by Michel Chossudovsky
GlobalResearch.ca
February-12-2008
from
Rense Website
What the Western allies face is a long,
sustained and proactive defense of their societies and way of life. To that
end, they must keep risks at a distance, while at the same time protecting
their homelands.
International terrorism today aims to disrupt and destroy our societies, our
economies and our way of life. ...
These different sources of [Islamist] propaganda and/or violence vary in
their intellectual underpinnings, sectarian and political aims, ... . But
what they have in common is an assault on the values of the West on its
democratic processes and its freedom of religion...
Notwithstanding the common perception in the West, the origin of Islamist
terrorism is not victim-hood, nor an inferiority complex, but a
well-financed superiority complex grounded in a violent political ideology.
If the irrational and fanatical [Islamist
organizations] get out of hand, there is a risk that, ... the rise of
fundamentalisms and despotisms will usher in a new, illiberal age, in
which the liberties that Western societies enjoy are seriously
jeopardized.
The threats that the West and its partners face today are a combination
of violent terrorism against civilians and institutions, wars fought by
proxy by states that sponsor terrorism, the behavior of rogue states,
the actions of organized international crime, and the coordination of
hostile action through abuse of non-military means.
Group report by former chiefs of staff General John Shalikashvili,
(US), General Klaus Naumann (Germany), Field Marshal Lord Inge
(UK), Admiral Jacques Lanxade (France) and Henk van den
Breemen (The Netherlands), published by the Netherlands based
Noaber Foundation, December 2007, (emphasis added)
The controversial NATO sponsored report entitled
"Towards
a Grand Strategy for an Uncertain World - Renewing Transatlantic Partnership",
calls for a first strike use of nuclear weapons.
The preemptive use of nukes would also be used
to undermine an "increasingly brutal World" as well as a means to prevent
the use of weapons of mass destruction:
"They [the authors of the report] consider
that nuclear war might soon become possible in an increasingly brutal
world. They propose the first use of nuclear weapons must remain "in the
quiver of escalation as the ultimate instrument to prevent the use of
weapons of mass destruction".
(Paul Dibb, Sidney Morning Herald, 11
February 2008)
The group, insists that the option of a nuclear
first strike is indispensable, "since there is simply no realistic prospect
of a nuclear-free world." (Report, p. 97):
Nuclear weapons are the ultimate instrument
of an asymmetric response and at the same time the ultimate tool of
escalation. Yet they are also more than an instrument, since they
transform the nature of any conflict and widen its scope from the
regional to the global. ...
...Nuclear weapons remain indispensable, and nuclear escalation
continues to remain an element of any modern strategy.
Nuclear escalation is the ultimate step in responding asymmetrically,
and at the same time the most powerful way of inducing uncertainty in an
opponent's mind. (Ibid, emphasis added)
The Group's Report identifies six key
"challenges", which may often result as potential threats to global
security:
-
Demography.
Population growth and change
across the globe will swiftly change the world we knew. The challenge
this poses for welfare, good governance and energy security (among other
things) is vast.
-
Climate change.
This greatly threatens
physical certainty, and is leading to a whole new type of politics one
predicated, perhaps more than ever, on our collective future.
-
Energy security continues to absorb us.
The
supply and demand of individual nations and the weakening of the
international market infrastructure for energy distribution make the
situation more precarious than ever.
-
There is also the more philosophic problem
of the rise of the irrational the discounting of the rational.
Though
seemingly abstract, this problem is demonstrated in deeply practical
ways. [These include] the decline of respect for logical argument and
evidence, a drift away from science in a civilization that is deeply
technological. The ultimate example is the rise of religious
fundamentalism, which, as political fanaticism, presents itself as the
only source of certainty.
-
The weakening of the nation state.
This
coincides with the weakening of world institutions, including the United
Nations and regional organizations such as the European Union, NATO and
others.
-
The dark side of globalization ...
These
include internationalized terrorism, organized crime and the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, but also asymmetric
threats from proxy actors or the abuse of financial and energy leverage.
(Ibid)
Deterrence and
Pre-emption
According to the Report, a new concept of deterrence is required directed
against both State and non-state actors. This "new deterrence" is based on
pre-emption as well as on the ability to "restore deterrence through
[military] escalation".
In this context, the Report contemplates, what
it describes as:
"escalation dominance, the use of a full bag
of both carrots and sticks - and indeed all instruments of soft and hard
power, ranging from the diplomatic protest to nuclear weapons."
(Report, op city, emphasis added).
Iran
In much the same terms as the Bush administration, the NATO sponsored report
states, without evidence, that Iran constitutes "a major strategic threat":
"An Iranian nuclear weapons capability would
pose a major strategic threat not only to Israel, which it has
threatened to destroy, but also to the region as a whole, to Europe and
to the United States. Secondly, it could be the beginning of a new
multi-polar nuclear arms race in the most volatile region of the world."
(Report, op. cit., p. 45)
Careful timing?
The
controversial NATO sponsored report calling
for a preemptive nuclear attack on Iran was released shortly after the
publication of the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) report entitled
Iran - Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities. The latter denies Iran's nuclear
capabilities. The NIE report, based on the assessments of sixteen US
intelligence agencies, refutes the Bush administration's main justification
for waging a preemptive nuclear war on Iran.
The NIE report confirms that Iran "halted its
nuclear weapons program in 2003":
"These findings constitute a damning
indictment of the Bush administration's relentless fear-mongering in
relation to an alleged nuclear threat from Iran. They demonstrate that
just as in the buildup to the war against Iraq five years ago, the White
House has been engaged in a systematic campaign to drag the American
people into another war based on lies."
(See
http://www.countercurrents.org/auken240108.htm
- Bill van Auken, 24 January 2008)
It should be noted that this recently
declassified intelligence (pertaining to Iran contained in the 2007 NIE
report) was known by the White House, the Pentagon and most probably NATO
since September 2003. Ironically, US military documents confirm that the
Bush Administration initiated its
war preparations against Iran in July
2003, two months prior to the confirmation by US intelligence that Iran did
not constitute a nuclear threat.
The July 2003 war scenarios were launched under TIRANNT: Theater Iran Near
Term.
The justification for TIRANNT as well as for subsequent US war plans
directed against Iran ( which as of 2004 included the active participation
of NATO and Israel), has always been that Iran is developing nuclear weapons
and plans to use them against us.
Following the publication of the 2007 NIE in early December, there has been
an avalanche of media propaganda directed against Tehran, essentially with a
view to invalidating the statements of the NIE concerning Tehran's nuclear
program.
Moreover, a third sanctions resolution by the UN Security Council, was
initiated with a view to forcing Iran to halt uranium enrichment. The
proposed UNSC resolution, which is opposed by China and Russia includes a
travel ban on Iranian officials involved in the country's nuclear programs,
and inspections of shipments to and from Iran "if there are suspicions of
prohibited goods" (AFP, 11 February 2008). Meanwhile, French President
Nicolas Sarkozy together with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, have been
calling for a unified EU sanctions regime against Iran.
Contradicting the US national intelligence estimate (NIE), Bush's most
recent speeches continue to portray Iran as a nuclear threat:
"I feel pretty good about making sure that
we keep the pressure on Iran to pressure them so they understand they're
isolated, to pressure them to affect their economy, to pressure them to
the point that we hope somebody rational shows up and says, okay, it's
not worth it anymore," Bush said.
Threat to "The Western
Way of Life"
The Western media is involved in a diabolical disinformation campaign, the
purpose of which is to persuade public opinion that the only way to "create
a nuclear free World" is to use nuclear weapons on a preemptive basis,
against countries which "threaten our Western Way of Life."
The Western world is threatened.
The NATO sponsored report, according to Paul Dibb:
"paint(s) an alarming picture of the threats
confronting the West, arguing that its values and way of life are under
threat and that we are struggling to summon the will to defend them."
(Dibb, op cit)
A preemptive nuclear attack - geographically
confined to Middle East (minus Israel?) - is the proposed end-game.
The attack would use US tactical nuclear
weapons, which, according to "scientific opinion" (on contract to the
Pentagon) are,
"harmless to the surrounding civilian
population because the explosion is underground".
(See
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=1988 -
Michel Chossudovsky The Dangers of a Middle East Nuclear Holocaust,
Global Research, 17 February 2006)
B61-11 bunker buster bombs with nuclear warheads
Made in America, with an explosive capacity between one third to six times a
Hiroshima bomb, are presented as bona fide humanitarian bombs, which
minimize the dangers of "collateral damage".
These in-house "scientific" Pentagon assessments regarding the mini-nukes
are refuted by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS):
Any attempt to use a [B61-11 bunker buster
nuclear bomb] in an urban environment would result in massive civilian
casualties. Even at the low end of its 0.3-300 kiloton yield range, the
nuclear blast will simply blow out a huge crater of radioactive
material, creating a lethal gamma-radiation field over a large area "
(Low-Yield Earth-Penetrating Nuclear
Weapons by Robert W. Nelson, Federation of American Scientists, 2001 ).
Professor Paul Dibb is a former Australian
Deputy Secretary of Defense, who has over the years also occupied key
positions in Australia's defense and intelligence establishment. Dibb
carefully overlooks the consequences of the use of nuclear weapons in a
conventional war theater.
According to Dibb, NATO's preemptive nuclear
doctrine, which replicates that of the Pentagon, constitutes a significant
and positive initiative to "halt the imminent spread of nuclear weapons"...
"They [the group] believe that the West must
be ready to resort to a pre-emptive nuclear attack to try to halt the
imminent spread of nuclear weapons."
Never mind the nuclear holocaust and resulting
radioactive contamination, which would spread Worldwide and threaten, in a
real sense, the "way of life".
There is no "way of life" in a World contaminated with deadly radioactive
material. But this is something that is rarely discussed in the corridors of
NATO or in strategic studies programs in Western universities.
What is frightening in Professor Dibb's article is that he is not expressing
an opinion, nor is he analyzing the use of nuclear weapons from an academic
research point of view.
In his article, there is neither research on nuclear weapons nor is there an
understanding of the complex geopolitics of the Middle East war. Dibb is
essentially repeating verbatim the statements contained in NATO/Pentagon
military documents. His article is a "copy and paste" summary of Western
nuclear doctrine, which in practice calls for the launching of a nuclear
holocaust.
The stated objective of a Middle East nuclear holocaust is "to prevent the
occurrence of a nuclear war". An insidious logic which certainly out-dwarfs
the darkest period of the Spanish inquisition...
Neither NATO nor the Pentagon use the term nuclear holocaust. Moreover, they
presume that the "collateral damage" of a nuclear war will in any event be
confined geographically to the Middle East and that Westerners will be
spared...
But since their in-house scientists have confirmed that tactical nuclear
weapons are "safe for civilians", the labels on the bombs have been switched
much in the same way as the label on a packet of cigarettes:
"This nuclear bomb is safe for civilians"
Nukes: Just Another Tool in
the Military Toolbox
The new definition of a nuclear warhead has blurred the distinction between
conventional and nuclear weapons:
'It's a package (of nuclear and conventional
weapons). The implication of this obviously is that nuclear weapons are
being brought down from a special category of being a last resort, or
sort of the ultimate weapon, to being just another tool in the toolbox,"
(Japan Economic News Wire, op cit)
This re-categorization has been carried out. The
"green light" for the use of tactical nuclear weapons has been granted by
the US Congress. .
"Let's use them, they are part of the
military toolbox."
We are a dangerous crossroads: military planners
believe their own propaganda. The military manuals state that this new
generation of nuclear weapons are "safe" for use in the battlefield. They
are no longer a weapon of last resort. There are no impediments or political
obstacles to their use.
In this context, Senator Edward Kennedy has
accused the
Bush Administration for having developed "a generation of more
useable nuclear weapons."
Russia and China
Who else constitutes a threat to " the Western way of life"?
Nukes are also slated to be used against Russia and China, former enemies of
the Cold War era.
This post Cold War logic was first revealed, when the Pentagon's Nuclear
Posture Review (NPR) was leaked to The Los Angeles Times in January 2002.
The NPR includes China and Russia alongside the rogue states as potential
targets for a first strike nuclear attack.
According to William Arkin, the
NPR,
"offers a chilling glimpse into the world of
nuclear-war planners: With a Strangelovian genius, they cover every
conceivable circumstance in which the president might wish to use
nuclear weapons-planning in great detail."
(Los Angeles Times, March 10, 2002)
"Decapitate Their Leadership
and Destroy their Countries as Functioning Societies"
The use of nukes against "rogue states", including Iran and
North Korea
(which lost more than a quarter of its population in US bombings during the
Korean war) is justified because these countries could act in an
"irrational" way. It therefore makes sense to "take em out" before they do
something irrational.
The objective is:
"decapitate their leadership and destroy
their countries as functioning societies".
"One line of reasoning is that so-called rogue states, such as Iran and
North Korea, are sufficiently irrational to risk a pre-emptive nuclear
strike on the US or its allies, such as Israel and South Korea.
The supposition here is that deterrence - that is, threatening the other
side with obliteration - no longer works. But even the nasty regimes in
Tehran and Pyongyang must know that the US reserves the right to use its
overwhelming nuclear force to decapitate the leadership and destroy
their countries as modern functioning societies."
(Dibb, op cit., emphasis added)
Use nuclear weapons to prevent the use of
weapons of mass destruction.
But of course, lest we forget, America's nuclear arsenal as well as that of
France, Britain and Israel are not categorized as "weapons of mass
destruction", in comparison with Iran's deadly nonexistent nuclear weapons
program.
Bin Laden's Nuclear
Program
Now comes the authoritative part of the Pentagon-NATO preemptive doctrine:
We need to use nukes against bin Laden, because Islamic "fanatics" can
actually make a nuclear weapons or buy them from the Russians on the black
market.
The Report calls for a first strike nuclear attack directed against Osama
bin Laden's Al Qaeda, which has the ability, according to expert opinion, of
actually producing small nuclear bombs, which could be used in a Second 9/11
attack on America:
The second line of reasoning [contained in
the NATO sponsored report] is more difficult to refute. It argues that
extreme fanatical terrorists, such as al-Qaeda, cannot be deterred
because,
(a) they do not represent a country
and therefore cannot be targeted
(b) they welcome death by suicide
So, we have to shift the concept of nuclear
deterrence to the country or regime supplying the terrorists with
fissile material.
Nuclear weapons require materials that can be made only with difficulty.
Once these materials are obtained by terrorists, however, the barriers
to fabricating a weapon are much lower. In that sense the nuclear threat
today is greater than it was in the Cold War and it seems the terrorists
cannot be deterred.
( Dibb, op cit, emphasis added)
The alleged nuclear threat by Al Qaeda is taken
very seriously. The Bush administration has responded with overall defense
spending (budget plus war theater) in excess of one trillion dollars. This
massive amount of public money has been allocated to financing the "Global
War on Terrorism" (GWOT).
Confirmed by Pentagon documents, this military hardware including aircraft
carriers, fighter jets, cruise missiles and nuclear bunker buster bombs, is
slated to be used as part of the "Global War on Terrorism". In military
jargon the US is involved in asymmetric warfare against non-State enemies.
The concept of
Asymmetric Warfare was defined in The National Defense
Strategy of the United States of America (2005)
"The American
Hiroshima"
The US media has the distinct ability to turn realities upside down. The
lies are upheld as indelible truths. The "Islamic terrorists" have abandoned
their AK 47 kalashnikov rifles and stinger missiles; they are not only
developing deadly chemical and biological weapons, they also have nuclear
capabilities.
The fact, amply documented, that Al Qaeda is supported by the CIA and
Britain's MI6 is beside the point.
The nuclear threat is not directed against the Middle East but against the
USA, the perpetrators and architects of nuclear war are
bin Laden's Al
Qaeda, which is planning to launch a nuclear attack on an American city:
"U.S. government officials are contemplating
what they consider to be an inevitable and much bigger assault on
America, one likely to kill millions, destroy the economy and
fundamentally alter the course of history,...
According to captured al-Qaida leaders and documents, the plan is called
the "American Hiroshima" and involves the multiple detonation of nuclear
weapons already smuggled into the U.S. over the Mexican border with the
help of the MS-13 street gang and other organized crime groups."
(World Net Daily, 11 July 2005, emphasis
added)
The New York Times confirms that an Al Qaeda
sponsored "American Hiroshima" "could happen" .
"Experts believe that such an attack,
somewhere, is likely."
(NYT, 11 August 2004)
According to the Aspen Strategy Group which is
integrated among others, by Madeleine Albright, Richard Armitage,
Philip D. Zelikow, Robert B. Zoellick,
"the danger of nuclear terrorism is much
greater than the public believes, and our government hasn't done nearly
enough to reduce it.":
If a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon, a midget
even smaller than the one that destroyed Hiroshima, exploded in Times
Square, the fireball would reach tens of millions of degrees Fahrenheit.
It would vaporize or destroy the theater district, Madison Square
Garden, the Empire State Building, Grand Central Terminal and Carnegie
Hall (along with me and my building). The blast would partly destroy a
much larger area, including the United Nations. On a weekday some
500,000 people would be killed.
(NYT, 11 August 2004)
"Threaten them with a
devastating [nuclear] attack"
According to professor Dibb, nuclear deterrence should also apply in
relation to Al Qaeda, by holding responsible the governments which help the
terrorists to develop their nuclear weapons capabilities:
"Ashton Carter, a former US assistant
secretary for defense, has recently argued, the realistic response is to
hold responsible, as appropriate, the government from which the
terrorists obtained the weapon or fissile materials and threaten them
with a devastating [nuclear] strike. In other words, deterrence would
work again.
(Dibb, op cit)
The real nuclear threat is coming from bin
Laden. The objective is to "to do away with our way of life":
None of this is to underestimate the impact
of a nuclear weapon being detonated in an American city. It could be
catastrophic, but it is highly unlikely to threaten the very survival of
the US. To believe otherwise risks surrendering to the fear and
intimidation that is precisely the terrorists' stock in trade.
General Richard Myers, another former chairman of the joint chiefs of
staff, has claimed that if [Islamic] terrorists were able to kill 10,000
Americans in a nuclear attack, they would "do away with our way of
life". But Hiroshima and Nagasaki incurred well over 100,000 instant
deaths and that did not mean the end of the Japanese way of life.
(Ibid, emphasis added)
In an utterly twisted and convoluted argument,
professor Dibb transforms the US-NATO threat to wage a nuclear war on Iran
into an Al Qaeda operation to attack an American city with nuclear weapon.
Dibb presents the US-NATO menace to trigger what would result in a Middle
East nuclear holocaust as a humanitarian operation to save American lives.
By implication, the Al Qaeda sponsored "American
Hiroshima" would be supported by Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and
this in turn would immediately provide a just cause (casus belli) for
retaliation against Iran:
"What a nuclear attack on a US city would
mean, however, is an understandable American retaliation in kind. So,
those countries that have slack control over their fissile nuclear
materials and cozy relations with terrorists need to watch out. A
wounded America would be under enormous pressure to respond in a wholly
disproportionate manner.
And then we would be in a completely changed strategic situation in
which the use of nuclear weapons might become commonplace."
(Ibid,
emphasis added).
Dick Cheney's Second
9/11
The insinuation that Al Qaeda is preparing an attack on America has been on
the lips of Vice President Dick Cheney for several years now.
Cheney has
stated on several occasions since 2004, that Al Qaeda is preparing a "Second
9/11":
In August 2005, Vice President Dick Cheney
is reported to have instructed USSTRATCOM, based at the Offutt Air Force
Base in Nebraska, to draw up a "Contingency Plan", "to be employed in
response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States".
(Philip Giraldi, Attack on Iran:
Pre-emptive Nuclear War, The American Conservative, 2 August 2005)
Dick Cheney's "Contingency Plan" was predicated
on the preemptive war doctrine. Implied in the "Contingency Plan" was the
presumption that Iran would be behind the attacks.
The Pentagon in a parallel initiative has actually fine-tuned its military
agenda to the point of actually envisaging a Second 9/11 scenario as a means
to providing the US administration with a "credible" justification to attack
Iran and Syria:
"Another [9/11 type terrorist] attack could
create both a justification and an opportunity that is lacking today to
retaliate against some known targets [Iran and Syria]"
(Statement by Pentagon official, leaked
to the Washington Post, 23 April 2006, emphasis added)
Meanwhile,. the US Congress is concerned that an
"American Hiroshima" could potentially damage the US economy:
"What we do know is that our enemies want to
inflict massive casualties and that terrorists have the expertise to
invent a wide range of attacks, including those involving the use of
chemical, biological, radiological and even nuclear weapons. ... [E]xploding
a small nuclear weapon in a major city could do incalculable harm to
hundreds of thousands of people, as well as to businesses and the
economy,...
(US Congress, House Financial Services
Committee, June 21, 2007).
As far as sensitizing public opinion to the
dangers of US sponsored nuclear war, there is, with a few exceptions, a
scientific and intellectual vacuum: No research, no analysis, no
comprehension of the meaning of a nuclear holocaust which in a real sense
threatens the future of humanity. This detachment and lack of concern of
prominent intellectuals characterizes an evolving trend in many universities
and research institutes in the strategic studies, the sciences and social
sciences.
Academics increasingly tow the line.
They remain mum on the issue of a US
sponsored nuclear war. There is a tacit acceptance of a diabolical and
criminal military agenda, which in a very sense threatens life on this
planet.
The US-NATO doctrine to use nukes on a
preemptive basis with a view to "saving the Western World's way of life" is
not challenged in any meaningful way either by academics or media experts in
strategic studies.