Category: Aggregated

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Rep. Walter Jones on C-SPAN TV: Congress Must Fully Debate and Amend Obama’s Military Force Bill; Release the ’28 Pages’

Rep. Walter Jones (R—N.C.), a leader of initiatives for a full and open debate in Congress on Obama’s Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF), and for an immediate de-classification of the 28 pages from the Congressional 9/11 inquiry, spoke strongly on these points yesterday on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” program. During the nearly hour-long program, people who calling in were moved by the morality and clarity of Jones’s leadership, and expressed this explicitly.

Jones’s TV appearance comes soon after the release of the letter he initiated with Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA), signed by 18 other Congressmen (9 of each party), sent to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) Feb. 18, stating the same demands.

Rep. Jones began by referencing this letter, stressing:

“Let’s have a full three-day debate, eight hours a day, or six hours a day, on this issue. It’s too important to the security of our country and it’s too important that we are spending absolutely billions of dollars with little accountability.”

Jones’s letter stated that over $1.5 trillion has been spent so far, and we have “lost over 6800 brave men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan…”

Jones said of the first AUMF in 2002, that “when we debated the Iraq AUMF, we only had two amendments…”. It was a closed process. Today, we must have an open debate. He spoke of the circumstances in 2002, saying:

“Obviously, that was a different administration and a different time. I sincerely believe that the previous administration had manipulated the intelligence to justify an unnecessary war. So I’m very cautious…I’ll use the word, dubious…”

Jones repeated the word, “dubious,” on Obama’s AUMF today. He continued, by warning:

“I know what the President sent to us was very vague, and he probably did that intentionally… Congress needs to be wary… We are going to spend a good deal of money on something that is unclear in both mission, measures of effectiveness, in start and exit strategy. Haven’t we been down this road before?”

He elaborated several specifics of today’s situation, which indicate the direction of what he believes needs to be done. For example:

“I would like at this time to thank the King of Jordan, and to thank the President of Egypt, for taking the lead to attack ISIL after they have done so much damage. This is what needs to happen. They are Middle Eastern Countries—Muslim countries. They need to take the lead. Let America support and back them, but not have America continuing to send our men and women on the ground.”

Jones spoke critically of the chaos and spreading terrorism resulting from the interventionist, regime-change approach, highlighting the consequences which have arisen from the invasion of Iraq and overthrow of Saddam Hussein using the pretext of falsified intelligence, as well as the more recent regime-change in Libya:

“Until the day I die, I believe sincerely that, if Saddam Hussein was still in power, I don’t think we would have all of these jihadists running around the world… Was he an evil dictator? Absolutely. I believe, had we not bombed Libya and taken out Qaddafi, I believe we would not have the terrorists living in Libya….Diplomacy is the best way to try to maintain some type of order…”

He denounced the carnage and brutality which results from war:

“[We are] not only killing the enemy, but also killing innocent people. When you are killing innocent people, their families will tell people for centuries that Americans killed their uncle or aunt…”

When asked how he originally come to vote for the first AUMF, then regret it, Jones answered that, the “Administration manipulated the intelligence.” Jones said that he attended all the classified briefings, “from Donald Rumsfeld to Condoleeza Rice, [who] talked about the threat of Saddam Hussein.” But stated regretfully, “I did not read the CIA analysis. I wish I had…”

The 28 Pages

Among Jones’s other key points was to reiterate his demand for the declassification of “the 28 pages that were in the 9/11 bipartisan report… It will help educate the American people and members of Congress to the role of foreign governments in the attack…”

Support Rep. Walter Jones’ H. Res. 14 to declassify the 28 Pages on 9/11.

Throughout his remarks, Jones stressed the need for citizens and Congressmen to take responsibility. “We, for too long, have abdicated responsibility.” He spoke sadly of writing letters to the families of stricken soldiers, wounded or killed.

“I still write letters—not as many. I have sent over 11,000 letters since we went into Iraq. I still go to Walter Reed to visit the bodies. I was there in October and need to go again, and will in March. We had Marines from my district… So many people watching this show, know [this]…”

Among the call-ins were citizens who responded to Jones’ leadership deeply moved. A few of their comments:

Caller: “Do you remember the Greek story about how the genie, who carried a lamp, looking for an honest man—about Diogenes…looking for an honest man? I thought that was you. I was impressed.”

Caller: “Thank you for your seriousness when it comes to this ultra-important issue.”

Caller: “I ask you this, Congressman, do you feel lonely up there in Washington? I wish there were more people that feel the way you do.”

Caller: “Good morning. I’ve been listening, and am completely overwhelmed by what he has been saying. From the Republican side of things, I have not heard this kind of candor before. It is greatly appreciated. I think it is having an effect even on the phone calls you are getting this morning, instead of the rant that I so often hear…”

Noted investigative journalist Bob Parry, who broke the original Iran-Contra scandal and now runs the consortiumnews.com website, published on February 23rd a devastating indictment of Washington’s creation of the Nazi regime in Ukraine, as leading to a possible thermonuclear war with Russia.

Under the headline “Ready for Nuclear War over Ukraine?” Parry begins by reporting on the demented statements of Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko calling for confronting Russia even though it is “a nuclear state,” including Prystaiko’s demand that
“What we expect from the world is that the world will stiffen up in the spine a little.”
Parry asks:

Parry goes on to describe, in accurate detail, the overtly Nazi nature of leading forces in Kiev, including the notorious Azov batallion.

Parry also documents the immoral cover-up of these facts by major US media, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, although he stops short of pointing the figure of those who actually put the Nazis in power: Victoria Nuland, Barack Obama, and their superiors in the British Empire.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was in Abu Dhabi Tuesday for the IDEX international arms trade show, where he announced a defense deal with the UAE, to obtain weapons. Though the details are as yet unspecified, the deal was reported as a breaking story this morning by Defense News.

This is the latest expression of how Victoria Nuland’s Nazi regime in Kiev is not satisfied with peace in southeast Ukraine, and is going around the world shopping for weapons, probably, in part, to replace the vast amounts of equipment and munitions that it lost in the Debaltsevo cauldron, but in reality, to drag the world into war with nuclear-armed Russia.

Poroshenko also indicated Tuesday, that he hopes for a deal with the US.

“We are in a very practical dialogue, and we hope in the very near future, we have a decision to help us attain defensive weapons,” he said. “I want to stress that the defensive capabilities for the Ukrainian Army are only to defend our territory, to keep our independence, to keep our sovereignty. We do not have any plans to attack anybody.”

All Poroshenko would say about the UAE deal was that the two countries signed “a very important memorandum about military and technical cooperation.” The UAE military is largely, but not exclusively, equipped with American and French-supplied equipment.

It is highly likely that there is far more than meets the eye in this UAE arms deal. Recall that the UAE, along with Qatar, played a key role as a pass-through for the British-Obama policy of sending arms to Libya, and from there on to Syria. The Ukrainian-UAE deal has the distinct odor of something similar— i.e., de facto arming of Ukraine by Obama, with an effort at plausible denial.

Also present at IDEX is US Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Frank Kendall. While there’s no report that Kendall and Poroshenko might be meeting, Kendall was to have met with the Ukrainian arms-buying delegation at the show. “I expect the conversation will be about their needs,” Kendall said yesterday, according to Defense One.

“We’re limited at this point in time in terms of what we’re able to provide them, but where we can be supportive, we want to be.”

Kendall doesn’t have the authority to negotiate arms deals, so he’ll be “primarily in listening mode, trying to understand what their needs are,” he said. Russia has a very large display in the exhibit hall, but it’s on the opposite end from the Ukrainian exhibit.

Andriy Parubiy, a co-founder of the neo-Nazi Svoboda party and of one of the paramilitary groups that became the Right Sector spearhead of the February 2014 coup, is scheduled to be in Washington this week. Parubiy took clear aim at the US in an interview in Ottawa, Monday, announcing that he expected Canada to pressure the US on the question of arms sales to Ukraine. “We’re sure that Canada’s voice is authoritative and carries a lot of weight,” he said.

“So the U.S. has to make this decision [about providing weapons], but Canada is kind of the authoritative voice that can push [for] that. It can influence the U.S. decision.”

While in Ottawa, he met with Foreign Affairs Minister Rob Nicholson and James Bezan, the parliamentary secretary to the defense minister, as well as members of Parliament.

Lyndon LaRouche stated today that the global pattern of British actions indicates that they are acting in a way which can only be attributed to a drive towards early thermonuclear war. The lightning-fast Watergating and resignation of Malcolm Rifkind, the Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament and a heavyweight of the British Establishment, for his opposition to escalating confrontation with Russia, means that the British are readying for war, LaRouche said. They are getting rid of any and all impediments to that war—that is the conclusion to be drawn from the Rifkind ouster.

That British war drive is also evident in developments around Ukraine and Greece—two strategic confrontations where temporary, uneasy ceasefires currently exist, but where the underlying issues have by no means been settled.

For example, in Ukraine, President Petro Poroshenko is actively shopping for arms to be used in their war against Russia. At the IDEX international arms exhibition in Abu Dhabi, he announced that he had signed a defense deal with the UAE, and that he hoped to do the same shortly with the United States:

“We are in a very practical dialogue, and we hope in the very near future, we [will] have a decision to help us attain defensive weapons,”

he stated. Meanwhile Andriy Parubiy, the commander of the Maidan “self-defense” contingent who is now head of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, is in Washington meeting with Pentagon officials and various senators, to get a commitment to send arms to Ukraine. Parubiy, like his controller Victoria Nuland, of Obama’s State Department, are open advocates of Nazi policies, including confrontation with Russia.

We know what Nuland is up to, LaRouche commented today; and we don’t think it’s human. In fact, Obama and his policy allies on the Republican side, are the single greatest source of danger to the continued existence of the United States itself. That is something that has to be stated explicitly, and widely—from the policy center of the LaRouche movement’s organizing in Manhattan, radiating outward to the rest of the country and the world.

In the case of Greece, the European Union is hell-bent on crushing the Tsipras government’s refusal to implement any more Troika austerity policies on the country, and is demanding that they capitulate or be subjected to financial and economic carpet-bombing, and expelled from the Euro zone.

Why should they stay in the Eurozone?, Lyndon LaRouche shot back today. The Greek government should tell the EU:

If you’re going to screw us, why should we be part of that? There is a limit to what any self-respecting nation will submit to, and we’ve reached that limit. What you are demanding is a fraud—and you know it. The British Empire has been bleeding us for years, and they have no right to do that; it is immoral. We have shown that we want to work with you, we have given you that option; but if we don’t get satisfaction, then we are under no obligation whatsoever to continue with the fraud. We cannot submit.

LaRouche specified that not everyone in Europe is aggressively pursuing the British Empire’s scorched earth policy towards Greece, but there are some particularly active people who must be singled out and stopped. That is the case with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, and Eurogroup Chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem, as well as Spain’s Finance Minister Luis de Guindos—who was the director of Lehman Brothers in Spain and Portugal from 2006 to the bank’s blazing demise in 2008. And now he presumes to lecture Greece on proper financial policies?!

But Greece has options against these hit-men, LaRouche emphasized. If they crush Greece the way they are planning to, they will sink the whole system. So what Greece has to say, LaRouche continued, is that the conditions being demanded of them are fraudulent. The debt is fraudulent; Greece doesn’t actually owe anything. The numbers that are being concocted are just another case of crooked bankers’ arithmetic—a practice that is so fraudulent, that it even gives a bad name to mathematics!

The point is, LaRouche concluded, that Greece doesn’t owe anything, and yet the British Empire, in their drive for war, are out to drown them, to kill them, and to crush them. It is time for Greece to make their move, and let the banks know that they have nothing coming. They are finished.

In conclusion to a discussion with associates Tuesday night, LaRouche said,