"I left off parts five and six in 1963 with the rise of the Baathists in a bloody CIA-sponsored coup, the torture and executions of Iraq's communist party, and the end of Iraq's first and only Republic. The Baathists came to power despite the fact that most of the army didn't support them, and almost no one on Iraqi streets did. The Baathist's base of support was murderous fascists, American and British politicians, and little else."
In 1963 the CIA determined that it wanted a regime change in Iraq. At the time a man by the name of Richard Helms was the Director of the CIA. Please remember that Saddam Hussein had been recruited by the CIA in 1958, at the age of 22, just after the popular revolution led by Abd al-Kassem Quassim which had thrown out the British installed king of Iraq - King Faisal. In 1959 the Saddam asset attempted, under CIA guidance, to assassinate the Iraqi leader Quassim. Saddam failed, only killing the driver and wounding Quassim.
It is difficult to tell the whole gruesome story since the CIA releases are very much doctored and sanitized. The events are much more dirty and messy then the CIA would ever like to admit. As Kissenger said one time as the CIA stabbed the Kurds in the back, "...covert action should not be confused with missionary work."
When developing an illegal military coup the CIA has not been afraid to initiate mass arrests nor mass murder and torture. The information we rely upon when there are coups in foreign lands is given out to us through our media. The news is always tainted and coloured that it seems to us that the country in turmoil is caused to be so because of its own internal problems and not the work of the CIA covert (illegal) operatives secretly working for and funded by the US government in power. So the guilt here is not necessarily Republican but it is a failing of the Democrats as well.
The CIA is not afraid to use assassination as a tool. It is not too difficult to have an asset recruited exactly for that purpose. It is doubtful that a US citizen would be used for that job. US citizens would be used for Control.
Assassination is not the beginning nor the end of CIA influence in the targeted country. The CIA is very 'conversant' with murder, torture, coercion, threats, frame ups and payoffs. For more than 50 years the CIA has been initiating regime changes in countries around the world. Whether it is true or untrue, coups benefiting American interests are almost always blamed on the threat of Communism; a word that has become the scariest word in America. America is never very far from another era just like McCarthyism era.
The American government has promoted CIA activities through Hollywood movies as have Britains through its movies. Blending into our minds so much 'make believe' and false news we are most apt to mistake fantasy as a reality. Former President Reagan did his service to his country during WW II creating these propaganda movies. The American armed forces are always open to help Hollywood make them look good and wholesome heroes giving themselves to the 'service of the world'. At steadfast occupation of serving as our world's police in the American military or CIA. Heroes all!
Through it all the CIA, the Green Berets, Special Forces and the DEA continue to 'change regimes' for the glorified elite of America while the people of the targeted country sink deeper into poverty, or are cruelly tortured or disappeared. These 'folks' have no voice except to retaliate through force which, more often then not, is labelled terrorism or the fighters as illegal combatants breaking the law as any good Texan would do in defence of invasion.
To make things even worse in countries suffering their 'made in America' destiny the CIA works to create Death Squads in their new, friendly, dictatorial regimes. Just think of Argentina, Chile and El Salvador as prime examples of Death Squads and the Disappeared. In Iraq many of the police make up parts of death squads expertly created by the CIA.
Once a new regime is in power CIA advisers as well as corrupt agents and assets are set to maintain a privileged elite that is friendly to American interests. Isn't that a cute label - American Interests! An all encompassing couple of words.
The CIA inserted regime, impressed upon the country of choice is then co-opted by the Americans to carry on an economy beneficial to America and so; unkind (shall we say) to the poor folk of that country.
At home, in the USA, a conservative press blames the unrest in 'the country of choice' as elements of destruction within that country itself which is backed up by stories placed in that country's co=opted media. (Remember Nixon in Chile.) Americans and much of the rest of the world is easily swayed into believing that the people of such countries are ignorant and resentful of their kindly elite. And so the story continues.
Once the coup d’état is fait accompli, the new regime is settling in, thousands of activists and trade union organizers are rounded up and tortured and summarily put to death. Organizations such as Green Peace and Amnesty International rise up to protest but their is nothing like the a secret and covert organization like the CIA to thwart any reality spoken by such humanist organizations and using the conservative media to make these folks look like zealots that they are not.
One horrid and truly dastardly event, mostly hidden from or not believed by Americans And other western powers, is the covet activity in Vietnam named "Phoenix Program". Thousands upon thousands of people were specifically chosen and murdered by the fascist American regime. An estimation suggests that 5 million or more people were killed by the USA in South East Asia during the war on Vietnam. Still, the CIA has not released any evidence of this holocaust, but, when an admission of this program finally sees the light of florescent tubing it will most certainly documented in a very sanitary manner.
But these truths are but the tip of the iceberg. RC
