US Training of Death Squads in Iraq? - War Is A Crime .org

thus making people believe that casualties among the mercenaries are innocent civilianconstruction workers who were unjustly victimized.The main thing about Covert Action is that it must be deniable. There is a term called “plausibledeniability”. When a government authorizes a covert action operation, the operation must bedone in such a way that the government can claim that it knows nothing about it; in other words,the operation must not be attributable to the government that authorized it.Covert Action operations are often Disinformation Operations, which are conducted in such away as to discredit the opposition or the enemy. This is done, for example, by doing a violentaction, such as a bombing, but making it look like the forces of another country or group did it.Such operations are sometimes called False-Flag Operations, meaning that the operation isconducted to make it look like it was done by people serving under another flag, preferably theenemy’s flag. If the operation succeeds as designed, people will blame the action on the wrongparty (the enemy). Thus, public opinion will be won over to the side that actually did the killing.Such false-flag, covert action operations are often referred to as Dirty Tricks.The British regularly employed Covert Action operations in Ireland, with the result that it islikely that the IRA often took the blame for violent actions with which they had no involvement,although they were hardly innocent players in the general mayhem. Many people suspect that theNorthern Irish bank robbery that occurred some time back was actually a British Covert Actionoperation designed to make the IRA take the blame, so that people would believe that the IRAwas not honouring the Good Friday Agreement. Incidentally, most of the British Northern Irishbank notes taken were worthless old notes, so they were no skin off anyone’s teeth.The policy in Iraq is to keep the country destabilized and on the verge of civil war to show that itcannot govern itself and that it therefore requires the continued presence of American and Britishforces. The man accused of being behind much of the bombing going on there is Al-Zarqawi, aman known to be dead for some time now. Also, because he is (or, rather, was) a Sunni,bombings against the Shi’ia population, if blamed on him and the Sunni insurgents, can keep thepot of civil war simmering, thus giving further justification to keeping American and Britishforces there.Most recently, two British Covert Operations specialists were captured in Basra, in SouthernIraq. They were disguised as Arabs and were carrying bomb-making materials. When Iraqipolice tried to apprehend them, the two covert action operatives resisted arrest and killed twopolicemen. They were eventually caught and held in jail. After the British military learned thatthey had been captured, it sent tanks into Basra to forcibly free the two men. An enraged mobattacked the tanks with petrol bombs, and people around the world saw British soldiers jumpingout of a flaming tank and being stoned. The reaction was one of sympathy for the Britishsoldiers. Few stopped to wonder what was behind the anger and the assault. Most weresympathetic towards the “poor” British soldiers, who were perceived as being unjustlyvictimized.225