Blackwater base in San Diego

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Blackwater base in San Diego

Blackwater evil

As a follow up to the report on the Blackwater base in San Diego, which
talked about their campaigns to "win the hearts and minds" of the people,
including parachuting over sporting events with gigantic US flags, see
below an excerpt from the CodePink DC blog from Sat, May 10.

"On Saturday, we went to a US-Italy polo game because one of the
sponsors was Blackwater. Two of us got inside (I got in as press, Tighe
bought a ticket that was refunded when they kicked us out). When
Blackwater paratroopers were skydiving with US and Italian flags (gross
site), we unfurled our Blackwater Makes a Killing banner and ran up and
down yelling that they were mercenaries and killers until they kicked us out.
Meanwhile, Liz and Des -- with their megaphones -- were talking to EVERY
CAR that came in, as there was only one entrance."

See video of the Blackwater parachute team with the Italian flag (near the
bottom of the page):
http://www.americaspolocup.com/theevent.php

CodePink was also there with a No Dal Molin flag! See photo:
http://tinyurl.com/3mtol5

The most disturbing part of all this is they participate as if they were just
another branch of the service! If you´d like to send comments to any of the
event's sponsors, here´s a list (I wouldn´t bother with the magazine called
Garden & Gun!): http://www.americaspolocup.com/officialpartners.php

Two of the sponsors have an Italian connection:
Birra Moretti: info@birramoretti.it
National Italian American Foundation: information@niaf.org

See also Bob Koehler´s latest column on Blackwater below.

Stephanie

http://www.commonwonders.com/archives/col445.htm

Apology Denied
Once we recognize their humanity, we've lost

By ROBERT C. KOEHLER
Tribune Media Services

May 8, 2008

"I want you to feel that Iraqi life is precious," he told them.

Well, that´s not going to happen. Here, at the level of basic humanity, the
occupation of Iraq -- indeed, the entire Bush administration -- begins to
unravel. We can see this with excruciating clarity as requests for an apology
waylay the smooth, legal cover-up (one in a series) of the latest spasm of
panic and target practice by Blackwater thugs, which left 17 Iraqis dead in
Baghdad´s Nisoor Square in September.

Even the embedded media, so valiant in their attempts to cast the
American presence as well-intentioned and, you know, doing the best it can
(under the circumstances), couldn´t help but convey, as they reported on
the investigation of the Blackwater killings, the humanity of the grieving
Iraqis. In so doing, the coverage hinted, unavoidably, at the truth about the
occupation: that we are, to put it mildly, the bad guys, that what we´re doing
there is barbaric, racist, insane.

Nothing drives this truth home quite as blatantly as America´s mercenary
army in Iraq, which is immune from prosecution under either Iraqi or U.S.
law. And the baddest of the American privateers are the Blackwater guys,
about whom a rival security contractor told Fortune magazine: "They always
shoot first and ask questions later. When we´re out in country, we often fear
Blackwater more than the Iraqis."

Back on Sept. 16, Blackwater personnel -- not for the first time -- convulsed
the people to whom we are bringing democracy with an unprovoked
shooting rampage. While providing security for a U.S. embassy mission,
they opened fire in the crowded square. By the time they stopped, 17 Iraqis
lay dead and another several dozen were wounded. These were just
ordinary people going about their lives. No one had fired at the security
team first, witnesses insisted. But apparently something spooked them, and
when you´re not accountable under any law, why take chances?

The incident, or massacre, as the Iraqis call it, was outrageous enough to
require some sort of investigation by the occupying authorities -- albeit a
meaningless one, if you measure the seriousness of an investigation by the
potential consequences that would flow from it. In the middle of it, the State
Department renewed Blackwater´s contract in Iraq, indicating that, whatever
the result, nothing was at stake.

The U.S. also tried to buy its way out of this sticky wicket by offering money
to the injured and the relatives of the dead. For some reason, the Iraqis
refused their envelopes full of cash; they wanted apologies.

It´s hard for me to read anything about Iraq in the mainstream media
without being tormented by the way it´s written: especially by what I would
call the requisite spin and omission. Thus every travesty of our occupation,
every hellish mishap, every stealth brutality that somehow finds its way into
the spotlight, is presented to us context-free. This is the media´s ongoing
gift to George Bush (and John McCain).

The Los Angeles Times, for instance, in its May 4 story about the
investigation of the Nisoor Square massacre, doesn´t trouble us with
references to other Blackwater shooting sprees; much less the larger
context of invasion, mission accomplished, and five years of occupation in
which more than a million Iraqis have died; much less the ample testimony
of returning vets that "the hadjis" of occupied Iraq are routinely belittled,
mistreated and dehumanized. If it had done so, the massacre in question
would suddenly be a piece in a far larger picture that would make almost all
Americans recoil in shame.

The story does, however, report the awkwardness of Iraqis´ turning down
cash settlements as a reflection of "the deep disconnect between the
American legal process and the traditional culture of Iraq, between the
courtroom and the tribal diwan."

Ah, so that´s it. Here in America, when someone is killed by a burly goon
wearing wraparound sunglasses as he walks through a public square, our
cut-and-dried system of justice spits out a cash payment to the parents and
they go away happy. In primitive Iraq, however, "The perpetrator admits
responsibility, commiserates with the victim, pays medical expenses and
other compensation, all over glasses of tea in a tribal tent."

In other words, as a U.S. diplomat is quoted as saying, "Our system is so
different from theirs."

But the story in spite of itself refutes this explanation and cuts through to
the human core that knows neither national nor cultural boundaries by
quoting the Iraqis themselves, who are the only ones speaking in plain
language: "Let them apologize by saying those were innocent people," said
the father of one of the dead. "Then we will be ready for understanding."

At some point the wall of denial and lies that is the U.S. occupation of Iraq
will give way and world -- including American -- outrage will demand its
cessation. I believe the collapse will begin with an apology, which is why
that´s the one thing Iraq´s grieving survivors cannot have.