Transforming the World into a War-zone
“Our enemies never stop trying to come up with new ways to harm
our people, and neither do we.” President George W. Bush
By Mike Whitney
04/24/06 "ICH"
-- -- Like everything else, Rumsfeld’s promise to
“transform” the military has been a lie. The Defense Secretary
never had any intention of converting the military into
“smaller, more agile units”. From the very onset his goal has
been to create a global strike-force that operates as the
enforcement-arm of the multinational corporations.
Rumsfeld has done everything in his power to remove the military
from congressional oversight or accountability to the people it
is supposed to serve. Under his stewardship, the Pentagon has
lurched from one humiliating scandal to the next. From Abu
Ghraib to Falluja, from Guantanamo to Bagram; his record has
been a dismal chronicle of one disgrace heaped upon another. No
wonder the generals are so eager to see him get his walking
papers.
An article in Sunday’s Washington Post
“Rumsfeld OKs wider anti-terror role for Military” shows that Rumsfeld’s powers are
expanding rather than contracting. The article by Ann Scott
Tyson outlines the Defense Secretary’s strategy for making the
entire world a “free-fire” zone for agents of the empire. The
details of the plan are still classified, but the documents
envision “a significantly expanded role for the military — and
in particular a growing force of elite Special Operations troops
— in continuous operations to combat terrorism outside of war
zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Developed over about three
years by the Special Operations Command (SOCOM) in Tampa, Fla.,
they reflect a beefing up of the Pentagon's involvement in
domains traditionally handled by the CIA and State Department.”
Just as Rumsfeld initiated Northcom and lowered the standards
for using the military in domestic affairs (check the debacle in
Katrina) so too, he intends to eschew the conventions
restricting the use of the military in foreign countries by
deploying “small teams of Army Green Berets and other Special
Operations troops to U.S. embassies …to conduct military
operations where the United States is not at war.”
This ambitious plan has been the military’s “top priority” for
over three years and is ready to be activated pending another
“terrorist attack” on American soil.
Even Rumsfeld apologists are probably shocked at the breadth and
arrogance of this sinister plan. The military is being hijacked
in full view of the American people and turned into the world’s
most-lethal security apparatus. Under Rumsfeld’s direction,
special units operating clandestinely around the globe will
perform criminal renditions, assassinations, sabotage, and acts
of piracy all in the name of corporate profiteering.
53,000 paramilitaries and Green Berets now operate within
Special Operations Command (SOCOM) The next terrorist attack
will allow the Pentagon to quickly mobilize these troops to
“disrupt and respond” to potential threats across the planet
ignoring national sovereignty or the laws of war. The surprise
appearance of Bin Laden in a video which aired yesterday on Al
Jazeera (another Rumsfeld psy-ops?) must have been warmly
received by the Pentagon warlords who would like to see their
plan executed pell mell.
There should be little doubt that Don Rumsfeld’s dream of a
global military empire, accountable only to the league of
corporate mandarins, hasn’t dimmed by his abysmal record of
failure in Iraq. Left to his own devices, Rumsfeld is determined
to put the US military under private control and turn the world
into one massive war zone.
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