posted on April 11, 2003 01:18:43 PM new
The News We Kept to Ourselves
By EASON JORDAN
ATLANTA — Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard — awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff.
For example, in the mid-1990's one of our Iraqi cameramen was abducted. For weeks he was beaten and subjected to electroshock torture in the basement of a secret police headquarters because he refused to confirm the government's ludicrous suspicion that I was the Central Intelligence Agency's Iraq station chief. CNN had been in Baghdad long enough to know that telling the world about the torture of one of its employees would almost certainly have gotten him killed and put his family and co-workers at grave risk.
Working for a foreign news organization provided Iraqi citizens no protection. The secret police terrorized Iraqis working for international press services who were courageous enough to try to provide accurate reporting. Some vanished, never to be heard from again. Others disappeared and then surfaced later with whispered tales of being hauled off and tortured in unimaginable ways. Obviously, other news organizations were in the same bind we were when it came to reporting on their own workers.
We also had to worry that our reporting might endanger Iraqis not on our payroll. I knew that CNN could not report that Saddam Hussein's eldest son, Uday, told me in 1995 that he intended to assassinate two of his brothers-in-law who had defected and also the man giving them asylum, King Hussein of Jordan. If we had gone with the story, I was sure he would have responded by killing the Iraqi translator who was the only other participant in the meeting. After all, secret police thugs brutalized even senior officials of the Information Ministry, just to keep them in line (one such official has long been missing all his fingernails).
Still, I felt I had a moral obligation to warn Jordan's monarch, and I did so the next day. King Hussein dismissed the threat as a madman's rant. A few months later Uday lured the brothers-in-law back to Baghdad; they were soon killed.
I came to know several Iraqi officials well enough that they confided in me that Saddam Hussein was a maniac who had to be removed. One Foreign Ministry officer told me of a colleague who, finding out his brother had been executed by the regime, was forced, as a test of loyalty, to write a letter of congratulations on the act to Saddam Hussein. An aide to Uday once told me why he had no front teeth: henchmen had ripped them out with pliers and told him never to wear dentures, so he would always remember the price to be paid for upsetting his boss. Again, we could not broadcast anything these men said to us.
Last December, when I told Information Minister Muhammad Said al-Sahhaf that we intended to send reporters to Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq, he warned me they would "suffer the severest possible consequences." CNN went ahead, and in March, Kurdish officials presented us with evidence that they had thwarted an armed attack on our quarters in Erbil. This included videotaped confessions of two men identifying themselves as Iraqi intelligence agents who said their bosses in Baghdad told them the hotel actually housed C.I.A. and Israeli agents. The Kurds offered to let us interview the suspects on camera, but we refused, for fear of endangering our staff in Baghdad.
Then there were the events that were not unreported but that nonetheless still haunt me. A 31-year-old Kuwaiti woman, Asrar Qabandi, was captured by Iraqi secret police occupying her country in 1990 for "crimes," one of which included speaking with CNN on the phone. They beat her daily for two months, forcing her father to watch. In January 1991, on the eve of the American-led offensive, they smashed her skull and tore her body apart limb by limb. A plastic bag containing her body parts was left on the doorstep of her family's home.
I felt awful having these stories bottled up inside me. Now that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment. At last, these stories can be told freely.
"Be kind. Remember everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." - Harry Thompson
"I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it." - A Few Good Men
posted on April 11, 2003 01:38:21 PM new
Here is the down side to the commercial nature of news - they will stay and maintaine a presence even when what they report is a false picture because of the restrictions.
They would serve their public better by pulling out and admitting they are not allowed the freedom to report accurately form there.
I suspect the same basic false fronts are needed to report from China and several other countries.
posted on April 11, 2003 02:31:38 PM new
My only hope is that when these stories do begin coming out, some of these people who were against the war will realize that even though we should keep our nose out of other countries' business at times, this time was justified.
How can these anti-war people stand by their beliefs when people are tortured, killed and those that are left behind must never speak of it?
posted on April 11, 2003 03:13:05 PM new
This is also the same thing that happens in Cuba. The only time you see them show anything about Castro is when it is favorable to him. Or when he marches his half million slaves protesting anything against the "Yankees".
posted on April 11, 2003 04:36:46 PM newHow can these anti-war people stand by their beliefs when people are tortured, killed and those that are left behind must never speak of it?
We need to keep our noses out of it from the very beginning because it is us who puts these morons in power in the first place through our actions both directly and covertly...
With Cuba, the reason Castro came into power is because the previous ruler that was installed by US was even worse...
Saddam, before he came into power, was "in talks" with the US before he seized power.
The Marcoses of the Phillipines....
Noriega of Panama.....
Sandinistas
Contras
And it goes on...and on
Heck, even before WWII we were trying to cozy up to Hilter....until he attacked Poland. The Jewish people weren't that big of a "problem"(read that as they weren't the political force they are now) to US politicians then.
A politician will call you intelligent to keep you ignorant. I tell you that you are ignorant so that you may want to be intelligent - Eugene Debs
Yeah, he was a Socialist Presidential Candidate but this was one statement he made I liked
posted on April 11, 2003 09:52:41 PM new
With Cuba, the reason Castro came into power is because the previous ruler that was installed by US was even worse....
mlecher
Pray tell me Mr/Mrs Cuban Historian HOW Batista was worse than Castro????
I would also like to know thru your CIA intel
how batista was U.S. installed or maybe it was ?supported?
12. On July 13, 1994, at approximately 3:00 a.m., 72 Cuban nationals who were attempting to leave the island for the United States put out to sea from the port of Havana in an old tugboat named "13 de Marzo". The boat used for the escape belonged to the Maritime Services Enterprise of the Ministry of Transportation.
13. According to eyewitnesses who survived the disaster, no sooner had the tug "13 de Marzo" set off from the Cuban port than two boats from the same state enterprise began pursuing it. About 45 minutes into the trip, when the tug was seven miles away from the Cuban coast--in a place known as "La Poceta"--two other boats belonging to said enterprise appeared, equipped with tanks and water hoses, proceeded to attack the old tug. "Polargo 2," one of the boats belonging to the Cuban state enterprise, blocked the old tug "13 de Marzo" in the front, while the other, "Polargo 5," attacked from behind, splitting the stern. The two other government boats positioned themselves on either side and sprayed everyone on deck with pressurized water, using their hoses.
14. The pleas of the women and children on the deck of the tug "13 de Marzo" did nothing to stop the attack. The boat sank, with a toll of 41 dead. Many people perished because the jets of water directed at everyone on deck forced them to seek refuge in the engine room. The survivors also affirmed that the crews of the four Cuban government boats were dressed in civilian clothes and that they did not help them when they were sinking.
15. Later, Cuban Coast Guard cutters arrived and rescued 31 survivors. After being rescued, the survivors were taken to the Cuban Coast guard post of Jaimanitas, which is located west of Havana. From there, they were taken to the Villa Marista Detention Center, which also serves as State Security Headquarters. The women and children were released and the men were held.
16. The victims who died in the incident of July 13, 1994 are: Leonardo Notario Góngora (27), Marta Tacoronte Vega (36), Caridad Leyva Tacoronte (36), Yausel Eugenio Pérez Tacoronte (11), Mayulis Méndez Tacoronte (17), Odalys Muñoz García (21), Pilar Almanza Romero (30), Yaser Perodín Almanza (11), Manuel Sánchez Callol (58), Juliana Enriquez Carrasana (23), Helen Martínez Enríquez (6 months), Reynaldo Marrero (45), Joel García Suárez (24), Juan Mario Gutiérrez García (10), Ernesto Alfonso Joureiro (25), Amado Gonzáles Raices (50), Lázaro Borges Priel (34), Liset Alvarez Guerra (24), Yisel Borges Alvarez (4), Guillermo Cruz Martínez (46), Fidelio Ramel Prieto-Hernández (51), Rosa María Alcalde Preig (47), Yaltamira Anaya Carrasco (22), José Carlos Nicole Anaya (3), María Carrasco Anaya (44), Julia Caridad Ruiz Blanco (35), Angel René Abreu Ruiz (3), Jorge Arquímides Lebrijio Flores (28), Eduardo Suárez Esquivel (39), Elicer Suárez Plascencia, Omar Rodríguez Suárez (33), Miralis Fernández Rodríguez (28), Cindy Rodríguez Fernández (2), José Gregorio Balmaceda Castillo (24), Rigoberto Feut Gonzáles (31), Midalis Sanabria Cabrera (19), and four others who could not be identified.
17. The surviving victims are: Mayda Tacoronte Verga (28), Milena Labrada Tacoronte (3), Román Lugo Martínez (30), Daysi Martínez Findore (26), Tacney Estévez Martínez (3), Susana Rojas Martínez (8), Raúl Muñoz García (23), Janette Hernández Gutiérrez (19), Modesto Almanza Romero (28), Fran Gonzáles Vásquez (21), Daniel Gonzáles Hernández (21), Sergio Perodín Pérez (38), Sergio Perodín Almanza (7), Gustavo Guillermo Martínez Gutiérrez (38), Yandi Gustavo Martínez Hidalgo (9), José Fabián Valdés (17), Eugenio Fuentes Díaz (36), Juan Gustavo Bargaza del Pino (42), Juan Fidel Gonzáles Salinas (42), Reynaldo Marrero Canarana (16), Daniel Prieto Suárez (22), Iván Prieto Suárez (26), Jorge Luis Cuba Suárez (23), María Victoria García Suárez (28), Arquímides Venancio Lebrijio Gamboa (52), Yaussany Tuero Sierra (20), Pedro Francisco Garijo Galego (31), Julio César Domínguez Alcalde (33), Armando Morales Piloto (38), Juan Bernardo Varela Amaro, and Jorge Alberto Hernández Avila (33).
Refusal of the Cuban Government to recover the victims' bodies
18. In the days following the tragedy, relatives of the victims who had drowned asked the Cuban authorities to recover the bodies from the bottom of the sea. The official response was that there were no special divers available to recover the bodies.
19. The nonprofit organization "Hermanos al Rescate" (Brothers to the Rescue)--which is dedicated to rescuing Cuban boat people trying to escape from the island--asked the Cuban Government for permission to fly over the spot where the events took place, to help recover the bodies, but the request was immediately denied. To date, none of the drowning victims' bodies has been recovered by the Cuban authorities, despite the fact that the sinking of the tug "13 de Marzo" occurred in Cuban territorial waters.[b]
I know you will not be able to explain none of this, because your socialist crap papers only tell the tale of how good Castro is and how bad everything else is.
posted on April 11, 2003 09:59:31 PM new
BTW the Sandinistas were Castro/Soviet backed,financed,trained,armed,healed and so on and so forth. Not the USA.
posted on April 12, 2003 01:17:07 PM new
Like i said you have not shown anything that explains how batista was worse than castro.
Last time i checked batista wasn't a sponsor of terrorism. Thhhhats right because Castro helped create it.
Anything as long its against the U.S. and freedom heh mlecher.
[Overview of State-Sponsored Terrorism, Patterns of Global Terrorism -2000, Released by the Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, April 2001.]
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Cuba, North Korea, and Sudan continue to be the seven
governments that the US Secretary of State has designated as state sponsors of
international terrorism...
Cuba continued to provide safehaven to several terrorists and US fugitives and
maintained ties to state sponsors and Latin American insurgents...
Cuba
Cuba continued to provide safehaven to several terrorists and US fugitives in 2000.
A number of Basque ETA terrorists who gained sanctuary in Cuba some years ago
continued to live on the island, as did several US terrorist fugitives.
Havana also maintained ties to other state sponsors of terrorism and Latin American
insurgents. Colombia's two largest terrorist organizations, the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia and the National Liberation Army, both maintained a permanent
presence on the island..
[Complete Text at: http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2000/index.cfm?docid=2441]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CASTRO SPEAKS IN TEHRAN MAY 2001
In a packed auditorium on May 9, 2001 at Tehran University, hundreds of students,
faculty, and administrators Fidel Castro addressed the throng with these words:
"You destroyed the strongest gendarme of the region not with guns, but with
your thoughts -- and the people of the region should thank you for that,"
Castro said. "Today, there is a king in the world a thousand times stronger
than the shah you overthrew, and that is the imperialist king living next to
my homeland. However, this imperialist king will finally fall, just as your
king was overthrown."
let me add also a blast from the past which by the way Clinton gave an early release from jail to please hillary:
TERRORISTIC ACTIVITY
The Cuban Connection in Puerto Rico
WEDNESDAY, JULY 30, 1975
U.S. SENATE,
SUBCOMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE THE
ADMINISTRATION OF THE INTERNAL SECURITY ACT
AND OTHER INTERNAL SECURITY LAWS
OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY,
Washington, D.C.
one more;
Cuban Terrorism in the United States in 1965
by Col. Esteban M. Beruvides
(U.S. Army, retired)
INTRODUCTION:
The following historical excerpts are events that occurred in the mid-sixties. These events take on greater meaning today as we are involved in a “war against terrorism”.
Thirty six years ago, U.S. press organizations reported terrorist activities with similar objectives as those perpetrated on September 11, 2001: the destruction of U.S. symbols such as the Statue of Liberty, the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, and the Washington Monument.
These terrorist activities, reported in February 1965 by these news organizations (Diario las Americas (DLA), New York Times (NYT), and French Press Agency (AFP), connect the actions with the Communist government of Cuba. In the year 2001, as in years past, the United States continues to officially include Cuba in the list of terrorist governments and by which officially accuses Cuba of terrorism. It is for this reason, that in addition to the book where this is published, we have decided to also publish this information on the electronic magazines Guaracabuya and Guama, where this is available to millions of people around the world.
posted on April 12, 2003 02:24:07 PM new
Iran - Syria - N. Korea - Cuba -
What the heck if you are making a big list add it on.
I bet they will end up invading Syria in "hot pursuit" of Iraqi officials.
The Cuban one makes the most sense.
They can be invaded on the cheap at 90 miles away and when you get done it is the very best piece of real estate to grab that doesn't have oil out of the list.........
posted on April 12, 2003 05:39:57 PM new
Here are some SPIES:
by Juan Tamayo The Miami Herald
Cuban spy in U.S. for debriefings
A top Cuban spy who defected in Panama two weeks ago has been brought to the United States for debriefings on Havana intelligence operations in Canada, America and Panama, U.S. and Panamanian officials say.
Orlando Brito Pestana, whose identity was previously undisclosed, was stationed in the early 1990s in Canada, a critical Cuban intelligence post because of its access to the unguarded U.S. border.
The FBI later blocked his way when Havana tried to appoint him to the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, U.S. officials added.
Brito was accredited as Cuba's commercial attaché in Panama when he asked Panamanian security officials on March 27 to help him, his wife and two daughters defect to America, a senior Panamanian security advisor said.
He was flown to the United States two days later aboard a commercial airliner, using false travel documents arranged by U.S. and Panamanian officials, the security advisor said on condition of anonymity.
Brito is believed to be one of the most senior Cuban intelligence officials to defect in recent years. It is a blow to Havana intelligence operations already battered by the capture of confessed spy Ana Belén Móntez at the Pentagon last year and several members of the ''Wasp Network'' in Miami in 1998.
Two U.S. government officials with access to intelligence data said Brito is undergoing debriefings by U.S. intelligence officials that could last for months, depending on the value of his knowledge.
But an FBI official who has handled Cuban spy cases warned that Brito may also be a double-agent sent by Havana to misinform.
''Cuba has one of the most aggressive intelligence operations in the world, and until we know more he will probably be treated as a potential double agent,'' the official said.
A State Department spokesman said he could not confirm Brito's presence in the United States. The usual CIA procedure is to keep foreign defectors under wraps while they are debriefed in isolation.
Foreign Minister José Alemán has said the Cuban Embassy reported Brito's disappearance in mid-March and asked Panamanian authorities to cancel his diplomatic identification card and drivers' license.
LINKED TO SCANDAL
The Panamanian security advisor said Brito may have decided to defect because of a scandal in Panama involving Sunset Group International, a Panamanian firm that has run an auto dealership in Havana and financed part of Cuba's sugar harvest since the mid-1990s.
The firm is wracked by a bitter dispute within the family of its owners, allegations that it bribed Panamanian Congressmen and reports that Cuba is investigating it for corrupting Cuban officials in Havana.
Sunset President Martín Rodin told reporters in Panama on Tuesday that the Cuban government owed him about $30 million for car purchases and sugar harvest loans.
''As the commercial attaché here, this guy would have been up to his eyeballs in this stuff and maybe thought it was time to pick up and run,'' said the Panamanian official, who asked that his name not be published.
Panamanian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mauricio Benaim said Brito had not asked for political asylum in Panama. ''It is curious that he simply disappeared,'' he said in a telephone interview from Panama City.
Brito, believed to be in his early 50s, first came into the limelight when he served as vice consul in Montreal. On Feb. 13 1994, Canada expelled him and another Cuban diplomat for spying.
The Toronto Sun newspaper at the time identified Brito as head of Cuba's intelligence office in Canada, a key post because of Canada's strong commercial ties with Havana and Cuba's use of Canadian territory as a base from which to handle intelligence agents inside the United States.
U.S. officials said they could not confirm whether Brito was the office chief or a lower ranking agent.
INTELLIGENCE CENTERS
''Canada and Mexico are always important Cuban intelligence centers because of their access to the U.S. border -- in the case of Canada so easy to infiltrate,'' said Carlos Cajaraville, a former Cuban intelligence agent who defected in 1995.
About two years after his expulsion from Canada, Cuba's Foreign Ministry notified the State Department that it planned to appoint Brito to the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, U.S. congressional officials said.
But FBI counter-intelligence officials persuaded the State Department to deny Brito a visa, arguing that it would look foolish to accept a Cuban diplomat already branded a spy and expelled by Canada, the aides said.
Brito was named commercial attaché at the Cuban Embassy in Panama City last year, in charge of monitoring trade links between Cuba and Panama, especially with companies in the Colon Free Zone, an area at the Atlantic gateway to the Panama Canal.
Cuba has long used Havana-owned and Panamanian firms in the duty-free zone to get around the 40-year-old U.S. trade embargo and purchase U.S.-made products, from computers to industrial air conditioners for hotels.
The Cuban Embassy in Panama has declined comment on the Brito case. But a person who answered the telephone at the mission Wednesday said, ``we don't talk about traitors.''
OMG EVEN IN THE PENTAGON!!!!!! Castro sure is looking just a tad bit anti-american. But batista's corrupt "friendships" with mobsters is still worse RIGHT MLECHER. REMEMBER that in this ERA there was a big anti mob push from the US government. Are you still sure the US backed batista. Think!!! WHY THE HELL DID THEY NOT HELP HIM FIGHT CASTRO.
LOOK AT THE DATE. RIGHT AFTER 9/11
Analyst charged as spy
Pentagon worker is linked to Cuba
September 22, 2001
BY PETE YOST
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON -- A Pentagon intelligence analyst who attended war games conducted by the U.S. Atlantic Command in 1996 was charged Friday with spying for Cuba.
Ana Belen Montes, an employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency, transmitted a substantial amount of classified information to the Cuban intelligence service, an FBI affidavit alleged.
Montes appeared before a U.S. magistrate in Washington and was charged with conspiracy to deliver U.S. national defense information to Cuba. She entered no plea and was ordered held without bond.
Montes has worked for the DIA, the intelligence arm of the Defense Department, since 1985, authorities said.
In a 17-page affidavit, the FBI alleged that earlier this year Montes contacted the Cuban intelligence service by shortwave radio and that she began spying for Cuba nearly five years ago.
The FBI secretly entered Montes' residence under a court order May 25 and uncovered information about several Defense Department issues, including a 1996 war-games exercise conducted by the U.S. Atlantic Command.
According to the affidavit, the DIA said that Montes attended the war games exercise in Norfolk, Va., as part of her official duties at DIA. The FBI said it found information on the hard drive of her laptop computer.
One partially recovered message deals with "a particular special access program related to the national defense of the United States," which is so sensitive that it could not be revealed in the court documents, the document said.
According to the FBI's affidavit, some of the messages suggested that Montes disclosed the upcoming arrival of a U.S. military intelligence officer in Cuba.
"As a result," the FBI said, "the Cuban government was able to direct its counterintelligence resources against the U.S. officer."
The FBI said it had Montes under surveillance since May.
It was unclear whether the Montes case was directly related to a ring in Florida convicted of spying for Cuba. However, the FBI affidavit notes repeatedly that methods of passing classified information that Montes allegedly used were the same as those used by the Miami defendants.
Five Florida defendants were convicted in June, and two pleaded guilty in Miami on Friday, bringing to seven the number of defendants in a spy ring that prosecutors have labeled "The Wasp Network."
- Harry Thompson