Answering Obama's Afghanistan deceptions

[IndianaGreen]

Answering Obama's Afghanistan deceptions

December 8, 2009
Eric Ruder

DECEPTION NO. 1: "We did not ask for this fight...(T)he United Nations Security Council endorsed the use of all necessary steps to respond to the 9/11 attacks...and only after the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden, we sent our troops into Afghanistan."

HERE, BARACK Obama is repeating a lie that has been told and retold so often that it goes completely unexamined in the mainstream press. Countless Western newspapers reported on the Taliban's offers to hand over Osama bin Laden, so long as the Bush administration provided Afghan government officials with evidence of bin Laden's involvement in the September 11 attacks--something that any sovereign nation, like the U.S., would require before agreeing to an extradition.

As the Washington Post reported on October 3, 2001: "In Afghanistan, leaders of the ruling Taliban militia, which has been harboring bin Laden, urged the United States to share its evidence with them, saying they hoped for a negotiated settlement instead of a military conflict. The Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, said his government would be willing to talk to the United States about bin Laden, but 'we don't want to surrender without any proof, any evidence.'"

The Bush administration refused to provide any evidence, insisting there would be "no negotiations."

But the narrative of Taliban intransigence was so thoroughly unquestioned from the start that it was possible for Reuters to headline an October 4, 2001, story: "Taliban won't give up bin Laden even if proof--paper"--even though the article itself acknowledged that Zaeef agreed to have bin Laden stand trial in an Islamic sharia court if the Afghan government was allowed to "thoroughly check" U.S. documents linking bin Laden to 9/11. (See the Institute for Public Accuracy's news release "Are Obama and Clinton Being Honest About How Afghan War Began?")

http://socialistworker.org/2009/12/08/obamas-afghanistan-deceptions

[FiveGoodMen]

1. Damn the un-rec'er

[scarletwoman]

2. The thing is, there will always be the Official, Government-Approved Narrative of events, and NO ONE

in the Government is EVER going to publicly go against that Official Narrative. NO ONE. NOT EVER. It's the Government's story and they're sticking to it.

Obama is not a revolutionary. It's absurd to think that anyone aspiring to the Presidency would BE a revolutionary. Revolution is the provenance of the PEOPLE, not the politicians.

The members of the Ruling Class are not interested in truth, their only interest is to support and reiterate the Official Narrative.

sw

[IndianaGreen]

3. We have always been at war with Eurasia, and Eastasia is our ally.

George Orwell was some damned prophet!

[scarletwoman]

4. Orwell wasn't a prophet, he was simply an intelligent and honest observer.

Throughout history, there has always been an Official Narrative promoted by the Ruling Classes. The Official Narrative is the means by which the Ruling Class convinces the masses to take up arms and throw away their lives in the wars that the Ruling Class devises for Its own ends.

For as long as there have been Rulers, there has been an Official Narrative, designed to send peasants into frenzies of killing other peasants. Whether it's the ancient Hittites attacking the ancient Egyptians, or Medieval peasants signing up to Crusade in Palestine, or the British laboring class dying by the thousand in trenches in WWI, the Official Narrative impels the citizenry to surrender their lives to the ambitions of the Ruling Class.

sw

[ShortnFiery]

5. Same as it ever was ....

:(

[yurbud]

6. great quote from Harvard monetary expert:

As Harvard monetary expert Linda Bilmes points out that there is "no benefit whatsoever for any American whose income does not derive from the military/security complex."