Unlimited Victory + WB: Garbage In, Garbage Out

September 20, 2006

Asked point-blank whether the United States is winning in Iraq, Abizaid replied: "Given unlimited time and unlimited support, we’re winning the war."
’06 Cuts In Iraq Troops Unlikely

Billmon:

Under the circumstances, nation building in the Middle East might best be compared to sand castle building — on the beach in the face of a rising tide. We’d probably all be better off if our imperial strategists could come up with a strategy for managing the transition to a more decentralized, fragmented and at times chaotic world, instead of trying to turn back the clock to a earlier day. But, of course, if they were comfortable doing that they probably wouldn’t be imperial strategists.

Garbage In, Garbage Out

Posted by b on September 20, 2006 at 18:43 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Billmon et al…
You might be a terrorist, enemy of the state etc, etc…hand off the keyboard and follow along:
police state begins to take physical form… ?

The coming police state begins to take physical form. Preemptive abroad, preemptive domestically. All aboard the disappearing express for any who are not with ‘us’. This is from a lengthy article on Dissident Voice. You’ll need to scroll dow to get to this part:
The Web and the New “Enemy Within”
As part of its drive toward a fascistic state, the regime has found a new “Enemy Within” — and it’s not just the Muslim Americans targeted for arrest, the Mexicans targeted for round ups and deportations, or the Blacks, Native Americans and “gang members” targeted for prison.
It’s what they now call the “homegrown terrorist” — apparently a most dangerous kind of terrorist, according to The Los Angeles Times; one almost impossible to track; one with no formal ties to known “networks”; one with no particular religion; a self-radicalizing “terrorist” whose “terrorist breeding ground” is the Internet and whose piper is not just “Osama Bin Laden,” but the radical writer, the blogger, and the so-called “conspiracy theorist.”
The BBC, in the opening line of a piece entitled US plans to ‘fight the net’, states it plainly: “Bloggers Beware.”
The LA Times reports — with a straight face — “US officials said the enemy from within was posing a new challenge and a new danger.”
The self-radicalized new “threat” doesn’t fit previous “profiles,” and the Feds are working overtime to build a new profile for these misfits. The Times says that according to one “terrorism expert” it’s “very difficult to find someone like that, someone not from the Middle East, not converted to any religion.”
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales made it clear; the new target is those who “are radicalized over the Internet.” Citing the “threat” of “home grown terrorists” FBI director Robert Mueller said the FBI is focused on understanding the “radicalization” process.
L.A. police chief William Bratton plans to build a new national anti-terrorism training academy for cops to reinforce the idea of “getting the bastards before they get us.” The Attorney General backed Bratton, framing it this way, “We know local police departments are in the best position to identify home grown radicals, so our network will be led by them.”
In other words, if you’re reading this essay — or writing essays like this one — you’re a potential target; you may be engaged in a process of self-radicalization. If so, the FBI wants to “understand” you. They want to know what makes the thought criminal tick.
Make no mistake; thought crime, much of it bred by the relatively free flow of information on the Net, is costing the neo-fascists dearly and creating a hell of a “breeding ground” for “home grown terrorists” — which is to say it is helping to create a social base for mass resistance to the emergence of home grown fascism and imperial war. A recent Zogby poll shows that 52% of Americans now question the “official story” of the 9/11 attacks, even as an overwhelming majority oppose the military occupation and colonization of Iraq.
This free flow of information is what the Bush regime calls “Subcultures of conspiracy and misinformation.”

Oh, and here is a gratuitous self-radicalization “attack” : Critical Iraq report withheld to avoid “politicizing” Nov. 7th elections
! take that you control freaks!

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 20 2006 19:18 utc | 1

Or How Attacking Iran will solve Everything…
As we’ve been saying for a longtime, USgov. presence in Iraq is possible ‘cuz it’s tolerated by Shias & Iran – but now Gareth Porter is saying it:
Only Iran’s ability to convince Sadr to hold off on his effort to end the occupation can prevent a violent confrontation between Shiite militants and the occupation forces. But Bush’s advisers may still not understand how fundamentally the power equation in Iraq has shifted. “They don’t think like that,” Patrick Lang told IPS. “They think they are still in charge.” Iraq Occupation Depends on Sadr — and Iran
Implications frightening, since xUS Junta will probably do anything to avoid photo-ops of helicopters fleeing from Embassy roof w/people hanging on..Hence the Pope’s recent anti-MaleMuslim bit, etc. etc….

Posted by: jj | Sep 20 2006 20:06 utc | 2

Lest ye forget…The Pentagon’s War on the Internet

The Pentagon has developed a comprehensive strategy for taking over the internet and controlling the free flow of information. The plan appears in a recently declassified document, �The Information Operations Roadmap�, which was provided under the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) and revealed in an article by the BBC.

Even if they can’t stop the “radical writer”, blogger etc, they can blame them for helping lose the war.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 20 2006 20:37 utc | 3

Addendum:
Could your social networks brand you an enemy of the state? As I have sd, a several times, this illegel war is not only abroad, but here at home, you (yes, you the American people ) are the enemy.
Also see: Bush Tags Bloggers As Terrorists!
From the creating their own realities (propagenda) dept:
Strategic Communication Laboratories

Strategic Communication Laboratories has pioneered a new methodology to enable governments and countries to manage their relationships with their key audience groups through more powerful communication.
In a world where the perception is the reality, all countries need to have the capability to manage their own perceptual alignment otherwise someone else will.

A direct quote from the website of Strategic Communication Laboratories:

a London based company that offers “the most powerful weapon in the world”, the ability to manage every aspect of a conflict from one operation centre.
Take a look around their website and witness sickening quote after quote explaining how their vision is to allow the total control of citizens by their government or their military, to keep it that way, and to facilitate conflicts with and the takeover of other countries and the execution of total control over their citizens.
The idea put across by SCL is that if you can control the perceptions people have of reality, then you can control reality itself.
it is a tight rope walk in distinction.

Rumsfeld’s Roadmap to Propaganda

Secret Pentagon “roadmap” calls for “boundaries”
between “information operations” abroad and at home
but provides no actual limits as long as US doesn’t “target” Americans

Uh huh…
Finally, US plans to ‘fight the net’ revealed
actually, i’m still hunting a report that veers very close to defining dissent as a psychological disorder and will post it if I find it…
they got drugs for that now.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 20 2006 21:23 utc | 4

Even if they can’t stop the “radical writer”, blogger etc, they can blame them for helping lose the war.
Well, since I blame them, I guess it’s only fair.

Posted by: billmon | Sep 20 2006 23:27 utc | 5

The southern administration was hamstrung too. The British didn’t send the progeny of party apparatchiks. They sent civilians with language skills and plenty of diplomatic experience to back up a military force that had done time in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Cyprus, etc. They sent people like Rory Stewart, who spoke fluent Persian and enough Arabic to correct his translators when they bullshitted what he was saying.
Read his book on overseeing the marshes and you’ll get a sense of how on the one hand the CPA didn’t help, but on the other hand the Big Neocon Idea was fucked from the outset by the fact that the non-exile resistance movement, which had lain dormant to escape persecution, was better organised and more willing to use violence and the threat of violence to gain local power. Stewart tried bankrolling a pluralist party with CPA funds that couldn’t campaign because it didn’t have the AK47-wielding capos; it still lost big time.

Posted by: ahem | Sep 20 2006 23:29 utc | 6

We’d probably all be better off if our imperial strategists could come up with a strategy for managing the transition to a more decentralized, fragmented and at times chaotic world, instead of trying to turn back the clock to a earlier day.

Now that’s radical. And the public discussion of this option has been…. (sound of crickets chirping).

Posted by: Anonymous | Sep 21 2006 2:56 utc | 7

Or we can just nuke ’em all, and turn our name into the National Socialist States of America.

Don’t give them ideas Billmon. Although, nothing socialist about the current government, more National Atrocious States of America, NASA.

Posted by: Feelgood | Sep 21 2006 3:46 utc | 8

Was there chaos after General Qassim’s coup? How many died in each of the Iraqi regime changes?

Posted by: Anonymous | Sep 21 2006 5:05 utc | 9

U.N. Finds Baghdad Toll Far Higher Than Cited

A United Nations report released Wednesday says that 5,106 people in Baghdad died violent deaths during July and August, a number far higher than reports that have relied on figures from the city’s morgue.
Across the country, the report found, 3,590 civilians were killed in July — the highest monthly total on record — and 3,009 more were killed in August. There were 4,309 Iraqi civilians reported wounded in August, a 14 percent increase from July.
The report also describes evidence of torture on many of the bodies found in Baghdad, including gouged-out eyeballs and wounds from nails, power drills and acid. “Hundreds of bodies have continued to appear throughout the country bearing signs of severe torture and execution-style killing,” the report found.

Posted by: b | Sep 21 2006 6:35 utc | 10

Back to Main