[Peace-discuss] What's it all mean?

[C. G. Estabrook]

[In a civilized society, Leiter (and his boss) would be in jail. Greenwald is 
good on the viciousness of the Obama administration, but he's silent on why 
they're murdering people and shredding the forms of democracy we pretend to. The 
American economic elite whom Obama is sucking up to will stop at nothing to make 
their writ run around the world. But they're not crazy - they know when a policy 
reaches the point of diminishing returns.  It did in Vietnam 40 years ago, and 
the president stepped down and the policy changed. We can hope for the same 
thing for Obama - and work to defeat him and his party - but SW Asia is far more 
important to the US than SE Asia ever was...]

	Tuesday, Jul 6, 2010 10:07 ET
	The crux of our endless War on Terror
	By Glenn Greenwald

As I wrote last week, the Obama administration finally purported to defend its 
presidential assassination program aimed at American citizens, when Obama's 
Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Michael Leiter, offered 
patently misleading claims to justify it.  Yesterday, Newsweek's Michael Isikoff 
posed several good questions to Leiter about this program and the "War on 
Terror" generally -- several of which are themes raised often here -- and 
Leiter's responses compellingly illustrate the utter illogic and 
counter-productive nature of our Terrorism and war policies.

First, Isikoff noted that CIA Director Leon Panetta said that there are at most 
100 Al Qaeda members in Afghanistan -- which led Fareed Zakaria, with great 
understatement, to suggest that our nine-year war there seemed 
"disproportionate" to the ostensible problem -- and then asked Leiter how many 
Al Qaeda members are in Pakistan:

     Leiter: I think [CIA director] Leon Panetta said on Sunday, and I agree 
with him, that in Afghanistan, you have a certain number, a relatively small 
number, 50 to 100. I think we have in Pakistan a larger number.

     Q:  How many?

     Leiter:  Upwards --more than 300, I would say.

So between Afghanistan and Paksitan combined, there are a few hundred Al Qeada 
members total.  All of this ongoing war and those hundreds of billions of 
dollars spent and those deaths and the decade of occupation, and those bombings 
and shootings and drone attacks and lawless prisons and habeas-stripping court 
precedents:  it's all (ostensibly) for a few hundred extremists total hiding in 
remote tribal areas.  A few hundred.  Making matters so much worse is this:

     Q:  Isn't it true that in almost every one of the big cases where there’s 
been attempted attacks on the U.S., the individuals involved -- Faisal Shahzad, 
Najibullah Zazi -- have said they were motivated to go abroad to learn how to 
attack the United States by the [military] actions we are taking now in 
Afghanistan and in Pakistan to try to defeat Al Qaeda there?

     Leiter:  Well I certainly will not try to argue that some of our actions 
have not led to some people being radicalized. I think that's a given . . . 
.That doesn’t mean you don’t do it. That means you craft a fuller strategy to 
explain why you're doing that and try to minimize the likelihood that 
individuals are going to be radicalized.

Actually, the recent attempted Terrorists referenced by Isikoff have said they 
were motivated by more than just our actions in Pakistan and Afghanistan; 
several have cited our attack on Iraq, our support for Israeli aggression, 
lawless prisons and torture.  Still, not only are we engaged in a 
nine-year-and-counting, highly destructive war and bombing campaign in that 
region all for a few hundred fighters, but Leiter concedes (as has been 
recognized by the U.S. Government for years) that those actions have the 
opposite effect of what is supposedly intended:  namely, these actions are what 
motivate so much of the very Terrorism (especially the recent Terrorism) that is 
cited to justify those policies.

Worse still, not only is our policy of endless war wildly disproprionate and 
counter-productive, but it provides the pretext for endless civil liberties 
abuses.  Here is what Leiter boasts after being asked about the Obama 
administration's targeting of U.S. citizens for assassination who have been 
charged with nothing:  "Just to be clear, the U.S. government through the 
Department of Defense goes out and attempts to target and kill people, a lot of 
people, who haven't been indicted."  Indeed it does.  And then Isikoff asked him 
about the extreme contradiction of the Democratic Party which I've raised over 
and over in every forum I could:

     Q.  When the Bush administration declared Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen, an 
enemy combatant, stripped him of all his legal rights, and threw him in a 
military brig, there was an enormous outcry from the civil liberties community. 
Here, the Obama administration is going one better than that; they're saying, 
"We can kill this guy. We can take him out." And there's been very little public 
debate about how that decision was made.  Doesn't the government at least owe a 
[fuller] explanation of how it's reaching these decisions?

     Leiter:  I absolutely agree with you.  These are tough issues that require 
a full and open debate.  That may not mean there's a full and open debate about 
an individual . . . because there are sensitive sources and methods involved. . 
. . But I will tell you from my perspective as director of the National 
Counterterrorism Center, if someone like Anwar al-Awlaki is responsible for part 
of an operation to kill more than 300 people over the city of Detroit, I think 
it would be wholly irresponsible . . .  not to at least think about and 
potentially direct all elements of national power to try to defend the American 
people.

In other words:  when we decide that an American citizen is Guilty of Terrorism, 
there is no need for a trial, or due process, or even any public presentment of 
evidence.  It suffices that we have concluded this in secret, with no checks or 
external review.  Once we decide that, the death penalty is imposed and we will 
execute it ourselves.  We are literally Judge, Jury and Executioner.  And, 
despite the fact that we have been continuously wrong in our accusations of 
Terrorism and have even knowingly imprisoned innocent people, you'll just take 
our word for it, on blind faith, that the citizen we want to kill is really an 
Evil Terrorist.  Yes, it's true that you refused to accept that same rationale 
when the Bush administration used it merely to eavesdrop on or detain American 
citizens -- in fact, you screeched that those less extreme policies were tyranny 
and a shredding of the Constitution when they did it -- but you should 
nonetheless accept this mentality when we use it to murder your fellow citizens 
who have never even been charged with any crime.

And that seems to be fine with our political class.  All because there are a few 
hundred people hiding in caves in remote tribal areas who are really, really 
Scary:  who will get you if don't acquiesce to endless war, the transfer of 
enormous amounts of money to fight those wars, and the most unlimited and 
unchecked government powers imaginable.  And even when they come right out and 
say that this is all about nothing more than a few hundred people -- many of 
whom are motivated by the very violence we're perpetrating -- it changes very 
little.  Fear is an extremely potent motivating force, overwhelming all reason 
and skepticism of power.  That's why political leaders -- in all eras and all 
places -- like it and use it so much.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/07/06/terrorism/index.html