Chomsky: The Long, Shameful History of American Terrorism

[eridani]

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/26980-the-long-shameful-history-of-american-terrorism

"It's official: The U.S. is the world's leading terrorist state, and proud of it."

That should have been the headline for the lead story in the New York Times on October 15, which was more politely titled "CIA Study of Covert Aid Fueled Skepticism About Helping Syrian Rebels."

The article reports on a CIA review of recent U.S. covert operations to determine their effectiveness. The White House concluded that unfortunately successes were so rare that some rethinking of the policy was in order.

The article quoted President Barack Obama as saying that he had asked the CIA to conduct the review to find cases of "financing and supplying arms to an insurgency in a country that actually worked out well. And they couldn't come up with much." So Obama has some reluctance about continuing such efforts.

The first paragraph of the Times article cites three major examples of "covert aid": Angola, Nicaragua and Cuba. In fact, each case was a major terrorist operation conducted by the U.S.

Angola was invaded by South Africa, which, according to Washington, was defending itself from one of the world's "more notorious terrorist groups" -- Nelson Mandela's African National Congress. That was 1988.

By then the Reagan administration was virtually alone in its support for the apartheid regime, even violating congressional sanctions to increase trade with its South African ally.

Meanwhile, Washington joined South Africa in providing crucial support for Jonas Savimbi's terrorist Unita army in Angola. Washington continued to do so even after Savimbi had been roundly defeated in a carefully monitored free election, and South Africa had withdrawn its support. Savimbi was a "monster whose lust for power had brought appalling misery to his people," in the words of Marrack Goulding, British ambassador to Angola.

The consequences were horrendous. A 1989 U.N. inquiry estimated that South African depredations led to 1.5 million deaths in neighboring countries, let alone what was happening within South Africa itself. Cuban forces finally beat back the South African aggressors and compelled them to withdraw from illegally occupied Namibia. The U.S. alone continued to support the monster Savimbi.

[daleanime]

1. Kick....

[JonLP24]

2. There a lot of things Chomsky says that are ridiculous

US foreign policy isn't one of them.

The title is inflammatory but the US uses the label for the same reason.

[woo me with science]

3. K&R

[woo me with science]

4. kick

[RiverLover]

5. The comments after the linked article are very interesting, too. Thanks for posting~ nt

[woo me with science]

7. +1

Some good discussion.

Also notable that the board participants there are very aware of their resident message control "board plants."

[baldguy]

6. So Obama is a terrorist.

How is this different from what Sarah Palin says?

[RiverLover]

8. Palin was talking about BS "domestic terrorism" with Obama & Ayers

This is about the US policy of supporting terrorists in some (documented) cases and/or being the catalyst for terrorism for many years. Not just Obama.

[woo me with science]

9. kick