Why does the left always blatantly lie about Grenada?

[Zuni]

They always (I have seen so many sources, including today's Democracy Now! try to peddle this blatant untruth) say Reagan deposed a democratically elected regime. Maurice Bishop was deposed by Communists in his own government, including General hudson Austin and his own VP, and subsequently murdered by them. It was Pro-Soviet/Cubans who deposed the elected government.
Reagan actually deposed the coup government, and then Grenada held elections again.
The coup plotters put the island on a 24 hour lockdown, and were holding 1000 Americans on the Island. Left wing sources always say the students were not afraid at all, but the students themselves were terrified according to their own accounts.

Why do Left wing sources constantly misrepresent Grenada? Because few know the actual details and they can get away with it.
They do the same thing with Nicaragua, Panama and many other things.
In this way, the hard left proves itself to be like the wingers on FR.

I am ready for flames---sometimes the truth is different than a political cause.

[DenverDem]

1. So we didn't burn the slums around the palace in Panama

killing a couple of thousand civillians?

[denverbill]

3. Yes, but it was to depose a dictator we installed.

So I guess that makes it ok.

[Zuni]

9. we did not install Noriega

He was a miltary commander under Omar Torrijos (and a CIA as well as Cuban ally. He played both sides). He worked his own way to the top.
In 1989 he overturned a democratic election and then declared war on the US, attacking US troops stationed at the Panama Canal. That was the immediate cause of the invasion

[Postman]

106. Give me a source ...

a story, a news article, a book, anything that backs up your claim that US forces were attacked in the Panama Canal Zone.

The only thing I can recall was that some US Army officer was insulted.

You can't make a claim and not back it up.

[papau]

20. So Maurice Bishop was not a CIA officer seen with Oswald and who took

power via a coup by his part against the previous government (his being not elected is in the history books) - and was killed because he could not be trusted - if under arrest and tortured - to not reveal GOP connections to the murder of JFK? (this idea is out there but it does seem nuts - Reagan needed a simple wag-the dog - and Bishop's problems were made for that moment - but the 1976 (CIA/JFK) testimony is confusing to me)

But Thank God/Reagan, we stopped that Pro-Soviet military coup IN Grenada.

And was Reagan involved in those ground to air missiles we sent Afghanistan, and our gift to Iraq of the chemical poison weapons (WMD), along with the special helicopters to distribute the chemical weapons over a village.

Granted the people on the Democracy Now site say what they (the folks on the left) want to have said, but is what they say wrong - a lie - or is it given a Fox like spin, leaving out extremely important contrary facts?

[papau]

21. So Maurice Bishop was not a CIA officer seen with Oswald and who took

power via a coup by his part against the previous government (his being not elected is in the history books) - and was killed because he could not be trusted - if under arrest and tortured - to not reveal GOP connections to the murder of JFK? (this idea is out there but it does seem nuts - Reagan needed a simple wag-the dog - and Bishop's problems were made for that moment - but the 1976 (CIA/JFK) testimony is confusing to me)

But Thank God/Reagan, we stopped that Pro-Soviet military coup IN Grenada.

And was Reagan involved in those ground to air missiles we sent Afghanistan, and our gift to Iraq of the chemical poison weapons (WMD), along with the special helicopters to distribute the chemical weapons over a village.

Granted the people on the Democracy Now site say what they (the folks on the left) want to have said, but is what they say wrong - a lie - or is it given a Fox like spin, leaving out extremely important contrary facts?

[H2O Man]

107. Maurice Bishop from Grenada

was, of course, distinct from the CIA asset who worked with Oswald.

[Zuni]

4. I don't think the number was that high

and I never said civilians weren't killed. I think the number was around 200, officially.

I have never seen an honest account of the Panama war and what led up to it in any left wing source. They lie by omission.

[DenverDem]

13. ONE is TOO MANY.

And just what did lead up to it, MR. HONESTY?

What role did the COCAINE TRADE and the CIA play in it?

How much atrocity is too much atrocity for you?

Your lies of omission are rather gargantuan here.

[Zuni]

25. That is fine

The CIA did help run drugs for Noriega. George Bush was tied to Noriega extensively.

And I am not supporting the invasion, just giving omitted facts.

[DenverDem]

27. So where is the HONEST account of the Panama atrocity in

your sainted wrong wing media.

[Zuni]

29. in history books, not political diatribes

I like solid history, not biased political storytelling desaigned to give me one opinion or another.

[DenverDem]

31. Cite the book, then.

Who has honestly reported the cynical and strategic destruction of the Panama City slums and who gives an accurate civillian casualty count? (200, my ass!)

[Zuni]

33. ok, your ass

I am at work right now. I have shelves of book on military history at home. I can look it up later. I am working from memory.

I think 200 is less ridiculous than 'many thousands'. People like Chomsky and Ramsey Clark say thousands, but I have seen no solid evidence. The bombing wasn't that intensive. It was mostly a quick ground operation, against the Dignity battalions that were in Panama City.
Why would the US Air force try to deliberatly kill all those people

[DenverDem]

44. OK, here's why.

The presidential palace was surrounded by shanty town slums, affording many escape routes out of the palace.

To deny Noriega this strategic advantage, the slums were fire bombed and burned to the ground before our heroic troops stormed the palace. Ten thousand people were left homeless and thousands were burned alive and buried in their shacks.

It was a strategic move by the US Air Force and just "acceptable collateral damage," no different from our strategy throughout Iraq.

If you are using revisionist military history books as your source material then you are no more rooted in "honest history" than those you savage with your wrong wing apologism.

[Zuni]

51. I still do not think thousands were killed

the air operations were not not that intensive. It was no where near the intensive bombing that Iraq had during the Gulf War.

I think I may have gotten numbers from David Halbertams 'War In a Time of Peace', but I would have to check on that later.

The story of firebombing indiscriminantly is most likely highly untrue, and I see no reason to believe it. I think it was put out by the same people I am decrying here.

[DenverDem]

136. I'm not saying the bombing was indiscriminant

it was completely strategic, but the "collateral damage" far exceeded the "official" estimates, as one would logically expect.

Of course you don't believe the people you are decrying, but just because you choose to disbelieve them and choose to believe revisionists and apologists, that doesn't PROVE that the atrocities didn't happen.

[Postman]

111. but all of history is biased storytelling, it can't be avoided.

you must be naive to think there is unbiased history.

The winners write the history books.

[Postman]

110. Lie by omission? Have you seen "The Panama Deception"?

Democracy Now has more integrity than all the corporate news sources put together.

I've yet to see a story from Democarcy Now that hasn't beaten the mainstream to the punch by at least 6 months or more. And of course there are stories Democracy Now reports that the mainstream will never touch.

[denverbill]

2. Are you saying that Anastasia Somoza was democratically elected?

Or that because the Sandanistas deposed him in a coup, that they were somehow illegitimate, while he was a elected leader? What's your point?

[Zuni]

5. Somoza was never elected

and he was a dictator.

I have never seen an honest account of the Sandanistas in a left wing source.

[denverbill]

8. So then what the hell is your point about Nicaragua?

The Sandanistas desposed a dictator. We illegally mined their harbor even though we were not at war with them, and funded a covert, terrorist war against them because they were communists. The communists then held election and lost in the elections.

[Zuni]

15. I have heard so many lies about the Sandanistas and the Contras

and about virtually everything that went on in Central America.

I cannot stand to see people make their points with deliberate misinformation. If you disagree with the Contras, fine.
Reagan's policy was shortsighted.
But I am sick to death of the Castro, Sandanista worship and the uncritical support of the commie line wherever it pertains to central America.

[denverbill]

36. OK, it's becoming obvious that you have no clue what you're talking about.

You accuse me of 'uncritical support of the commie line', when I haven't even offered ANY support for the commie line.

You claim Noreiga wasn't installed by the US, even though he was on the CIA payroll.

It's painfully obvious to me that you are attempting to debate this stuff without having a clue what you are talking about. Go read some books about the right-wing death squads, the murderers of priests and nuns, who you apparently support. Take a trip to Columbia.

[Zuni]

39. It is apparent that you are just trying to smear me

I never said I supported death squads in El Salvador. I never made any excuses for them.
Your attempt to label me is lame and very FReeperish
I said Noriega worked with the CIA very clearly in another post. The CIA helped him run drugs---that is not in dispute.
He even had extensive ties to george bush Sr.

[denverbill]

43. Well, frankly, anyone stupid enough to post this in the lounge deserves it

And it is VERY ironic to be called freeperish by someone who not one post ago accused me of 'uncritical support for commies' and who accuses all of DU of and who accuses all left wing sources of lying about the Sandanistas.

Sorry about Reagan dude. You must be really hurting.

[Zuni]

53. once again

I can count on you for a smear. Thanks for debating my post.

I think if you are going to debate political policies, you should at least be honest about them.

I never said you have uncritical support for commies. I said you are using communist sources uncritically. My family came from the USSR, and I can tell you the truth was in very short supply.
A lot of what came out about the US was disseminated by the KGB and used uncritically by left wing authors. Read the Mitrokhin Archive. They planted their stories in even the most mainstream news organizations.
They even say that an unnanmed member of Jimmy carter's campaign staff was a KGB agent!

[denverbill]

86. The truth may have been in short supply in the USSR.

However, you seem to be under the impression that just because one source is left and one is right that the one on the left is automatically lying. Frankly, I flat out KNOW that's not true.

If you seriously are looking for a debate on this issue, then you are going to have to stick to specifics.

Let me give an example. Let's take Venezuala. I've never been there, nor, likely have you. We can only judge events there by what we read in various news sources or read in 'eyewitness' accounts. The right-wing media claims the Chavez is a ruthless left-wing communist dictator. The left-wing press claims he is the popularly elected champion of the poor. So how do you go about judging who is lying and who is telling the truth?

The best way I can do that is to use my common sense in determining who is lying. The right-wing media in Venezuala claims he is a dictator. However, one characteristic of a dictator would certainly be ruthless repression of any opposition. And in the case of Venezuala, 90% of the media is owned by wealthy aristocrats opposed to Chavez. They operate freely and openly, even to the point of running 24-hour a day programs decrying Chavez and railing against him. Now, what kind of dictator allows his opposition to attempts to destabilize his regime 24 hours a day? Surely, any dictator I've ever heard of would have immediately closed all media, jailed the owners, and probably killed them off and confiscated their assets.

So that tells me that if Chavez is a dictator, he's a pretty darned mild one. And that tells me that the right-wing media is at minimum overstating their case against Chavez, if not out-right lying.

Now, short of actually flying to every country to inspect events first hand, that's the only way I can determine truth from fiction. However, even if I had travelled there, and KNEW truth from fiction, I would probably be called a left-wing dupe by some.

BTW, do you find it at all suspicious, that 24 years after Carter left office, someone who 'claims' to know still refuses to actually name the KGB spy? Surely, if he WAS a KGB spy, he still deserves punishment, so why not name him?

[Zuni]

93. The spy is listed in KGB documents smuggled out of the USSR

he is not named.
He is listed only by a code name, and apparently he was in on some policy talks during Carter's presidential campaign in 1976. He had a meeting with carter in california Hotel several times in 1976. That is all I know.

[salin]

52. No Sandista worship... but you realize that Reagan's policy

defied congressional LAW, right? That congress barred intervention in the conflict in Nicaragua (on either side).

Our continued involvement - extralegal - continued brutal bloodshed and fighting... many deaths. And while we opposed this government due to antidemocracy reasons... we were bolstering a rightwing dictatorship (re: antidemocracy) in El Salvador which used paramilitary deathsquads in a reign of terror to control the public.

In each case - our interventions made really bad situations, much worse and bigger humanitarian crises.

Gee, I can think all of that without falling into Contra worship.

As much as you dislike what you call "commie worship" (even when there is none.)... Many others decry the bullshit behind the policies that support brutal anti-democratic regimes (funding, etc.), while perpetuating war against other brutal anti-democratic regimes. The whole hypocritical policies in the eighties led to thousands of deaths - and were pointless. They weren't about supporting freedom and democracy (or we wouldn't have been supporting rightwing dictatorships).

They were about a fear of the Soviets (which were known to be teetering on bankruptcy), somehow lodging a war directly against the US. Arguments that had NO sound reality behind them. It simply was never feasible. And our interventions made things that were bad, much worse.

[Zuni]

54. I am not arguing

at least you are basing your opinions on things that actually happened.

I am not defending Reagan. But if you do criticize him, do so on how the events really happened.

[salin]

60. I try to. But please

don't lump all who criticize Reagan's central american policies into a caricature of a one-dimensional vilified commie loving america hating image. We get enough of that every day on talk radio. Simplifying and twisting arguments into something comical to be dismissed. There were many reasons to be opposed to those policies. They were costly, they were based on foolish presumptions, they were hypocritical, and our participation inflamed incendiary situations into prolonged, heightened periods of violence.

[Zuni]

62. I did not try to do that---if you got that impression, I apologize

If I sounded like that, that is my bad.
I did not mean to lump that together---I disagree with most of Reagan's policies, period.
I hate RW talk radio and the constant smear jobs they do on responsible liberals.

I was merely complaining about the way that left wing authors and critics leave out details that are crucial to underfstanding the conflicts, and make the account very biased. I want accuracy and honest debate, not debate based on mispreceptions and partial accounts.

[salin]

66. I bet that you would have had a much less

combative thread - with some actual discussions - if you had started it out in the tone of this post.

[denverbill]

96. Yes, he would have.n/t

[Lydia Leftcoast]

75. "Commie"?

What is this, a Barry Goldwater speech?

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

139. Please don't put the Sandinista and Castro in the same sentence.

The Sandinista held free elections TWICE, DURING the shitstorm the USA government brought upon them and their country. Allowed opposition, won the first time, lost the second, left power like democratic rulers do.

Oh, and then ran again later, missing victory by THIS (holds thumb and index close to each other).

Yea, such Commie dictatorship.

[WilliamPitt]

26. Is it also a lie that thousands of people died?

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/08/1453219

Tuesday, June 8th, 2004
"Reagan Was the Butcher of My People:"
Fr. Miguel D'Escoto Speaks From Nicaragua

We go to Managua, Nicaragua to speak with Fr. Miguel D'Escoto, a Catholic priest who was Nicaragua's Foreign Minister under the Sandinista government in the 1980s. The 8 years Reagan was in office represented one of the most bloody eras in the history of the Western hemisphere, as Washington funneled money, weapons and other supplies to right wing death squads. And the death toll was staggering - more than 70,000 political killings in El Salvador, more than 100,000 in Guatemala, 30,000 killed in the contra war in Nicaragua. In Washington, the forces carrying out the violence were called "freedom fighters." This is how Ronald Reagan described the Contras in Nicaragua: "They are our brothers, these freedom fighters and we owe them our help. They are the moral equal of our founding fathers."

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

FATHER MIGUEL D'ESCOTO: First of all, let me start out by saying that, of course, Reagan is now dead. And I, for one, would like to say only nice things about him. I'm not insensitive to the feelings of many U.S. people mourning president Reagan, but as I pray that god in his infinite mercy and goodness forgive him for having been the butcher of my people, for having been responsible for the deaths of some 50,000 Nicaraguans, we cannot, we should not ever forget the crimes he committed in the name of what he falsely labeled freedom and democracy.

...more...

Is Father D'Escoto lying?

[Zuni]

30. People did die

But I would hardly use a Sandanista minister to give me an unbiased account.
They have blood on their hands too.

I am sick of reading reports that unconditionally take the Sandanista version of events---it is a plague here at DU

[playahata1]

67. What do the Sandinistas have to do with Soviet-style Communism?

How Communism (to be more accurate, in this case, Socialism) is/was practiced varied and varies from country to country.

Furthermore, if someone finds truth in the Sandinista version, for them it's truth.

[LittleApple81]

64. ANASTASIO with an "O" . Anastasia would be female. n/t

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

70. Not too many people know this. But on weekends he was known as Anastasia.

;-)

[ALago1]

6. Grenada was misplaced aggression

After 240 marines were slayed by bombings in Beirut, Reagan could have showed some tenacity and retaliated for such an attack.

Instead he attacked Grenada two days later, a true moral relativist example of wagging the dog.

[Zuni]

10. legitimate critiscm

and the fact that he intervened the day after Lebanon are not what I am talking about.
I am talking about deliberatly shading the facts to suit a neo-communist political agenda.
Democracy Now did it today, I have heard.

[ALago1]

18. I'm not going to claim I have substantial knowledge of this conflict

I was 1 year old in 1983, but here is what I've garnerned in retrospect.

Yes, the Marxist gov't did gain power in a bloody coup but I don't know conclusively if said gov't represented the will of the people. The leftist sources I read (ala Chomsky, etc.) conclude that they did, so one can reasonably conclude that U.S. intervention desposed of a democratically supported gov't, which I would claim to be wrong to do.

I also think it's wrong to support coups when they are in U.S. interests and denounce them when they are against our interests. It's such relativistic thinking that comes back to bite us in the ass years later (i.e. Osame bin Laden & Saddam).

[Zuni]

12. I agree 100%

Grenada was partly to cover up for his mistake in Lebanon 2 days before..
That is honest critiscm, not distorting the facts

[lanparty]

115. Wag the Dog????

Reagan did it well.

[davidinalameda]

7. so one good coup deserves another?

it was an internal matter--something we shouldn't have been sticking our noses in

Reagan used the 1000 or however many American med students there were as the premise to invade a soverign country--sound familar?

[Zuni]

11. I am not complaining about honest critiscm

I am complaining about deliberate misinformation from popular left wing sources.

[DenverDem]

17. So deliberate misinformation from wrong wing mass media is OK with you?

The Truth, unfortunately, is pretty subjective these days.

[Zuni]

23. I never excused any media misinfo

and I criticize RW media all the damn time

[papau]

24. What was the dis-information?

:-)

[northzax]

14. surely, some people were terrified

my grandparents (americans) lived in Grenada at the time, and had no fear of the new government. don't use that as an excuse. oh, and they were free to leave, many of their friends did so.

[Zuni]

16. There was a 24 hour curfew

how were they free to leave?

[Zuni]

19. The new government only lasted a few days

and the whole time they had a 24 hour curfew.
I do not know the status of stay/leave policy of the government, but they were only in power for a few days.
I have no idea on any offers they might have made to foreigners living there about leaving.
I do know the students at St. Georges were held under 24 hour, shoot on sight curfew.

[drdtroit]

32. Who told you this???

"I do know the students at St. Georges were held under 24 hour, shoot on sight curfew."

[WilliamPitt]

22. "They do the same thing with Nicaragua, Panama and many other things."

Care to substantiate that?

[Zuni]

28. I have seen many sources omit much information on both

and take the communist line on virtually everything that happened.

For example--On Panama, I have never seen a left wing source (I am talking a real lefty source, like Parenti who omits virtually everything) state that Noriega overturned the election after he lost and sent his 'Dignity Battalions' on a killing spree, even attacking US forces in the Canal Zone. But they all mention the CIA's contacts (by now long severed) with Noriega and George Bush's dealings with him.

I am not supporting the invasion, just stating facts.
If when the major media and RW media distort and omit it is wrong, then why is it ok for left wing sources to do so?

[blindpig]

88. If our invasion of Panama was such a good thing

why do so many Panamanians hate us? I encountered more anamosity there than in 6 other Neotropical countries that I've visited in the past decade. Just wondering.

[lanparty]

116. Deposed Ali Babba ...

The let loose the Forty Thieves!!!!!

The election was rigged. Noriega was screwed in the same fashion as Saddam Hussein. He got independent minded and forgot who his real master was.

[HuckleB]

34. Perhaps it's the natural reaction to RW sources doing the same thing?

Not that this is an excuse, mind you. Just saying.

History forgets that Bishop came to Reagan asking for help after his election, but he was summarily refused. So he went to Cuba/Russia for assistance. In other words, it was Reagan's policy mistake that led to the whole deal in the first place. Why is that never mentioned? Nevermind the timing of the whole invasion. Shall we go into that? If it wasn't for the Marine barracks bombing, would we have done anything at all?

[Zuni]

37. I hate RW distortions too---I cringe at Sean hannity's version too

If I was on FR, I would take issue with their versions too.

The timing of the invasion, 2 days after Lebanon is very shady.

I have no disagreements with anything you say.
Believe me, I cringe when I hear Sean Hannity talking like Reagan was a Saint who did everything right.

[HuckleB]

55. OK. So outside of ignoring the ten-day-old coup...

what else does "the left" blatantly lie about Grenada?

Yes, I think it's stupid not to report the reality, but if we're going to talk about "always blatantly lying," I hope the lies are a bit bigger than that, not to mention more pervasive among the so-called "left."

[Zuni]

59. I am talking about every left source I have read lately

the left I refer to is not a standard liberal press or an objective article in a mainstream paper, but the Michael parenti kind of neo-communist stuff that I run into way too much.
I have never seen one honest account of Grenada, Panama or Nicaragua from this crowd. I was writing in response to Democracy Now, who had a former Grenadian minister and a former Sandanista minister on today.

It would be like uncritically accepting Ed Meese's version of events.

[ieoeja]

90. I think you answered your own question.

"the left I refer to is not a standard liberal press or an objective article in a mainstream paper, but the Michael parenti kind of neo-communist"


Could it be that your sources toe the communist line because you're reading communist sources? You sound somewhat like David Brock who, having discovered his socialist friends were really pushing for Soviet style communism, became a radical rightwing columnist decrying the evil Democratic party. Were Brock's former friends Democrats? Why, no, they hated the Democratic party. So why was Brock attacking Democrats for things done and said by Communists? That would be like me attacking Republicans because of things said by members of the White Power Party.


This is where Hannity's and Rush's description of liberals raise my ire. They're always talking about what liberals say and leftists want, but for some interesting reason they never give any actual quotes. So their listeners go out and have conversations like:

"I heard some liberals talking about how good the Sandinistas were and how horrible the United States is."

"The Democrats said that?"


If Hannity and Rush ever provided actual quotes and cited sources their listeners conversations would go more like:

"I heard Michael Parenti talking about how good the Sandinistas were and how horrible the United States is."

"Who?"

"Michael Parenti. He's a well-known liberal activist."

"Where's he from? Is he in congress?"

"He's not an office holder. He's a famous writer."

"Well, if he's so famous, how come I never heard the f--- of him before?"

[PATRICK]

35. I thought it was only the typical

three corner Latin America Doctrine shot. A leader not totally a puppet loses favor with US. Goes elsewhere(Cuba, lefties) for protection. Which offers an excuse to take down the whole country.

Venezuela, Haiti(we are beyond needing Castro as a dupe thanks to Bush).
The old populist catch-22. Side with the masses of poor and you lose the patronage of the rich and the US. Easy then to become an outright enemy as you struggle to survive. Big Boss Us moves in to restore order and a new cycle of patronage problems.

Specifically Grenada was not just a concern of the "lefty" media. We left the leader of Grenada who had gone already to the Cubans to stew in his own juices and the horribly misguided Cuban foreign policy(hey, if not aggressive you are just waiting to be attacked) walked rather weakly into a trap probably no president could resist springing, but maybe without all the bloated fanfare and medals. Like Aristide, we wanted that guy out and teach Cuba(and Latin America) another lesson

Discussions fighting over the details of the war and the PR exploitation ignores the underlying exercise of US policy.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

38. Thanks for that Utterly Uninformed Opinion

Nobody ever said that Reagan deposed a democratically elected regime (not in Grenada, anyway), so that much of your post is pretty much a sophomore debating class strawman that we can dispense with from the beginning.

As to the students being held in "lockdown," the new Grenedan government offered to allow all U.S. citizens to leave the island, and the day before the invasion, four flights left from country. A few passengers were medical students, but the rest remained because they didn't see any danger.

The government locked down the medical school campus after the U.S. invasion began, and it was done to protect the safety of the students, not to hold them hostage. Many who came back (including the one who famously kissed the tarmac upon arrival) were indeed terrified because U.S. helicopter gunships had been swooping over the campus and spraying 50 cal. rounds at anything that moved.

For more: Killing Hope

I'm sure that your opinions on Nicaragua and Panama are similarly devoid of facts.

[Zuni]

40. Thanks for giving me an utterly biased source

That book sounds like Ramsey Clark. I would take it with a grain of salt.

I read more than the usual left wing circle jerks.
The curfew started several days before the invasion.

I have no idea what the Grenadian offers to US citizens were, but Hunter S. Thompson's account shortly after the invasion suggests that they were held there and the Grenadian military were holding hostages.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

50. LOL!

Hunter S. Thompson is, as always, a source of strictly objective journalism! The book cites U.S. and foreign diplomatic sources in the U.S. and the Caribbean, but you're taking the word of a gonzo journalist who was on his ranch in Colorado at the time.

Can I have some of what you're smoking?

[Zuni]

68. I mentioned him because I remmebred his articles FROM Grenada

right after the invasion.
I did not use him as a primary source. I am working from memory at work right now.
I happened to remember he wrote a bunch of articles for magazines back home from Grenada right after the short battle.
I find Thompson to be as good a bullshit detector as any in his serious reporting, even if he is f-ed up on God knows what pill.
Not all of his stuff is 'Gonzo' journalism like fear and Loathing. He actually is a serious reporter, sometimes.

[playahata1]

72. If you hate the left so much, then why are you posting here?

Not that DU is a far-left site, but understand that we take RW sources with a grain of salt.

[northzax]

41. and the bullet holes coming through my grandparents' roof

must have been made by the Grenadine air force, right?

[Zuni]

42. no

probably from a US air force chopper

[northzax]

47. righto

but it was supposed to be the locals they were terrified of?

[DinahMoeHum]

45. As I understand it, Maurice Bishop WAS democratically elected

and he headed a political movement called New Jewel, which had Marxist tendencies.

Grenada was considered a thorn in the side of Reagan's government, particularly among neocons.

Unfortunately, his colleagues Hudson Austin and Bernard Coard were asshole enough to be impatient with Bishop and his political/economic programs, and deposed him. They provided the perfect pretext for US intervention with their 24-hour lockdown and possible threat to US students there. The Grenadians weren't cheering US troops out of any love for Reagan or capitalism - they were cheering because they deposed the murderers of Maurice Bishop, who was very popular among them. They even had a slogan - "No Bish - No Revo!"

I also understand that there was a plethora of screw-ups regarding military tactics and communications. And that even after all that, there were more medals given out than there were soldiers out there - practically handing them out like supermarket flyers.


:evilfrown:

[Zuni]

48. I agree with everything in this post

That is what i was trying to say

[papau]

58. Maurice Bishop WAS democratically elected - eventually!

But to use Hunter Thompson- the non drug free freelance journalist and his memory as recounted in his book Kingdom of Fear of a post invasion trip to Grenada, to claim that it is a fact that the college kids were in danger via a pre-invasion lock down directed toward them is a bit much - especially when the freelance journalist says he presents a "warped" view of the facts.

However I did like his comment that the Grenada invasion was "low-risk, high-gain, cost-plus.

By the way, The town was "locked down with a curfew" one day pre-war, but it was not directed at the college students. Phone interviews at the time had the kids saying there was no problem - but what would they know?

:-)

peace

[Zuni]

65. I just remembered his not so sober account while I was typing

I am not basing the posts on Hunter S. Thompson. I just remembered reading articles he wrote from Grenada.
Even though Thompson is frequently very intoxicated, I have found him to be a very good bullshit detector in his serious reporting.

[papau]

87. I like Thompson - and I agree he tends to see through the BS

But the Grenada invasion had "no save the medical students", or even "stop the 30 Cubans with the equivalent of AK-47's that were at the site of the to be built airport" reason to it. And a killing of a marxist like Bishop by other Marxists does not seem a reason to invade.

I am getting old - I can't remember if any died when we bombed the mental hospital - I only recall that at the time I related the bombing to Reagan's previous actions against the mentally ill in Cal as Gov, and then again in Aug 81 when he ended federal funding of the Carter Mental health bill - meaning he ended all federal federal funding for mental health.

sigh - I am just hanging on to the fact that Warren Harding was the most beloved President for almost all Americans when he died per the media of the time - and now he isn't!

I also can't remember which travel agency gave the Pentagon the Grenada maps for the invasion (because the Pentagon had none!)- which seemed to prove at the time that there was no worry about or planning about Grenada amoung our policy makers.

[Zuni]

92. I have no arguments with anything you are saying

I am just challenging the orthodox opinions floating around here.

[lanparty]

120. If Reagan wanted to stop Cubans with AK-47s

He should have invaded Miami!!!!!

[papau]

137. LOL - thanks for the smile!

:-)

[DenverDem]

46. WHY DOES THE RIGHT ALWAYS BLATANTLY LIE ABOUT EVERYTHING?

Explain that away.

[Zuni]

49. I never said they did not

I just finished reading 'Blinded by the Right' andf it is chock full of examples.

[redqueen]

56. Maybe because

journalists on the 'left' aren't 100% responsible. Just like the ones on the right.

Or maybe it's intentional - maybe as the right does, they figure in order to get results they need to stoke the fires of outrage.


On another note, maybe if you chose to make your point in a less accusatory manner, you would have a more constructive convo here.

[Zuni]

63. I think you hit the nail right on the head

If I was a conservative, I would take issue with glowing, saintly accounts of everything Reagan did, that leave out all of the black marks on his record.

[redqueen]

69. To be fair, I think you have a good point

and people would be wise to listen. How you are perceived goes a long way toward affecting the results of your actions.

It seems many present a one-sided view of events - who knows why - but it seems to be considered acceptable, as if the goal is simply preaching to the choir, who will be less skeptical of the information.

But IMO there's a danger there, because what's important is reaching those that have been disinformed. And providing more (even slight) disinformation doesn't seem to be the best way to go about it. Just makes people more cynical if you ask me, which never helps.

[Zuni]

71. Thank you

n/t

[bobbyboucher]

79. You two should start a mutual naivete society.

You mean to tell me the left has a better disinformation and propaganda operation than the right?

Quick, what color is the sky?

[redqueen]

80. Nice straw man

Please point out where ANYONE said the left's disinfo was 'better' than the right?

Less kneejerking, please.

:eyes:


on edit: FWIW, I'd like to just state right here and now that I find a lot of what Zuni has posted to have been short of factual information. I can understand that. I know many people who still believe that objective history books are less rare than they really are. But posts that are designed to inform or persuade are far more effective than posts that ridicule.

[Zuni]

99. did I ever say that

a left winger is just as capable of lying in print as a right winger.
No one in the US has a better disinfo campaign than the Republicans, but few can match Mao's or Stalin's either.

[buddhamama]

89. Or maybe is it because he assumed

He didn't even listen to show or read the transcript from it, so he couldn't possibly Know for a Fact whether or not anyone, let alone anyone from the left, "misrepresented" the facts.

Zuni has misrepresented himself.

[durutti]

150. As a general rule of thumb...

I agree, but I tend to think the Left does it much less than the Right, simply because the Left can less afford to do so. The Left doesn't have nearly the amount of money, the think tanks, the media, etc. If the Left had as much power behind it as the Right, it would lie more -- because it could get away with it. As it is, though, the real or imagined deceptions of Leftists (those that even appear on the media radar) are quickly exposed.

I've also arrived at this view from experience, as it's my personal policy to try to see an issue from every angle before reaching a conclusion. With the Left, deception happens occasionally. With the Right, it's constant.

[Alpharetta]

57. link? Democracy Now does not lie

I watched yesterday and they made it clear Bishop was dead before the invasion.

They made it clear the students walked freely after the coup and before the election.

They made it clear a small contingent of students expressed gratitude for being rescued and even went so far as to kiss U.S. soil upon his return.

They also made it clear the U.S. had been accusing Bishop of being too close to Cuba.

I don't see any inaccuracies in their reporting. PLease show me.

[Zuni]

61. I posted this because

someone else posted DN's lineup, with a former Grenadian minister and a former Sandanista. From the way it was presented on paper, it looked like it would be the left wing equivalent of a Rush limbaugh smear job on the Clintons.

I did not hear the broadcast, but I assumed it would be similar to the articles I keep reading all over the internet that leave out crucial facts.

[Junkdrawer]

81. I happened to have heard the show and you're all wet...

The former Grenadian minister was VERY CLEAR that there was NO EVIDENCE that US had anything to do with the coup.

[Zuni]

101. No, the Coup came from the Grenadian military

the US invaded after the coup

[Junkdrawer]

114. Do you suppose the words "I was wrong" apply here ? n/t

[pschoeb]

82. So you smear Democracy Now because of your concern

with it possibly smearing? but you didn't bother to find out if it did

in your original post you clearly claimed thet

"I have seen so many sources, including today's Democracy Now! try to peddle this blatant untruth"

that clearly implied you actually listened to the show, but in reality you didn't. Since it was the only source you gave for this kind of "blatant untruth" it seems like a pointless strawman smear of the ambigous group "the left".

Patrick Schoeb

[Zuni]

100. I smeared Democracy Now for the hell of it

Amy Goodman annoys me

[Junkdrawer]

112. So it would seem... n/t

[Forkboy]

121. ahhhh

Another DUer to never take seriously.

[tkmorris]

125. So, let's get this straight

You smear Democracy Now! and Amy Goodman with what you now admit was a false accusation because "Amy Goodman annoys me".

But the entire point of this thread you started was to decry the innaccuracies in the arguments of Leftists. You are upset because too many people here use false arguments to support their point of view.

Looks like we're having irony for dinner.

[buddhamama]

85. i heard the show as well and you are wrong in your assumptions

And, why is it that you always represent your Opinions as facts and, never cite sources? IF you care at all for intellectual honesty, you would.

To avoid further embarrassment i suggest you go to the damn website and read the transcripts. Transcripts are available for the entire week's broadcasts.

[Zuni]

98. I am at work

I work, 9-5, for a living. Sorry if I don't have piles of documents at hand. Luckily I finished most of my work early today. That is why I got into this argument in the first place.

[bobbyboucher]

73. Have you seen "The Panama Deception"?

I suppose that is all bullshit too. It put the number of civilians killed in the barrio at 3000. Not to mention the time that the survivors were detained in camps and mass graves. Please document your objections to what that documentary suggests.

[Zuni]

94. I think Ramsey Clark made that film

or was involved in it. I do not trust any thing that man goes near. He is about as intellectually honest as Richard nixon.

[bobbyboucher]

102. As usual, loaded for bear with.....

NO documentation.

did you see it?

Produced by Barbara Trent, Joanne Doroshow, Nico Panigutti and David Kasper; directed by Barbara Trent; written and edited by David Kasper; cinematography by Michael Dobo and Masnuel Becker; narration by Elizabeth Montgomery; music by Chuck Wild. Distributed by Tara Releasing, 124 Belvedere St., San Rafael, CA 94901, phone [phone] and The Video Project, 5332 College Ave., Oakland, CA 94618, phone 1 (800) 4-PLANET. For further information, contact The Empowerment Project, 1653 18th St., Santa Monica, CA 90404, phone [phone].

http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/CineastePanamaDeception.html

[Zuni]

104. no, but if Clark worked on it

then I know it is intellectually dishonest. This is a guy who has done propaganda and legal work for Milosevic and Saddam Hussein, just to name a few.
Did you ever see the Clinton Chronicles, put out by Jerry Falwell? Well would you trust Jerry Falwell as a source for accurate documentation on Bill Clinton? Neither would I. And I wouldn't trust Ramsey Clark for an honest report about any American military action. He is the Jerry Falwell of the left.

[bobbyboucher]

105. Clark name isn't anywhere to be found.

What's your next excuse, he was behind the scenes?

You got no cred.

[Zuni]

122. I've got no cred

I am sorry I have no 'street cred' with you, holmes.

Actually, I am getting off work soon, and I am going to meet a girl downtown. She is pretty attractive. Have fun on the internet, "Bobby".

[Forkboy]

135. The first honest thing you've posted

"I've got no cred"

[Sterling]

154. Someone seems to have made a serious ass of themselves on this thread.

I’m getting of it before I allow this troll to waste anymore of my time with his hypocrisy, lies and inane straw man discussions..

[Lydia Leftcoast]

74. Here's what I heard from Canadian sources in 1983:

and a couple of years later from a sociologist at the university where I was teaching who had relatives there.
(I was 33 years old and following the story on Minnesota Public Radio's broadcasts of the Canadian national news program As It Happens.)

Maurice Bishop and co. came to power in a coup against a president who was clearly mentally unbalanced. (At the time the coup occurred, the former president was at the UN General Assembly giving an incoherent speech about space aliens.)

Bishop wanted to develop the island economically. For example, he thought it was ridiculous that Grenada should have to pay inflated prices for imported orange juice and orange marmelade when it grew oranges, so he set up co-ops to process the local orange crop into products for local consumption. Grenada also grew spices--and had to import processed spices from the U.S., so there were plans for a domestic spice processing plant as well.

Bishop also saw a crime problem with unemployed youth, so he set up youth centers where young people could hang out in a non-criminal atmosphere.

He wanted to promote tourism, so he asked for help in building a new airport. Reagan refused, so he turned to Cuba for help. Cuba sent 500 civil engineers and construction workers.

Whatever Cuba's motives were, Reagan immediately went into propaganda overdrive and accused Grenada of planning to host Cuban military bases. Why did such a small island need a 10,000 foot runway? (He conveniently ignored the fact that you need a 10,000 foot runway to land jumbo jets and that other, similarly-sized islands already had such airports.)

Night after night, we saw genial old Uncle Ronnie telling us with weepy concern in his voice what a threat this 30 by 40 mile island was to the security of the U.S. and the entire Caribbean region. He acted as if the airport was a secret, underhanded project, when in fact, it was being constructed in a conspicuous place, and the American medical students even went to sun themselves and swim off the portion of the partly constructed runway that projected out into the sea.

Bishop was overthrown and killed by members of his own party who thought he was "soft on America," because he tried to placate Reagan.

While NPR moaned and groaned about not being able to find out what was going on in Grenada, the Canadian anchors simply picked up the phone and called St. George's Medical School in Grenada (the Caribbean islands are on the same phone and area code system as the U.S. and Canada).

The president of the medical school told the Canadians that the coup leader had contacted him personally, saying that he meant no harm to the students, that he wanted them to stay, and that if any caused any trouble, the president was supposed to call a certain phone number. They also called the British consul (?--some British official, anyway), who assured them that the situation was calm and that ordinary residents were in no danger.

That was when the U.S. invaded. Again, NPR and other U.S. news orgs. fretted about not having any information, but the Canadians once again picked up the phone. Now things WERE dangerous on the island, because the U.S. forces had hit the ground shooting. The people at the medical school were saying that they were in no danger UNTIL the U.S. forces arrived, but now they were scared and were lying low to avoid getting inadvertently caught up in the fighting.

However, you'll remember the picture of the student kissing the ground after arriving in the U.S. I suppose after a plane ride in a military transport, at least one student could be persuaded to ham it up by kissing the ground for the cameras.

You will also remember the pictures in news magazines of fences and buildings daubed with white-painted slogans such as "Thank you, President Reagan!" and "God Bless America!"

On his next visit, my acquaintance who had relatives in Grenada asked them who had painted the slogans. They did not know: the slogans had just appeared one morning. Finally, he found a man who had gotten up in the middle of the night to pee; he reported seeing some white guys emerge from a panel truck, paint the slogans, and drive off.

(Interestingly, the same white-painted slogans--in English-- appeared after the Panama invasion, only this time they were "God Bless America" and "Thank you, President Bush.")

The man with Grenada connections also reported that the U.S. forces had shut down the orange processing and spice processing plants (can't have anyone competing with U.S. goods, you know) and closed the youth centers, on the excuse that they were for "Communist indoctrination."

Oh, and the runway that was supposedly the cause of all the trouble? U.S. companies finished it, U.S. companies went in and opened hotels, and fenced off beaches that had always been open to the public.

So I don't know what your point is, Zuni, but if there's anything the Reagan era taught me, it's not to believe ANYTHING that either the U.S. government or the U.S. news media tell me without corroboration from foreign sources. I should think that would be elementary DU wisdom by now.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

77. You see, now this is why I love this site. n/t

[bobbyboucher]

78. Thanks Lydia,

Zuni is conspicuously absent from replying to yours and my posts, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. Reagan's funeral is going on and all the indoctrinated are programmed to drop everything and fall on their knees and pray to the god of television for the gift of being able to see their savior's funeral live.

Praise Reagan! Praise Reagan! Praise Reagan! MMMMMMMMMMMMM. Praise Reagan! Praise Reagan! MMMMMMMMMMM. Praise Reagan! Praise Reagan! MMMMMMMMMM.

Thank God Almighty that Reagan had the moral clarity to invade Grenada. He is such a great, great man. Did I mention that he had a great sense of humor and was plain spoken and was very, very optimistic?

[Zuni]

91. what is this crap

I hadn't seen this yet.

Just call me a Reagan fanatic. That is good.

[bobbyboucher]

103. You're a Reagan fanatic.

Good enough?

[Zuni]

129. and you love Dwight Eisenhower

I can say it all I want, but it doesn't mean anything, "Bobby".

[Judi Lynn]

84. Wonderful post, so well done.

We're lucky you showed up and threw this well-needed light on Grenada's experience with Reagan's strange foreign policy.

I'm going to read it again, and make a copy. Just excellent. Thanks.

[Zuni]

95. I can neither confirm nor deny anything that your friend says

I have no idea if Beaches were blocked off or not.
I have no idea if mysterious white people were setting up signs.
My post never denied that deception was not involved.

[greatauntoftriplets]

113. Great post, Lydia.

Ray-goon was paranoid about Grenada as a Cuban base and looked for any reason to invade.

I've been to Grenada twice (post-invasion) and the airport is one of the best in the Caribbean. The people there laugh about the invasion, but -- like "The Mouse That Roared" -- welcomed the foreign aid we ultimately dropped on them.

[Q]

76. It seems you started this whine fest...

...based on a thead I started: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x1768781

- And I noticed you still haven't answered any direct questions with anything other than opinion. May I suggest you do research at the following websites that use FOIA documentation from the administrations in question:

The National Security Archive

Federation of American Scientists

- These documents clearly show that YOU are wrong and use revisionism and disinformation as the basis for your arguments.

- You call others liars...but aren't prepared to back up your own claims. How shabby is that?

- And frankly...it's disgusting the way you've trashed Democracy Now without having actually WATCHED AND LISTENED to the programs in question. Did you at least read the transcripts? If so...how about quoting those you find less than credible?

[Junkdrawer]

83. See post #81 n/t

[Zuni]

97. F---- Democracy Now

Why do people get so mad when people challenge Amy Goodman? I am sorry i challenged your hero. Next time she calls those tree sitting weirdos, let me know. They are good for a laugh.
Goodman is about as unbiased as Limbaugh. Sorry, no sale.
Pacifica turned me off with the tribute to Fidel Castro they had on a year or two ago. Absolute revisionist history.

[bobbyboucher]

109. You got no cred, quit while you're behind.

Any doc for your prop yet?

[Zuni]

119. what does that mean?

I have no documentation. I am not at home. I have said it before, 'Bobby'.

I have no idea what you want me to document, either. Perhaps you should provide a list of sources everythime you complain.

[Q]

118. Tree sitting weirdos?

- Are you SURE you're on the right board? We're still WAITING for you to provide anything that backs up your OPINION.

- Clue: when you find yourself in a hole: stop digging.

[Zuni]

123. Actually I am finding this to be entertaining

Yes, I am a very partisan Democrat. I find George Bush and Dick Cheney, Rush limbaugh and Sean hannity, Trent Lott and Tom Delay all to be disgusting.

I still think people who live in trees for months to protest loggers (who they won't stop anyway) are a bit out there.
So do most people, even Democrats.

[Q]

128. Well...I'm finding this...

...to be a waste of time. You've offered NOTHING to support your claims. The best I can do is put you on ignore. You should be ashamed to call others liars and then refuse to support your own assertions. You could easily find a job in the Bush* WH.

[Zuni]

130. Ignore me, please

'Q'.
I am going home anyway.
Sorry if I pissed off the orthodox opinion here.
Maybe tommorrow i will post something mildly critical of Hugo Chavez. Then all the nuts will come out.

[resident bunnypants]

131. Please do. But next time try to use coherent arguments.

The nuts have already come out apparently. You've managed to produce a bunch of silly one liners and lame excuses. "I'm at work, I tell you I'm at work". That's not an excuse for making shit up.

[redqueen]

138. I don't think your comments pissed people off

Your consistent refusal to back up your comments, that's what did it.

And 'I'm at work' is no excuse. If you're goofing on DU, then you can do a search.

[tkmorris]

132. Revisionist history?

I don't think you'd know revisionist history if it bit you on the arse friend. A lot of people have posted factual accounts of events in Nicaragua and Grenada as well as a few other places and you have not refuted any of them. You have no facts of your own to support any of the things you say but seem to be having a ball tossing around accusations against others for being biased.

You think Amy Goodman lies? Fine. I'll listen to whatever you have to say and try to be objective. But you have to actually demonstrate your case, flinging around insults isn't the way to convince people.

[Postman]

133. Amy Goodman has more journalistic integrity than any mainstream source.

You obviously don't know a damn thing about the world to think THAT about Amy Goodman's reportage.

Democracy Now has more integrity than any corporate whore reporting service, which you seem to uphold in higher esteem.

Too bad you showed your dishonesty in posting how you listened to Democracy Now's reporting on the Grenada invasion and then later admit you didn't listen to it.

[Trajan]

108. BADDDDD left ....

Dont be such a bad left wing .... You STOP that ! ...

Er ... btw: WHO exactly is 'the left' ? ...

Does the ENTIRE 'left' feel exactly the same about this issue ? ..

Do you think you might be committing a hasty generalization fallacy ?

I think so ...

[buddhamama]

117. what i have learned from this thread

1) Zuni cited Democracy Now and accused the show of misrepresenting the facts, when he did not hear the show or read the transcript.

2) He claims to speak for the truth but does not provide sources.

3) He is intellectually dishonest. He attacks the left for subjective reporting of the facts, without acknowledging his own. He offers opinions as Facts.

4) Anyone who claims with such absolutism to "know" the truth should not be trusted.

[Zuni]

126. Well, I am at work

and I am unable to listen to Democracy Now at Work.
I never said I spoke the absolute truth. I never said that I knew everything. I do know some details that are always left out. And I knew when I saw their line up they were going to do one more hatchet job. They had a Sandanista on today.

I do not need to read the transcript to get a pretty good idea what a Sandanista and a New jewel minister are going to say. I do not need to watch Pat Robertson to get a good idea of how he feels about certain issues either.

I never claimed I know the truth. I am just sick of partisan hatchet jobs.

[buddhamama]

134. oh right-

"Because few know the actual details and they can get away with it."

meaning what...? You do. I stand behind my Opinion presented in the previous post.


and the work excuse is no excuse at all.

[JanMichael]

140. 50 posts from work in 5 hours? Bravo.

Quite the accomplishment:-)

[Name removed]

124. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Zuni]

127. I never said that was my solution

I just am sick of hatchet jobs

[struggle4progress]

141. Reagan lied about Grenada

The US Invasion of Grenada: A Twenty Year Retrospective
<snip>
The major justification for the invasion was the protection of American lives. Reagan administration officials falsely claimed that the island’s only operating airport was closed, offering the students no escape. In reality, scores of people left the island on charter flights the day before the U.S. invasion, noting that there was not even a visible military presence at the airport and that customs procedures were normal. Regularly scheduled flights as well as sea links from neighboring Caribbean islands had ceased as of October 21, however, though this came as a direct result of pressure placed on these governments to do so by U.S. officials. Apparently, by limiting the ability of Americans who wished to depart from leaving, the Reagan administration could then use their continued presence on the troubled island as an excuse to invade. The Reagan administration admitted that no significant non-military means of evacuating Americans was actively considered.
Particular concern was expressed over the fate of 800 American students at the U.S.-run St. George’s University School of Medicine. The safe arrival in the United States of the initial group of happy and relieved students evacuated from Grenada resulted in excellent photo opportunities for the administration. It appears, however, that the students’ lives were never actually in any danger prior to the invasion itself.
Grenadan and Cuban officials had met only days earlier with administrators of the American medical school and guaranteed the students’ safety. Urgent requests by the State Department’s Milan Bish to medical school officials that they publicly request U.S. military intervention to protect the students were refused. Five hundred parents of the medical students cabled President Reagan to insist he not take any “precipitous action.” Staff members from the U.S. embassy in Barbados visited Grenada and saw no need to evacuate the students.
The medical school’s chancellor, Charles Modica, polled students and found that 90% did not want to be evacuated. Despite repeated inquiries as to whether Washington was considering military action, he was told nothing of the sort was being considered. As the invasion commenced, Dr. Modica angrily denounced the invasion as totally unnecessary and a far greater risk to the students’ safety than Grenada’s domestic crisis. Vice-chancellor Geoffrey Bourne and Bursar Gary Solin also declared their steadfast opposition. The U.S. media focused great attention on the students who were first evacuated and “debriefed” by U.S. officials who generally supported the invasion. However, virtually no attention was given to those who stayed behind, who tended to be more familiar with the island and who largely opposed U.S. intervention. There were no confirmed reports of any American civilians harmed or threatened before or during the invasion. It was three days after U.S. troops initially landed before they decided to take control of the second medical school campus, raising questions as to whether the safety of Americans was really the foremost priority.
<snip>
http://www.globalpolicy.org/empire/history/2003/10grenada.htm

[struggle4progress]

142. Reagan pretended the Queen had requested intervention

Lying -- one of the few growth industries in Washington
<snip>
On 31 October, the London press reported that British Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe "was emphatic that there had been no request for intervention from Sir Paul Scoon". Prime Minister Thatcher unequivocally confirmed this. Scoon, said Sir Geoffrey, "had been seen by a British diplomat last Monday-the day before the invasion-and had not mentioned any such desire." The same day (another report places it on Sunday) Scoon spoke by phone to the Commonwealth Secretariat in London and to Buckingham Palace, but, again, made no mention of intervention.
<snip>
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/Grenada_KH.html

<snip>
The invasion did not receive the support of the British government, who were put out by the fact that the United States had neglected to inform them of their intentions, despite the fact that the Queen Elizabeth II was the head of state and the nominal "Queen of Grenada".
<snip>
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Invasion%20of%20Grenada

[struggle4progress]

143. Planning was inconsistent with Reagan's lies

White House Lies: A Brief History
<snip>
Ronald Reagan invaded Grenada because, he said, US students studying at a medical school there were in imminent danger from an anti-US leadership. Yet State Department personnel had been in close contact with the Grenadan leadership and knew the students were not at risk. When Norman Schwarzkopf's troops hit the beaches in Grenada, no one had told them the location of the students they were supposed to rescue, even though State Department personnel had been interviewing the students for several days, trying to convince them they needed to be saved.
When confronted by the press for not knowing where the students were located, Schwarzkopf called it an "intelligence failure." But it did not take much intelligence to know where the students were. The Pentagon could have asked their parents. The State Department in fact knew.
<snip>
http://hnn.us/articles/3432.html

[struggle4progress]

144. US pressured the Caribbean states

Lying -- one of the few growth industries in Washington
<snip>
One of the fundamental falsehoods concerning the invasion of Tuesday, 25 October 1983 was that the United States had been requested to intervene by an urgent plea on the 21st from the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), comprising six countries and joined in this instance Barbados and Jamaica. These countries purportedly feared some form of aggressive act from the new ultra-leftist regime in Grenada which had deposed socialist leader Maurice Bishop. Bishop had been expelled from the ruling party on 12 October, placed under house arrest the next day, and murdered on the 19th.
<snip>
As matters later transpired, Tom Adams, the Prime Minister of Barbados, stated that the United States had approached him on 15 October concerning a military intervention. (The State Department declined to comment when asked about Adams' statement.) Then "sources close to Jamaican Prime Minister Edward Seaga" asserted that the plea by the Caribbean nations "was triggered by an offer from the United States"-"Issue an appeal and we'll respond" was the message conveyed by Washington. Furthermore, on 26 October, the US ambassador to France, Evan Galbraith, stated over French television that the Reagan administration had been planning the invasion for the previous two weeks, that is, not only well before the putative request from the Caribbean countries, but, if Galbraith is to be taken literally, even before Bishop was overthrown or before this outcome could have been known with any certainty, unless the CIA had been mixed up in the intra-party feud .
<snip>
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/Grenada_KH.html

[struggle4progress]

146. And Otto Reich continues to threaten them

Caribbean seeks strength in face of aggressive U.S.
Updated Apr 21, 2003
Barbados Prime Minister Owen Arthur recently went on the offensive, defending his nation’s right to speak out on international issues, a right that was challenged by an envoy of U.S. President George W. Bush during a recent television interview with members of the regional press.
"The Barbadian government will fearlessly and freely state its opinion on international matters," Mr. Owen said during a forum called the "World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization: A Caribbean Dialogue," hosted by the International Labor Organization in collaboration with the government of Barbados.
"The acceptance of the notion that we should not express ourselves freely on serious matters which concern our sovereign interest is a betrayal of the nature of our independence," Mr. Owen added.
The Barbadian government was reacting to a veiled threat from Washington, carried by Otto Reich, that the Caribbean should not fear a backlash because of the 15-member Caribbean Community secretariat (CARICOM) stance against the U.S. invasion of Iraq without the full endorsement of the United Nations. Mr. Reich singled out the Barbadian Parliament for making their criticism of the Bush administration public.
<snip>
http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/article_696.shtml

[struggle4progress]

147. Once an SOB, always an SOB

<snip>
I couldn't help but think there might be something to this comparison as I remembered that Ambassador Otto Reich, President Bush's Envoy for Western Hemisphere Initiatives, had arrived in Haiti the same week bombs began falling on Iraq. Reich came as part of a delegation representing the Organization of American States and the Caribbean Community Council with the intention of brokering an agreement between the Haitian government and the Washington-backed "opposition" to Lavalas. Otto Reich is a known quantity when it comes to controlling the press and manipulating events to achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Reich's visit was especially ominous as it coincided with reports from the Haitian police that uniformed soldiers of Haiti's abolished army had begun regular armed incursions into the Central Plateau region of the country from the Dominican Republic. A March 17, 2003 article in the Miami Herald reported, "In December, men wearing uniforms and carrying guns stopped a car with doctors and Washington-based filmmaker David Murdock. 'If our driver had kept going through it, who knows if they would have opened fire,' he said last week. He said he felt afraid for Haitians who have to travel that road regularly. Murdock said the men held him and others at gunpoint, lecturing them on how they would overthrow Aristide." Several policemen in Haiti's police force have recently referred to the current situation in the area as "the beginning of civil war in Haiti." And now Otto Reich was in Haiti.
Otto Reich? Is this the same Otto Reich who once used taxpayer dollars under the Reagan administration, from within his shadowy Office of Public Diplomacy, to cajole the U.S. press into supporting the Contra war against the Sandinistas in Nicaragua? According to The National Security Archive, a staff report by the House Foreign Affairs Committee (September 7, 1988) summarized various investigations of Mr. Reich's office and concluded that "senior CIA officials with backgrounds in covert operations, as well as military intelligence and psychological operations specialists from the Department of Defense, were deeply involved in establishing and participating in a domestic political and propaganda operation run through an obscure bureau in the Department of State which reported directly to the National Security Council rather than through the normal State Department channels.... These private individuals and organizations raised and spent funds for the purpose of influencing Congressional votes and U.S. domestic news media."
<snip>
http://www.blackcommentator.com/36/36_guest_commentator.html
<edit: article date April 3, 2003>

[struggle4progress]

145. Why we'll never really know what happened in the invasion

"The Torturers' Lobby"
The 1983 US invasion of Grenada, a tiny island nation with a population of 160,000 and a per capita income of $390 per year, marked the adoption of the new military doctrine. Following a violent coup within Grenada's leftist government, the Reagan administration seized the opportunity to return Grenada to the fold of capitalism by send in an invasion force of 6,000 US troops to storm the island. Grenadan troops, outnumbered, outgunned and demoralized by the recent coup, offered little resistance. "With the equipment we have, it's like Star Wars fighting cavemen," said one soldier. Three days after the troops landed, the fighting was essentially over.
Unlike the invasion of Normandy Beach during World War II, the invasion of Grenada took place without the presence of journalists to observe the action. Reagan advisors Mike Deaver and Craig Fuller had previously worked for the Hannaford Company, a PR firm which had represented the Guatemalan government to squelch negative publicity about Guatemala's massive violence against its civilian population. Following their advice, Reagan ordered a complete press blackout surrounding the Grenada invasion. By the time reporters were allowed on the scene, soldiers were engaged in "mop-up" operations, and the American public was treated to an antiseptic military victory minus any scenes of killing, destruction or incompetence. In fact, as former army intelligence officers Richard Gabriel and Paul Savage wrote a year later in the Boston Globe, "What really happened in Grenada was a case study in military incompetence and poor execution." Of the 18 American servicemen killed during the operation, 14 died in friendly fire or in accidents. To this day, no one has been able to offer a reliable estimate of the number of Grenadans killed. Retired Vice-Admiral Joseph Metcalf III remembered the Grenada invasion fondly as "a marvelous, sterile operation.''
After reporters protested the news blackout, the government proposed creating a "National Media Pool." In future wars, a rotating group of regular Pentagon correspondents would be on call to depart at a moment's notice for US surprise military operations. In theory, the pool system was designed to keep journalists safe and to provide them with timely, inside access to military operations. In practice, it was a classic example of PR crisis management strategy- enabling the military to take the initiative in controlling media coverage by channeling reporters' movements through Pentagon designated sources.
<snip>
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Public_Relations/TorLob_Grenada_TSIGFY.html

[dudeness]

148. flames?..ya ass is gunna get fried on this one zuni..

good to see you dropping in from freeperland to peedle some pro raygun propaganda..I admire your intestinal fortitude comrade..mull over this for a while..

Forget the smiles, the great communicating, the talk of fighting Communism - the basic policy goals of US power in Central America are clearly spelled out in government documents. In 1954, the National Security Council produced a Top Secret Memorandum titled "US Policy Toward Latin America" (NSC 5432).

The document describes how the biggest regional threat to US interests was "the trend in Latin America toward nationalistic regimes" that responded to "popular demand for immediate improvement in the low living standards of the masses" and for production geared to domestic needs. This trend was in direct collision with US policy, the report noted, which was committed to "encouraging a climate conducive to private investment," and had to "encourage" the Latin American countries "to base their economies on a system of private enterprise, and, as essential thereto, to create a political and economic climate conducive to private investment of both domestic and foreign capital," including guarantees for the "opportunity to earn and in the case of foreign capital to repatriate a reasonable return."

US internal documents have since restated these principles many times. The documents make clear that it was necessary for the US to control the Latin American military, which were explicitly assigned responsibility for overthrowing civilian governments that obstructed US interests. It was also necessary to block "subversion" and to prevent any challenge to US domination.

In other words, US policy in Central America had nothing to do with anti-Communism; it had to do with controlling Third World natural and human resources for the benefit of Western corporations at the expense of local peoples.

Reagan's eight years in office (1981-89) resulted in a vast bloodbath as Washington funnelled money, weapons and other supplies to client dictators and right wing death squads across Central America. The death toll was staggering: more than 70,000 political killings in El Salvador, more than 100,000 in Guatemala, and 30,000 killed in the US Contra war waged against Nicaragua. Journalist Allan Nairn describes it as "One of the most intensive campaigns of mass murder in recent history." (Democracy Now, June 8, 2004)

Analyst Chalmers Johnson notes that "the Reagan years the worst decade for Central America since the Spanish conquest." (Quoted, Milan Rai, War Plan Iraq, Verso, 2002, p.29)

Consider the fate of El Salvador.

In the eighteen-month period leading up elections in El Salvador in March 1982, twenty-six journalists were murdered. In December 1981 the Salvadoran Communal Union reported that eighty-three of its members had been murdered by government security forces and death squads. The entire six-person top leadership of the main opposition party, the FDR, was seized by US-backed government security forces in 1980, tortured, murdered and mutilated. More generally, any left-wing political leader or organiser who gained any kind of prominence in El Salvador in the years 1980-83 was liable to be murdered. Between October 1979 and March 1982, killings of ordinary citizens occurred at the average rate of over 800 per month, on conservative estimates.

To put this level of violence in perspective, Edward Herman and Frank Brodhead converted the figures to a country with the population size of the United States. Doing so, they report, "allows us to imagine an election in the United States preceded by the murder of a thousand-odd officials of the Democratic Party; 5,000 labour leaders; 1,200 journalists; and a million ordinary citizens. Internal and external refugee numbers in El Salvador would correspond to a US equivalent of over 30 million refugees". (Herman and Brodhead, Demonstration Elections, South End Press, 1984, p.124)

Between 1980 and 1983, Amnesty International "received regular, often daily, reports identifying El Salvador's regular security and military units as responsible for the torture, 'disappearance' and killing of noncombatant civilians from all sectors of society". Moreover, "the vast majority of the victims" were "characterised by their association or alleged association with peasant, labour or religious organisations, with human rights monitoring groups, with the trade union movement, with refugee or relief organisations, or with political parties". (Quoted, Mark Curtis, The Ambiguities of Power, Zed Books, 1995, p.161)

This was at a time when the US was directing vast amounts of military aid into the country.

The terror continued throughout the decade. In November 1989, six Jesuit priests, their cook and her daughter, were murdered by the army. That same week, at least 28 other Salvadoran civilians were murdered, including the head of a major union, the leader of the organisation of university women, nine members of an Indian farming cooperative and ten university students.

The Jesuits were murdered by the Atlacatl Battalion, created, trained and equipped by the United States. It was formed in March 1981, when fifteen specialists in counterinsurgency were sent to El Salvador from the US Army School of Special Forces. The Battalion was consistently engaged in mass killing. A US trainer described its soldiers as "particularly ferocious... We've always had a hard time getting them to take prisoners instead of ears." (Quoted, Noam Chomsky, What Uncle Sam Really Wants, Odonian Press, 1993, http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Chomsky/ChomOdon_ElSalvador.html

In December 1981, the Battalion killed a thousand civilians in a massacre that involved murder, rape and burning. Later, it was involved in the bombing of villages and the murder of hundreds of civilians by shooting, drowning and other horrors. The majority of its victims were women, children and the elderly.

The results of Salvadoran military training were graphically described in the Jesuit journal, America, by Daniel Santiago, a Catholic priest working in El Salvador. Santiago told of a peasant woman who came home one day to find her three children, her mother and her sister sitting around a table, each with its own decapitated head placed carefully on the table in front of the body, the hands arranged on top "as if each body was stroking its own head."

The killers, from the Salvadoran National Guard, had struggled to keep the head of an 18-month-old baby in place, so its hands were nailed onto it. A large plastic bowl filled with blood stood in the centre of the table. Noam Chomsky comments:

"According to Rev. Santiago, macabre scenes of this kind aren't uncommon. People are not just killed by death squads in El Salvador-they are decapitated and then their heads are placed on pikes and used to dot the landscape. Men are not just disembowelled by the Salvadoran Treasury Police; their severed genitalia are stuffed into their mouths. Salvadoran women are not just raped by the National Guard; their wombs are cut from their bodies and used to cover their faces. It is not enough to kill children; they are dragged over barbed wire until the flesh falls from their bones, while parents are forced to watch." (Ibid)

Raising a classic 'red scare', Secretary of State Alexander Haig asserted in 1982 that he had "overwhelming and irrefutable" evidence that the guerrillas were controlled from outside El Salvador. (Quoted, William Blum, Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, Common Courage Press, 1995, p.363)

However, a New York Times reporter asked former Salvadoran leader, Jose Napoleon Duarte why there were guerrillas in the hills. The reason, Duarte said, was:

"Fifty years of lies, fifty years of injustice, fifty years of frustration. This is a history of people starving to death, living in misery. For fifty years the same people had all the power, all the money, all the jobs, all the education, all the opportunities." (Ibid., p.353)

As elsewhere in the Third World, desperate poverty and crude exploitation, not Soviet designs, were at the heart of the conflict, a view confirmed even by the US Ambassador to El Salvador, Robert White:

"The revolution situation came about in El Salvador because you had what was one of the most selfish oligarchies the world has ever seen, combined with a corrupt security force... (Ibid., pp.364-5)

This was an example of the "Communism" that US-backed insurgents were fighting, according to the Sunday Mirror. As Piero Gleijeses wrote:

"Just as the Indian was branded a savage beast to justify his exploitation, so those who sought social reform were branded communists to justify their persecution." (Gleijeses, Politics and Culture in Guatemala, Michigan, 1988, p.392)

more to come..

[struggle4progress]

149. Quick! We need a diversion!

10/19/83
At his 20th press conference, President Reagan is asked about the safety of US Marines in Beirut. "We're looking at everything that can be done to try and make their position safer," he says. "We're not sitting idly by."
10/23/83
A truck bomb at the US barracks in Beirut kills 241 Marines.
10/24/83
Larry Speakes calls speculation about a US invasion in politically torn Grenada "preposterous".
10/25/83
Claiming that US medical students are in grave danger, President Reagan launches an invasion of Grenada. Photos are released to the press showing President Reagan, clad in pajamas at 5:15 am, being briefed on the situation.
http://www.quickchange.com/reagan/1983.html

The timing speaks for itself.

[neuvocat]

151. I guess that bombing of the mental hospital was a lie too, huh?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

152. Right!

I'd forgotten about that part.

I did remember, though, about the Army unit that needed to communicate with the Navy ship that was anchored offshore, but they weren't on the same radio system, so one of the soldiers used his AT&T calling card to phone divisional headquarters from a phone booth, so that the Stateside authorities could get a message through.

[durutti]

153. Why does Zuni always lie about the Left?

You can always count on Zuni -- like jaciento (sp?) and MuddleoftheRoad before him -- to make these childishly contrarian posts characterized in varying amounts by inaccuracies and strawmen -- apparently for no purpose other than to pick a fight. If I recall correctly, he was also the one who made some baseless claims about Chomsky a while back. Normally, I wouldn't open on such a caustic note, but the accusatory tone of Zuni's initial message demands it.

Prior to 1974, Grenada had been a colony of England. In the 1950s, the Grenada United Labour Party was founded by Eric Gairy. Gairy soon won a seat in the General Election. Gairy became increasingly paranoid and developed a set of bizarre beliefs about aliens and UFOs. He also became Minister of Finance.

In 1961, England suspended Grenada's constitution after unveiling a scandal that became known as "Squandermania", in which Gairy was implicated. Gairy's credibility was greatly damaged.

Nevertheless, in 1974 he instigated a General Strike, winning the country's independence from Great Britain. He then installed himself as dictator. He was not democratically elected. The election was controlled by his party and the results were faked. Demonstrations of the opposition were responded to brutally by Gairy's paramilitary Mongoose Gang, which was often compared to Haiti's infamous Ton-Ton Macoute. Gairy was friends with Augusto Pinochet, from whom he received advice on crowd control. Grenada's police and paramilitary forces received training from Pinochet.

In response, Maurice Bishop led a popular uprising in which Gairy was deposed. Bishop was influenced by Castro and the Sandinistas. However, he was by no means about to allow Grenada to become a Soviet satellite. Grenada under his rule received aid from the Soviet Union and Cuba, but it also tried to develop a good relationship with the U.S. and allowed private enterprise to continue on the island. Bishop also pushed to establish grassroots democracy in the form of workers' councils.

Bishop and his allies were overthrown in a bloody coup led by Finance Minister Bernard Coard. A 96-hour shoot-on-sight curfew was declared.

There is no evidence of any action taken or threatened against any foreign citizen during this period. As far as anyone knows, no one was shot during the curfew. There was no evidence that Grenadians or Cubans were going to take hostages; officials from both governments assured the U.S. the Americans in the country were safe. Medical students were crucial to the country's economy. Grenadan General Hudson Austin personally visited the medical school to assure the Dean that the students were safe, and that any assistance they needed during the curfew would be provided. Students were given passes to walk the streets during the curfew. Water was specially delivered to the school.

The medical school took a poll of its students showing that only 10 percent wanted to leave the island. On October 23, parents of medical school students met in NYC to discuss the situation. Many of them had been in contact with their children. They sent a telegram to Reagan asking him not to "take any precipitous actions at this time."

Reagan administration officials contacted the chancellor and tried to convince him to state the they were in danger. He refused. Officials then made a visit to the students -- approved by the new government -- and tried to convince them that they were in danger.

There was absolutely not danger to the students. The above is just a sampling of the evidence in support of this assertion. The Left wasn't and isn't wrong. Zuni is.

Also, Zuni is quite wrong in claiming that "pro-Soviet/pro-Cuban" forces were behind the coup. Cuba was outraged at the ouster of Bishop, who modeled his uprising after Castro's in a very direct fashion. Those who killed Bishop were independent despots.