by Mickey Huff
Groups deemed terror organizations by the US operate among the Syrian opposition. In November 2012, many of the opposition forces united under the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces. Several groups, most notably Jabhat al-Nusra or the al-Nusra Front, joined the coalition. Al-Nusra is designated a terrorist organization by the US because of its pledges of allegiance to al-Qa-eda. Al Jazeera reported that the UN Security Council has blacklisted al-Nusra, claiming it is an alias for al-Qaeda. Al-Nusra has claimed responsibility for bombings that have racked Syria for the past year, targeting Assad’s regime and supporters. In April 2013, al-Nusra and al-Qaeda publicly announced support of each other.
Corporate reporting follows a well-worn Western narrative, emphasizing the dilemmas posed by humanitarian intervention—a frame much favored by officials in the Obama administration, and likely to become more pronounced since the appointments of Saman-tha Power and Susan Rice, to serve as US ambassador to the United Nations and as the president’s national security advisor, respectively. The only corporate publication to offer a differing perspective was the New York Times, which investigated the claims of CIA involvement in Syria’s civil war. All other major corporate news outlets have primarily focused on terror attacks in the region, the invisible “red line,” John McCain’s secret trip to Syria, and the true humanitarian crisis.
That stated, as Censored 2014 went to press, the US officially announced it would arm and train the Syrian rebels via a CIA-run program.
SOURCES:
John Glaser, “Stratfor Emails: Covert Special Ops Inside Syria Since December,” Antiwar.com, March 7, 2012, http://news.antiwar.com/2012/03/07/stratfor-emails-covert-special-ops-inside-syria-since-december/.
Eric Schmitt, “CIA Said to Aid in Steering Arms to Syrian Opposition,” New York Times, June 21, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/21/world/middleeast/cia-said-to-aid-in-steering-arms-to-syrian-rebels.html.
“Obama Gives the ‘Secret’ Order for CIA to Help Syrian Rebels Dispose of Assad’s Brutal Regime,” Daily Mail, August 1, 2012, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2182427/Obama-authorizes-secret-support-Syrian-rebels.html.
Chris Hughes, “CIA Spies ‘Smuggle 14 Stinger Missiles into Syria So Rebels Can Take Out Regime Warplanes,’” Mirror News, August 18, 2012, http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/cia-spies-smuggle-14-stinger-1266487.
Marc Ginsberg, “Obama’s Syrian ‘Red Line’ Is No Red Light to Hezbollah or Iran,” Huffington Post, August 21, 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/amb-marc-ginsberg/obamas-syrian-red-line-is_b_1819351.html.
Tony Cartalucci, “MI6, SAS, CIA: Western Troops in Syria,” Global Research, September 1, 2012, http://www.globalresearch.ca/m16-sas-cia-western-troops-in-syria/5302879.
“U.S. Intervention in Syria Appears Unlikely, Say Officials,” Washington Post, September 2, 2012, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-intervention-in-syria-appears-unlikely-say-officials/2012/09/02/cicd4e9a-f2bb-11e1-a612-3cfc842a6d89_story_1.html.
Bill Van Auken, “US Escalates CIA Intervention on Syrian-Turkish Border,” World Socialist Web Site, September 8, 2012, http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2012/09/syri-s08.html.
Anne Gearan, “U.S. Yanks Support for Syrian Opposition Group, Warns of Extremist Takeover of Uprising,” Washington Post, October 31, 2012, http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-10-31/world/35499721_1_syrian-national-council-opposition-group-snc.
Arthur Bright, “What is the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces?,” Christian Science Monitor, November 12, 2012, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/terrorism-security/2012/1112/What-is-The-National-Coalition-for-Syrian-Revolutionary-and-Opposition-Forces-video.
Schlomi Diaz, Daniel Siryoti, Eli Leion, “Israeli Special Forces Tracking Chemical Weapons inside Syria,” Israel Hayom, December 9, 2012, http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=6668.
Michael R. Gordon and Anne Barnard, “U.S. Places Militant Syrian Rebel Group on List of Terrorist Organizations,” New York Times, December 10, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/11/world/middleeast/us-designates-syrian-al-nusra-front-as-terrorist-group.html.
“US Officially Designates Key Syrian Opposition Group as al-Qaeda Affiliate,” Russia Today, December 11, 2012, http://rt.com/usa/us-opposition-group-al-nusra-853/.
Jamie Dettmer, “Jihadists Are Creeping Into Syria’s Rebel Factions,” Daily Beast, January 4, 2013, http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/01/04/jihadists-are-creeping-into-syria-s-rebel-factions.html.
Vladimir Isachenkov, “Russian Arms Trade With Syria Will Continue, State Arms Trader Says,” Huffington Post, February 13, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/13/russian-arms-syria_n_2677279.html.
Michael R. Gordon, “U.S. Steps Up Aid to Syrian Opposition, Pledging $60 Million,” New York Times, February 28, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/01/world/middleeast/us-pledges-60-million-to-syrian-opposition.html.
C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt, “Arms Airlift to Syrian Rebels Expands, With Aid From C.I.A.,” New York Times, March 24, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/25/world/middleeast/arms-airlift-to-syrian-rebels-expands-with-cia-aid.html. Jim Muir, “Syria Crisis: Al-Nusra Pledges Allegiance to al-Qaeda,” BBC News, April 10, 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22095099.
“McCain Sneaks across Border, Visits Syrian Rebels,” Fox News, May 27, 2013, http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/27/mccain-sneaks-across-border-visits-syrian-rebels . “UN Blacklists Syria’s al-Nusra Front,” Al Jazeera, May 31, 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2013/05/201353021594299298.html “CIA Will Lead US Effort to Arm, Train Syrian Rebel Forces,” Fox News, June 15, 2103, http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/06/15/cia-will-lead-us-effort-to-arm-train-syrian-rebel-forces-fox-confirms/.
Censored 2013 #16
Sexual Violence Against Women Soldiers On The Rise and Under Wraps
SUMMARY: The 2005 death of US Army Private LaVena Johnson, officially ruled suicide by the Department of Defense, in fact exemplifies the sexual violence that female soldiers encounter while serving their country. Johnson’s autopsy revealed wounds inconsistent with suicide, including chemical burns that many believe were intended to destroy DNA evidence of rape. The Pentagon has tried to intimidate reporters and editors working on stories about Johnson. Johnson’s case is among at least twenty in which female soldiers have died under suspicious circumstances. The mysterious deaths are coinciding with an increase in sexual violence against women in the military. According to the Department of Defense, in 2010, there were 3,158 total reports of sexual assault in the military. The DOD estimates that this number represents only 13.5 percent of the actual assaults, making the total number of military rapes and sexual assaults over 19,000 for the year.
UPDATE: The near-epidemic of rape in the military has been covered heavily by the corporate media since its release in Censored 2013. For example, NBC News covered Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel’s decision to strip the authority of commanding generals to void military court convictions. This prevents generals from overturning sexual as-sault sentences. The defense department launched a “public relations campaign to show they’re serious about cracking down on sexual assault in the military.” The department “expanded its victim-assistance programs, sought help from outside advocacy groups, and required sexual assault to receive attention higher up the chain of command.”
Much attention was brought to this previously underreported issue of rape inside the military by the documentary The Invisible War. Directed by Kirby Dick and produced by Amy Ziering, The Invisible War received nominations for numerous awards including Best Documentary Feature at the Academy Awards. The Chicago Film Critics Association named it the Best Documentary of 2012. It appeared on numerous year-end best lists, including those published by the New York Times and the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures.
Although media attention on sexual assault in the military has increased, statistics do not reveal an improv
ement on the situation. Independent news center Common Dreams reported that, despite the changes in oversight championed by Hagel, issues persist. Abby Zimet reported, “The military’s annual report shows sexual assaults are in fact on the rise, with at least 26,000 a year. That’s about 70 a day.” Foreign Policy reported that the Air Force’s attempt focused on giving servicemen and women “a box of breath mints, which has a bold sticker on the cover that says ‘NO MEANS NO!’” and a “2.5-ounce hand sanitizer bottle shaped like an open palm. Printed on the bottle: ‘KEEP UR HANDS 2 YOURSELF,’ along with the telephone number for the Sexual Assault Response Coordinators 24-hour hotline.”
Another problem for victims is that those tasked with policing assaults are themselves assaulting victims. In 2013, Lieutenant Colonel Jeffrey Krusinski was charged with sexual battery against a woman in a parking lot. Krusinski’s job until the charge was chief of the US Air Force’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Program. Officially the program “reinforces the Air Force’s commitment to eliminate incidents of sexual assault.” Krusinki’s arrest occurred the day before the Pentagon released its annual report on the epidemic of sexual assaults in the military. “How many more reasons do we need to take cases of rape and sexual assault out of the chain of command?” questioned Representative Jackie Speier (D-CA).
That is an excellent question. And given that this issue has become a much more high-profile one, deservedly so, this is one question the corporate media should press to have answered. The Senate’s Committee on Armed Services was meeting to take action on this important issue in June as Censored 2014 went to press, but at that time, there was very little coverage in the corporate media about this crucial hearing.19
SOURCES:
Ann Jones, “The War Against Women, at Home and Abroad,” Nation, March 21, 2013, http://www.thenation.com/article/173463/war-against-women-home-and-abroad.
R. Clifton Spargo, “The Illuminator: Helen Benedict and the Journalistic Investigation that Inspired The Invisible War,” Huffington Post, April 3, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/r-clifton-spargo/the-illuminator-helen-ben_b_3001042.html.
Bill Briggs, Jim Miklaszewski, and Courtney Kube, “Defense Secretary Hagel Demands Rape Reform in Military,” NBC News, April 8, 2013, http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/08/17658388-defense-secretary-hagel-demands-rape-reform-in-military.
Liesl Gerntholtz, “It’s Not Just About Sexual Violence,” Huffington Post, April 9, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/liesl-gerntholtz/its-not-just-about-sexual_b_3045633.html.
Abby Zimet, “Air Force Sexual Assault Prevention Chief Arrested for . . . Sexual Assault,” Common Dreams, May 6, 2013, http://www.commondreams.org/further/2013/05/06-3.
Kevin Baron, “Air Force Fights Sexual Assault with Lip Balm, Hand Sanitizer, Breath Mints,” Foreign Policy, April 24, 2013, http://e-ring.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/04/24/air_force_fights_sexual_assault_with_lip_balm_hand_sanitizer_breath_mints
Kumar Ramanathan , “What The Military Is Doing To Address Its Sexual Assault Crisis,” ThinkProgress, June 14, 2013, http://thinkprogress.org/security/2013/06/14/2150351/military-address-sexual-assault.
Censored 2012 #3
Obama Authorizes International Assassination Campaign
SUMMARY: Advancing a policy set forth by the George W. Bush administration, the Obama administration created an “international assassination program” to carry out “targeted killings” of suspected terrorists. Under this program, the president has authorized the high-profile killing of Osama bin Laden, as well as the killings of US citizens, such as Anwar al-Awlaki. The Obama administration has gone even further by leading covert drone wars in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia.
UPDATE: Despite coverage from both corporate and independent media outlets, the Obama administration’s targeted killing program remains shrouded in secrecy. In January 2013, a federal judge dismissed a parallel Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the New York Times, that would have required the government to disclose documents that justify with evidence the targeted killing of US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki. Judge Colleen McMahon stated in response to her ruling, “I can find no way around the thicket of laws and precedents that effectively allow the executive branch of our government to proclaim as perfectly lawful certain actions that seem on their face incompatible with our Constitution and laws while keeping the reasons for their conclusion a secret.” Both the ACLU and New York Times appealed this decision, while the ACLU filed another FOIA lawsuit requesting information to be released on who and how many people have been killed in targeted drone strikes. The number is currently estimated to be around 4,000 casualties.
On February 4, 2013, NBC News published a “white paper” leaked by the Department of Justice, which meant to give legal justification for the US government to carry out the extrajudicial killing of a US citizen. The document, which is not an official legal memo, offers the broad explanation that a citizen can be targeted if “an informed, high-level official” determines the person to be “an imminent threat,” “capture is infeasible,” and the killing is carried out within “applicable law of war principles.” More examples of the white paper’s vague language include the targeted individual being a part of al-Qaeda or “associated forces,” with little definition of what an associated force is.
As a journalist whose sources include members of groups such as the Taliban, Chris Hedges is concerned that, under the guidelines of the DOJ white paper, the US might consider him included among those “associated” who could be targeted. The memo offers no geographical restrictions as to where these killings can occur. Furthermore, it effectively eliminates due process by stating there is no court that can evaluate the constitutional issues because “matters intimately related to foreign policy and national security are rarely proper subjects for judicial intervention.” As a response to the overly broad language, Mother Jones reported that members of the House sent a letter to President Obama requesting further clarification on several points of the white paper.
On March 6, 2013, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky performed a thirteen-hour filibuster during the nomination hearings on John Brennan’s appointment to become director of the CIA. Paul sought to encourage the Obama administration to release information concerning its drone program. The next day, Paul stated that he had received the desired information from the White House. On Fox News, he read a brief letter of response from Attorney General Eric Holder, which stated, “It has come to my attention that you have now asked an additional question: ‘Does the President have the authority to use a weaponized drone to kill an American not engaged in combat on American soil?’ The answer to that question is no.” Attorney General Holder’s response in effect further stalled the corporate media’s coverage of the topic.
Then, on March 10, 2013, a lengthy New York Times article chronicled the events leading to the Obama administration’s decision to kill Anwar al-Awlaki. Citing interviews with legal and counterterrorism officials, the report described a decade of investigation of al-Awlaki by the FBI, alleging that he “was clearly a direct plotter, no longer just a dangerous propagandist,” and which concluded by declaring that al-Awlaki posed sufficient threat to US security that “his constitutional rights did not bar the government from killing him without a trial.”
The Times came under criticism for its coverage from multiple outlets, with Glenn Greenwald in the Guardian stating that the article only “summarizes the unverified justifications” of officials, and expressing concern that the Times’ account allowed government officials to present evidence after the fact without having “done the same thing in a court of law prior to killing him.” The ACLU and Center for Constitutional Rights called the report “the latest in a series of onesided, selective disclosures that prevent meaningful public debate and legal or even political accountability for the government’s killing program, including its use against citizens.”
While the issue of drone strikes is now cover
ed by the corporate media, the issue has still oft been framed in ways that do not highlight the many civilian deaths associated with the program, or what appear to be clear violations of due process. In President Obama’s national security speech on May 23, 2013, which corporate media covered extensively, he stated that America could not be on a permanent war footing, and that the government needed to close Guantanamo, curtail drone strikes, and have more oversight of such matters. Conservatives decried the talk as a “victory for terrorists,” while many liberals tried to support the president’s strong reformist rhetoric. Meanwhile, ACLU executive director Anthony Romero’s remarks were covered in some independent online sources, but not much was covered elsewhere besides cursory mentions on the Washington Post blog and in USA Today. Romero remained skeptical of Obama’s claims and added,
To the extent the speech signals an end to signature strikes, recognizes the need for congressional oversight, and restricts the use of drones to threats against the American people, the developments on targeted killings are promising. Yet the president still claims broad authority to carry out targeted killings far from any battlefield, and there is still insufficient transparency. We continue to disagree fundamentally with the idea that due process requirements can be satisfied without any form of judicial oversight by regular federal courts.
SOURCES:
“Court Dismisses Most of FOIA Lawsuit on Targeted Killings of U.S. Citizens,” American Civil Liberties Union, January 2, 2013, http://www.aclu.org/national-security/court-dismisses-most-foia-lawsuit-targeted-killings-us-citizens.
Adam Liptak, “Secrecy of Memo on Drone Killing is Upheld,” New York Times, January 2, 2013,http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/03/us/judge-rules-memo-on-targeted-killing-can-remain-secret.html.
Martin Michael, “Obama Signs 2013 NDAA into Law, Preventing Gitmo Closure,” Mint Press News, January 5, 2013, http://www.mintpressnews.com/federal-judge-permanently-strikes-down-ndaa-provision-upholds-previous-rulings/.
