How America Made ISIS

[eridani]

http://www.nationofchange.org/how-america-made-isis-1409674407

Looking back, it’s hard not to think of all of this as a kind of American jihadism, as well as an attempt to establish what might have been considered an American caliphate in the region (though Washington had far kinder descriptive terms for it). In the process, the U.S. effectively dismantled and destroyed state power in each of the three main countries in which it intervened, while ensuring the destabilization of neighboring countries and finally the region itself.

We, however, ignore the virtual library of videos and other imagery the U.S. generated, images widely viewed (or heard about and discussed) with no less horror in the Muslim world than ISIS’s imagery is in ours. As a start, there were the infamous “screen saver” images straight out of the Marquis de Sade from Abu Ghraib prison. There, Americans tortured and abused Iraqi prisoners, while creating their own iconic version of crucifixion imagery. Then there were the videos that no one (other than insiders) saw, but that everyone heard about. These, the CIA took of the repeated torture and abuse of al-Qaeda suspects in its “black sites.” In 2005, they were destroyed by an official of that agency, lest they be screened in an American court someday. There was also the Apache helicopter video released by WikiLeaks in which American pilots gunned down Iraqi civilians on the streets of Baghdad (including two Reuters correspondents), while on the sound track the crew are heard wisecracking. There was the video of U.S. troops urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban fighters in Afghanistan. There were the trophy photos of body parts brought home by U.S. soldiers. There were the snuff filmsof the victims of Washington’s drone assassination campaigns in the tribal backlands of the planet (or “bug splat,” as the drone pilots came to call the dead from those attacks) and similar footage from helicopter gunships. There was the bin Laden snuff film video from the raid on Abbottabad, Pakistan, of which President Obama reportedly watched a live feed. And that’s only to begin to account for some of the imagery produced by the U.S. since September 2001 from its various adventures in the Greater Middle East.

[CJCRANE]

1. Good article.

It makes a good start of understanding this whole neocon era that we are living in.

[Ron Green]

2. Not only this, but their atrocities are a priceless gift

to the warmongers in the Congress and the Ruling Class.

[newfie11]

3. Thanks for posting this

It should be seen by every American.

[littlemissmartypants]

4. Kicking. Thank you. nt

[Live and Learn]

5. K&R nt

[truedelphi]

6. K & R. An article from "Syrian Free Press"

http://syrianfreepress.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/origins-of-isis/

[eridani]

7. Thanks--salient quote below

http://syrianfreepress.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/origins-of-isis/

Moderate rebels? Well it’s complicated. Not that this should really come as any surprise. Reuters had reported in 2012 that the FSA’s command was dominated by Islamic extremists, and the New York Times had reported that same year that the majority of the weapons that Washington were sending into Syria was ending up in the hands Jihadists. For two years the U.S. government knew that this was happening, but they kept doing it.

And the FSA’s ties to Al-Nusra are just the beginning. In June of 2014 Al-Nusra merged with ISIS at the border between Iraq and Syria.

So to review, the FSA is working with Al-Nusra, Al-Nusra is working with ISIS, and the U.S. has been sending money and weapons to the FSA even though they’ve known since 2012 that most of these weapons were ending up in the hands of extremists. You do the math.

[malaise]

8. Add parading the dead bodies of Saddam Hussein's sons

and then showing his hanging as part of the Western Christmas holiday celebrations.

You cannot invade, occupy, torture and not expect retribution. What you sow you reap. Sadly the wrong people are reaping this madness.

[jakeXT]

9. From a Kucinich tweet

:large

https://twitter.com/Dennis_Kucinich/status/506990744096493568