Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
skep...@aol.com
"Kieft ordered the massacre of the Wappingers, a friendly tribe.
Eighty were killed and their severed heads were kicked like soccer
balls down the streets of Manhattan. One captive was castrated,
skinned
alive and forced to eat his own flesh while the Dutch governor
watched
and laughed."
Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
the
Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
ruthless ways of capitalism.
* * * * *
In mid-winter 1620 the English ship Mayflower landed on the North
American coast, delivering 102 Puritan exiles. The original Native
people of this stretch of shoreline had already been killed off. In
1614 a British expedition had landed there. When they left they took
24
Indians as slaves and left smallpox behind. Three years of plague
wiped
out between 90 and 96 percent of the inhabitants of the coast,
destroying most villages completely.
The Puritans landed and built their colony called "the Plymouth
Plantation" near the deserted ruins of the Indian village of
Pawtuxet.
They ate from abandoned cornfields grown wild. Only one Pawtuxet
named
Squanto had survived--he had spent the last years as a slave to the
English and Spanish in Europe. Squanto spoke the colonists' language
and taught them how to plant corn and how to catch fish until the
first
harvest. Squanto also helped the colonists negotiate a peace treaty
with the nearby Wampanoag tribe, led by the chief Massasoit.
These were very lucky breaks for the colonists. The first Virginia
settlement had been wiped out before they could establish themselves.
Thanks to the good will of the Wampanoag, the Puritans not only
survived their first year but had an alliance with the Wampanoags
that
would give them almost two decades of peace.
John Winthrop, a founder of the Massahusetts Bay colony considered
this
wave of illness and death to be a divine miracle. He wrote to a
friend
in England, "But for the natives in these parts, God hath so pursued
them, as for 300 miles space the greatest part of them are swept away
by smallpox which still continues among them. So as God hath thereby
cleared our title to this place, those who remain in these parts,
being
in all not 50, have put themselves under our protection."
The deadly impact of European diseases and the good will of the
Wampanoag allowed the Puritans to survive their first year.
In celebration of their good fortune, the colony's governor, William
Bradford, declared a three-day feast of thanksgiving after that first
harvest of 1621.
How the Puritans Stole the Land
But the peace that produced the Thanksgiving Feast of 1621 meant that
the Puritans would have 15 years to establish a firm foothold on the
coast. Until 1629 there were no more than 300 Puritans in New
England,
scattered in small and isolated settlements. But their survival
inspired a wave of Puritan invasion that soon established growing
Massachusetts towns north of Plymouth: Boston and Salem. For 10
years,
boatloads of new settlers came.
And as the number of Europeans increased, they proved not nearly so
generous as the Wampanoags.
On arrival, the Puritans discussed "who legally owns all this land."
They had to decide this, not just because of Anglo-Saxon traditions,
but because their particular way of farming was based on
individual--not communal or tribal--ownership. This debate over land
ownership reveals that bourgeois "rule of law" does not mean "protect
the rights of the masses of people."
Some Puritans argued that the land belonged to the Indians. These
forces were excommunicated and expelled. Massachusetts Governor
Winthrop declared the Indians had not "subdued" the land, and
therefore
all uncultivated lands should, according to English Common Law, be
considered "public domain." This meant they belonged to the king. In
short, the colonists decided they did not need to consult the Indians
when they seized new lands, they only had to consult the
representative
of the crown (meaning the local governor).
The Puritans embraced a line from Psalms 2:8. "Ask of me, and I shall
give thee, the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts
of the earth for thy possession." Since then, European settler states
have similarly declared god their real estate agent: from the Boers
seizing South Africa to the Zionists seizing Palestine.
The European immigrants took land and enslaved Indians to help them
farm it. By 1637 there were about 2,000 British settlers. They pushed
out from the coast and decided to remove the inhabitants.
The Birth of
"The American Way of War"
In the Connecticut Valley, the powerful Pequot tribe had not entered
an
alliance with the British (as had the Narragansett, the Wampanoag,
and
the Massachusetts peoples). At first they were far from the centers
of
colonization. Then, in 1633, the British stole the land where the
city
of Hartford now sits--land which the Pequot had recently conquered
from
another tribe. That same year two British slave raiders were killed.
The colonists demanded that the Indians who killed the slavers be
turned over. The Pequot refused.
The Puritan preachers said, from Romans 13:2, "Whosoever therefore
resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that
resist shall receive to themselves damnation." The colonial
governments
gathered an armed force of 240 under the command of John Mason. They
were joined by a thousand Narragansett warriors. The historian
Francis
Jennings writes: "Mason proposed to avoid attacking Pequot warriors
which would have overtaxed his unseasoned, unreliable troops. Battle,
as such, was not his purpose. Battle is only one of the ways to
destroy
an enemy's will to fight. Massacre can accomplish the same end with
less risk, and Mason had determined that massacre would be his
objective."
The colonist army surrounded a fortified Pequot village on the Mystic
River. At sunrise, as the inhabitants slept, the Puritan soldiers set
the village on fire.
William Bradford, Governor of Plymouth, wrote: "Those that escaped
the
fire were slain with the sword; some hewed to pieces, others run
through with their rapiers, so that they were quickly dispatched and
very few escaped. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400 at
this time. It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the
fire...horrible was the stink and scent thereof, but the victory
seemed
a sweet sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had
wrought so wonderfully for them."
Mason himself wrote: "It may be demanded...Should not Christians have
more mercy and compassion? But...sometimes the Scripture declareth
women and children must perish with their parents.... We had
sufficient
light from the word of God for our proceedings."
Three hundred and fifty years later the Puritan phrase "a shining
city
on the hill" became a favorite quote of Ronald Reagan's
speechwriters.
Discovering the
Profits of Slavery
This so-called "Pequot war" was a one-sided murder and slaving
expedition. Over 180 captives were taken. After consulting the bible
again, in Leviticus 24:44, the colonial authorities found
justification
to kill most of the Pequot men and enslave the captured women and
their
children. Only 500 Pequot remained alive and free. In 1975 the
official
number of Pequot living in Connecticut was 21.
Some of the war captives were given to the Narragansett and
Massachusetts allies of the British. Even before the arrival of
Europeans, Native peoples of North America had widely practiced
taking
war captives from other tribes as hostages and slaves.
The remaining captives were sold to British plantation colonies in
the
West Indies to be worked to death in a new form of slavery that
served
the emerging capitalist world market. And with that, the merchants of
Boston made a historic discovery: the profits they made from the sale
of human beings virtually paid for the cost of seizing them.
One account says that enslaving Indians quickly became a "mania with
speculators." These early merchant capitalists of Massachusetts
started
to make genocide pay for itself. The slave trade, first in captured
Indians and soon in kidnapped Africans, quickly became a backbone of
New England merchant capitalism.
Thanksgiving in the
Manhattan Colony
In 1641 the Dutch governor Kieft of Manhattan offered the first
"scalp
bounty"--his government paid money for the scalp of each Indian
brought
to them. A couple years later, Kieft ordered the massacre of the
Wappingers, a friendly tribe. Eighty were killed and their severed
heads were kicked like soccer balls down the streets of Manhattan.
One
captive was castrated, skinned alive and forced to eat his own flesh
while the Dutch governor watched and laughed. Then Kieft hired the
notorious Underhill who had commanded in the Pequot war to carry out
a
similar massacre near Stamford, Connecticut. The village was set
fire,
and 500 Indian residents were put to the sword.
A day of thanksgiving was proclaimed in the churches of Manhattan. As
we will see, the European colonists declared Thanksgiving Days to
celebrate mass murder more often than they did for harvest and
friendship.
The Conquest of New England
By the 1670s there were about 30,000 to 40,000 white inhabitants in
the
United New England Colonies--6,000 to 8,000 able to bear arms. With
the
Pequot destroyed, the Massachusetts and Plymouth colonists turned on
the Wampanoag, the tribe that had saved them in 1620 and probably
joined them for the original Thanksgiving Day.
In 1675 a Christian Wampanoag was killed while spying for the
Puritans.
The Plymouth authorities arrested and executed three Wampanoag
without
consulting the tribal chief, King Philip.
As Mao Tsetung says: "Where there is oppression there is resistance."
The Wampanoag went to war.
The Indians applied some military lessons they had learned: they
waged
a guerrilla war which overran isolated European settlements and were
often able to inflict casualties on the Puritan soldiers. The
colonists
again attacked and massacred the main Indian populations.
When this war ended, 600 European men, one-eleventh of the adult men
of
the New England Colonies, had been killed in battle. Hundreds of
homes
and 13 settlements had been wiped out. But the colonists won.
In their victory, the settlers launched an all-out genocide against
the
remaining Native people. The Massachusetts government offered 20
shillings bounty for every Indian scalp, and 40 shillings for every
prisoner who could be sold into slavery. Soldiers were allowed to
enslave any Indian woman or child under 14 they could capture. The
"Praying Indians" who had converted to Christianity and fought on the
side of the European troops were accused of shooting into the
treetops
during battles with "hostiles." They were enslaved or killed. Other
"peaceful" Indians of Dartmouth and Dover were invited to negotiate
or
seek refuge at trading posts--and were sold onto slave ships.
It is not known how many Indians were sold into slavery, but in this
campaign, 500 enslaved Indians were shipped from Plymouth alone. Of
the
12,000 Indians in the surrounding tribes, probably about half died
from
battle, massacre and starvation.
After King Philip's War, there were almost no Indians left free in
the
northern British colonies. A colonist wrote from Manhattan's New York
colony: "There is now but few Indians upon the island and those few
no
ways hurtful. It is to be admired how strangely they have decreased
by
the hand of God, since the English first settled in these parts."
In Massachusetts, the colonists declared a "day of public
thanksgiving"
in 1676, saying, "there now scarce remains a name or family of them
[the Indians] but are either slain, captivated or fled."
Fifty-five years after the original Thanksgiving Day, the Puritans
had
destroyed the generous Wampanoag and all other neighboring tribes.
The
Wampanoag chief King Philip was beheaded. His head was stuck on a
pole
in Plymouth, where the skull still hung on display 24 years later.
The descendants of these Native peoples are found wherever the
Puritan
merchant capitalists found markets for slaves: the West Indies, the
Azures, Algiers, Spain and England. The grandson of Massasoit, the
Pilgrim's original protector, was sold into slavery in Bermuda.
Runaways and Rebels
But even the destruction of Indian tribal life and the enslavement of
survivors brought no peace. Indians continued to resist in every
available way. Their oppressors lived in terror of a revolt. And they
searched for ways to end the resistance. The historian MacLeod
writes:
"The first `reservations' were designed for the `wild' Irish of
Ulster
in 1609. And the first Indian reservation agent in America, Gookin of
Massachusetts, like many other American immigrants had seen service
in
Ireland under Cromwell."
The enslaved Indians refused to work and ran away. The Massachusetts
government tried to control runaways by marking enslaved Indians:
brands were burnt into their skin, and symbols were tattooed into
their
foreheads and cheeks.
A Massachusetts law of 1695 gave colonists permission to kill Indians
at will, declaring it was "lawful for any person, whether English or
Indian, that shall find any Indians traveling or skulking in any of
the
towns or roads (within specified limits), to command them under their
guard and examination, or to kill them as they may or can."
The northern colonists enacted more and more laws for controlling the
people. A law in Albany forbade any African or Indian slave from
driving a cart within the city. Curfews were set up; Africans and
Indians were forbidden to have evening get-togethers. On Block
Island,
Indians were given 10 lashes for being out after nine o'clock. In
1692
Massachusetts made it a serious crime for any white person to marry
an
African, an Indian or a mulatto. In 1706 they tried to stop the
importation of Indian slaves from other colonies, fearing a slave
revolt.
Celebrate?
Looking at this history raises a question: Why should anyone
celebrate
the survival of the earliest Puritans with a Thanksgiving Day?
Certainly the Native peoples of those times had no reason to
celebrate.
A little known fact: Squanto, the so-called "hero" of the original
Thanksgiving Day, was executed by the Indians for his treacheries.
But the ruling powers of the United States organized people to
celebrate Thanksgiving Day because it is in their interest. That's
why
they created it. The first national celebration of Thanksgiving was
called for by George Washington. And the celebration was made a
regular
legal holiday later by Abraham Lincoln during the civil war (right as
he sent troops to suppress the Sioux of Minnesota).
Washington and Lincoln were two presidents deeply involved in trying
to
forge a unified bourgeois nation-state out of the European settlers
in
the United States. And the Thanksgiving story was a useful myth in
their efforts at U.S. nation-building. It celebrates the "bounty of
the
American way of life," while covering up the brutal nature of this
society.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This article is posted in English and Spanish on Revolutionary Worker
Online
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Write: Box 3486, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 60054
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raven1
>Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
>Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
>
>
>Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
>the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
>after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
>history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
>and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
>ruthless ways of capitalism.
You must be a riot at parties.
JW
He gets invited?
Budikka666
>
> read more »
It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not everything is as
cozy as American folklore would have it. It's a pity that people
forget two important things: the filthy despicable origins of these
"celebrations" and the fact that whilst we sit here feasting our faces
and growing fat, there are literally millions of children starving -
children who could be fed if we quit feeding ton after ton of grain to
support our meat habit and instead gave it to those hwo need it both
for food and seed.
Budikka
runningwolf
>
> It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not everything is as
> cozy as American folklore would have it. It's a pity that people
> forget two important things: the filthy despicable origins of these
> "celebrations" and the fact that whilst we sit here feasting our faces
> and growing fat, there are literally millions of children starving -
> children who could be fed if we quit feeding ton after ton of grain to
> support our meat habit and instead gave it to those hwo need it both
> for food and seed.
>
> Budikka
Excellent point, Budikka.
Better yet, give them the peace, resources, education and equipment to
grow their own, so they don't have to depend on such as the USofA
and European countries.
Gary Rosen
"raven1" <quotht...@nevermore.com> wrote in message
news:eulvg5psjj9qgu4uq...@4ax.com...
If you really want to look at the "ruthless ways of capitalism",
watch septic evict poor kids from his slums on Christmas Eve.
- Gary Rosen
Christopher A. Lee
<budi...@netscape.net> wrote:
>It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not everything is as
>cozy as American folklore would have it. It's a pity that people
>forget two important things: the filthy despicable origins of these
>"celebrations" and the fact that whilst we sit here feasting our faces
>and growing fat, there are literally millions of children starving -
>children who could be fed if we quit feeding ton after ton of grain to
>support our meat habit and instead gave it to those hwo need it both
>for food and seed.
>
>Budikka
Christians and Christianity are in serious denial about its bloody
history
skep...@aol.com
> On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:45:14 -0800 (PST), "skepti...@aol.com"
>
> <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> >Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
> >Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
>
> >Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
> >the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
> >after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
> >history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
> >and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
> >ruthless ways of capitalism.
>
> You must be a riot at parties.
In about 1989 I used to drive people out of the room at parties
babbling about the JFK assassination. I'm much more restrained now.
skep...@aol.com
> On Fri, 27 Nov 2009 08:45:09 -0500, raven1
>
>
>
>
>
> >On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:45:14 -0800 (PST), "skepti...@aol.com"
> ><skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> >>Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
> >>Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
>
> >>Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
> >>the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
> >>after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
> >>history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
> >>and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
> >>ruthless ways of capitalism.
>
> >You must be a riot at parties.
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
My only 'party' this year was going to my parents house for Thanks
giving. My mother ignored me to hurt my feelings and wouldn't talk to
me, until I burst into tears.
skep...@aol.com
Capitalism is about mass murder through conquest, armed robbering of
the poor by the rich and working people crumble, for generations they
had slavery, working to death hundreds of thousands.
skep...@aol.com
> "raven1" <quoththera...@nevermore.com> wrote in message
>
> news:eulvg5psjj9qgu4uq...@4ax.com...
>
> > On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:45:14 -0800 (PST), "skepti...@aol.com"
> > <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> >>Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
> >>Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
>
> >>Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
> >>the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
> >>after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
> >>history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
> >>and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
> >>ruthless ways of capitalism.
>
> If you really want to look at the "ruthless ways of capitalism",
> watch septic evict poor kids from his slums on Christmas Eve.
>
> - Gary Rosen
Gary Rosen takes his IDF riding crop, and uses it to turn the face of
an old Palestinian woman, to degrade her, before he is about to murder
her children in front of her with a rifle, after they have stood
passively next to his unit for 20 minutes.
The Greenwood is Magic
>
> - Show quoted text -
Wake up Mr Obama
Blessed be
skep...@aol.com
wrote:
>
> - Show quoted text -
Barrack Hussein BUSH-bama is our class enemy. His policies are Bush
policies. Hate Capitalism for its crimes against Humanity.
Gary Rosen
"The Greenwood is Magic" <grim...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:8d7ea577-800a-43ec...@m38g2000yqd.googlegroups.com...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Bwahahaha, I guess I got to septic.
- Gary Rosen
JTEM
"skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> In mid-winter 1620 the English ship Mayflower
> landed on the North American coast, delivering
> 102 Puritan exiles.
So much for accuracy...
> The original Native people of this stretch of
> shoreline had already been killed off.
Again, no. In fact, the only reason why the
Mayflower passengers survived that first winter
was by discovering -- and stealing -- Indian
food stocks.
> The Puritans landed and built their colony called
> "the Plymouth Plantation" near the deserted ruins
> of the Indian village of Pawtuxet.
That would be Rhode Island, while the so-called
"Pilgrims" landed in what is now Massachusetts.
> They ate from abandoned cornfields grown wild. Only
> one Pawtuxet named Squanto had survived
Again, you're WAY off base here...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pawtuxet_Village
> Squanto spoke the colonists' language and taught
> them how to plant corn and how to catch fish
> until the first harvest.
'Cus fishing was unheard of in Europe... right?
Man, this is utter bullshit...
> Squanto also helped the colonists negotiate a
> peace treaty with the nearby Wampanoag tribe,
> led by the chief Massasoit.
....who apparently were resistant to old
world diseases, huh?
> These were very lucky breaks for the colonists.
> The first Virginia settlement had been wiped out
> before they could establish themselves.
Let's see... a brief stop by a fishing exhibition
depopulated the Massachusetts coast, but an actual
colony in Virginia failed to leave the Indians with
so much as an uncomfortable feeling...
> Thanks to the good will of the Wampanoag, the
> Puritans not only survived their first year but
> had an alliance with the Wampanoags that
> would give them almost two decades of peace.
So smallpox wiped out all the indians within 300
miles, and they had peace with their indian
neighbors.
Say, you;re not very good at spotting contradictions,
are you?
> But the peace that produced the Thanksgiving Feast
> of 1621 meant that the Puritans would have 15 years
> to establish a firm foothold on the coast.
The "Puritans" arrived AFTER the so-called "Pilgrims,"
and founded a completely different colony.
The "Puritans" founded the "Massachusetts Bay Colony,"
while the so-called "Pilgrims" founded the "Plymouth
Colony."
The Plymouth colony existed alone for a while, then
the two colonies co-existed for some years until
finally the larger Massachusetts Bay colony absorbed
the Plymouth Colony.
I mean, damn, the number of blatant errors...
I just don't have the time or the patience to make
all the necessary corrections. Who wrote this crap,
a grade school special needs student? Sheesh!
--
Check out my friend's lame ass show:
JTEM
Budikka666 <budik...@netscape.net> wrote:
> It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not
> everything is as cozy as American folklore would
> have it.
What "skeptic" posted was a pile of shit. Do not --
Repeat: Do not -- mistaken it for accurate.
Jimbo
Exactly how was it a pile of shit? What is inaccurate about it, and
what are your sources?
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Exactly how was it a pile of shit?
It was completely inaccurate (as even a
modest Google search would have demonstrated
for you.
Put another way: It was factually incorrect.
See my other post.
The Raider on a Rock
> On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:45:14 -0800 (PST), "skepti...@aol.com"
>
> <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> >Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
> >Revolutionary Worker #883, November 24, 1996
>
> >Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of
> >the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast
> >after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real
> >history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people
> >and the theft of their land by European colonialists--and of the
> >ruthless ways of capitalism.
>
> You must be a riot at parties.
He's the reason that I don't like clowns. You really never know.
skep...@aol.com
You don't care if the indians were massacred do you JTEM? It's just
some joke for you to try to nit pic about. Huh?
skep...@aol.com
I don't like Brian Boytano. You can never really know about ice
skaters.
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Exactly how was it a pile of shit?
>
> It was completely inaccurate (as even a
> modest Google search would have demonstrated
> for you.
You made the claim, the burden of proof is yours.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> You made the claim, the burden of proof is yours.
Um, no. As a matter of fact, I was responding
to some stupid dip-shit that made a claim.
And, besides, like I said: See my other post.
Seriously, dude, freedom from ignorance is it's
own reward. At least TRY to cash in...
JTEM
"skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> You don't care if the indians were massacred
> do you JTEM?
According to your post, they weren't. They were
the victims of their continental isolation, not
any act of violence.
So not only are you a completely unskeptical
"skeptic" -- swallowing obvious bullshit trying
to pass itself off as history -- but you lack
reading comprehension...
SkyEyes
> Budikka666 <budik...@netscape.net> wrote:
> > It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not
> > everything is as cozy as American folklore would
> > have it.
>
> What "skeptic" posted was a pile of shit. Do not --
> Repeat: Do not -- mistaken it for accurate.
Indeed, JTEM, it was *not* a pile of shit. It was far more accurate
than the commercial version of history, which is what you apparently
espouse.
Brenda Nelson, A.A.#34
BAAWA Knight
EAC Professor of Feline Thermometrics and Cat-Herding
skyeyes nine at cox dot net
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > You made the claim, the burden of proof is yours.
>
> Um, no. As a matter of fact, I was responding
> to some stupid dip-shit that made a claim.
His claim is rather extensive, well noted, with references. Your
claim is "Is not!".
>
> And, besides, like I said: See my other post.
>
> Seriously, dude, freedom from ignorance is it's
> own reward. At least TRY to cash in...
>
So, your lack of a valid argument is reason to insult others?
Jimbo
> "skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> > You don't care if the indians were massacred
> > do you JTEM?
>
> According to your post, they weren't. They were
> the victims of their continental isolation, not
> any act of violence.
Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize I was dealing with the mentally
deficient when responding to your post. Carry on then.
Jimbo
> On Nov 30, 6:40 am, JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Budikka666 <budik...@netscape.net> wrote:
> > > It's nice to be reminded at times like this that not
> > > everything is as cozy as American folklore would
> > > have it.
>
> > What "skeptic" posted was a pile of shit. Do not --
> > Repeat: Do not -- mistaken it for accurate.
>
> Indeed, JTEM, it was *not* a pile of shit. It was far more accurate
> than the commercial version of history, which is what you apparently
> espouse.
>
We do know for a fact, according to the journal the James Chilton kept
that they did rob graves and food stores of the natives when they
first made landfall on the cape. No doubt they engaged in similar
behavior after landing at Plymouth.
JTEM
SkyEyes <skyey...@cox.net> wrote:
> Indeed, JTEM, it was *not* a pile of shit.
It got every major fact wrong, including where
villages were located.... not to mention who
was on the Mayflower.
Any high school kid would have been flunked for
passing in that shit.
It was sub-standard for amateurs....
skep...@aol.com
You are quivering and trembling trying to make some micro, nit picking
point, when the article is a brilliant bombshell on a little topic
known as [shouting]: ---> GENOCIDE (!)
skep...@aol.com
The Native Americans didn't succumb to continental isolation, they
were wiped out with genocidal acts, such as giving tribes small pox
blankets, or hunt and destroy death squad style military campaigns
against them. Forced relocation. Indians attacked to wipe them out as
a political entity by the white supremacists colonial conquerors.
Pull your head out, JTEM. Join humanity on this one.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't
You need to get some reading comprehension.
The post couldn't be less accurate, confusing
settlers and geographic locations.
HINT: The "Puritans" founded the Massachusetts
Bay Colony, not the Plymouth colony.
It's true that thousands of Indians died from
diseases such as the Chicken Pox, because they
lacked any resistance to them, but nobody outside
of a mental institution is trying to claim that
this was intentional.
Yes, MUCH LATER in a TOTALLY DIFFERENT PLACE
there was a BRITISH MILITARY plan to give
smallpox infected blankets to Indians, but there
is no evidence that this plan was ever placed in
operation.
Jackass.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> We do know for a fact, according to the journal
> the James Chilton kept that they did rob graves
> and food stores of the natives when they
> first made landfall on the cape.
The shit post which your mental illness if forcing
you to defend states otherwise. It claims that they
fed from an abandoned corn field left behind by
indians who were wiped out previously by smallpox.
Jackass.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> His claim is rather extensive, well noted, with
> references.
And yet you yourself dispute it a little further
down.
I can't say I'm surprised. You mental cases have
the annoying habit^H^H^H^H^H ability to hold two
contradictory opinions simultaneously.
I guess it's that whole "Meta Truth" you're
chasing...
JTEM
"skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> You are
You're an extremely UNskeptical skeptic.
If you spent even a few moments on Google
you would have verified everything I said.
Dip shit.
skep...@aol.com
Admit it JTEM, you did not read the article, (I can tell from your
posts) you stopped after a few paragraphs. How do you know what the
article claims if you won't read the whole thing? Who cares about your
little nit picking point? Don't you have compassion Native Americans?
What about the US Cavalry deliberately giving Native Americans
diseased blankets to wipe them out with germ warfare? What about the
torture and mutilation by white people against Native Americans? What
about wiping out whole peoples. 120 Million Native Americans were
killed by colonial conquerors since the monster Columbus invaded.
Canada just had to pay Indians because Canada had Christian torture
schools, which committed mass murder against Native people, and
systematic rape of children all the way up to 1993. Today Pig Police
murder Native Americans on city streets in considerable numbers. John
Wayne spend a whole movie career murdering Native Americans. All my
heros killed Cowboys. "We ought to be fed up by now. Turn the system
upside down." --The Coup
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't
>
> You need to get some reading comprehension.
Have all I need, thank you very much.
>
> The post couldn't be less accurate, confusing
> settlers and geographic locations.
Then show us the evidence.
Jimbo
Actually, they did that as well, but that was after landing at
Plymouth. They originally made landfall on Cape Cod, due to storms,
where they robbed graves and food stores of the local tribe. Squanto
was from the tribe that was wiped out by the ill fated 1614 English
Settlement in the area of Plymouth. Squanto, and about 10 others from
his tribe was captured and enslaved. Squanto, through a whole serious
of events, managed to return to the area only to find that his entire
tribe had been wiped out by Smallpox. Amazingly, after having been
through all of this, he still decided to help the Pilgrims.
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > His claim is rather extensive, well noted, with
> > references.
>
> And yet you yourself dispute it a little further
> down.
>
You inability to understand the facts is not in dispute from me.
raiderjet
Hey Jimbo! Where the fuck have you been bro? I was reading your
posts in the mid 90s back when Usenet was in its infancy.
BTW, I owned a house in Squantum for a year, which is an island off of
the south of Boston in Quincy, named after Squanto. One two-lane road
in and out through the marshes. Cool place that is totally insulated
from the Boston BS.
Mostly Boston cops lived there. So you never got fucked with, and in
fact were protected for the most part no matter what you did. The
next island out is the mental institution. The island after that is
the Boston Police shooting range (which explains the Boston cop
density IMO).
Good to see you post again.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > You need to get some reading comprehension.
>
> Have all I need, thank you very much.
So what you're telling us is that you depend heavily
on oral instructions...
JTEM
> On Nov 30, 5:42 pm, JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > We do know for a fact, according to the journal
> > > the James Chilton kept that they did rob graves
> > > and food stores of the natives when they
> > > first made landfall on the cape.
>
> > The shit post which your mental illness if forcing
> > you to defend states otherwise. It claims that they
> > fed from an abandoned corn field left behind by
> > indians who were wiped out previously by smallpox.
>
> Actually, they did that as well,
No, honey. He got it wrong. And what are you using for
a cite to back up your claim that they robbed indian
graves? They certainly found Indian graves -- Bradford
records that -- but there's no mention of robbing graves.
> Squanto was from the tribe that was wiped out by the
> ill fated 1614 English Settlement in the area of Plymouth.
You're out of your mind. This is simply not true, and the
briefest of investigations would have revealed this to you.
JTEM
"skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> Admit it JTEM, you did
Again, if you had spent even a few moments on Google
you could have verified everything I said.
The story is hogwash.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> You inability to
I'm not interested in your "Meta Truths." The piece is
factually __Wrong__. It's not history, it's a cheap
rationalization. Only a jackass would be fooled by it.
Jimbo
What I'm telling you is that you're full of shit.
Jimbo
It is 100% true, and historically accurate to the accounts given by
the Pilgrims themselves.
Jimbo
Yet, you have provided no evidence whatsoever.
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > You inability to
>
> I'm not interested in your "Meta Truths."
You're also not interested in the known facts.
Jimbo
Tell me John, if you're so knowledgeable, can you tell me why the
English born Pilgrims are typically depicted in what was then Dutch
clothing?
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> You're also not interested in the known facts.
Ironic, considering that you yourself disagreed
with what the piece called "facts."
Then again, what's a "Fact" to your meta-truth...
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Tell me John, if you're so knowledgeable,
> can you tell me why the
Tell me, psycho breath, how can you pretend
to know me yet not know that I NEVER respond
to such obvious diversions?
HINT: No matter how I respond, the original
piece is still factually incorrect, and you
yourself have contradicted it.
You're welcome.
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Again, if you had spent even a few moments on Google
> > you could have verified everything I said.
>
> > The story is hogwash.
> Yet, you have provided no evidence whatsoever.
Are you just typing in order to listen to the
clicks, or what?
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> What I'm
You clearly have this deep emotional need to
claim vicarious-victim status. You should
seek professional help in exploring why.
Anyhow, as you are so BIG on cites, why don't
you cite us some evidence that anyone
intentionally infected the Indians with smallpox
or any other disease.
...or are you too busy pretending to be a
victim here?
Well, you pathetic shit?
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> It is 100% true,
And yet you yourself contradict it.
Are you bipolar or just a really bad liar?
Jimbo
>
> - Show quoted text -
You must be thinking of another Jimbo, I did post back during that
time, but under a different pseudonym.
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Tell me John, if you're so knowledgeable,
> > can you tell me why the
>
> Tell me,
So, basically, you have no valid point, and you substitute insult for
argument. So noted and goodbye.
skep...@aol.com
Germs, Gas and Bugs:
Made in USA
Revolutionary Worker #1126, November 11, 2001, posted at http://rwor.org
In 1763, Lord Jeffrey Amherst was looking for a new weapon to fight
the Native peoples who were resisting British colonial advances into
the Ohio Valley. In a letter to Colonel Henry Bouquet, commander of
British forces in Pennsylvania, Amherst wrote: "Could it not be
contrived to send the smallpox among these disaffected tribes of
Indians? We must on this occasion use every stratagem in our power to
reduce them."
Bouquet replied, "I will try to inoculate them...with some blankets
that may fall into their hands, and take care not to get the disease
myself."
Amherst wrote back: "You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians
by means of blankets as well as to try every other method that can
serve to extirpate this exorable race."
Bouquet ordered one of his officers, Captain Ecuyer, commander of the
"Royal Americans," to call the Delaware chiefs to Fort Pitt to
negotiate and give them infected presents. On June 24, Captain Ecuyer
wrote in his journal, "Out of our regard for them, we gave them two
blankets and a handkerchief out of the smallpox hospital. I hope it
will have the desired effect."
Shortly afterward, smallpox spread through the Indian peoples of the
Ohio River, causing many deaths among the Mingo, Delaware and Shawnee
people.
*****
The tradition of biological warfare among the Anglo-American power
structure on the North American continent is a long one.
You could even say that biological warfare is as American as cherry
pie.
And today, as the U.S. government and media search for "suspects" in
the incidents of anthrax, it is important to remember that the U.S.
military is the world's leader in the development, production,
proliferation, and use--massive use--of chemical and biological
weapons.
This brief history offers some highlights:
1917-1918:
World War 1
After refusing to sign the international agreements of 1898 and 1907
to ban "projectiles the sole object of which is the diffusion of
asphyxiating or deleterious gases," U.S. forces used 1,000 tons of
phosgene, mustard gas and chlorine shells against German troops after
entering World War 1 in 1917.
All told, the combatants in that first World War fired a total of
124,200 tons of toxic gas shells, resulting in 400,000 casualties. The
resulting outcry led to the 1925 Geneva accord, signed by the U.S.,
outlawing all use of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases.
1941-1945:
World War 2--The Beginning of the
U.S. Biological Weapons Program
Chemical and biological weapons were not used extensively on the
battlefields of World War 2, although the Nazis used poison gas in
massive quantities in their death camps.
But during the course of World War 2 the U.S. created the Chemical
Warfare Service (CWS), later the Army Chemical Corps--budgeting
millions of dollars to develop deadly biological weapons. Along with
this they enlisted universities and private industry.
According to a historical chronology by the Chemical and Biological
Weapons Nonproliferation Project, "In August 1942, George Merck,
president of the Merck & Co. pharmaceutical company, accept[ed] the
position as head of the newly created War Research Service (WRS), the
coordinating agency that joins government and private institution
resources to carry out the U.S. biological warfare program. Headed by
a small cadre of well-connected individuals, the WRS [began] to
conduct research at dozens of American universities."
The U.S efforts were to culminate in the dropping of anthrax bombs on
Germany. An article in the LA Times in 1987 reported on the findings
of Stanford University historian Prof. Barton J. Bernstein: "British
Prime Minister Winston Churchill was advised that 1,000 projectiles,
each of 500 pounds and containing 106 four-pound anthrax bombs, could
destroy life in a 25-square-mile area. Potential targets included
Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Aachen and Wilhelmshafen. American
production of the bombs fell too far behind schedule to make available
enough of the anthrax weapons in 1944, Bernstein said, and by 1945
'Germany was near surrender.'"
In 1943 the U.S. secretly sent a cargo ship with 100 tons of 100-pound
mustard bombs to the European theater, supposedly for retaliation if
the Germans used gas against Allied forces. When the Germans bombed
the ship, 83 sailors died and 534 were seriously injured. The truth
concerning this incident remained secret until 1959.
1945-1991:
China, Korea, and
The Cold War
Following World War 2 the U.S. turned its attention to the Soviet
Union, the People's Republic of China and Korea.
In December 1951, the U.S. Secretary of Defense had ordered that the
"actual readiness be achieved in the earliest practicable time" for
offensive use of biological weapons. Within weeks, the chief of staff
of the Air Force reported that such capabilities "are rapidly
materializing."
Though the U.S. continues to deny it, North Korea reported that they
were targets of U.S. biological warfare involving plague agents in
1951.
In 1952, the Chinese and North Korean governments accused the U.S. of
dropping germ bombs on North Korea and northeast China. To investigate
these charges, the People's Republic of China helped form the
"International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the
Facts Concerning Bacterial Warfare in Korea and China." It included
scientists from Sweden, France, Italy, Russia, Brazil and England. The
Commission concluded: "the peoples of Korea and China did actually
serve as targets for bacteriological weapons. These weapons were used
by detachments of the armed forces of the USA...including cholera-
infected clams, anthrax-infected feathers, plague- and yellow-fever-
infected lice, fleas, mosquitoes, rodents, rabbits, and other small
animals." The U.S. denied these charges, but later admitted it did
have the capability of waging such germ warfare.
According to William Blum, author of Rogue State, the U.S. also
dropped "huge amounts of napalm on Korea, an average of 70,000 gallons
daily in 1952."
From the end of World War 2 in 1945 until 1991, the Soviet Union was
the U.S. imperialists' main target, and various plans were developed
to prevail in war against the Soviet Union.
The U.S. developed, tested, and stockpiled a wide array of chemical
and biological weapons for use in war against the people of the Soviet
Union.
And the U.S. government often secretly tested these weapons systems on
people in the Caribbean, Canada, and the U.S. itself.
In 1977 it was revealed during Senate Intelligence Committee hearings
that from 1949 to 1969, the U.S. military secretly conducted 239 open-
air tests of biological agents--80 of which used live bacteria. The
military supposedly thought the bacteria were harmless, but in a
number of cases this was not true. In 1994 one professor who studies
biological warfare testified that for over 20 years the Army released
clouds of "simulant" microbes and chemicals over hundreds of populated
areas.
These experiments included:
� From the late 1940s to some time in the 1950s, a joint U.S.-Canada-
British team sprayed bacteria in the Bahama Islands of the Caribbean.
Thousands of animals died as a result of the tests.
� In 1950, the Army sprayed the entire city of San Francisco with
billions of the Serratia marcescens bacteria from a Navy ship cruising
outside the Golden Gate. The bacteria was supposedly harmless, but 11
people were hospitalized for severe urinary and respiratory infections
and one person died.
� During the 1950s, U.S. army researchers also dispersed serratia
bacteria on Panama City and Key West, Florida, and released cancer-
causing zinc-cadmium-sulfide particles in Winnipeg, Canada, Minnesota
and other Midwestern states to see how far they would disperse.
� In 1966, military researchers spread bacillus subtilis variant niger
in the subway, where the germs carried for miles.
� In 1965, the military released bacillus globigii at Washington's
National Airport and Greyhound Bus terminal.
The 1977 hearings also revealed that from 1956 to 1961, the CIA
carried out a secret program called MK-ULTRA. These mind-control
experiments consisted of agents in cities across the country spiking
drinks with mind-altering drugs like LSD and mescaline and then
"observing" the actions of the unsuspecting victims. Many hallucinated
or became sick and at least two deaths resulted from the experiments.
Between 1944 and 1974, the Defense Department and the Atomic Energy
Commission studied the impact of radiation by secretly exposing many
thousands to harmful doses of radioactive materials, including
injections of plutonium. In 1995 a government committee reported there
had been more than 4,000 such experiments in scores of hospitals,
universities and military bases--usually conducted without the
knowledge or consent of the victims.
� From the 1940s to the 1990s, the U.S. used Panama as a testing
ground for chemical weapons, including mustard gas, VX, sarin,
hydrogen cyanide and other nerve agents. Some of the earlier tests
exposed U.S. troops with horrific results for some of the soldiers.
The U.S. military also conducted secret tests of Agent Orange and
other toxic herbicides in Panama during the 1960s and '70s--spraying
jungle areas to simulate battlefield conditions of Southeast Asia.
When the U.S. military invaded Panama in 1999, residents of the
mountain village of Pacora, near Panama City, reported being bombed
with a chemical substance that burned their skin and produced intense
stinging and diarrhea. The U.S. forces left behind many sites with
chemical weapons residue in Panama, including numerous chemical
weapons dropped from planes that failed to detonate.
1961-1975:
Vietnam--Napalm, Agent Orange
and Nerve Gas
The U.S. unleashed the most vicious and intense air war in world
history against the people's war waged by the North Vietnamese and the
National Liberation Front of Vietnam.
Seven million tons of bombs were dropped on Vietnam, Cambodia and
Laos--three times as many as had been dropped in all of World War 2.
Chemical weapons such as napalm, white phosphorus incendiary bombs,
Agent Orange, tear gas, and nerve gas were all part of the U.S.
arsenal.
In all, an estimated three million Vietnamese people died in the war
and millions of acres of crop land and jungle were poisoned.
Napalm. This syrupy jellied gasoline was widely used by the U.S. to
burn down forests, villages, and people--and came to symbolize the
horror and criminality of the U.S. war. Napalm burns at more than
5,000 degrees--and keeps burning after it sticks, sometimes burning
people to the bone. Napalm sucks the oxygen out of the air,
asphyxiating anyone nearby.
Nick Ut was the Associated Press photographer who took the now famous
picture of a young Vietnamese girl, Kim Phuc, running in terror after
being burned by U.S. napalm. He said, "Napalm was everywhere in
Vietnam, and I shot a lot of pictures of it. That day, I took a
picture of a little boy who died right there in front of my camera.
Then a few minutes later, I shot a picture of Kim Phuc."
Defoliants and Agent Orange. The U.S. began destroying the jungles
used by Vietnamese liberation fighters and the crops of the Vietnamese
farmers as early as 1961 when it began supplying South Vietnamese
pilots with massive amounts of Agent Orange--a 50/50 mixture of the
defoliants 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T--and other defoliants, including some
containing arsenic, and training them in its use.
By 1967, U.S. pilots were flying 18 massive C-123 transports outfitted
with special tanks capable of carrying 10,000 pounds of Agent Orange
and high-pressure nozzles for spraying; and the U.S. was spending $60
million a year on the operation. A Japanese study that year claimed
that U.S. attacks had ruined more than 3.8 million acres of arable
land in South Vietnam. One Vietnamese peasant described a three-day
chemical attack near Da Nang in February 1966:
"Affected areas covered 120 kilometers east-west and 150 kilometers
north-south. Five minutes was all that was needed to wither tapioca,
sweet potato...and banana plants. Livestock suffered heavy
injuries....Most of the river fish were found lying dead on the
surface of mountain streams and brooks. The three days of chemical
attack poisoned scores of people, took the lives of about 10 and
inflicted a "natus" disease [with symptoms like a severe rash] upon
18,000 inhabitants."
It was also revealed in 1980 that the U.S. had sprayed Agent Orange
over 23,607 acres of southern border of the demilitarized zone between
North and South Korea.
Tear gases. In 1962 the U.S. began supplying the puppet South
Vietnamese army with CN tear gas and CS--or super--tear gas, as well
as DM nausea-inducing gas. These were first used to attack anti-
government protests and later widely used in military operations--in
violation of the 1925 treaty prohibiting such gases in war. Often U.S.
helicopters would drop hundreds of tear gas grenades to try and flush
Vietnamese liberation fighters out of their tunnels or hide-outs, and
then U.S. bombers would saturation bomb the area. In one such attack
in May 1966, the U.S. dropped 12 tons of CS gas near the Cambodian
border.
Nerve gas. In 1998 CNN and Time magazine reported new revelations of
the use of chemical weapons by the U.S. in Vietnam: the U.S. had used
nerve gas in combat. During "Operation Tailwind," the U.S. military
used sarin nerve gas on a targeted village--which included Indochinese
civilians, American military deserters, and fighters of the Vietnamese
and Laotian liberation armies. CNN/ Time's report claimed there were
at least 20 other instances in which the U.S. used nerve gas during
the Vietnam War.
Retired Adm. Thomas Moorer, the Chief of Naval Operations during the
Vietnam War and later Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed
that the U.S. had CBU-15 cluster bombs, designed to deliver nerve gas,
and he admitted that they had been used repeatedly during the Vietnam
War. Under intense pressure from the U.S. imperialist establishment,
including the military, CNN later retracted their story and fired
those who reported it. A number of the reporters, however, have stuck
to their report.
1962-1996:
Cuba
In 1962, a sugar shipment bound for the Soviet Union was contaminated
by CIA agents with a chemical agent when the ship was forced to dock
in Puerto Rico for repairs. Fearing public outcry and exposure,
President Kennedy ordered that the sugar not be put back on board the
ship. But a CIA official later revealed that "there was lots of sugar
being sent out from Cuba and we were putting a lot of contaminants in
it."
That same year, an American military intelligence agent paid $5,000 to
a Canadian technician working as an agricultural advisor to the Cuban
government to infect Cuban turkeys with a virus that would produce a
fatal disease.
In 1971, the CIA turned over a virus which causes African swine fever
to Cuban exiles--six weeks later an outbreak of the disease--the first
ever recorded in the Western hemisphere--forced the slaughter of
500,000 pigs.
Ten years later, an epidemic of dengue hemorrhagic fever--leading to
300,000 cases of the intense flu-like illness and 158 fatalities--
swept Cuba. This was the first reported case of dengue fever in the
Americas. It was later revealed that tests done on mosquitoes in the
U.S. in the late 1950s included mosquitoes bred to carry dengue fever.
And in 1984, a Cuban exile on trial in Miami testified that in late
1980 he had traveled from Florida to Cuba with "a mission to carry
some germs to introduce them in Cuba to be used against the Soviets
and against the Cuban economy."
In October 1996, a Cuban pilot observed a U.S. crop-duster plane
releasing some kind of mist about seven times over Matanzas province.
Operated by the U.S. State Department, the plane had obtained
permission to fly over Cuba on a trip to Colombia. Two months later,
Cuba observed the first signs of a plague of Thrips palmi, a plant-
eating insect never before detected in Cuba, which spread rapidly--
affecting corn, beans, squash, cucumbers and other crops. In April
1997, Cuba submitted a report to the UN charging the U.S. with
"biological aggression."
1980-1988:
The Iran-Iraq War
The U.S. imperialists have been on a 10-plus-year rant against the
danger of Iraqi "weapons of mass destruction."
However, they never seem to mention several key facts. First, almost
all of Iraq's weapons systems have been dismantled by UN inspectors.
Second, the U.S. and its allies supplied Iraq with the capacity to
produce chemical and biological weapons. According to a 1994 Senate
report, between 1985 and 1989 a "veritable witch's brew of biological
materials" were exported to Iraq by private American suppliers
"pursuant to application and licensing" by the U.S. Department of
Commerce. These materials included anthrax, botulism toxin, and e.
coli bacteria. "It was later learned," the committee reported, "that
these microorganisms...were identical to those...found and removed
from the Iraqi biological warfare program."
Third, when Iraq actually did use these weapons the U.S. barely
objected because at the time U.S. leaders considered it in their
interests to support the Saddam Hussein regime in its war with Iran.
Iraq used chemical weapons, mainly mustard gas, against Iranian troops
in 1984, 1985, and 1986. The U.S. initially criticized Iraq but would
not agree to any Security Council action against Iraq. The Security
Council only succeeded in denouncing Iraq in 1986, two years after
Iraq's initial chemical attack.
In the late 1980s, the Iraqi regime used poison gas on the oppressed
Kurdish people with no serious U.S. protest.
1991:
The Persian Gulf War
Poison Water. The U.S. government and press won't call it biological
warfare, but that's what it is. During "Desert Storm," U.S.-led forces
deliberately targeted Iraq's water system and electrical grid, totally
destroying 11 of Iraq's 20 power generating stations and damaging
another six. As one Iraq relief official explained, "When you destroy
the infrastructure of a country, sewage with all its germs will flow
into the streets; you stop pure water from reaching the children; you
give them malnutrition; you prevent medicines from reaching the
country. So it's an excellent environment for death and disease."
Since the war, the U.S. has blocked Iraq from rebuilding its civilian
infrastructure with punishing sanctions. The contamination of Iraq's
water supply, coupled with shortages of food and medicine, has led to
sharp increases in disease, starvation, and death across Iraq.
The UN estimates that 5,000 Iraqi children die every month as a
result.
Radioactive shells. The U.S. military introduced a new weapon in the
Persian Gulf War--armor-piercing anti-tank shells made of a
radioactive material known as "depleted uranium" (DU). The military
claimed these weapons pose no radiation danger, but when DU shells
explode, they release highly poisonous dust that can be inhaled or
ingested and then trapped in the body--where it can cause lung and
bone cancer and kidney disease.
U.S. forces fired off 860,590 rounds of such depleted-uranium
munitions during the Gulf War. Hundreds of tons of exploded DU
ammunition were left in Iraq and Kuwait, turning the area into a huge
toxic waste dump. An August 1995 study submitted by Iraq to the UN
reported sharp increases in cancers and various diseases in Iraq's
southern region. Iraqi health officials say radioactivity levels in
southern Iraq are "150 to 200 times the background level," and that
"our cancer incidence has increased 10 times during the past few
years."
The Nation reported, "A secret British Atomic Energy Authority report
leaked to the London Independent in November 1991 warned that there
was enough depleted uranium left behind in the Persian Gulf to account
for '500,000 potential deaths' through increased cancer rates."
Another study, by the Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm
Association, found that out of 10,051 Gulf war veterans who have
reported mysterious illnesses, 82 percent had entered captured enemy
vehicles and probably been exposed to DU munitions.
Toxic Clouds over the Gulf and the Gulf War Syndrome. After the Gulf
War, tens of thousands of GIs and reservists began experiencing
debilitating and sometimes life-threatening medical problems: immune
system failure, respiratory problems, severe joint and muscle pain,
headaches, nausea, diarrhea, dizziness, fatigue, loss of memory,
sores, intestinal and heart problems. Some Gulf vets developed
cancers, and many babies born to Gulf war veteran families have birth
defects. These illnesses have come to be known as Gulf War Syndrome,
and by March 1996 over 80,000 U.S. vets were suffering from it.
Many questions remain about the cause or causes of Gulf War Syndrome,
but most researchers are certain that these health problems result
from war-time exposure to toxic chemicals and other poisonous
substances.
U.S.-led forces bombed chemical, biological and nuclear facilities in
Iraq--one Senate investigation found that 18 chemical, 12 biological
and 4 nuclear facilities were hit--and debris from the bombings was
carried by the wind and spread over a wide area of Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi
Arabia and Iran. Some vets and others also say that exposure to
chemical and biological poisons occurred as a result of Iraqi missile
attacks against U.S. and other Coalition forces.
There is clear evidence that top government and military officials
knew the troops were exposed to toxic chemicals--but the military
establishment refused to admit there was a problem until 1996--five
years after the war ended.
Many vets also believe their illness results from being made guinea
pigs for experimental and unapproved vaccine cocktails--supposedly to
protect them from Iraqi chemical and biological weapons that the U.S.
military forced them to have before the war.
1999:
The Balkans War--
Assaulting Yugoslavia's Environment
Scientists warned NATO that bombing the Pancevo's industrial zone
would unleash a cancer-causing, environmental nightmare--but NATO
planes bombed it nonetheless--more than 20 times in a two and one-half
month period. At least 80,000 tons of oil and 3,000 tons of ethylene
dichloride, vinyl chloride monomer and mercury burned in one night of
bombing--all known toxins and suspected carcinogens. One professor at
Belgrade University called the 1999 attack a "chemical war," which
released hundreds if not thousands of known toxins and carcinogens
into the environment, threatening the region's ecosystem and
threatening Yugoslavia's food chain.
U.S. jets also fired 31,000 depleted uranium shells during the Balkans
War.
Assaulting Arms Control and Developing More Deadly Biological Weapons
of Mass Destruction
Today, the rulers are spreading panic over anthrax and threatening
massive military action against any who use chemical or biological
weapons against the U.S. But meanwhile, these same hypocritical
imperialists are working to further gut existing agreements banning
the development and production of biological weapons--which have never
been seriously enforced--so that they can build their own biological
arsenal.
For the past 10 years, countries around the world have been in
negotiations over how to enforce the 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons
Convention, signed by 143 nations including the U.S., which bans the
development, production and possession of biological weapons. These
negotiations are to culminate in an international conference in
November. Yet this past summer, the U.S. announced it would refuse on-
site inspections and instead argued that the focus should be on
punishing those who develop or use biological weapons--after the fact.
In the October 25 issue of Counterpunch, the Sunshine Project writes
that while currently the Convention bans a whole class of weapons, the
U.S. is attempting to "permit a stratification of biological weapons
into 'good' and 'bad' ones. This would permit the United States (and
other countries) to continue work on a number of biological weapons
under development, including anti-crop fungi ("Agent Green"), Pentagon
work on so-called "non-lethal weapons" to control (in the U.S.
military's words) 'potentially hostile civilians,' and the U.S. Navy's
genetically-modified superbugs that consume materials, such as
plastics, jet fuel, rubber, and asphalt."
According to the Sunshine Project, the U.S. also wants to "shift the
arms control focus away from prevention of biological weapons
development" to taking action against violators. And whatever action
would be taken under U.S. proposals would be tailored to its own
imperialist interests -- that is friends and allies would be allowed
to slide, while opponents and targetted regimes would be assaulted.
U.S. opposition to strengthening the Convention comes after stunning
new revelations of secret U.S. biological warfare projects. In "U.S.
Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits," the New York Times,
September 4, 2001, reports that "over the past several years, the
United States has embarked on a program of secret research on
biological weapons that, some officials say, tests the limits of the
global treaty banning such weapons."
These U.S. programs, called "Clear Vision" and "Bacchus," were
intended to develop biological weapons production facilities in
Nevada.
The Times also reports that "Earlier this year, administration
officials said, the Pentagon drew up plans to engineer genetically a
potentially more potent variant of the bacterium that causes anthrax,
a deadly disease ideal for germ warfare." The U.S. is opposed to
international inspections because it wants to keep such projects
secret.
The U.S. claims these programs, which "mimic the major steps a state
or terrorist would take to create a biological arsenal," are all for
defensive purposes.
But after the imperialists' long history of unleashing massive
biological and chemical horrors on the peoples of many countries, why
should anyone in their right mind believe them?
SOURCES
"When U.S. attacked itself--Government tested germs, drugs on
unsuspecting citizens," San Francisco Chronicle, October 28, 2001
"Of Microbes and Mock Attacks: Years Ago, the Military Sprayed Germs
on U.S. Cities," Wall Street Journal, October 22, 2001.
"Hunting the Longshadows Exposed: U.S. Nerve Gas Crimes in Vietnam
War," Revolutionary Worker #962, June 21, 1998
"Military Says Goodbye to Napalm," San Francisco Chronicle, April 4,
2001
"The United States and the Iran-Iraq War," Stephen R. Shalom, online
at Zmag.org.
"The United States vs. Iraq--a Study in Hypocrisy," by William Blum,
February 9, 1998
"Umatilla Residents See Nerve-Gas Facility As Bulls-Eye in the Wake of
Terror Attacks," Wall Street Journal, October 23, 2001
"U.S. Seeks Changes in Germ War Pact," New York Times, November 1,
2001
"U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treat Limits," New York Times,
September 4, 2001
"Gulf War's Deadly Legacy," San Francisco Chronicle, March 11, 2001
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower, William Blum,
(Common Courage 2000)
Iran and Iraq At War, Shahram Chubin and Charles Tripp, (Westview
1988)
Chemical & Biological Warfare--America's Hidden Arsenal, Seymour M.
Hersh (Anchor Books 1969)
"Eyewitness Report: What the U.S. Bombs Have Done to the People of
Iraq," Revolutionary Worker #1120, September 30, 2001
"Gulf War Syndrome: The Cold Cover-up," Revolutionary Worker #884,
December 1, 1996
"Eco-Crisis Feared in Yugoslavia--Scientists say NATO air attacks did
long-term damage," San Francisco Chronicle, August 11, 2000
"Police Brutality, USA: 'Systematic and Widespread,'" Revolutionary
Worker #978, October 18, 1998
"Two Fisted Assault on Germ Weapons Control: Will the Bio-Weapons
Convention Be Left Standing?" The Sunshine Project, in Counterpunch,
October 25, 2001
Jimbo
>
> HINT: No matter how I respond, the original
> piece is still factually incorrect,
Nice assertion, now prove it.
Jimbo
> Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > Again, if you had spent even a few moments on Google
> > > you could have verified everything I said.
>
> > > The story is hogwash.
> > Yet, you have provided no evidence whatsoever.
>
> Are you just typing in order to
See if you will prove your assertion.
JTEM
JTEM
Jimbo <ckdbig...@gmail.com> wrote:
> JTEM <jte...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > HINT: No matter how I respond, the original
> > piece is still factually incorrect,
>
> Nice assertion
You can argue against reality all day long
if you like... as if you need me to tell you
that.
JTEM
"skepti...@aol.com" <skepti...@aol.com> wrote:
> In 1763, Lord Jeffrey Amherst was
So your "Proof" that these so-called "Pilgrims"
intentionally killed Indians with smallpox is
a letter by a British officer which dates to
more than 140 years later....
This is before we consider that it was not only
concerning Indians hundreds of miles away, but
every indication is that NOBODY -- not even
Amherst -- actually gave the Indians infected
items.
Yes, he talks about it. No, there is no evidence
that it ever rose above "Talk."
Your nonsense concerning WWI and later is just
too bizarre to waste my time on. Let me just
point out that it's irrelevant (not to mention
overtly biased), and leave it at that.
skep...@aol.com
I posted that article to show to you the long list of history of the
whites from North America deliberately using germ warfare agaisnst the
peoples of the world. The United Snakes are the grand masters of germ
warfare. The US government is to germ warfare what Hitler was to the
Volkswagon. The USA is to world domination and genocide, like white on
rice, or cold on ice.