On Thu, 27 Aug 1998, Tresy Kilbourne wrote:

> Wat Tyler writes:
>
> >Chomsky says law-abiding states should refrain from using
> >violence and try to prosecute the perpetrators of terrorist
> >attacks, rather than resorting to the same tactics.
>
> "Same tactics"? Did we deliberately target innocent civilians?

Yes, the U.S. did know and deliberately target innocent civilians.  It is
part of the psychological warfare and propaganda tactics used to make
people fearful.  The fear (terror) will force some people tell on people
who might be suspected of being affiliated with the opposing forces.

> Last I checked we took out a VX nerve gas facility and the perpetrators'
> meeting place.

Where is the evidence that it was a "VX nerve gas facility"

Full article post under separate cover:

====================================

Sudan shows off ruined factory to "disprove" US claims it was dangerous

KHARTOUM, Aug 23 (AFP) - Factory officials took the UN representative in
Sudan on Sunday to the pharmaceutical plant destroyed by last week's US
raid, seeking to disprove American claims it made chemicals which could be
used in nerve gas.

"The Al-Shifa factory produced no chemical products," Mohammed Shibli,
director of exports for the ruined plant, told UN representative Philippe
Borel.

To make his point, Shibli reached into the debris to gather up a handful
of pills, crushed them in his palm and held them to his mouth.

"Look, I can sniff these medicines, I can taste them, and I am a family
man who can't afford to die," he told reporters.

"Where are the chemical (weapons) products? Where's the nerve gas? Bring me
proof," Shibli demanded.

                [       [       TEXT CUT        ]       ]

 =======================================================================


> According to news reports, a second plant in a densely populated
> area was not targeted precisely because of the civilian casualties that
> would result. We did not attack the sponsor governments. Meanwhile they
> took out 2 embassies, killing over 200 people (most of them African), and
> if news reports are accurate, twice planned to assassinate our head of
> state.

Again the U.S. doing its dirty work cloaked in African garb.


>
> If Chomsky is really asserting a moral equivalence between the 2 acts,
> he's losing my respect. Maybe he needs to revisit his oft-quoted
> definition of terrorism: the use of violence against civilians for
> political ends. If self-defense is terrorism, the definition is
> meaningless.

You have really confused me here.  I do not understand your point.  Are
you saying that the U.S.  was acting in self-defense?  What
"self-interest" were they defending?  If there were so much interest in
self-defense then why wasn't there adequate security at those U.S.
embassies in African? -- Self-defense

If the U.S. government is about justice then they will pursue with the
same compassion and zeal that Kenneth Star has for Clinton those
government officials who KNEW and did nothing to enhance the security at
U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.


> >
> >``People who carry out terrorist attacks are culpable and
> >should be punished just like any other crime.''
> Easy to say, difficult to carry out, no? The Taliban unsurprisingly has
> said that they would never turn over bin Laden to international
> authorities. Meanwhile Chomsky is willing to risk that thousands of
> civilians, US or otherwise, will get VX dumped on them while we spend
> years trying to bring these people to justice?

I am still waiting for proof of VX gas.

Anyone remember this:

CNN chief calls nerve gas broadcast a "fiasco"

NEW YORK, July 27 (AFP) - The president of CNN called the network's report
about using a deadly nerve gas to kill American deserters in Vietnam "a
fiasco," according to an article published Monday.

"I tell you, it's almost incomprehensible that a team of experienced
journalists could work for eight and a half months ... and produce such a
badly flawed piece of work," CNN president Tom Johnson said in an
interview in The New Yorker.

In their program about "Operation Tailwind" broadcast June 7, CNN
producers alleged that US troops fired lethal sarin gas on a Laos village
suspected of harboring American deserters in September 1970.

Both CNN and Time Magazine, which published an article on the operation,
retracted the story with public apologies earlier this month.

Producers April Oliver and Jack Smith were both fired but still stand by
their story. On-camera correspondent Peter Arnett received a reprimand.

About Arnett, Johnson said: "Most of my correspondents felt that I should
have fired Peter. Still do. He was spared only because of his entire
record with us and the fact that he was willing to volunteer to stay back
in Baghdad," referring to Arnett's work during the Gulf War.

Recently, the Pentagon released a report denying any allegations in the
CNN report.

Commander of "Operation Tailwind," Eugene McCarley said in the August 10
issue of Forbes magazine that he had refused a financial settlement
offered by CNN to withdraw his defamation case against the network.

CNN is in discussion with 100 people who have threatened or filed suit
against CNN, according to Forbes magazine.

=================================================

Proof  . . . not psychological warfare and propaganda.

F. Leon

> If he is, he should have
> the courage to say so, or expect that people who live in the real world
> will see his rhetoric as armchair moralism made risk-free by the umbrella
> of force he professes to despise.
>
> _________
> Tresy Kilbourne, Seattle WA
> "The intellectual tradition is one of servility to power, and if I didn't
> betray it I'd be ashamed of myself." --Noam Chomsky, responding to an
> accusation of betrayal by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
>