Declassified: US Imperialism, Terror, and Support for Tyranny

[Horhey]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P77s-SeA8rs#

2004 US Military Coup in Haiti

The punishment of Haiti became much more severe under Bush II - there are differences within the narrow spectrum of cruelty and greed. Aid was cut and international institutions were pressured to do likewise, while Washington propped up the Haitian elite. Once again, the elites in "America's backyard" are happy to be rescued by Fascism.

In an article titled, "Growing Disquiet in Latin America Over America's Role in the Fall of Haiti's Leader", The Gaurdian reports:

After Aristide took office in February 2001, the US played a leading role in forcing hundreds of millions of dollars in international aid to be cut off, while bolstering a minority opposition led by Haiti's tiny elite. In the past three years, the nation's already moribund economy further deteriorated and the government ground to a halt as the opposition refused to participate in elections.

Putting details aside, what has happened since is eerily similar to the overthrow of Haiti 's first democratic government in 1991. The Aristide government, once again, was undermined by US planners, who understood, under Clinton, that the threat of democracy can be overcome if economic sovereignty is eliminated, and presumably also understood that economic development will also be a faint hope under such conditions, one of the best-confirmed lessons of economic history.

Bush II planners were even more dedicated to undermining democracy and independence, and despised Aristide and the popular organizations that swept him to power with perhaps even more passion than their predecessors. The forces that reconquered the country in 2004 - at the instigation of the International Republican Institute - are mostly inheritors of the US-installed army and paramilitary terrorists.



According to a preliminary report issued in the Dominican Republic, the United States Government funded and trained a 600-member paramilitary army of anti-Aristide Haitians in the Dominican Republic with the authorization of the country's president, Hipolito Mejia. The funds—totaling $1.2 milllion—are directed through the International Republican Institute (IRI) on the pretext of encouraging democracy in Haiti:

200 soldiers of the US Special Forces arrived in the Dominican Republic, with the authorization of Dominican President Hipolito Mejia, as a part of the military operation to train Haitian rebels.

With Paramilitaries in the streets (many of them former FRAPH militants) President Aristide was loaded onto a US military transport, in what he referred to as a "kidnapping," and airlifted into exile in the Central African Republic. Vice President Dick Cheney then appeared on FOX News and explained that the US had intervened because Aristide had "worn out his welcome."

The New York Times reports:

The International Republican Institute counseled the opposition to stand firm, and not work with Mr. Aristide, as a way to cripple his government and drive him from power . The I.R.I. was sending the instructions: "Hang tough. Don't compromise. In the end, we'll get rid of Aristide." The I.R.I. "was prepared to act aggressively to get Aristide out of power."

Several months later, the rebels marched on Port-au-Prince and Mr. Aristide left Haiti on a plane provided by the American government.

On Feb. 29 2004 the United States flew President Aristide to exile in South Africa.

A year later, the I.R.I. created a stir when it issued a press release praising the attempted overthrow of Hugo Chávez, the elected president of Venezuela and a confrontational populist, who, like Mr. Aristide, was seen as a threat by some in Washington.

The Daily Beast reports:

The federally funded International Republican Institute's (IRI) senior program officer for Haiti, Stanley Lucas, appeared on the Haitian station Radio Tropicale to suggest three strategies for vanquishing Haiti's president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. First, Lucas proposed forcing Aristide to accept early elections and be voted out; second, he could be charged with corruption and arrested; and finally, Lucas raised dealing with Aristide the way the Congolese people had dealt with President Laurent Kabila the month before. "You did see what happened to Kabila?" Lucas asked his audience.

Kabila had been assassinated.

Whatever the case, Lucas and IRI, did more than talk. Throughout the last six years, IRI, whose stated mission is to "promote the practice of democracy" abroad, conducted a $3 million party-building program in Haiti, training Aristide's political opponents, uniting them into a single bloc and, according to a former U.S. ambassador there, encouraging them to reject internationally sanctioned power-sharing agreements in order to heighten Haiti's political crisis.

Moreover, Lucas' controversial personal background and his ties to Haitian opposition figures with violent histories -- including some who participated in a coup against Aristide in February -- raise questions about whether IRI's Haiti program violated its own guidelines and those of its funders.

In a statement, Jamaican Prime Minister P.J. Patterson said that:

The removal of President Aristide in these circumstances sets a dangerous precedent for democratically elected governments anywhere and everywhere, as it promotes the removal of duly elected persons from office by the power of rebel forces .

Despite maintaining widespread support by the majority of Haitians, the Washington Post had earlier informed their readers that regime change was looming:

Aristide has pushed with mixed success a populist agenda of higher minimum wages, school construction, literacy programs, higher taxes on the rich and other policies that have angered an opposition movement run largely by a mulatto elite that has traditionally controlled Haiti's economy.

The New York Times noted that Washington ousted Aristide exactly for that reason:

Voice of the Poor

After two centuries of foreign occupiers, dictators, generals, a self-appointed president for life and the overthrow of more than 30 governments, Haitians finally had the chance in 1990 to elect the leader they wanted. The people chose Mr. Aristide, a priest who had been expelled from his Roman Catholic order for his fiery orations of liberation theology.

"He was espousing change in Haiti, fundamental populist change," said Robert Maguire, a Haiti scholar who has criticized American policy as insufficiently concerned with Haiti's poor. "Right away, he was viewed as a threat by very powerful forces in Haiti."

President Aristide promised not only to give voice to the poor in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, but also to raise the minimum wage and force businesses to pay taxes. He rallied supporters with heated attacks on the United States, a tacit supporter of past dictatorships and a major influence in Haitian affairs since the Marines occupied the country from 1915 to 1934.

"He wasn't going to be beholden to the United States, and so he was going to be trouble," said Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, a Democratic critic of Bush administration policy on Latin America. "We had interests and ties with some of the very strong financial interests in the country, and Aristide was threatening them." Those interests, mostly in the textile and electronic assembly businesses, sold many of their products cheap to the United States.

The anti-Aristide message had currency around Washington. Mr. Einaudi, the veteran diplomat, recalled attending the I.R.I.'s 2001 fund-raising dinner and being surrounded by a half-dozen Haitian businessmen sounding a common cry: "We were foolish to think that we could do anything with Aristide. That it was impossible to negotiate with him. That it was necessary to get rid of him."

On Feb. 29 — Mr. Philippe's birthday — the United States flew President Aristide to exile in South Africa.

A year later, the I.R.I. created a stir when it issued a press release praising the attempted overthrow of Hugo Chávez, the elected president of Venezuela and a confrontational populist, who, like Mr. Aristide, was seen as a threat by some in Washington.

Perhaps the cardinal sin, however, was not selling off state infrastructure to foreign investors. As part of the agreement for his 1994 return to Haiti, Aristide had to promise to open up the electrical grid, phone lines, flour mills and banks to privatization. As The New York Times reported, the US and other international donors refused to grant any promised aid until Haiti followed through on these commitments.

The New York Times reports:

There are just 66,000 telephone lines in all of Haiti, and the Government-run telephone company says it does not have the money to install more. The electric company, airport and harbor, also Government-owned and in need of modernization, complain of the same lack of funds.

Selling a share of those and other state enterprises to private investors might appear to offer a promising way out for a poor, nearly bankrupt country. But a plan to do just that has split the Haitian Government into two bitterly feuding camps and driven a widening wedge between President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and Haiti's foreign aid lenders, led by the United States.

Hinging on the outcome of the policy dispute, the most serious the Aristide Government has experienced since being returned to power by American troops a year ago, is the disbursement of nearly half of Haiti's projected $350 million budget for this fiscal year. If Mr. Aristide does not go ahead with the privatization and other reforms he previously promised, the donor nations say they are prepared to hold back much of the aid they have pledged.

US Imperialism in Indonesia and Genocide Campaign in East Timor 1965-1999

How the US Supported General Suharto

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRf5T0GiefY#

Bill Clinton questioned on his Death Squad Killings in East Timor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzYcQUQgcpw#

Death Squad Massacres in East Timor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZohcbKYg5s#

CIA-Military Coup and Genocide in Indonesia 1965

After the second world war, Indonesia had a prominent place in US efforts to construct an international political and economic order. Planning was careful and sophisticated; each region was assigned its proper role. The "main function" of Southeast Asia was to to provide resources and raw materials to the industrial societies. Indonesia was the richest prize.

In 1958, US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles informed the National Security Council that the main problem in Indonesia was that the:

the PKI had won widespread support not as a revolutionary party but as an organization defending the interests of the poor within the existing system.

And also that:

The party's mass base among the peasantry had been attracted by the PKI's vigor in defending the interests of the abangan (nominally Islamic) poor .

The head of State Department's Policy Planning Staff, George Kennan argued that:

it would only be a matter of time before the infection would sweep westward through the continent to Burma, India, and Pakistan.

On October 29, one cable from the State Department—marked "Action"—made it clear that the Johnson administration wanted a military dictatorship established, and was ready to support it financially and militarily. The message noted that Washington was developing its policy on Indonesia and wanted a military-run government:

Sooner or later it will become increasingly clear to army leaders that they are the only force capable of creating order in Indonesia, and that they must take initiative to form a military or civilian-military provisional government, with or without Sukarno.

It urged the Embassy to make this known to the army:

The next few days, weeks or months may offer unprecedented opportunities for us to begin to influence people and events. Small arms and equipment may be needed to deal with the PKI.

The cable continued:

As events develop, the army may find itself in major military campaigns against PKI, and we must be ready for that contingency.

Many of the cables—sent from Jakarta to Washington between October 1965 and February 1966—were written by the US Ambassador Marshall Green and were addressed to Secretary of State Dean Rusk and his aides. Green had arrived in Jakarta just before the coup, selected for the post by the Democratic Party administration of President Lyndon Johnson on the basis of definite experience. Green indicated that Washington's long-held hopes that the military would remove Indonesian President Sukarno were finally coming to fruition:

Despite all its shortcomings, we believe odds are that army will act to pin blame for recent events on PKI and its allies. Much remains in doubt, but it seems almost certain that agony of ridding Indonesia of effects of Sukarno has begun.

He advised Washington to:

Avoid overt involvement as power struggle unfolds . However, indicate clearly to key people in army such as Nasution and Suharto our desire to be of assistance where we can . Maintain and if possible extend our contact with the military ... Spread the story of PKI's guilt, treachery and brutality (this priority effort is perhaps most-needed immediate assistance we can give army if we can find way to do it without identifying it as solely or largely US effort).

The threat of democracy was not overcome untill General Suharto siezed power in military coup in 1965, with Washington's strong support and assistance. Ralph McGehee, a senior CIA operations officer in the 1960s, describes the terror of Suharto's takeover in 1965-6 as "the model operation" for the US-backed coup that got rid of Salvador Allende in Chile seven years later:

The CIA forged a document purporting to reveal a leftist plot to murder Chilean military leaders.

Immediatly after the coup, army led massacres wiped out the PKI and devastated its mass base. A CIA report on the annihilation of the PKI and its supporters reported that:

In terms of the numbers killed, the anti-PKI massacres in Indonesia rank as one of the worst mass murders of the 20 th century, along with the Soviet purges of the 1930s, the Nazi mass murders during the Second World War and the Maoist bloodbaths of the 1950s.

The US embassy in Jakarta supplied Suharto with a "death list" of Indonesian PKI members and crossed off the names when they were killed or captured. Suharto's tyranny "which created killing fields and mass graves exceeding those of Saddam Hussein by an order of magnitude lasted for over 30 years."

Documents from the US State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) indicate that, having seized power on October 1, 1965, Indonesia's General Suharto and other army generals—acting on the urgings of US leaders—used military and Muslim death squads to massacre of hundreds of thousands of workers, students and peasants.

The Washington Examiner reports:

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. government played a significant role in one of the worst massacres of the century by supplying the names of thousands of Communist Party leaders to the Indonesian army, which hunted down the leftists and killed them, former U.S. diplomats say.

For the first time, U.S. officials acknowledge that in 1965 they systematically compiled comprehensive lists of Communist operatives, from top echelons down to village cadres. As many as 5,000 names were furnished to the Indonesian army, and the Americans later checked off the names of those who had been killed or captured, according to the U.S. officials.

The killings were part of a massive bloodletting that took an estimated 250,000 lives.

The events were greeted with euphoria. The New York Times described the "staggering mass slaughter" as "a gleam of light in Asia," praising Washington for keeping its own role quiet so as not to embarrass the "Indonesian moderates" who were cleansing their society, then rewarding them with generous aid (6/19/66). "Almost everyone is pleased by the changes being wrought," C.L. Sulzberger commented (4/8/66). The Times itself editorialized (4/5/66) that the Indonesian military was "rightly playing its part with utmost caution." Time praised the "quietly determined" leader Suharto with his "scrupulously constitutional" procedures "based on law, not on mere power" as he presided over a "boiling bloodbath" that was "the West's best news for years in Asia"

Roland Challis, the BBC's south east Asia correspondent at the time, reported, "There was a deal, you see." The deal was that Indonesia under Suharto would offer up what Richard Nixon had called the richest hoard of natural resources, the greatest prize in south-east Asia.

The World Bank restored Indonesia to favour. Western governments and corporations flocked to Suharto's "paradise for investors,".  For more than 20 years, Suharto was hailed as a "moderate" who is "at heart benign" (The Economist) as he compiled a record of slaughter, terror, and corruption.

TO BE CONTINUED.

US-Indonesian Genocide Campaign in East Timor 1975-1999

Bill Clinton questioned on his Death Squad Killings in East Timor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzYcQUQgcpw#



In 1975, the Indonesian army invaded East Timor, then being taken over by its own population after the collapse of the Portuguese empire. The US knew that the invasion was coming and approved it.

From the National Security Archive's declassified US documents:

The document shows that Suharto began the invasion knowing that he had the full approval of the White House.

From 1974-1999, the Indonesian army relied on the US for 90% of its arms military hardware. Then Washington immediately stepped up the flow of arms while declaring an arms suspension.

From the National Security Archive's declassified US documents:

The final report of East Timor's landmark Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) has found that U.S. "political and military support were fundamental to the Indonesian invasion and occupation" of East Timor from 1975 to 1999, according to the "Responsibility" chapter of the report posted today on the Web by the National Security Archive, which assisted the Commission with extensive documentation.

Furthermore, In an article entitled, "US Trained Butchers of Timor",the Gaurdian reports:

US trained butchers of Timor

Exclusive: Washington trained death squads in secret while Britain has spent £1m helping Indonesian army

Indonesian military forces linked to the carnage in East Timor were trained in the United States under a covert programme sponsored by the Clinton Administration which continued until last year.

The US programme, codenamed 'Iron Balance', was hidden from legislators and the public when Congress curbed the official schooling of Indonesia's army after a massacre in 1991. Principal among the units that continued to be trained was the Kopassus Ð an elite force with a bloody history Ð which was more rigorously trained by the US than any other Indonesian unit, according to Pentagon documents passed to The Observer last week.

Kopassus was built up with American expertise despite US awareness of its role in the genocide of about 200,000 people in the years after the invasion of East Timor in 1975, and in a string of massacres and disappearances since the bloodbath. Amnesty International describes Kopassus as 'responsible for some of the worst human rights violations in Indonesia's history'.

The Pentagon documents Ð obtained by the US-based East Timor Action Network and Illinois congressman Lane Evans Ð detail every exercise in the covert training programme, conducted under a Pentagon project called JCET (Joint Combined Education and Training). They show the training was in military expertise that could only be used internally against civilians, such as urban guerrilla warfare, surveillance, counter-intelligence, sniper marksmanship and 'psychological operations'.

Specific commanders trained under the US programme have been tied to the current violence and to some of the worst massacres of the past 20 years, including the slaughter at Kraras in 1983 and at Santa Cruz in 1991. The US-trained commanders include the son-in-law of the late dictator General Suharto, Prabowo Subianto, and his mentor, General Kiki Syahnakri Ð the man appointed last week by the so-called 'reform' government as commissioner for martial law in East Timor.

American sponsorship of the Indonesian regime began as a matter of Cold War ideology, in the wake of defeat in Vietnam. The left-wing movement in East Timor was feared by Jakarta and seen by the US as an echo of those in southern Africa and of Salvador Allende's government in Chile. Jakarta's harassment of the Timor government and the invasion of 1975 were duly encouraged by the United States.

The training of Indonesia's officer corps peaked during the mid-Eighties. In 1990 a former official at the US Embassy in Jakarta cabled the State Department to say US sponsorship had been 'a big help to the (Indonesian) army. They probably killed a lot of people and I probably have a lot of blood on my hands'.

Amnesty International's East Timor country specialist, Deborah Sklar, traces the regime's 'over-reliance on thuggish military operations' as being due to the demands of the foreign investment community and even from the World Bank.

She cites a blueprint called The East Asian Miracle, written by US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, in which he urges governments to 'insulate' themselves from 'pluralist pressures' and to suppress trade unions. This, she says, became a primary Kopassus role during the years of training by the United States.

'If the US,' says Sklar, 'has supplied to the Indonesians equipment that has been concerned in the perpetration of human rights abuses, then that is an outrage.'

The UN Security Council ordered Indonesia to withdraw, but that was an empty gesture. As UN Ambassador Daniel Patrick Moynihan explained in his memoirs:

The United States wished things to turn out as they did and worked to bring this about. The Department of State desired that the United Nations prove utterly ineffective in whatever measures it undertook. This task was given to me, and I carried it forward with no inconsiderable success.

He also noted that within a few months 60,000 Timorese had been killed, "almost the proportion of casualties experienced by the Soviet Union during the second world war."

Atrocities continued with the support of the US and its allies. The death toll is estimated at about 200,000 - a third of the population – lost their lives. In 1989 Australia signed a treaty with Indonesia to exploit the oil of "the Indonesian Province of East Timor" - The treaty was put into effect immediately after the army massacred several hundred more Timorese at a graveyard commemoration of a recent army assassination. Western oil companies joined in the robbery, eliciting no comment.

Suharto remained "our kind of guy", as the Clinton administration described him, untill he commited his first real crime, in 1998: dragging his feat on IMF orders and losing control over the population, though some like Suharto's longtime advocate Paul Wolfowitz, continued to support him. Suharto's fall from grace follows a familiar course: Mobutu, Saddam Hussein, Duvalier, Marcos, Somoza, etc. The usual reasons are disobedience or loss of control.



Motive:

The reasons Washington strongly supported the Suharto regime and the genocide campaign in East Timor were explained by Clinton administration officials.

the New York Times reports:

Why Suharto Is In and Castro Is Out

Administration officials said the treatment of Mr. Castro, Mr. Jiang and Mr. Suharto was driven by very different litmus tests, a potent mix of power politics and emerging markets.

Mr. Suharto, who is sitting on the ultimate emerging market: some 13,000 islands, a population of 193 million and an economy growing at more than 7 percent a year. The country remains wildly corrupt and Mr. Suharto's family controls leading businesses that competitors in Jakarta would be unwise to challenge. But Mr. Suharto, unlike the Chinese, has been savvy in keeping Washington happy. He has deregulated the economy, opened Indonesia to foreign investors and kept the Japanese, Indonesia's largest supplier of foreign aid, from grabbing more than a quarter of the market for goods imported into the country.

So Mr. Clinton made the requisite complaints about Indonesia's repressive tactics in East Timor, where anti-Government protests continue, and moved right on to business, getting Mr. Suharto's support for market-opening progress during the annual Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Osaka in mid-November.

"He's our kind of guy," a senior Administration official who deals often on Asian policy, said the other day.

TO BE CONTINUED

[DoomRulz]

Homeboy, those are some posts.  I've never seen posts like that, and I damn sure didn't think this thing would make it to 17 pages, but I digress...

The CIA has been spearheading nefarious operations for decades.  Haven't you seen all of those Chuck Norris films?

It was never a secret to begin with. Why the thread is titled "Declassified", I don't know.

[Horhey]

Naming names worth mentioning

Then the Assistant Secretary of State in the Carter administration - Richard Holbrooke could've stopped the genocide in East Timor by ordering Suharto - a US puppet - to withdraw, but he chose to praise the mass murderer's efforts to "resolve Indonesian problems" instead.

Suharto: A Declassified Documentary Obit

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 242

In August of 1977, then Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke traveled to Indonesia to meet with Suharto in the midst of one of the Indonesian military's brutal counterinsurgency campaigns in East Timor in which tens of thousands of East Timorese were being slaughtered. The State Department at the time wrote, "Assistant Secretary of State Holbrooke", who was also Obama's ambassedor to Pakistan, "that this would be an unusual opportunity to press the case for human rights and self-determination for East Timor", if that had indeed been the US goal.

Instead, once Suharto was met by Richard Holbrooke, he was praised by Holbrooke for Indonesia's human rights improvements and was told that he in fact welcomed the steps that Indonesia had taken to open East Timor to the West, allowing a delegation of congressmen to enter the territory under strict military guard, where they were greeted by staged celebrations, welcoming the Indonesian armed forces.

In his meeting with Suharto, the Assistant Secretary offered no criticism of Indonesia's human rights record while "acknowledging efforts President Suharto appeared to be making to resolve Indonesian problems," especially on East Timor, where he "applauded" the President's judgment in allowing Congressional members to visit the territory but remained mute on reports of ongoing atrocities. Suharto responded that Indonesia did "not seek to hide anything" in East Timor – at a time when journalists and relief organizations were banned and visitors allowed only under military escort.

TO BE CONTINUED

It's quite an interesting rogues gallery in the current administration.



As US Commander in Chief of the Pacific (CINCPAC) from February 1999 to May 2000, Dennis Blair secured continuing US military aid to the Indonesian death squads by covering up their atrocities and lieing to Congress about them. He also opposed "trials, international or otherwise, for the high level perpetrators of mass violence."

Obama Intelligence Chief helped killings in East Timor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIMJG--YolQ#

How Obama's New Intelligence Chief Ran Interference for Indonesia's Butchers

The Skeletons in Dennis Blair's Closet

By Bradley Simpson - research fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington, DC, where he directs the Indonesia and East Timor Documentation Project.

The presumed appointment by President-elect Barack Obama of retired Admiral Dennis C. Blair as his new Director of National Intelligence is being greeted with cheers by the national media, who hail his experience, bureaucratic infighting skills and comparatively moderate views on national security issues. The New York Times, in a recent profile, seemed much impressed by the fact that the 34-year Navy veteran once water skied behind an aircraft carrier, in addition to his stints with the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Institute for Defense Analysis (from which he resigned in 2006 over conflict of interest charges involving the F-22 raptor).

But human rights supporters are right to be worried that Dennis Blair will hardly lead the charge for reform in the nation's intelligence community after the Bush Administration's embrace of torture, rendition and other crimes. For in the period leading up to and following East Timor's August 1999 referendum on independence from Indonesia Blair, from his perch as US Commander in Chief of the Pacific (CINCPAC) from February 1999 to May 2000, ran interference for the Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI) as they and their militia proxies committed crimes against humanity on an awesome scale.

Following the ouster of long-time dictator Suharto in 1998, Indonesian president B.J. Habibie signaled that Indonesia would be willing to allow East Timor an up or down referendum on independence following 24 years of brutal Indonesian occupation. The Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI), hoping to sway the vote in Jakarta's favor, launched a campaign of terror and intimidation led by the Army, Police and local militia proxies in which they killed hundreds of people displaced tens of thousands, most infamously on April 6, 1999, when militia forces massacred 57 Timorese in a church at Liquica on the outskirts of the capitol Dili.

As readers of the Nation will recall from the reporting of Alan Nairn, two days after the massacre the Pentagon dispatched Blair two days later to meet with Wiranto and demand that he disband the militias and allow a fair vote in East Timor. Instead, Blair offered assurances of continued US support for the TNI and invited Wiranto to Pacific Command Headquarters in Hawaii as his personal guest. According to top secret CIA intelligence summary issued after the massacre, however (and recently declassified by the author through a Freedom of Information Act request), "Indonesian military had colluded with pro-Jakarta militia forces in events preceding the attack and were present in some numbers at the time of the killings."

A Top Secret Senior Executive Intelligence Brief from April 20, 1999 stated plainly that "to restore stability, the Indonesian security forces must stop supporting the militias and adopt a neutral posture." A Top Secret CIA Intelligence Report dated May 10, 1999 reported that "local commanders would have required at least tacit approval from headquarters in Jakarta to allow the militias the blatant free hand they have enjoyed." Blair's performance, which prompted a rebuke by the State Department, was part of a fierce bureaucratic struggle between the Pentagon and State Department and Embassy officers seeking to reign in the TNI's terror.

Immediately after the August 30, 1999 referendum, in which nearly 80% of Timorese voted for independence from Indonesia, TNI forces and their militia proxies launched a murderous scorched earth campaign, killing nearly 1,500 Timorese, forcing a third of the population from their homes and destroying most of the territory's infrastructure. Following a global outcry and enormous pressure from Congress and grassroots activists, President Clinton finally severed military ties on September 8, with Dennis Blair personally conveying news of the cutoff to General Wiranto.

By this point the TNI's – and by extension Wironto's - control of the terror operations in East Timor was being widely acknowledged internally by both State Department and CIA sources. On September 10 the US Embassy in Canberra, Australia dispatched a secret telegram to Washington reporting in the subject line that that the TNI was "controlling and assisting militia" in East Timor. Yet in Pentagon news briefing two weeks later Blair continued publicly to push the 'bad apple' line – characterizing the TNI's deliberate destruction of East Timor and murder of hundreds of people as "a bad breakdown of order with some elements of TNI contributing to it and not helping it."

He went on to insist that US training of the Indonesian Armed Forces had paid dividends, with "many of those officers who did have training and education in the United States ... are leading a very strong reform movement within TNI." As Dana Priest of the /Washington Post/ later reported, however, fully one third of the Indonesian officers indicted by Indonesia's national human rights commission for "crimes against humanity" committed in East Timor in 1999 were US trained.

Wiranto, also indicted, is now considering a run at the Indonesian presidency in 2009. The clear links between US training and TNI terror clearly did not trouble Blair, who spent much of his remaining time as CINCPAC fighting to restore the military ties to his allies in Jakarta that grassroots activists and their Congressional allies had worked since 1992 to sever, finally winning their resumption in 2002.

Blair's apologetics for murder and torture by the Indonesian armed forces in East Timor, and his opposition to trials, international or otherwise, for the high level perpetrators of mass violence, offers a sobering indication of the positions he is likely to take as Director of National Intelligence. President-elect Obama's choice suggests that he will resist - as Blair almost certainly will - demands for the prosecution of high-ranking Bush Administration officials, much less lower level employees in the Pentagon and Central Intelligence Agency, for torture, rendition and other crimes carried out in the name of the so-called War on Terror.

Bradley Simpson is assistant professor of history and international affairs at Princeton University and a research fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington, DC, where he directs the Indonesia and East Timor Documentation Project. He is the author of Economists With Guns: Authoritarian Development and U.S.-Indonesian Relations, 1960-1968.

[Prison_Mike]

Just a question Horhey, I know what you are trying to do, and I know you think it is for a good cause, the truth, BUT WHY post this all on an ALIEN AND PREDATOR FAN FORUM. Aren't there OTHER forums, speccifically political, where you would post this, and thus, have more effect and conversation. Because most who read this, simply don't care. This is because the internet is usually a way to get away from world affairs, especially a fan forum, not worry or get involved with them, like you want the readers of your post to do.

It has got more then 1,600 hits? Does this mean you are doing it for hits?

Even though this is my 9th post, how does it affect my point? Why post on a forum where you will be heard/listened to less, go to a political forum to post what you think. Not AVPGalaxy.
Also, WHY post it on AVPGalaxy in the first place?

It has got more then 1,600 hits? Does this mean you are doing it for hits?

Even though this is my 9th post, how does it affect my point? Why post on a forum where you will be heard/listened to less, go to a political forum to post what you think. Not AVPGalaxy.
Also, WHY post it on AVPGalaxy in the first place?

It's not reading me. Number doesnt change when I click on it. If you really want to know go back and look how it started.

How did that anwser my question? Why post on a forum, clearly where one escapes from real world political issues, to try to inform? Not to mention post pictures real dead bodies.
Also, why did you deleted the previous post?

It has got more then 1,600 hits? Does this mean you are doing it for hits?

Even though this is my 9th post, how does it affect my point? Why post on a forum where you will be heard/listened to less, go to a political forum to post what you think. Not AVPGalaxy.
Also, WHY post it on AVPGalaxy in the first place?

It's not reading me. Number doesnt change when I click on it. If you really want to know go back and look how it started.

How did that anwser my question? Why post on a forum, clearly where one escapes from real world political issues, to try to inform? Not to mention post pictures real dead bodies.

Why talk about anything else in the General Discussion then? Why talk about tits and ass or anything else in an AVP forum. You're discriminating against this one issue. I sense an Obama follower...

1. Obama is a pretty bad president, I'm not Republican either, and how does that effect anything about this current exchange.

2. Do you see any other topic in general that deals with political issues on this scale?

3. Yes I am discriminting, because, even though I do not speak for everyone, I find it irritating and sad you are trying to get your voice heard on an AVP forum of all places. Not that AVP should be the only talking point, but do you see how one might not listen. Do you see how another forum might be a better place?

It has got more then 1,600 hits? Does this mean you are doing it for hits?

Even though this is my 9th post, how does it affect my point? Why post on a forum where you will be heard/listened to less, go to a political forum to post what you think. Not AVPGalaxy.
Also, WHY post it on AVPGalaxy in the first place?

It's not reading me. Number doesnt change when I click on it. If you really want to know go back and look how it started.

How did that anwser my question? Why post on a forum, clearly where one escapes from real world political issues, to try to inform? Not to mention post pictures real dead bodies.

Why talk about anything else in the General Discussion then? Why talk about tits and ass or anything else in an AVP forum. You're discriminating against this one issue. I sense an Obama follower...

1. Obama is a pretty bad president, I'm not Republican either, and how does that effect anything about this current exchange.

2. Do you see any other topic in general that deals with political issues on this scale?

3. Yes I am discriminting, because, even though I do not speak for everyone, I find it irritating and sad you are trying to get your voice heard on an AVP forum of all places. Not that AVP should be the only talking point, but do you see how one might not listen. Do you see how another forum might be a better place?

Oh I see. So certain political issues should be off limits if they are too powerful.

Wow, I never said that, if you want to post political issues of this scale on this forum, be my guest, I'm only saying, do you see the PROBLEM of posting on this forum, and not another. Nothing else, nothing more. Just that.

Are you ok? I never even heard of that thread, let alone read it while lurking.

I only said DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Yet you refuse to anwser the question. Do you see how that might affect the way people will see the issues you bring up.

I dont care man. You can have the last word. Just please go away after that.

Why can't you anwser the question? Your making me sound like Judge Judy, when all I'm asking is a simple yes or no?

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Edit: Really, and delete all your posts after that. I smell rage quit.

[Horhey]

Lawrence Summers was the cheif economic advisor to President Obama. As US Treasury Secretary under the Clinton administration, Lawrence Summers wrote the blueprint called "The East Asian Miracle", in which he instructs Third World governments to "insulate" themselves from "pluralist pressures" and to suppress trade unions:

The Gaurdian: US trained butchers of Timor

Exclusive: Washington trained death squads in secret while Britain has spent £1m helping Indonesian army

Amnesty International's East Timor country specialist, Deborah Sklar, traces the [Suharto] regime's 'over-reliance on thuggish military operations' as being due to the demands of the foreign investment community and even from the World Bank.

She cites a blueprint called The East Asian Miracle, written by US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, in which he urges governments to 'insulate' themselves from 'pluralist pressures' and to suppress trade unions. This, she says, became a primary Kopassus role during the years of training by the United States.

Larry Summers: We should dump our toxic waste in low wage countries

In December 1991, while chief economist for the World Bank, Lawrence Summers wrote an internal memo saying that the Bank should encourage migration of "the dirty industries" to the less-developed countries because, amongst other reasons, health-impairing and death-causing pollution costs would be lower. Inasmuch as these costs are based on the lost eamings of the affected workers, in a country of very low wages the computed costs would be much lower. The memo states:

A given amount of health-impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest-wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.

The New York Times - Furor on Memo At World Bank

Despite this memo receiving wide distribution and condemnation, Summers, in 1999, was appointed Secretary of the Treasury by President Clinton. This was a promotion from being Undersecretary of the Treasury-for intemational affairs.

After Summers' departure from the Obama team, in a handsome tribute, Obama issued a statement saying:

I will always be grateful that at a time of great peril for our country, a man of Larry's brilliance, experience and judgment was willing to answer the call and lead our economic team.

And that's despite the fact that when he was Treasury Secretary, he prevented Congress from regulating derivatives, and exotic financial instruments which was one of the main factors that led to the crisis.

One leading economist who have been right all along in predicting what's happening, Dean Baker, pointed out that Obama  selecting him, among others, to fix the economy is like selecting Osama bin Laden to run the war on terror:

By Dean Baker

I usually don't watch much television news. When I do, I realize why. I saw Andrea Mitchell tonight talking about who President Obama will turn to for help in dealing with the financial crisis. The first two names were at the top of the list of people who gave us the financial crisis: Robert Rubin and Larry Summers. This would be a bit like turning to Osama Bin Laden for aid in the war on terrorism.

Rubin and Summers were both major advocates of the one-sided deregulation of the financial industry under which we maintained the security blanket of "too big to fail" for the Wall Street big boys, but gave them the green light to take whatever risks they wanted in order to enrich themselves. It would be difficult to imagine that President Obama would embrace people with such a dismal track record.

http://prospect.org/csnc/blogs/beat_the_press_archive?month=11&year=2008&base_name=andrea_mitchell_hasnt_heard_ab

[Prison_Mike]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

[Prison_Mike]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Ok if it will make you go away I'll answer your question:

Nope.

And this is why, not many listens to you here, because of your arrogant attitude, lack of appreciation for others opinions then your own, as well as feedback, and yet continuing to post walls of pictures and text like you are on a crusade. It only makes you look bonkers, not smart, and it makes your objective of educating less and less credible in the eyes of the reader.

[Horhey]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Ok if it will make you go away I'll answer your question:

Nope.

And this is why, not many listens to you here, because of your arrogant attitude, lack of appreciation for others opinions then your own, as well as feedback, and yet continuing to post walls of pictures and text like you are on a crusade. It only makes you look bonkers, not smart, and it makes your objective of educating less and less credible in the eyes of the reader.

This is what happenned man. In the other political thread, I made the statement that it doesnt matter who's President, the policies will remain largely the same and I was called a nutjob. My analysis was challanged so I am now backing it up. Was it the right choice? Probobly not. But I always finish what I start no matter what it is. You understand?

[Purebreedalien]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Ok if it will make you go away I'll answer your question:

Nope.

And this is why, not many listens to you here, because of your arrogant attitude, lack of appreciation for others opinions then your own, as well as feedback, and yet continuing to post walls of pictures and text like you are on a crusade. It only makes you look bonkers, not smart, and it makes your objective of educating less and less credible in the eyes of the reader.

I don't think you're gonna get very far, Mike. Just let him get on with it and if people wanna read it they will. Personally I agree with you but nevermind.

[Prison_Mike]

I understand, it may be against the rules, but I love watching him squirm, it is insanely entertaining.  But it is useless, I admit.

[Horhey]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Ok if it will make you go away I'll answer your question:

Nope.

And this is why, not many listens to you here, because of your arrogant attitude, lack of appreciation for others opinions then your own, as well as feedback, and yet continuing to post walls of pictures and text like you are on a crusade. It only makes you look bonkers, not smart, and it makes your objective of educating less and less credible in the eyes of the reader.

I don't think you're gonna get very far, Mike. Just let him get on with it and if people wanna read it they will. Personally I agree with you but nevermind.

You're one of the one's that called me a "conspiracy theorist" and now that Im backing it up you're agreeing with him?

[Prison_Mike]

No, you aren't backing anything up. You are only backing yourself up agaisnt the wall by not anwsering a simple question for more then an hour. Your final anwser, was the one I anticipated, and it's the one which makes you look more like a sociopathic attention seeker then anything else. My opinion, you could care less about what you are posting.

[Purebreedalien]

Really, just moving on? All I want is a simple yes or no, the more you delay, the less credible you look, which is how I assume you want to come off.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM OF POSTING SUCH A LARGE SCALE POLITICAL ISSUE ON A FORUM SUCH AS THIS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE.

Ok if it will make you go away I'll answer your question:

Nope.

And this is why, not many listens to you here, because of your arrogant attitude, lack of appreciation for others opinions then your own, as well as feedback, and yet continuing to post walls of pictures and text like you are on a crusade. It only makes you look bonkers, not smart, and it makes your objective of educating less and less credible in the eyes of the reader.

I don't think you're gonna get very far, Mike. Just let him get on with it and if people wanna read it they will. Personally I agree with you but nevermind.

You're one of the one's that called me a "conspiracy theorist" and now that Im backing it up you're agreeing with him?

Hey, I didn't even read any of the posts properly because, well, tl;dr. But maybe 'conspiracy theorist' was the wrong title, but I agree with him that hardly anybody is gonna read it and it's certainly not a place I would post something like this.

Also, I hate political bullshit and don't give a flying f**k about who's running my country or what's happening inside it. As long as my family and my friends are OK I don't care either way. Maybe I will when I'm older, but in the foreseeable future? No way.

[Horhey]

No, you aren't backing anything up. You are only backing yourself up agaisnt the wall by not anwsering a simple question for more then an hour. Your final anwser, was the one I anticipated, and it's the one which makes you look more like a sociopathic attention seeker then anything else. My opinion, you could care less about what you are posting.

Now you're just harassing me. You're clearly looking for trouble. You're opinion is silly. I wouldnt know about any of this if I didnt care, now move on and stop wasting your time and mine.

[Prison_Mike]

No, you aren't backing anything up. You are only backing yourself up agaisnt the wall by not anwsering a simple question for more then an hour. Your final anwser, was the one I anticipated, and it's the one which makes you look more like a sociopathic attention seeker then anything else. My opinion, you could care less about what you are posting.

Now you're just harassing me. You're clearly looking for trouble. You're opinion is silly. I wouldnt know about any of this if I didnt care, now move on and stop wasting your time and mine.

You better watch out, I can waste time. Be afraid, be very afraid.