Blowback 101
Today is 15 May 2006.
One of my favorite terms is "blowback."
In the "intelligence" community, it means an operation whose negative and unintended consequences rebound upon the head of its creator.
In 1969, Nixon and Kissinger came up with the strategy of turning the Shah of Iran into America's gendarme in the Middle East: a Muslim (but non-Arab) ally who would throw its weight around on America's behalf. To this end, from 1969 to 1979, the United States Empire (USE) showered the Shah's military dictatorship with billions in foreign aid, particularly military assistance, helping him create the 4th or 5th largest armed forces in the world.
Unfortunately, this was one of the straws to break the camel's back. After the Oil Crisis of 1973, the Shah had spent billions in windfall oil revenue on his dreams of becoming, not only a gendarme, but a true emperor. This naturally inflamed the population even further than had decades of the Shah's regime's ccorruption and misappropriation of natural resources.
The result was the Iranian Revolution of 1979, when the Shah was forced to flee. There was to be no third act for the Shah; the CIA could not, as in 1953, organize a coup to return him to power. After factional struggle, the government was seized by the faction of reactionary mullahs led by Ayatollah S.R. Khomeini. The arrogance and blunders of the USE ruling elites had made the Khomeini regime the present of billions of dollars in taxpayer funded armaments.
Perhaps the most salient incident of blowback is CIA creation and funding of the mujahedin as proxy warriors against the USSR in Afghanistan. The propaganda line was "Kill the infidels." USE taxpayer dollars gave many warlords their starts, including a little-known Saudi named Osama bin Laden. Once the Soviets had been vanquished, is it any wonder that bin Laden would turn his efforts to killing other infidels?
According to the latest public opinion polls, 2/3rds of USE citizens support National Security Agency spying on their phone records. Blowback, anyone?
Once having these records in hand, the NSA is free to abuse them in any way its masters in the Bush Junta see fit. Already, two ABC news reporters have been contacted by a patriot within the federal government, advising them that their phone records are being analyzed in an attempt to discover who in government is leaking facts about illegal Junta operations. One must assume this is happening across the board.
Blackmail, anyone? For example, phone record analysis could determine a certain government or corporate official, or journalist, was making repeated calls to a person not their spouse, and physical surveillance could determine if the relationship were sexual. J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI regularly blackmailed with the results of investigative methods far less sophisticated.
The Bush Junta is using "national security" in the way that white Southern politicans once used "n*****," or Hitler once used "Jew."
Those who surrender their freedoms in a foolish attempt to protect their persons and prosperity cease to be citizens, and become mere subjects.
One of my favorite terms is "blowback."
In the "intelligence" community, it means an operation whose negative and unintended consequences rebound upon the head of its creator.
In 1969, Nixon and Kissinger came up with the strategy of turning the Shah of Iran into America's gendarme in the Middle East: a Muslim (but non-Arab) ally who would throw its weight around on America's behalf. To this end, from 1969 to 1979, the United States Empire (USE) showered the Shah's military dictatorship with billions in foreign aid, particularly military assistance, helping him create the 4th or 5th largest armed forces in the world.
Unfortunately, this was one of the straws to break the camel's back. After the Oil Crisis of 1973, the Shah had spent billions in windfall oil revenue on his dreams of becoming, not only a gendarme, but a true emperor. This naturally inflamed the population even further than had decades of the Shah's regime's ccorruption and misappropriation of natural resources.
The result was the Iranian Revolution of 1979, when the Shah was forced to flee. There was to be no third act for the Shah; the CIA could not, as in 1953, organize a coup to return him to power. After factional struggle, the government was seized by the faction of reactionary mullahs led by Ayatollah S.R. Khomeini. The arrogance and blunders of the USE ruling elites had made the Khomeini regime the present of billions of dollars in taxpayer funded armaments.
Perhaps the most salient incident of blowback is CIA creation and funding of the mujahedin as proxy warriors against the USSR in Afghanistan. The propaganda line was "Kill the infidels." USE taxpayer dollars gave many warlords their starts, including a little-known Saudi named Osama bin Laden. Once the Soviets had been vanquished, is it any wonder that bin Laden would turn his efforts to killing other infidels?
According to the latest public opinion polls, 2/3rds of USE citizens support National Security Agency spying on their phone records. Blowback, anyone?
Once having these records in hand, the NSA is free to abuse them in any way its masters in the Bush Junta see fit. Already, two ABC news reporters have been contacted by a patriot within the federal government, advising them that their phone records are being analyzed in an attempt to discover who in government is leaking facts about illegal Junta operations. One must assume this is happening across the board.
Blackmail, anyone? For example, phone record analysis could determine a certain government or corporate official, or journalist, was making repeated calls to a person not their spouse, and physical surveillance could determine if the relationship were sexual. J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI regularly blackmailed with the results of investigative methods far less sophisticated.
The Bush Junta is using "national security" in the way that white Southern politicans once used "n*****," or Hitler once used "Jew."
Those who surrender their freedoms in a foolish attempt to protect their persons and prosperity cease to be citizens, and become mere subjects.
posted by HH at 11:17 AM
2 Comments:
You are not the only one who likes the word "blowback":
Daily Kos, 5/16/2006
Does this comment mean Mob is not a G-rated site?
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