994 and 1996, the USA supported the Taliban politically through its allies Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, essentially because Washington viewed the Taliban as anti-Iranian, anti-Shia, and pro-Western.”[69]
Selig Harrison, a scholar with the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars and “a leading US expert on South Asia,” said at a conference in India that the CIA worked with Pakistan to create the Taliban. Harrison has “extensive contact” with the CIA, as “he had meetings with CIA leaders at the time when Islamic forces were being strengthened in Afghanistan,” while he was a senior associate of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. As he further revealed in 2001, “The CIA still has close links with the ISI.”[70] By 1996, the Taliban had control of Kandahar, but still fighting and instability continued in the country.
Osama and Al-Qaeda
Between 1980 and 1989, roughly $600 million was passed through Osama bin Laden’s charity front organizations, specifically the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK), also known as Al-Kifah. The money mostly originated with wealthy donors in Saudi Arabia and other areas in the Persian Gulf, and was funneled through his charity fronts to arm and fund the mujahideen in Afghanistan.[71]
In the 1980s, the British Special Forces (SAS) were training mujahideen in Afghanistan, as well as in secret camps in Scotland, and the SAS is largely taking orders from the CIA. The CIA also indirectly begins to arm Osama bin Laden.[72] Osama bin Laden’s front charity, the MAK, “was nurtured” by the Pakistani ISI.[73]
Osama bin Laden was reported to have been personally recruited by the CIA in 1979 in Istanbul. He had the close support of Prince Turki bin Faisal, his friend and head of Saudi intelligence, and also developed ties with Hekmatyar in Afghanistan,[74] both of whom were pivotal figures in the CIA-Safari Club network. General Akhtar Abdul Rahman, the head of the Pakistani ISI from 1980 to 1987, would meet regularly with Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, and they formed a partnership in demanding a tax on the opium trade from warlords so that by 1985, bin Laden and the ISI were splitting the profits of over $100 million per year.[75] In 1985, Osama bin Laden’s brother, Salem, stated that Osama was “the liaison between the US, the Saudi government, and the Afghan rebels.”[76]
In 1988, Bin Laden discussed “the establishment of a new military group,” which would come to be known as Al-Qaeda.[77] Osama bin Laden’s charity front, the MAK, (eventually to form Al-Qaeda) founded the al-Kifah Center in Brooklyn, New York, to recruit Muslims for the jihad against the Soviets. The al-Kifah Center was founded in the late 1980s with the support of the U.S. government, which provided visas for known terrorists associated with the organization, including Ali Mohamed, the “blind sheik” Omar Abdel Rahman and possibly the lead 9/11 hijacker, Mohamed Atta.[78]
This coincided with the creation of Al-Qaeda, of which the al-Kifah Center was a recruiting front. Foot soldiers for Al-Qaeda were “admitted to the United States for training under a special visa program.” The FBI had been surveilling the training of terrorists, however, “it terminated this surveillance in the fall of 1989.” In 1990, the CIA granted Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman a visa to come run the al-Kifah Center, who was considered an “untouchable” as he was “being protected by no fewer than three agencies,” including the State Department, the National Security Agency (NSA) and the CIA.[79]
Robin Cook, a former British MP and Minister of Foreign Affairs wrote that Al-Qaeda, “literally ‘the database’, was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians.”[80] Thus, “Al-Qaeda” was born as an instrument of western intelligence agencies. This account of al-Qaeda was further corroborated by a former French military intelligence agent, who stated that, “In the mid-1980s, Al Qaida was a database,” and that it remained as such into the 1990s. He contended that, “Al Qaida was neither a terrorist group nor Osama bin Laden’s personal property,” and further:
The truth is, there is no Islamic army or terrorist group called Al Qaida. And any informed intelligence officer knows this. But there is a propaganda campaign to make the public believe in the presence of an identified entity representing the ‘devil’ only in order to drive the ‘TV watcher’ to accept a unified international leadership for a war against terrorism. The country behind this propaganda is the US and the lobbyists for the US war on terrorism are only interested in making money.[81]
The creation of Al-Qaeda was thus facilitated by the CIA and allied intelligence networks, the purpose of which was to maintain this “database” of Mujahideen to be used as intelligence assets to achieve US foreign policy objectives, throughout both the Cold War, and into the post-Cold War era of the ‘new world order’.
Part 2 of “The Imperial Anatomy of al-Qaeda” takes the reader through an examination of the new imperial strategy laid out by American geopolitical strategists at the end of the Cold War, designed for America to maintain control over the world’s resources and prevent the rise of competitive powers. Covertly, the “database” (al-Qaeda) became central to this process, being used to advance imperial aims in various regions, such as in the dismantling of Yugoslavia. Part 2 further examines the exact nature of ‘al-Qaeda’, its origins, terms, training, arming, financing, and expansion. In particular, the roles of western intelligence agencies in the evolution and expansion of al-Qaeda is a central focus. Finally, an analysis of the preparations for the war in Afghanistan is undertaken to shed light on the geopolitical ambitions behind the conflict that has now been waging for nearly nine years.
* [Note on the research: For a comprehensive analysis of the history, origins and nature of al-Qaeda, see: Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire and the Future of America, which provided much of the research in the above article.]
Andrew Gavin Marshall is a Research Associate with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is co-editor, with Michel Chossudovsky, of the recent book, “The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century,” available to order at Globalresearch.ca.
Notes
[1] Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America. University of California Press: 2007: page 62
[2] Ibid, page 63.
[3] Ibid, page 62.
[4] Ibid, pages 66-67.
[5] HP-Time, The Crescent of Crisis. Time Magazine: January 15, 1979:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,919995-1,00.html
[6] Peter Dale Scott, op. cit., page 67.
[7] F. William Engdahl, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order. London: Pluto Press, 2004: page 171
[8] Manouchehr Ganji, Defying the Iranian Revolution: From a Minister to the Shah to a Leader of Resistance. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002: page 41
[9] Ibid, page 39.
[10] Ibid, page 41.
[11] Ibid.
[12] F. William Engdahl, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order. London: Pluto Press, 2004: page 172
[13] Ibid, page 171.
[14] George Lenczowski, The Arc of Crisis: It’s Central Sector. Foreign Affairs: Summer, 1979: page 796
[15] Ibid, page 797.
[16] Ibid, page 798.
[17] IPS, Q&A: Iran’s Islamic Revolution Had Western Blessing. Inter-Press Service: July 26, 2008:
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43328
[18] Michael D. Evans, Father of the Iranian revolution. The Jerusalem Post: June 20, 2007:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1181813077590&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull
[19] Peter Dale Scott, op cit., page 89.
[20] George Lenczowski, The Arc of Crisis: It’s Central Sector. Foreign Affairs: Summer, 1979: page 810
[21] F. William Engdahl, op cit., page 172.
[22] Peter Dale Scott, op cit., page 81.
[23] Michael D. Evans, Father of the Iranian revolution. The Jerusalem Post: June 20, 2007:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1181813077590&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull
[24] Peter Dale Scott, op cit., page 83.
[25] Ibid, page 84.
[26] Ibid, page 81.
[27] Ibid, pages 85-86.
[28] Ibid.
[29] Ibid, page 87.
[30] Ibid, pages 88-89.
[31] Ibid.
[32] Ibid, pages 87-88.
[33] Ibid, page 85.
[34] Ibid, page 86.
[35] Ibid, page 88.
[36] F. William Engdahl, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order. London: Pluto Press, 2004: page 173
[37] Andrew Gavin Marshall, Controlling the Global Economy: Bilderberg, the Trilateral Commission and the Federal Reserve. Global Research: August 3, 2009:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14614
[38] Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America. University of California Press: 2007: page 89
[39] PBS, Secrets of His Life and Leadership: An Interview with Said K. Aburish. PBS Frontline:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/saddam/interviews/aburish.html
[40] Michael Parenti, Afghanistan, Another Untold Story. Global Research: December 4, 2008:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=11279
[41] Oleg Kalugin, How We Invaded Afghanistan. Foreign Policy: December 11, 2009:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/12/11/how_we_invaded_afghanistan
[42] ‘’Le Nouvel Observateur’ (France), Jan 15-21, 1998, p. 76:
http://www.ucc.ie/acad/appsoc/tmp_store/mia/Library/history/afghanistan/archive/brzezinski/1998/interview.htm
[43] Ibid.
[44] Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America. University of California Press: 2007: page 73
[45] Michael Parenti, Afghanistan, Another Untold Story. Global Research: December 4, 2008:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=11279
[46] Peter Dale Scott, op cit., page 78.
[47] Ibid, page 116.
[48] Ibid, page 122.
[49] Ibid, page 123.
[50] Ibid,.
[51] Alfred W. McCoy, The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade. (Lawrence Hill Books: Chicago, 2003), page 80
[52] Ibid, page 162.
[53] Ibid.
[54] Ibid, pages 283-386.
[55] Ibid, page 466.
[56] Ibid, page 474.
[57] Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America. University of California Press: 2007: page 73
[58] Alfred W. McCoy, op cit., page 475.
[59] Peter Dale Scott, op cit., page 74.
[60] Ibid, pages 75-76.
[61] Ibid, page 124.
[62] Ibid, pages 75-76.
[63] Ibid, page 124.
[64] Carol Off, Back to school in Afghanistan. CBC: May 6, 2002:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/afghanistan/schools.html
[65] Joe Stephens and David B. Ottaway, From U.S., the ABC’s of Jihad. The Washington Post: March 23, 2002:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A5339-2002Mar22?language=printer
[66] Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, From the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001. Penguin Books, New York, 2004: Page 328
[67] Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, From the Soviet Invasion to September 11, 2001. (London: Penguin, 2005), page 285
[68] Steve Coll, “Steve Coll” Interview with PBS Frontline. PBS Frontline: October 3, 2006:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/taliban/interviews/coll.html
[69] Robert Dreyfuss, Devil’s Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam. (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2005), page 326
[70] ToI, “CIA worked in tandem with Pak to create Taliban”. The Times of India: March 7, 2001:
http://www.multiline.com.au/~johnm/taliban.htm
[71] Robert Dreyfuss, Devil’s Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam. (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2005), pages 279-280
[72] Simon Reeve, The New Jackals: Ramzi Yousef, Osama bin Laden, and the Future of Terrorism. (London: André Deutsch Ltd, 1999), page 168
[73] Michael Moran, Bin Laden comes home to roost. MSNBC: August 24, 1998:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3340101/
[74] Veronique Maurus and Marc Rock, The Most Dreaded Man of the United States, Controlled a Long Time by the CIA. Le Monde Diplomatique: September 14, 2001:http://www.wanttoknow.info/010914lemonde
[75] Gerald Posner, Why America Slept: The Failure to Prevent 9/11. (New York: Random House, 2003), page 29
[76] Steve Coll, The Bin Ladens. (New York: Penguin, 2008), pages 7-9
[77] AP, Al Qaeda Financing Documents Turn Up in Bosnia Raid. Fox News: February 19, 2003:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,78937,00.html
[78] Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America. University of California Press: 2007: pages 140-141
[79] Ibid, page 141.
[80] Robin Cook, The struggle against terrorism cannot be won by military means. The Guardian: July 8, 2005:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jul/08/july7.development
[81] Pierre-Henri Bunel, Al Qaeda — the Database. Global Research: November 20, 2005:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=BUN20051120&articleId=1291
My mother knew a retired opera singer – she lived in my hometown. I don’t know how they met, but Marie knew a lot about things – she had sung on the same stage with Caruso and was a star during the golden age of opera. This is a picture http://digitalcollections.lib.washington.edu/cdm/ref/collection/sayre/id/20407
She used to dine at the Rockefeller estates in Europe – she said she got a lot of information from their servants – for one thing, they said that the Rockefellers were Turkish Jews whose original name was something like Raw-ghen-mute or Row-ghen-mute.
She once said that whenever you see these weird happenings, it means a dictatorship is coming soon. She was talking about some incident prior to WWI – some guy rushes out of a shop somewhere in Europe, starts slashing someone’s horses to death with a butcher knife. It’s basically the same m.o., these days on a much bigger scale.
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You should have used a dreidel for the graphic. ;)
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When I was a kid we were taught you never talk about politics or religion in polite company. We adhered to it, avoiding a lot of controversy and family fights. Except for our uncles. Get togethers were fraught with political discussions and eventually verbal fights. And I mean the left-right wing, public-private kind of thing.
Now, I ask myself how can politics or religion be irrelevant if they are a crucial part of people’s lives? How can you even try to make a change if you don’t talk about the necessary ingredients? It’s not like we live in a vacuum, tend to our gardens and say high to our neighbours once in a while. Politics decides if the potholes in my neighbourhood are getting fixed or the public pool is open.
Politics is the thing going on at City Hall. I know it isn’t easy to come up with different alternatives. Someone still has to show me it is possible the way society works at present. My fear is that we really need a major upheaval in order to be able to make real changes. Just turning off the TV isn’t going to do it.
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I’ve been asking those same questions my entire life, MachtNichts. I can’t even talk about the weather anymore without being called a conspiracy kook. “just in case” I wear a duct tape bangle bracelet for laughs now when I get together with the family
well…..actually – come to think of it — I don’t get invited to go out much anymore
don’t know what I’d do w/o blogs like this
You mean weather like in cesium skies, tic-tac-toe artificial clouds, rain that’s either coming down in a deluge or sometimes even doesn’t touch the ground?
I know, I wish they would give me a buck for every one of their weird looks. I’d be rich.
Great site, Kenny’s Sideshow. Became also a portal to the many links you have some yeaers ago. When I googled ‘ exposing the jewish crime network behind 911’ I entered a Crimi as the Germans call the crime movies. You can check out out any time you like but you can never leave. Kali’s fornuis. Kali’s stove in (in Dutch fornuis). Mossad – in Tel Aviv talk: ‘the institute’- has not yet succeeded to do me de das om. To tighten the scarf the tie around me neck, imho I did that to them.
www we will win
Gabreal Jones / Sam Hita
CIA O
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What is meant with imho i did it to them should be read as i=we did it to them. Not really able to describe exactly all that is happening on the gross and subtle planes since…..Turning off the TV is a must. Having faith as big as the size of a mustardseed the second that will open your own magic box that is full of weaponry to slay these evil forces. Think everyone here knows that…..
www we will win, is this nonsense or what? Absolutely not. The G4S 2012 Olympic terror attack did not come about as the rockefeller foundation report so arrogantly boasted in retrospect. Not due to this former childactor Ben…
Kenny, you write here key words: NOR WILL WE EVER FORGIVE. Last Walpurgis night (the Christmas of the Satanists) 30 april-1may i spent in the most heavy what i called now ‘stralen bunker’ radio frequency bunker in the PIL Penitantiary Institution Lelystad, in Lelystad, Holland. After having a esp visit in another prisoncell by Jacob R. the head of the cabal.
Someone close to me taught me via esp in that PIL that very night the difference between the different satanic magica judaica lines. And said- while i was again bombarded by frequencies and also by the not so fresh air from the airconditioning of that isolation cell- and kept emphasizing you should never ever forgive (like the JC faith prescribes) cause when you don’t forgive the person with whom i had a heart contact and who monitored me via a very sophisticated chip placed in me and who is an agent for the nazizionsatanists of jr- for what he did to you then he is dismantled by his higherups his ultimate higherup is of course Jabulon or whatever name this very real entity has…..I survived that night…..and still survive.
The jacob r. story published in a comment by gj at Dublinmick’s Here Comes The Sun 30 june has taken a definite different turn. He did not die the 25th but as far as i can conclude he did now.
Hope you will publish this Kenny. No forgiveness, not turning the other cheek, The Master Key to our survival and victory over these satanists. Which means no atonement with them. As Benjamin F. and the like suggest. That would be classjustice optima forma. How is forgiveness possible for 9/11 , Fukushima, g.o.d.=Gulf Oil Disaster, MH17 and the like…..Enfin
CIA O
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We may use a little different terminology but we are seeing things essentially the same. There is no forgiveness for the most heinous of crimes. Only after true justice could we even begin to let it go.
I’ve read that the actual “quote” reads:
Forgive them NOT, Father, for they know what they do.
Somehow it got lost in translation by moving a few words around.
Truth really matters even if all the idiots who watch TV can’t stand to hear it…
Truth is “we” have a right to know the truth that precedes “their” so-called “right” to print
the currency and LIE on the TV…and we have a right to self defense that precedes their
“right” to commit mass murder….with “Taxpayer” so-called “dollars”.
http://www.ini-world-report.org/2014/09/07/the-master-list/
It is an either or situation…even if the braindeadgoy don’t …”get it”.
sincerely
Davy
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I’ll be gone for the rest of the day and will get to the comments later. Wish I could leave the thread open without moderation but I’m afraid it won’t work. Thanks…..
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“Turn off the tell lie vision. If you think it enriches your life, provides crucial information, is a socially acceptable pastime & will deliver you & your family to Utopia you may be too far gone already. Fakery TV is how they can control entire populations in their corporate debt slave central bank income tax pyramid scam. The world is nothing but a bunch of corporate slave colonies”
Bingo! – No tell a vision at my house. No cable. No satellite. No telly all day long. Hubby watches a few shows, but, other then that- zero, zip, zilch
“Politics is irrelevant, stop validating it by participating. Create a new artifact, design something, an open communicative cooperative community of planet earth”
Last election here in Ontario, Canada I declined my ballot- Officially
It has to be marked that way- I went to the poll and declined my paper ballot
This sends a message that there is no one to vote for
And even worse- I spoke loudly with someone else who was there about our frustration with the offerings and how sick we were of the whole situation. I will vote for my locals, though.
-I am still paying with cash except for large purchases- non trackable and my privacy intact
-I go to my local farmers for food we can’t grow ourselves
and Yes I have a garden- who else does?
I am not on facebook and don’t want to be- it’s too creepy, tracks you everywhere on line and what with all those friend connections much dirt can be dug
Bad enough to be on blogger,but, in order to get news out, someone has to do it? Keep personal info to the minimum
And I talk, I drop memes to everyone- Yes, I actually think of short, direct sentences to drop at appropriate times that I hope will get people to think about reality- or what is presented to us as reality
And tell people all the time, stop allowing yourself to be ‘moved along’ like cattle to the slaughterhouse, because that is exactly what is happening-
And one last think I urge everyone to do- drop your smart phone- it’s just an addiction inducing device and is equal to an ankle bracelet some criminal is forced to wear, which anyone would feel resentful of being forced to wear, but, willingly drag their smart phone everywhere with them? I don’t get it?!
I am one person doing everything I possibly can to clog the gears, if everyone did this the paradigm would shift
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Hey Penny, all great advice. Most of which I strive for. Yes, had/have a garden. Ate and put up a lot but it’s all played out except for jalapenos and okra, do you guys eat breaded fried okra where you are? Lately I’ve been getting some Amish grown organic produce at a local fruit stand. Those people don’t fool around when it comes to their crops.
Yard sales are also an outside the system source for necessities, at least for me. Even men are discarding their almost new cotton with no logos t-shirts, shirts, shorts, jeans, everything I need for 50 cents or a dollar. I hope to never pay retail and sales tax for clothes again. :)
Hi Kenny
Okra is not a big food in this area- Is it good? I would try it?
I can get it at the grocery store, but not at the local market.
We had a cool summer, so, unfortunately my peppers and eggplant were duds
And yes the garden is just about finished here also
We planted a late batch of pole beans and they have been going gangbusters
Everything else did good. I have been freezing, vacuum sealing and prepping food
A few years back yard sales used to be frequent and plentiful, but now not so much
It’s quite depressed where I live, lots of unemployment
I have watched globalization destroy a once solid community
It’s pitiful :(
The purpose of “9/11” was to induce a trauma based fear into Americans in order to control them. It is that simple. The less you are traumatized the less they have control over you. In fact, they can’t control you. They can only control the system. You can not be made to do anything you don’t want to do. They can only create conditions that force you to comply because you fear the repercussions in noncompliance. The spinning top only stops in the real world. In the dream state (believing in fakery or make believe), the top spins forever. In my view, the “9/11” spinning top no longer spins. There may be another “9/11” in the works. If it does, it won’t have any effect on me.
“The organizing principle of any society is for war. The basic authority of a modern state over its people, resides in its war powers. Today its oil. Tomorrow, water. Its what we like to call the GOD business. Guns, oil, and drugs. But there is a problem. Our way of life. Its over. Its unsustainable and in rapid decline. Thats why we implement “demand destruction”. We continue to make money as the world burns. But for this to work, the people have to remain ignorant of their problems until its too late. Thats why we have triggers in place, 9/11, 7/7, WMDs, a population in a permanent state of fear does not ask questions. Our desire for war, becomes its desire. A willing sacrifice. You see, fear is justification, fear is control, fear…is money.”
Fear is control.
ArisReply
Very wise words Aris. Thank you for adding them to this narrative.
The Jews have hated us GOYIM for centuries and centuries, killing us in batches when they get the chance, whether its killing nearly 3,000 on 9/11 or nearly 3,000 back in Biblical times to placate their psycho G-d.
Yes, I know, not being politically correct and saying Zionists, but we don’t have enough time left for niceties.
From the Book of Exodus, Chapter 32: 26-29:
26 Then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Who is on the LORD’S side? let him come unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him.
27 And he said unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor.
28 And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses: and there fell of the people that day about three thousand men.
http://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Exodus-Chapter-32/
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Supposedly the Hebrews were wandering around in the desert, but their camp had gates!? :-/
Personally I don’t think anything in the ‘hebrews’ book they wrote actually happened to them . The stole all the stores from prior ones and put their own often perverted spin on them.
All Bible history makes sense IF one wants to understand it, but understanding is based on believing in the existence and divine power of God — as revealed in the Bible that revisionists don’t want to believe. Selectively choosing theological talking points is a form of revisionism just as is the Jewish version of history is today. Truth is what anyone wants it to be, that is why so much information is censored, and why so many people become victims of oppression and death. The power on earth belongs to Satan and his ruling agents — Jews like the Rothschilds, Even the Bible states this. That is why real Christians do not base their faith on earthly realms and rulers, because these people have gotten their power and kingdoms from Satan. Even the occultic State of Israel exists because of Satan and not by the power of a Holy God. But then, Satan can’t be real — he is only a made up character from a made-up Bible.
Re 9/11 justice in the United States…all you need is one honest judge. Is there even one honest judge in the US who will listen to the evidence? So far….all these long, painful years of grief…it appears not.
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There may be some honest judges here but none that have the courage.
An honest judge will never be allowed to hear the case, and I’m not sure how many truly honest judges there are. Can you act honestly in a dishonest/corrupt/rigged system. Also, honesty requires courage in my opinion.
Alex in vermont
The US doesn’t even have an honest Att. General, Eric Holder, or DOJ, or Supreme Court. I agree with Alex in Vermont. Courage often means death when someone even tries to counter the “dishonest/corrupt/rigged system.” One current example being the cop, Darren Wilson. Eric Holder has already promised black protesters that Wilson will be held guilty for murder. Right now the system is being corruptly rigged so that even if Wilson gets a trial, it will only be a show one. Straight out of the former Soviet Union’s Communist playbook. Remember how Americans used to deride them for their fake, public trials? Now it is done here!
— mtw —
Spot on, Kenny. I’d also add, movies deserve to be shunned as well.
Oh, and I love Thievery Corp but their new album – waaaay too sedate. Still, hoping they’re coming up to Cascadia this fall. Have you listened to Ancient Astronauts? Give the album Into Bliss and Time a listen. Trip Hop Happiness.
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I’ve listened to the Thievery live show I linked in the background, fairly loud, a couple of times. I like the groove. The industry has promoted them a little but has not really made them ‘stars.’ With up to 24 members in the band, they are different. The live show would be exceptional to see.
I have a feeling you would love this album
Whipped Cream and Other Delights ReWhipped
http://www.anthonymarinelli.com/Anthony_Marinelli/Albums_ReWhipped.html
(Thievery does Lemon Tree)
Dreidel Song
Dreidel music with lyrics
By Chayim B. Alevsky
Chorus:
My dreidel’s always playful
It loves to dance and spin
A happy game of dreidel
Come play now, let’s begin!
http://www.chabad.org/multimedia/media_cdo/aid/797123/jewish/Dreidel-Song.htm
Israel And The Art Of War, Spin And Slaughter
By Michael Brull
The real story about the destruction of Gaza by Israel, and the targetting of civilians, schools, hospitals and other infrastructure must be told. Michael Brull explains.
https://newmatilda.com/2014/07/24/israel-and-art-war-spin-and-slaughter
— mtw —
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actually there are no “Jews” in the Old Testament…
and the deity of the Talmud is a stool sculpture…named Lucifer
if the Almighty gave you a brain…why not use it
http://forward.com/articles/205421/steven-salaita-speaks-out/
sincerely
Davy
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“Truth really matters even if all the idiots who watch TV can’t stand to hear it…” Neither can some bloggers.
PC spin keeps lies in circulation, the dreidel version that is.
Making vulnerable persons aware of the truth can save lives. Warnings could save unwitting victims from harmful attacks. Censoring truthful facts by claiming it is racial prejudice is applied only to black criminal behavior; not white. Why do bloggers not care about whites being the victims, often very violently assaulted? Why hide the truth that is becoming a more and more abusive societal norm under Obama/Holder? It is a crisis subject, too, for Black power and Jewish power are intertwined on a destructive agenda for America. — mtw —
EDOMS THORN ON WHITE GENOCIDE: GUEST POST
Wanting to preserve our White Nations is RACIST!
There is a cure for wanting that, It is called WHITE GENOCIDE!
“Anti-Racist is a code-word for Ant-White.”
“Sadly the vast majority of the peoples opinions are not based on fact, rather they are based in Agenda Driven Rhetoric, wrapped in emotion. Based on ‘feelings,’ or ‘acceptable opinions’ (dogma) that, while ‘some what’ rooted in fact, having been wrapped in emotion, it is only to hide an agenda, that is DESIGNED for their own destruction.”
http://buelahman.wordpress.com/2014/09/10/edoms-thorn-on-white-genocide-guest-post/
Feb 20 2014
Google Cracks Down on WND for Reporting Racial Mob Violence
The world’s most powerful Internet search engine has accused WND of using “hate speech” and has threatened to block ads on the news site over its use of the term “black mobs” in news stories and columns reporting on a two-year epidemic of racial attacks in the U.S.
A little background:
Two years ago, WND began investigating and reporting on a spree of unprovoked attacks by groups of blacks on non-black victims, spearheaded by accounts compiled by journalist Colin Flaherty, author of “White Girl Bleed A Lot.” The book has been endorsed prominently and repeatedly by celebrated black scholar Thomas Sowell for connecting the dots between hundreds of incidents taking place in cities across the country. Flaherty’s reporting also first identified the phenomenon known as “the knockout game,” in which groups or individual black people have targeted non-black victims for unprovoked attacks designed to knock them unconscious with a surprise blow to the head.
If not for sites like WND, the mainstream media never would have acknowledged this nationwide and extremely alarming phenomenon even as briefly as it did. Cut off from reality by liberal censorship, unwitting victims would continue to wander into situations that put their lives at risk, like teenagers who never received John Derbyshire’s talk.
As Sowell puts it:
“Most of the media see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil. In such an atmosphere, the evil not only persists but grows.”
Google’s policy is totalitarianism wrapped in the usual squishy-soft coating of politically correct “tolerance”:
http://moonbattery.com/?p=42589
— mtw —
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Cannot watch any of the media ‘outrage porn’ of 9/11 today as it highlights what I already know…what a horrible job they do of informing the public. [sigh]
After 9/11, America was so outraged by the deaths of thousands of innocent American civilians over a political beef, that in response we killed hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians over a political beef. ~ LanceThruster
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This is a good one for today from Visible…
“Today we celebrate the incredible and mind blowing ignorance of the American public, not only their ignorance but also their cowardice and arrogant sense of entitlement. We celebrate the many wars generated by the dual national Israeli neo-cons who used the lies woven around 9/11 in order to justify attacking one country after another in the Middle East to fulfill their Ersatz Israel Zionista fantasies. Millions have died and millions more displaced. There was no reason for these wars because these wars all came out of a ridiculous presumption that a handful of stone age Arabs had masterminded this colossal event, when, in fact, it was masterminded and carried out by agents of Israel and compromised and corrupt intelligence agencies.”
more here
http://www.smoking-mirrors.com/2014/09/we-celebrate-anniversary-of-israeli.html
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hmmm
Sibel Edmonds via Washington’s Blog calls out the ‘masterminds’ of 9/11 but leaves Israel out of the mix.
FBI Whistleblower: Pentagon, CIA, NATO and MI6 Were Masterminds Behind 9/11
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Here’s an interesting exchange [edited]:
Alananda: …I believe, based on reading your site’s posting for a couple years, you — like Stephen Lendman, Paul Craig Roberts, Michel Chossudovsky, and (now with sorrow I have to add) “Cognitive Dissonance” — serve in part as a “gatekeeper”, directing attention away from those who actually carried out 9/11/2001, lifted the load, so to speak, the same cadre who carried out the attack on the USS Liberty, the bombing of the London Underground, and so may more “false flags” and mass killings. “Limited hangouts” this 13th Anniversary of the murders and destruction on 9-11 (WTC 1 & 2 & 7, Pentagon) and later (murders of witnesses, investigators, journalists) seem all the rage. I recommend ZH’ers look up Lasha Darkmoon’s collage of quotes from that period, currently posted on veteranstoday.com and on the website devoted to her work. GOOGLE still returns legitimate links for Lasha Darkmoon at last try. She told the truth about 9-11 without shrinking from, and skirking, the task of describing the “elephant in Room 911”.
George Washington [of Washington’s Blog]: If Israel was involved, it was a SUBCONTRACTOR to bigger players.
Also, alot of what Veteran’s Today writes is disinfo.
Alananda: …I have to disagree and then question on what authority you assert that “If Israel was involved, it was a subcontractor to bigger players.” What dots did YOU connect for that conclusion? Is that something you know you know with high certainty? Let’s refer to the essay of Cognitive Dissonance, then, shall we?
As for your assertion and link that “what VeteransToday.com writes is disinfo” — VT has “columnists and contributors and editors”, some of which (Stephen Lendman comes to mind), you yourself post on YOUR blog. I have had a run in with Mr. Gordon Duff (senior editor and contributor, VT) about his ill-advised statement that 40% of what “he” writes is disinfo. He “outed me” — posted my own real name, called me a paid troll or shill (I can’t recall which as I type), and left it like that. Irrascible for sure, Mr. Duff. I would recommend your reading the postings of Jonas Alexis and Jim Fetzer and others, though. Tell me when you do that what they write is “disinfo”!
One man’s disinfo, I suppose, in your and Cognitive Dissonance’s epistemology, is another’s truth, and vice versa. All relative, right? There is no Truth, correct? Sounds like the formula that dumbed down America and corrupted what values remained among the common folk, those not chosen, the goyim, so to speak.
I submit to you that lies of omission — especially omitting facts and verified information about (1) the role of the “State of Israel” (a poor and misleading construct, I think, perhaps “agencies and corporations serving interests associated with that ‘state'” is more precise), (2) the role of many people who hold dual Israeli-US citizenship, most if not all are “Jews” — whatever that appellation means today — and (3) the evidence of their involvement in events leading up to and including the murders and destruction on 9-11-2001 along with murders and cover-ups since — identify “gatekeepers” just as certainly as those who espouse the “offical government conspiracy theory”, one or two of whom I knew professionally if not personally…
Alananda’s comments begin at the following link, although the link won’t take you directly to the comment — you’ll have to search the page for the comment number, and the comment may be on a different page than it is now:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-10/911-ultimate-litmus-test#comment-5205289
The upper level perpetrators of 9-11 and every other mass-media-orchestrated major PsyOp are the bankers, of course, predominantly Jews from the Rothschilds on down. Nothing ‘world-changing’ or even just society-changing gets done without their given go-ahead. However, any list of the lower-level operational perps of 9-11, no matter how many tribe members it contains, that does not include the names Steven Rosenbaum, Rick Leventhal, Joel Meyerowitz, Charles Hirsch, Kenneth Feinberg, Alvin Hallerstein, Howard Lutnick, Matt Lauer, Katie Couric, Diane Sawyer, etc. is amateurishly incomplete at best and completely ignorant of proven image-fakery and merely dogmatic movie-criticism passing as ‘real research’ at worst.
The fact that most 9-11 truthers and especially the plane-huggers have never even heard of Rosenbaum, Lutnick and the rest shows you how well the gatekeeping has worked in the alternative media. The fact that not just the video of building seven, given as a red herring on a Silverstein platter on Jew-owned PBS to the troofers, was faked ahead of time, but even the birds flying in the sky
goes to show how unafraid of possible discovery and brazen the planners of the PsyOp were and how knowledgeable of what it takes to permanently install divide-&-conquer from the root up, the root being PROPER PROCEDURE in criminal investigations which always puts IMAGE VERIFICATION ahead of any analysis based on images. They not only brazenly put Silverstein, an obvious Jew, in there as a front man, when they could have easily paid him off and got a gentile front-man, but they had the unmitigated audacity and balls to put false-trails in the PsyOp further promoted by their agents in the alternative media for practically EVERYBODY, knowing that it’s all a numbers game and a few marginalized people on the internet pointing directly to Jews and Israel means practically nothing in the grand scheme of things, as long as they get to use their Weapon of Mass Deception, the mass-media (both mainstream and a large chunk of the alternative) to churn-out these mostly media-faked PsyOps over and over again and re-trigger the FEAR-&-TRAUMA-BASED programming constantly.
http://www.davidicke.com/forum/showthread.php?t=224648&page=7
Furniture – Brilliant Mind Lyrics
Artist: Furniture
Album: The Wrong People
I’m at the stage
Where everything I thought meant something
Seems so unappealing
I’m ready for the real thing
But nobody’s selling
Except you and yours
Saying open up your eyes and ears
And let me in
You must be out of your brilliant mind
You’re at the stage
You want your empty words heard
And everybody’s ready
They want to know your secret
But you are not telling
You’re just gesturing saying open up your arms and hearts
And let me in
You must be out of your brilliant mind
I’m at the stage
Where I want my words heard
When no one wants to listen
Because everybody’s yelling
About you and yours
And how I’d have the answer if I’d only open up, up, up
And let you in
They must be out of their brilliant minds
I said shame
Shame on you
Shame
Shame on you
Shame
Shame on you
You must be out of your brilliant mind
And they must be out of their brilliant minds
Everyone out of their brilliant minds
I’m must be out of my brilliant mind
My brilliant mind
~ Negentropic MK IReply
Flashback. A reminder to all those who were called morons by one unreliable blogger who assured everyone that Sandy Hook was real and a missile hitting the Pentagon, only very stupid people could believe that. Never rely on just one know-it-all disinfo agent whose purpose is to foggy up truth. — mtw —
Ryan Dawson: Sandy Hook Was Real, Morons
By Jesse Herman On January 2, 2013
“Youtube has been absolutely blowing up with conspiracy theories regarding Sandy Hook. People are claiming that the because the father of Emily Parker was giggling and asking for money before a speech that he was a paid actor. There have been in-depth analyses of how actors are meant to act and paralleled with his motions.
They have also pointed to the movie Dark Knight and the fact that a town called “Sandy Hook” was pointed to on a map and that there was a building called Aurora. There is another video that shows past victims, such as Caylee Anthony whose mom allegedly killed her, whose pictures are popping up as if they are still alive. These people claim that there is a network of psyop mind control at play here, maybe by the CIA or other underground agency. These are all rabbit holes, which will never produce real answers, only further rabbit holes to chase.
Don’t get me wrong, the chase can be fun, in a sick and twisted sort of way. For the people that do this research, they exist for a reason and they have a purpose to serve. For the people who believe every rabbit hole they peak into, they have a purpose to serve as well. As for Ryan Dawson, his purpose is to call these people out.”
“It is exactly as the conspiracy site claim for Sandy Hook and other massacres. It is all too real. It’s hard to be hard on “Conspiratards” as Ryan Dawson calls them. They are just participating in the illusion like the rest of us, no matter what side of the fence you happen to fall.”
Sandy Hook fake?
Ry Dawson
Published on Jan 1, 2013
http://www.naturalindependent.com/archives/10482/ryan-dawson-sandy-hook-was-real-morons/
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Obama has started another war on 9/11/2014. Never, ever again support any more the US military murderers who don’t have the guts to refuse! Cowards in uniform! A shame for any DECENT American family! — mtw —
Thursday, September 11, 2014
THAT DIDN’T TAKE LONG! ON THE SAME DAY that the god damned JEWS GLOATED that they Got Obama to BOMB SYRIA.. the JEWS now, INSTANTLY DEMAND “US BOOTS ON GROUND” in Syria.. = A US INVASION of Syria! SEND THE TERRORIST SUPPORTING JEW WAR-PIG TRAITORS TO THE HAGUE for INSTIGATING MASS-MURDER TERROR WARS and CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY!
THAT DIDN’T TAKE LONG!
ON THE SAME god damned DAY that the JEW war pigs GLOATED that they got their blackmailed homosexual puppet of a U.S. president, Barack Obama, to BOMB SYRIA…
a “policy” that was SOLD TO AMERICANS as being “only” “low cost, low-threat drone ‘srikes’ that would only attack ISIS terrrorists”…
the evil jew owned press/media now, instantly!, DEMANDS “US BOOTS ON GROUND” in Syria to go along with their “camel’s nose in the tent” DRONE STRIKES”
= AN OPEN-ENDED US INVASION of Syria!
IS THERE NO ONE ON PLANET EARTH who can PREVENT THESE DEMONIC JEW WAR PIG vampire ghouls FROM INSTIGATING TERRORIST ATTACKS ACROSS the planet…
and then getting their BRIBED & BOUGHT-OFF, blackmailed, extorted, and MASS-MURDEROUSLY CORRUPT U.S. government & congressional COWARDS
to SEND IN THE U.S. MILITARY TO FINISH OFF THE VICTIMS???
SEND THE TERRORIST SUPPORTING genocidal JEW WAR-PIG TRAITORS
at USA Today TO THE HAGUE!
SOMEONE AUTHORIZE some “DRONE STRIKES” ON THE ISIS TERRORIST SUPPORTING NETANYAHU and ALL HIS GENOCIDAL, 9-11 perpetrating JEWISH WAR PIGS!
http://thejewishwars.blogspot.com/2014/09/that-didnt-take-long-on-same-day-that.html
Syria airstrikes need boots on the ground, AF officer says
Tom Vanden Brook, USA TODAY 11:26 p.m. EDT September 11, 2014
WASHINGTON — U.S. special operations forces will be needed on the ground in Syria to make the expanded air war President Obama has ordered there more effective, a senior Air Force commander told USA TODAY.
The spy planes flying missions over Iraq and Syria can develop a list of potential Islamic State targets, said the commander who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe what the war might look like. But it’s “absolutely crucial that pilots are talking to an American on the ground” who can verify that the target is legitimate.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/09/11/is-obama-bomb/15463535/
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Flashback: President Obama should already have been forcibly, and legally removed from office by designated US Military commanders. Should they have tried, undoubtedly they would have been removed first by Obama’s military loyalists. Perhaps a “7 Days In May” has actually happened. Any of the last few Presidents have certainly deserved removal. “America’s Coups Blues” should be a song. — mtw —
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Obama A Traitor And War Criminal – Where’s Congress?
On the eighth anniversary of the day President George W. Bush ordered US troops into Iraq in 2003, with the full support of the US Congress and majority support from the UN Security Council, Barack Obama launched a Tomahawk missile assault on the sovereign nation of Libya with no majority support in the UN and without even consulting congress.
Acting alone while congress was away on recess, solely at the command of the United Nations and without constitutional authority, Barack Obama dropped over $70 million worth of Tomahawk missiles on the sovereign nation of Libya in a dictatorial maneuver to force regime change of a foreign land.
He launched a military assault on Libya under what authority? To be certain, Gadhafi is no prize, but what Obama just did is far worse. Acting all alone in a truly imperialistic fashion, Obama violated his Oath of Office, Article I and II of the US Constitution and The War Powers Act all in one mindless kneejerk decision.
Article II – Section II of the US Constitution identifies the US President as the civilian oversight of the US Military and Commander-in-Chief. But it gives the US President no authority to use military might to enforce its political will upon foreign nations.
Article I – Section VIII of the US Constitution rests the power to declare war solely with the US Congress. It requires both the Commander-in-Chief and Congress to commit US troops to combat, without which the act is wholly unconstitutional.
[MORE]
http://newsthatmakesyoumad.blogspot.com/2011/03/obama-traitor-and-war-criminal-wheres.html
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