Oswald in the doorway: the blog of the Oswald Innocence Campaign, by Ralph Cinque

As I predicted, the impeachment fell flat. It was ridiculous to begin with. A phone conversation with the leader of Ukraine? They were going to impeach Trump for that? How about for killing 10 men in a undisguised act of terrorism? I could see that, but no, that wasn't going to work either. It's very American to do that. That's part of our culture now, that our Military kills whoever it wants and doesn't have to provide any reason. We just lip-flap it: "He was going to commit imminent attacks." You notice that we never did get any evidence for that. And it makes absolutely no sense because Suleimani was invited to Iraq by the Iraqi PM to discuss peace in the region and improved relations with Saudi Arabia. That's according to the Iraqi PM. So, how do you combine that with imminent attacks on Americans? That's like combining a stop at Western Union, with plans to drop your dog off at the Carousel Club afterwards, with killing a guy in a swarm of police, and thus destroying your whole life. Certain things just don't go together. They're not like peanut butter and jelly. 

So no, there were no imminent attacks. There were no attacks, period. The recent violence of Iraqis against Americans came from them, the Iraqis. Maybe they got some inspiration from Suleimani, but that's about it. They didn't need him, and he certainly had no reason to get involved in it. What for? How was that going to help Iran? No, we just killed him because we wanted him dead, and Trump wanted to gain some Commander in Chief points. 

But, why'd we kill the 9 other Iraqis? There's the one we named, Muhandis, but if there were bad things to say about the other 8, I'm sure we would have heard them. And I think it's very likely that Muhandis rode in the same car as Suleimani, just like Connally rode in the same car as JFK.  So, we probably could have just droned the one car that they were in and spared the other car. So, why kill those other guys? Just because they were part of the welcome party? But, here's an idea: how about we killed them because they could have talked? They could have denied that there was any discussion of imminent attacks or attacks period. They could have reported what Suleimani said, what his expectations were, what his objectives were in going there. They could have challenged the credibility of what Pomphideous Pompeo was saying. So, it was better to just kill them. Silence the whole bunch. Dead men tell no tales. 

It really is the sad truth that the incredible arrogance of U.S. Presidents and the U.S. Military, where they think they're God reigning over the planet, is OK with most Americans. Most Americans, young and old, just don't mind it. Nothing exists today that compares to the anti-war movement of the 1960s. It's a different time, a different generation, with different values.  

But, through it all, there is the extremely dark reality, the truth that the wars were based on lies, that there never was a legal or moral basis on which to attack Afghanistan, Iraq, and other countries.  The very dark evil lies that underlie the whole system of American warfare, I don't see how it can be kept covered up forever. And when it unravels, even if Americans still don't care, others in the world will. 

It's like the dark secrets of what we did to JFK and Oswald and Ruby.These are like the secret of what the Bolsheviks did to the Romanov family- which is no longer a secret. And that's why the idea of arbitrarily killing 10 men and without even a declaration of war, it is such naked aggression against everyone in the world. Who is safe if the U.S. can get away with doing that? 

You should think about the fact that there have been no declarations of war since WW2. There have been plenty of wars but no declarations. And that's how they want it. They don't want lethal action to be limited to formal wars. They want to be on war footing all the time. They want to be able to kill anyone they want, and they don't want it to be restricted to formal war zones. The whole world is their oyster when it comes to killing. Perennial war is the watchword. The U.S. is always at war, and it is always entitled to take lethal action- whenever and wherever it wants. And that is fine with most Americans.