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It seems like a lost cause. A recent Gallop poll shows a large increase in anti-war sentiment. CNN reports two thirds of Americans oppose the war in Afghanistan. Yet there is no end in sight to the Afghanistan war. It is being compared to Vietnam by some very prominent people like Congressman Ron Paul and Col. Andrew Bacevich (video below), as well as many not so prominent but knowledgeable people, like most veterans (see the Winter Soldiers.

Some film clips provided by: ReThink Afghanistan, Sir! No Sir!; Some photos by: AfterDowningStreet.org, Chris-Floyd.com, and RAWA.org

Find more photos like this on The Stop War Project Network Help stop war. Embed the video and photo album above on your website.

The Vietnam War Reincarnated

This is another Vietnam. We can win nothing. It will cost immensely in lives and money, and the return will be less than nothing (ref. The Three Trillion Dollar War by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Blimes - read it). We will be left with tens of thousands of veterans facing lifetimes of disability, poor health, lost limbs and suffering families. These wars are simply made to profit the corporations who benefit from them, as usual. The Iraq war too continues will no commitment to get out of there, despite the fact that our presence there is an illegal racist genocide. But there are things you can do to stop these wars.

Why?

These wars persist because most people are not aware of the reality of what is going on. Most people believe the political rhetoric and corporate media propaganda that these wars are protecting America from terrorists like the ones who committed the 9-11 attacks. The facts are that these wars endanger our freedom more and more with every day. They continually commit genocide against innocent people in Iraq and Afghanistan. This motivates more and more people to join anti-American insurgencies. There are now more terrorists than ever. The military plays the facts down. They censor all media reports and photographs. Only a very few get through. The media reports that do get through are watered down. If you want to know the truth of what is going on, listen to the veterans who have been there and who have experienced the horror.

You can Stop War

You can stop war by listening to veterans. Post links to their websites and videos on your websites, and on your social networks like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Digg, NewsTrust. If you aren't familiar with these web services and social networks, go to their websites and sign up. Usually all you need is a username, password and email address. once you have accounts on these sites, post links to any stories you find, any video clips of veterans speaking out, any pictures of the truth about what goes on in these wars. Join our project, The Stop War Project, a Ning network. Post your pictures, videos, or blogs about war, on this or any other network. Tell the world your opinions. Post videos from YouTube or anywhere else you find them. Let your friends know. All of these social networks have a feature to let you add friends. all you need is their email address, or if they are already on those networks just invite them to the cause. Use those features to invite all your friends, relatives and contacts to join up, or at least read about the truth. Visit the many veterans against war websites. You will be amazed at how many veterans and honorable military organizations opposed these lawless genocidal wars. Have a problem with the term genocide? Read how the people who know this term best define it, The Holocaust Museum. If you have any problems with any of this, we are here to help. Post a comment here or let us know. We'll put up a tutorial or respond with detailed information. You can also find help on the web. All of these websites have extensive help documentation and even help lines. If we must live with these wars then we should face up to what we are paying for. Americans should admit their country is a racist genocidal warmongering nation. Write your Congressman and tell them what you think. Many of these veteran and anti-war organizations have mailing lists and will keep you informed of opportunities to write your Congressman or to participate in other ant-war activities. Join them.

A Racist America

Do you think America is not racist? Do the police in our cities drop bombs on neighborhoods where there are gangs, who commit domestic terrorism by killing people in the streets? Do we wipe out entire neighborhoods of innocent people just to get to a few terrorists? No. So why do we do that in other countries? Ask a veteran. They don't understand it either. I think the reason is because they are not Americans. They are not white. They are not Christians, and we are a racist nation. So our leaders have no problem with racist preemptive genocide. If you disagree, then get into the fray. Make your arguments. Compare what you have to say with what veterans who have been there say. Read the books and watch the movies that reveal the truth. Link to them on your social networks and pass them on to al your friends. This is what you can do to stop war.

Social Web Networks and Services:

Facebook - Network with family, friends, acquaintances. Join or create groups. Post links, pictures, and video. Link up with other networks.

Twitter - Post 140 character messages with a link. Follow others Twitterers. MySpace- Network with family, friends, acquaintances. Join or create groups. Post blogs, links, pictures,music, and video.

Digg - Post links to news items on the web. Vote and comment on other Digg posts.

NewsTrust - Submit your review of news stories on the web. Review other posted stories. Review other reviews. Delicious - Post bookmarks to favorite web links and news items. Make feeds of your links based on keywords you assign. Flickr -post pictures. Join groups. Make contacts. Look at pictures. Make photo albums like ours. Blogger - Create you own blog website for free. Includes free hosting and many gadgets and widgets, like feeds, blog editor, layout, and themes. Wordpress - Create you own blog website for free (like this one). Does not include hosting but is easy to setup on your website. Includes many gadgets and widgets, like feeds, blog editor, layout, and themes.

Ning - Create your own free social network, with picture albums, video, music, and many gadgets

Current.com - News video/documentary website. Upload your video. Post news limks.

Anti-War Veterans' Groups:

IVAW (Iraq Veterans Against the War)

VVAW (Vietnam Veterans Against the War)

VAIW (Veterans Against the Iraq War) West Point Graduates Against the War Service Academy Graduates Against the War Veterans For Peace Operation Homefront Veterans For America Center On Conscience And War The Central Committee For Conscientious Objectors

Follow the Stop War Project on Social Networks

On Current: StopWarProject On Facebook join The Stop War Project On Twitter follow StopWarProject On Ning join The Stop War Project On MySpace join The Stop War Project Many of the other organizations listed also have groups on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter

Books

The Three Trillion Dollar War by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes The War Within by Bob Woodward Conservatives Without Conscience by John Dean Worse than Watergate by John Dean The 25 Year War: America's Military Role in Vietnam by General Bruce Palmer, Jr. Blackwater - In his gripping bestseller, awardwinning journalist Jeremy Scahill takes us from the bloodied streets of Iraq to hurricane-ravaged New Orleans to the chambers of power in Washington, to expose Blackwater as the frightening new face of the U.S. war machine. ...and there are more. Post your suggestions.

Films, Web Series, Media

Rethink Afghanistan - Documentary film and website and Iraq for Sale - Acclaimed director Robert Greenwald (Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, Outfoxed and Uncovered) takes you inside the lives of soldiers, truck drivers, widows and children who have been changed forever as a result of profiteering in the reconstruction of Iraq. Iraq for Sale uncovers the connections between private corporations making a killing in Iraq and the decision makers who allow them to do so. Winter Soldier - Veterans' testimonials to the truth about war Sir! No Sir! - A documentary about the suppressed Vietnam War documentary film, FTA, about Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland's anti-war tour among the troops. FTA (a.k.a Free the Army, a.k.a Fuck the Army) - A documentary of Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland's anti-war tour among the troops. Standard Operating Procedure - Errol Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison. Democracy Now! - A daily TV/radio news program, hosted by Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, airing on over 750 stations, pioneering the largest community media collaboration in the U.S.
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What do the CIA, John McCain, the Iran Uprising, the Afghanistan War, and your Lockheed-Martin Stocks have in Common?

For years right wing extremists have been bucking to have a confrontation with Iran. Had McCain won the election we’d likely be at war with them now, or at least making a military stand. It’s no surprise he now calls on Obama to publicly give America’s official support to the uprising in Iran. But as Obama has explained, doing so would exacerbate the problem and motivate the Iranian government to cite America as the force behind the uprising.

Interestingly, it may well be a fact that America is the force behind the uprising. Maybe not Obama. But America is a complicated place these days. We “elected” a president twice under highly questionable circumstances, a corrupt Supreme Court, corrupt election officials, a governor of Florida who used his authority in miscounting votes to see that his brother was elected, and hacked election machines in at least two recent presidential elections. We committed an illegal international act in a preemptive war, a racist genocidal war with a military that dehumanizes all Muslims, disdainfully calling them “Hajjis” as a matter of policy to better help our troops deal with killing innocent people. These are facts reported by veterans in the Winter Soldier testimonies.

Then there’s America’s example of free enterprise, or as it’s better known, the socialist corporate welfare state. In America the biggest banks and auto companies are goverment owned, at least in part. Government officials are bought and paid for by corporations like the military industrial complex, which could sure use another war in Iran. Bush and Cheney immediately upon taking office in 2000 changed laws so that the monopolistic energy industry, with Enron as it’s poster boy, was given great tax breaks (Worse Than Watergate, John Dean, Warner Books 2005, p75-76)

So now McCain and others cry to Obama to stand up to Iran and tell them how to run a “democratic” election? What a comedian. We’ve got some cleaning up to do before we can go around telling people how to be a democracy.

But how is America behind the uprising? With all the right wing sentiment and misplaced power, likely in places like the military, Wall Street, corporate America, and the CIA (who have fronted for the corrupt Bush and Cheney regime) it’s not much of stretch to consider that the Iran uprising was indeed orchestrated by these underground right wing U.S. powers. Pakistan Daily reports in two separate articles, and you won’t find this in the U.S. corporate media:

CIA has Distributed 400 Million Dollars Inside Iran to Evoke a Revolution.

Former Pakistani Army General Mirza Aslam Beig claims the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has distributed 400 million dollars inside Iran to evoke a revolution. In a phone interview with the Pashto Radio on Monday, General Beig said that there is undisputed intelligence proving the US interference in Iran. “The documents prove that the CIA spent 400 million dollars inside Iran to prop up a colorful-hollow revolution following the election,” he added.

Pakistan’s former army chief of joint staff went on to say that the US wanted to disturb the situation in Iran and bring to power a pro-US government. He congratulated President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on his reelection for the second term in office, noting that Pakistan relationship with Iran has improved during his 4-year presidency.

“Ahmadinejad’s re-election is a decisive point in regional policy and if Pakistan and Afghanistan unite with Iran, the US has to leave the area, especially the occupied Afghanistan,” Beig added.

So then Ahmadinejad’s re-election is a threat to America’s war machine?

You mean they might stop us from bombing Afghanistan? The CIA will have none of that.

US Official: The CIA bribed Iranian government officials, businessmen, and reporters, and paid Iranians to demonstrate in the streets

Stephen Kinzer’s book, All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror, tells the story of the overthrow of Iran’s democratically-elected leader, Mohammed Mosaddeq, by the CIA and the British MI6 in 1953. The CIA bribed Iranian government officials, businessmen, and reporters, and paid Iranians to demonstrate in the streets.

The 1953 street demonstrations, together with the Cold War claim that the US had to grab Iran before the Soviets did, served as the US government’s justification for overthrowing Iranian democracy. What the Iranian people wanted was not important.

Today, the street demonstrations in Tehran show signs of orchestration. The protesters, primarily young people, especially young women opposed to the dress codes, carry signs written in English: “Where is My Vote?” The signs are intended for the western media—not for the Iranian government.

More evidence of orchestration is provided by the protesters’ chant, “death to the dictator, death to Ahmadinejad.” Every Iranian knows that the president of Iran is a public figure with limited powers. His main role is to take the heat from the governing grand Ayatollah. No Iranian, and no informed Westerner, could possibly believe that Ahmadinejad is a dictator. Even Ahmadinejad’s superior, Khamenei, is not a dictator, as he is appointed by a government body that can remove him….

It’s interesting how transparent and open to the media this Iranian uprising is. It seems like a well coordinated media campaign, complete with an official color (green), and the latest Web 2.0 social network technology. The Huffington Post is live blogging the Tweets and videos. Twitter is inundated with second by second accounts of the happenings in Iran. They even have little green overlays for Twitterers to place on their icons, in a showing of “solidarity”. The BBC and CCN have almost complete access, compared to the Iraq War. But is this solidarity and access contrived and seeded by the CIA?

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are quite the opposite in transparency. No moment by moment updates on Twitter. No green overlays. No inundations of on the spot photographs, and videos of people dying in the streets of Baghdad. The BBC doesn’t find a way to break through the censorship in Iraq or Afghanistan with their news satellites. Yet 1.5 million innocent Iraqis are known to have been killed since America’s occupation. Iraq War veterans say that most of those deaths are due to our bombs and bullets. The U.S. notoriously censors every bit of media of these wars. No pictures, no video. Only a very few officially Pentagon approved pictures and videos get through. It’s all way too curious how easily we see everything that’s going on in Iran, but absolutely nothing of Iraq or Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the Congress this week, passed 106  billion more dollars in war funding. Is this all coincidence? There’s a saying in the law enforcement community, “There are no coincidences”.

From the CIA’s book review of All the Shaw’s Men ( New York: John Wiley and Sons, 2003. 258 pages):

All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror

At an NSC meeting in early 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower said “it was a matter of great distress to him that we seemed unable to get some of these down-trodden countries to like us instead of hating us.”1 The problem has likewise distressed all administrations since, and is emerging as the core conundrum of American policy in Iraq. In All the Shah’s Men, Stephen Kinzer of the New York Times suggests that the explanation may lie next door in Iran, where the CIA carried out its first successful regime-change operation over half a century ago….

….The CIA’s covert intervention—codenamed TPAJAX—preserved the Shah’s power and protected Western control of a hugely lucrative oil infrastructure. It also transformed a turbulent constitutional monarchy into an absolutist kingship and induced a succession of unintended consequences at least as far ahead as the Islamic revolution of 1979—and, Kinzer argues in his breezily written, well-researched popular history, perhaps to today….

For most of us, these facts only come to light and are admitted to, years after the fact. It seems then, more likely than not, that the CIA is now behind the uprising in Iran. The CIA is defending it’s setting up the Shaw for Nixon in this book review on it’s own website. But the fact that the CIA has to have a review of this particular book indicates they are concerned about their image. People don’t normal look to the CIA for literary reviews and guidance.

This recent Iranian uprising is a little too convenient for Republicans and right wingers looking for a new emergency situation that will give them the right to exercise their military industrial complex to secure and control Mid-Eastern oil, and boost Shell, Exxon, General Dynamics, Lockheed-Martin and KBR to boot. That’s been their plan all along, and Obama is messing it up.

Anyone who accuses Republicans and the CIA of such things could easily be labeled as, now famously, a conspiracy theorist (as if that were a lunacy, considering co-conspirators Bush and Cheney), or anti-American, anti-democracy, and siding with “the enemy”, that is, if you’re one of those authoritarian half-wits who can’t think for themselves. Thinking people, like President Obama, know that getting into this mess is the worse thing Americans could do, unless of course we want to have another war, or maybe want to protect our investments in Lockheed-Martin.

References include Worse that Watergate, John Dean; Conservatives Without Conscience, John Dean; and The Three Trillion Dollar War, Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Blimes; and ReThink Afghanistan, among others.

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  • David J.
    You know, it does raise the basic question. Do you want Iran supporting Al Qaeda with weapons? Are you in support of wiping Israel off the map? Our do you suppose that if we all close our eyes, hold hands and sing Kumbaya my Lord it will all just go away?
  • What makes you think a U.S. puppet dictator will be any better? The reality is that we don't know the future, nor should we make decisions for the Iranian people based on conjecture. We have a problem with democracy in the U.S. Who are we to judge and occupy the world? It's their country. Let them fix it. Didn't we learn enough from the Nixon-Iran Shaw debacle, Vietnam and now Iraq? Is Iraq a bastion of democracy by our occupation? Go live there if you like it so much.

    Then there's all that lovely oil. Makes your mouth water, I bet.
  • You accused me leaving out inconvenient facts yet you call it the Nixon-Iran Shah debacle? How deeply do you have to drink of the koolaid to ignore that Carter was President, the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress in 1979? You're nothing but a partisan hack shilling for your share of Skittles and rainbows.
  • wciemorq
    Oh no....not the old "protect Israel" violin! The translation was always wrong but the Western media won't change it: Ahmadinnejad said, the Israeli regime should be erased from history. Regime...not the country or the people. However, the Jewish lobby, fully aware that Israel has nuclear weapons, has great interest in wiping Iran "off the map" ( originally an expression used by a Jewish Zionist ) and has asked Washington for permission to do so twice. They are the ones who benefit most - destabilizing and destroying the Middle East so they can be left alone to continue seizing land that is not theirs.
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