Back Into The Memory Hole?

That's how some would like it. With the death of Bruce E. Ivins, named as a suspect in the 2001 anthrax attacks, reports indicate that the government may mark the case "closed." But Ivins's death raises more questions than it answers. Glenn Greenwald performs a public service by asking some important ones here and here. Read the full posts if you haven't already. This entire episode is crying out for a full-scale, public inquiry.

As Glenn notes, it's important to remember the role the anthrax attacks played in the "case" against Saddam. A retrospective of the efforts by the usual suspects to link Iraq to the attacks would take a lot of ink. But this one, at the 1:05 mark, is both relevant and frightening:





If the allegations against Ivins are true, that makes at least three false flag operations contemplated and/or executed while this administration has been in office (though of course there's no evidence the administration had anything to do with the anthrax attacks). The others were Bush's prewar proposal to paint U.S. aircraft in the colors of the U.N. in hopes that Saddam would fire on them, and the post-Hormuz discussion of building replica Iranian boats and staging a confrontation. Throw in the Niger forgeries if you want. Of course these are the ones we actually know about. There's been a lot of speculation about war crimes and legal consequences, but I think prosecution, if it happens, is just as likely to be for this sort of misconduct. Remember, stuff like this almost always stays secret for decades. Usually the public has to wait for a guilty conscience in old age or a shredder-cheating document discovered in dusty archives (a well-known example of the latter is here). It's rare for these things to come out while the principals are alive, much less still in office. That bodes well for future disclosures.

But you have to wonder what it will take. It's scandalous that no one in Washington with subpoena power seems to think any of this is worth looking into. If at this point you don't understand that there are some truly malevolent actors out there willing to do literally anything to "wake up" the American public -- up to and including leaving a suitcase or backpack full of nastiness in the middle of a U.S. city -- you're either willfully ignorant or dangerously naive. Of course the message to developing nations, particularly ones with valuable natural resources, is protection by any means possible. False flag deception is a bit riskier when the target country possesses the ultimate deterrent.

Normally the best defense against all this is in a nation's character, in an innate ability to avoid what Haffner called "a million-fold nervous breakdown" -- a lack of national gullibility, collective coolheadedness under "attack," and skepticism about elected demagogues and disdain for their media mouthpieces. Which explains a lot about the past seven-plus years, unfortunately.

Dangerous times.