Horrific, long-term consequences of regime change

  84-year-old Emma Thiessen Alvarez has never forgotten the day in 1981 when Guatemalan officials came to her house looking for her daughter, a student leader who had escaped from military custody. Unable to find her, the officials settled for Thiessen’s 14-year-old son. She never saw him again.

  Thiesen’s story was highlighted in a recent New York Times article because the Guatemalan legislature is now contemplating granting blanket amnesty to military officials who participated in the reign of terror that the Guatemalan national-security establishment inflicted on the Guatemalan people for a period of some 36 years.

Jacob G. Hornberger: Madison was right about war

  Given that so many Americans continue to express gratitude to the troops for their forever service in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and elsewhere, it would be worthwhile to revisit the immortal words of James Madison, the father of the U.S. Constitution:

Jacob G. Hornberger: Prepare now for blowback

  By this time it has become painfully obvious that Donald Trump is going to follow the interventionist road in the Middle East that Republicans and Democrats have been following ever since the Cold War ended in 1989. Like any good conservative, Trump is expanding the size of the military establishment, unleashing the Pentagon to wage its war on ISIS and terrorism, and continuing the bombing, shooting, and assassinations by the military and the CIA in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and other parts of the Middle East. At the same time, he’s keeping the entire NSA surveillance machinery fully intact and operational.

Jacob G. Hornberger: Prepare yourself for blowback from Yemen

  If there is another terrorist attack on U.S. soil, this time because of the death and destruction that the U.S. government is wreaking in Yemen, I can already hear the laments and complaints of statist-Americans: “Oh my gosh, another terrorist attack against us! Why do the terrorists and the Muslims hate us for our freedom and values? Why can’t they see that we’re good people who just want to live our lives in peace? We must now give more power and more money to the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA so that they can keep us safe from those who hate us because we’re good.”

Jacob G. Hornberger: What if ISIS were to win?

  For the past few years, the American people have been exhorted by the U.S. national-security state to be obsessed with ISIS, the brutal organization that is fighting to achieve political power in Iraq, Syria, and Libya, the three countries that, not coincidentally, have been targets of regime change by the U.S. national-security state.

  Today, ISIS is constantly on the minds of millions of Americans. “We have to stop ISIS!” the battlecry goes. “We have to stop them from winning.”

  So, today, more than 10 years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, there are almost 5,000 U.S. troops back in Iraq. Their mission? To stop ISIS from winning in Iraq.

Jacob G. Hornberger: The U.S. Middle East killing racket

  Consider the following two headlines during the past three weeks:

  “U.S. Strike Kills ‘150 al-Shabaab Terrorists’ in Somalia” (March 7, The Telegraph)

  “49 Killed in U.S. Airstrike Targeting Terrorists in Libya” (February 20, CNN)

Jacob G. Hornberger: How can anyone still be an interventionist?

  Given the ongoing disasters in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Libya, and the rest of the Middle East, how can anyone in his right mind still be an interventionist?

  Look at Iraq. The U.S. invasion and multi-year occupation of that country was supposed to bring a paradise of peace, prosperity, and harmony to the country. That’s what killing all those Iraqis was about — sacrificing them for the greater good of a beautiful society. Wasn’t it called Operation Iraqi Freedom?

The Real scandal in Libya: A security vacuum and new terrorist threats

  President Barack Obama’s political opponents are trying once again to manufacture a scandal out of the tragic deaths of four American government personnel at a U.S. facility in Benghazi, Libya, last September. Among those killed was the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens. The current political and media feeding frenzy surrounding the Benghazi attacks is no more than a parsing of interagency debates on post-attack talking points, and it is based on what former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates called “cartoonish” views of U.S. military capabilities.

Sheldon Richman: The hubris of Romney and Obama

  Mitt Romney, whose bid to unseat Barack Obama looks more desperate every day, senses he’s found a weakness in his rival. In a foreign-policy speech, he blasted Obama over the upheaval in the Arab world, saying, “This is a time for a president who will shape events in the Middle East.”

  Romney is making two claims: that Obama has failed to shape events in the Middle East and that he, Romney, will succeed.

  Could the hubris of a man seeking power be plainer? Does anyone with even a minimum ability to think clearly believe that Romney could “shape events” there?

Ian M. MacIsaac: A National tragedy made partisan

  A national tragedy at the United States Consulate in Benghazi, Libya became a partisan spectacle Wednesday. Lacking a clear foreign policy difference with President Obama, Mitt Romney decided that exploiting the deaths of State Department officials was a safer bet than being seen standing with the president on anything.

  Before all the dead in Benghazi had even been accounted for, as the consulate there literally continued to burn and protestors continued to climb the gates of the embassy in Cairo, Egypt, the Romney campaign was already sending out press releases calling President Obama "disgraceful" and criticizing the president for apologizing for America and leading from behind.