Dr. Abbas Bakhtiar scoop.co.nz 8/27/06

“Naturally, the common people don’t want war … but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.”
Hermann Goering

Once again we are being prepared for another devastating war in the Middle East. A terrorist group is “allegedly” discovered planning to blow-up 6 aircraft in UK [1]. Another group is “discovered” in Germany planning to blow-up a train [2]. Then UK warns whole Europe about the threat of terrorism [3]. Then there are “loud” accusations that Iran has been trying to buy Uranium from Congo [4] followed by a small retraction [5] [6]. Then there is the release of the 9/11 sound tapes of the fire-fighters along with the release of the emotional movie “9/11”. And finally we have the President of the United States warning us about the threat of Islamo-Fascism.

We are constantly reminded that our very lives are in danger. If it is not the threat of poison gas, anthrax, conventional explosives, dirty radiation bombs then it is some unexplained clear liquid. The favourite target is of course aircrafts, or was it trains, or may be it was ships, or was it tunnels? There is no end to the methods that the terrorists use and places that they could kill us in (read “The Great Deception”). And despite all the wars and billions and billions of dollars that governments are pouring into this war on terror, it seems that we are no safer now than we were in 2001. And every so often Mr. Bin Laden or his lieutenants come on TV to tell us that they are still in Afghanistan. How on earth Mr. Bin Laden, that needs dialysis machine to stay alive, has managed to hide for three years in Afghanistan is beyond me. He must be a very clever man indeed.

But like the hated “Goldstein” of George Orwell’s “1984” [7], Mr. Bin Laden is alive and well and his organisation can still scare us witless. Now people are so scared that if you look Middle Eastern or Asian, you are automatically assumed to be a terrorist. And as though we did not have enough threats hanging over us, we are introduced to a new one: “being Middle Eastern/Asian while travelling”. This was recently demonstrated in Malaga, Spain when two young men were removed from the plane because other “passengers” were worried that they were acting suspiciously (i.e., looking foreign and talking in a language that others didn’t understand).

“The removal of two men from a holiday flight on the grounds that fellow passengers feared they were terrorists was condemned yesterday. The pair, thought to be in their 20s and of Middle Eastern or Asian appearance, were removed from a flight to Manchester from Malaga, Spain, after passengers became suspicious of their behaviour.

“In the early hours of Wednesday a number of passengers on Monarch Airlines flight ZB613 left the plane, refusing to fly unless the two men were removed, causing a three-hour delay.

“Passengers are reported to have become suspicious after the men were overheard apparently speaking Arabic and seen repeatedly checking their watches, although this has not been confirmed by the airline.”[8]

I suppose if we do not urge our leaders to invade Iran soon, we will have to go through a strip search before boarding planes, trains or buses.

We are being mentally prepared for what is about to come: a devastating war with Iran. This war has been planned a long time ago and has been delayed by the unexpected insurgency in Iraq (for full details read “Why Iraq and Now Iran”). This war, in one form or other, is “almost” inevitable. The current US administration has climbed on a tiger, and in fear of being eaten, doesn’t know how to get-off.

Full article: scoop.co.nz

Dr. Abbas Bakhtiar lives in Norway. He is a consultant and a contributing writer for many online journals. He is also on the editorial board of CASMII. He’s a former associate professor of Nordland University, Norway.

1 Business Standard, “UK Terror Threat: BoE issues list of 19 suspects”, 11 August, 2006
2 Bloomberg.com, “German Suitcase Bombs were Primed to Go Off, Kill”, 18 August, 2006
3 Guardian Unlimited, “Reid warns of EU-wide terror threat”, 16 August, 2006
4 The Australian, “Iran bid to get Congo Uranium”, 7 August, 2006
5 Rawstory.com, “Intelligence officials doubt Iran claims, say Cheney receiving suspect briefings”, 18 August, 2006.
6 Khaleejtimes.com, “Congo denies selling unranium to Iran”, 9 August 2006
7 George Orwell, ’1984’, Plume (Centennial Edition), UK 1949 ISBN 0452284236 (Paperback edition)
8 Guardian Unlimited, “Removal of men from holiday flight condemned”, 21 August, 2006