The Iranian Strait Of Hormuz Tanker "Attack" - Can We Say 'Gulf Of Tonkin' Redux?

"Yeah, it'd be a great idea to blame Iran for the oil tanker attacks and start another bogus war!"

"Right now, the U.S. and the Saudis are pointing fingers at the Iranians. Perhaps — but it begs the question, why? Tensions in the region, thanks to the highly inflammatory rhetoric coming out of the Trump administration, are already dangerously high.

National Security Adviser and longtime proponent of war with Iran John Bolton is predictably pushing Donald Trump to, for lack of a better phrase, make war on Iran.

The Saudis, who view Iran as a bitter regional rival, are pushing for the same thing. They would love for the U.S. to use its military against its enemy."  - Marc Ash,  'Were The Gulf Tanker  Strikes A Saudi-Run Operation?', smirkingchiimp.com

"Why of course the people don’t want war...But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship ... Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they’re being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.” --  Hermann Goering.  Nuremberg, 1946

Hours ago,  Trump -corrupted Washington claimed Iran was behind a succession of recent shipping attacks in the Gulf. The Trumpie liars, criminals and reprobates asserted that  grainy video published on the U.S. Central Command’s website provided "evidence"  of Iran’s involvement in Thursday’s attacks. The footage purportedly shows crew from an Iranian boat removing an unexploded mine from one of the vessels.   (Note: It did not show them placing the mine ON the vessel. Hence, alert to how rabid the Amerikkan warmongers are for a new regime change, it made sense to remove what Saudi operatives likely planted, in order to provoke a conflict with Iran.)

Outlandish!? Not any more than Trump and Pompeo's nest of propaganda and BS when we know that John Bolton is itching for a new Mideast war. Do I believe any of the crap spewed out by this administration? Well, no more than I could hurl them all into the Potomac!  

As the Trump cabal and its allies beat the drums for war with Iran, pardon me while I don't buy the huff and puff from pundits, or the alleged "evidence' or the ancillary claims.  In fact it's all too much of a perfect setup, a big pretext for an unnecessary conflict  - like Vietnam or Iraq.  As blogger Marc Ash put it:

"Iran stands to gain little by damaging or destroying Japanese or Norwegian ships. There is no economic or military logic to support that. To the contrary, with U.S. sanctions constraining the Iranian economy, it would be in Iran’s interest to maintain good relations with Japan, Norway, and any other country willing to maintain trade."

Truth be told what's unfolded in the Strait of Hormuz  reminds me more of the bogus Gulf of Tonkin incident that triggered the Vietnam War.  At the time  (summer of 1964)  LBJ ordered two destroyers,  the Turner Joy and Maddox, to stage daylight runs into North Vietnamese waters to test the 12 nautical mile limit.

 Not long after invading the water, the two vessels were allegedly "attacked without provocation".  The claim of  LBJ  - much like Trump today with the oil tanker attacks alleged to be the work of Iran - is the attacks on  Turner Joy and Maddox were initiated by the North Vietnamese.

But in 2005, an internal National Security Agency historical study was declassified; it concluded that the Maddox had engaged the North Vietnamese Navy on August 2, but that there were no North Vietnamese Naval vessels present during the incident of August 4. The report stated regarding August 2:

“At 1505G, Captain Herrick ordered Ogier's gun crews to open fire if the boats approached within ten thousand yards. At about 1505G, the Maddox fired three rounds to warn off the communist boats. This initial action was never reported by the Johnson administration, which insisted that the Vietnamese boats fired first”

And regarding August 4:

“It is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night. [...] In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on August 2”

In other words, the U.S. aggressors used it as a pretext to demand the "Gulf of Tonkin Resolution"  and launch a war that killed nearly 58,000. Like other pretext wars (e.g. Iraq, see the excellent MSNBC special ‘Hubris’) Vietnam never should have occurred. It was once again a case of congress abdicating responsibility as opposed to actually declaring a war.

In the same vein, what's happening now near the Strait of Hormuz is all bogus, a setup, a pretext to start a war.   Fortunately, António Guterres, the UN secretary general, called for an independent investigation, affirming:

"It’s very important to know the truth and it’s very important that responsibilities are clarified. Obviously that can only be done if there is an independent entity that verifies those facts,"

Well, yes, because a war with Iran would be calamitous, far more than the Iraq conflict and we saw how that has turned out - what with ISIS being spawned and massive instability throughout the region.

Unfortunately, the UK appears to have sided with the U.S.  warmongers.   The Foreign Office issued a statement saying: “It is almost certain that a branch of the Iranian military – the Islamic Revolutionary Guard – attacked the two tankers on 13 June. No other state or non-state actor could plausibly have been responsible.”

This, of course, is baseless codswallop.  There are at least two other actors with the means, motives, and opportunity - including Israel and Saudi Arabia.  Both detest Iran to the core, and each would like nothing better than a war fought against Iran but on their behalf.   As smirkingchimp blogger Marc Ash put it in regard to each:

"Israel gets thrown in only because they do have the military technology, they are in the region, and they do share the Saudis’ fear and contempt of Iran."

Ash does add, however, that the Israelis likely didn't mount the tanker attacks given that "striking Japanese and Norwegian vessels is not the type of thing Israel would engage in".   Yeah, but if they wanted a U.S. war with Iran bad enough, they could.  

So why is the UK siding with the Trump vermin?   Well, maybe their Foreign Secretary happened to watch Trump's bloviating performance on FOX and Friends yesterday a.m. and bought it.  Trump is a great con man you know. Particularly where Dotard yapped:

“Iran did do it. You know they did it because you saw the boat. I guess one of the mines didn’t explode and it’s probably got essentially Iran written all over it … You saw the boat at night, successfully trying to take the mine off – and that was exposed.”

And we're supposed to believe this drivel from a walking maggot.  This now after he blabbed three days ago he'd willingly accept the help of a foreign power in the 2020 election - then retracted it the next day? Excuse me while I laugh.  So I am far more inclined  (especially after the fake Iraq WMD B.S. too) to accept the take of Iranian ambassador to the UK, Hamid Baeidinejad.  He said the western intelligence claims were similar to :

“false fabrications during World War I, the Vietnam war and Iraq war that were designed to instigate military interventions and armed conflicts in different parts of world.”

Bingo, Mr.  Baeidinejad, you nailed it!    Besides, in Tokyo yesterday the owner of the Kokuka Courageous   affirmed the Japanese tanker's sailors saw “flying objects” (drones?) before the attack, suggesting it was not damaged by mines. The claim of the  company’s president, Yutaka Katada, totally  contradicted the U.S. military account.

Bottom line, claims of monstrous terror and shameless attacks on innocents (in oil tankers)  cannot be accepted from a monstrous administration that prides itself on flouting the rule of law, and shameless attacks on innocents. (Like locking migrant kids and families up in cages and glorified NM "dog pounds".)

Amidst this background and the further  lying drumbeat for war in the coming days, we should be mindful of the words of former Obama deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes (on 'All In' last night):

"I step back and I worry about the two most disastrous wars in this country's history, Vietnam and the Iraq war. The second thing is that Donald Trump has lied repeatedly about Iran....There's been this pyramid of lies built up about Iran, so he has little credibility now.  The American people if they're being asked to go to war need to be able to trust the people who are leading...

It feels like we are trying to provoke  the Iranians to do something to serve as a pretext to have a war, which is what John Bolton wants.  Do the American people really want to go to war over the fact that two tankers blew up in the Gulf of Oman?  Do the American people want to go to war on behalf of Saudi Arabia, a murderous country that butchers journalists and provokes famines in Yemen?"


Amen, Mr. Rhodes!  I for one certainly don't  trust the deranged renegades now in power, whether Bolton, Trump or Pompeo. They comprise a Liar's Triumvirate. As I  said before, after Trump's 4,500th lie, I would not believe this turd if he claimed the missiles were flying from North Korea.  

If I would not believe him in that context there's no way in hell I'm believing him now with the manufactured "Iran threat".

See also:

Middle East

Were the Gulf Tanker Strikes a Saudi-Run Operation?

And:

Will the Real Bombers Please Stand Up

And:

Armed Forces | Environmental Policy

How the Pentagon’s Forever Wars Are Killing the Planet

by Ilana Novick | June 15, 2019 - 6:46am | permalink

Can We At Last Admit the Iraq Occupation Was A Waste? Have We Finally Learned the Lessons of Vietnam?

These questions bear asking as we behold  all the effort of 8-plus long years of Iraq occupation evidently all for naught as thousands of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq in Syria)  militants rage across the country - taking Mosul, Tikrit, Samara and bearing down on Baghdad. In the meantime, the $100m the U.S. spent prepping an Iraqi Army appears to have been wasted, along with the $150b reported wasted in Afghanistan this morning,  on equipment never used - only stored.  This, as we beheld images of the Iraqis cutting and running even tearing off their uniforms

Let us go down memory lane and recall here that every manjack with a brain knew Saddam was no angel, but at the same time no one would be stupid enough to displace him - given it was his strongman secular stranglehold that was in fact preventing Muslim factionalism and civil war between Shi'ites and Sunnis. Let us also recall, lest memories have become ossified or lost, that the U.S. actually cultivated Saddam as its own 'creature' (in the 1980s)  to leverage against the Iranians. (A video still exists from the media, likely found on Youtube, showing Donald Rumsfeld praising Saddam for his efforts.) In addition, the U.S. supplied Saddam with billions of dollars in weapons to carry on the fight against the Ayatollahs - some of which were believed to be the "WMD" the Bushies used as a pretext to launch the Iraq invasion. See e.g. http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-scheer/56466/up-close-and-personal-with-george-w-bush-s-horrifying-legacy

After being shoehorned into the Oval Office by the five conservo Supremes in 2000, Bush was now in position to implement the "Project for the New American Century" (PNAC) which had originally been designed for 1992 after an expected Bush Sr. election win. This plan had been originally designed by the likes of Cheney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld to extend American power in the world starting in the Middle East, namely Iraq and Afghanistan. Oil also figured mightily into the planning, and no surprise a big Oil honcho (Halliburton) like Cheney would be humping and pumping it to the nth degree.

All the best laid plans went askew after Clinton won the 1992 election, and so the PNAC plan had to be put on hold, specifically its plan for an Iraq invasion and occupation.  The plan sprung to life anew after the Bush Jr. win in the 2000 general election (though Al Gore won the popular vote). Cheney, Wolfowitz et al knew they needed an excuse for invasion, however, since "Americans are still suffering from Vietnam hangover" as Wolfie once put it.  The event for springing into action occurred with 9/11 - and all the Bushies needed was a means to link Saddam to it - even if it was all bullshit.

The Bushies did a well known propaganda two step, first perfected by Hitler ("If you repeat a lie often enough, most people will believe it.") . They started by using the Reepo-friendly FOX bunch to keep repeating a link between al Qaeda and Saddam. As this specious crap kept being repeated the Bushies became elated as watching pro-intervention poll numbers increase. Now, they needed another more believable Act Two.

They attained it via a dog and pony show after enlisting  Colin Powell to be their stooge in front of the UN. Using every sort of ruse - from 'yellowcake' to aluminum tubes and alleged claims of possible "weapons of mass destruction" (from a rat named 'curve ball') - the Bushies pumped up a bogus case for invasion, just like Hitler and the Nazis did (using faked imagery of German fraus being raped by Poles) to justify an invasion of Poland in 1939. Once he had the U.S. corporate media on his side it was merely a matter of drum beating a sheep-like American public into giving him the poll numbers he desired to launch an invasion in March, 2003.

Those of us who knew history, watched the hijinks in disbelief, wondering how or why so many - especially in the media - could believe it. Some tried to head it off, like Joe Wilson in an op-ed in the WSJ, pointing to the fact the whole "yellowcake in Niger"  thing was a ruse. But Wilson was crucified by the Bush bastards in a vengeful media onslaught (mainly on FOX) and in addition they outed Wilson's wife  (Valerie Plame) as a CIA agent.  Not one damned thing was done to the putative bastard who did it, which is why I don't get exercised now when the same weasels insist Edward Snowden is a "traitor".

Let's also bear in mind that congress was the last bulwark to stop the Iraq invasion and they punted. Though yes,   Bush and his craven neocon slime confected an "Iraqi War Resolution" enough courageous congressmen could have killed it - but they were yellower than the yellowcake link the Bushies claimed- as most signed on to it. So even if Bush and his cohort designed the plan, congress as the last bulwark to preventing an outlaw act could have stopped it. They didn't.

And it indeed was an outlaw, illegal act - invading a sovereign state under a pretext to launch a pre-emptive war. Bush’s aggression then exposed other unsavory aspects about ourselves as a nation:  a willingness to violate Nuremberg Article IV to actually launch a pre-emptive, aggressive war just as the Nazis did when they invaded Poland in 1939. The rich humor of it all is that at the time the Bushies actually compared Saddam to Hitler!  Some 'Muricans actually swallowed this shit up and took it as gospel!

Again, to those of us who know and RECALL history, it also disclosed disturbing similarities to Vietnam.  For example, LBJ employed the ruse of the North Vietnamese firing on the Maddox and Turner Joy in international waters in August, 1964 as the basis to ramp up the Vietnam War. Later documents released under the freedom of information act showed it was all based on deceptions and lies.

 In 2005, an internal National Security Agency historical study was declassified; it concluded that the Maddox had engaged the North Vietnamese Navy on August 2, but that there were no North Vietnamese Naval vessels present during the incident of August 4. The report stated regarding August 2:

“At 1505G, Captain Herrick ordered Ogier's gun crews to open fire if the boats approached within ten thousand yards. At about 1505G, the Maddox fired three rounds to warn off the communist boats. This initial action was never reported by the Johnson administration, which insisted that the Vietnamese boats fired first”

and regarding August 4:

"It is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night. [...] In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on August 2"


In other words, the U.S. aggressors used it as a pretext to demand the Gulf of Tonkin resolution and launch a war that killed nearly 58,000.

In the aftermath, the more sober heads believed the U.S. had finally learned its lesson not to intervene in other nations on the basis of false pretexts. The losses, in blood and treasure, were just too costly. Vietnam rang up a loss of $269b compared with $ 4 trillion in Iraq.  The sad part is that our unjustifiable meddling in Iraq showed we never learned the lessons of Vietnam.

Worse, through all the years of military waste and intervention - in both Iraq and Afghanistan - we could have better used those trillions to  attend to our own nation's needs: repairing our crumbling infrastructure, bolstering our social insurance programs and providing money for students in affordable loans. What one hopes now, in the case of both Iraq and Afghanistan -  is that we finally re-learn the lessons we ought to have learned after Vietnam. That is to stay the fuck out of places where our immediate domestic security isn't threatened and not to invent bogus pretexts to make war on others. 


Were all those troops that went to Iraq and Afghanistan "fighting for my freedom"? Hell no! They were fighting for Wall Street, the Bushie opportunist Oil imperialists and their privateer companies (like Halliburton and Bechtel) and the advance of Amerikkan Neoliberalism. Believe it! (Some, of course, loved the 'high' of 'war' - as professed yesterday morning by the guy who did the recent documentary 'Korengal' and fought in Afghanistan. He claimed on CBS Early Show he got "addicted" to the "brotherhood" and the "action".)

It's about damned time future troops understand what they're getting into before they enter some hyped- up "freedom crusade" - and they also understand that when they sign onto a "volunteer army" (even for later supposed "benefits")  they become de facto mercenaries in the service of war capitalists.  As for getting "high" on the fighting, and "brotherhood" - I suggest they join a gym, take up amateur boxing, and sign on to a club volunteering in positive ways to assist their communities. You don't have to blow up villagers and kick down their doors to get "get high". Or shoot them dead.

To that end, all citizens also need to understand how Bush has recently  tried to whitewash his crimes in Iraq using the venue of his Bush Library. To see Rachel Maddow's  take down of this nonsense, go to one of my previous blog posts here:


http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/05/rachel-maddow-exposes-bush-library-for.html

When the militants finally get to Baghdad, as they will - and the media will show the imagery non-stop-  let's remember all the above and how we really only have limited control over our own plot of the planet. Let's mind that before we fuck around with others in the future! The Neocons, their puppets in the media (like the WaPo's Trudy Rubin) and other miscreants will scream for "boots on the ground" but that ain't an option! Besides, with a backlogged VA,  where will all the additional wounded go for care?  If the Reepos aren't going to fund the VA they have no right to call for any more wars, or ground troops!

See also:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-parry/56347/blaming-obama-for-iraqs-chaos

and:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/chris-floyd/56373/hell-s-gate-the-iraqi-blitzkrieg-and-the-cult-of-violence

and:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/gary-leupp/56399/no-peace-and-no-democracy-two-occupations-ending-in-hopeless-disasters

LBJ Was a "Reluctant Warrior"? It Doesn't Even Pass the Laugh Test!

From front page of Dallas Morning News: Mar. 23, 1984.

According to a Sunday New York Times front page story ('Rescuing a Vietnam Casualty': Johnson's Legacy') LBJ's  family and hagiographers are desperate to reconstruct his image and legacy. For those of us who were alive back then and have followed Johnson's career, it makes us want to puke. The danger is that too many people alive today - who weren't back then (and that is the majority of the U.S. population) will swallow this revisionist bunkum hook, line and sinker.

According to daughter Luci Baines Johnson, quoted in the piece:

“Nobody wanted that war less than Lyndon Johnson”. 

REALLY?  Then pray tell us why, right after your pop succeeded Kennedy - after his life was snuffed out in Big D in a triangulated crossfire- he issued National Security Action Memorandum 273 which effectively repealed JFK’s NSAM 263. For those who need memory jogged, the latter was the NSAM which would have had the bulk of personnel out of ‘Nam by 1965.

What is often actually cited as JFK's NSAM, i.e.http://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/w6LJoSnW4UehkaH9Ip5IAA.aspx


Is in fact only the cover letter by McGeorge Bundy. It has only passing relevance to the actual content of the NSAM, but it does clearly state “the President approved sections IB(1-3) of the report". Which report? To find these, the researcher must turn to Document 142 in The Pentagon Papers: ‘Report of McNamara Taylor Mission to South Vietnam'. Then the serious researcher will read:

IB(2) A program be established to train Vietnamese so that essential functions now performed by U.S. military personnel can be carried out by the Vietnamese by the end of 1965. It should be possible to withdraw the bulk of U.S. military personnel by that time.

IB(3): In accordance with the program to train progressively Vietnamese to take over military functions, the Defense Department should announce in the very near future presently prepared plans to withdraw 1,000 U.S. military personnel by the end of 1963.

Note the wording and that a partial drawdown of 1,000 was due for the end of 1963 and the bulk by 1965. Most lazy wannabes never get this far while some others that do mistake the "1,000" total for the entire intended lot.

Not only did Johnson not preserve Kennedy's plans for drawdown as revealed in the NSAM,  he willingly  signed off on the decisions that dispatched the troops and ordered the bombing campaigns. Hell, the bastard even finagled to get the damned war on a full scale footing!   He instigated the Tonkin Gulf ruse which directly expanded the U.S. presence and incepted the eventual 58,000 deaths and the nefarious designs of Nixon himself!

Again, for the memory -lapsed, the Gulf of Tonkin incident involved two gunboats, the Turner Joy and Maddox,  allegedly being attacked without provocation in the summer of 1964. The claim of baby killer LBJ was that the attack(s) were initiated by the North Vietnamese.  The fucker wanted it as a pretext to start a full scale war!

In 2005, an internal National Security Agency historical study was declassified and  it concluded that the Maddox had engaged the North Vietnamese Navy on August 2, but that there were no North Vietnamese Naval vessels present during the incident of August 4. The report stated regarding August 2:

“At 1505G, Captain Herrick ordered Ogier's gun crews to open fire if the boats approached within ten thousand yards. At about 1505G, the Maddox fired three rounds to warn off the communist boats. This initial action was never reported by the Johnson administration, which insisted that the Vietnamese boats fired first”

and regarding August 4:

“It is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night. [...] In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on August 2”


In other words, Johnson and the U.S. aggressors used it as a pretext to demand the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and launch a war that killed nearly 58,000. Like other pretext wars (e.g. Iraq, see the excellent MSNBC special ‘Hubris’) Vietnam never should have occurred. It was once again a case of congress abdicating responsibility as opposed to actually declaring a war. It was also a case of a criminal's ascension to power predicated on his promising to give the militarists and oilmen what they wanted even before JFK was hit!  Don't believe me? You need to check out:

http://jfklancer.com/NSAM273.html


Most of us in deep politics firmly believe that Vietnam was the “Devil’s deal” LBJ struck with his JFK assassination collaborators, in order that he be catapulted into office – while facing  felony charges(barely days before) .  This isn’t “blowing smoke” either. As Steve Kornacki reported in his ‘UP’ journal on MSNBC, the morning of Nov. 23, 2013. Using tapes and media documents, Kornacki showed that Johnson was about to be exposed as an influence peddler in conjunction with the Bobby Baker scandal by LIFE magazine in its upcoming issue (to be published the week of Nov. 25[1], 1963).

A paper trail of bank statements and payments was to have been included, and as Kornacki pointed out a Senate investigation would likely have ensued with LBJ being dumped from Kennedy’s 1964 ticket.  In other words, LBJ had by far the most to gain from JFK’s assassination, since he’d then be next in line as President, and not have to face justice in the Baker scandal. Just consider the contrasts: dishonor and imprisonment versus ascension to the top office in the land and the power to set in motion an “investigation” that would not only hide the real culprits but quash the Baker episode in its tracks.

Apart from motive, he had the will, means and opportunity to carry it out, especially given all his Texas connections. 

Former LBJ Personal Attorney, Barr McClellan, deals head on with the core question[1]: “Did Johnson have the motive, the means and the opportunity?”

He answers[2]:

"Johnson’s motivations included a determination to do anything to become the most powerful man in the world, a fear of total loss of power followed by indictment, and a willingness to go to the edge and beyond…

Johnson also had the means at his control: a legal system in Texas controlled by his attorney, Edward A. Clark. Johnson and Clark, in turn, had a hired gun on hand for the dirty work. Finally, when Kennedy, in June of 1963, included Texas on his travel agenda, the opportunity was there. Where better to commit a crime than on the home courts, or more appropriately, in the home courts?”

Philip Nelson, whose powerful book ‘LBJ – The Mastermind of the JFK Assassination’ – is noteworthy for its exacting documented detail, observes (Chapter 6: The Conspirators, p. 317):

“The crime could only have been accomplished with at least the acquiescence and foreknowledge of the only man capable of choreographing the massive cover-up which was immediately launched. It is axiomatic that since the cover-up started before the shots were fired, the order for JFK’s assassination could only have come from his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson.”

He goes on to note that no other conceivable person, whether Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana, Clint Murchison, H.L. Hunt….or Lee Harvey Oswald…" had the motive, means, the opportunity, the demonstrated pattern of previous criminal – even murderous conduct, and the resolve to see it through.”

Could Johnson have actually stooped to have anyone killed? The Dallas Morning News story from March 23, 1984  (see image inset) is quite blunt about it. Billie Sol Estes reported that Johnson had Henry Harvey Marshall, a USDA official in charge of the federal cotton allotment detail,  killed because he had attempted to link Estes’ nefarious dealings to the then Vice-President.  While Estes ended up doing prison time, he did have his say before a grand jury (which subpoenaed him) after his release in 1984. As reported in news story, Estes linked Johnson and two others to the slaying of Marshall.   In the follow-up grand jury investigation, Johnson, his one-time aide Cliff Carter, and ‘Mac’ Wallace were all deemed “co-conspirators in the murder” of Marshall[1].

Let’s also -  one time - put the kibosh on the NY Times take that the two men- JFK and LBJ were “highly competitive” – one reason we are led to believe that the ardent Johnsonites have held back pushing their thug’s……errrr…..man’s achievements forward.  This is total hogwash! The two men “competitive”?    No way – there existed major, visceral hatred – especially on the part of LBJ for Kennedy, as both Nelson’s and Barr McClellan’s books make clear.

LBJ felt he was screwed out of the Presidency at the 1960  LA convention, when JFK did a neat end run about him  and already had the nomination sewed up at the first roll call – unbeknownst to the hot-headed Texan. LBJ accepted JFK’s offer for VP – but only grudgingly. Meanwhile, he stewed over time, entering the Oval office almost at will in the mornings – according to Kennedy’s secretary Evelyn Lincoln (in her book: Kennedy and Johnson,  Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1968, pp. 149-151 ).  He felt he was entitled to be top dog or at least be co-president and even proposed on one occasion a “shared presidency” – at which point Jack kicked him out of his office and gave him some more scut work to do.

Make no mistake there was NO love lost between these two and the hatred likely festered until LBJ’s primo opportunity transpired – just before he was about to be investigated for his role in the Bobby Baker scandal.  The Johnson image purveyors who want to remake his image ought to be ashamed of themselves. If they had any scintilla of shame they'd keep themselves in the shadows lest we spill more beans about what LBJ did, and which they don't want circulated.

All this may appall some delusional Americans, and I can picture some of them holding fingers to their ears screaming ‘La la la la la la”.. But they had better damned well wake up to the facts. This guy not only saw to it Kennedy was offed, and he could take his sordid place in history without being prosecuted, he also paved the way for the Vietnam war as payback to his nefarious  allies (especially in the national security state) who helped him do it!

I understand Luci Baines’ effort to rehabilitate the old man’s “legacy” – but if she really had a clue, and an interest in national history, she’d be trying to expose the truth of how he came even remotely being able to have a legacy (as President) in the first place.

Enough political bullshit! We deserve the TRUTH and most of us, I believe, can handle it!

---

[1] See also: Phillip F. Nelson: 2013, LBJ – The Mastermind of the JFK Assassination, Skyhorse Publications, p. 309.

2 Barr McLellan: 2003, Blood, Money & Power: How L.B.J. Killed J.F.K., Hanover House, p. 8.

3 Ibid.

4 McLellan, op. cit., page 159

Putin Correct to Warn About American Exceptionalism

I know it's "politically incorrect" (at least American-style) to applaud and assert a foreign leader is spot -on in his perceptions, but no matter what the blowhard punditocracy says, Putin nailed it in his NY Times op -ed  ('A Plea for Caution from Russia') today.  Among the things Putin wrote, with which no sane or rational person could disagree (especially after last night's NBC News segment showing radical jihadis staging in Turkey then moving into Syria with IEDs etc.):

"A strike would increase violence and unleash a new wave of terrorism."

After seeing the pro-Syrian opposition jihadis whipping a couple for marrying non-Muslims on the same NBC segment, I believe it! And the U.S. would be dumb as a sack of hammers to oust Assad by helping these "rebels" - when it will likely be a replay of their dopey ignorant move helping Osama and his rebels in the 1980s, to harass the Soviets who had occupied Afghanistan. Stay with the devil you know, in other words, instead of unleashing tens of thousands of devils you don't. As one of the jihadis interviewed on the NBC spot put it:

"We want the Americans and Assad forces to fight, then when Assad is weak we can move in!"

Really? Hope Obama is paying attention here!

Putin went on:

"It could undermine multilateral efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear program and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and further destabilize the Middle East and North Africa."

And:

"No one doubts there was poison gas used in Syria, but there is every reason to believe it was used not by the Syrian Army but by opposition forces... to provoke intervention by their powerful foreign patrons, who would be siding with the fundamentalists"

Well, where have we seen this before? In Afghanistan, in the 80s, as I already noted, siding with Osama bin Laden to harass and punish the Russians. And more recently, in Egypt, siding with the Muslim Brotherhood president Morsi.....well, how did that turn out?

Putin then hit the chord with American exceptionalism, a meme American Neoliberal Presidents have fed to their charges since the Reagan era - trying to take the minds of the hoi polloi off the vast and expanding economic inequality that's emerged as a direct result of their allowing and enabling the war state's meddling ....from Reagan in Nicaragua and Honduras, to Bush I in the Gulf (after encouraging Saddam's reckless expansion), to Clinton in Kosovo, to Bush II in Afghanistan and Iraq - when the 9/11 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia. But then Bush's oilmen had special deals with the Saudis, so couldn't go after them- hence allowing the bin Laden family to leave the country in the wake of the attacks.  Oh, and Obama now wanting to meddle in Syria if the Russians "aren't serious".

Putin wrote:

"It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional , whatever the motivation. There are big countries and small countries, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy"

According to the corpora-media blow drieds this a.m.  the WH dismissed it as "posturing" but they shouldn't. Whether really posturing or not, the words contain more than the proverbial grain of truth - in fact, they contain a store house of truth.

One can debate about whether Putin was "posturing" or "hypocritical" in lecturing on democracy, but he was dead on in terms of sounding the dangers of American exceptionalism.

Exceptionalism refers to the virulent meme that Americans and the U.S. are somehow "special" in history and hence, are charged with acting "special" on the world stage. That ranges from valuing American lives much more than foreign ones - embodied in the U.S. refusal to sign on to Protocol 1 of the Geneva Conventions - which explains how military strikes and aggression can be carried out without being mindful of collateral damage, to indiscriminately messing in other nations' because the U.S.  feels it's a sole superpower's "right" to do so.

In regard to the devaluation of foreign lives one can look at travesties from meddling in Honduras and Guatemala - see e.g.  http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB4/  leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths, as well as extended internal instability to the malignant  exceptionalist invasions sponsored by the Bushies in the name of the so-called "Bush doctrine".   These, when the historical savvy person examines them, little different from the Nazi ideology of Lebensraum, see e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebensraum

The point is, the maniacal Bushie Neocons believed their own puffed up bullshit that this nation is "exceptional" and has the right to lord it over all others, by intervening and "policing" any time it chooses. No bigger pile of horse shit has ever been conceived as national policy and Americans would do well to reject it.

Does that mean the rational American rejects ALL wars? Of course not! There ARE just wars, just as there are unjust and ILLEGAL wars!  World War II was a just war because first, Americans were attacked by the Japanese Empire at Pearl Harbor, and second the Axis Powers and especially Japan and Nazi Germany, were bent on global domination. Not to have responded would have invited a nightmare world we can only imagine today.

Vietnam, by contrast, was an ILLEGAL war! The conflict was started on a pretext, i.e. the Gulf of Tonkin incident,  wherein the Turner Joy and Maddox were allegedly attacked without provocation in the summer of 1964. The claim of baby killer LBJ was that the attack(s) were initiated by the North Vietnamese.  But in 2005, an internal National Security Agency historical study was declassified; it concluded that the Maddox had engaged the North Vietnamese Navy on August 2, but that there were no North Vietnamese Naval vessels present during the incident of August 4.

The report stated regarding August 2:

“At 1505G, Captain Herrick ordered Ogier's gun crews to open fire if the boats approached within ten thousand yards. At about 1505G, the Maddox fired three rounds to warn off the communist boats. This initial action was never reported by the Johnson administration, which insisted that the Vietnamese boats fired first”

and regarding August 4:

“It is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night. [...] In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on August 2”


In other words, the U.S. "exceptionalist" aggressors used it as a pretext to demand the Gulf of Tonkin resolution and launch a war that killed nearly 58,000.

Here's advice for every real red -blooded American, as opposed to the paper patriots, including cook and bottle washers who pound their chests for having "served their country" but never saw more than a soup spoon and kettle: Don't trust anything any leader says if he uses the words "exceptional" as applied to you the citizen or the country as a whole, or  employs manipulative bafflegab throwaways like "freedom" and especially "defending our freedoms".

Oh, and if he asserts:  "Y'er either with us or against us!" Tell him to fuck himself!

See also:  http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/thom-hartmann/51589/the-presidents-speech-reveals-he-has-never-seen-war

Are Afghan Lives = American Lives? The Lessons of Vietnam - Why They Remain Unlearned.

My Lai, with some of the hundreds of villagers slain, in 1968 by Lt. William Calley and his troops. Will Americans ever learn the lessons of Vietnam, or remain in denial – providing an excuse for our leaders to start more wars?

The NBC News lead story last night noted the death of a 25-year old U.S. diplomat, her life cut short by a roadside bomb attack. Yes, she was yet another casualty of the odious overlong U.S. occupation of Afghanistan – still continuing even after al Qaeda has been chased out of the country and its putative leader, Osama bin Laden, killed. Less mentioned by our corpora-media was that 10 innocent Afghan villagers, including toddlers and women, were slain in a misguided NATO attack.

Let me spell this out in black and white so that even an idiot ignoramus like my youngest bro can compute it: If you kill more ‘friendlies’ than you do bad guys, you are not going to win the hearts and minds of the people you are supposedly fighting for, and you won’t win any claimed “war”. All the beleagured people will do, as they did in Vietnam, is collaborate with the enemy to rid themselves of the vicious invaders. This stuff isn’t rocket science, and it is but one more reason Obama, in his budget Wednesday, ought to be announcing an additional saving of $600b by pulling out of Afghanistan immediately! (Another $400b would be saved in having less materiel to send back after this farce is finished)

The Russians learned their lesson in Afghanistan, but too late. That involvement essentially laid waste to the USSR, and bankrupted their nation as it’s doing to us. A superpower was reduced to an ordinary power with lots of nukes. Meanwhile,  our politicos are so wedded to the tits of the military- industrial bloodsuckers (including their lobbyist defense contractors) and parasites they can’t or won’t see that. Hence, they refuse to act, though they insist the "deficits matter". Bull pockey!

According to a recent article in The Washington Spectator (Vol.39, No.4, p.6) by Nick Turse, the U.S. still hasn’t learned and applied the lessons of the Vietnam debacle. Because like it or not, our involvement in dozens of conflicts since Vietnam is underwritten by our failure to grasp the lessons of Vietnam. This, as Turse, notes, is because we display a “collective failure to reckon honestly with the reality of the Vietnam War”.

He goes on to add (ibid.):

“The reason that the conflict rises again and again like a B-movie monster is because the United States has long refused to truly acknowledge , let alone take responsibility for, the bombs and artillery shells, grenades and rockets, mines and bullets, incendiary weapons and chemical defoliants that ravaged the land, made refugees of more than 1.1 million, killed an estimated 2 million and wounded 5 million more.”


Why such waste of lives? FOREIGN lives? My personal theory is because this nation, exceptionalist that it is, doesn’t grant the same value to foreign lives (especially of those it seeks to ‘save’) as its own. Hence, it repeatedly gets involved on these ‘Pax Americana’ missions in which more  lives are wasted, destroyed than the putative ‘enemy’ would have done. Because we are so detached from reality in our exceptionalist blindness, we don’t see lives we have taken as wasted but write them off as “collateral damage”.

As if that stupid canard justifies further warmongering and ‘all is well’! (See also the book, 'Collateral Language' and how they are making our language a casualty as well, to mindfuck most of us not paying attention.)

Anyway, Turse goes on:

“Never having come to grips with what this country actually did during this war, we see its ghost arise anew with each successful military intervention. Was Iraq the new Vietnam? Or was that Afghanistan? Do we see the light at the end of the tunnel? Are we ‘winning hearts and minds’? Are we applying the lessons of Vietnam? What are those lessons anyway?”


At least one lesson ought to have been to remove the blinders and cease with the hindsight war mythology, e.g. “Vietnam was a conflict nobly fought by responsible commanders and good American boys who should not be tainted by the occasional mistake of a few bad apples in their midst”.


All of which is balderdash. The truth is Vietnam was a war of choice, initiated under false pretense, fought at the behest of banksters (Wall Street), oil men and defense contractors (who needed to try out new weapons developed since the Korean conflict) and by a manipulative president who nullified the previous National Security Action Memorandum of his predecessor to pull out by 1965.

Its commanders were mostly craven, untested egomaniacs who stayed at the rear while they ordered pizza deliveries and brewskies, as they sent green horn grunts out on ‘search and destroy’ missions. Those grunts were mostly only able to function by taking daily tokes on their weed or other drugs, and if they got pissed at a fellow grunt, or more often an officer, would as soon “frag” him as look at him. Moreover, given the demand for the daily “body count” – innocent villagers such as slain at My Lai, were way more common than generally believed.

But this is a truth that exceptionalist Americans- raised on the codswallop of Pentagon PR and modern “history” books- refuse to accept. However, until they do, we are bound to enter into ever more “wars” at the cost of even more blood and treasure.