"And, on a larger scale, Washington uses murder and corpses to transmit

[understandinglife]

.... its wrath.

We delivered such incendiary messages in Vietnam, Iraq, Serbia, and Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden has learned to speak the language of modern industrial warfare."

And Hedges notes: "It was Robert McNamara, the American Secretary of Defense in the summer of 1965, who defined the bombing raids that would eventually leave hundreds of thousands of civilians north of Saigon dead as a means of communication to the Communist regime in Hanoi."

Forty years later, with a "war on terrorism" serving as the central theme of pro-war propaganda, the United States and its military allies are routinely sending lethal messages. It should not surprise us when such messages are returned to sender.

<clip>

The president who lied his way into an invasion of Iraq is now exploiting Thursday’s atrocities in London to justify US policies that are bringing daily atrocities to Iraq. Bush is intent on sending a message to "the terrorists" by continuing the Pentagon’s war effort. The idea of communicating by killing is very familiar.

From Terrorism, "The War on Terror" and the Message of Carnage

by Norman Solomon

July 9, 2005

More at the link:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/070905X.shtml

We need to develop a different message and we have a powerful communications medium in which to spread and implement that message. Let's make history that is not a redundant, banal rehash of the cycle of mass murder justifying more mass murder.

Senator Boxer addressed the issue of the history we could make, quite eloquently, this past week.

"Iraq: Credibility, Responsibility, Accountability"

by Senator Barbara Boxer

July 6, 2005 Address to the Commonwealth Club

<clip>

Last week, President Bush had a chance to regain credibility when it comes to Iraq. In my opinion, he did not.

He mentioned 9/11 five times in 30 minutes, despite the fact that there is absolutely no connection between Iraq and that tragic day.

Iraq was a war of choice, not necessity. The war of necessity was the war against Osama bin Laden that we launched after 9/11...the war that every single Senator voted for...the war that was a clear response to the vicious attack of that day.

<clip>

Now, there were some who tried to speak the truth. But they didn't last long in the Bush Administration. Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill are both gone. Army Vice Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki estimated that it could take "several hundred thousand" soldiers to successfully stabilize Iraq, Wolfowitz called that number "wildly off the mark." Shinseki retired early. White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey said that a U.S. intervention in Iraq could cost between $100 and $200 billion. He was disputed, and ultimately left. We've now surpassed $200 billion. The rest of us were told we had no right to criticize the President in a time of war.

<clip>

Because, 20, 50, even 100 years from now, another group will gather in this spot to discuss issues of war and peace. And, when they do, I hope they look back and say that the summer of 2005 is when Americans, brought credibility, accountability, and responsibility to a very tough situation.

Full transcript at:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/071005A.shtml

Listen to the speech at:
http://www.commonwealthclub.org/audio/05-07boxer-complete.ram

Yes, in the Summer of 2005, we Americans need to make a decision.

Do we simply want to extend the wealth of the military corporatist and the neoconster mechanism that ensures that wealth, perpetual war: Perpetual killing and perpetual destruction with ever more sophisticated weapons.

Because if that is the only message we have for the vast segment of the earth's population that is not wealthy, then they will continue to respond in a manner that ensures the cycle of fear, the cycle of hatred and the cycle of killing never cease.

In the history of mankind we have never had a more facile and peaceful mechanism for communicating our goals, our challenges, our differences and our willingness to solve rather than slaughter. You are using that technology when you read this post.

We have the mechanism to rally vast numbers of citizens, throughout the world, to refuse to participate and refuse to fund the corporate enterprises of killing and destruction, of fear-mongering and torture, of private armies and phony security services.

We should urge that people throughout the world march in their capitols and other major cities on September 24 - 26, 2005 in synchrony of purpose of what will be happening in DC:

D.C. - United for Peace and Justice - 9/24-26/2005
http://impeachbush.meetup.com/boards/view/viewthread?thread=1429154

We need to realize that the solution is much, much more than 'Impeach Bu$h'; we must unite as the citizens of the world in refusing to participate in wealth-creation by cluster-bombing children and innocent civilians in response to 'terror': terror that was the induced outcome of a previous cycle of aggressive war launched as the profit-generating, and 'patriot'-rallying response to a previous 'terrorist' event.

Break the cycle of terror by breaking the cycle of profiteering on smart bombs.

Break the cycle of terror with a response other than 'shock and awe.'

Break the cycle of terror by refusing to be a high-tech terrorist.

Begin a chapter of history that has never before been written; a chapter about global peacemaking.

A chapter about communicating with compassion, with food, with medicine, with clean water; a chapter the terrorist will understand all too well as the elegy of their ilk; the foreclousre notice to their enterprises-of-death.

http://www.peacecandy.com/gwbush/remindus
REMIND US

Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us - How ever long it takes, the day must come when tens of millions of caring individuals peacefully but persistently defy the dictator, deny the corporatists their cash flow, and halt the evil being done in Iraq and in all the other places the Bu$h neoconster regime is destroying civilization and the environment in the name of "America."

[hiley]

1. We must pull all peace groups together...

George Galloway spoke of this.
It is so much more than just Impeaching the Dictator and the neo-con posse' you are so right. We have to change our Policies and attitudes. Education through peaceful actions, clean out the Senate and the House all the while learning to never close our minds or eyes to injustices and the sins against humanity.
Every person on this earth has the right to clean running water, a great food supply, medical treatment, etc.
This should be the standard here and around the world in every corner and we must teach it.
Stop the hate crimes and the hate spew that feeds it, this should be the peoples of the world's goal united.
Solidarity
Hiley

Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
Martin Luther King Jr.,
December 11, 1964

[understandinglife]

2. Herbert: "The war has diminished the stature and weakened the credibility

... of the United Sates around the world.

Whatever one's views on the war, thoughtful Americans need to consider the damage it is doing to the United States, and the bitter anger that it has provoked among Muslims around the world. That anger is spreading like an unchecked fire in an incredibly vast field.

The immediate challenge to President Bush is to dispense with the destructive fantasies of the true believers in his administration and to begin to see America's current predicament clearly. New voices with new approaches and new ideas need to be heard. The hole we're in is deep enough. We need to stop digging.

From It Just Gets Worse by Bob Herbert

July 11, 2005

More at the link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/11/opinion/11herbert.html?hp

We need to stop digging. We need to stop destroying. We need to build, and nurture, and share, and we will find we have no one terrorizing us, because we will not be terrorizing others.


Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us

[hiley]

3. Internationalize the Peace

ENDING THE U.S. WAR IN IRAQ :
How to Bring the Troops Home and Internationalize the Peace
Phyllis Bennis and Erik Leaver
Institute for Policy Studies
January 12, 2005

"There is an old military doctrine called the First Rule of Holes: If you find yourself stuck in one, stop digging."

--the late Rear Admiral Eugene Carroll, US Navy (Ret.)

Those who advocate “staying the course” or “internationalizing the war” are too busy digging deeper. A real solution to the Iraq War must start with ending the U.S. occupation. Then, and only then, we can talk about internationalizing the peace.

snip---

The U.S. in Iraq : Two Years of War

The Iraq War has, like the Vietnam War of a generation ago, sorely divided the people of the United States . The invasion, occupation and continuing war have brought about the death of over 1,300 young women and men serving in the U.S. military. Over 10,000 have been seriously injured. Thousands are returning home with grievous mental and emotional damage. Civil rights, particularly those of Arab immigrants and Arab-Americans, have been shredded. The $151 billion in U.S. tax dollars spent on the war, not to mention the $100 billion more Congress will soon be asked to allocate, has wrought havoc on the economy and dramatically escalated the deficit.

Iraqis have suffered far more. Their country has been shattered by military assaults, and continues to languish under a violent occupation and brutal war. Cities such as Fallujah have been virtually destroyed by U.S. military forces claiming to “liberate” the now-deserted city of 300,000. The ruin of Fallujah, and so much of Iraq , by U.S. forces recalls the words of the great writer Tacitus, who followed Rome ’s legionnaires as they laid waste to the empire’s far-flung cities. “The Romans brought devastation,” he wrote, “and they called it peace.”

snip---

Ending the U.S. occupation of Iraq is the only solution to this escalating crisis

snip---
http://www.ips-dc.org/iraq/bringthetroops.htm

[hiley]

4. A Plan for “Internationalizing the Peace”

snip---

The obligations of U.S. , British, Australian and other “coalition” members to Iraq go far beyond the withdrawal of U.S. and “coalition” troops and the end of the illegal occupation. The U.S. in particular owes a massive financial debt to Iraq . Over time that obligation must be to repay Iraq for the cost of the collapse of their economy as a result of the U.S.-orchestrated 1990-2003 economic sanctions; for the damage of the 2003-2005 invasion and occupation; and promised U.S. reconstruction funds far beyond the pittance so far released.

Internationalizing the peace means that after the war the U.S. must accept primary responsibility for supporting - financially and diplomatically, but without exerting control - a truly international campaign to help reconstruct Iraq . That campaign will largely be centered in the regional (Arab League and Organization of the Islamic Conference) and multilateral organizations (United Nations, including UN Development Program for reconstruction assistance and Department of Peacekeeping Operations for temporary security help).

The initial UN estimate for repair of war damage to Iraq , not including reconstruction from sanctions-caused damage, was $200 billion. With the additional damage of recent months, particularly the destruction of Fallujah , Washington must be prepared to fund all of those projects, with British, Australian and other coalition help, paying at least the equivalent to what the U.S. and its allies have paid to destroy Iraq .

snip---

http://www.ips-dc.org/iraq/bringthetroops.htm

[EFerrari]

5. kick

[Independent_Liberal]

6. Kick!

[understandinglife]

7. "The real solution lies in immediately ending the occupation of Iraq..."

Ever since 9/11, I have been arguing that the "war against terror" is immoral and counterproductive. It sanctions the use of state terror - bombing raids, torture, countless civilian deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq - against Islamo-anarchists whose numbers are small, but whose reach is deadly. The solution then, as now, is political, not military. The British ruling elite understood this perfectly well in the case of Ireland. Security measures, anti-terror laws rushed through parliament, identity cards, a curtailment of civil liberties, will not solve the problem. If anything, they will push young Muslims in the direction of mindless violence.

The real solution lies in immediately ending the occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine. Just because these three wars are reported sporadically and mean little to the everyday lives of most Europeans does not mean the anger and bitterness they arouse in the Muslim world and its diaspora is insignificant. As long as western politicians wage their wars and their colleagues in the Muslim world watch in silence, young people will be attracted to the groups who carry out random acts of revenge.

At the beginning of the G8, Blair suggested that "poverty was the cause of terrorism". It is not so. The principal cause of this violence is the violence being inflicted on the people of the Muslim world. And unless this is recognized, the horrors will continue.

From The Price of Occupation by Tariq Ali

July 8, 2005

More at The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5234044-103677,00.html

As long as we use the excuse of violence, to inflict more violence, we will never live in peace; we will never realize that the 'war on terror' is a device of those who profit from perpetuating it.


Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us - My fellow Americans, please explain to me how the 10 Commandments permit murder, torture and destruction of civilization.

[hiley]

8. End the war in Iraq

redraw immediately, leave Afghanistan and stop attacking Iran........
Give food, medicine and let someone NOT BEHTEL
http://www.bechtel.com/
rebuild the water system. The Iraqis had the most advance water system very complicated and working system.
Close Halliburton and all American and British owned HUGE Corporation out of IRAQ Immediately !

[hiley]

9. How about calling on Bechtel, Halliburton all of them to give

the MONEY back NOW..?
All contractors OUT of Iraq and any other Country we are destroying ..
There has to be a way to stop these Corporations somehow.
hiley

[understandinglife]

10. Agree. I've offered some specifics in the following threads:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4070938&mesg_id=4070938

And,

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4071692&mesg_id=4071692

We clearly share similar perspective of the scope of the problem.

What our fellow citizens need to realize is that we can solve the problem, and, in fact, it is entirely our choice whether we do so.


Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us

[hiley]

11. Thank you for the links they are going in my files immediately..

Much was lost back a few months ago when my computer was murdered !
These problems can be solved and until my dying breath that is what I am working on. So happy you are there with the guidance for easier excess to knowledge needed."We" just have to get bigger !!!
Peace to you
Hiley