US Considers Summary Execution
Assassination Squads
Pentagon Said To Be Discussing Use Of Units To Work Abroad
By Oliver Burkeman in New York
The Guardian - London
8-14-2
The US government is considering plans to send elite military units on missions
to assassinate al-Qaida leaders in countries around the world, without necessarily
informing the governments involved, it was reported yesterday.
The Pentagon is discussing proposals which could see special operations units
dispatched to capture or kill terrorists wherever they are be lieved to be hiding,
despite a long-standing presidential order forbidding US personnel from carrying
out assassinations abroad, the New York Times reported.
Senior army advisers believe they could justify the practice on the grounds
that it would constitute "preparation of the battlefield" in a war
against terrorism that has no boundaries, because the September 11 terrorist
attacks in effect initiated a worldwide state of armed conflict, the newspaper
said.
"We're at war with al-Qaida. If we find an enemy combatant, then we should
be able to use military force to take military action against them," a
senior adviser to the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, was quoted as saying.
The plan was said to be caus ing concerns in other parts of the US government
because it might blur the line between army activity and missions usually handled,
under strict legal guidelines, by the Central Intelligence Agency.
The president and Congress monitor CIA activities to ensure compliance with
a presidential executive order first signed by President Gerald Ford, but regularly
renewed since, forbidding government-sponsored assassinations.
The order followed revelations of CIA plans to murder foreign leaders including
Fidel Castro and Patrice Lumumba of the Congo.
But Mr Rumsfeld is said to be frustrated by the CIA's activities in Afghanistan,
especially when the activities of special forces working with local war lords
were slowed down because the Afghans were still waiting for cash payments they
were promised for cooperating against the Taliban.
The CIA's director, George Tenet, was understood not to oppose the proposals
Mr Rumsfeld is considering, and discussions were under way to negotiate a new
relationship between the agency and the army, an official said.
The soldiers who would be used in any such plan are the army's secretive Delta
Force and the navy's Seal unit.
"The people in these units are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week,
anywhere around the world. They are very highly trained, with specialised skills
for dealing with close-quarters combat and unique situations posed by weapons
of mass destruction," a military officer said.
A senior official in the Bush administration told the New York Times that the
US had to adapt its methods to match al-Qaida's for speed and stealth.
"If we find a high-value target somewhere, anywhere in the world, and if
we have the forces to get there and get to them, we should get there and get
to them," the official said.
"Right now, there are 18 food chains, 20 levels of paperwork and 22 hoops
we have to jump through before we can take action. Our enemy moves faster than
that."
Shortly after last September's attacks, Dick Cheney, the vice-president, indicated
that the administration might review the ban on assassinations, because "to
be able to penetrate organisations you need to have on the payroll some very
unsavoury characters... It is a mean, nasty, dangerous, dirty business out there,
and we have to operate in that arena."
Asked directly if there was a law which would outlaw assassinating Osama bin
Laden, he said he did not think so, "but I'd have to check with the lawyers
on that".
Presidents since Mr Ford have often been accused of sidestepping the executive
order by launching targeted military attacks primarily to kill leaders, such
as the 1986 attack on Libya authorised by Ronald Reagan, of which he later commented
that he would not have shed tears if it had happened to kill the Libyan leader,
Muammar Gadafy.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/bush/story/0,7369,773574,00.html
The Summary Execution Issue
From Robert Anderson
top_view@planetmail.com
Top View News
8-15-2
On Monday morning (August 12) I found a Reuters story on ABC News online news-wire,
which stated that the White House had quietly announced summary executions of
certain persons designated as "terrorists" by Bush or other high-ranking
Bush Cartel members HAD BEEN given the OK. So: ONLY the SAY-SO of Bush gang,
in other words, is sufficient to incur the MURDER of whomever is so designated,
by OFFICIAL US government policy. No evidence whatsoever need ever be presented
to ANYONE, that the person so designated IS in fact a "terrorist"
at all. This Reuters article indicated that the directive applied both abroad
AND at home in the U.S.
We forwarded the article to our recipient list with the url, but soon began
receiving emails saying the link was not working. And true enough, the story
WAS gone, and could not be found at the Reuters site either.
We had several people we know (some in the journalism business) contact White
House information sources, and we received to clear replies to the effect that
the article must have been either in error or a hoax.
THEN, on Tuesday evening associate Mark Jahnsky found an item on the Washington
Post website which reported that a CIA spokesperson said the agency HAD been
given the "green light" (the Post's words) to carry out summary executions
or assassinations of certain persons whom the Bush Mob claimed were "terrorists."
Although THIS article gave no indication that the new directive applied WITHIN
the United States as the CIA is specifically FORBIDDEN from conducting operations
within the US, apparently by the time the Post article was published, either
the Presidential directive had been amended or else the full extent of its intended
scope had been COVERED UP.
Nevertheless, and regardless: ONLY the SAY-SO of Bush-Mobsters is sufficient
to incur the MURDER of whomever is so designated, by OFFICIAL US government
policy! No evidence whatsoever need ever be presented to ANYONE, that the person
so designated IS in fact a "terrorist" at all!
And then a funny thing happened. The Washington Post article ALSO disappeared
from the face of the Earth. Gone -- zip -- nada.
Nobody know nuttin'.
THEN, by Wednesday evening, a series of communications to TOP_VIEW on the subject
from Jeff Rense were massively interfered with, our computer was repeatedly
hacked into via our Internet hookup resulting in several crashes, and the Reuters
article --which Rense had posted and then removed when it couldn't be confirmed
-- mysteriously reappeared at Rense.com attached to an unrelated link, and then
disappeared again forever.
Anyway, by Wednesday evening Jeff Rense had discovered an article by The London
Guardian, which stated that the Bush Mob was about to give the green light to
assassinations or summary executions of certain persons designated as terrorists
by top Bush Cartel members!
The Guardian article, however, like the Washington Post article, gave no specific
indication that the now-"PLANNED" policy directive would also pertain
domestically.
But nevertheless and regardless, ONLY the SAY-SO of the Bush Cartel is sufficient
to incur the MURDER of whomever is so designated, by OFFICIAL US government
policy. No evidence whatsoever need ever be presented to ANYONE, that the person
so designated IS in fact a "terrorist."
So: what IS the real story about the approval of summary executions for certain
persons whom Bush and his gang CLAIM are "terrorists?" Exactly what
is the scope of this HORRIFIC, newly-implemented or soon-to-be-implemented official
US "policy?" Apparently, the truth of the directive's scope is being
COVERED UP.
However, no matter whether this deranged, sickening, brutish and MASSIVELY illegal/unconstitutional/unconscionable
"policy" is to be applied only outside the United States or whether
the United States and its people are to be INCLUDED, the "policy"
itself is an absolute and totally intolerable outrage to the civilized world
and a profound violation of international AND national law in the highest degree.
The mightily perverted, grotesque G. Dubya Shrubya Bush and his band, who've
usurped control of this nation and are turning it into a CommuNazi 4th Reich
totalitarian NIGHTMARE, are a MASSIVE menace and threat to the entire planet."