Nightmare Without Limits

I must begin with a reminder. In "The Face of the Killer Who Is Your President," I excerpted an article by Nick Turse. Here are several passages from Turse's reporting:

Somewhere on this planet an American commando is carrying out a mission. Now, say that 70 times and you're done... for the day. Without the knowledge of the American public, a secret force within the U.S. military is undertaking operations in a majority of the world's countries. ...

While it's well known that U.S. Special Operations forces are deployed in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, and it's increasingly apparent that such units operate in murkier conflict zones like Yemen and Somalia, the full extent of their worldwide war has remained deeply in the shadows.

Last year, Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post reported that U.S. Special Operations forces were deployed in 75 countries, up from 60 at the end of the Bush presidency. By the end of this year, U.S. Special Operations Command [SOCOM] spokesman Colonel Tim Nye told me, that number will likely reach 120. "We do a lot of traveling -- a lot more than Afghanistan or Iraq," he said recently. This global presence -- in about 60% of the world's nations and far larger than previously acknowledged -- provides striking new evidence of a rising clandestine Pentagon power elite waging a secret war in all corners of the world.
...

SOCOM represents something new in the military. Whereas the late scholar of militarism Chalmers Johnson used to refer to the CIA as "the president's private army," today JSOC performs that role, acting as the chief executive's private assassination squad, and its parent, SOCOM, functions as a new Pentagon power-elite, a secret military within the military possessing domestic power and global reach.

In 120 countries across the globe, troops from Special Operations Command carry out their secret war of high-profile assassinations, low-level targeted killings, capture/kidnap operations, kick-down-the-door night raids, joint operations with foreign forces, and training missions with indigenous partners as part of a shadowy conflict unknown to most Americans. Once "special" for being small, lean, outsider outfits, today they are special for their power, access, influence, and aura.

Turse's article was published at the beginning of August 2011.

In a story dated today, February 12, 2012, the New York Times now reports:

As the United States turns increasingly to Special Operations forces to confront developing threats scattered around the world, the nation’s top Special Operations officer, a member of the Navy Seals who oversaw the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, is seeking new authority to move his forces faster and outside of normal Pentagon deployment channels.

The officer, Adm. William H. McRaven, who leads the Special Operations Command, is pushing for a larger role for his elite units who have traditionally operated in the dark corners of American foreign policy. The plan would give him more autonomy to position his forces and their war-fighting equipment where intelligence and global events indicate they are most needed.

It would also allow the Special Operations forces to expand their presence in regions where they have not operated in large numbers for the past decade, especially in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

I'm certain you find all this tremendously reassuring. How good to know that Special Operations forces are used more and more frequently "to confront developing threats." What constitutes a "developing threat"? What are the factors involved? Who evaluates the available information and judges the severity of the threat?

And, if I may be so bold as to ask, what the hell does anyone in this criminal government mean by "threat" in the first damned place? Every bloody and blood-drenched official and miserable bureaucrat in Washington tells us that Iran is the gravest "threat" facing the United States -- except that it is no threat at all, nor will it ever be in the foreseeable future.

But Special Operations wants a still "larger role," and its leader wants "more autonomy to..." To what? Counter non-existent "threats"? And Special Operations wants "to expand their presence in regions" where they aren't yet killing whomever they choose and generally wreaking devastation whenever they feel like it. But I'm certain you'll sleep much better in light of all these wonderful reassurances.

I will give the NYT credit in one respect: their reporting on matters of this kind perfectly captures the nauseatingly hilarious mood of the murderous, maniacal farce that suffocates our lives. The very next paragraph of its story offers a series of real howlers:

While President Obama and his Pentagon’s leadership have increasingly made Special Operations forces their military tool of choice, similar plans in the past have foundered because of opposition from regional commanders and the State Department. The military’s regional combatant commanders have feared a decrease of their authority, and some ambassadors in crisis zones have voiced concerns that commandos may carry out missions that are perceived to tread on a host country’s sovereignty, like the rift in ties with Pakistan after the Bin Laden raid.

Don't you adore the fact that this collection of murderers and assassins exhibit the same petty squabbles over influence and power as are found in the moth-eaten bureaucracy of any pathetically rotten company you care to name? "No, no, you can't kill that guy! He's mine!" Or: "Wait a second, you miserable bastard. I'm the one who gets to order the destruction of those villages!" It's a magnificently edifying spectacle, it most surely is.

And I simply love that "some ambassadors" have "voiced concerns" that the always courteous and thoughtful United States might "tread on a host country's sovereignty." When killing a country's citizens, destroying their land, and exploiting their resources, you can never be too thoughtful. We wouldn't want to offend anyone, for heaven's sake.

I could go through the rest of the story, but honestly, neither you nor I deserve that kind of punishment. I want to make a few general points of some significance.

First, and I consider this absolutely crucial, stories like this -- especially when reported in the NYT, or the Washington Post or other organs of the State -- and let's please cut to the chase here and state what is indisputably the truth, for they are merely extensions of the State -- are what the State wants us to know. I repeat: this is what those with all the power want us to know.

I realize that all of us, including me, spend a lot of time analyzing and commenting on the "news." Of course we do: for the most part, what else do we have to go on? But do you honestly believe -- honestly, mind you -- that anything you read in the NYT or similar publications, or hear on radio or television, is what is actually going on right now? I haven't for decades. I don't consider this to be engaging in "conspiracy" theories to any degree whatsoever. I view it as the unvarnished, awful truth of where we are, and where we've been for a long time. To be sure, stories like this one bear some kind of very rough approximation to something that's going on -- but do they constitute a complete and accurate version of those events? Absolutely not.

The major purpose of this kind of "reporting" is to soften the public up, to get the suckers accustomed to what's already going on and/or what will happen very soon. That way, when a completely "unexpected" crisis occurs in some country no one has ever paid the slightest bit of attention to, we've already been conditioned for the "surprising" and uniformly awful "news." Perhaps it's an attack on the Third Minister of Transportation for the Fourth Southeastern Subdistrict in Middle Ofuquia. Lo and behold! Heroic Special Operations personnel just happen to be there to kill the "terrorists," and incidentally slaughter most of the inhabitants of all the surrounding towns. These things happen. And the fact that a small deployment remains to "guard" the nearby natural gas deposits is entirely coincidental. That's not reported in the NYT until a year later, and then only as a passing mention in a report on still another "crisis." An "unexpected" one, of course.

We've known for over half a year that Special Operations forces would be operating in roughly 120 countries by the end of 2011. It's now February 2012. The actual number is higher, if anything. And we know those forces are engaged in "high-profile assassinations, low-level targeted killings, capture/kidnap operations, kick-down-the-door night raids, joint operations with foreign forces, and training missions with indigenous partners as part of a shadowy conflict unknown to most Americans."

That's what they want us to know. The truth must be far worse. The latest NYT story, like all such stories, is at best a general, indistinct approximation of the truth. We can only guess at the rest.

As for all the talk about "developing threats" and the other "needs" that supposedly demand a U.S. presence in almost every corner of the world ... that's marketing. It's all about the marketing, baby. This bullshit sells. What's beneath the marketing? The ruling class has told us repeatedly, and with regard to this issue, they've been admirably clear over a period of many decades. As I recently explained once again:

[T]his is the view of the ruling class: "America is God. God's Will be done."

What they want is dominion over the world. They intend to have it. In pursuit of this aim, as they believe the necessity arises, they will destroy anyone and anything that stands in their way. To describe their behavior as insane is to miss the much more critical point, and to minimize the far greater danger. They know exactly what they're doing. They're hoping that you do not. To date, far too many people oblige them.

Don't help them in their pursuit of brutality, oppression, murder and vast destruction. I state again: they know exactly what they're doing. Be sure you judge them accordingly.

Believe it.