Unca Ray 'Splains It All To You

[Karenina]

I wanna have this man's love-child. (NEVER MIND I had the tubes tied 20 years ago and have experienced "the change," we got all this modern technology and whatnot! ;-)

RAY MCGOVERN COMMENTS:

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050613/downing_street_ii.php


Downing Street II
Ray McGovern
June 13, 2005

Ray McGovern is a co-founder of the Truth Telling Coalition and of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. He had a 27-year career as a CIA analyst, and now works for Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC.

Yesterday, London's Sunday Times published the text of another SECRET UK EYES ONLY briefing document prepared for senior British officials. This one was dated July 21, 2002, two days before British intelligence chief Richard Dearlove gave Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top national security advisers a briefing based on discussions with American counterparts in Washington. The minutes recording the discussion at the July 23, 2002, meeting, published by the Rupert Murdoch's Sunday Times on May 1, 2005, included Dearlove's matter-of-fact report that President George W. Bush had decided to bring about "regime change" in Iraq by military action; that the attack would be "justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD" (weapons of mass destruction); and that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

Creating Conditions

At that meeting, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw noted that the evidence regarding "weapons of mass destruction" was "thin." And British Attorney General Peter Goldsmith pointed out that "the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action." But Blair gave them the back of his hand, ordering them to "work on the assumption that the U.K. would take part in any military action."

It is a safe bet that the British seemed a bunch of nervous Nellies in the eyes of the hard-nosed "neoconservatives" running our policy toward Iraq. The briefing paper of July 21 shows senior British officials preoccupied with the question of how to fix it so the war would be legal. The paper makes it clear that U.S. military plans assumed, "as a minimum, the use of British bases on the islands of Cyprus and Diego Garcia." Even this minimum gave rise to serious legal questions. Pervading the briefing paper is the British leaders' need to square a circle: how to render legal an illegal, unprovoked attack on Iraq—or in the words of the briefing paper, how to go about "creating the conditions...in which we could legally support military action."

The briefing paper of July 21, 2002, offers this clear picture of what the British see as the U.S. goal. "U.S. military planning unambiguously takes as its objective the removal of Saddam Hussein's regime, followed by elimination of Iraqi WMD." But, alas, with the evidence of WMD "thin," and an invasion to bring about "regime change" illegal, the British found themselves between Iraq and a hard place—Washington. The document reeks not only of obsequiousness toward the United States, but also wonderment at Washington's policies—particularly with respect to international law.

MUCH more at link.

[NYPagan]

1. Why can't we?

Join the EU? They have level headed, right thinking politicians.

I would vote for that!

[Karenina]

2. Well I wouldn't go THAT far...

The "American model" is in hyperdrive to strip the Bevolkerung of its power, as it has so successfully done in the U.S.

[G_j]

3. ..particularly with respect to international law.

The document reeks not only of obsequiousness toward the United States, but also wonderment at Washington's policies..


obviously somebody recognized that these folks were/are extremely dangerous

[Karenina]

4. Obsequiousness...

"marked by or exhibiting a fawning attentiveness. Syn: SUBSERVIENT ;-)

[FreedomAngel82]

5. He's great

I heard him on BradBlog's radio show last Saturday and he was great. :loveya:

[LightningFlash]

6. Thin apparently equals non-existent....

So then they had to justify that intelligence, said in the briefing papers, in order to make it existent. Does anyone have any idea how that could have been done?

:eyes:

[Karenina]

12. Diplomat-speak

Gee... I wonder... :freak: :think:

[kenny blankenship]

7. You're just misunderstanding the definition of "creating"

See, what God fearing people of faith like George W. and his legwarmer Tony Blair mean by "creation" is Biblical creation. That is to say they placed the future existence of war-justifying conditions in the hands of The Creator, Jehovah. The Lord will provide.

The idea that "create conditions" phrase plucked from text of the memo might mean anything other than simply and humbly leaving it all in the hands of Almighty God is the propaganda of anti-Christian militant secular Socialists and demon-worshipping infidels.

[LightningFlash]

10. Just like it was placed in their hands...For the election!!!

:eyes: :eyes:

[Karenina]

15. Are you talkin' those machines

that don't CREATE paper trails? :freak:
OFF-TOPIC!!! :spank: We be talkin' about my main man Ray here and what HE got to say!!! ;-)

[H2O Man]

8. Ray is one of the best.

I'm reminded of in 1954, when the Vietnamese were spanking the French in Dien-bien-phu. VP Nixon told a group of newspaper editors that, "as a leader of the Free World," the USA could not "retreat" from Asia. He urged that "the Administration must face up to the situation and dispatch forces."

Admiral Radford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, favored air strikes, and noted the US had to consider using tactical nuclear weapons. Yet one military leader, Army Chief of Staff, General Matthew B. Ridgway, carried his opposition of the plan straight to the President.

(Also, JFK made a powerful speech in 1954, opposing US intervention: "For the United States to intervene unilaterally and to send troops to the most difficult terrain in the world, with the Chinese able to pour in unlimited manpower, would mean we face a situation which would be far more difficult than even that we encountered in Korea.")

Twelve years later, James C. Thompson, Jr., left government service over the US policy in Vietnam. He had served in the White House and State Department. He noted that all of the best minds in Asian affairs "had been purged .... as a result of McCarthyism."

Thus, when CIA Director John A. McCone opposed US intervention in Vietnam (yes, many in CI opposed the war before being silenced), he was not able to speak to anyone but Robert McNamara about his concerns. Then McNamara "translated" these to LBJ.

We are seeing a repeat, in a sense, of that type of silencing those who oppose the official line. Thank goodness Ray speaks up.

[H2O Man]

9. PS: Your introduction

cracked me up! My post (above) probably shows my age. I like to remind my wife that my grandfather had his 14th child at the age of 70. Got to keep your hopes up at my age.....

[Karenina]

11. At mine too!!!

:blush: Oh dear... Was that a blush or a hot flash? :freak:

[H2O Man]

13. I think our country is

experiencing something akin to a hot flash .... or at least it should be sweating the outcome of this administration. Ignoring the advice of the Thomson's, the Ridgway's, or the Uncle Ray's goes beyond the wanton arrogance that we call "hubris." It comes closer to the Greek concept of a cycle that is fueled by the "danger of success" that creates a hubris that can only lead to "nemesis" or divine retribution .... and those too stupid to catch on reach a state of "ate," or the complete destruction and annihilation of the empire.

Now there's a hot flash that ain't nothing to blush at! (grin)

[Karenina]

14. Indeed, Waterman

When someone of Ray McGovern's calibre speaks, it's w-a-y past time to shut up and listen VERY carefully. Americans have yet to comprehend the epic proportions of the CATASTROPHE their gub'mint's "foreign policy" has perpetrated. The difference between our current predicament and all that has gone before is the technological advancements that have given us the capacity to COMPLETELY DESTROY the balance of life on this planet. Never mind we are well along our way to doing so, even without those nassy :nuke::nuke::nuke:

[H2O Man]

16. "All nations have their myths,

and there is some merit in them as the bond of unity and the spur to effort. The danger, for a nation as for an individual, comes when the gap between rhetoric and reality becomes too wide. In an individual, such a gap between self-perception and reality is known as psychosis. A nation that indulges in too much self-glorifying rhetoric while unable to win a small war or to prevent deterioration in its social fabric is unlikely to be able to heal its real distempers."
-- An American Melodrams: The Presidential Campaign of 1968; Chester, Hodgson, & Page; 1969; page 44)

The more things change, the more they stay the same.