I’LL BE BACK

Obama’s fierce critic Johnny Boy could cause problems to him if he heads the all-powerful Armed Services Committee of
GOP-controlled Senate 

A chuckling and parodying John McCain during his presidential campaign in Murrells Inlet, South Carolina, in 2007 tried to ‘bomb’ Iran—a Goebbels-like GOP propagated that Tehran was surreptitiously enriching uranium to produce the N-bomb. After countless parodies of The Beach Boys’ chartbuster Barbara Ann, McCain’s diabolical-yet-risible version of the song, Bomb Iran, was not just some off-the-cuff remark; it showed the hatred ingrained in the Republican Party towards Muslim nations, and the war-mongering conservative cosying up to the gun and Jewish lobbies. Later, he added, “Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb ... anyway, ah! ...” 
The Arizona Senator, who responded to an audience question about military action against Iran, later said that the remark was made only in jest though his Democratic opponents used it against him till the man he abhorred most and his Illinois counterpart Barack ‘Hussein’ Obama romped to the White House.
Now, the former naval aviator whose A-4E Skyhawk was shot down over North Vietnam during war, could be in the hot seat again with the possibility of chairmanship of the influential Armed Services Committee in the new Republican-controlled Senate passing to him. The Committee has legislative oversight of the military, including the Department of Defense, military research and development, nuclear energy and defence policy. 
McCain would also have a role in the deciding the Pentagon’s budget though Rep and Senate appropriation committees oversee the actual finances. His role doesn’t end there: defence spending, new weapons and closure of military bases would also be under his scrutiny.
In February, McCain, moved by the “mass atrocities” in Syria—but not the countless killings caused by the military misadventure in Afghanistan and Iraq all these years—said on the Senate floor, “Mr. President, I rise today to appeal to the conscience of my colleagues and my fellow citizens about the mass atrocities that the Assad regime is perpetrating in Syria. When the images and horrors of this conflict occasionally show up on our television screens, the impulse of many Americans is to change the channel. But we must not look away. We must not avert our eyes from the suffering of the Syrian people for if we do, we ignore, we sacrifice that which is most precious in ourselves—our ability to empathise with the suffering of others …”
The pugilistic Arizona Senator has tried to take on Vladimir Putin as well after the Russian annexation of Crimea in Ukraine and slamming Obama in the process. When Obama said that Russia would have to pay “costs” if it moved troops into Ukraine, McCain said that the “threat is laughable”. In fact, McCain suggested including high-ranking Russian officials in the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law and Accountability Act if they were involved in sending troops into Ukraine. He also wanted to reverse the decision to scuttle missile defence plans for Eastern Europe and expedite the process of including Georgia—invaded by Russia in 2008—in Nato. 
Defence experts say that Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II could come under further scanner of the Congress if Johnny Boy becomes the Committee chairman. He has been critical of the ‘jinxed’ project: though dubbed as the fifth-generation fighter, the fighters were grounded in June, when one of the jets caught fire at a Florida air base. F-35s have been grounded, at least, 13 times since 2007 due to snags in their engines. Besides, the special shape and coating, which is meant to avoid detection, does not work. Air Force Lieutenant General Chris Bogdan, who runs the F-35 programme, has acknowledged that the project could face increased scrutiny.
More importantly, any military intervention or non-intervention by Obama in his last two years would be difficult with the GOP wresting control of both Senate and House. Interestingly, Obama has said that he is planning to ask the Congress to allow use of military force against Islamic State (IS) contrary to his earlier stand of engaging US forces directly with the Sunni extremists in Iraq. “I am going to begin engaging Congress over a new authorisation to use military force against ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant),” he said at a news conference in the White House. 
Obama’s about-turn could be attributed to several reasons. With the mid-term election rout, he has no option but to appease the war-mongering Republicans. If the Congress allows a ‘direct war’ against IS, Obama won’t have to share the blame if the plan goes awry. On the other hand, if the Congress does not allow direct intervention, which will boost IS further, it will be GOP’s fault. In case, the Congress allows direct confrontation with IS, McCain as Committee chairman will have to agree to fund the war. While hardliners like McCain support such military campaigns, the Tea Party is opposed to them. McCain has been critical of Obama’s military policy, especially regarding IS and Syria, and called for a tough response to the Russian aggression in Ukraine. 
Afraid that critics may see his plan of direct confrontation with IS way to appease the Congress, now Obama has struck a combative mode saying that he will work with GOP on his own terms. 
Obama might not publicly express the discomfort and anger after the mid-term massacre and the fear of the possibility of McCain becoming Committee chairman, the Arizona Senator is having the last laugh.

ZARQAWI SHINE, TILLMAN SMEAR

Mere jitters of getting sucked into the massive fiscal black hole—which seemed as gaping as the Great Depression initially—are undoubtedly too overwhelming for the Joes and Janes to concentrate on military matters, and wars being waged on foreign shores. But what does not seem even remotely connected to the economic 'carnage'—orchestrated by Uncle Sam—is interwind with the average American's life. Every extra day 'wasted' in the military misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan is gobbling up the tax payer's money with America hurtling down the economic abyss more recklessly. The Senate confirmation of Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal as Commander of the International and Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan and subsequent promotion as General was one such incident—ignored by the public, and conveniently overlooked and idiotically supported by the “Change We Can Believe In” Democrats.

Two events that will never be washed away from public memory in general and that of the Pentagon in particular—even after McChrystal's death—are the General's role in the killing of Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and the investigation into the 'murder' of Army Ranger Pat Tillman. The first one a shining star in the history of US military and the second a blot that resurfaces despite several desperate whitewash bids by top-ranking Army officers.

But first, a look at the profile of the Black Ops expert. An expert in covert overseas operations, the supremely fit 55-year-old Green Beret is the 'Rambo' America was desperately searching for to turn the tide in Afghanistan. The highly motivated commando wears several distinguished colours: the Defense Distinguished Service Medal; the Defense Superior Service Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster; the Legion of Merit with two Oak Leaf Clusters; the Bronze Star; the Defense Meritorious Service Medal; the Meritorious Service Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters; the Army Commendation Medal; the Army Achievement Medal; the Expert Infantryman Badge; the Master Parachutist Badge; the Ranger Tab; the Special Forces Tab; and the Joint Chiefs of Staff Identification Badge.

The former Director of the Joint Staff had also commanded the secretive Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) from 2003 to 2008. He also participated in Operation Desert Shield (Saudi Arabia, '90), Operation Desert Storm (Kuwait, '91), Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan, Africa and Philippines, '01) and Operation Iraqi Freedom ('03). It was the JSOC—the Pentagon refused to acknowledge its existence for years—which captured Saddam Hussein in December, 2003. According to an interview Pulitzer-winning American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh gave to GulfNews on May 12 this year, former US Vice-President Dick Cheney actually headed the JSOC.

A May New York Times article in May mentioned the Generals' high level of physical fitness and strict regimen: “...Usually eats just one meal a day, in the evening, to avoid sluggishness. He is known for operating on a few hours’ sleep and for running to and from work while listening to audio books on an iPod. In Iraq... former intelligence officials say that he had an encyclopedic, even obsessive, knowledge about the lives of terrorists, and that he pushed his ranks aggressively to kill as many of them as possible.” The JSOC, which oversees the operations of the Delta Force and the Navy Seals, mainly operates at night; but the workaholic General was on his toes even during the day. He was a commander of a Green Beret team in 1979 and 1980, and he did several tours in the Army Rangers as a staff officer and a Battalion Commander, including service in the Gulf War, 1991, the article adds.

At the Joint Staff at the Pentagon, McChrystal chaired a 6.30 am classified meeting with top 25 officers and, military commanders around the world by video daily. In half-an-hour, the group raced through military developments and problems over the past 24 hours. As a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in 2000, he ran a dozen miles every morning to the council’s offices from his quarters at Fort Hamilton on the southwestern tip of Brooklyn, the article states. “If you asked me the first thing that comes to mind about General McChrystal,” said Leslie H. Gelb, the President emeritus of the council, “I think of no body fat.”

But McChrystal is also a master manoeuvrer—like his very dear friend and US Central Command Commander General David Petraeus (refer to the post 'Politician General' earlier in the blog)—off the battlefield, impressing his political bosses with his tough tactics and highly covert anti-terror operations, and intellect. According to the NYT article, “Fellow officers on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, where he is Director, and former colleagues at the Council on Foreign Relations describe him as a warrior-scholar, comfortable with diplomats, politicians....” “He’s lanky, smart, tough, a sneaky stealth soldier. He’s got all the Special Ops attributes, plus an intellect,” says Major General (retired) William Nash. Even his present appointment was recommended by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen.

In 2005, McChrystal and the CIA strongly proposed a secret, joint operation in the tribal region of Pakistan to target al-Qaeda's second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri. But then Defense Secretary Donald H Rumsfeld nixed the operation at the eleventh hour on grounds of safety and alleged questionable intelligence.

McChrystal also has an innate ability to forge close alliances with other branches of the government to eliminate terrorists. According to his colleagues, as JSOC boss, he built a close relationship with the CIA and the FBI, ending the frosty ties with the former investigative agency. “He knows intelligence, he knows covert action and he knows the value of partnerships,” said Henry Crumpton, who ran the CIA’s covert war in Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks.

ELIMINATION OF ABU MUSAB AL-ZARQAWI

The killing of Zarqawi was the turning point in McChrystal's career. A Jordanian terrorist, al-Zarqawi ran a terror camp in Afghanistan before landing in Iraq to join the anti-US cause and conducted a spate of deadly suicide bombings and beheadings. The terror outfit he formed in the 1990s, al-Tawhid wal-Jihad, was subsequently named Al-Qaida in Iraq after Zarqawi aligned with Osama bin Laden. In September 2005, he declared a war on Shias in Iraq after the government ordered an offensive against Sunni insurgents. The group bombed the UN headquarters in Baghdad in 2003, killing the UN envoy to Iraq and 21 others. It also bombed three hotels in Amman, Jordan, in the same year, killing 60 people.

Zarqawi's elimination was the result of months of meticulous planning and weeks of round-the-clock surveillance of his movements. The Joint Task Force 145, comprising Delta Force and Seals of the JSOC, had been tracking him for quite sometime with the help of Jordanian intelligence. The Jordanians were also tracking Zarqawi's spiritual adviser Sheik Abd-Al-Rahman, who often frequented his hideout, located in Baqubah, the capital of Diyala province. In addition, another elite and much less-known highly trained special unit called also by their older code name Gray Fox was said to have been involved. On June 7, 2006, when Rahman entered the hideout, the intelligence was pretty sure that Zarqawi was there.

Immediately, two F-16s were dispatched with one dropping two 500-pound guided bombs—a laser-guided GBU-12 and GPS-guided GBU-38—killing Zarqawi and six others, including Rahman, on the spot. Soon, the commando general rushed to the site to get first-hand information. According to a Washington Times report dated October 2, 2006: “Its commander, Army Lt. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, was so personally involved in the hunt that he went with his men to the bombed-out hut near Baqouba to make sure they got their man.” A source close to the special-operations community said, “Gen. McChrystal's... goes on raids. He doesn't sit back at headquarters.”

Gen. McChrystal's team was so instrumental in finding Zarqawi... that President Bush thanked the general in a phone call to him and Gen. George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq. "I haven't spoken to our commanders yet, except to call Gen. Casey and McChrystal and congratulate them, but more importantly, for them to congratulate the troops and the intel groups that were working on finding Zarqawi," said then US President George W Bush at a June 10 press conference at Camp David, the report added.

“Larry Di Rita, a former senior aide to former Defense Secretary Donald H Rumsfeld, who worked with Gen. McChrystal, said, “McChrystal is well-known in the Army as an exceptional operator and an ability to work in a joint environment, an ability to work at various levels of operational skills.”

A Newsweek report on June 26, 2006, stated: “Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, West Point '76, is not someone the Army likes to talk about. He isn't even listed in the directory at Fort Bragg, N.C., his home base. That's not because McChrystal has done anything wrong—quite the contrary, he's one of the Army's rising stars—but because he runs the most secretive force in the U.S. military. That is the Joint Special Operations Command, the snake-eating, slit-their-throats "black ops" guys who captured Saddam Hussein and targeted Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.”

“After the Zarqawi strike, then multinational forces spokesman Gen. Bill Caldwell refused to comment on JSOC's role, saying, 'We don't talk about when special operating forces are involved.' But when Bush revealed to reporters that it was McChrystal's Special Ops teams that found Zarqawi, Caldwell had to gulp and say (to laughter), 'If the president of the United States said it was, then I'm sure it was.',” the Newsweek report added. Rumsfeld was especially impressed with McChrystal's "direct action" forces or so-called SMUs (Special Mission Units) whose job is to kill or capture bad guys.

PAT TILLMAN—A FIERCE PATRIOT



"I play football. It just seems so unimportant compared to everything that has taken place [World Trade Center attacks, September 11, 2001]. A lot of my family has gone and fought wars, and I really haven't done a damn thing."

He could have made a glittering career in professional football, earned millions, and relaxed sipping beer while just getting aghast for a moment as the Twin Towers collapsed. But Pat Tillman wasn't an ordinary American: he was courage personified, fiercely patriotic, and as mentally strong as he was physically indomitable on the field for the Arizona Cardinals of the National Football League. Zapped by 9/11, he volunteered for the 'war against terror', declining a $3.6-million contract.

A Washington Post article “Barrage of Bullets Drowned Out Cries of Comrades” on December 5, 2004, reported: “Friends and family describe Pat Tillman as an American original, a maverick who burned with intensity. He was wild, exuberant, loyal, compassionate and driven, they say. He bucked convention, devoured books and debated conspiracy theories. He demanded straight talk about uncomfortable truths.”

"There was so much more to him than anyone will ever know," reflected Denver Broncos quarterback Jake Plummer, a teammate at Arizona State University and on the Cardinals, speaking at a memorial service. Tillman was "fearless on the field, reckless, tough," yet he was also "thought-provoking”.

When Tillman's lead gunner succumbed during a gunfight in the initial months of the Iraq War, he immediately replaced him, according to Steve White, a Navy Seal who was on the same mission. "He was thirsty to be the best," White said.

Like Pat, his brother Kevin (in the picture below with Pat in the Ranger combat gear) was savagely patriotic—he could have shined while playing minor league baseball for the Cleveland Indians Organization, but he preferred serving America. After completing the Ranger Indoctrination Program, they were assigned to the "Black Sheep", otherwise known as 2nd Platoon, A Company, Second Battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment in Fort Lewis, Washington. After being deployed in Iraq during the invasion, Pat graduated from Ranger School.

Subsequently, the two brothers were deployed in eastern Afghanistan as part of Operation Enduring Freedom to hunt down Taliban and al-Qaeda members; Pat could never anticipate that it was his last deployment. Killed in friendly fire with M16 bullets cutting his head into three pieces, Tillman lay dying while his platoon continued firing, mistaking him to be a Taliban member.

STAIN OF FRATRICIDE

“It ended on a stony ridge in fading light. Spec. Pat Tillman lay dying behind a boulder. A young fellow U.S. Army Ranger stretched prone beside him, praying quietly as tracer bullets poured in. 'Cease fire! Friendlies!' Tillman cried out. Smoke drifted from a signal grenade Tillman had detonated minutes before in a desperate bid to show his platoon members they were shooting the wrong men. The firing had stopped. Tillman had stood up, chattering in relief. Then the machine gun bursts erupted again,” the Post story added.

"I could hear the pain in his voice," recalled the young Ranger days later to Army investigators. "I am Pat [expletive] Tillman, damn it!" the former footballer shouted, trying to stop fellow Rangers from firing their weapons recklessly. His comrade recalled: "He said this over and over again until he stopped." But it was too late as the pumped-up soldiers had charged with a barrage of bullets after being ambushed by the Taliban.

This is how the events had unfolded on April 22, 2004. The the Black Sheep platoon was combing an area near Khost, Paktia province, under the command of then Lieutenant David A Uthlaut. Suddenly, one of the Humvees broke down, restricting the men to the tiny village of Margarah—a Taliban stronghold—and jeopardising the mission of searching for terrorists in Manah. Ultimately, the platoon was divided into two under pressure from Uthlaut's commander Captain William Saunders, who rebuked the platoon leader for protesting his decision: the first would help tow the Humvee with the help of a local truck driver to a nearby road form where the Army could collect it, and the second would move to Manah. It was a drastic decision.

The first group, including Tillman and led by Uthlaut, moved to Manah. Kevin was assigned to the second group. Sergeant Greg Baker commanded the heaviest-armed vehicle in the second group.

The day was fateful from the very start. Just when group 2 proceeded, the Afghan truck driver refused to navigate the pitted road and suggested following the route that the first group had taken. But group 1 was not informed about the the change in plan. A few moments later, group 2 was ambushed by the Taliban with mortars and small arms from high up above the walls of a canyon that was 5-10 yards narrow. The Rangers couldn't even flee as the lumbering truck had stopped, blocking their exit. Baker took charge of the truck, firing at the attackers. After running out of ammunition, he dismounted ran back to his vehicle and reloaded. Finally, Baker's Humvee whiz past the canyon walls with an Army driver at the wheel and others firing at the terrorists.

Meanwhile, an explosion caught Uthlaut's attention, who ordered Tillman and the other Rangers to proceed towards the blast site. As a fire team leader, Tillman guided his men to the top of a rocky north-south ridge that faced the canyon on a roughly perpendicular angle. The most dangerous aspect of this mission was the problem in differentiating between friends and adversaries. While Tillman thought he saw the Taliban on the southern ridge, his Sergeant wanted to assault the north. “I didn't think about it at the time, but I think he wanted to assault the southern ridge line,” the Sergeant recalled.

Subsequently, Tillman, another Ranger and an Afghan militia fighter started firing towards the canyon to suppress the ambush. Several of group 2 Rangers later said that as they shot their way out of the canyon, they had no idea where their comrades in group 1 might be. As Baker saw muzzle flashes coming from a ridge to the right of the village they were approaching, his Humvee guys almost emptied their weapons at the flashes. “I saw a figure holding an AK-47, his muzzle was flashing, he wasn't wearing a helmet, and he was prone," Baker recalled in a statement. "I focused only on him. I got tunnel vision," the Post article said. Actually, Baker's team had killed the militia fighter in a jiffy mistaking him as a Taliban member.

Tillman was destined to be the next wrong target as Baker & Company stormed the area where the group 1 members were positioned with a fusillade of bullets, confusing them with the enemy as they could see only silhouettes. According to the article, “The gunner of the M-2 .50-calibre machine gun in Baker's truck fired every round he had.” Though the Humvee driver recognised the parked vehicles of group 1 and warned twice that they were shooting at their own friends, it was too late as every time Tillman and other Rangers waved their arms and shouted, they faced one volley after another. One of the gunners with Baker recalled, “They did not look like the cease-fire hand-and-arm signal because they were waving side to side.”

Though Tillman lobbed a smoke grenade, the firing continued, blowing his head off. Finally, a flare fired by another Sergeant resolved the fatal confusion.

THE BLOT GETS THICKER

Tillman’s enlistment in the Army and his sacrifice moved America. When he spurned the Arizona Cardinals offer and joined the Army, then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had sent a personal letter to thanks to him. After his death, President Bush equated the killing to an “ultimate sacrifice in the war on terror”. “His killing was widely reported by the media, including conservative commentators such as Ann Coulter, who called him 'an American original — virtuous, pure and masculine like only an American male can be'. His May 3, 2004, memorial in San Jose drew 3,500 people and was nationally televised,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported in 2005.

But the Army took almost five weeks to admit that the fierce patriot was killed by his colleagues. Different versions of his death kept pouring in after the incident—or accident as the Rangers put it. Initially, the Tillman family was informed that Pat died after the Taliban fired at him while he was alighting from a vehicle. Besides, his immediate death was concealed with the Army informing the family that he had no pulse when brought to the hospital and was even given cardio pulmonary resuscitation. According to another version, Tillman died “when his patrol vehicle came under attack”.

“The records show Tillman fought bravely and honorably until his last breath. They also show that his superiors exaggerated his actions and invented details as they burnished his legend in public, at the same time suppressing details that might tarnish Tillman's commanders. Army commanders hurriedly awarded Tillman a posthumous Silver Star for valor and released a nine-paragraph account of his heroism that made no mention of fratricide. A month later, the head of the Army's Special Operations Command, Lt Gen Philip R Kensinger Jr, called a news conference to disclose in a brief statement that Tillman 'probably' died by 'friendly fire'.” the Post article added.

On April 30, Tillman was awarded a Silver Star for bravery. Even as late as May 7, the Army report stated that the Tillman was killed by the enemy. Finally, on May 28, the Tillman family was informed of the reality. Tillman's father Patrick said, “The administration clearly was using this case for its own political reasons. This cover-up started within minutes of Pat’s death, and it started at high levels.”
Tillman had been maintaining a journal since 16; the recordings, which the Army took from the Tillmans purportedly to aid the probe, were never returned to them.

It was the same Ranger—whose enlistment in the Army was hailed by the high and mighty of Washington—who was conveniently forgotten by his superiors. Chronicle interviews with Tillman’s family and soldiers also revealed that Tillman was against the Iraq War. The Army not only tried to conceal the fratricide, but three investigations into the killing were futile; one of the investigators alleged that witnesses were allowed to change their testimonies. “There have been so many discrepancies so far that it’s hard to know what to believe. There are too many murky details. I want to know what kind of criminal intent there was. There’s so much in the reports that is (deleted) that it’s hard to tell what we’re not seeing,” the slain Ranger's mother Mary Tillman said, according to an story “Family Demands Truth”, published in the Chronicle on September 25, 2005. The files the family received from the Army in March are heavily censored with nearly every page containing blacked-out sections; most names have been deleted, the story added.

Mary also expressed her disgust and anger to the Washington Post: “The fact that he was the ultimate team player and he watched his own men kill him is absolutely heartbreaking and tragic. The fact that they lied about it afterward is disgusting.”

“According to testimony, the first investigation was initiated less than 24 hours after Tillman’s death by an officer in the same Ranger battalion. His report, delivered May 4, 2004, determined that soldiers involved in the incident had committed “gross negligence” and should be appropriately disciplined. The officer became a key witness in the subsequent investigation. For reasons that are not clear, the officer’s investigation was taken over by a higher ranking commander. That officer’s findings, delivered the next month, called for less severe discipline,” the Chronicle said.

The investigator testified that senior officers had permitted soldiers to change their testimonies to avoid singling out a particular Ranger for the murder. Besides, witnesses changed details of the distance, the location and positioning, he added.

According to the documents and interviews, Saunders had initially testified that he had reported Uthlaut's protest against splitting his troops to a higher-ranking commander. But when the commander contradicted his version, Saunders was threatened with perjury charges. “He was given immunity and allowed to change his prior testimony,” the Chronicle added. Shockingly, Saunders was also authorised to determine the punishment of his juniors. “Uthlaut — who was first captain of his senior class at West Point, the academy’s highest honor — was dismissed from the Rangers and re-entered the regular Army,” the Chronicle further reported.

In a letter sent to the Post, Patrick wrote: “With respect to the Army's reference to 'mistakes in reporting the circumstances of [my son's] death': those 'mistakes' were deliberate, calculated, ordered (repeatedly), and disgraceful — conduct well beneath the standard to which every soldier in the field is held.”

On April 24, 2007, Kevin testified at a Congressional hearing: “The deception surrounding this case was an insult to the family: but more importantly, its primary purpose was to deceive a whole nation. We say these things with disappointment and sadness for our country. Once again, we have been used as props in a Pentagon public relations exercise.” After Kevin's testimony Pete Geren, acting Secretary of the Army told reporters: "We as an Army failed in our duty to the Tillman family, the duty we owe to all the families of our fallen soldiers: give them the truth, the best we know it, as fast as we can.”

On May 6, 2008, Mary blasted the US military's cover-up on The Today Show—an American morning news and talk show aired on weekday mornings on NBC—and talked about her new book Boots on the Ground by Dusk: My Tribute to Pat Tillman. In an interview with * Meredith Viera, she termed Tillman's killing “an act of gross negligence,”, adding that “someone started this deception, and it didn’t start at the three-star level”.

But despite six investigations and two Congressional hearings in the last five years, questions on his controversial death and the subsequent cover-up remain unanswered.

BULLETS SHOOT DOWN THE LIE

Countless newspaper pictures and TV reports—besides it is common knowledge—over several years clearly show that al-Qaeda and the Taliban rely heavily on the Kalashnikov rifle series, not on M16 variants. What would rankle even a laymen was the blatant lie propagated as truth by the Army top brass that Tillman was killed by an enemy combatant though it was clear from the autopsy report that his head was severed into three pieces by 5.56 mm calibre bullets (right) of an M16 rifle—not 7.62 mm bullets (below left) of a Kalashnikov rifle. The post-mortem report nailed the lie, making it clear that it was fratricide, not enemy fire which downed the Ranger.

In July, 2007, the Associated Press reported that a doctor who examined the body said, "The medical evidence did not match up with the, with the scenario as described.” He noted further that the wounds showed as if he had been shot with an M16 rifle from less than 10 yards away.

“The three-star general who kept the truth about Tillman's death from his family and the public told investigators some 70 times that he had a bad memory and couldn't recall details of his actions. In more than four hours of questioning by the Pentagon Inspector General's office in December 2006, retired (Lt. Gen. Philip) Kensinger repeatedly contradicted other officers' testimony, and sometimes his own. He said on some 70 occasions that he did not recall something,” the AP report added.

McCHRYSTAL'S ROLE IN THE COVER-UP

It is the same McChrystal, who approved Tillman's posthumous Silver Star, which is awarded explicitly for combat, not death by friendly fire. Undoubtedly, the General was part of the cover-up, knowing full that it was fatal mistake by the elite Rangers that claimed Tillman's life—though he later testified that it might have been friendly fire.

Last year, Mary said, "He [McChrystal] definitely eased out of the situation. He didn't blatantly say he wouldn't help us, it's just that it became clear that he kind of drifted away." Patrick too believes that the General was in collusion with other senior officers. "I do believe that guy participated in a falsified homicide investigation," he told AP.

According to a CNN report this June, responding to the General's statement before the Senate Armed Services Committee that he had expedited the decoration for Tillman without knowing that he was killed by friendly fire, Mary said, "McChrystal was lying. He said he didn't know for certain Pat was killed by fratricide. That isn't true. If the Army chain of command didn't know what happened to Pat, why did it present us with a false story at the memorial service. That is not an error; that is not a misstep; that is deliberate deception. McCain [Republican Senator from Arizona John McCain] was at Pat's service. He was read a false narrative like the rest of us. Where is his outrage? Did he know all along?"

"I would do this differently if I had the chance again," the General told the committee. But he defended the awarding of the Silver Star: "I did then; I do now. I don't believe that the circumstance of death detracts from the courage and commitment of his contribution.” But when Senator Jim Webb, D-Virginia, grilled McChrystal, he said, "I was a part of that, and I apologise for it.”

The Nation in an article “McChrystal's Pat Tillman Connection” in May this year advocated the Generals' dismissal. “McChrystal has never explained why the early reports of Tillman's death were covered up, why his clothes and field journal were burned and destroyed on the scene or why Pat's brother Kevin, serving alongside him in the Rangers, was lied to on the spot. Even the cover-up was covered up. This should be a cause for dismissal—or indictment—not promotion,” The Nation said.

NASTY ASS MILITARY AREA

McChrystal has another shady aspect of his past: Nasty Ass Military Area (Nama). Better known as Camp Nama, it was a torture chamber where suspects underwent the most excruciating forms of interrogation like use of ice water to induce hypothermia, beatings, death threats, humiliation and several forms of psychological abuse. And it was headed by the tough-talking McChrystal. The General's Zarqawi unit Task Force 6-26 was notorious for its interrogation methods at Camp Nama.

In August 2006, an anonymous Army interrogator revealed to Esquire about the extensive torture chamber, being headed by the then unknown McChrystal. As Esquire reported: “Once, somebody brought it up with the Colonel. "Will [the Red Cross] ever be allowed in here?" And he said that absolutely not. He had this directly from General McChrystal and the Pentagon that there's no way that the Red Cross could get in—they won't have access and they never will. This facility was completely closed off to anybody investigating, even Army investigators.”

In March 2006, the NYT carried a report based on interviews with over a dozen US personnel who served at Camp Nama. Out of the five interrogation rooms at Camp Nama, the "black room" was the harshest one where everything was black with speakers in the corners and on the ceiling. A Sergeant who had used such torture techniques told NYT that detainees were stripped and subjected to stress standing, sleep deprivation, rock music and other forms of extreme torture. The interrogator had seen McChrsytal visit Camp Nama several times.

Camp Nama was built by the government of late dictator Saddam Hussein in Baghdad. Purportedly, the original Iraqi name was later used by US Army personnel deployed there as an acronym standing for “Nasty Ass Military Area”. Placards reading "No Blood No Foul,"—a reference to the notion described by a Pentagon official that "If you don't make them bleed, they can't prosecute for it"—were hanged around the military base.

Will the Obama administration's decision to appoint a new 'Rambo' as ISAF chief will prove to be tactical and bring about a tectonic shift in the war-ravaged nation? Well, the road is long, and with a shady past and an exemplary military record, McChrystal's journey will sure be an arduous one.

POLITICIAN GENERAL

His calm manoeuvrings off the battlefield and his highly-exaggerated actions in the line of duty—Iraq initially, and now, the whole of Middle East, Egypt and Central Asia—have paid him rich dividends in the highest echelons of the American political class. He straddles the scalding deserts of major anti-US conflicts and the cool corridors of the White House with equal ease and elan seldom seen in any top-ranking military leader in the United States so far. His thinking carries as much weight in the Barack Obama administration as it did during George W Bush's ignominious presidency. But the reality is that he badly faltered in Iraq under the 'facade' of the Surge, and has been equally dismal in the Af-Pak region—he had never been involved in combat operations before his first tour of Iraq.

Meet US Central Command (Centcom) Commander and former chief of the Multi-National Force-Iraq (MNF-I) General David Howell Petraeus—the most politically astute and the shrewdest US General who commands equal respect in the political fraternity and military ranks, especially among Generals who toe his lethal and ruthless line of action during war time and share his thinking during peace.

Politician Petraeus' towering political ambitions often have overshadowed his military goals. In 2007, speculation was rife that the General wanted to run for the White House a few years down the line—considering how cadet Petraeus rapidly scaled the heights of success from the US Military Academy in West Point, New York, to the Centcom in October, 2008, it is quite possible. *Patrick Cockburn of The Independent reported that when Petraeus was commanding the US forces in Iraq and was stationed in Baghdad, he told Sabah Khadim, then a senior adviser at Iraq’s Interior Ministry, about his long-term interest in running for the presidency. “I asked him if he was planning to run in 2008, and he said, ‘No, that would be too soon,' ” Khadim told Cockburn.

What brought Petraeus into the limelight of the US media was the 'sham of the Surge in Iraq'. The Surge was an increase in the number of American troops in Iraq by 30,000 authorised by Bush in January, 2007 to provide security to Baghdad and Al-Anbar province. Bush also extended the tour of 4,000 Marines already in Anbar, describing the overall objective of the Surge as establishing a "...unified, democratic federal Iraq that can govern itself, defend itself, and sustain itself, and is an ally in the War on Terror." The aim was to "to help Iraqis clear and secure neighborhoods, to help them protect the local population, and to help ensure that the Iraqi forces left behind are capable of providing the security".

UNITS DEPLOYED UNDER THE SURGE

The five US Army brigades committed to Iraq as part of the Surge were:

1. 2nd Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division, deployed in Baghdad
2. 4th Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, deployed in Baghdad
3. 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, deployed in southern Baghdad Belts
4. 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, deployed in Diyala province
5. 2nd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, deployed in the south-east of Baghdad

RIDING THE 'SURGE'

But the Surge failed though Petraeus rode the media surge and hijacked headlines for the 'purported reduction in violence in Iraq'. A confident Petraeus, a media manipulator, presented his report to the Congress on September 10, claiming that "the military objectives of the surge are, in large measure, being met" with the Al-Qaeda in Iraq taking a beating. Soon the media embraced its 'darling' with Michael O'Hanlon and Jason H Campbell of the Brookings Institution crediting the General with “an improved security environment, the best since 2004”. Even the CNN reported that the monthly death rate of US forces was “its second lowest point during the entire course of the war”.

SHAM OF THE SURGE

Though there was an overall reduction in violence, reports stated that the monthly death toll in Iraq rose by 15% in March, 2007. Besides, 65 Iraqi policemen were killed in the same month against 131 the previous month while 44 Iraqi soldiers died compared to 29 in February. The number of insurgents killed fell to 481 in March compared to 586 killed in February.

Then Marine Corps General James Logan Jones Jr (right)—the current US National Security Advisor—who was appointed the head of an independent military commission, found that the decrease in violence might have been due to areas overrun by Shias or Sunnis. Cockburn seconded Jones' view, stating that Sunnis relented since the Shia government orchestrated an ethnic cleansing of their community. Even Jessica Tuchman Mathews, President of foreign policy think tank Carnegie Endowment, wrote in September, 2007 that the Surge had failed. “By tacitly conceding that there has been no political progress in Iraq since then, Mr Bush admits as much, but asks for more time,” she wrote.

The Sunni Awakening councils, which were formed in 2005, were another reason for the reduction in violence. Infuriated by a string of attacks by the al-Qaeda in Iraq, Sunnis had formed armed councils to take on the terror group. In the process, they were ably aided by the US forces to contain violence. David Kilcullen, Petraeus' counter-insurgency and troop Surge adviser, said that "the tribal revolt was arguably the most significant change in the Iraqi operating environment in several years”. In fact, **Juan Cole's post in JuanCole.com on July 29, 2008, says that the technique of bribing Sunnis to fight radical vigilantes “began months before the troop escalation and had a dramatic effect in Anbar province long before any extra US troops were sent”.

“For the first six months of the troop escalation, high rates of violence continued unabated. That is suspicious. What exactly were US troops doing differently from September than they were doing in May, such that there was such a big change? The answer to that question is simply not clear. Note that the troop escalation only brought US force strength up to what it had been in late 2005. In a country of 27 million, 30,000 extra US troops are highly unlikely to have had a really major impact when they had not before.”

Besides, Cole also mentioned the ethnic cleansing: “As best I can piece it together, what actually seems to have happened was that the escalation troops began by disarming the Sunni Arabs in Baghdad. Once these Sunnis were left helpless, the Shiite militias came in at night and ethnically cleansed them. Shaab district near Adhamiya had been a mixed neighborhood. It ended up with almost no Sunnis. Baghdad in the course of 2007 went from 65 per cent Shiite to at least 75 percent Shiite and maybe more. My thesis would be that the United States inadvertently allowed the chasing of hundreds of thousands of Sunni Arabs out of Baghdad (and many of them had to go all the way to Syria for refuge).”

Cole added, “Of course, General David Petraeus took courageous and effective steps to try to stop bombings in markets and so forth. But I am sceptical that most of these techniques had macro effects. Big population movements because of militia ethnic cleansing are more likely to account for big changes in social statistics.” Besides, the US was successful in Anbar because of the split between Al-Qaida in Iraq and the more nationalist insurgent groups, not due to the Surge.”

Khadim too was sceptical about the Surge. Commenting on the US military alliance with the Sunni tribes in Anbar, he said: “They will take your money, but when the money runs out, they will change sides again.”

PETRAEUS 'AMBUSHED'

The highly decorated parachutist was himself unclear about what the Iraq invasion of 2003, in general, and the Surge, in particular, intended to achieve—at the back of his mind Petraeus knew he had failed. When the Bronze Star winner General and then Ambassador to Iraq Clark Ryan Crocker testified before the Senate on the Surge progress report on September 11, 2007, their ambiguity and lack of conviction was exposed. In reply to Word War II veteran and then Republican Senator from Virginia John Warner's (left)question that whether Petraeus' strategy would make America safer, the General's replied like a nincompoop: “I don't know that Iraq victory will make America safer. Sir, I don't know actually. I have not sat down and sorted out in my own kind. What I have focussed on is to how to accomplish the mission of the multi-national force in Iraq.”

Warner's party colleague and then Senator from Nebraska Chuck Hagel (right)had Petraeus and Crocker in a tighter spot. "The Green Zone in the last few days has been rocketed and mortared, we took casualties there.... The reality is since the Surge in January 2007, we have lost 1,000 American soldiers. General, you said in March last year, 'There is no military solution to a problem like that of the insurgency in Iraq. A political resolution is what will determine in the long run the success of that effort.' When you were here in September, you both noted that the Surge was to buy time for some political resolution or, at least, some accommodation.”

Hagel caught Petraeus unawares further: “Couple of weeks ago in an interview in The Washington Post you, General, said: "No one in the US and Iraqi government feels that there has been sufficient progress by any means in the area of national reconciliation.”

As Petraeus and Crocker listened speechless, the Senator stressed the guiding principle behind government's military policies and the accountability they demand: "If we are to be held accountable... elected officials for anyone thing, we should be held accountable to developing and setting policy worthy of the sacrifices of our men and women that we ask to implement policy."

GREATEST DEBACLES

The failure of the Surge was Petraeus' third unsuccessful and desperate attempt to register a military success in Iraq—but the wily General has always turned fiascos into glitte

SOLDIERS WITH SCRUPLES

It resembles a gargantuan squid hurtling towards you with enormous speed, its fearful tentacles bracing up for the kill and its frightening eyes fixed on the prey. You empty your M16A2 rifle—which fires a 5.56-mm bullet at a muzzle velocity of 2,800 feet per second—fitted with the M203 40-mm grenade launcher to flatten the devouring monster. But the tentacles are furiously fast to dodge every volley, and you are startled to discover that it is actually a mirage that has claimed several collateral targets—men, women and children—when you fired your service weapon recklessly. You are safe, but maimed and badly scarred mentally, desperately looking for a prosthetic for your amputated spirit and to hobble honourably for the rest of your life—the damage is too gory to forget.

Democracy Now!—a syndicated programme of news, analysis, and opinion aired by more than 700 radio and television, satellite and cable TV networks in North America—aired some 'men of honour' in May who were conscientious enough to admit their complicity in the unscrupulous orders of their superiors, felt shame and disgust in treating Iraqis inhumanly, termed the American occupation inhuman and illegal, and advocated strong action against some of their high-ranking commanding officers—including former commander of American forces in Iraq and present head of US Central Command David H Petraeus. And they can still walk honourably without a crutch for they are “Winter Soldiers on the Hill”. These war veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan testified before the Congressional Progressive Caucus at Capitol Hill and gave a first-hand account of the horrors of war.

Amy Goodman, the terrific hostess of Democracy Now!, explained before the testimonies were aired: “Like the Winter Soldier hearings in March 2008, when more than 200 service members gathered for four days in Silver Spring, Maryland, to give their eyewitness accounts of the injustices occurring in Iraq Afghanistan, “Winter Soldier on the Hill” was designed to drive home the human cost of the war and occupation—this time, to the very people in charge of doing something about it.”

Amy further explained, “The name Winter Soldier has been derived from the name of a similar event held in 1971, when hundreds of Vietnam veterans gathered in Detroit. The term was derived from the opening line of Thomas Paine's pamphlet The Crisis, published in 1776, which read, 'These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman'.”

Consumed by shame and regret and their souls shattered by the shards of war, these 'soldiers with scruples' were visibly scarred as they narrated their harrowing and horrifying experiences on and off the battlefield. Former Marine Corp Scout/Sniper Sergio Kochergin (above, in the middle with a beard) was the first to shoot, giving behind-the-scene account of the initial days of the US invasion of Iraq. “It was very hard to see the pain in people's eyes... from their losses they begun to cry... they said it was our fault, the planes killed them.”

Once, Kochergin and his fellow soldiers were instructed to guard an ammuntion supply point in Al-Najaf city—capital of Al-Najaf governorate in central Iraq and located about 160 km south of Baghdad—and take action against anyone trying to steal the weapons. The former sniper mentioned how the High Command had instructed them to “roughen up everybody, that they could not trust anybody and put as much fear as possible... instill fear into people on every chance we got.”

Kochergin also explained the “drop weapon” strategy, which he witnessed on duty in Al Anbar province. US Army personnel were supplied AK-47s whenever they killed unarmed people so that they could be planted on their bodies to make it look like real encounters. These weapons were supplied by the higher chain of command, he added. Kochergin went on to add how within two months of deployment, the rules of engagement changed drastically: any Iraqi carrying a bag and a shovel was to be considered a suspect. “We killed innocent people.... We got approval to kill anyone with a bag and a shovel.” He and his unit were ultimately “tired of killing people and wanted to go home”.

Kochergin also exposed how the US had rendered them vulnerable to attacks by providing outdated equipment, and questioned the allocation of massive amounts of money to logistics when the situation was abysmal as ever. Shockingly, Kochergin was using an M-16 of '70s make, and the Hummers even lacked the basic safety mechanism.

Finally, Kochergin mentioned how the Army Command even dubbed mentally-scarred soldiers on their return as “cowards”. And psychologists, instead of counselling, suggested alcohol as the best way to overcome the tremendous stress and guilt. “The Marine should have never gone to Iraq,” he asserted.

Former US Army Captain Luis Montalvan (above, to Kochergin's right), 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment, who had worked extensively for General Petraeus, further exposed America's laxity towards the urgent requirement of more resources and troops in Iraq. “I wrote countless memorandums for more resources and personnel... but was never answered. I was given unlawful orders to stop humanitarian assistance to refugees caught between the Syrian and Iraqi borders. I disobeyed them,” he said. He added how “General Petraeus never heeded to requests of his subordinate officers for more troops and resources”… and painted a
rosy picture as the country slipped into a civil war. Montalvan advocated
court martial of such generals.

Montalvan also mentioned American callousness towards the spiralling insurgency. As of March 2006, no system to track immigration or emigration between Iraq and Syria was installed. From 2005-07, the absence of such a mechanism contributed to the instability of Iraq as foreign fighters and criminals frequently crossed the border at will. For the past year-and-a-half, Montalvan and other Iraq vets have co-authored several pieces in the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle “raising the issue of dereliction of duty by generals who have been promoted... and continue to perpetuate lies”.

The High Command was also perpetuating the dangerous trend of Army bravado and machoism in tackling even ordinary citizens, who had earlier been repressed by dictator Saddam Hussein and were now enraged by the foreign occupation. Rifleman and Automatic Machine Gunner Vincent GR Emanuele, 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Alpha Company, 3rd Platoon, who was deployed in Al-Qa'im town, located nearly 400 kms north-west of Baghdad near the Syrian border and situated along the Euphrates River in Anbar province.

Between 2002 and 2006, he was jolted as the disgusting events unfolded. Emanuele narrated how taking potshots at cars that drove by was a regular feature of the Army. At times, the soldiers did not even fire warning shots at cars that pulled by roadsides before targeting them. “Thus was not the best way to become friendly with an already-hostile population,” he said. When under mortar fire, American soldiers, at times, responded with mortars without specific target information, “hitting buildings, houses and businesses”. “We rarely conducted battle damage assessment... no investigation was done and many incidents went unreported.... Because of the hostile intent, our unit had a general disdain and distaste for Iraqis and Iraq.”

A repentant Emanuele described how several innocent prisoners from the unit's detention facility were frequently left in the desert. “Desert because we dropped them off in the middle of nowhere. If they were not innocent, why were they not sent to a permanent detention facility?” While they were being transported, these innocent people were punched, kicked, butt-stroked, abused and harassed by Army personnel, he added. Other forms of inhuman treatment included addressing Iraqis as Hajis or sand niggers.

Months of deployment in a hot and hostile foreign land, under the perpetual fear of being terminated in an ambush or maimed by an improvised explosive device, and a high-pressure job started taking toll on the soldiers' personal lives. Emanuele said, “Several members of my platoon had divorces and separations.... Many of us did not think dying in Iraq was honourable... and did not want to be get deployed a second or third time.” Many Marines, including Emanuele, “turned to drugs and alcohol to cope with the horrors of this bloody occupation”.



As Emanuele's heartwrenching account ended, a soul-stirring song with a video showing coffins containing bodies of soldiers killed in Iraq and stressing the hollowness of war played during the break. The lyrics force you to think twice about military conflicts:

He's five foot-two, and he's six feet-four,
He fights with missiles and with spears.
He's all of thirty-one, and he's only seventeen,
Been a soldier for a thousand years.

He's a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain,
A Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew.
And he knows he shouldn't kill,
And he knows he always will,
Kill you for me my friend and me for you.

And he's fighting for Canada,
He's fighting for France,
He's fighting for the USA,
And he's fighting for the Russians,
And he's fighting for Japan,
And he thinks we'll put an end to war this way.

And he's fighting for Democracy,
He's fighting for the Reds,
He says it's for the peace of all.
He's the one who must decide,
Who's to live and who's to die,
And he never sees the writing on the wall.

But without him,
How would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone,
He's the one who gives his body
As a weapon of the war,
And without him all this killing can't go on.

He's the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame,
His orders come from far away no more,
They come from here and there and you and me,
And brothers can't you see,
This is not the way we put the end to war.

After the break, Former Marine Corp Sergeant Adam Kokesh blasted the government brass for flouting the US Constitution: “The greatest enemies of the Constitution are not be found in the sands of Fallujah (a city in Al Anbar, located roughly 69 kms west of Baghdad on the Euphrates) but right here in Wasghingtion DC.”

Kokesh repented his involvement in an incident during his attachment to Golf Company 2/1 before the siege of Fallujah. An Iraqi returning home after work in his car was approaching a military checkpoint and failed to notice a Humvee camouflaged in desert pattern. A suspicious Marine thinking that the vehicle was too fast immediately emptied his 50-calibre machine gun on it. “We justified it by saying that there were ammunition rounds in the vehicle that started going off due to heat. There were no rounds.” The second volley hit the man's chest so hard that it broke his seat. Later, the 'prized kill' was snapped with Kokesh posing next to the vehicle. “I am very ashamed of the picture posing with the dead Iraqi,” a sombre Kokesh said.

Under strict orders from their superiors, the soldiers were so reckless in dealing with Iraqis that even the faintest suspicion led to an assault. “During the siege of Fallujah, our rules of engagement changed so frequently that we were often uncertain of them.... Anyone with binoculars or cell phone would be legitimate target,” he added.

Fromer Marine Corp Corporal James Gilligan (with partially shaven head in the picture above that of the cemetery), who had served in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, was involved in the Operation Iraqi Freedom. His version supported Emanuele's examples of sadistic American approach towards Iraqis. Once surrounded by a non-hostile crowd, Gilligan's Sergeant suddenly lifted a child of seven or eight years old in the air and almost choked him with “his pistol pointed towards his head and neck area”. Gilligan, who was also part of the team that searched for weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), corroborated Kochergin's version of lack of proper safety mechanisms. “During the initial invasion, my Humvee had plastic doors.... And, we never found WMDs,” he added.

As Gilligan finished, another break followed, and another song played describing how the Army recruits young Americans promising a bright future.

The army recruiters in the parking lot...
Listen young man, listen to my plan
Gonna make you money, make you man
Here's what you get an M-16 and a Kevlar vest
You might come home with one less leg
But these things are surely keep a bullet out of your chest
So c'mon c'mon sign on c'mon
This one is nothing like Vietnam
Except for the bullets, except for the bombs.

What followed was a question-answer session with lawmakers asking these 'heroes' about the dehumanising aspect of military training, and their experiences. Democrat Representative from California Barbara Lee asked about the war psychology of dehumanising soldiers so that atrocities committed by them during occupation have minimal emotional impact on them, and how does it affect soldiers emotionally? She also invited suggestion on how to stop suicide attempts by Iraq-returned soldiers.

Former Army Sergeant Kristofer Goldsmith described how during initial training days trainees repeatedly stab a dummy with bayonets and yell, “KILL”. This is the first step to dehumanise soldiers, he said. Drill sergeants say a popular thing which trainees have to repeat: “Soldiers, what makes the green grass grow? Blood, blood, blood.” “I refused to say it,” he added.

Former Army National Guard Geoffrey Millard said, “As Iraq War Veterans Against The War, we have started a counselling group in Washington DC. We are not going to wait for politicians to end the war, we end the war everyday in what we do.”

Democrat Representative from Minnesota Keith Ellison asked whether the situation in Iraq would really deteriorate, as claimed by the US, if American forces withdraw and is America the glue holding the Iraqi society together?.

Before Montalvan could answer, he had a temporary amnesia—perhaps due to brain damage caused by the ordeal—with Kokash correcting him. He continued saying that this [the terrible consequences of withdrawal] was an assumption made by the highest echelon of the Army who have lied and misrepresented the situation on the ground. “There is no doubt that a withdrawal from Iraq is going to increase bloodshed, humanitarian refugees and sufferings," he said, but asked whether should the US fund with billions of dollars of tax payer's money an endeavour with no clearly defined objectives and for an unknown period of time. “Tribal leaders will sort out matters on their own,” he added. Kokash added, “It will be worse the longer we stay there.”

Ellison's last question raised the issue of abuse, particularly that of prisoners, and its impact on the general population. “What does things like Abu Ghraib and other abuses... do to the average Iraqi who may not hold any enmity towards the United States or US soldiers, but after their cousin uncle, aunt or wife has been abused? What does it do to them and to your security?

Gilligan answered the obvious—which the US government and the Army has conveniently overlooked—“When you meet an Iraqi teenage male... who is experienced in conflict... occupation going on in the last five years in his homeland, his neighbourhood, his streets and his schools. You are meeting people who know what exactly the Marine Air Wing is capable of, what our prison systems are like, they know what our responses are going to be to gunfire, mortar fire and sniper attack? And they are doing it and they are doing it good. They are doing it consistently and they are trying to continue this resistance, and this act of resistance is not going to end until we are actually out of that country.”

Eminent columnist *Chris Hedges rightly sums up the courage of such soldiers and the US indifference towards them: "Those who return to speak this truth, such as members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, are our contemporary prophets. But like all prophets they are condemned and ignored for their courage. They struggle, in a culture awash in lies, to tell what few They have the fortitude to digest. They know that what we are taught in school, in worship, by the press, through the entertainment industry and at home, that the melding of the state’s rhetoric with the rhetoric of religion, is empty and false."

Hedges adds: The words these prophets speak are painful. We, as a nation, prefer to listen to those who speak from the patriotic script. We prefer to hear ourselves exalted. If veterans speak of terrible wounds visible and invisible, of lies told to make them kill, of evil committed in our name, we fill our ears with wax.... We do not listen to the angry words that cascade forth from their lips, wishing only that they would calm down, be reasonable, get some help, and go away. We, the deformed, brand our prophets as madmen. We cast them into the desert. And this is why so many veterans are estranged and enraged. This is why so many succumb to suicide or addictions."

What goes on in the mind of a war veteran when he returns to civilian life after witnessing bloodshed and suffering personal losses was best summed up by Jake Gyllenhaal in the 2005 movie Jarhead: “A man fires a rifle for many years, and he goes to war. And afterward he turns the rifle in at the armoury, and he believes he's finished with the rifle. But no matter what else he might do with his hands, love a woman, build a house, change his son's diaper; his hands remember the rifle.”

Gyllenhaal played the role of former Marine Anthony Swofford, who wrote his memoir by the same name as that of the movie—the best-selling book describes his pre-Desert Storm experiences in Saudi Arabia and fighting in Kuwait. Jarhead is a slang used to refer to Marines (sometimes by Marines themselves). After leaving the Marine Corps, Swofford initially found it difficult to adapt to civilian life. “It felt strange to be in a place without having someone telling me to throw my gear in a truck and go somewhere,” he said.

WAR IS WRONG: more than 4,223 US soldiers have been killed and another 30,182 injured since the 2003 invasion. BESIDES, MORE THAN A LAKH IRAQIS HAVE DIED SINCE THE MISADVENTURE.

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* Chris Hedges is a senior fellow at The Nation Institute and a Lecturer in the Council of the Humanities and the Anschutz Distinguished Fellow at Princeton University. He spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. Hedges, who has reported from more than fifty countries, worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, where he spent 15 years.

He is the author of the best selling War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, which draws on his experiences in various conflicts to describe the patterns and behavior of nations and individuals in wartime. The book, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, was described by Abraham Verghese, who reviewed the book for The New York Times, as “... a brilliant, thoughtful, timely and unsettling book whose greatest merit is that it will rattle jingoists, pacifists, moralists, nihilists, politicians and professional soldiers equally.”

Hedges was part of The New York Times team that won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for the paper’s coverage of global terrorism and he received the 2002 Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. He was an early and vocal critic of the plan to invade and occupy Iraq.

PREPOSTEROUS PROPOSITION

Why the media goes into orgasmic fits whenever the United States concocts a delectable dish with distasteful ingredients like India and Pakistan? What is aroma for the US and the media is a unbearable pong for India as it very well knows that for a 'terrorist nation' that wants its obliteration and lusts after terror and nuclear proliferation cooperation will be 'unpatriotic'.

Right from The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) and AFP to the PTI and the Dawn gave ample space to the purported intelligence sharing between India and Pakistan at the 'prodding of Uncle Sam'. The conviction with which WSJ “intelligence reporter” Siobhan Gorman explains that “it may be right for longtime rivals Pakistan and India to forge an alliance that allows for greater intelligence sharing with the US” is at best a supersonic flight by America into the realm of impossibility.

The peg of US assumption would rankle even the dumbest: “Washington hopes the cooperation will get a lift from last week's Indian elections, in which the incumbent Congress Party won by a wide margin over a Hindu nationalist party traditionally more hostile to Pakistan,” the reports states. Amazing!

And how could the US miss the palate-teasing ingredient Kashmir for it hopes that “a calming of tensions can allow India's Congress Party government, strengthened by its election victory, to resume peace talks with Pakistan over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir". And the American dessert after the platter was too frosty to take even a small scoop: "American officials believe that the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) orchestrated the Mumbai assault specifically to undermine the peace process”.

To remind America and the WSJ, the there Indo-Pak wars (1947, '65 and '71) before the Kargil intrusion ('99) were fought when the Congress was in power. The “Hindu nationalist party” or the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was in power during the Kargil War. In fact, then Prime Minister (PM) Atal Bihari Vajpayee—who belonged to the BJP—had signed the Lahore Declaration with his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif in Lahore itself on on February 21, 1999. The agreement was supposed to overcome the historically strained bilateral relations between the two nations. But then Pakistan started sending its Northern Light Infantry personnel in the guise of intruders to Kargil under explicit orders from its Chief of Army staff General Pervez Musharraf. And when India retaliated, a full-scale war was inevitable.

Clearly, the squirrelly connection between the Congress' win and such an “alliance” between the two fiercely antagonistic nations defies logic.

The idiotic and fanciful idea—if at all it has materialised as the US claims, and continues—is a sheer mirage. After decades of animosity between a belligerent Pakistan and pacifistic India, the concept is anathema to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Pakistani military establishment as well. And if India thinks on similar lines too, another 26/11 is not too far as Pakistan has excelled the art of digging trenches under the facade of cooperation.

To expect the ISI, which is closely interwind with the Taliban and the al-Qaeda, to share its secrets is like chasing the chimera. Many years ago, former ISI chief Hamid Gul admitted to History Channel that he had lunched with al-Qaeda head Osama bin Laden and was all praises for “doughty and fiercely independent” members of the two terror groups.

The WSJ report further states quoting US officials, “The Central Intelligence Agency arranged for Pakistan and India to share information on LeT, the group widely blamed for last November's terrorist attack on Mumbai, as well as on Taliban commanders who are leading the insurgency against Pakistan's government.” The US is stressing to Indian and Pakistani leaders that they face a common threat in Pakistan-based militant groups.

The Mumbai terror attacks clearly exposed Pakistan's collusion with the LeT. The consequent flip-flop by Islamabad on joint investigation into 26/11, its denial of the Pakistani identity of Ajmal Amir Kasab—the lone surviving terrorist in the Mumbai siege—and lack of action against LeT chief Hafeez Mohammed Sayeed and the other perpetrators of the violence further ripped apart its claims of innocence. Under US pressure, Pakistan just detained six people, partially mollifying the Indian outrage. “We have to satisfy the Mumbai question, and show India that the threat is abating," said a US official involved in developing Washington's South Asia strategy, according to WSJ.

Washington hopes that when India sees the intelligence and evidence that Islamabad is seriously fighting the militants in some areas, it will ease its deployments against Pakistan—which in turn would prompt Islamabad to put even more focus on the battle at home, the report adds.
It mentions Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari's wishful thinking that the Indian government, boosted by the Congress' victory, could result in removal of one or two Army divisions from the Pakistan border in coming months. But an Indian official, according to the report, “documented an escalation of cross-border infiltrations by Pakistani militants into Kashmir”.

Amid the strange possibility of such a preposterous idea, the report also quotes an ISI officer who cautions, “We're not going to tell them everything we know and they're not going to tell us everything they know. Nobody expects that to happen.... But we're talking about [the attack]. We weren't doing that in December." Though the official also says that India and Pakistan have shared “a lot” of information with each other about the Mumbai attack with the CIA initially acting as a conduit but the two countries.

According to America, under this brilliant model of cooperation, “India gets information on groups that threaten it, including the one that carried out the Mumbai attacks”. And Pakistan gets “more trust from India that it is serious about taking on militants”. Finally, the US gets “sharper Pakistani focus on the battle against the Taliban and al Qaeda”. Though the report also mentions the American apprehension by quoting a US official that “Washington isn't under any illusions about the difficulty of erasing decades-old suspicions between India and Pakistan”.

The CIA and other intelligence agencies are tracking the location of cellphones of Taliban commanders and their training camps. The report says that the US shares this information with Pakistan, and sometimes with India, to reinforce the US argument that the Taliban threat to Pakistan is greater than the Indian threat. Uncle Sam definitely gains from such intel, but how sharing reports of progress against militants in Bajaur, Swat, and Buner with India would help us is beyond comprehension.

Similarly, AFP quotes Michele Flournoy, Undersecretary of Defense for policy, “The administration hopes that in the aftermath of elections in India the two governments could resume steps to reduce tensions. I would love to see the Indian government and the Pakistan government re-engage in confidence-building measures and discussions about Kashmir and about other areas of difference.”

The Dawn published the WSJ report verbatim. Most news agencies who splashed the “cooperation” had based their reports on the WSJ story.

Besides, the reports—including the one by WSJ—were one-sided with no Indian version.

The sudden US interest in the region, now called Af-Pak, not only smacks of brazen hypocrisy, but also shows its foreign policy in poor light. America looked the other way after exit of the erstwhile USSR forces from Afghanistan and left the beautiful country to be riven by warlords battling for supremacy, and the ever-booming opium trade.

America continued its biased foreign policy when the Taliban were in the saddle in Afghanistan in September 1996—then Pakistani PM Benazir and its staunchest ally the US, in fact, bolstered the terror group with military and financial support, according to the book Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, written by Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist and writer Steve Coll.

India has been reeling under Pakistan-sponsered terrorism since late Pakistani President and Army chief Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq launched Operation Topaz—that visualised cutting India and thereby bleeding it by a thousand cuts—in 1989 in Jammu and Kashmir. Therefore, fanciful ideas such as intel sharing between India and Pakistan don't deserve so much prominence in the media.

GREAT INDIAN POLL WALTZ

The writing's on the wall: the ballot is not only stronger than the bullet, but can also force you into oblivion if you fail to gauge the electorate's mood, remain glued to dogmatic beliefs and continue to flush the voter down like poop after every election.

The 2009 poll dance was fiercely competitive, pulsated with verve like the former concours, but hobbled contestants and made it clear that those puffed up with overconfidence had killed their chances of a wild card entry. And those who couldn't read the audience's mind were panting for breath at the end and made a disgraceful exit.

The saffron and the Red brigade tumbled down the stage and were zapped by the verdict. The characteristic swagger suddenly resembled flawed movements that elicited derision from the viewers, who wanted a winner that could lead the nation without the crutches of selfish coalitions and be savagely loyal to them. “We need gallops, not saunters,” the voter ruled.

Stuck in the old rut of communal politics and Stone Age-mindset, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was swept away by the 'tsunami of young India'. Like MJ Akbar wrote in The Times of India that “India is not a secular nation because Indian Muslims want it to be secular. India is a secular nation because Indian Hindus want it to be secular.” It is a reality the BJP better get accustomed to; otherwise, it will again meet the fate of John McCain—though he's still surviving—who failed miserably last year despite whipping up racist sentiments and 'hollow nationalism', and finally lost the game to Barack Obama.

With 50 per cent of the Indian electorate young, the voter was in no mood to press the button for a party and its affiliate organisations whose 'hoodlums' could bash them for pubbing, or caressing on Valentine's Day. Besides, the party had completely forgotten that it was not the '90s; it could no more force-feed the 'young India' its stinking concoction of communalism and retrograde thinking.

And haven't we had enough of 'young guns' of the saffron outfit—the vituperating Varun Gandhi. The enfant terrible of the BJP was definitely much bigger for the shoes of his maverick father; the way he tried to breach the secular bastion of Pilibhit with his communal volleys shook both the public, the political class and the government. It had to take the National Security Act to block the 'communal cannon', which threatened to blast the secular fabric in a way similar to LK Advani's 'Chariot of fire'. Of course, the invocation of the act was a clear political vendetta by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati. But what might have shocked the voter—though the other Gandhi won the Lok Sabha seat—was the party's decision to still field him despite the Election Commission recommending the withdrawal of his candidature.

Coming to our overzealous Comrades—the worst of the worse and Chinese stooges—biting the bullet is the only way they can show some grace. The cacophonous bugle of secularism, the anti-NDA and BJP stance, and the non-existent Third Front, was too blaring for voters, who had sensed this time that the Left switches side and deceives them as fast as the camouflaging chameleon bamboozles its adversaries. The Communists' sudden withdrawal of support to the United Progressive Alliance government last year in the wake of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal was enough to wipe them off. Besides, the alacrity with which the West Bengal government alloted agricultural land to the Tatas for the Nano factory had scarred the rural voter beyond any cure. And Mamata was quick to grease the anti-Nano juggernaut to her advantage, claiming 18 more Lok Sabha seats and overshadowing her poor performance in the last slugfest.

Some overexcited participants suffering with acute verbal diarrhoea like Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad even admitted their fault in waltzing alone after skidding ignominiously. The bucolic 'son of Bihar'—who had boasted of 'gyrating with public support'—conceded that without the Congress prosthetic, it was a futile attempt to make a mark. The mere thought of some Congressman snatching his baby, the Railways, from his lap had the otherwise belligerent Lalu in the appeasing mode.

Shape up or ship out: that's what India wants.

(Photo credit: nytimes.com)