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Take an anonymous Pentagon leak from a “high level military officer,” add an appalling lack of knowledge of history, and compound it with ignorance of special warfare tactics. This process describes the article published by Newsweek breathlessly revealing that a “desperate” Defense Secretary Rumsfeld is “considering” employing the “Salvadoran option” to thwart the “growing quagmire” of the Iraq War. This terrible option, reports Newsweek, was used effectively in the counter-guerrilla wars in El Salvador in the early 1980s. It involves U.S. special operations forces leading indigenous “death squads” to root out and kill or capture enemy military and political leaders....

"A report says government officials are reviewing a page from their old playbook to help deal with Iraqi guerrillas: sending special forces to train "death squads" to help install order."

Under President Hugo Chávez, the rule of law in Venezuela has been deteriorating steadily -- some would say precipitously -- for a long time. Two recent events have made matters much worse. The Chávez-controlled Congress last week approved a ''media reform'' bill that imposes stiff censorship on one of the few remaining independent institutions in the country. More urgently, the assassination of prosecutor Danilo Anderson 10 days ago has set off a series of arrests and at least two police killings of ''suspects'' under circumstances that are far from clear. Political killing Mr. Anderson was said to be investigating some...

CARACAS, Venezuela - Two former Caracas police chiefs requested asylum at El Salvador's embassy Friday amid investigations into their handling of violent 2002 protests that left 19 people dead, their lawyer said. Henry Vivas, Caracas' police chief during the protests and Lazaro Forero, police chief until two months ago and previously Vivas' deputy chief, remain in the embassy," attorney Juan Garanton.

London 26.11.04 | Last week the top dog, oh silly me, prosecutor of Venezuela was 'bombed' out of this world, in what constituted the first evident political assassination under Chavez. The neofascist leader wasted no time and sent his thugs after the opposition. This week, two more political assassinations have taken place, this time round by operatives of the regime. The first victim is an Antonio Lopez, who according to Venezuela's Minister of Interior, was an extremely dubious character trained in Langley. His parents, former COPEI Senator Hayde Castillo (70 years of age) and Antonio Lopez (69 years old) are...

Rights group Amnesty International has condemned what it said were summary executions by police, serious human rights abuses and an alarming number of illegal detentions in Haiti. After an 18-day visit to the impoverished Caribbean nation, Amnesty called on the interim government to investigate the police, and urged it and a UN peacekeeping force to carry out a program of disarmament. While acknowledging interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue inherited numerous problems from the ousted democratically-elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Amnesty said, "None of these difficulties can be invoked by state agents to justify violations of human rights committed in total impunity"....

During the Reagan era, the media described roving bands of right-wing militias in Central America as "death squads." Why, then, are the terrorists and murderers in Iraq described with the neutral term "insurgents"? These people are doing exactly what the "death squads" did - targeting both random civilians and "collaborators" with the government (including humanitarian and relief workers), yet the media treat them very differently from the Central American thugs.

Murder Inc. Seymour Hersh, with his usual thoroughness, has documented Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's latest scheme for Iraq. It is, in short, to set up death squads, trained by Israelis and using Israelis as consultants in Iraq. The Israeli role is supposed to be hush-hush, but not only Hersh, in his New Yorker article, but also a British reporter in the Guardian have confirmed the Israeli role. That will win a lot of hearts and minds in the Arab world. About the only government they hate worse than ours is Israel's. The idea is to hire some of the...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec 14, 2003 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- The interim Iraqi government said Sunday it wants to try Saddam Hussein before a special tribunal, but a human rights group voiced deep concern about the legitimacy of the newly established panel. The United States reserved judgment. Iraq's new leaders want Saddam to face the tribunal they established last week specifically to hear cases involving leading members of the Saddam regime accused of genocide and other crimes against humanity. "We will deal with Saddam Hussein," said Adnan Pachachi, a member of the 25-seat interim Governing Council. "He was an unjust...

I personally know Pat Matrisciana and some of the researchers for the CLINTON CHRONICLES. I've met troopers and others involved. I've met and interviewed Paula Jones. Never have I accused the Clintons of the attempted murder of Gary Johnson. But those who tried to murder him clearly were doing it to benefit Bill Clinton. ===================================== LARRY NICHOLS: During the 1992 presidential campaign, I was getting bludgeoned by the media because Gennifer Flowers had come out of my lawsuit. A man called me on the phone on a Monday, his name was Gary Johnson. He was an attorney. He told me...

<p>Baghdad -- Like so many Iraqis these days, Chedha al Awsi feels betrayed and confused.</p> <p>On a computer screen before her, poorly recorded footage shows half a dozen laughing soldiers of Saddam Hussein's elite Republican Guard as they beat and kick civilian men kneeling on the ground, their hands bound behind their backs.</p>

BOSTON GLOBE CONTINUES FABRICATIONS On its front page today, the Boston Globe continues its misreporting and printing false information to deceive the Boston and American public for its thoroughly antiAmerican owners (NYTimes). On page 1 and then leading in to the War in Iraq section, Brian BacQuarrie, is disingenuous to America over and over claiming the torture chambers are a "ghost", a "tale", and mostly made up. Most importantly, the article claims that no one was found imprisoned -- despite the fact that yesterday over 100 men and women were freed from a cemented-in chamber. No matter that torture chambers...

ATLANTA — Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard — awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff. For example, in the mid-1990's one of our Iraqi cameramen was abducted. For weeks he was beaten and subjected to electroshock torture in the basement of a secret police headquarters because he...

WASHINGTON, -- Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld gave details of Saddam Hussein's death squads, during a Pentagon press briefing today. He also warned Iraq's neighbors Syria and Iran not to interfere with coalition combat operations in Iraq. Finally, the secretary and Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, gave a rundown of coalition military successes of the past eight days. Coalition success can lead to more uncertainties and has served to drive Saddam's death squads to more excesses, the men observed. "Each day, more coalition forces flow into country, and each day more Iraqi forces...

Part three: The Fedayeen have vowed to step up their suicide bombings. Neil Mackay reports that they are just one string of militias ready to fight to the death for Saddam YOU'LL have seen one of their number already -- a middle-aged man in a blue serge suit with a keffiyeh scarf wrapped around his head. As the TV cameras rolled, he triumphantly waved his Czech-made assault rifle in the air while Iraqi villagers in the distance behind him stripped down the US Apache helicopter he'd just shot down. This avuncular-looking farmer, Ali Obeid, now praised as a national hero...

GULF WAR II: Brit support grows for conflict + Officer reveals brutality LT COL TIM COLLINS: Reveals his battle to lift Iraq's shadow of tyrannyTO THE RESCUE: US marine carries tot to safety after Iraqis fire on civiliansTO LOVING CARE: Forces doc cradles tot A SMILING teenage girl who waved at patrolling British soldiers and accepted a big-hearted squaddie's gift of chocolate was HANGED by agents of Saddam. The butchers of the dictator's corrupt Ba'ath party had spied on the Muslim youngster from an alleyway in Az Zubayr near Basra. Battle-hardened troops of the 1st Batallion, The Royal Irish Regiment...

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast - The United Nations says it has evidence that the Ivory Coast government is sending out death squads that have killed or abducted dozens of politicians and businessmen in the capital of Abidjan since civil war broke out four months ago. The United Nations is investigating the alleged death squads, which operate largely under the cover of Abidjan's 10 p.m. curfew. The deaths and disappearances have spread fear in the capital and silenced many of the government's political opponents. Hundreds of people have been killed, and an estimated 600,000 have fled their homes since civil war broke...