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New 9/11 Investigation, 'War on Terrorism' Wrong Response
Hawkins' Senate Campaign Airs Radio Ads Calling for New Investigation of 9/11
Calls Bush/Clinton "War on Terrorism" the Wrong Response |
Media Release
For immediate release: September 11, 2006
For more information: Howie Hawkins, (315) 425-1019
Howie Hawkins, the Green Party candidate for US Senate, has begun airing radio ads calling for a new investigation into the 9/11 attacks and condemning the so-called war on terrorism as the wrong response to 9/11.
The ads will initially begin running on 9/11 in New York City on Air America, WWRL; WSYR in Syracuse; and WROW in Albany (on the Fred Dicker Show).
Hawkins said the unlike the previous investigations, this one needed to be led by people from outside the US military, intelligence, and national security establishment.
"The fifth anniversary of the murders of several thousand individuals at the World Trade Center, DC and Pennsylvania is an opportune time to reflect on whether our country took the right response after 9/11. This tragedy has been cynically manipulated by the Bush administration with the active support of both parties in Congress. The so-called ‘war on terrorism’ has isolated the US politically. It has fueled a huge increase in an already bloated military budget, leading to massive war profiteering, soaring federal budget deficits, and cutbacks in many domestic programs. It led to the invasion of Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9/11. And it has curtailed civil liberties and public dissent at home. Meanwhile, terrorism has increased throughout the world," said Hawkins.
"The Bush administration squandered the worldwide good will that existed towards America after 9/11 in pursuit of global domination, oil, and corporate profits. Our pursuit of oil, combined with our tradition of supporting brutal dictators when it benefits our oil and other multinational companies, has plunged Iraq into a protracted war that has killed thousands of our soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis while providing motivation for recruiting terrorists throughout the Arab and Muslim world. The most critical and immediate solution is to bring our troops home," added Hawkins, a former Marine who was active in organizing opposition to the Vietnam War.
"The best way to prevent future 9/11s is to seek a global common agenda focused on lifting up the standard of living and security for all. We need an energy policy based on energy conservation and clean renewable energy, not seizing oil fields in foreign countries," added Hawkins.
On the afternoon of 9/11 five years ago, the Green Party of New York State issued a statement reflecting on the grief that all individuals felt about the horrific attacks. The Greens however said that our cries for grief should not be turned into a call for war; instead, the attack should be treated as a crime against humanity and prosecuted at such. Five years later, the need for a real criminal investigation continues to grow, particularly as the evidence mounts of the Bush's administration lying and cover-up regarding the events of 9/11.
The recent release of the NORAD tapes from the morning of 9/11 documented that the Pentagon had repeatedly provided false information concerning how the national security defenses responded. The White House and EPA deliberately provided false information concerning the health and environmental risks from the WTC site, contributing to significant health problems among relief workers and residents. The Bush administration lied to the American public about the reasons for invading Iraq. The co-chairs of the 9/11 Commission recently admitted it lied to the American public, covering up their finding that the US support for Israel’s occupations of Palestinian and other Arab territories was the central motivation behind the attacks.
"The Bush administration seems incapable of telling the truth to the American public. The Bush administration and Congress resisted an investigation into 9/11 until the cries of the victims' families were too loud to ignore. Those finally appointed to the commission were selected based on their willingness to protect the national security establishment, not purse the truth. Their conflicts of interests were so overwhelming that all of its members at various points had to recuse themselves from the so-called investigation. Most galling was the effort by President Bush to appoint former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger as chair of the Commission. Kissinger is condemned world-wide as a war criminal and terrorist for his leadership role in the bloody overthrow of the elected Allende government in Chile on September 11, 1973," noted Hawkins.
The neocons led by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and Vice-President Cheney but also including leading Democratic hawks wrote in the Project for a New American Century’s September 2000 report, Rebuilding America’s Defenses, that it would take a new Pearl Harbor to win public support for launching various military invasions to secure oil in Iraq and other oil producing countries. The 9/11 attacks conveniently provided the hoped for pretext.
"Finding the truth about what happened on 9/11 and why it happened is essential both to hold those accountable for these murders criminally responsible and to begin the healing process. There is considerable evidence that the Bush administration received extensive warnings about a major impending terrorist attack on America from a wide range of foreign government and our own intelligence system. Was the failure of the American national security force to prevent 9/11 due to its incompetence? Did the Bush administration allow the terrorist attacks to occur in order to provide a hoped for Pearl Harbor to mobilize support for wars for oil? Or, most unbelievably, did a group of neocons in the Bush administration actively assist in carrying out the 9/11 attacks? Criminal investigations start with looking at those who had motive for, and profited, from the crime, and unfortunately, the neocons fit that bill," noted Hawkins.
Among the myriad of questions a new investigation needs to examine are:
- Who provided logistical and intelligence support to the individuals who flew the planes on 9/11? Why has no one in the US been prosecuted for being the hijackers support network? At a minimum, they seem to have known a lot about the weaknesses of our defenses, such as which airports (e.g., Logan in Boston) had the weakest security systems. The NORAD tapes confirmed that the attacks took place on the morning that the US was running major war games involving hijacked airplanes, leading to tremendous confusion. Was this merely an amazing coincidence or had the hijackers obtained this information?
- Who were the hijackers? Several of the individuals who were identified as the hijackers have since turned up alive. It is no surprise that hijackers would steal identify papers. Why hasn't this been pursued? Family members of the 9/11 victims found that the FBI was providing them with misinformation about the surveillance of the hijackers prior to 9/11. The lead hijacker, according to the 9/11 Commission, trained at the Venice Florida airport that has routinely been utilized by the CIA in their “dirty tricks” black operations, such as the Iran-Contragate drugs and arms smuggling. How much did the CIA and FBI know about the hijackers before 9/11 and why wasn't action taken?
- Who financed the hijackers? The Commission officially reported that it was unimportant to answer this question, since they concluded al Qaeda was so well funded from the ruling Saudi family and others. Did the Saudis knowingly fund this terrorist attack? There have been numerous media reports, including CBS, that the head of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (i.e., their CIA/FBI) wired $100,000 to the lead hijacker before 9/11. In an at least awkward co-incidence, this individual was meeting with the heads of the various Congressional intelligence committees on 9/11. In another strange twist, the Pakistani agent who allegedly physically transferred the money was sentenced to death for the murder of Wall Street Journalist Daniel Pearl, who was allegedly investigating the Pakistani intelligence service and its ties to al Qaeda.
- The role of Saudi Arabia. The Saudi ruling family, which has longstanding, close financial ties to the Bush family, is widely known to have financially supported terrorist groups of the Islamic Right in exchange for their agreement not to commit terrorist attacks in their Saudi Arabia. Various FBI and CIA officials have stated that both Bush and Clinton actively blocked their pre-9/11 investigations into bin Laden and Al Qaeda out of fear of embarrassing Saudi Arabia. A captured Al Qaeda operative, who allegedly was the mastermind of the attack on the USS Cole in October 2000, allegedly stated that he has working directly with three leading figures of the Saudi ruling family. All three of these individuals died shortly after he disclosed this information.
- The role of the CIA, American government and Pakistan in Afghanistan. President Carter, at the urging of his National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinksi, initiated the effort to support terrorists in Afghanistan in order to destabilize the existing pro-Soviet government in the hope of dragging the Russians into a Vietnam-like quagmire. It worked, as the Soviets invaded Afghanistan five months later and left in defeat a decade later. The CIA apparently used bin Laden as a major funding conduit because they found the Saudi-based terrorists easier to deal with than the local mujahideen fighters who were often more interested in pursuing intra-tribal conflicts than in challenging the Soviets. The US-initiated terrorist war produced the conditions that allowed the al Qaeda terrorist camps to operate there. There is considerable evidence that the CIA and the Pakistani Inter-Service Intelligence worked together to support the rise to power of the Taliban in order to restore "order" to the country, at least partially to facilitate the construction of an oil pipeline.
- Did the actions and negligence of the Giuliani administration contribute to so many rescue workers being killed? The Commission chairs recently admitted they erred in treating Giuliani as a hero and refusing to ask basic questions. Were the fireman stuck with radios that didn't work because of Giuliani's ties to Motorola, meaning they failed to hear the warnings that the police received about the pending possible collapse of the Towers? Why wasn't there better coordination between the firemen, police, and other rescue workers?
The list of questions evaded and unanswered goes on and on.
"The American people should use the 5th anniversary as an opportunity to debate whether the choices made by Bush and Congress after 9/11 were the right ones. And to demand that a real investigation be conducted of what led to so many Americans being killed on 9/11, and that all of those responsible be brou |
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 *Website by David Doonan, Labor Donated to Hawkins for Senate Campaign* |
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