Bush's Weapon of Mass Deception
by
Larry C Johnson
It is a week since news broke in London about an alleged plot to blow up nine commercial jetliners and there are emerging indicators that Bush and Blair exaggerated the truth about the actual readiness of the so-called plot. And yes, I mean so-called plot. Why would Bush and Blair hype a terrorist threat? A very simple answer. The White House was on notice that Seymour Hersh's story that the Bush Administration encouraged Israel to invade Lebanon as part of a broader scheme to set the stage for war with Iran. Tony Blair, Bush's enabler, went along with the ruse.
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I have no doubt that British intelligence had succeeded in penetrating a group of Muslim extremists who had big dreams about hurting the United States but they lacked a viable terrorist plan ready for execution. We also know that the Bush Administration, who was being regularly briefed by the Brits about the plot, pushed London to act prematurely. What is particularly galling is that no one at the Bush White House apparently felt compelled to look for ways to boost aviation security in the United States. Instead, they sought to create a firestorm of fear in order to distract public attention from the devastating article written by Sy Hersh. One of Sy's key points:
The Bush Administration, however, was closely involved in the planning of Israel’s retaliatory attacks. President Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney were convinced, current and former intelligence and diplomatic officials told me, that a successful Israeli Air Force bombing campaign against Hezbollah’s heavily fortified underground-missile and command-and-control complexes in Lebanon could ease Israel’s security concerns and also serve as a prelude to a potential American preëmptive attack to destroy Iran’s nuclear installations, some of which are also buried deep underground.
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060821fa_fact That is the kind of news the White House would like to bury, particularly as a ceasefire took hold in Lebanon that left Hizbullah standing ten feet tall. As Keith Olberman showed the other night, the Bush Administration has been zealous about trotting out bogus threats when there is political bad news afoot. If I'm right about this latest incident, Keith Olberman has a new item to add to his list of ten.
more at:
http://noquarter.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/08/bushs_weapon_of.html