It was a short message to end a short war. On February 26 1991, Iraqi foreign minister Tariq Aziz put his signature to a letter addressed to the United Nations Security Council:
I have the honour to notify you that the Iraqi Government reaffirms its agreement to comply fully with Security Council Resolution 660 and all other UN Security Council resolutions.
A few hours later, at 8am Baghdad time, a ceasefire entered into effect. The international military campaign, dubbed by the United States as “Operation Desert Storm”, had lasted only a few weeks. And yet, as recent rocket attacks against US targets in Iraq illustrate, its consequences are still with us today.
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Nicholson Baker’s fascinating, discouraging search for the truth about biological warfare
By Dana Wilde
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“Baseless: My Search for Secrets in the Ruins of the Freedom of Information Act” by Nicholson Baker; Penguin Press, New York, 2020; 464 pages, hardcover, $30.
“Baseless: My Search for Secrets in the Ruins of the Freedom of Information Act” is the product of Nicholson Baker’s 10-year effort to answer the question: Did the United States ever use biological weapons against its enemies?
Baker, the mild-mannered reporter and novelist who lives in or near Bangor, titled his book after the U.S. Air Force’s Korean War-era program “Project Baseless,” whose aim was “to achieve ‘an Air Force-wide combat capability in biological and chemical warfare.’” It turns out that not only the Air Force, but seemingly every nook of the U.S. military concerned with covert Cold War activities were interested in developing biological and/or chemica
Classified report finds slow, chaotic response to brain injuries affecting diplomats in Cuba
Karen DeYoung, The Washington Post
Feb. 10, 2021
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More than four years after personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Havana began reporting sudden, debilitating illnesses, with severe headaches, hearing loss and other brain injuries, there are still no definitive answers as to what caused the outbreak.
The Trump administration did not reveal the incidents until they appeared in news reports many months later. Despite the State Department s initial reticence to assign blame, President Donald Trump quickly labeled the Cuban government guilty of attacks on the diplomats, charges that were used to buttress his administration s reversal of much of the Obama era s normalization with Cuba.
Classified assessment found slow and chaotic response to brain injuries affecting diplomats in Cuba Karen DeYoung More than four years after personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Havana began reporting sudden, debilitating illnesses, with severe headaches, hearing loss and other brain injuries, there are still no definitive answers as to what caused the outbreak. The Trump administration did not reveal the incidents until they appeared in news reports many months later. Despite the State Department’s initial reticence to assign blame, President Donald Trump quickly labeled the Cuban government guilty of “attacks” on the diplomats, charges that were used to buttress his administration’s reversal of much of the Obama era’s normalization with Cuba.
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by Rick Sterling
Sixty years ago, John F Kennedy (JFK) was inaugurated as president of the USA. In less than three years, before he was assassinated in November 1963, he initiated major changes in foreign policy.
These foreign policy changes are documented in books such as “JFK and the Unspeakable” (2008) and “Betting on the Africans” (2012). One of the foremost scholars on JFK, James Di Eugenio, has an excellent new article of the Kennedy foreign policy at Covert Action: “Deconstructing JFK: A Coup d’Etat over Foreign Policy?”. Despite this literature, many people in the West do not realize the extent to which JFK was an exception. This article w