Defending Liberty?

Steve Curtin
Blood of Patriots and Tyrants -

There is an old adage that tells us perception is reality. In a certain metaphysical sense, this is true, usually, but not always. Sometimes a lie is so great that no matter how many believe in it, no matter how deeply they believe in it, it still cannot be made true.

One of the biggest, most grotesque fallacies perpetuated on the American masses is the lie that our soldiers fight to protect our freedoms. The more I reprogram myself, the more I filter through the garbage my head's been filled with most of my life, the more I realize what a lie this is, and the more repulsed I am every time I hear it. I cannot, will not sit quietly. A friend of mine mentioned to me that, even though it may be a lie that they are fighting for our freedom, they believe they are fighting for our freedom, and we should thank them for this anyway. Perhaps I could grit my teeth and bear it if what they actually were fighting for were not so incredibly evil.

I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority ... I am truly not that concerned about him. - George W. Bush

Examining the "enemy" that supposedly threatens the freedom our soldiers are fighting to preserve, one cannot possibly justify the notion. Even if you buy the official narrative on 9-11, the attack was planned in apartment buildings in Germany and Spain, not in terrorist training camps in Afghanistan. Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers were Saudis - none of them were Afghans or Iraqis. Osama bin Laden denied his involvement while he was still alive - he's been dead since December 2001 - and any videos purported to be bin Laden admitting his involvement were such obvious fakes it's an insult to the intelligence to say he confessed. And to top it all off, the FBI most wanted website for Osama bin Laden doesn't even mention 9-11 as one of the crimes he's wanted for. Irregardless, whatever "al Qaeda" was, it has been nearly wiped out of existence in the area.

The Taliban are not terrorists. They are not a threat to the West. In fact, up until May of 2001, the Taliban were allies of America and received aid from our government. In the aftermath of 9-11, the Taliban asked the American government for proof that bin Laden was behind 9-11, after which they would gladly turn him over. Not only did our government tell the Taliban to go pound sand, because we wanted war, but our government has to this day refused to provide what it claims is "overwhelming evidence" of bin Laden's involvement to the American people. That's because Americans have been so indoctrinated to fear al-Bogeyman that the second the second plane hit the tower, our brains shut off and all we were capable of thinking was al Qaeda bin Laden al Qaeda bin Laden... We didn't need evidence.

And yet consider the fruits of our invasion of Afghanistan. In a country where opium farming was banned by the Taliban, so successfully that it was lauded by the UN, 8 years later Afghanistan has the global opium market cornered at over 95%. Afghanistan is now also the world's top hashish and marijuana exporter. Black market narcotics are an extraordinary lucrative trade - at least half a trillion dollars a year in opium, which, when leveraged through fractional reserve banking, becomes many trillions of dollars. It is no coincidence that a similar "anomaly" occured in Vietnam. Finally, I realize that you've been programmed to think that whenever a country besides America does something evil, it's only because they are deranged lunatics, but, considering black market narcotics are pretty much the only commodity of value to be found in Afghanistan, why do you think the Soviets invaded in the early 80's?

Meanwhile, the wanton slaughtering of civilians continues at such a rate that it cannot be anything other than policy, assuring that more and more Afghans, seeking to avenge their murdered friends and relatives, become "terrorists" or "insurgents" that uhhhh would come to America and cut your head off and rape and murder your children if our troops were not over there stopping them. Are the Taliban bad people, by Western standards? Well, ignoring the fact that they banned opium farming, yes, they were some pretty unsavory people. That doesn't mean they had the intent, much less the capabilities, of threatening American liberties.

And then there is Iraq. What can be said about Iraq? Sure, Saddam was a bad guy. In power courtesy of the CIA. Armed, in large part, by the American government. Sure, okay, we made a mistake, and we should be able to uhhh liberate the Iraqi people of their lives in order to correct that mistake. Except - whoops! - Saddam had already disarmed before we invaded, and we knew it. There's not a lot of drugs coming out of Iraq, but they do have the second largest oil reserves in the world. And of course, Iraq had nothing to do with 9-11. The fact that Rumsfeld proposed an invasion of Iraq the day after 9-11 should tell you all you need to know.

A state of war only serves as an excuse for domestic tyranny. -Alexander Solzhenitsyn

And so we return to the original idea which led to this diatribe, the ludicrous assertion that our troops are out there protecting our freedoms. There's not a person alive today who lived through or even fought in a war that was fought to protect American liberties, and that's a fact. Our country has the most powerful military in the history of human kind. And yet according to our government, the biggest threat in our history to the existence of this nation - bigger than the Soviet Union - is a bunch of cavemen and goat herders who, if they have any modern, up-to-date weaponry, it's because we gave it to them. They have no air force. They have no navy. And so there is only one possible way they could come to this country and do anyone any harm: our government lets them in.

With the advent of the Federal Reserve, which creates our own money out of thin air and loans it to us at interest, and its devil spawn, the military industrial complex, war has become not a means of national self preservation but a method of securing massive profits for banks and military contractors. The amount of money involved with preparing for and waging war means there can literally never be peace so long as these two institutions survive. And so, in order to prop up these entities, which enslave all of us, a perpetual fear is engineered, of external (and now internal) threats that we must be ever fearful and vigilant against; any suggestion to the contrary is un-American, un-patriotic.

This is what war has become; this is what our troops are fighting for. Not for freedom; for empire. For profit. I am sorry if the notion offends yours or their delicate "patriotic" sensibilities, but the truth is rarely comforting; it often stings. This endless cycle of enslavement, murder, and mass destruction will never end so long as we lie to our soldiers and thank them for protecting our liberties. I will thank them for protecting our liberties when they lay down their arms and refuse to obey the unconstitutional orders of their "superiors".