why 911 happend. Documentary on UK tv last night.

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by Oerdin
So when Krusev tried to brow beat Kennedy into giving up east Berlin or the Soviets would invade is just a myth?

Bluff? Krusev wasn't a warmonger at all.

It didn't happen? The Soviet backed coupes which occured in Greece and Turkey in 1946 were just the SU's way of being a good neighbor?

There were already thousands of communist partisans operating in these countries, SU or not. They might have received some help, but it was not terribly significant.

As it turned out, the SU's concerns about Turkey turned out to be legitimate, when it appeared later that nuclear missiles were being positioned there.

BTW I don't like the use of the word 'coup'. Communists make revolutions, capitalists coup.

Stalin's threat to invade Austria if it joined NATO was just a game he was playing?

Yes.

[the_ceebs]

I'll give the writer his point about Islamists not liking modern freedoms (I won't call them liberal) but he once again displays his ignorance of conservativism and its offshot neo-conservativism.

Unfortunately for your position it was the Neo-conservatives themselves that put forwards this argument.

[MalevolentLight]

There's a reason the BBC was banned on British warships.

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by MalevolentLight
There's a reason the BBC was banned on British warships.

It's because the military is a well-known haven of free thinking.

[Immortal Wombat]

Yay! Our broadcast network isn't a puppet of the state

[Imran Siddiqui]

It basically seems the writer is trying to claim a false equivalency between Islamism and Consevativism which simply doesn't exist.

Yep... or at least Neo-Conservativism which he doesn't understand. I wonder how he'd react if he was told the founders of the Neo-Conservative movement were former Trotskyists.

[chequita guevara]

If neo-conservatism hadn't spectacularly flamed out in Iraq, there's be a future for me in politics.

[child of Thor]

Interesting views - i spent hours to draft a rough document on what was covered in the program. It really opened my eyes some! I dont usualy get so passionate about things - but i feel the things that this program reveals are in ALL our best interests to at least think upon.
I'm all 'politicked' out after this, not really a political animal, i usualy hang here to talk about computer games(my constant passion), but i 've been stired enough to bother my ass for your benefit I really doubt you guys in the Usa could get to see this program easily.
I may have made mistakes but this in a honest transcript of issues covered by the program, peoples names i've probalby spelt wrong, but as i'm no expert on who's who in american politics i should be forgiven for stuff like that.
The key issue to me is the whole neo-con movement and what that means to you as american citizens and the effect they are having on the world.

Intro

Ok guys, I’ve spent my evening last night going over the video of the first program in the series making notes, and will present some of what to me were startling revelations about the current state of american politics.
I really needed this program to clarify in particular the position of the neo-conseritives in your political system(and it also has helped me to know what to look for in our political system!).
I already knew of the position of the Islamic extremists so what the program had to say about them wasn’t news to me in the same way.
I could have spent my time playing Zelda – Orcarina of time, or LMA football manager 2004 , but instead I found this more important for a number of reasons.
The main one being I truly believe in democratic process, I feel that enough of our fore-fathers have given there lives for us to enjoy the democratic countries we live in(I’m talking about America and Britain here), so it must be worth protecting.
I also truly believe that society and the way it is organised by government must reflect the common good of the majority – that is after all why we elect our politicians, other wise we could just as well get on with dictators/kings as we did in the past before America was even a concept.

These are my basic starting beliefs on which I assume we all agree for the most part, all enjoying the freedoms that these beliefs have given us in our lives.

The program started by looking at two people in 1949. The first was an egyptian teacher called Sayyid Qutb link (this link was the first that came up), who had come to Colorado in America to study the eductaion system, but later went on to become the writter of many texts that became the foundation of many of the Islamic extremeist groups in the world. In a nutshell his time in America during the 50’s made him come to believe that American society led to all the worst qualities in humans and the breakdown of society. Basically he was a fruit cake that probably wasn’t getting enough sex and became a very bitter man etc.

At the same time in Chicago a guy called Leo Strauss
link (this link is again the first I found)
who was a politcal philosopher at the University of Chicago, was also coming to a similar mind set about the state of American society, in that he felt the same freedoms of the individual that the liberal cause had championed at this time, was the main reason for what he percieved as the breakdown of american society. The program had some refrence to riots in Detroit on july 25th 1967 with comments on national tv by Lyndon Johnson to the nation.
So he had come up with what became the foundation of the neo-conseritive movement in america, and set about creating a body of pupils to further his theories. He believed that it was the destiny of the Elite to create a better America and its methods of achieving this were to use two main approaches: Religion and the creation of the Nation as a mythic concept that at its root placed Americas unique role in the world as the defender of good against evil.
It was also the role of the Elite to create in public the image that they believed in any myths that were created as it was neccesary to combat the growing collapse of society, but in private they didn’t have to believe these myths.

At this point my feelings at watching the film was that something about these aims of the neo-cons really reminded me of the kind of social experiments that went on in germany around the same time, which immediately set alarm bells ringing!
They had interviews with Professor Harvey Mansfield, a staussian philosopher at Harvard University and Professor Stanley Rosen who had been a pupil of Leo Strauss in 1949. And each basicaly admitted that creating a phatom enemy was a perfectly good and acceptable myth to propergate in furthering the Straussian cause.

In 1950 Sayyid Qutb went back to egypt and helped set up the Muslim Brotherhood that later helped wrested control from the british and established there own government. But the new prime minister bought in the CIA and decided to streangthen links with the west, which to Sayyid and his group was a slap in the face and further crystalised his view of the corruption of the west. In 1954 he was arrested and time in jail made his views on the west even more extreme, to the extent that he came to believe that it was legitimate to kill fellow muslims that had become influenced by the western disesease that he came to call ‘Jahalia’. In 1966 he was tried for treason and executed. His group had been responsible for the killing of the egyptian primeminister. Basicaly this guy is anti-democratic, choosing to use terror to further his aims, so yeah to a normal person(and indeed to the same people in egypt that failed to rise up in revolution in support of his groups activities) his ideas are basicaly wrong, even if he was correct in identifying the rot in the society of the time, as was Struass. These guys had both seen the symptoms of an ailing society BUT had in my view both come to the wrong answers to solve the problem.

In the 1970’s Irving Kristal drew together a group of individuals in america to try to understand why the liberal dream had failed, he found many of the answers in the works of Leo Stauss.
Paul Wolfavitz,William Kristal, Donald Rumsfield and a japanese/american fellow I’d not heard of before called Yukiama(I think!) became the foundations of the Neo-Conservetive movement.
A direct quote from I think it was William Kristal in the program about the problems in american society:
“The very basis of the liberal idea – the belief of individual freedom is what causes the chaos”.

Now I am no way an expert on American politics, infact this program was the first time I’ve been compelled into finding out more, but hold on a second. If this is a fundemental belief of the neo-cons, and most of the guys mentioned above are well entrenched in the Republican party as I write this, then just what the hell is going on?!
To me America stands for freedom, liberty etc? How can any party in America that stands up on tv and proclaims to its voters that it stands for freedom and justice have any connections with these neo-cons, let alone have them holding senior positions in government? Someone answer me that?

Here’s a direct quote from Donald rumsfield(who had become then the secetary of defense) speaking in 1976 trying to persuade people that the russians were cheating over the ‘de-tant’ agreement:

“the russians have been busy,they’ve been busy in terms of the level of effort, they’ve been busy in terms of actual weapons they’ve been producing.They’ve been busy in terms of expanding production rates. They’ve been busy in terms of expanding their industrial capability to produce additional weapons at additional rates. They’ve been busy in terms of expanding their capability to um…in, in(stutter) increase and improve the sophistication of these weapons.
Year after year, after year they’ve been demonstrating that they have a steadiness of purpose, that they are purposeful about what they are doing. Now the question is what one aught be doing about that”

The CIA and other agencies that were watching the USSR for these kind of things said that it was a complete work of fiction. There was no proof in the intelligence agencies to back Rumfields alegations.

This can be seen as part of the Straussian belief that the creation of myth should be utilised.

Rumsfield did persuade President Ford to set up a new agency called Team B, that was to find proof of russia’s secret intentions. In charge of this team were Professor Richard Pipes a recognised anti-soviet writter, Rumsfield and Wolfavitz. After months of effort they could come up with no hard evidence to support their claims so instead invented the notion that the russians weapons systems were so advanced as to be undetecable. The program uses an example of Russian submarines using a new non-acoustic sonar system that was impossible to detect.

The CIA accuses TeamB of moving in a fantasy world.
A quote from a Dr.Anne Cohn who was in the Arms control+disarmament agency 1977-80:

“I would say that all of it(in reference to the report that TeamB had submitted) is a fantasy. Out of all of their specific allegations about weapons systemsof the soviets, if you had examined them one by one you would find they were all untrue”.

They had examples of Radar dishes being laser guns etc!

With resistence from the intelligence agencies what the neo-cons needed was a man inside the CIA, and this they got when William Cassey became the new head of the CIA under President Regan(I think it was him).
He had read a book called ‘The Terror Network’, which had been a best seller in america. And because of this book he called a meeting of all the heads of departments in the CIA and said he wanted a report written up for President Regan proving the existence of the terror network.

A Quote from Melvin Googman, Head of Office of Soviet Affairs CIA 1976-87:

“We told him point blank that it was all made up,black propaganda created by us, I even had the operations people to tell Mr Cassey this, but he had made up his mind……lies became reality”.

There was a whole load more very interesting stuff. I’ve concentrated on what was going on in America more, mainly because as you still have a democratic process in place, you can do something about it. And we all know what the Islamic militants stand for. The Neo-cons on the other hand are completely un-repentant about what they stand for(using lies and fear to control/shape american society) and mostly unknown to many people. These guys are completely anti-democratic and I can almost guarantee that things like the patriot act are just the tip of the ice-berg that they are planning. It comes from their own mouths – personal freedom = america’s biggest problem!!

Makes you think, whatever side of the political barrier you sit on in America. I just wish you guys all the best and pray you all don’t end up in some kind of sick police state, having to show your passes all the time to police or getting taken away for re-programming! And I don’t think I can even add a winking smilie to this – things are just too serious in a bad kinda way. All I can say is if you can see this program its definitely worth it :b

[Imran Siddiqui]

Oh jeez, what a joke. This documentary also gets neo-conservatism wrong. Funny that the only leftist I've seen get it right is che.

[child of Thor]

well maybe it was my understanding of it - although its very difficult to misunderstand direct quotes and statements from the people that founded the movement - unless they used clever computer technology to lip-sync them into saying lies??

[Imran Siddiqui]

Btw, some information about Strauss, who was a big believer in liberal universal principles:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Strauss

although its very difficult to misunderstand direct quotes and statements from the people that founded the movement

Never heard of quoting someone out of context? I could say that Churchill claimed "Democracy is the worst system of government" without telling you he said except for all the others, and you could be none the wiser.

Oh, btw, Rumsfeld is a realist in IR, not a neo-con.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Oh, and I love this quote from Irving Kristol (a founder of neo-conservatism):

Ever since I can remember, I've been a neo-something: a neo-Marxist, a neo-Trotskyist, a neo-liberal, a neo-conservative; in religion a neo-orthodox even while I was a neo-Trotskyist and a neo-Marxist. I'm going to end up a neo-that's all, neo dash nothing.

[child of Thor]

Thanks for the link - i'm reading now

well the only bit that seems like it could point to some of my darker fears in the wikipedia summery was this bit:

From Wikipedia on Stauss:

‘Given that philosophy is necessarily radical relative to common opinion it was necessary for a philosopher to conceal his intent from the majority of the populus, both for their sake (i.e. the millions of deaths in Cambodia due to Sarte and his influence on Polpot) and for the philosophers own sake (i.e. Socrates was put to death by the many for his radical criticism of public opinion). In addition to what has been discussed above, Strauss constantly stressed the importance of two dichotomies in political philosophy: Athens and Jerusalem (revelation vs. reason)’

Which might give some clues as to why the neo-con movement basicaly seemed to move into power in stealth mode?

BUT it also says that Strauss himself was such a complex political philosipher that is was really easy to completly misunderstand the man. And that he is often taken out of context as few people can understand him.

Still my beef isnt with the philosopher Strauss but with the neo-con agenda and thier belief in an elite ruling the state through the creation or emphersising of myths and fears to achieve more control over people.



wikipedia on neo-cons .

Now that contains much more scary references in the context of my being what i percieve as a free indiviual that doesn't think that creating conflict is the solution to societies ills, infact it just creates fear, which is what the documentary is examining.

[child of Thor]

Again from wikipedia a list of known neoconservatives:

Public Sector
Elliott Abrams, Senior director, National Security Council; son-in-law of Norman Podhoretz.
Kenneth Adelman, member of Pentagon's Defense Policy Board, former member of Reagan administration who praised Apartheid era South Africa for its nuclear proliferation.
John Bolton, Undersecretary of State.
L. Paul Bremer, administrator of the U.S. Occupation of Iraq.
Stephen Cambone, first Defense Undersecretary for Intelligence, Rumsfeld protege.
Linda Chavez, Hispanic Republican Cabinet Appointee.
Richard Cheney, United States Vice President since 2001, former Secretary of Defense, former CEO of Halliburton.
Eliot Cohen, member Defense Policy Board.
Douglas Feith, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy since 2001, responsible for planning the occupation of Iraq.
Larry Franklin, Feith lieutenant being investigated for passsing government secrets to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and Israeli Embassy Officials.
Francis Fukuyama, author of The End of History, leader of non-scientist faction on the President's Council on Bioethics.
I. Lewis Libby, a.k.a Scooter Libby, Chief of Staff to the Vice President. Suspected of having committed treason by revealing the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame as a political reprisal against her husband.
William J. Luti, Deputy Undersecretary of Defense.
Harold Rhode, Foreign Affairs Specialist, Office of Net Assessment, Office of the Secretary of Defense.
Condoleezza Rice, National Security Advisor since 2001.
Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense since 2001, responsible for the occupation of Iraq.
Abram Shulsky, Director Office of Special Plans.
Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense since 2001, a major advocate for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation
David Wurmser, Office of the Vice President, Middle East Adviser.
Dov Zakheim, former Comptroller, Department of Defense.

Private Sector
Lynne Cheney, wife of Vice President Richard 'Dick' Cheney; critic of academic critics of the second Bush administration, best known for having expressed shame about her daughter's sexuality.
David Frum, Canadian, newspaper columnist, and speechwriter.
David Horowitz McCarthyism on Campus (http://www.workingforchange.com/arti...m?itemid=17838)
Robert Kagan, co-founder, Project for the New American Century.
Jeane Kirkpatrick, former Ambassador to the United Nations, famous for asserting the existence of a meaningful difference between totalitarianism and authoritarianism.
Charles Krauthammer.
Irving Kristol
William Kristol, co-founder, Project for the New American Century.
Michael Ledeen
Philip Merrill, Chairman of the Export-Import Bank since 2001.
Dennis Miller, comedian.
Oliver North, talk show host.
Richard Perle, Chairman of the Defense Policy Board.
Norman Podhoretz
Daniel Pipes, anti-Soviet popular historian and activist.
Ronald D. Rotunda, law professor at conservative George Mason University, apologist for denying Prisoner of War status under the 1949 Geneva Conventions to the prisoners from the War in Afghanistan held at Guantanamo Bay.
Michael Rubin, lecturer; former Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute; Washington Institute for Near East Policy: Soref Fellow (1999-2000).
Mark Steyn, author of several books, and politics, arts, and culture commentator for, most notably, the Chicago Sun-Times, the UK's Daily Telegraph, and The Irish Times.


I feel the more that the general public discovers about these people and their beliefs and aims in determining the course of America's history, the more we should all examine them in greater detail. I have grave misgivings about their agenda and its outcome both for the good of America and the world

[Imran Siddiqui]

Still my beef isnt with the philosopher Strauss but with the neo-con agenda and thier belief in an elite ruling the state through the creation or emphersising of myths and fears to achieve more control over people.

But they don't.

--

And I think wikipedia's view on Neo-conservatism falls into the same trap. Neo-conservatism was never meant to be a domestic policy, but always a foriegn policy. It has always meant that we must support democracy around the world, not by debate and diplomats, but by force. We should get rid of dictators who will not reform and be democratic.