On November 30th, the website Wikileaks released 250,000 private communications between U.S. officials and foreign heads of state. The cables reveal the brutal attacks on civilians, torture, blackmail and lies perpetrated by the American government. These are just a few examples:
Blackmailing Governments
- U.S. representatives to international climate change meetings have blackmailed other countries to loosen restrictions on pollution. The U.S. Government opposes restriction on its own corporations’ emissions. Aid to Bolivia and Ecuador was cut after they voted against the Copenhagen Accord – a plan which would give U.S. corporations the option of buying the right to pollute from third world governments.
Spying on Foreign Officials
- The CIA organized spying on U.N officials. Orders were signed by Condaleeza Rice during the Bush administration and Hilary Clinton during the Obama administration.
Illegal Weapons Stored in Britain
- The cables between Washington and London reveal that the United States obtained authorization from the British government to store cluster bombs on British soil. Cluster bombs are brutal weapons designed to inflict painful injuries on large groups of people. They have been banned in Britain since 2008 by an international convention, which the U.S. refused to sign. However the cables show that even after the ban, the British government agreed to store the weapons for the United States until 2013.
Slaughtering Innocent Civilians
- The cables show that U.S. air strikes in Yemen caused massive civilian casualties last year. The cables mention a major air strike at the Yemeni town of Abyan where dozens of people were killed including 21 children. The Yemeni government agreed to hide the U.S. involvement in these attacks and claim that the Yemeni military carried out the missile strikes.
Assassination Squads
- The cables revealed the operation of Task Force 373 – a team of Navy and Army special operatives who carry out capture and assassination missions. These missions have increased under the Obama administration. Their missions have resulted in the deaths of civilians.
Ignoring Torture
- In 2004 an order was sent to coalition forces which stated that only abuse of prisoners by coalition forces would be investigated. This left the Iraqi military set up by the U.S.-installed regime to torture people indiscriminately.
Suppressing Criminal Investigations
- In 2003, a Spanish journalist was killed by U.S. forces while staying at the Palestine Hotel, a hotel in Iraq where foreign journalists were specifically stationed. The U.S. secretly pressured the Spanish government not to pursue investigation into the crime.
- The CIA abducted a German Citizen named Khaled El-Masri. He was taken to Afghanistan and held for months without charges. When it looked as if the German government was going to charge the CIA officers involved, the U.S. embassy threatened that any arrest warrants would harm U.S. relations with Germany.
- And That’s Only the Tip of the Ice Berg!
Even if two or three times as many documents were released it couldn’t begin to measure all of the crimes, deceit and violence which this government has committed.
In fact this is what it is the government has always done. It is what it is designed to do. This government blackmails, murders, lies, and covers up its crimes as it works to extend a system of imperial domination over the world. The leaked documents only confirm what many have suspected.