First: does this scare anyone else? Or is it just me?

Moving on – it would seem that despite the efforts of the Iraqi government to downplay the issue, six years after the US assault on Fallujah a stunningly high rate of birth defects is being witnessed by local physicians. While not a single investigation has been attempted to support the government’s claim that birth defects in the Fallujah largely coincide with the national average, local physicians that spoke with the BBC have claimed that birth defects are not a once in a while phenomenon – rather a daily one…

“…in the impressive new Fallujah General Hospital, built with American aid, we found a paediatric specialist, Dr Samira al-Ani, who told us that she saw two or three new cases every day.

Most of them, she said, exhibited cardiac problems.

When asked what the cause was, she said: “I am a doctor. I have to be scientific in my talk. I have nothing documented. But I can tell you that year by year, the number [is] increasing.”

The specialist, like other medical staff at the hospital, seemed nervous about talking too openly about the problem.

They were well aware that what they said went against the government version, and we were told privately that the Iraqi authorities are anxious not to embarrass the Americans over the issue.

There are no official figures for the incidence of birth defects in Fallujah.

The US military authorities are absolutely correct when they say they are not aware of any official reports indicating an increase in birth defects in Fallujah – no official reports exist.

But it is impossible, as a visitor, not to be struck by the terrible number of cases of birth defects there.

We heard many times that officials in Fallujah had warned women that they should not have children.

We went to a clinic for the disabled, and were given details of dozens upon dozens of cases of children with serious birth defects.

One photograph I saw showed a newborn baby with three heads.

While we were at the clinic, people kept arriving with children who were suffering major problems – a little girl with only one arm, several children who were paralysed, and another girl with a spinal condition so bad I asked my cameraman not to film her.

At the clinic we were told that the worst problems were to be found in the neighbourhood of al-Julan, near the river.

This was the heart of the resistance to the Americans during the two major offensives of April and September 2004, and was hit constantly by bombs and shells.

We went to a house where three children, all under six, were suffering from birth defects.

Two boys were partially paralysed, and their sister clearly had serious brain damage.

Like all the other parents we spoke to, their mother had no doubt that the American attacks were responsible.

Outside, a man who had heard we were there had brought his four-year-old daughter to show us. She had six fingers on each hand, and six toes on each foot.

She was also suffering from a number of other serious health problems. The father told us that the house where they still lived had been hit by an American shell during the fighting in 2004.

There may well be a link with drinking-water, especially in al-Julan.

After the fighting was over, the rubble from the town was bulldozed into the river bank, and most people in this area get their water from the river.

The true causes of the problem, and the question of the effects of the weapons the Americans used, can be resolved only by a proper independent inquiry by medical experts.”

Now, does that sound ‘normal’ to you? That despite the ‘official word’, such a high concentration of birth defects is occurring in a place where the US military used incendiary weapons and then defended their use by claiming the shells were only used for ‘screening purposes’ to hide troop movements? If you’re unaware, the use of incendiary weapons produces particles that are cast off by the initial explosion of ordinance, causing severe internal and external damage.

While the use of such weapons aren’t explicitly limited by treaties when used against military targets, the use of incendiary weapons in any civilian area is strictly forbidden under the Geneva Conventions. This leads us back to the debate that arose when evidence of WP use first reared its head in 2004. Despite claims that a ‘benign’ version of the chemical was used, in actuality the US most likely used Mark 77’s, which are 500 to 750 pound incendiary bombs consisting of several different agents: kerosene-based fuel with a low concentration of benzene, an oxidizing agent, and white phosphorus. Photographs that came out of Fallujah after the assault lend credence to this assertion.

The MK-77 was introduced to replace napalm as the US’s primary incendiary weapon of choice. While journalists covering the war in Iraq questioned military spokespeople about the use of ‘napalm’, the official response was always that napalm was no longer used – and that’s ‘technically’ true. Unfortunately, what military spokespeople didn’t say was that MK-77’s were used – something that they didn’t have to offer up because they had been asked about napalm, not newer incendiary ordinance. That misconception was also turned into a comfortable lie when the United States informed the British Ministry of Defense that MK-77’s had not been used in Iraq. The falsehood was then presented to the British Parliament by Defense Minister Adam Ingram, ultimately resulting in an apology by both Ingram and then US Secretary of State for Defense John Reid, as MK-77’s had been used by the US since the commencement of the initial invasion in 2003.

If the United States thought it acceptable to lie to an allied foreign government, then whose word is worth more – theirs or that of Iraqi physicians that are witnessing the affects?

It all comes down to perception – making this subject no different than that of rendition or illegal detention. The United States is, for all intents and purposes, ‘above’ such criminality, transforming the crimes that it does commit into ‘necessities’ given the perpetual perception of American ‘moral superiority’. Under such a guise, the unthinkable is not merely possible, but entirely probable.

March 4, 2010 23 Comments

While there should most certainly be an inquiry into the 2006 “suicides” of three Guantanamo detainees, the likelihood of it actually happening is next to none…

“According to the Pentagon, three Guantánamo prisoners hung themselves in their individual cells on the night of June 9, 2006, in order to commit an act of “asymmetrical warfare.” But that official account is riddled with gaping holes and is challenged by an alternative explanation that they died of asphyxiation during brutal interrogations after cloth was stuffed into their mouths and lodged in their throats.

This homicide theory is posited in a blockbuster piece by human rights lawyer Scott Horton in the March issue of Harper’s magazine and is supported by questions raised in an investigative report, “Death in Camp Delta.” by Seton Hall University Law School faculty and students, released late last year.

There are enough credible discrepancies that Congress should launch its own public, independent review into what really happened.”

Scott Horton’s piece, The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle, is a must read…

“According to the NCIS documents, each prisoner had fashioned a noose from torn sheets and T-shirts and tied it to the top of his cell’s eight-foot-high steel-mesh wall. Each prisoner was able somehow to bind his own hands, and, in at least one case, his own feet, then stuff more rags deep down into his own throat. We are then asked to believe that each prisoner, even as he was choking on those rags, climbed up on his washbasin, slipped his head through the noose, tightened it, and leapt from the washbasin to hang until he asphyxiated. The NCIS report also proposes that the three prisoners, who were held in non-adjoining cells, carried out each of these actions almost simultaneously.”

[…]

“Now four members of the Military Intelligence unit assigned to guard Camp Delta, including a decorated non-commissioned Army officer who was on duty as sergeant of the guard the night of June 9, have furnished an account dramatically at odds with the NCIS report—a report for which they were neither interviewed nor approached.

All four soldiers say they were ordered by their commanding officer not to speak out, and all four soldiers provide evidence that authorities initiated a cover-up within hours of the prisoners’ deaths.”

That’s homicide. Flat out.

February 26, 2010 18 Comments

On September 4th of last year, US bombers were responsible for the deaths of 142 people. It has now emerged that the German-ordered attack was in contravention of NATO rules of engagement…

“SPIEGEL has learned that German commanders on the ground withheld important information from the US pilots above Kunduz — information which, had it been available, might have led to the pilots’ refusing to drop their payload.

One pilot, who goes by the handle Dude 15, told NATO investigators that, prior to the bombing, he had “an uneasy feeling about everything.” He and the pilot of a second F-15 flying over Kunduz that night both “could tell the ground commander was really pushing to go kinetic” — in other words, to bomb. He said they even considered breaking off the operation altogether.”

In other Afghanistan related news, despite US objections, the government of Hamid Karzai says that it plans to move forward with reconciliation talks with the leadership of the Taliban. Masoom Stanekzai, one of Karzai’s top advisors, was quoted as saying – “If they are willing to join the peace process, then why not?”

February 2, 2010

We begin today in London with something positive. Imagine that.

From there we travel back in time to Jon Stuart’s interview with John Yoo last night. Unfortunately, it was as about as exciting and purposeful as watching paint dry. Slimy torture advocates on television 1 – 0 Jon Stuart.

From there we jump back into the present and travel to Afghanistan where US General Stan McCrystal is declaring the Afghan ‘surge’ a success. Aren’t they always?

Meanwhile, in an attempt to ensure that the Shia block in Iraq doesn’t achieve an utterly overwhelming majority in that country’s upcoming elections, the CIA is reportedly holding secret talks in Yemen and Syria with the King of Clubs, former Iraqi Vice President Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the current leader of the now banned Ba’athist Party. Even more interesting is the fact that…

“Last week it was reported that the Yemeni government, at America’s behest, founded a new spy agency specifically to fill with former Ba’athists who fled Iraq during the 2003 US invasion.”

Just so you know, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri remains the 6th most wanted individual on Iraq’s 55 Most Wanted list. I suppose if the CIA is talking to him then that ‘reward money’ is out the window.

January 12, 2010

From the BBC…

“US President Barack Obama has said he will end the ban on gay people serving openly in the military.

He said he would repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that allows gay people to serve in the military if they do not reveal their sexual orientation.

Mr Obama was speaking to America’s largest gay group – the Human Rights Campaign – in Washington.”

It’s funny. Students at West Point are no strangers to the exploits of Alexander. He was, of course, gay as the day is long, but he was also one of history’s foremost military geniuses.

Think about something.

Race was a factor in the military at one time. You could be a cook or an orderly if you were African American, but you couldn’t put your life on the line for your country – even though African American soldiers fought during the Civil War. The 442nd Regimental Combat Team remains the most highly decorated unit in American history – made up entirely of Japanese Americans who had to prove their loyalty by doing the extraordinary and paying with their lives to prove that they were worthy of being treated the same as dead white Americans.

For the majority of American history, straight, white men have reserved the exclusive right to die for their country. Everyone else has had to struggle to attain that right.

I’m a pretty renowned expert when it comes to the fucked up, and even I’ve never been able to get my head around that one.

October 11, 2009