ISIS
has been in the news a lot lately. I don't have a lot of time to
search out links, but I will give a summary of my impression of the
news. According to American media, ISIS has grown from a smattering
of formerly American-funded and American-trained Islamic militants
into a powerhouse of radical terrorist jihadism threatening to
destabilize the entire Middle East. Not only that, but they are
behind the barbarous beheadings of a number of foreign journalists
who were unwise enough to be caught hanging out in places where they
should not have been. And to top it all off, several ISIS plots have
been uncovered recently to attack public targets in the United
States, Australia and France.
In
response to all of these things, President Barack Obama has declared
a war to the finish against ISIS. (Never mind that we attacked ISIS
first, thus prompting the first beheading of a foreign journalist.)
So far, this has involved American and British airstrikes against
targets in Syria and Iraq. Some members of the U.S. government have
also talked of the need to initiate a ground campaign in the Mideast
in order to eradicate ISIS.
That's
my impression of the official story line, anyway. Now, I am not a
national security analyst, but a few things smell quite fishy about
the official story line. They have to do with how the U.S. and
Britain are using the ISIS crisis (hey, that rhymes!) to accomplish a
few policy objectives which they have long wanted to achieve, but
which have to date been stymied. First is the overthrow of the
Syrian government and its replacement by a puppet government
constructed by the United States, which tried for many months to find
a pretext for military operations against President Hassad, and which
failed to motivate enough Americans to back such a stinky business.
First, we tried to foment a fake revolution. Then we carried out a
number of false flag operations. Then certain highly placed
government officials told outright lies to a bunch of “news”
outlets unworthy of the title of journalists. Now ISIS provides a
convenient excuse to do something which was never legitimate in the
first place.
So
what about those beheadings? Well, all I know for sure is that they
were carried out by a bunch of guys in Arab costumes with masks on
their faces and speaking in funny accents. No sane or reasonable
person would venture to try to identify any of those masked men by
name – or by nationality. In the absence of more
substantive identification, I feel the same way I felt after watching
a grainy, low-resolution video broadcast by some mainstream media
outlets purporting to prove that someone who looked like Michael
Brown held up a convenience store before he was shot to death by a
white cop while unarmed. Pardon me, but I need to see faces that I
can recognize before I will even begin to consider any video
“evidence.” Who knows, the beheaders might be my next door
neighbors in Halloween costumes.
Compare
the Anglo-American portrayal of ISIS to the portrayal of Osama bin
Laden and al-Qaeda, and you'll notice a striking number of
similarities. Bin Laden served for years as America's bogeyman in
order to legitimize two stupid wars, huge losses of life, oppression
of two nations (three if you count the progress that has been made in
turning the U.S. into a police state), and untold damage. Osama was
America's Goldstein
from 2001 until his untimely death at the tusks of a bunch of trained
seals in 2011. I guess it was time for a new bogeyman, a new
La_Llorona to
keep us properly scared, compliant and willing to support our raging,
uncontrollable addiction to war. Thanks, ISIS!
Oh,
and one other thing. ISIS is being used to help us conveniently
forget our own self-inflicted problems, such as the oppression of
people of color by holders of white privilege in this country, the
continued oppression of women by dominating, narcissistic men who
legitimize domestic violence and rape, the oppression of sick people
by a predatory system of “insurance”, “medicine” and Big
Pharma, the environmental consequences we are now suffering due to
the non-negotiable American way of life, the predation of the poor by
the rich, etc, etc.
