Terrorism is the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives. - US Federal Bureau of Investigation
Read the sentence carefully. You didn’t hear it on any corporate media newscast since 9/11. It’s the official US FBI definition of terrorism. In its official definition, the FBI does not limit terrorism to stateless individuals or groups. In its official definition, the FBI does not suggest that terrorism cannot be perpetrated by the leader of a nation state. But even more amazing is that the official FBI definition of terrorism describes exactly what George Bush did in the aftermath of the attacks of 9/11!
APPLYING THE DEFINITION
George W. Bush, in his unprovoked attack against the sovereign nation of Iraq, openly violated the UN Charter, to which the US is a signatory. The Charter's core principles contained in Article 2(4) and Article 51 prohibit one nation from attacking another except in self-defense or with the authority of the U.N. In effect, George Bush launched an unlawful use of force against persons and property.
The invasion launched by George W. Bush was heralded by the most frightening and powerful use of force and military violence in recent history. His Shock and Awe bombardment of Baghdad was designed to intimidate and coerce the government as well as the civilian population of that nation to change its existing leadership. That, in itself, was a political objective.
The purpose of the invasion and ensuing occupation of Iraq was to replace the existing dictatorship with an American-backed form of democracy that would not permit the emergence of a government headed by the majority Shia religious leadership. These motives were unquestionably political and social.
So, what part of the FBI definition of “terrorism” do the voters of the United States not understand? And what acts of terrorism as defined by the FBI do the voters of the United States not recognize? Is there any doubt at all that the Bush administration committed acts of terrorism when it unlawfully used force and violence against the nation of Iraq to intimidate and coerce its government and the civilian population, in furtherance of the Bush/PNAC political and social objectives.
Therefore, by any definition, if George W. Bush is guilty of terrorism, he can accurately be identified as a TERRORIST. And if he is truly a terrorist, it is only fitting that George W. Bush be scrutinized in terms of his success in that capacity. What is his standing among the other murderous terrorist activity in the world today? Is it possible that George W. Bush actually has claim to being the very BEST at something during his reign in office? Let’s look at the figures.
MIRROR, MIRROR ON THE WALL WHO’S THE LEADING TERRORIST OF ALL?
THE CONTEST
EVERYONE ELSE: Despite the protestations of George W. Bush to the contrary, we are NOT safer now by any stretch of the imagination. According to an NBC report at the beginning of September, 2004, there were roughly 2,929 terrorism related deaths around the world since the 9/11 attacks. Of these, 58 per cent of them – 1,709 – occurred in 2004 - this year!
Repeat: The total number of deaths in the entire world at the hands of terrorists since George W. Bush declared a War on Terror, amounts to around 3,000. Add the terrible losses in the United States on that fateful morning of September 11th, and we reach somewhere in the vicinity of 6,000 precious, innocent lives. Again: In only three years, terrorists around the world took the lives of approximately six thousand people.
GEORGE W. BUSH: In pursuit of his arrogant and PNAC-driven political and social objectives in Iraq, George W. Bush has the blood of thousands of innocent civilians on his hands. To cover his guilt, early in the war, the US government ordered the Iraqi Ministry of Health to stop counting civilian deaths, and forbade them from releasing any totals previously gathered. The image of a surgical war, dominated by smart bombs and resulting in very few civilian casualties was televised to the American public throughout the hostilities.
As a result, the number of civilian casualties in Iraq is probably vastly under-estimated. According to Human Rights Watch, many of the civilian deaths were the direct result of weapons that should never have been used in populated areas. Among these were nearly 2 million submunitions which fail to explode immediately and killed people long after the initial conflict had ended. In addition, the strategy of decapitation bombing killed many civilians while it failed to kill a single Iraqi military leader in 50 attempts.
According to the Christian Science Monitor, civilian losses in Iraq have been severe. They used the research results of a group of British and Americans who surveyed media reports of casualties as well as eyewitness accounts to conclude that between 8,789 and 10,638 Iraqi civilians have died since war began March 19, 2003. That puts George Bush in the lead for most successful terrorist, big time.
As of September, 2004, IraqBodyCount.net placed the Iraqi civilian death total at a minimum of 11,793 and a maximum of 13,802. On September 8th, 2004 the AP reported that no official, reliable figures existed for the whole country, but private estimates ranged from 10,000 to 30,000 killed since the United States invaded in March 2003. Whatever count you accept, George W. Bush wins, big time.
If we go with the lowball figure, - the very least estimate of Iraqi civilians killed as a direct result of the unlawful invasion and occupation of the country, George W. Bush still wins the title of the LEADING TERRORIST alive today, big time.
If we go with the lowest estimate, then the number 8,789 stands for the total civilian deaths caused by the invasion of Iraq in LESS THAN A YEAR AND A HALF. Contrast that number to the 6,000 deaths caused AROUND THE WORLD in THREE YEARS, by other terrorists. No matter how you look at it, George W. Bush wins, big time.
And that doesn’t include the estimated 3,485 civilian deaths in Afghanistan, - the country to which we sent only 11,000 troops to fight the Taliban. George W. Bush claimed victory in Iraq in his acceptance speech. What utter nonsense. The country is dangerous and explosive, and in the hands of the same warlords and Taliban chieftains who ruled before 9/11. Revisionist history by this administration is never challenged by the media. The list of Big Lies prevails.
And it doesn’t include the military deaths on all sides, or the kidnappings, or the contractor deaths or the wounded or the dying. It doesn’t count the deaths to come from the depleted uranium shells or the permanently maimed and psychologically affected.
George W. Bush, his handlers and his administration can be proud. The dubious title of LEADING TERRORIST now belongs to the most powerful man in the world who seeks another term of office to continue what he has begun.
The American corporate media refuse to address the totals. Doing so might result in an accusation of being unpatriotic or un-American. Doing so would challenge directives from the WH such as those that keep the nation from seeing the draped coffins of our military dead. Doing so might even influence the outcome of this crucial election.
How utterly shameful that is for this wonderful country and how tragic for the world.
Time to Recognize State Terror - These days, the Americans routinely fire missiles into Fallujah and other dense urban areas; they murder whole families.
“If You Harbor Terrorists, You Are a Terrorist” - While delegates to the GOP convention were congratulating themselves for their candidate’s tough stand against terrorism, the Bush administration was creating an international incident—little publicized in the United States—by harboring a notorious group of international terrorists on U.S. soil.
By Robert Rivas and Robert Windrem NBC News Updated: 10:43 a.m. ET Sept. 2, 2004 Of the roughly 2,929 terrorism-related deaths around the world since the attacks on New York and Washington, the NBC News analysis shows 58 percent of them — 1,709 — have occurred this year. In the past 10 days, in fact, the number of dead has risen by 142 people in places as diverse as Russia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Israel. On Tuesday, the number of civilians killed by terrorists totaled 38 — 10 at a subway entrance bombing in Moscow, 16 in a bus bombing in Israel and 12 Nepalese executed in Iraq. Moreover, the level of sophistication is increasing. Terrorism experts point in particular to the attacks apparently carried out by Chechen rebels during that 10-day period. The rebels, whose top military commanders have been Arabs, are operating at a whole different level.
September 33rd - Tom Engelhardt on the many thousands all over the world who have suffered, since 9/11, thanks to the Bush administration. - On that initial September 11th, thousands of people from many countries, all in three buildings, went to their deaths. By this September 33rd, three years later, in addition to those 1000-plus young Americans dead in Iraq; and another 132 in Afghanistan, and many thousands of Afghan civilians dead in our initial bombings and in the chaos as well as civil and guerrilla warfare that followed, the latest guesstimates on Iraqi civilian deaths go as high as 30,000 or more, not counting the thousands of Iraqi soldiers, often conscripts, who died in our several-week long invasion of the country. In the meantime, deaths worldwide from acts of terror, slaughters on trains in Spain, or in banks, hotels, and temples in Turkey, or in buses in Israel, or in the streets and clubs of Indonesia, or on the streets and in mosques in Pakistan, or in a classroom in Beslan -- often thanks to disparate movements, causes, reasons -- are significantly on the rise.
According to anti-war protest in London "World's No. 1 Terrorist" is Bush - Marchers carried signs reading "World's No. 1 Terrorist" over a picture of US President George W. Bush. British Prime Minister Tony Blair was also a target: other placards read "Out with Blair." - While the forum discussed a range of issues concerning privatization and globalization, the march was almost overwhelmingly devoted to opposition to the war in Iraq and the Bush administration.
WORSE THAN TERRORISM Editorial by Mike Schiller - September 20, 2004 Permission granted to republish, fwd, post, reproduce widely Please help spread the message!
Several newspapers recently estimated the number of Americans injured in Iraq now exceed 6,000. In addition to those figures are the over 1,000 Americans who were killed in Iraq… and for what? Surely this was never about terrorism, as it has been revealed that Saddam Hussein did not have any chemical weapons, nor the capability of developing them. This was always about corporate profits, and every single person in America knows that, but some people were willing to overlook that because they believed, naively, that Saddam Hussein may have also posed a terrorist threat. Everyone knew Bush did not believe his own rationale, but they pretended to think he believed it because most Americans have always harbored some paranoia about Iraq, ever since the first gulf war. Saturday Night Live skits, news casts, jokes told in television shows painted a picture of Saddam Hussein which left a lasting impression in people’s minds… that he was dangerous and determined to attack us. We now know that this was all nonsense. Yet some people still believe that Iraq has some relevance to the national security of the United States. Whenever one reason for supporting this war is proven false, they invent a new reason, one which is just as imaginary and untrue as the reason which preceded it.
They convince themselves the war is now suddenly justifiable because “Al Quaida now has a foothold in Iraq”, or “Religious extremists will start a civil war and the result will eventually increase the threat of terrorism”, or “We have to finish what we started or the Iraquis will be angry at us for leaving and then engage in terrorism”. All of these reasons are absurd. Even if you are dumb enough to believe these bogus excuses for Bush’s refusal to bring the troops home, consider this: The Iraq war has, now, statistically, harmed more Americans than the attacks of September 11th did. Over 7,000 Americans have been senselessly and purposelessly killed or wounded in Iraq. Even when the WTC casualty figures were at their most inflated estimates, they never exceeded 4,000. Once all the inaccuracies were corrected, the figures were lowered to somewhere in the 1,000 + range.
So Bush’s war in Iraq, which was never the American people’s war in the first place, has actually harmed more Americans than the September 11th attacks. Bush has now harmed more Americans than Osama Bin Laden. The war in Iraq is a greater threat to the American people than terrorism is. The continuation of the Iraq war is a worse scenario than that of another terrorist attack. Even if we were attacked by terrorists again, it is unlikely the death toll would be high enough to come close to the number of Americans Bush himself has killed with his narcissistic obsession with Iraq. Not even if the number was added to the September 11th numbers.
Don’t get me wrong. People are much more than numbers, and I understand in a very personal way how terrible September 11th was. I lost many of my neighbors that day. I could have died that day, given that I commuted through the World Trade Center every morning. Yet I would feel much safer in a world where terrorism was the worst thing I had to worry about, than I would in a world where a never-ending war was the worst thing I had to worry about. It is quite clear to me that terrorism, though dangerous, is nowhere near as dangerous as war. There is absolutely nothing positive which can be achieved from continued US military involvement in Iraq. The worse terrorist act imaginable cannot harm as many Americans as leaving our troops in Iraq would.
Bush’s war in Iraq has already devastated a larger number of American families than the September 11th attacks ever did. For the American people to tolerate the continuation of this war because it makes them feel safer is self-defeating. This war is already harming too many Americans, and it’s inflicting more harm than any terrorist attack ever could. This war in itself is a greater danger to the safety of the American people than anything else. There is no greater threat to our safety than this war, and not because it increases the likelihood of terrorism, but because the death toll is worse than that of terrorism.
I am not suggesting that we stop caring about terrorism, but that we understand that anti-terrorism efforts should be handled strictly by law enforcement as they always were. What should we be doing, as an alternative to this self-defeating involvement in the middle east? We should be increasing the size of our police forces, providing new police and FBI recruits with the best possible training, and expand the FBI and CIA without consolidating them. We should be giving out government grants to management firms that own skyscrapers so that they can install cutting edge technology which would enable them to sense a problem before it occurs, conduct an evacuation, and notify the authorities. We should have our entire military stationed here in the US, and deploy it domestically only for the purpose of responding to a specific threat or incident.
Our military should never have been involved in an overseas operation. Nothing could have been achieved by such a course of action, and nothing will be achieved by it. Yes, the September 11th attacks were a horrible, horrible thing which I hope and pray we as Americans never experience the likes of again. However, we need to be careful not to let our fears cause us to support a course of action which is more dangerous to our way of life than Al Quaida could ever be. Most of the arguments which an array of lawmakers and media pundits have tried to pound into our brains have been lies, manipulations, and propaganda. Even if some of the people who read this article do believe Iraq is relevant to our national security, they should seriously consider the fact that this state of war is, in itself, killing and maiming more Americans than a series of Al Quaida attacks ever could. We should not offer the souls of our young to Iraqui blood hunters as human sacrifices just because it gives us the illusion that those of us still living on American soil are somehow safer. The matter of domestic terrorism has always been dealt with by domestic law enforcement, and it always will be. Nothing that happens in the middle east will help our domestic law enforcement agencies, and thus nothing which happens in the middle east will have any affect on the question of whether we are or aren’t attacked by terrorists.
The war is worse than terrorism. If we are going to worry about something, we need to worry more about the prospect that a bunch of fools in Washington may be too ignorant to see that they are personally responsible for harming more Americans than Osama Bin Laden himself, and that their complicity in the continuation of this war poses a greater threat to the security of the American people than terrorism does.
