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Thread: Joint India Indonesian Army Exercise Garud Shakti Concludes.

  1. #61
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    Who decides what is an Oppressive regime?

    The Chinese don't think that they are under an oppressive regime.

    And yet, others do!

    Tibetans feel they are oppressed, but nothing happens!

    And yet, Arab Spring and Colour Revolutions happen!

    And the Mali coup?
    Last edited by Ray; 04-05-2012 at 04:41 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Who decides what is an Oppressive regime?
    The people living under the regime, of course. Who else would have an opinion that means anything?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    The Chinese don't think that they are under an oppressive regime.
    "The Chinese"? Obviously they don't all think the same thing. Some feel the regime is oppressive, some don't, presumably a whole lot are in between. There are Americans who think they live under an oppressive regime.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Tibetans feel they are oppressed, but nothing happens!

    And yet, Arab Spring and Colour Revolutions happen!
    The Arab Spring and Color Revolutions happened when the populace not only felt it was oppressed, but perceived that the regime was vulnerable. That's obviously not the case in Tibet. Is there any specific evidence suggesting that foreign support is a key variable in any of these cases?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    And the Mali coup?
    A coup is a completely different thing, generally not connected to any popular sentiment or perception.
    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”

    H.L. Mencken

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    Media hype is what gives 'credence' to who is 'oppressed'

    The west feels that Muslim women are oppressed. How come the Muslim women don't claim they are oppressed?

    I would be surprised if any country will ever let it be known that it is supporting rebels or encouraging/ assisting rebellion!
    Last edited by Ray; 04-06-2012 at 03:08 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Media hype is what gives 'credence' to who is 'oppressed'
    To outside observers, yes, but outside observers aren't the ones who rebel.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    The west feels that Muslim women are oppressed. How come the Muslim women don't claim they are oppressed?
    Maybe because they aren't allowed to talk? Any time you deal with a group as large as "Muslim women" or "the Chinese" there will be diversity of opinion. Some feel oppressed, some don't.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    I would be surprised if any country will ever let it be known that it is supporting rebels or encouraging/ assisting rebellion!
    Lots of countries supported the rebels in Libya, and didn't try to hide it. Of course that support didn't mean much until it arrived in the form of cruise missiles and air strikes. Lots of countries openly support the rebels in Syria, but unless that support takes a much more aggressive and material form, it's not going to overthrow the regime.

    Is there any actual evidence that foreign support was a critical element in the Arab Spring (other than Libya) or in the Color Revolutions?
    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”

    H.L. Mencken

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    Quote Originally Posted by Dayuhan View Post
    To outside observers, yes, but outside observers aren't the ones who rebel.
    Let us come closer home.

    I presume you, as a resident of Philippines, subscribe to the fact, or should it be the idea, that the Moros are an 'oppressed lot'.

    Do let us know, we 'outsiders' about how the 'insiders' opine.



    Maybe because they aren't allowed to talk? Any time you deal with a group as large as "Muslim women" or "the Chinese" there will be diversity of opinion. Some feel oppressed, some don't.
    What makes you come to the conclusion that burkha-ed women don't talk or are not allowed to talk?

    Where did you get that idea from?

    I have Muslim friends in India, whose wives have of late taken to the burkha, they used to talk earlier and they still talk now.

    They tell me that they are flaunting their Islamic identity just to cock a snook at the idea that they are a subjugated lot!



    Lots of countries supported the rebels in Libya, and didn't try to hide it. Of course that support didn't mean much until it arrived in the form of cruise missiles and air strikes. Lots of countries openly support the rebels in Syria, but unless that support takes a much more aggressive and material form, it's not going to overthrow the regime.
    Lots of countries?

    Like?

    The West?

    Is there any actual evidence that foreign support was a critical element in the Arab Spring (other than Libya) or in the Color Revolutions?
    Can there ever be?

    Which country will go tomtoming that they are coming to destroy another country, unless it is a declared war.

    Just for starters here is something to chew upon

    The CIA School of Assassination at Fort Bragg
    http://ciaschool.tripod.com/

    and this:

    The Central Intelligence Agency has an almost unblemished record of screwing up every "secret" armed intervention it ever undertook. From the overthrow of the Iranian government in 1953 through the Bay of Pigs, the failed attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro of Cuba and Patrice Lumumba of the Republic of Congo, the Phoenix Program in Vietnam, the "secret war" in Laos, aid to the Greek colonels who seized power in 1967, the 1973 killing of Salvador Allende in Chile and Ronald Reagan's Iran-contra war against Nicaragua, there is not a single instance in which the agency's activities did not prove acutely embarrassing to the United States. The CIA continues to get away with this primarily because its budget and operations have always been secret and Congress is normally too indifferent to its constitutional functions to rein in a rogue bureaucracy. Therefore the tale of a purported CIA success story should be of some interest.
    http://hnn.us/articles/1491.html

    This is in the open forum.

    I am sure other powers that be are doing the same, even if it does not have the US reach!

    Could we not waste our time to substantiate what is obvious and true?
    Last edited by Ray; 04-07-2012 at 09:59 AM.

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    Red face Quite some selection, that...

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Just for starters here is something to chew upon

    The CIA School of Assassination at Fort Bragg
    http://ciaschool.tripod.com/

    and this:


    http://hnn.us/articles/1491.html

    This is in the open forum.

    I am sure other powers that be are doing the same, even if it does not have the US reach!

    Could we not waste our time to substantiate what is obvious and true?
    The CIA and Fort Bragg are Apples and Breadfruit -- that 'relationship' is testy to say the least. All things considered, if you believe much that is in the first link, I have a Bridge I can sell you. That foolishness is totally laughable. Starting with the attempts to whitewash the Kennedy brothers who started a war to boost the US economy and their domestic political prospects -- and had no intention of leaving as the latter day apologists often have tried to contend. It simply gets worse from there...

    As for the CIA, generally speaking, try Hanlon's Razor...

    The second link is more accurate and less politicized but is hardly and indictment of anything or anyone. Nations use fair and unfair means to achieve their aims. Who knew?

    Re: your question on Libya / Syria; for the former, in addition to the west add Qatar and the UAE plus Egypt at a minimum. For Syria, the Arab League -- almost all of them -- and Turkey for starters.

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    Re: your question on Libya / Syria; for the former, in addition to the west add Qatar and the UAE plus Egypt at a minimum. For Syria, the Arab League -- almost all of them -- and Turkey for starters.
    Libya. Obviously Qatar would support. Its Sheik is in the minority (Sunni) and requires to be salvaged by the US and the Saudis. UAE too has been a pro West lot.

    Syria. Indeed the Sunni Arab League would be against Shia governed Syria with links to Shia Iran! Nothing out of the ordinary.

    Nations use fair and unfair means to achieve their aims. Who knew?
    Just the point.

    If one has the capability and it is in the Nation's interest, then it would surely be used!

    And why not?

    But it will never be officially acknowledged.

    Do nations acknowledge they have spies operating in foreign countries?

    Even when they are caught, they are disowned!

    Do nations acknowledge that the NGOs are funded and nurtured for ulterior motives?

    The Peace Corps, which otherwise was a good idea, have been accused of being spies!

    Ministers of foreign countries, including mine, have been allegedly recruited by foreign countries. Anyone will acknowledge that?

    Covert operations would be overt operations if one acknowledged that such things were happening!

    Was Raymond Davis a mere innocent security contractor?
    Last edited by Ray; 04-07-2012 at 06:36 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    ...Nothing out of the ordinary.
    True; the point was merely that your allegation was incorrect.
    Covert operations would be overt operations if one acknowledged that such things were happening!
    Also true -- and nothing out of the ordinary.
    Was Raymond Davis a mere innocent security contractor?
    Almost certainly not. Nor, apparently and so far as is known, was he a a very good whatever he was...

  9. #69
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Libya. Obviously Qatar would support. Its Sheik is in the minority (Sunni) and requires to be salvaged by the US and the Saudis. UAE too has been a pro West lot.

    Syria. Indeed the Sunni Arab League would be against Shia governed Syria with links to Shia Iran! Nothing out of the ordinary.
    Of course it's nothing out of the ordinary. The sanctions and verbal support coming from the US and Europe are also nothing out of the ordinary. Given Syria's close relationship with Iran, we can also expect that there's a bit of covert skullduggery going on. That's not likely to make any difference if the regime and its armed forces hold together.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Ministers of foreign countries, including mine, have been allegedly recruited by foreign countries. Anyone will acknowledge that?

    Covert operations would be overt operations if one acknowledged that such things were happening!

    Was Raymond Davis a mere innocent security contractor?
    We all know that covert operations happen. That doesn't mean that any given event was necessarily the outcome of a covert operation. Certainly I see no credible reason to suppose that the Arab Spring or the Color Revolutions were the outcome of US covert operations.
    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”

    H.L. Mencken

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    We all know that covert operations happen. That doesn't mean that any given event was necessarily the outcome of a covert operation. Certainly I see no credible reason to suppose that the Arab Spring or the Color Revolutions were the outcome of US covert operations.
    True.

    Collective conscience of different peoples but of the same region/ area ignites simultaneously.

    Referring to communism in Indochina, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower put the Domino effect theory into words during an April 7, 1954 news conference:
    Finally, you have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the "falling domino" principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.
    So, it is but a Domino Effect happening all around in the 'oppressed world'!

    The issue still remains - how did Indo China or even China get influenced by Communism for the Domino effect to happen, when it was an European and Russian phenomenon and not a Oriental One? How was a foreign concept injected in Oriental societies? Surely, there would have been some 'encouragement' by interested foreign elements. Or not?

    You feel that the historical distaste that Sunnis have for Shias and vice versa is not at play when the Sunni Arab League gangs up on Shia Syria duly supported by Shia Iran?
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 04-08-2012 at 10:30 AM. Reason: Citation in quotes

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    Is there any actual evidence that foreign support was a critical element in the Arab Spring (other than Libya) or in the Color Revolutions?
    While I have no problem with the Colour Revolution or the Arab Spring or the Iraq War or the US reasserting itself in the Asia Pacific Region because each is a geostrategic necessity, if seen from the US standpoint, I do find it difficult to credit the 'purer than driven snow' justifications as wholesome truths.

    Each nation has to look after its own interests. It is easier, if not axiomatic, for Nations that are powerful. And because they are powerful, they have larger number and more sophisticated instruments to pursue their strategic and political aims, at times with total disdain for international opinion. Therefore, to feel that events around the world is self driven or self combustible, is a bit artful.

    Therefore, in my limited knowledge of geostrategy and geopolitics, I believe that the momentous events are not solely self driven or self ignited.

    Just as one found the spread of Communism and the 'struggle of the proletariat' and such things, which were foreign to cultures and political ideology of many countries that was affected, were not an instant upheaval caused by domestic philosophy, I find that it is too simplistic to believe that the Colour Revolution, Arab Spring, Iraq War etc are but a self expression of 'oppressed people' revolting against the shackles of modern slavery!

    Since you are from the Philippines, you would be aware that the Hilarion del Rosario aka ahmed Santos is a Filipino who converted to Islam while working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1991. Therefore, for a staunch Catholic to convert to Islam without Saudi Mullahs' encouragement would be too hard to believe. Further, such a man would proselytise and convert many more Catholics and organise, fund, arm such Catholic converts into a radical Islamic terrorist organisation without Wahabbi backing would also be a bit extraordinary a phenomenon to believe.

    But ask a Wahabbi. He will deny any connection or support! He will claim it is but a natural, home-grown reaction to Catholic domination and historical US subjugation of the Muslims, especially the Moros or some such wild justification!
    Last edited by Ray; 04-08-2012 at 05:14 AM.

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    Those who seek to address perceived social-political grievances will typically seek/need some degree of support to advance their goals. There will always be those who see that that their own goals can be advanced by such changes as well, and will provide that support.

    The provision of support does not cause the unrest and instability, nor does any ideology that might come attached to that support (be it Wahabbi, Democracy or Communism or any other such message).

    Arab Spring is not caused by AQ, it is caused by how various populace groups feel about their conditions of governance and lives, and their belief that new governance is the key to better lives. AQ has worked to leverage that energy for years, but does not cause that energy. The same is true elsewhere.

    This is an uncomfortable reality for governments to come to grips with. Far easier to blame some bogeyman or ideology, or source of funding and weapons. US Stinger missiles did not cause the resistance against the Soviets in Afghanistan, they just helped the movement to be successful. Thank god the Russians have not seen it in their interests to similarly accelerate the resistance to our presence there now.
    Robert C. Jones
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    "The modern COIN mindset is when one arrogantly goes to some foreign land and attempts to make those who live there a lesser version of one's self. The FID mindset is when one humbly goes to some foreign land and seeks first to understand, and then to help in some small way for those who live there to be the best version of their own self." Colonel Robert C. Jones, US Army Special Forces (Retired)

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    While I have no problem with the Colour Revolution or the Arab Spring or the Iraq War or the US reasserting itself in the Asia Pacific Region because each is a geostrategic necessity, if seen from the US standpoint, I do find it difficult to credit the 'purer than driven snow' justifications as wholesome truths.
    I certainly wouldn't accuse the US of purity; I just don't think they have the capacity to generate revolutions on demand.

    RCJ made this comment:

    Those who seek to address perceived social-political grievances will typically seek/need some degree of support to advance their goals. There will always be those who see that that their own goals can be advanced by such changes as well, and will provide that support.
    and it's true to some extent, It's important to realize, though, that many of these "flash revolutions" are not the product of some organized movements to redress grievances. They can emerge independently of any such movement and there's rarely enough time for anyone to try to leverage them. In the instance with with I'm most familiar, the Manila uprising in '86, bothe the NPA and the USA failed to anticipate the form events would take and were forced into reactive positions. I see evidence of the same phenomenon in Tunisia and Egypt, and in the Color Revolutions.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Therefore, in my limited knowledge of geostrategy and geopolitics, I believe that the momentous events are not solely self driven or self ignited.
    Of course all powers pursue their own interests, but it's a fallacy to assume that all that happens is therefore a product of great powers pursuing their interests. The efforts of the great powers may prove redundant, and events may emerge that bypass them. They can also have a wide range of unintended consequences.

    I'd say that any attempt to attribute the Arab Spring or Color Revolutions to US agency has to have a stronger basis than the simple assumption that the US must have been involved because it must have been involved.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    Since you are from the Philippines, you would be aware that the Hilarion del Rosario aka ahmed Santos is a Filipino who converted to Islam while working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1991. Therefore, for a staunch Catholic to convert to Islam without Saudi Mullahs' encouragement would be too hard to believe. Further, such a man would proselytise and convert many more Catholics and organise, fund, arm such Catholic converts into a radical Islamic terrorist organisation without Wahabbi backing would also be a bit extraordinary a phenomenon to believe.
    I'm very familiar with the Balik-Islam movement, the short and less than happy life of the Rajah Solaiman Group, and the career of Ahmed Santos. I did a fair bit of research on the subject at one point, including fairly extensive interviews. I haven't time to discourse on the subject now, especially as I tend to go verbose on such things, but I think you're misreading it in some quite substantial ways.
    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”

    H.L. Mencken

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
    Those who seek to address perceived social-political grievances will typically seek/need some degree of support to advance their goals. There will always be those who see that that their own goals can be advanced by such changes as well, and will provide that support.

    The provision of support does not cause the unrest and instability, nor does any ideology that might come attached to that support (be it Wahabbi, Democracy or Communism or any other such message).

    Arab Spring is not caused by AQ, it is caused by how various populace groups feel about their conditions of governance and lives, and their belief that new governance is the key to better lives. AQ has worked to leverage that energy for years, but does not cause that energy. The same is true elsewhere.

    This is an uncomfortable reality for governments to come to grips with. Far easier to blame some bogeyman or ideology, or source of funding and weapons. US Stinger missiles did not cause the resistance against the Soviets in Afghanistan, they just helped the movement to be successful. Thank god the Russians have not seen it in their interests to similarly accelerate the resistance to our presence there now.
    I have not said AQ is involved. Arab League is not AQ.

    I merely stated that the Sunni Arab League is naturally not very comfortable with Shia regimes around them, given their historical sectarian temporal rivalries, inspite of having the same God and Prophet.

    In so far as the paragraph in bold.

    Have you read Unholy Wars by Cooley?

    Or the Bear Trap by Brig Yousaf of the ISI, who organised the Mujahideens?
    Last edited by Ray; 04-08-2012 at 06:17 PM.

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    The Anglo-American support apparatus
    behind the Afghani mujahideen


    by Adam K. East

    Following the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union in December 1979, the U.S. administration, first under Carter and then under Reagan, launched a massive support and training campaign for the Afghan freedom fighters, or "mujahideen" (holy warriors), as they came to be known. In addition to overt and covert funding operations by various U.S. governmental agencies for the mujahideen, a plethora of private "aid" agencies, think-tanks, and other odd outfits joined the fray, with the ostensible aim of helping the Afghans to liberate their nation from the clutches of the Soviet invaders.

    However, a closer look at the activities of these private agencies reveals that there was much more at stake. As the profiles below show, the source of policy for most of these groups was British intelligence. As such, these groups lobbied the U.S. Congress, set up conferences, launched pro-mujahideen propaganda campaigns, and, in some cases, even provided military training for various mujahideen groups. U.S. policy toward Afghanistan, and the region, was largely determined by the aims of these "committees," which also represented the controlling "mediators" between the mujahideen and British policy.

    Some of the members and leaders of the organizations profiled below were also involved with some of the figures in the drugs-for-guns related Iran-Contra networks of then-Vice President George Bush and his sidekick Oliver North.
    Afghan Aid U.K./Radio Free Kabul

    Afghan Aid U.K. (AIUK), together with Radio Free Kabul of London, were the two most important coordinators of Afghan mujahideen aid efforts internationally throughout the Afghan War.

    Afghan Aid U.K. was set up in Peshawar, Pakistan, by Romy Fullerton, in the early stages of the war. She was the wife of the British journalist John Fullerton, who has written extensively on Afghanistan, and the Afghan War. The main sponsor and funder of the group was Viscount Cranbourne, currently Lord Privy Seal (chief of the Queen's Privy Council), and Leader of the House of Lords.

    Viscount Cranbourne is a member of the Cecil family, one of the oldest and most powerful oligarchical families in Britain, whose ancestor, Lord Burghley, was the Lord Privy Seal and Lord Treasurer of Queen Elizabeth I. Viscount Cranbourne is the son and heir to the current Sixth Marquis of Salisbury. His grandfather, the Fifth Marquis, had been a British colonial secretary in World War II, and a postwar foreign minister, as well as having been Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the House of Lords. His great-great-grandfather, the famous Third Marquis of Salisbury, had been the British prime minister and foreign minister from 1878-87, and again 1900-02; he helped lay the basis for World War I. The family motto is, "Late, but seriously."

    AIUK's initial refugee aid programs were soon expanded to include numerous other services, including medical and agricultural aid, and it even offered a hostel for British journalists. According to one U.S. journalist, AIUK received "considerable British government funding" in addition to "massive amounts of money" from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). In order to solicit U.S. government funds for this British operation, Viscount Cranbourne once appeared before the U.S. Congress Special Joint Task Force on Afghanistan, where he attracted considerable attention by twirling his full-length cape around his chair before seating himself to testify.

    AIUK funneled much of its support to Masood in the north of the country, to the Tajiks (as opposed to the Pushtuns in the south). Masood's brother is currently the Afghan "ambassador" to London.
    Radio Free Kabul

    Radio Free Kabul was formed almost immediately after the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, by Lord Nicholas Bethell, a former lord-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth II. A career British intelligence official with a specialization in Iranian and Arab affairs, Lord Bethell had served in the Mideast and Soviet sections of official British intelligence, MI6. Lord Bethell had been a decades-long friend and colleague of British intelligence operative Kim Philby, who "defected" to the Soviet Union in 1963.

    Radio Free Kabul, which was formed virtually single-handedly by Lord Bethell, was run out of Coutts and Co., the private banker to Queen Elizabeth.

    In 1981, Lord Bethell accompanied British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on a tour of the United States dedicated to drumming up support for the mujahideen. Thatcher and Lord Bethell met over 60 congressmen and senators, and aided in organizing the Committee for a Free Afghanistan, the de facto U.S. arm of Radio Free Kabul. In 1983, Radio Free Kabul sponsored the formation of Resistance International, which pulled together various "freedom movements" sponsored by the Thatcher and Reagan-Bush administrations, including the Afghan mujahideen, the Nicaraguan Contras, anti-Castro Cubans, and various anti-communist eastern European and African movements.

    Lord Bethell was also the British sponsor of the operations of Jon Speller, a former aide to CIA director Allen Dulles, who played an instrumental role, as did Bethell, in coordinating the operations of the Sikh independence movement (Khalistan), which was allied to the Afghan mujahideen.

    Other figures on the board of Radio Free Kabul included:

    Ray Whitney, a former British intelligence official who had for years run the disinformation operations unit of the Foreign Office, the so-called Information Research Department. Whitney's outfit was the model for the Reagan administration's new creation, the National Endowment for Democracy.

    Winston Churchill III, the grandson of Prime Minister Winston Churchill and a leader of Britain's Conservative Party, who was reportedly the main financial backer of the group.

    Lord Morrison of Lambeth, the former head of the British Foreign Office when two of his employees, Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess of the Philby ring, fled to Moscow.

    Baron Chalfont, the former British foreign secretary and longtime defense correspondent, with a particular expertise in Mideast affairs.
    Continued

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    Afghanistan Relief Commitee

    The Afghan Relief Committee was established in 1980 by Wall Street investment banker and spook John Train, who handles the family fortunes of some of the oldest and most powerful U.S. establishment families, such as the Mellons. The organization was housed in Train's investment consultant office. Train was the president of the group, and, according to a 1980 Washington Post article, "its financial whiz." Simultaneous with his founding of ARC, Train was organizing a "media salon" of press prostitutes to launch a massive slander attack on EIR's founder, Lyndon LaRouche.

    The stated purpose of the ARC was to raise "seed money" for medical organizations treating casualties among the mujahideen. After receiving the Relief Committee's seed money, the medical organizations were expected to go elsewhere for financing. The ARC was especially fond of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hezb-i-Islami group (see article, p. 26).

    Also operative were Leo Cherne's International Rescue Committee (IRC), whose Peshawar-based office was staffed mostly with Hekmatyar's gang; the National Endowment for Democracy (NED); and the State Department's Agency for International Development. CIA director William Casey was on the IRC's board of directors, and served as its president at one time. Cherne was then vice-director of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB), with offices at the White House.

    From its inception, the ARC worked closely with Freedom House, which had been chaired by Cherne since the 1940s, and whose treasurer, Walter Schloss, was a longtime business associate of Train. Rosanne Klass, vice president of the ARC, was also the director of Freedom House's Afghanistan Information Center, and had formerly been the founding director of the Afghanistan Council of the Asia Society.

    Founders of the ARC, in addition to Train, included four former U.S. ambassadors to Afghanistan: Francis L. Kellogg, a decades-long associate of Train from the prominent grain-interest family; Train's cousin Sen. Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.); and the ubiquitous professors Louis Dupree and Thomas Gouttierre, both longstanding Afghan hands for U.S. intelligence. Jeane Kirkpatrick, later the Reagan administration ambassador to the U.N., was co-chairman of the group.

    The main known financial beneficiaries of the group were:

    Doctors Without Borders, run by Ronny Brauman in Paris. This organization, whose most prominent representative was Danielle Mitterrand, wife of President François Mitterrand of France, also received money from the National Endowment for Democracy.

    Freedom Medical of Washington, D.C.

    Aide Medicale International

    Sainte Sud of Marseilles

    Most money to such groups, although not these specifically, originated with the International Rescue Committee or Relief International. The first two listed received almost all of ARC's funds.

    ARC on-the-ground operations (like those of many other western organizations) were based in Peshawar, Pakistan, the main Pakistani base of the mujahideen. ARC-funded physicians were smuggled into Afghanistan from this base. Foreign national physicians were preferred for this function.

    ARC also worked with the National Endowment for Democracy, the congressionally created funding conduit for Project Democracy, on two NED Afghan projects: the Writers Union of Free Afghanis and Freedom House's Afghan Information Center. The two groups were dedicated to training Afghan mujahideen spokesmen in "communication skills." Additionally, the group received NED grants to operate schools inside Afghanistan.

    Honorary co-chairmen of the group drawn from the Congress included: Senators Richard Lugar (R) of Indiana, Alfonse D'Amato (R) and Daniel Moynihan (D) of New York, Claiborne Pell, Gordon Humphrey (R) of New Hampshire, Orrin Hatch (R) of Utah, and Representatives Charles Rangel (D) of New York and Bill McCollum (R) of Florida.
    Committee for a Free Afghanistan

    CFA was founded in 1981 in the aftermath of a trip by Prime Minister Thatcher and Radio Free Kabul founder Lord Bethell to the United States, dedicated to building U.S. support for the mujahideen. The founding executive director of CFA, Karen McKay, was reputed to be the mistress of Lord Bethell. From its inception, the CFA acted as the U.S. arm of Bethell's London-based Radio Free Kabul.

    McKay, a major in the Rapid Deployment Force reserves, had spent four years in the U.S. Army's Delta Force, studying unconventional warfare in the 1960s. Following active duty, McKay spent nine years in Greece and Israel as a freelance journalist, during which time she also studied for a doctorate in history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. She returned from Israel shortly before taking over CFA.

    CFA's publicly known funding came largely from the Heritage Foundation, an offshoot of the British Fabian Society, the Free Congress Research and Education Foundation headed by Paul Weyrich, and Accuracy in Media, of which CFA was a formal arm.

    CFA also held numerous conferences and other events throughout the early and mid-1980s, which attempted to organize Americans to support the Afghan mujahideen cause, while simultaneously raising funds. It also put out a publication called the Free Afghanistan Report.

    The committee actively lobbied Congress. In addition, it managed to gain the sympathy of some high-ranking military officials.

    Although the CFA provided funds for almost all of the "Peshawar Seven" groups of mujahideen, the Jamiat-e-Islami, of Burhanudeen Rabbani and his military commander Ahmad Shah Masood, was CFA's favored group. It brought various mujahideen leaders to Washington in order to influence the decision-making regarding aid for the Afghan War.

    In late 1981, McKay took part in a conference in Paris organized by Lord Bethell aimed at patching together an alliance of the more traditionalist groups of the mujahideen, under the banner of the Islamic Federation of Mujahideen. The groups included the National Islamic Front of Afghanistan of Pir Sayed Ahmad Gailani—the group most patronized by Lord Bethell; the Afghan National Liberation Front of Sebghatullah Mojaddidi; and the Islamic Revolutionary Movement of Mohammed Nabi Mohammedi.

    CFA was also engaged in raising funds for Radio Free Kabul, International Medical Aid, and Doctors Without Borders.
    Continued

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    Some of CFA's key figures included:

    Maj. Gen J. Milnor Roberts, chairman of the CFA board of directors, a member of the board of the U.S. branch of World Anti-Communist League (WACL) during the 1980s, and executive director of the Reserve Officers Association. In 1984, Roberts expressed satisfaction over the assassination of Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, which he stated benefited the Afghan War against the Soviets. He also later told a journalist that the 1991 assassination of Rajiv Gandhi would help western interests in the region.

    Charles Moser, professor of Slavic Studies at George Washington University.

    David Isby, author of a book for Jane's Defense Weekly of Britain, which analyzed Soviet weaponry. Isby was working for Rep. Bobbi Fiedler (R-Calif.) when he joined the CFA. He later became a contributing editor and Soviet analyst for Soldier of Fortune magazine.

    Brig. Gen. Theodore Mataxis, who served as a "military adviser" to the mujahideen, and also paid regular visits to the Salvadoran-based Contras, and the Cambodian rebels in Thailand. From 1986-70, Mataxis was a senior officer with the Army's Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) in Iran.

    The list of CFA's Council of Advisers also included Gen. John Singlaub, the former international president of WACL who was deeply involved in various Iran-Contra operations; former U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency head Gen. Daniel Graham; former Reagan-Bush administration National Security Adviser Richard V. Allen; Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.), Claiborne Pell, Paul Tsongas (D-Mass.), and Paul Simon (D-Ill.); and Representatives Barney Frank (D-Mass.), Gerald Solomon (R-N.Y.), Mickey Edwards (R-Okla.), and Charles Wilson (D-Tex.).

    Other members of its advisory council included Washington Times editor Arnaud de Borchgrave, whose cousin Alexander de Marenches was then running French intelligence; and two known CIA operatives, Louis Dupree and Thomas Goutierre. A Peace Corps veteran of Afghanistan, Goutierre is now the director of the Center for Afghan Studies at the University of Nebraska. Dupree, formerly with the U.S. Military Academy, has written a book on Afghanistan and also authored many articles for Soldier of Fortune during the Afghan War.

    Fundraisers for the CFA included the Bush-linked televangelist Pat Robertson, former Ambassador Angier Biddle Duke, and former U.S. Attorney General Eliot Richardson.
    Federation for American Afghan Action

    The FAAA was founded in 1983, with the help of Paul Weyrich and his Coalition for America, the Heritage Foundation, and the Committee for a Free Afghanistan, of which it was a de facto arm. The first executive director of the Federation for American Afghan Action, which was based at the Heritage Foundation, was Andrew Eiva. Eiva's career started at West Point; upon graduation in 1972, he went on to command paratroopers in the 82nd Airborne Division in North Carolina. While with the 82nd, Eiva also led a detachment of Green Berets which specialized in Soviet weapons, tactics, and languages.

    Eiva officially gave up his West Point commission in 1980, and went to Afghanistan and other places in order to train the mujahideen. He reportedly trained Afghan guerrillas in bases in West Germany and the United States. Later that year, Eiva came to know Louis Dupree of the Committee for a Free Afghanistan, and soon became president of the Free Afghanistan Alliance in Massachusetts. In that capacity, he came in contact with the CFA's Charles Moser, who brought him to Washington, D.C.

    A few notable figures who were on the FAAA board of directors include:

    Louis Dupree of the Committee for a Free Afghanistan.

    Don Weidenweber, who founded American Aid for Afghans (AAA) in 1980, which organized the delivery of combat supplies to the Afghan mujahideen, and which worked closely with Lord Bethell's Radio Free Kabul.

    Matthew D. Erulkar, formerly with the Peace Corps in Zaire, who worked as the legislative director of FAAA, and executive director of its American Afghan Education Fund. In 1985, he formed an organization called the Afghan Support Team in Washington, D.C. That same year he claims to have covertly penetrated the Soviet Union with the Afghan mujahideen, "carrying Korans and other Islamic texts."

    In cooperation with Senator Tsongas and others, FAAA introduced legislation in Congress to provide funds for the mujahideen in 1984-85. Its May 1985 International Conference on Afghanistan, held in Virginia, was attended, among others, by:

    Louis Dupree, FAAA board member.

    Edward Luttwak, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

    Col. Robert Downs (USAF, ret.), an expert in "clandestine air resupply operations," according to Karen McKay.

    Anthony Arnold, a former CIA officer and author of Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion in Perspective, whose overseas service included two years in Afghanistan.

    Ralph Magnus, a former United States Information Service (USIS) official in Kabul (1962-65). From 1983-84, Magnus served as the original project director of "Americares For Afghans," a project of the Americares Foundation, with responsibility for establishing ties between Americares and the Peshawar offices of the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, and the Belgian group Solidarité Afghanistan. Americares was created by George Bush's career-long associate, Robert C. Macauley, and included the president's brother, Prescott Bush, on its board.

    Angelo Codevilla, legislative assistant to Sen. Malcolm Wallop (R-Wyo.).

    Mike Utter, executive director of the International Medical Corps. IMC worked closely with the American Aid for Afghans and was also contracted by the USAID to help resupply the Nicaraguan Contras. IMC was instrumental in the effort to send Stinger missiles to the Afghan mujahideen, and also helped to force CIA Deputy Director John McMahon out of office. McMahon had reportedly displayed hesitancy in sending Stingers to the Afghans.

    http://www.larouchepub.com/other/199...n_control.html



    This should indicate what can be done without the world knowing it!

    It had to be done for strategic interests.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ray View Post
    This should indicate what can be done without the world knowing it!

    It had to be done for strategic interests.
    Yes, we all know about US support for the Afghan resistance to Soviet occupation. It was not exactly secret at the time. What I don't see is how you jump from there to the assumption that the Arab Spring and Color Revolutions were caused by US interventions.
    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”

    H.L. Mencken

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    It was not exactly secret at the time.
    It is good to know that.

    However, Yousaf and Cooley seem to suggest that it was hush hush.

    Why live in denial?

    Check this:

    link



    If Pakistan was denying, how come the US was active and it was no secret.

    What was the route that the US was assisting, if not with Pakistan's assistance?

    For discussion, one cannot ignore the universal truth, just to deflect an issue!

    In my country such a way of squashing discussion is in Punjabi Maine Dasiya. That means - I am saying so. Period!

    You maybe saying so, but the facts prove otherwise!
    Last edited by Ray; 04-09-2012 at 05:59 PM.

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    What I don't see is how you jump from there to the assumption that the Arab Spring and Color Revolutions were caused by US interventions.
    Maybe later in time, this too would be claimed as not to be a secret.

    Events seem to suggest external encouragement.
    Last edited by Ray; 04-09-2012 at 06:28 PM.

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