Lugovoi: An enigma wrapped in a riddle

[Fruitloop]

I disagree, if there was enough popular pressure, politicians would have no choice but to abolish the security services. Most of London knows where MI6 operate from, it's hardly a secret underground bunker. That would be silly, because among other things they do help to prevent attacks here.

But now we're getting into a different debate, about what states are and whether we should have them. Perhaps our security services are products of elite interests; as far as I recall they were mainly established in current form to help fight the imperial European powers.

But elite and general interests are rarely totally divergent, and that doesn't mean they don't have their uses to the general population. Providing intelligence on outside powers or individual groups wishing to blow up car bombs in London, for example.

The debate should be to what extent we allow them to operate outside the scrutiny that applies, say, to the police. Quite possibly we shouldn't.

I'm sorry but I think this is pretty much all wrong. Whatever the intention (or rather the excuse) for establishing the security services in the first instance, the fact remains that in western democracies they are used to suppress internal dissent, from COINTELPRO to spying on anti-war activists, in the interests of facilitating the aims and continued hegemony of the ruling class. Neither do I think that any amount of public pressure would see them disbanded or even altered, unless by public pressure you mean a substantial shift in the state of class relations like the post-war consensus.

It seems to me to be ludicrously optimistic to reconcile yourself to elite rule on the grounds that sometimes your interests and theirs may be congruent, particularly when this is not a view that is widely held in private by the rulers themselves (although obviously what they say in public is another matter).

 

[slaar]

I'm sorry but I think this is pretty much all wrong. Whatever the intention (or rather the excuse) for establishing the security services in the first instance, the fact remains that in western democracies they are used to suppress internal dissent, from COINTELPRO to spying on anti-war activists, in the interests of facilitating the aims and continued hegemony of the ruling class. Neither do I think that any amount of public pressure would see them disbanded or even altered, unless by public pressure you mean a substantial shift in the state of class relations like the post-war consensus.

Well, yes, that's precisely what I mean. But in any case, how can you say that public pressure doesn't lead to reform? If you have such a poor opinion of spooks, then why do you think our security services are not anally raping suspects (as the Egyptian security services do according to Human Rights reports), or boiling them alive (as in your Uzbek example)? Because according to you, they would be if they thought it was necessary and could get away with it.

It seems to me to be ludicrously optimistic to reconcile yourself to elite rule on the grounds that sometimes your interests and theirs may be congruent, particularly when this is not a view that is widely held in private by the rulers themselves (although obviously what they say in public is another matter).

We clearly have very different ideas about what constitutes 'elite rule'. But then I'm no revolutionary.

 

[Fruitloop]

Well, yes, that's precisely what I mean. But in any case, how can you say that public pressure doesn't lead to reform? If you have such a poor opinion of spooks, then why do you think our security services are not anally raping suspects (as the Egyptian security services do according to Human Rights reports), or boiling them alive (as in your Uzbek example)? Because according to you, they would be if they thought it was necessary and could get away with it.

Because it's not necessary. We have the manufacture of consent in this country and don't require a terror state in the general course of things. Of course the legitimacy of government still ultimately relies on the monopoly of force, as could be seen in the factory occupations etc of May '68 - ultimately de Gaulle was going to declare a state of emergency and send the tanks in - but in the main our terror is exported not domestic. This may well be changing though, little by little.

We clearly have very different ideas about what constitutes 'elite rule'. But then I'm no revolutionary.

It seems a simple enough concept to me - to ignore it is to saddle yourself with an interpretation of society that fundamentally doesn't add up.

 

[JimPage]

although I am supportive of open borders, when i see groups of russian plutocrats who have stolen the wealth of the russian working class trying to kill each other, i start to change my view a little

open borders for working class people by all means, plutocrats can stay in russia to face whatever they face.....

 

[Darios]

If you have such a poor opinion of spooks, then why do you think our security services are not anally raping suspects (as the Egyptian security services do according to Human Rights reports), or boiling them alive (as in your Uzbek example)? Because according to you, they would be if they thought it was necessary and could get away with it.

How can you be so sure that they're not? If it gets a result, it's probably used. There's also a reason "rendition" has now entered our lexicon. Is getting another secret service to do your torture for you fundamentally more acceptable than doing it yourself? If it is I'd like to know why as the ends and the means appear almost identical in either case.

Another thought:
Consider Abu Ghraib. It has been alleged that spooks were directing this torture. Anal rape was, apparently, one of many horrific abuses visited upon the prisoners. Is this more 'ok' because it occurred in Iraq?

Perhaps you might respond by saying - 'but hey, this was carried out by soldiers suffering from PTSD (or whatever else can fuck you up in the field), they didn't know what they were doing, it's a warzone man.' First, recent research has revealed that these kind of abuses are in fact systematic and not just 'one offs' or 'bad apples' as Washington claimed.

And secondly, more to the point: - these soldiers are supposed to be constrained by the rules of the game. I.e. they are accountable......

.....so my inference is - if this is what the (accountable) soldiers are doing (and thinking they can get away with it, or that it's "acceptable"), WTF are the (unaccountable) spooks doing? I'm still at a complete loss to understand this notion that the spooks are somehow nobly self-restraining and the soldiers aren't.

 

[Fruitloop]

'Accountability' just means whitewash, but in the long term IMO.

 

[CyberRose]

I think we should invite Ukraine to join NATO

 

[Darios]

Leader of Al-Q group in Iraq was fictional, U.S. Military says

"On Wednesday, a senior American military spokesman provided a new explanation for Baghdadi's ability to escape attack: He never existed.

Brigadier General Kevin Bergner, the chief American military spokesman, said the elusive Baghdadi was actually a fictional character whose audio-taped declarations were provided by an elderly actor named Abu Adullah al-Naima."

.........

"The ruse, Bergner said, was devised by Abu Ayub al-Masri, the Egyptian-born leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, who was trying to mask the dominant role that foreigners play in that insurgent organization."

.......

"The struggle between the American military and Qaeda affiliate in Iraq is political as well as military. And one purpose of the briefing Wednesday seemed to be to rattle the 90 percent of the group's adherents who are believed to be Iraqi by suggesting that they are doing the bidding of foreigners."

Who else might not exist? Or is already dead? Or is not who we thought they were?

It's ok! Our boys and girls would never do anything like this.......

 

[Darios]

With respect to 'Get Your War On':

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
An extrajudicial execution by the CIA?

The Stab in the Back
Israel plays the Kurdish card – and Americans are caught in the crossfire

The Ricin Ring that Never was