Anti-war activists in Olympia, Wash., have exposed U.S. Army spying and infiltration of their groups, as well as intelligence gathering by the U.S. Air Force, the federal Capitol Police and the Coast Guard.
The infiltration appears to be in direct violation of the Posse Comitatus Act preventing U.S. military deployment for domestic law enforcement, and may strengthen congressional demands for a full-scale investigation of U.S. intelligence activities, like the Church Committee hearings of the 1970s.
Brendan Maslauskas Dunn asked the City of Olympia for documents or e-mails about communications between the Olympia police and the military relating to anarchists, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) or the Industrial Workers of the World (Dunn's union). Dunn received hundreds of documents. One e-mail contained reference to a "John J. Towery II," who activists discovered was the same person as their fellow activist "John Jacob."
Dunn told me: "John Jacob was actually a close friend of mine, so this week has been pretty difficult for me. He said he was an anarchist. He was really interested in SDS. He got involved with Port Militarization Resistance (PMR), with Iraq Vets Against the War. He was a kind person. He was a generous person. So it was really just a shock for me."
"Jacob" told the activists he was a civilian employed at Fort Lewis Army Base, and would share information about base activities, which could help PMR organize rallies and protests against public ports being used for troop and Stryker military vehicle deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 2006, PMR activists have occasionally engaged in civil disobedience, blocking access to the port.
Larry Hildes, an attorney representing Washington activists, says the U.S. attorney prosecuting the cases against them, Brian Kipnis, specifically instructed the Army not to hand over any information about its intelligence-gathering activities, despite a court order to do so.
Which is why Dunn's request to Olympia and the documents he obtained are so important. The military is supposed to be barred from deploying on U.S. soil, or from spying on citizens.
Christopher Pyle, now a professor of politics at Mount Holyoke College, was a military intelligence officer. He recalled: "In the 1960s, Army intelligence had 1,500 plainclothes agents watching every demonstration of 20 people or more. They had a giant warehouse in Baltimore full of information on the law-abiding activities of American citizens, mainly protest politics."
Pyle later investigated the spying for two congressional committees: "As a result of those investigations, the entire U.S. Army Intelligence Command was abolished, and all of its files were burned. Then the Senate Intelligence Committee wrote the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to stop the warrantless surveillance of electronic communications."
Reps. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., Rush Holt, D-N.J., and others are pushing for a new, comprehensive investigation of all U.S. intelligence activities, of the scale of the Church Committee hearings, which exposed widespread spying on and disruption of legal domestic groups, attempts at assassination of foreign heads of state, and more.
Demands mount for information and accountability for Vice President Dick Cheney's alleged secret assassination squad, President George W. Bush's warrantless wiretapping program, and the CIA's alleged misleading of Congress. But the spying in Olympia occurred well into the Obama administration (and may continue today). President Barack Obama supports retroactive immunity for telecom companies involved in the wiretapping, and has maintained Bush-era reliance on the state secrets privilege. Lee and Holt should take the information uncovered by Brendan Dunn and the Olympia activists and get the investigations started now.
See/hear/read the full exclusive hour broadcast exposé on Democracy Now!:
Declassified Docs Reveal Military Operative Spied on WA Peace Groups, Activist Friends Stunned
Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
Follow Amy Goodman on Twitter: www.twitter.com/democracy_now
"...agents of the 902nd Military Intelligence Group from Fort Meade, MD ... infiltrated the Quaker Meeting House, and then filed a report designating us a CREDIBLE THREAT.
"The president’s agents DID NOT come to worship alongside us, to help us plan our educational program, or to protect us.
"And it wasn’t just us. Shortly after NBC aired its report, churches and other groups began sharing their experiences of infiltration and intimidation with us.
"Saint Maurice’s Catholic Church in Dania, the Unitarian Universalists, the Fort Lauderdale Friends, members of Pax Christi in West Palm Beach, environmental groups, and many others.
"Agents rummaged through trash, attacked and snooped into email, hacked web sites, and listened in on phone conversations ... address books and activist meeting lists have disappeared.
"...as a citizen, I have heard today that the President has obviously broken the law, ... he has admitted that he's broken the law, and if you read the oath of office, he's not upheld the Constitution of the United States.
I think it's time for us to act.”
Richard Hersh
The Truth Project, Inc.
Remarks to House Judiciary Congressional Briefing
January 20, 2006
There are many documents on the site relating to warrantless government surveillance.
- dcm
One other disagreement I have is that the establishment WANTS to implement universal healthcare. Nothing they would like better than to tell everyone what health care they can and cannot have, force everyone to remain in good favor with them in order to get any treatment and control doctors to the point where any disease they want to cover up can just never be diagnosed like what has been done in the VA for gulf war syndrome (due to all those experimental vaccines, btw, you're going to take the new flu vaccine right?).
USA Government and Military are both considered as a country and according to this mornings stats:
19th out of 82 countries hitting on WAWA was the USA governmental (.gov) and in 20th place US Military (.mil)
Even if Big Bro were the ONLY one's reading me, it is worth every dime it has cost me to travel 7 times to Israel and occupied Palestine and maintain my website- my public service -and report what the MSM ignores.
Wiki: In the Final Report of the Select Committee, COINTELPRO was castigated in no uncertain terms:
Many of the techniques used would be intolerable in a democratic society even if all of the targets had been involved in violent activity, but COINTELPRO went far beyond that...the Bureau conducted a sophisticated vigilante operation aimed squarely at preventing the exercise of First Amendment rights of speech and association, on the theory that preventing the growth of dangerous groups and the propagation of dangerous ideas would protect the national security and deter violence.
The Puebla Document published by the Third Conference of Latin American Bishops in 1979, stated in its 'Thoughts on Political Violence'No. 547:
The last few years have seen the growing importance in our continent of the so-called Doctrine of National Security, which is in fact more ideology than doctrine. It is linked to a certain elitist, hierarchical, political and economic model which denies the vast majority of the population any part in political decision-making. In certain Latin American countries it is even justified in terms of defending Western, Christian civilization. It has developed a repressive apparatus to reinforce its concept of 'permanent warfare'. In some cases its intentions are clearly political.
They can't figure out to deal with individuals humanely, so they're spying on people who actually respect each other and the earth.
They're taking lessons. Let's hope they learn something.
... the Clinton administration showed a surprising willingness to expand the role of the military in civilian law enforcement. For example, during the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian complex in Waco, Texas, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF) requested military support, including tanks and training sessions by Green Berets, basing their request on a single drug charge pending against one of the Davidians. Military lawyers blocked the request on grounds that it would be a clear violation of the Posse Comitatus Act.
Also see OPERATION GARDENPLOT.
We've already been through this before - in recent history, but since our eductation system is what it is, we must learn on our own. When you start learning about recent history, it becomes clear how far we've slipped towards fascism. Howard Hughes was accused of war profiteering in a congressional hearing, which he indignantly denied. Now look at them, Hartman, Feinstein and Cheney for example, they view it as their rightful benefits, the hallmarks of Capitalism.
Going to be a lot of unnecessary opposition in 2010 and 2012 if he doesn't take a courageous stand against this.
But since he isn't doing much about investigating and prosecuting the many violations of Federal Laws (including Torture ) by Bush and Cheney, I doubt he will do much to stop the spying on peace groups.
We need to push AG Holder, Obama and our Congressional Democrats
to investigate and prosecute the Bushies, at least for Torture.
Prosecute all those that tortured in our name, then go after all the other Federal Crimes and violations of our Constitution committed by Bush and Cheney.
If House Judiciary Chairman Rep. John Conyers
does not soon start hearings in his Committee
on the crimes of the Bush Administration
WE Must ALL Call For His Resignation.
SIGN THE PETITIONS
Demanding
both a Commission of Inquiry
and a Special Prosecutor
For All Their Crimes
at ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
http://ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
We must hang in there...
or our own children or grandchildren may in future decades
be tortured and imprisoned without cause because of our failure