The journalist who broke the 45 minute WMD story strikes again

Campaign Iran | 30.01.2007 13:42

Daily Telegraph political editor investigated over misleading articles...again

Press Release – 29th January 2007

The Press Complaints Commission have launched their third investigation of Daily Telegraph political editor, Con Coughlin, in as many months, after a number of high level complaints about his latest ariticle on Iran. The investigation is looking at an article by Mr Coughlin on 24 January relying on an unnamed “European defence official” alleging that North Korea is helping Iran prepare a nuclear weapons test and follows the recent publication of a report detailing a catalogue of innaccurate and misleading stories about Iran by. The report, put together by Campaign Iran and published last month, revealed that Mr Coughlin, the man who ‘broke the story’ of Iraq’s 45 minute WMD capacity, is behind sixteen articles containing unsubstantiated allegations against Iran over the past twelve months. The PCC will examine whether the stories, all based on unnamed or untraceable sources, are in breach of Clause 1 of their Code of Practice, requiring accuracy.

The veracity of Coughlin’s writing on Iran is already under investigation by the PCC following complaints about a headline article in last month’s Telegraph that claimed that Iran was “grooming Bin Laden’s successor”. The story, universally dismissed by Middle East experts, led the organisation Campaign Iran to conduct a broader analysis of the accuracy of Mr Coughlin’s stories and the journalistic methods he uses. Analysing 44 articles by Mr Coughlin on Iran, the report finds some stark patterns in terms of his journalistic technique:

• Sources are unnamed or untraceable, often “senior Western intelligence officials” or “senior Foreign Office officials”.
• Articles are published at sensitive and delicate times where there has been a relatively positive diplomatic moves towards Iran.
• Articles contain exclusive revelations about Iran combined with eye-catchingly controversial headlines;
• The story upon which the headline is based does not usually exceed one line or at the most one paragraph. The rest of the article focuses on other, often unrelated, information.

The report also reveals that Coughlin has a history of breaking politically important stories that are later shown to be inaccurate. He is the journalist who, discovered “the fact” that Saddam Hussein could launch weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes. He was also the journalist who, in 2003, unearthed “the link” between the 9/11 hijacker, Mohammed Ata, and the Iraqi intelligence.

Professor Abbas Edalat of Campaign Iran said today: “The quoting of unnamed sources has always been an essential aspect of news reporting, but Coughlin is abusing the practice in order to give substance otherwise implausible political stories. These stories are repeated as fact on news outlets and websites across the world. They cannot be easily challenged because the unnamed source can never be revealed. During the build-up to the invasion of Iraq Coughlin was behind two very influential stories that helped pave the path to war. Both were later found to be completely untrue. We must be vigilant against similar inaccuracies being used to prepare the path for intervention against Iran, and we call on the PCC to take action against Coughlin and to safeguard the integrity and accuracy of our press.”

The report, ‘Conning the Nation: An Analysis of Con Coughlin’s Reportage on Iran’ has been compiled by Campaign Iran, based on research led by Dr Majid Tafreshi.

For more information visit

http://www.campaigniran.org/

Appendix 1
Sources used by Coughlin’s for his articles published in the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph within the last one year.
10/10/2006: “The West woke up too late to the nuclear threat of rogue states” Source: none.
04/08/2006: “Teheran fund pays war compensation to Hizbollah families” Source: “A senior security official”.
21/07/2006: “Meanwhile, Iran gets on with its bomb”Source: none.
14/07/2006: “Israeli crisis is a smoke screen for Iran's nuclear ambitions” Source: none.
13/07/2006: “Cat and mouse games on border that is 'our front line with Iran’” Source: An Israeli soldier.
12/06/2006: “Iran accused of hiding secret nuclear weapons site” Source: A senior western diplomat”
11/04/2006: “The West can't let Iran have the bomb” Source: “An official closely involved in the IAEA's negotiations with Iran”
07/04/2006: “Iran has missiles to carry nuclear warheads” Source: “A senior US official”
07/04/2006: “UN officials find evidence of secret uranium enrichment plant” Sources: “A diplomat closely involved in the IAEA's negotiations with Teheran” and “A senior diplomat attached to the IAEA headquarters in Vienna”.
04/04/2006: “Iran's spies watching us, says Israel”Sources: “A senior Israeli military commander” and “an officer with Israel's northern command”.
06/03/2006: “Teheran park 'cleansed' of traces from nuclear site” Source: “A senior western official”
11/02/2006: “Iran plant has restarted its nuclear bomb-making equipment” Source: “A senior Western intelligence official”
30/01/2006: “Iran sets up secret team to infiltrate UN nuclear watchdog, say officials” Source: “a senior western intelligence official”
16/01/2006: “Iran could go nuclear within three years” Sources: “A senior western intelligence officer” and “an intelligence official”
27/11/2005: “Teheran secretly trains Chechens to fight in Russia” Source: “a senior intelligence official”
29/10/2005: “Smuggling route [from Iran] opened to supply Iraqi insurgents” Source: “The National Council of Resistance of Iran”

Campaign Iran

Additions

Con Coughlin is a MI6 I/Ops (Information Operations) spook?

30.01.2007 14:33

If he isn't then he is, as a minimum, a top pusher of MI6 disinfo:

Back in 2000 the British Journalism Review remarked: "officers of MI6... had been supplying Coughlin with material for years."

http://www.moonofalabama.org/2006/11/ides_of_march.html

Coughlin has: "been outed, in the past, for publishing propaganda for MI6"

http://www.ministryoftruth.org.uk/2006/11/17/i-wonder-are-we-being-coughlind-here/

"Coughlin... was dependent on MI6 for the discreditable details about the alleged counterfeiting scam."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/shayler/article/0,2763,339990,00.html

"Con Coughlin - described in The Guardian (7 March 1999) as someone with “good contacts in MI6” "

http://www.salaam.co.uk/themeofthemonth/january03_index.php?l=7

"Con Coughlin... set up two lengthy briefings - on October 25 and October 31 - with a senior MI6 officer with whom he had dealt for several years."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,178092,00.html

MI6
Homepage: http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/nbbw.cgi?Gw=%22Con+Coughlin%22+mi6

MI6... had been supplying Coughlin with material for years

30.01.2007 18:01

British journalists – and British journals – are being manipulated by the secret intelligence agencies, and I think we ought to try and put a stop to it.

The manipulation takes three forms. The first is the attempt to recruit journalists to spy on other people, or for spies to go themselves under journalistic “cover”. This occurs today and it has gone on for years. It is dangerous, not only for the journalist concerned, but for other journalists who get tarred with the espionage brush. Farzad Bazoft was a colleague of mine on the London Observer when he was executed by Saddam Hussein for espionage. It did not, in a sense, matter whether he was really a spy or not. Either way, he ended up dead.

The second form of manipulation that worries me is when intelligence officers are allowed to pose as journalists in order to write tendentious articles under false names. Evidence of this only rarely comes to light, but two examples have surfaced recently – mainly because of the whistleblowing activities of a couple of renegade officers – David Shayler from MI5 and Richard Tomlinson from MI6.

The third sort of manipulation is the most insidious – when intelligence agency propaganda stories are planted on willing journalists, who disguise their origin from their readers. There is – or has been until recently – a very active programme by the secret agencies to colour what appears in the British press, called, if publications by various defectors can be believed, “I/Ops”. That is an abbreviation for Information Operations, and I am – unusually – in a position to provide some information about it.

Let us take that third allegation first. Black propaganda – false material where the source is disguised – has been a tool of British intelligence agencies since the days of the war, when the Special Operations Executive got up to all kinds of tricks with clandestine radio stations, to drip pornography and pessimism into the ears of impressionable German soldiers. Post-war, this unwholesome game mutated into the anti-Soviet Information Research Department. Its task was ostensibly to plant anti-communist stories in the press of the third world, but its lurid tales of Marxist drunkenness and corruption sometimes leaked back to confuse the readers of the British media. A colourful example of the way these techniques expand to meet the exigencies of the hour came in the early 1970s, when the readers of the News of the World found before their eyes – and no doubt to their bewilderment – a front page splash, Russian Sub in IRA plot sensation, complete with aerial photograph of a Soviet conning tower awash off the coast of Donegal. That was the work of Hugh Mooney of the IRD, an organisation which was eventually closed down in 1977. Its spirit did not die, however. Nearly 25 years later, readers of the Sunday Telegraph were regaled with a dramatic story about the son of Col Gadafy of Libya and his alleged connection to a currency counterfeiting plan.

The story was written by Con Coughlin, the paper’s then chief foreign correspondent, and it was falsely attributed to a “British banking official”. In fact, it had been given to him by officers of MI6, who, it transpired, had been supplying Coughlin with material for years.

British Journalism Review
Homepage: http://www.bjr.org.uk/data/2000/no2_leigh.htm

Comments

Hide the following 47 comments

United States

30.01.2007 13:55

have published that north korea is aiding Iran to build a nuke long befor Con.It was in a report re Irans missle stocks and capability.

Bollocks

here is

30.01.2007 14:57

a jan 24th 2007 link braking the story.

http://www.ntnews.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,7034,21110039%255E401,00.html

mmm

Miscellaneous Porky Pies - Operation Mass Appeal

30.01.2007 15:39

Here's another little jewel in the crown of British intelligence which Scott Ritter blew the whistle on: Operation Mass Appeal. Imagine that you're a British spy and you want to get some bullshit facts out there in the public domain and the mass media, but you don't want it traced back to you. Nor do you want to annoy British newspaper editors if they rumble that the facts you are trying to peddle are as false as a Labour Party manifesto pledge. What do you do? It's such a dilemma. I'll give you a little clue. It beings with 'L' and ends in 'ie'.

Why not invent a ridiculous sounding intelligence operation and then instruct all your spooks who have contact with journalists (half of them probably are journalists) to plant fake facts in the foreign press about how scary Iraq really is? Hey presto! You've got Operation Mass Appeal on your hands, created solely to gently coax the British public around to believing that Saddam was armed to the gunnels and that his country should be invaded.
Initially, Operation Mass Appeal was there to prop up the sanctions regime, but it soon became a conduit for planting stories in papers which showed that there was no other way to deal with Saddam but military intervention.
It was launched in the late 1990s on Tony Blair's watch and saw claims crop up - or 'surface' as the spooks like to say - about Saddam developing nerve agents and other evil super weapons of doom. These appeared in newspapers in countries like Poland or India or South Africa. Nations which were all non-aligned at the time.
Once the stories appeared in a foreign paper, dumb-ass British reporters would leap on them joyfully as free copy and reprint them back home. It was a job well done as far as the government was concerned, and it just goes to show you how useless so much of the British press really is. Too many journalists are lazy, conservative by nature, cheerleaders for the Establishment and the ruling class and unquestioning supporters of the status quo. Another swathe is so cynical that the bulk of them have had a humanity-bypass and barely blink when confronted with something truly immoral. Operation Mass Appeal was the perfect confection to feed lazy, drugged and jaded little sheep. You know when you hear about a journalist taking a politician to lunch? Well, think Operation Mass Appeal on a tiny scale. That journalist is there so he or she can repeat to you in print the lies that the politician is telling him or her face-to-face. The hack is your bullshit intermediary; your crap channel. That's freedom of information for you in Britain today.
The government has admitted that Operation Mass Appeal did exist, but swears that no misinformation was planted. Yeah, right. One government spokesman even had the audacity to say: 'There were things about Saddam's regime and his weapons that the public needed to know.' What he meant to say was: 'There were made-up things about Saddam's regime and his non-existent weapons that we wanted the public to know.' I often wonder how these 'government spokesmen' - who are, after all, supposed to be unpartisan civil servants - sleep at night.

Ritter says he sat in on meetings where MI6 officers discussed the best way to manipulate public opinion. 'The aim was to convince the public that Iraq was a far greater threat than it actually was,' he added. 'Stories ran in the media about secret underground facilities in Iraq and on-going programmes [to produce WMDJ. They were sourced to western intelligence and all of them were garbage.'
One of the key figures involved in Operation Mass Appeal was Sir Derek Plumbly, former director of the Middle East department at the Foreign Office and now the UK's Ambassador to Egypt. Plumbly worked hand-inglove with MI6 to promote theUK's Middle East policy.
Ritter met two men and a woman from MI6 at a lunch in London in June 1998 to discuss Operation Mass Appeal. They discussed what information could be planted in foreign papers which would inevitably 'feed back' to Britain and America. 'What MI6 was determined to do by the selective use of intelligence was to give the impression that Saddam still had WMD or was making them, and thereby legitimise sanctions and military action against Iraq.'
Ritter again pointed to Dr David Kelly's possible involvement in underhand intelligence activities, either wittingly or unwittingly, when he noted that Kelly may have been used by MI6 to pass on fake facts to journalists. 'Kelly was a known and government-approved conduit with the media,' he said. What an irony that Kelly's own flirtation with the BBC contributed to his suicide and caused the playing-card walls of the government's case for war to come tumbling down.
This use of MI6 as a so-called 'back channel' for government lies was judged a success by all those involved. The cack that was being printed in the papers about Saddam hiding his weapons and building assorted doommachines ramped up public support for sanctions and laid the foundation stones for the British people and Parliament listlessly backing the inevitable use of military force. It's a wonder that MI6 didn't get totally carried away and plant a story saying that Saddam had developed a laser on the moon or a Death Star with which he planned to destroy the entire planet. If they had, then the press mob in the UK would have sucked it up like leeches and run a graphic showing Saddam kitted out in a full Darth Vadar Nazi spacecostume under the headline EARTH: 45 MINUTES FROM SPACE-STATION DESTRUCTION.

Neil Mackay

Scott Ritter

30.01.2007 16:34

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#UNSCOM_inspections_1991-1998

I like this one:

'In August 1998, Ritter resigned his position as UN weapons inspector and sharply criticized the Clinton administration and the U.N. Security Council for not being vigorous enough about insisting that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction be destroyed. Ritter also accused U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan of assisting Iraqi efforts at impeding UNSCOM's work. "Iraq is not disarming," Ritter said on August 27, 1998, and in a second statement, "Iraq retains the capability to launch a chemical strike." '

sceptic

Critter

30.01.2007 17:51

And Ritter was also a US marine. The fact that he can admit he was wrong and work to undo his previous mistakes before the war is obviously to his credit though. That fact that Coughlin is still pumping out this propaganda is obviously not to his credit. And that fact you choose to siderail this discussion on journalist-spooks shows where you are coming from.

wonder

30.01.2007 19:56

what MI5 / MI6 spooks operate on here.

MI2

Spooks on IM

30.01.2007 22:20

Well I know one did for sure, claimed to be here from 'day one'. I could name names ( phone numbers, addresses, photos etc ) but that tends to degenerate the wire and the posts get hidden since it is simply one persons word against another to strangers. But don't use the 'MI2' tag as a Spook-plant predecessor used 'MI5' and he wasn't being ironic - at least not as ironic as Con calling himself Con. Besides the fact that on an anonymous site like this creeps like that tend to post discreditable comments under other peoples names. Suffice it to say that every public forum that gets any amount of attention will get attention from spooks. A whole block of Madison Avenue advertising / PR folk volunteered to do the neo-cons viral-advertising for them, disrupting and even destroying any forum of dissent. The Sunday Herald forum was shut down by dirty tricks after the US agent their was roundly humiliated.

So judge each post on it's own stand-alone merits and don't go by names. Any post that is too cynical, dismissive or pessimistic should be treated as suspect. Any poster who is regularly cynical, dismissive or pessimistic likewise. Anyone who claims expertise should be challenged on their supposed expertise. And one thing I've learned from hard experience, if you have a good or worthy action that relies upon secrecy, don't recruit here or from other anonymous sites, recruit from you own friends and family.

And if you doubt my advice - and I can prove I have been too damn poor for too damn long to be on anyones payroll - just trust your own common sense. There are spies here, sometimes they post disinformation, mostly they just listen. Sceptic, got anything to say at this point ?

Appreciated dp

30.01.2007 22:46

MI2 Now MI0

hey, dp ...

31.01.2007 00:13

where am I coming from?

sceptic

Andrew Marr compromised

31.01.2007 09:08

Andrew Marr, British political correspondent, said in a recent BBC report (10 July 2003) that senior sources in Whitehall had "virtually ruled out the possibility of finding the weapons" (of mass destruction). Marr speculated on what happened to the absent WMDs, still unable to acknowledge the original deception and still seemingly unaware that Mossad's deception was still working.

"But as time has gone on," said Marr, "those weapons don't seem to be there and the best explanation going around at the moment is that, some time shortly before the war, Saddam Hussein destroyed them or hid them beyond discovery." Saddam said he had destroyed them in his report to the UN. Why, by anyone's logic, would he have "hid them beyond discovery" instead of using them against his enemies?

The so-called intelligence that Bush and Blair depended on came from Mossad, and Bush and Blair wouldn't dare acknowledge that. Mossad faked or doctored the evidence that they had to be convincing enough for Bush and Blair to act on it. Mossad, under Sharon's guidance, wanted Iraq eliminated from any threat to Israel, and they wanted Bush and Blair to do it for them.

The only WMDs in Iraq were those supplied by the US or manufactured under a US umbrella when Iraq was doing the US's dirty work with Iran. As both Scott Ritter and Imad Khadduri have said, whatever WMDs left there were discovered and destroyed. But the reliable senior UN inspector (Ritter) became the object of a Zionist-controlled media campaign in America to discredit him; and the knowledgeable Iraqi scientist (Khadduri) was told to keep quiet until not even his expert knowledge could stop the Bush and Blair invasion.

As one distinguished journalist recently observed, "The problem with people like Marr (in fact, most correspondents with 'high-level contacts'), is that, in order to keep on the right side of these contacts, they compromise themselves by peddling part of the official line."

The resulting shoddy journalism will have to be corrected by its practitioners before the exposure it gets in alternative news sources increase their popularity and fully reveal the complicit deceptions of the press.

dp
Homepage: http://www.redress.btinternet.co.uk/pjballes10.htm

anti-sceptic

31.01.2007 09:21

I don't know where you are coming from. I know where your wage-slip gets stamped though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIS_Building

Now it is good to be able to be sceptical, but to be constantly cynical, dismissive and pessimistic - well, you're slip is showing. Can you link to a single positive or encouraging post here that you've written ? And yet you keep coming back - why ?

That's the thing about British intelligence, at least the sort of junior-school spies that get assigned to us, they aren't that intelligent.

MI6 officers used journalistic cover on 4 of every 10 missions

31.01.2007 09:42

BOB GARFIELD: British agent James Bond faced death at the hands of many a polite-talking madman. Maybe he could have avoided confrontation all together if he'd flashed the bad guys a press card. A spy masquerading as a journalist makes a fine movie plot, but now the British Secret Service, also known as MI6 has been accused of adopting that very scenario. According to Richard Tomlinson, the renegade MI6 officer whose whistle-blowing book The Big Breach: From Top Secret to Maximum Security was just published in Russia, MI6 officers used journalistic cover on 4 of every 10 missions in conflicts ranging from Afghanistan to the Balkans. Tim Gopless from the National Union of Journalists in Britain joins me. Mr. Gopless, if we're to believe what we hear from Richard Tomlinson, the British intelligence community and Fleet Street are dangerously intertwined. How much truth do you think there is to these charges?

MAN: I'm certain it's true that Richard Tomlinson had a forged NUJ press card when he was in Bosnia because there were many people trying to get into Bosnia at that time, and the only way you could get in was on a press card. You, you had to get a card issued by the United Nations during the war there, and the United Nations only, only gave press cards to people who came along with national press credentials. Journalists who are working in war zones are always in danger, and if it becomes known to any of the parties that there are people going around claiming to be journalists with apparently authentic journalist I.D. on them, the snipers and the warring factions in the dispute are going to think twice and they'll start thinking that journalists are spies, and we can't have that.

BOB GARFIELD:In the short term, obviously having spies operate under journalistic cover serves the interests of for example the British government, however in the medium term and in the long run it can't possibly serve the British government to have its legitimate journalists in danger, can it?

MAN: Well there's an implication in what you're saying that the, the intelligence services in Britain are subject to control by the government. Many people think it's almost the other way round. The intelligence services are very much a law to themselves, and are protected by our formidable official secrecy structure. I think most people believe that when the government denies that they're true, the government are telling the truth because they don't know, because the, the security service don't tell them!

BOB GARFIELD: I gather MI6 has had no comment on any of this.

MAN:No, MI6, M--MI6 never breaks cover. It is government ministers in, in the case of MI6 the foreign and commonwealth office, they are the public face; they answer the questions. The - MI5 and MI6 never say anything publicly at all. I mean this is a real problem in this country and, and if I may say so, quite different from, from the United States where the CIA appears to have a degree of public accountability or at least there's a degree of public knowledge about its activities.

BOB GARFIELD:So where does this leave the National Union of Journalists -- what can you do under circumstances like this when you're dealing with a black agency that doesn't even comment on the charges much less act to protect legitimate working journalists?

MAN:Well on the specific point of, of, of disguise and masquerading, then we are talking to the foreign office which is the government department that notionally controls MI6. But most importantly we are involved in permanent campaigning against the protected secret world of the British security agencies, and then the Official Secrets Act itself is going to have to be changed because of legal changes in Britain over the last couple of years -- we've now introduced a new law - a human rights law - kind of equivalent to the Bill of Rights which gives people rights - for on-- for instance of freedom of expression and rights to stand a fair trial, both of which the Official Secrets Act procedures appear to be in breach of. So there is going to be a campaign to change the official secrecy laws over the next year or so in our country.

careful, dp, your paranoia is showing ...

31.01.2007 11:25

and the deduction is on a par with the rest of your analysis.

Why on earth would MI whatever want to read or post on Indymedia? It cliams to be a news outlet, but I've never yet read any 'news' on it.

Most of the posters are nutters - US bomb caused the tsunami! - no planes ever hit the WTC! - the Holocaust is a myth! - or are of the 'Bush Eats Babies for Breakfast' persuasion.

Comments on foreign affairs are centred on Bush, Israel, Iraq, Bush, Iraq, Israel.

We hear a lot about the 'apartheid wall'. Now that's a good bit of propaganda and disinformation. 'Apartheid' - very loaded word, isn't it? The wall was built to keep suicide bombers out, and was very successful until the other day. Of course, people reading the 'news' here won't know, because when someone posted the suicide bombing it was immediately hidden.

Ah, and no 'censorship' like we get in the 'lying mass media'. No, they just 'hide' posts, not delete them. So you can find them. If you know how. Like Author Dent and the plans for the bypass ...

As for Cuba - any post remotely critical - hide it! I think if Jesus and Mohammed appeared hand in hand on the top of Mount Sinai tomorrow, and denounced Cuba's human rights record, any posting on the subject would immediately be hidden.

Genocide and Rape? Darfur? Forget it, mate. At least everyone here has.

Starvation in Zimbabwe? Yawn.

Plus, of course, the pervasive Jew hating, rather thinly disguised as 'anti-zionist'.

That's why some of my posts might seem a tad cynical.

sceptic

another IM spy exposed by himself

31.01.2007 12:15

"Why on earth would MI whatever want to read or post on Indymedia? It cliams to be a news outlet, but I've never yet read any 'news' on it."

So what is your supposed motivation for posting here if you believe that ? C'mon, I want your 'back-story' ? You've been caught with you pants down so often you'll soon be reassigned.

"Most of the posters are nutters - US bomb caused the tsunami! - no planes ever hit the WTC! - the Holocaust is a myth! - or are of the 'Bush Eats Babies for Breakfast' persuasion."

A few of them are nutters for sure. A few genuine nutters, but more of the sad-posts are down to your colleagues. And the fact that your colleagues care to smear us shows the rest of us how important we are to you. In that way your posts are a great vindication to the rest of us.

"Comments on foreign affairs are centred on Bush, Israel, Iraq, Bush, Iraq, Israel."

And why shouldn't they be ? - ps you forgot Blair. Unsurprisingly enough.

"We hear a lot about the 'apartheid wall'. Now that's a good bit of propaganda and disinformation. 'Apartheid' - very loaded word, isn't it? The wall was built to keep suicide bombers out, and was very successful until the other day. Of course, people reading the 'news' here won't know, because when someone posted the suicide bombing it was immediately hidden."

Aw, diddums, a couple of Israelis got killed. You want to compare relative death rates between Israelis and Palestinians over the past decade ? And here was I thinking you were MI5 when you sem intent to portray yourself as Mossad.

"As for Cuba - any post remotely critical - hide it! I think if Jesus and Mohammed appeared hand in hand on the top of Mount Sinai tomorrow, and denounced Cuba's human rights record, any posting on the subject would immediately be hidden."

Fidel Castro is an awful dictator ? Compared to which other leader exactly ? Remind me, where did Cuba occupy again ?

"Genocide and Rape? Darfur? Forget it, mate. At least everyone here has."

We don't need to look to the Sudan for genocide and rape. We can look at our own troops behaviour in Iraq.

"Starvation in Zimbabwe? Yawn."

And who did that again ? Not the same glorious leader who killed 500,000 children in Iraq through illegal and immoral sanctions ? Not your boss with your help ? Seek help you murderous little shite.

"Plus, of course, the pervasive Jew hating, rather thinly disguised as 'anti-zionist'.
That's why some of my posts might seem a tad cynical. "

That's also why some of your posts are received as cynical.

Why do I read Indymedia?

31.01.2007 13:12

I read a lot of stuff, left and right, PowerLine and Indymedia. It's often amusing to see what they have to say about each other.

I post when I see something which is wilfully misleading.

'Aw, diddums, a couple of Israelis got killed. You want to compare relative death rates between Israelis and Palestinians over the past decade ? And here was I thinking you were MI5 when you sem intent to portray yourself as Mossad.'

Again, you miss the point. It's the one sideness and suppression of fact. A suicide bombing did occur. But the post was promptly hidden. Why? Which 'editorial guidline' did it breach?

'Fidel Castro is an awful dictator ? Compared to which other leader exactly ? Remind me, where did Cuba occupy again ?'

You miss the point. Why are the posts hidden? Which 'editorial guidline' do they breach?

""Starvation in Zimbabwe? Yawn."

And who did that again ? Not the same glorious leader who killed 500,000 children in Iraq through illegal and immoral sanctions ? Not your boss with your help ? Seek help you murderous little shite."

You seriously think that Blair and Bush are responsible for the death by starvation of the people in Zimbabwe? I think it's you that needs to seek help.

Please do tell us how this is the case.

'
We don't need to look to the Sudan for genocide and rape.'

No, maybe you don't. But it would be a relief to know that some one here cared- which apparently they don't.

sceptic

at last

31.01.2007 14:06

I think DP protests too much, must have something to hide I think.

Very very cunning, just becasue you claim to be poor doesn't mean you aren't in the pay of the state. Your brief is to clog up the newswires with paranoid ranting so that people get disillusioned and dont bother reading anymore.

Don't think we can't see through your smokescreen of lies and deceit DP, I know who you work for.

And sceptic, I agree, Indymedia posters are all insane - at least the ones that work for the security services like DP are.

MI13

blank him

31.01.2007 16:50

From the off Indymedia has had a resident twat on board, if I remember rightly the first one was Harliquin
lonely ex cop type. he left after his replacement had got nicely settled in, then I have lost count of all
types that have been on board, some of them put comments on just about everything and others were more
specialized, the pro israeli's coming out more in the school holidays maybe.
Now we have Sceptic and Architect as the main critics they could be related, Twilight seems to have emigrated.
Their tactics seem to work they specialize in curt little one liners which only address a very limited amount of the content of the original article and provide links to corporate media or other similar bull shit.
On this thread I am not even sure what Sceptic is actually not just arguing in his spare time .
But really we should just ignore these jerks.

Picatrix

...

31.01.2007 18:46

Funnily enough there really are people out there who spend there time on message boards arguing their politics. It doesn't mean they have to be spies, although I'm sure if I went to Townhall.com and started posting all my views some guys would denounce me as being Al Qaeda or something.

Having said that, Sceptic is quite sus the way he keeps posting his extremely non-sceptical, "the US and UK are the best countries in the world, they have wonderful, selfless foreign policy ra ra ra, we liberated Iraq, freedom freedom inc", despite the fact that for these days, all this has been shown to be bullshit.

Thanks Sceptic, for being the cheerleader for war with Iraq. It really did a whole lot of good, didn't it. I feel so much safer now Iraq has been transformed into a bloody chaos, where thousands of pissed of people can go, train in guerilla warfare, and learn all about car bombs and suicide bombings. That was really a smart move.

If you do work for MI6, could you tell them that if they're really concerned about British security, they should take out George Bush and Tony Blair. I think we would all sleep more soundly at night.

Djinn

Now, if you'd really been paying attention ..

31.01.2007 21:25

and sit up at the back, there!

"the US and UK are the best countries in the world, they have wonderful, selfless foreign policy ra ra ra, we liberated Iraq, freedom freedom inc",

I've never said that, nor am I likely to. No country has a 'selfless' foreign policy.

Iraq was a monumental blunder.

On the other hand, would you have rather America have stayed out of the war in Europe? There was no necessity for the US to fight Hitler. Yet quite a few people ought to be grateful.

And yes, you can point me to the nasty regimes supported by the US during the Cold War.

One the other hand, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland et al are quite grateful for the pressure exerted on the USSR.

And would you give Afghanistan back to the Taleban?

sceptic

Sceptic the Muppet

01.02.2007 00:48

I realised the scourge of indymedia was a spin merchant years ago. His emphatic opinion that Depleted Uranium is harmless was the clincher for me back in 2003-04.

BTW sceptic, Iraq could only be described as a “monumental blunder” if the outcome had not been foreseen. Blair was warned what would happen. Even I worked out what would happen, and I’m no expert. Why could the ordinary guy on the street seen the consequences but our MI could not? Hardly a blunder! The whole charade was patently orchestrated.

Also, I notice sceptic has suddenly developed poor spelling skills, can’t possibly be a spook then…? Or an educated journo like Nick Cohen..

Citizen Intelligence

Hoisted by your own petard

01.02.2007 05:44

Sceptic seems quite keen to talk about anything except MI5 influence over Brtish journalism...odd that. In fact he throws up so many distracting statements it's hard to know where to start ripping him apart and it probably is better ignoring him. I'll answer his question though "And would you give Afghanistan back to the Taleban? "

Unlike our 'intelligence services', I wouldn't have been stupid enough or evil enough to give it to them in the first place. I do think it is time we gave Afghanistan back to the Afghans though.

The CIA, MI6 and Pakistani ISI deliberately funded, equipped, armed and trained the extremist militant Muslims in Afghanistan to 'lure in' the Soviet Union. Zbigniew Brzezinski still boasts about that, although a bit more quietly these days. Back in 1977 his Nationalities Working Group was formed to inflame ethnic strife in the USSR, especially Islamic populations who they hoped would “explode into genocidal fury”. They ramped up aid - including CIA and military advisors on the ground- to anti-Soviet forces in Afghanistan in 1978.

Once Soviet troops entered to support their satellite state, US and UK aid went through the roof. They passed 2000 Stinger SAMs to the Afghan militia and are still trying to but them back. They brought some of the 'heroic mujahadeen' to friendly countries for military training - including a young Ossama Bin Laden to Scotland for SAS training.

To be 'hoisted by your own petard' means to be blown up by your own bomb, to be the agent of your own destruction. Now if we are charitable to Sceptics pals at MI5, we might conclude that Islamic terrorism is an unfortunate and unforseen 'blowback' from a cunning plan which wrecked the Soviet Union. But anyone who can remember the Berlin wall falling will remember all the talk of peace-dividends and decreases in military spending. And the 'military-industrial complex' (to quote that left-winger President Eisenhower) couldn't survive that. There was a Soviet-Union sized hole in the 'defence' budgets and so a new enemy had to be created to justify all those lucrative contracts. So began the demonisation of Islam. It was quite open and was widely discussed at the time.

British fucking Intelligence. It is big but it is not at all clever.
By the way Sceptic, I wasn't talking about you when I said I knew a spy here. But thanks for exposing yourself.

dp
Homepage: http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/entity.jsp?entity=zbigniew_brzezinski

British Intelligence and journalism

01.02.2007 09:26

Do the Intelligence services feed stories to the press? Of course they do. Every organisation in the country, from Oxfam to BA wants a favourable press.

Are the stories true? Well, no newspaper editor wants to be made to look like an idiot, and so will tread very carefully before publishing anything that looks too absurd. But just because a journalist has been given a story, doesn't mean that the contents are automatically false.

'The demonisation of the Muslim world'. It doesn't seem as though parts of it need much demonising.

Try Googling for the killings of Christians in Indonesia or Pakistan.

Ask the family of Bigley.

And haven't you been reading the accounts of the trial currently in progress? Or has that all been made up by the Intelligence services too?

I hadn't noticed any drop off in my spelling skills, but if there has been, put it down to Miss Moneypenny being on leave.

sceptic

scaredy spooks

01.02.2007 13:42

Oxfam don't invent false stories and plant them in the foriegn press to justify an illegal, immoral and genocidal invasion. You don't even protect your own. Oxfam aren't responsible for the outing of security service staff like David Kelly or Valerie Plame. Still think Saddam was buying uranium from the Niger - nah, that was your lie wasn't it ?

It's worse than just the security services planting false stories, it is the political manipulation and bullying of the security services into helping create disasterous foriegn policy blunders aimed solely at the personal profit of a small cabal of ultra-rich politicos. It is the debasement of both journalists and the security services. And the spooks were too scared to stand up to them. Cowards. British soldiers are dying because you were scared of losing your jobs. Britain is now a major terrorist target because you were scard of losing your pensions. Hundreds of thousands of innocents died for no reason other than to enrich your bosses. Treacherous cowards.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Rockingham

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Special_Plans

Obsessives

01.02.2007 15:50

Sorry, dp, I can't lose my job with the spooks or anyone else, since I don't have a job. But you've demonstrated often enough that to you, facts are irrelevant. You believe what you want to believe, and I'm sure you'll be very content.

You did read the second part of the Rockingham article, didn't you?

As for Ritter, well, I refer you back to: my previous reference.

He does seem to have changed his mind extremely rapidly, and he's never given, as far as I can see, any reason for his changing so radically from hawk to dove.

sceptic

Sunday Times confirmation of Operation Mass Appeal

01.02.2007 18:00

Of course, 'cause I'm upset by the fact we were lied into a war that's killed hundreds of thousands you call me obsessive, paranoid and even claim facts are irrelevant. Funny how Sceptic smears, distracts and dismisses but doesn't actually ever say anything. Strange too that the Sunday Times could claim Ritter met with MI6 as part of Operation Mass Appeal and that only the official secrets act prevented them from revealing their names.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5433.htm

So Sceptic, if you aren't a spook, if you've never read any news here and all the posters are nutters, I'll ask again, what reason do you have to keep posting your deluded far-right views here over these years ?

Since that seem to be a question you simply can't answer, I'll give you some easy ones.

Do you deny that the niger-uranium deal was a lie ?
That the mobile bio-weapons labs stoy was a lie ?
That the 45 minutes from destruction claim was a lie ?
That Ritters predictions that no wmd would be found were in fact vindicated by subsequent events ?

dq (yawn)

01.02.2007 19:32

A lie? The only really dodgy one was the 45 minute claim.

Try looking at this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_wmd#Theories_in_the_aftermath_of_the_2003_war

You'll see that there's a lot of 'on the one hand, on the other ... were there, weren't there..'

And it might have escaped your notice that even it they were wrong, that does not mean they were lying. It means they got it wrong. How and why they got it wrong is another matter.

sceptic

Subtle shifts in conversation…

01.02.2007 21:34

Did I just read the scourge of indymedia call others obsessive? I guess he has at least learnt to accuse his opponents of his own most obvious flaw.

Why is it that sceptic never seems to give much attention to the main points of an accusation/debate but instead seems to spend far more energy on the more irrelevant aspects of an accusation/debate?

Manipulator of the mind Derren Brown says “lairs like to shift conversations to less troublesome areas and, therefore, may not answer you directly but may become obsessed with irrelevant aspects of an accusation.” Obviously, therefore, a trained liar will be far more subtle in shifting the conversation than an ordinary liar.

Besides if some accuse you of being a spook would you defend yourself at length without really addressing the main issues and instead expand the debate in all directions? Or would you just laugh and move on?

Of course pointing this out will no doubt mean sceptic will now realise he should act as you or I would to avoid any further suspicion. But there again why change tactic now if it is not in his nature in the first place…?

What will he do? Whatever it is I bet he will not address the main issues.

Indyreader

liar

01.02.2007 21:44

"The only really dodgy one was the 45 minute claim."

Bullshit. The Niger claim was famously used by Colin Powell at the UN and Tony Blair in the dodgy dossier to justify war. And it was false, based on childish forgeries. And they both knew it was wrong before they made their claims.

The mobile weapons lab was a story used by Chalabis INC to justify the war. And the CIA knew it was false because it was them that had made it up in the first place.

"even it they were wrong, that does not mean they were lying."

But they were lying,. They have been proven to be lying. Just like you've been proven to be lying now. Now, I'll ask you a third time, as a supposedly sane person happy to accuse others of paranoia and obsessive behaviour, and as someone totally dismissive of Indymedia, why have you disassembled here for years if you aren't a spook ?

whatever

01.02.2007 23:26

If it makes it happy for you to think I'm a 'spook', then, fine, go ahead, think it.

if it makes you happy to say 'they lied', then, fine go ahead, say it.

either way, it matters bugger all to me.

sceptic

Whatever, [NAME REMOVED]

02.02.2007 01:23

I know this post won't stand, but I have video of you, I have photos of you, I have proof of your identitiy. I have your own testimony via email and can prove your identity from your posting times, spelling mistakes and bizarre political views.

Jeez, IM volunteers, can't I print one photo of this agent simply to save other campaigns from being infiltrated in a similar way to the way Trident Ploughshares has been infiltrated ?
Just this once ? Or can you suggest a way I can 'out' a long-term infiltraitor without breaching guidelines ? I have proof but no media willing or interested in publicising it. Given activists here are his bosses main target surely you should have a forum for this sort of thing.

“it matters bugger all to me.”

02.02.2007 02:03

Yeah right!

Ha Ha Ha

Now you are seriously deluded.

02.02.2007 09:27

Publish and be damned.

All I have is the sure and certain knowledge that whatever pictures/videos/emails you publish won't originate from me.

sceptic

Spelling mistakes

02.02.2007 13:18

I'm a bit dyslexic, whatever that means, but even this post is an effort. I have an odd speech impediment, though I'm not stupid, I'm a 'techies techy' I have more of a natural understanding of computers and shit like that than any of you do. Call it autism if you want but I'd disagree. It's just my own peculiarities makes me more sensitive to other peoples spelling mistakes. People mistype words for various reasons I don't understand. They mistype the words regularly whenever they are under stress, lying or drunk or doped.

Apart from my fixation upon words I'm reasonably normal. I empathise. I empathise more with victims over persecutors. I care more for Iraqi children more than British soldiers for example. I'm not stupid enough to blame British soldiers for an illegal war but I know their ignorance is more to blame for their deaths than the Iraqis.

I've argued against this war before it started. I argued against neo-con posters on other forums who would happily assume multiple identities. And it was hard to identify who was who when certain people assume more than one identitiy. So I developed a little MS-Excel macro that would check spelling mistakes against statistical posting times ( not too sophisicated I know but the concept was). It was designed for aother forum but it works here too. You have to be either evil or thick as shit to argue that DU is harmless. Few people are so fucked up tat they'd argue that. That was my first clue, before someone else pointed out the spelling mistakes which I didn't notice at first. Beyond that I've already had personal run-in's with this guy, I recruited him for an action and he immediately took over the group I was working with. The whole group is now 'dodgy' in my eyes. Their cultist-leader is a paedophile who was thrown out from Faslane for trying to instite a cult of personality.

I tried to contact other people I knew to be genuine in the wider group (TP) to warn them, but nobody was interested. So goes it. Shit happens. So with sceptics permission, here is a photo of him:

waaaay off the mark

02.02.2007 13:49

What you know about me can be written on the back of a postage stamp, or the inside or your skull, whichever is the smaller. And it's a moot point.

There is one small slight snag in your spelling mistakes spreadsheet. There is a difference between misspelling and mistyping. Many common words are often misspelled. Many are often mistyped. The two sets are not mutually exclusive, but may have some overlap

[Their are four misteaks in this sentnece. What are they?]

The trouble with issues like DU is that emotion triumphs over physics. I can see you go for he emotional approach - 'evil'. I prefer the physics.

DU.

Can you tell me the decay rate?
Can you differentiate between alpha, beta and gamma decay?
Do you know the relative penetrations of these emissions?
Why is there still uranium left on the earth after 6 billion years?

sceptic

Seceptic is a long term apologist for the 'military-industrial complex'

02.02.2007 14:34

Not only has sceptic previously alleged with some self appointed certainty that DU is harmless, he also says that the pesticide DDT is harmless and even defends corrupt pharmaceutical companies and their callous profit driven medical research. And he also refers to all those with autism as “loonies”.

See:

https://www4.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/02/284985.html?c=on

Indyreader

wrong again

02.02.2007 15:52

As you may aware, posts on Indymedia do not appear for quite some time after pressing SUBMIT. My comment about 'loonies' was referring to Captain Wardrobe and Cheryl Seal - see Captain Wardrobe's posting of 08.02.2004 22:41. That is certainly a judgement I'll stand by.

As for drug companies - name me one valuable pharmeceutical product that has come from any nationalised or state run drug firm, excluding university research.

sceptic

proof of the pudding

02.02.2007 17:02

Well the bloke I pictured claimed to my face to have been disrupting this place since day one under a variety of names, and his spelling mistakes and posting times match yours. Once i realised what he was up to he started posting discreditable posts under my name, or the names of former girlfriends of mine, and he threatened my family directly. I guess the easiest way to figure out which identities he's adopted lately is just to make sure he can't post and see who disappears. Sceptic would surely approve of that logic. Now Sceptic, still no closer to answering my one question are you ? If You think this wire is so shite why have you posted here for years if you aren't paid to ?

why do I post if I don't get paid to?

02.02.2007 17:41

Because I don't like stupidity.

Adn because I don't like people making claims that aren't true.

And what the fuck has it to do with you?

What do you want this place to be? An echo chamber?

And what's the point of posting at a place where everyone agrees with you? Where's the fun in that?

Tell you what, go along to this fellow's place, knock on the door, and ask him if he's sceptic.

sceptic

diagnosis murder !!

02.02.2007 18:15

So you've been posting here for how long - is it really years ? - cos you don't like stupidity. And yet searching through your back posts you haven't once persuaded anyone of anything. Given your stated knowledge of mental illness in others can't you see you have a problem ? So your battle against stupidity doesn't seem to be going to well. The sort of stupid people who believe Depleted Uranium is dangerous seem to be ignoring your opinions on politics. I'm the only person who is talking to you and I don't think you are as smart as you obviously do.

From personal experience, people like you who diagnose othr peoples mental faults over the internet tend to be 'projecting', a psychological term I'm sure you are familiar with. And you being a better placed doctor than me, I'd go with your diagnosis of 'Paranoid Obsessive'. You know what a rational person with a hatred for stupidity would do ? They'd stop posting on sites they rate as stupid and uninformative and take up some form of further education. That's what a rational person would do - let's see what you do.

Whoever said I was rational?

02.02.2007 19:59

Now you're making assumptions.

And I'm not really into any further education, as I have two degrees already.

sceptic

Sceptic the volunteer fake persuader?

02.02.2007 20:57

So you still say DU is harmless and the pesticide DDT which has been banned for decades and which is associated with a range of health problems including cancers and nervous and immune system disorders is also harmless.

Will you agree that GSK cover-up the suicidal effects of Seroxat? Do you also say global warming is not man made? And apart from the so-called war on terror, I bet you also support GM crops, Trident and ID cards, etc, etc.

Is there anything about the military industrial complex you do disagree with?

Your invariable trashing of all alternative opinion, including the article above, is getting tedious, predictable and giving Indymedia a bad name. Who are you and what is your motivation if you are not a paid spook?

I also note with interest a previous comment you made:

“Anyone can put up an internet site. I have several myself.” – sceptic, 08.02.2004 22:02

If you have nothing to hide you can tell us what websites you have…although I can well imagine what these may be.

Indyreader

as usual, you're wrong again

02.02.2007 22:10

For one, I do not support ID cards.

Second, I hadn't realised that DDT was part of the 'military industrial' complex.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ddt#Effects_on_human_health

'There are no substantial scientific studies which prove that DDT is particularly toxic to humans or other primates, compared to other widely-used pesticides.'

More on DDT:

http://www.reason.com/news/show/34823.html

Global warming: well, the whole Yorkshire was under glaciers a hundred thusand years ago. Unfortunately they melted. It is a mistake to think the climate is static.
Sea levels? They've risen a hundred metres or more in a hundred thousand years - let's see, a centimetre a year. Going to blame mankind for that?

Nor was I aware that I'd posted anything about the 'military industrial' complex.

You may point to DU - but no posts of mine have supported it. What they have done is to assert that DU will be the major health hazard that people claim.

If it is so dangerously radioactive, why do people in uranium mines not keel over after a week or two?

DU was used in Kosovo in 1999 - here we are, 8 years later. Any health hazards been reported?

My websites have my name on them - and I don't really want to be stalked by dp. he seems dangerously close to that already.

sceptic

Who and What

02.02.2007 23:21

I am a controversial individual who exists merely to dismiss and, therefore, subvert the efforts of independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

sceptic

Ah, very clever

03.02.2007 09:10

... but they do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

(If you haven't gathered yet, the preceding post isn't mine)

sceptic

Good article, at long last on indymedia...

29.05.2007 12:43

I tend to believe this article for once on indymedia, this good article althou’ to quote David Shayler from MI5 name is at best a bit iffy.

Jo Bloggs

Wasn't the 45 min broken first by the London Evening Standard?

01.06.2007 23:04

Wasn't the 45 min broken first by the London Evening Standard?

Jo Bloggs