Who's Running The Show

[Sevachia]

Sitting in front of US congressional panel, answering crucial questions concerning the current US "mess" in Iraq, are few of the highest ranking government officials; Wolfowitz, Grossman. Behind the scenes are a handful of close advisers to President Bush led by non-other than Richard Pearle.

 

No wonder the Israeli government acts the way she acts...they are covered very well within the administration of the strongest nation in the world.

 

If Bush had as many Armenians working around him not only Artsax would already be part of Armenia...we would have "summer houses" in Bitlis and Kars...

[Stormig]

Bush Resignation Hailed by World Leaders

by Greg Palast

 

September 11, 2003

 

[Washington] The surprise resignation of the forty-third President of

the United States, George W. Bush, on the second anniversary of the

terrorist attack on America, was hailed by chiefs of state throughout

the world. Mr. Bush announced that after, "two years of bloodshed,

economic devastation, and spreading fear in America and abroad," he saw

no choice but to accept that, "I have held a title which I did not win,

and for which I have proven unqualified."

 

The text of the former President's September 11 address to the nation

follows:

 

"My fellow Americans:

 

I come to you tonight with a heavy heart. Two years ago today,

thousands of innocent Americans were murdered by terrorist maniacs.

 

In the script I've been handed, I'm now supposed to tell you that

America is safer today, and that the world is kinder and nicer and

happier, because of I'm such a brilliant general in the War on Terror.

 

But who are we kidding? Yesterday, Osama released his new hit video.

The terrorists are having a picnic ever since I turned over our foreign

policy to Saudi Arabia and Exxon-Mobil.

 

And here's the point in my speech where my handlers would have me tell

you about how I've been praying hard, making it sound like I just got

off the phone with the Lord. I don't know about you, but I find it

pretty darn offensive, downright blasphemous, to drag the Lord's name

into every cheap campaign speech and chest-pounding war threat. Osama

says he talks to God too. Let's leave Him out of the politics from now

on, OK?

 

Look, in my speech this past Sunday, I used the word "democracy" about

11 times when talking about Iraq. It's democracy Florida-style, I

suppose. Except we're not fixing the vote this time … we aren't

letting these people vote at all. "Iraqis aren't prepared for

democracy." That's what Dick Cheney and Saddam Hussein told me.

 

So we're blowing 100 billion bucks we don't have to colonize a country

we don't want. Rummy tries to explain it to me each morning -- oil

this and oil that -- but I just don't see it. And one of our kids dying

there every day - where are their parents, anyway? My dad didn't let

that happen - he got me out of the service. Didn't I look neat in that

fly-boy suit?

 

And, let me tell you, I just looked at our nation's piggy bank. Uh-oh.

 

When I arrived, the last guy left me $4 trillion and said, "Be

careful with all that cash in this neighborhood." Well, I have to level with

you, America: it's all gone. The cupboard's bare and this year alone

we blew half a trillion more dollars than we have in our bank account.

Man, I can't believe I went through all that dough stone sober.

 

And what did we get for it? A Fatherland Security Department that's

trying to read the labels on everyone's underpants. Think about it,

all this Total Information Awareness KGB stuff: two years ago

Americans were the victims - but my government has made Americans the

suspects. I don't know about you, but this guy Ashcroft scares the

bejeezus out of me.

 

And today I'm told that over nine million Americans are out of work.

That's not so bad: I haven't done much work in my lifetime either.

But my mama explained to me that not everyone's daddy can lend them an

oil well to tide them over.

 

It's like I can't get anything right. The lights are going out in Ohio

and the North Pole is melting. I don't get it. I appointed all those

regulators that Ken Lay told me to, and I got rid of all the rules that

got in the way of patriotic Polluter-Americans …. and what's the

upshot? America the Beautiful is looking like she's had a pretty rough

night. Won't be long before the whole country smells like Houston.

 

And now the stock market's floating face down in the swimming pool --

despite everything I've done for those guys on Wall Street. Even my

plan to give every millionaire an extra million seems to have

backfired. Greenspam says I've created "business risk." Says I spook

investors. But when I asked Greenspam for a solution, all he did was

hand me a bag of pretzels.

 

Hey, I can take a hint. OK, I'm over my head on this one. I look back

over these last years, and what have I got to show you for it: two

years of bloodshed, economic devastation, and spreading fear in America

and abroad.

 

When I ran for this office, I said the issue was, "character." And

just look at the characters around me. I've gotten all their

resignations today. And while I've got some character left, here's my

own good-bye note too. Let's face it: I have held a title which I did

not win, and for which I have proven unqualified. You know it. And I

know it.

 

It's at this point in the speech where I'm supposed to say, "And may

God bless America." God better, because Dick Cheney won't. Don't

panic: I'm not turning over this sacred office to Mr. Contracts-R-Us.

 

Instead, I've petitioned the United States Supreme Court to pick a

President for us. Those guys picked the last one, why not the next

one?

 

And so, my fellow Americans, you can take this job and …."

 

Here, Mr. Bush's words became unintelligible. As usual.

[America-Hye]

This problem is CLEARLY the fault of the Armenian Diaspora hierarchy. The Jewish folks have influence in both major American parties. As I entered my teen years, I was working on President John Kennedy's campaign. At 17, I was sitting in private meetings in limousines with Attorney General Robert Kennedy and staff during his 1964 Senatorial Campaign. I was soon at the highest levels of the State Democratic Party, meeting with Gubernatorial nominees and the state Democratic leader. Then a shrewd and ruthless Republican operative, who is well known today, discovered that I was an Armenian. He and his cohorts destabilized my life, and negatively influenced my father's health to the point where he passed away. The Jews are not in anybody's pocket. Until recently WE WERE.

[bellthecat]

Hmmm, I think I would prefer to think that nobody is running the show! If that is not the case then what are the alternatives - that those in charge are so useless that they have created this mess by accident. Or worse - that those in charge (or those pulling the strings of those "in charge") have created this mess deliberately, according to some sort of master-plan.

 

Steve

[Sevachia]

Well, sombody or some group is running the show in Washington, and it certainly ain't Bush.

[joseph parikian]

From LATIMES

 

COMMENTARY

 

By Michael Keane, Michael Keane, a lecturer on strategy at the USC's Marshall School of Business, is also a fellow of the U.S. Department of Defense's National Security Education Program.

 

 

That Iraq would become a troublesome source of guerrilla tactics should come as no surprise to any student of T.E. Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia. Lawrence is considered by many strategists to be the father of guerrilla warfare. He articulated a powerful treatise on the topic in his classic book, "The Seven Pillars of Wisdom."

 

During World War I, Lawrence's guerrilla victories against the Turkish forces occupying the Arabian peninsula provided a stunning contrast to the simultaneous slaughter occurring in the trenches of Europe. Although Lawrence claimed that his vision of warfare came to him as he lay dazed in a feverish state, he was actually formalizing a form of war practiced by Arab tribes for centuries.

 

Lawrence's thesis was that a successful rebellion required three elements. First, the rebels must have an unassailable base, not merely a physical base of operations but also a psychological fortress in the mind of every soldier willing to die for his convictions.

 

Second, in what he called the "doctrine of acreage" (what strategists now call the force-to-space ratio), Lawrence stated that an insurgent victory required that the size of the occupying force must be insufficient to pacify the contested area.

 

Finally, the guerrillas must have a friendly population. Although the population need not be actively friendly, it must not be hostile to the point of betraying the insurgents. This support can be generated either from fear of retaliation or sympathy for the guerrilla cause or both.

 

The application of Lawrence's theory to the current military situation in Iraq is not comforting. First, the rebels seem to possess an unassailable base in both physical and psychological terms.

 

Within Iraq, hostile forces have demonstrated an ongoing ability to launch numerous daily attacks. The continuing inability to capture Saddam Hussein is the most significant evidence of this problem. Externally, there is a base of bordering states like Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iran that are failing to stop volunteers from infiltrating Iraq. American troops have found foreign passports on the bodies of enemy forces killed. Perhaps more troubling, however, is the psychological "base" — the mind of the enemy. When religious extremism is mixed with nationalistic fervor, it cements to form the bricks of unshakeable conviction. As Lawrence himself noted, "An opinion can be argued with; a conviction is best shot."

 

Then there is the force-to-space ratio of coalition forces, which is clearly inadequate. The Americans have only about 130,000 soldiers in Iraq. To match the number of soldiers per inhabitant as the United States has in Kosovo would require 526,000 troops in Iraq.

 

Finally, guerrilla victories can work to slowly undermine U.S. credibility while simultaneously building support and gaining recruits for the insurgents. Over time, guerrilla tactics tend to frustrate conventional troops, which are increasingly likely to overreact by humiliating men and offending women and thereby alienating the local population. Though Iraqi guerrillas lack the necessary firepower and manpower to forcibly remove the Americans, Lawrence would argue that should not be their proper objective. Even while suffering tactical defeats, the guerrillas could erode the will of the Americans and thereby achieve a strategic victory. As Henry Kissinger succinctly stated: "The guerrilla wins by not losing. The army loses by not winning."

 

After liberating the region from the Turks in World War I, Britain ruled the newly formed country of Iraq under a mandate from the League of Nations. The population's gratitude for having been freed from 400 years of Ottoman oppression was short-lived. There were uprisings and assassinations of British soldiers and civilian administrators.

 

Lawrence was sent back to Baghdad to report on conditions there. He wrote these haunting words: "The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honor. They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding of information Things have been far worse than we have been told, our administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows. We are today not far from a disaster."