For Bush, Lying is the Norm

Since the attacks of September 11, George W. Bush has 'used lies in a systematic way to further his agenda.' According to this op-ed article from Mexico's La Jornada, 'Bush and his underlings are drowning in a swamp of lies' and 'Europe is unlikely to do anything to help.'

By Carlos Fazio

Translated by Paula van de Werken

December 19, 2005

Original Article (Spanish)

The president of the United States, George W. Bush, is a consummate liar. During all of his time as Commander in Chief, he has deceived the American people and the world. I refer specifically to the time after the attacks on the Twin Towers of New York, September 11, 2001.

Since then, he has used lies in a systematic way to further his agenda.

He lied again when he spoke at the Woodrow Wilson Center, a think tank in Washington DC [SEE VIDEO], last December 14, and where he admitted that the Intelligence that assured him that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction "was an error." Neither did Iraq have this type of armament, nor were the Iraqis the largest active military force in the world, nor was Saddam Hussein an international menace, and Bush knew this all along.

These false premises, which are really part of a scheme - a poisonous propaganda campaign promoted by the group of murderous, psychopathic fundamentalists that surround him (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Ashcroft, Ridge, Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, Bolton), authorized by him (Bush), carried out by the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and which is designed to fabricate an internal consensus to invade and destroy Iraq, take control of their oil, get rich from the reconstruction, and change the map of the Middle East and the Persian Gulf.

Bush's propaganda advisors know that wars are waged and then easily forgotten. They know that normally, an act of war of some magnitude requires a preliminary phase of propaganda in the form of an overwhelming media barrage. For this reason, before starting the neo-con wars of aggression in Afghanistan and Iraq, the media was manipulated to divert attention from their real end game and to fool the people and justify scorched earth operations in two Arab countries.

On September 24, 2001, before the invasion of Afghanistan, a United States Army officer revealed to the Washington Post that a war of "Great Disinformation" was going to be waged to "lie to the press" and that they would put " strict new limits" on journalists. He also warned of a growing campaign to "assure the loyalty" (patriotism) of the journalists in Bush's crusade against the Taliban regime.

The next day, in a vague denial, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld himself explained that "there could be circumstances when it will be necessary to not tell the truth" to the media. Pressed as to whether or not in the "campaign of information operations," and as part of the psychological war against the enemy - the Pentagon could release false information, Rumsfeld answered: "I suppose that one should never says never."

When the aggression was consummated in February 2002, one heard that the Pentagon had set-up an office charged with deliberately spreading "false news" overseas by using the TV networks to hide the origin or official character of certain information. This was a new front in the battle - the information battle. This has since been confirmed by The New York Times (2/19/02), as a part of covert operations and psychological warfare from the Office of Strategic Influence (OSI), designed by experts in military intelligence. The OSI was created by the Pentagon after September 11 to plant "black propaganda" (deliberate lies), disinformation and "white propaganda" (true and believable information favorable to the United States) with journalists and foreign media to influence international public opinion and governments, friends and enemies alike, within the framework of Washington's "War on Terror."

The OSI is under the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflicts. Among its functions are developing techniques of subterfuge, psychological warfare, the jamming of radio transmissions and attacks on computer networks, with the hoped-for-result of deceiving the enemy and influencing public opinion, both national and international.

For this reason, the comedy over a supposed Iraqi nuclear arsenal - that even now Bush regards as "responsible" and which he falsely attributes to an "Intelligence error" - was an "arrangement" in which he directly participated.

Lies form an instrumental part of imperial domination. The Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice, lied in early December before departing on a damage-control-tour of Old Europe" when she denied the existence of secret CIA flights which transported kidnapped alleged terrorists, some of whom were assassinated and others tortured in a network of clandestine prisons established in more than 40 countries.

The current Director of the CIA, Porter Goss, lied when he insisted that his "organization doesn't torture," but simply uses "innovative methods."

As Noam Chomsky says, "the United States is truly a contemptible State," a criminal State that uses violence and State terrorism in world affairs. With the scandal of the CIA flights it is clear that the United States has violated sovereign air space and the laws of various European countries.

Bush and his underlings are drowning in a swamp of lies. But a compliant Europe in unlikely to do anything to help truth and justice prevail.