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60

AN ORDERED BEHEADING

Decapitation of a Detainee by U.S. Forces in Iraq

And you think these officially sanctioned policies didn’t rub off on our troops on the ground in Iraq? I wish I could say that was the case. When WikiLeaks released some 400,000 documents about the ongoing war in Iraq, they contained some pretty grim disclosures, including this one about American forces decapitating an Iraqi on order of their higher-ups. You can only go by what the document says as to whether this really happened or not, but it’s definitely disturbing to read and think about.

61

EMBASSY CABLES

The State Department’s Take on Drug Money Leaving Afghanistan

The WikiLeaks cache of State Department cables contains quite a few about our war in Afghanistan, but none more revealing than what our diplomats really know about the country’s president, Hamid Karzai. One secret cable talks about how he’d released 150 of the 629 detainees that the coalition had transferred to Afghan custody since 2007—and pardoned five border police who were caught with 273 pounds of heroin in their vehicle and already been sentenced to prison. Karzai’s brother is portrayed as a corrupt drug baron.

It’s time we faced facts: fighting the Taliban over there is at the same time propping up the biggest drug-based regime in the world. The cable I’m reprinting here is all about how the money gets smuggled out of Afghanistan to countries like Dubai. And be sure to catch point number 6, about how our Drug Enforcement folks got a bit suspicious of the Afghan vice president entering the country with $52 million early in 2009.

62

“AFGHANISTAN’S OPIUM ECONOMY”

A World Bank Report on Drugs

The World Bank issued a report in 2006 on “Afghanistan’s Opium Economy.” I’m just including the chapter summaries, but you can read the whole thing on the World Bank website, including “Prices and Market Interactions in the Opium Economy.”

Isn’t it interesting that we’re fighting a “war on drugs,” yet over there we have no problem with this? Certainly those drugs are going to get here eventually, again just follow the money. But obviously the Afghans involved can buy protection and continue doing their business.

63

RETHINKING THE “WAR ON TERROR”

The Rand Report on Terrorism

The Rand Corporation has been around forever, it seems, doing policy analysis for the government on all kinds of things. I mean, the government is always basing policies on what the Rand people say. Well, in 2008, Rand came out with a major study titled “How Terrorist Groups End,” look-Rand came out with a major study titled “How Terrorist Groups End,” looking at data on all such between 1968 and 2006.

Their findings apparently weren’t too heartening to our policy-makers, if they bothered to read the study. The whole war on terror notion needs to be rethought, according to Rand, because in simple terms “countering al Qa’ida has focused far too much on the use of military force.”

If the government follows Rand on other matters, why not give them due consideration on this? Supposedly this is their job and they’re the experts. I mean, realistically, the “war on terror” is the equivalent of trying to exterminate the Hells Angels. You don’t need the military to do it!

Here’s the two-page summary of the study, including how you can order the whole thing.

I hope after digesting all this—if you can stomach it, pardon the pun you’ll agree with me that it’s time to end these “phony wars on terror” and get down to the serious business of rebuilding our own democracy from the ground up. Let me close with a quote from Theodore Roosevelt, from his Progressive Party presidential platform in 1912:

“Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul this unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the