Dirty Wars: The World Is A Battlefield

by Jeremy Scahill

A New York Times bestseller. Now also an Oscar-nominated documentary

In Dirty Wars, Jeremy Scahill, author of the New York Times bestseller Blackwater, takes us inside America’s new covert wars. The foot soldiers in these battles operate globally and inside the United States with orders from the White House to do whatever is necessary to hunt down, capture or kill individuals designated by the president as enemies.

Drawn from the ranks of the Navy SEALs, Delta Force, former Blackwater and other private security contractors, the CIA’s Special Activities Division and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), these elite soldiers operate worldwide, with thousands of secret commandos working in more than one hundred countries. Funded through black budgets, Special Operations Forces conduct missions in denied areas, engage in targeted killings, snatch and grab individuals and direct drone, AC-130 and cruise missile strikes. While the Bush administration deployed these ghost militias, President Barack Obama has expanded their operations and given them new scope and legitimacy.

Dirty Wars follows the consequences of the declaration that “the world is a battlefield,” as Scahill uncovers the most important foreign policy story of our time. From Afghanistan to Yemen, Somalia and beyond, Scahill reports from the frontlines in this high-stakes investigation and explores the depths of America’s global killing machine. He goes beneath the surface of these covert wars, conducted in the shadows, outside the range of the press, without effective congressional oversight or public debate. And, based on unprecedented access, Scahill tells the chilling story of an American citizen marked for assassination by his own government.

As US leaders draw the country deeper into conflicts across the globe, setting the world stage for enormous destabilization and blowback, Americans are not only at greater risk—we are changing as a nation. Scahill unmasks the shadow warriors who prosecute these secret wars and puts a human face on the casualties of unaccountable violence that is now official policy: victims of night raids, secret prisons, cruise missile attacks and drone strikes, and whole classes of people branded as suspected militants. Through his brave reporting, Scahill exposes the true nature of the dirty wars the United States government struggles to keep hidden.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Politics, War, Military Fiction, Middle East, Military History

680 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2012

About the author

Jeremy Scahill is an American investigative journalist and author whose work focuses on the use of private military companies.

He is the author of the best-selling book Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, winner of a George Polk Book Award.

He also serves as a correspondent for the U.S. radio and TV program Democracy Now!. Scahill is a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute and a frequent contributor to The Nation.

Reviews

[Slim Khezri · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Dirty Wars" has a somewhat different tone that Scahil's book on Blackwater. It is a rigorous history of un-declared and largely un-reported violence in many countries around the world by various parts of the United States government since Sept 11th. There is,as one might expect, a sub-text of great alarm about the deterioration of American legal standards and a profound concern about the effects of killing of thousands of people, many of them children and others who died for having the bad luck to be near a US target.

The concerns are both moral and strategic since it is not at all clear that the policies have not created far more terrorists than they have killed. But what is most striking about "Dirty Wars" is how thorough and careful it is as a work of history. There is no name calling there are no no knee-jerk left wing attitudes. There is an implicit empathy and respect for many in the military and intelligence communities who wouldn't be caught reading a copy of The Nation.It is a search for the truth in an arena that most of the media has ignored or failed to have the resolve to fully learn and analyze. It is primarily a recitation of facts which gives the book far more authority than a mere polemic and it will be a permanent part of the history of these times.

[Elmwoodblues · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was very nearly finished with this book I recommended it to a friend whom I consider quite conservative; I cautioned him that the read may appear a bit 'liberal' for his tastes. Somehow, an honest assessment of our military killing civilians in certain parts of the world has come to be seen as 'liberal' for some, but there you are.
These words, then, from the epilogue, drew me up quite short:

"No country on Earth would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders." --President Obama in Israel, Nov. 19, 2012

So, regardless of stripe, if you want to read a clear and documented (sometimes too documented, at the cost of pacing) look at how America has come to be on a 'perpetual war footing', where the entire world is the battlefield, grab this book. There is plenty of outrage to go around.

Note: last week (mid-May 2013), Obama announced a move away from, in his own words, America's perpetual war footing. I felt eerily like he had been reading Scahill, too.

[Maria Espadinha · Rating 4 out of 5]

«É proibido matar: logo, todos os assassinos serão punidos, salvo se matarem em grande quantidade e ao som de trombetas.» , Voltaire

O Terrorismo do Anti-Terrorismo

"Encontrar o pai não ia ser fácil. Era um homem procurado. Tinha a cabeça a prémio e escapara à morte por pouco mais de uma dúzia de vezes. O facto de forças poderosas em vários países procurarem o seu pai não desencorajava o rapaz. Estava cansado de ver vídeos em que pintavam o pai como terrorista e uma figura malévola. Para ele, era só o seu pai, e queria ter um último momento com ele. Mas as coisas não correram bem assim.
Três semanas depois de ter saltado pela janela da cozinha, o rapaz estava lá fora com os primos — adolescentes como ele — a preparar um piquenique, um jantar sob as estrelas. Terá sido então que ouviu os drones aproximarem-se, seguidos do zumbido dos mísseis. Foi um golpe direto. O rapaz e os primos foram despedaçados. Do rapaz só sobrou a parte de trás da cabeça, com o cabelo solto ainda preso a ela. Tinha ele feito 16 anos umas semanas antes e, agora, fora morto pelo seu próprio Governo. Era o terceiro cidadão dos EUA a ser morto, em duas semanas, em operações autorizadas pelo presidente. O primeiro fora o seu pai."

E qual o seu crime?
Procurar o pai ? Ser filho?
Ou tratou-se duma "inteligente" medida de prevenção?
- Vamos já dar cabo do filho (subentenda-se chacinar), não vá ele ser um futuro lider terrorista. Afinal de contas, filho de peixe sabe nadar, certo?! E se acaso morrerem mais alguns (mortes colaterais) não há problema! Aquilo come tudo da mesma panela - é tudo da mesma raça!

É inquestionável que o terrorismo é um mal a combater!
Mas se retaliarmos com mais terrorismo, alimentam-se desejos de vingança e multiplicam-se inimigos. E o mal prolífera, contrariando o objectivo desejado!...


Nota: Para quem preferir, existe uma edição em português de Portugal, publicada pela Marcador

[Leftbanker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Even if you don’t like the work Scahill does (and I do) you must admit that he is one of the few people out there doing actual journalism instead of sitting in a TV studio spewing out opinions. We have made the news such an entertainment industry that most people don’t know the difference between news and editorial.

Most of this is old news for people who bothered to keep themselves truly informed during the Iraq War disaster. Reading it in this kind of detail is depressing. Like the guy said at the end of the fine German film, The Lives of Others, I can’t believe my country was run by men like these.

I will admit that Obama has committed many sins as president but for fuck’s sake, compared to the Bush regime this is like Camelot. Dick Cheney made $32 million in the year before he became the vice president. Bush’s family is heavily invested in oil. An idiot could connect the dots that led to our completely failed invasion of Iraq. I don’t see this level of collusion in the Obama cabinet.

[David Stephens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jeremy Scahill has written here what is likely the most comprehensive reference book on the U.S.'s foreign policy post-9/11, focusing mostly on the country's covert and clandestine affairs. While he does cover the history of the CIA and other earlier issues, he spends most of his time reporting on how things have changed over the last decade.

The book is composed of relatively short occurrences from many different times and places, detailing aspects of the conventional military, the CIA, the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), specific terrorists—confirmed and suspected—and the differences and similarities between the Bush and Obama administrations in regard to military and intelligence matters. And while, at first, these events may seem disparate and unconnected, they eventually weave together to show the bigger picture of U.S. aggression and its wide-reaching effects, which Scahill argues have increased both the ire directed at the U.S and the number of anti-American terrorists worldwide.

Ever since the Authorization for the Use of Military Force was signed into law shortly after 9/11, the two administrations have held that the world is a battlefield and, therefore, they have the authority to deploy special operations troops wherever terrorists are alleged to be plotting against the U.S. So the Bush administration implemented tactics that were questionable at best, and the Obama administration has, in many cases, normalized those tactics.

One of the book's main focuses is the use of JSOC, essentially the president's private military force. This group was charged with conducting night raids in the more troublesome countries of Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, and Yemen. While at first their methods seem to be efficient, precise, and uncontroversial ways of dispatching enemies, the evidence Scahill presents shows a much more complicated picture. He quotes career CIA case officer Philip Giraldi as saying, "the JSOC route has problems. When you use military as your cutting edge on some of these activities where you're not at war with somebody, where you're getting involved with sending people into someone else's sovereign territory, then you're opening up a can of worms that intelligence agencies were created to avoid." In many cases, JSOC was working with faulty intelligence that led to the killing of innocent civilians, including one incredible cover up that was eventually exposed. They also worked with no oversight and no accountability.

If there is a main character in the book, then it is Anwar al-Awlaki, an American of Yemenese descent who eventually became a radicalized cleric denouncing the U.S. because of its foreign policy in Muslim countries. The book does a fantastic job dispelling numerous myths about Awlaki, such as the claim that the U.S. attempted to have him extradited from Yemen or captured, which it never did. It also doesn't let Awalki off the hook by presenting him as some totally innocuous figure. He clearly said vile and heinous things. However, for all the accusations lobbed at him, still no evidence has been presented to back up those claims. This is not to say that he was guilty or innocent, just that U.S. citizens shouldn't be killed without official charges, due process, and a trial.

While the book might sound like it gets bogged down in excessive detail, it doesn't. Scahill finds the right balance so that he can back up his assertions with evidence while recounting compelling real life stories, some of which sound like invented Hollywood tales.

Overall, this is an absolutely phenomenal read, one that I can't recommend highly enough. If you have any interest in foreign policy, understanding relations with certain Middle Eastern countries, or the civil liberties issues at stake, this is definitely something you should check out.

[Raya راية · Rating 5 out of 5]

كتاب مهم، يسرد فظائع السياسة الخارجية الأمريكية خلال فترة حكم بوش الابن وباراك أوباما، والحروب التي خاضوها بهدف محاربة الإرهاب، بعد أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر.

رغم طوله لكنه يستحق القراءة بشدة.

[Ryan Gilbert · Rating 2 out of 5]

It quickly becomes obvious as to where the author stands with his view on war, and what he thinks of the United States when it comes to geopolitics. It's hard to discern fact from fiction, because the author integrates so much of his own hyperbole with hard facts, and first person testimony, it becomes a convoluted mess.

There are some very interesting stories and research the author has done, but at times it feels like on Oliver Stone movie where he's presenting the data in a way that supports his opinion as opposed to just giving the reader the facts. Almost every personal testimony presents them as an innocent civilian, who has been unfairly targeted by the evil US government.

I don't think there was any story the author presented where the US government was presented in a positive light. This is what irked me the most, because I'm not naive enough to believe that there isn't a ton of nasty things that any government does when it comes to Special Ops, but I didn't get this book to listen to an author give his opinion on this stuff. Just give me the facts!

The only person I would recommend this book to, is anyone who is anti-war or who doesn't agree with how the US Government is handling the war on terror. This book would be very good for you, because it does present great information and your opinion will line up with what the author feels as well.

For anyone else, I would NOT recommend this book.There are lots of other books out there that present this same information is a much more factual presentation, and with a more interactive writing style. By the end, I could barely finish listening to this book as it was just becoming unbearable.

[Terri · Rating 2 out of 5]

I nearly read this book in 2014, only my reading schedule was tight and I put it aside for another time. After watching the documentary a few weeks back, I decided the time to read it was now, as I could not believe that the book would be anywhere near as sensationalist in style as that truly awful documentary.

I was disappointed to find that it was. Maybe I shouldn't have watched the Doco first with all it's blatant heart string pulling slow shots of children's little faces and weeping wives and grandmothers. Maybe my cynicism came to the book as a result of that tarnish. But there was no doubt what this author was about. Sensationalism in it's finest post Vietnam War petticoats.
Something happened to War Journalism during and after the Vietnam War. With the other large conflicts that preceded it, WW1 and WW2, civilians had blind faith in their soldiers. They were heroes and assets to their greater community, gracing print media and advertising material with their arms around the girl, or Coca Cola pouring down their throats.

They could do no wrong and did no wrong. They did not rape nor torture, and collateral damage was a myth.
Of course, none of that was true. But while soldiers in WWI & II were portrayed with positive bias, the Vietnam War brought about a new world order of negative bias. These modern armies became armies of 'baby killers'. Degraded and shamed by the media, they were murderers of women and children. Burning villages, slaughterers of the innocent.

There was murder. There is no doubt of that. Women and children killed and villages destroyed, but it has always been this way in war. It was this way in WWI and WWII. It was this way in Iraq and Afghanistan, and it will be this way forever more. This is the bloody reality of War. And while this journalist went about trying to expose covert US led thuggery, tried to prove that the American military and the JSOC arm were all bloodthirsty baby killers, to me all he really managed to expose was his own ignorance of War.

Isn't it time that journalists got passed the exhaustive finger pointing. This need to sensationalise and dramatise for the benefit of making a name for themselves amoung the bleeding hearts?
I did not think this book revealed any new moot points about American led covert global operations.
America the thug. America the war monger. Killing with expedience and without remorse. Baby killers. Vietnam's Search and Destroy becomes the Middle East's Capture or Kill.
So easy to put down a country like the US, when one does not realise they are only one piece of a broader puzzle.

America do not go these things alone. Why do journalists like these ignore that fact? What conflict or offensive has America ever gone into that was not supported by another country in some way or boosted by Coalition SOF?

This book did it's job. It exposed some catastrophic failures by professional soldiers. To err is human. And in many cases, those errors have disappointing outcomes. That will always be revealed when you put War under the microscope.

The world is full of readers who will not see the one sided story told within its pages, but since I am not a bleeding heart, I only believe half of what he is saying – actually, it's less than that – because I know when a journalist who was not there and does not know, and clearly did not heed any opportunity to expunge JSOC of any sin (imagined or not), is trying to lead me around by the nose.

[Steven Z. · Rating 5 out of 5]

The reemergence of the Benghazi attack as a partisan political issue, the popularity of the film “Zero Dark Thirty” and the recent bombing in Boston have refocused Americans on the issue of terror and its threat. Did the FBI and CIA miss intelligence in dealing with the Tsarnaev brothers and other questions regarding the devastation at the Boston marathon have been discussed repeatedly during our twenty four hour news cycle and the question must be asked are we doing enough in terms of protecting the Homeland. The appearance of Jeremy Scahill’s new book, Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield is very timely as it posits the argument that after 9/11 the Bush administration implemented numerous policies that aborted many civil rights that Americans cherish and created a new world view that assassinations would be a central part of our national security and the secret operations infrastructure to carry out that mission. According to the author this had tremendous consequences for the United States as our policy decisions created the opposite results in countries like Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan, Iraq and ostensibly world wide as our counter terrorism decisions allowed our enemies to recruit more followers and became an even greater danger than they were before. Offshoots from the original al-Qaeda in Afghanistan emerged in Yemen under the banner, al-Qaeda Arab Peninsula (AQAP), al-Shabab in Somalia and others. It fostered new spokespersons, even American citizens like Anwar Awlaki. In 2008 when President Obama was campaigning he argued against the tactics that were developed by Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, but as Scahill lays out his case, the President not only did not change any of the policies of the Bush administration that argued that “the world is a battlefield,” but the Obama administration has gone even further in implementing an enhanced version of counter terrorism that relies on targeted killing and drone strikes worldwide.
The key domestic political component in the implementation of enhanced interrogation techniques, renditions, black sites, assassinations etc. was to make sure that there would be no Congressional oversight for these policies. This was the goal of the Cheney-Rumsfeld partnership after 9/11 that was accomplished with the creation of a separate counter terror infrastructure in the Pentagon and away from the CIA. Scahill does an excellent job detailing how this was accomplished as Cheney and Rumsfeld were victorious in their “turf battles” within the Bush administration after 9/11. The result was that the Bush administration “asserted the right under US law to kill people it designated as terrorists in any country even if they were US citizens.” (78) Scahill reviews the lead up to the invasion of Iraq that has been detailed in books such as The Dark Side by Janet Mayer, The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq by George Packer, and Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq by Thomas Ricks and the author reaches the same conclusions concerning Bush administration deception, lies, and a lack of strategy in all areas. The development of “enhanced interrogation” techniques to obtain information is argued pro and con, but what is important is how the Bush Justice Department developed the legal rationale for such techniques. As the separate infrastructure for counter terrorism was developed with the attendant lack of oversight the United States ignored its own laws and the Geneva Convention resulting in what the author describes as a “prophetic backlash” that would cost us dearly.
Scahill provides intricate details of events in Yemen, Somalia, and Pakistan. The reader is brought into US decision-making and the missions that resulted. We see the development of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) as a separate tool apart from the CIA and how it was led, funded, and carried out its killing operations. In fact the “JSOC was free to act as a spy agency and a kill/capture force rolled into one.” (171) Important figures involved in this process are presented from General Stanley McCrystal, Vice Admiral William McRaven and others who implemented counterterrorist policy, to the pseudo allies in foreign countries like General Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen, the Ethiopian military, warlords in Somalia, among many others. The victims of American policy are delineated in detail be it the massacre at Gardez in Afghanistan, al Majalah in Yemen, to targeting and killing the likes of Anwar Awlaki, and the persecution of journalist Abdulelah Haider Shaye. These policies and negative outcomes did not only take place on the Bush administration watch, but were continued at a new level under the Obama administration.
According to Scahill the Obama National Security team is as guilty as the previous administration no matter how much former Vice President Cheney has “chirped” over the years how weak Obama has been in the war on terror. While Obama was receiving his Nobel Peace Prize the US was targeting AQAP in Yemen and al Shabab in Somalia. The basic difference between the two administrations is that the Obama people wanted to make the war on terror more efficient. All one has do is to look at Obama’s national security team to see that it was not going to change policy. Obama did take more responsibility than President Bush by approving certain operations, but that did not alter the overarching policy goals.
Other topics of importance that Scahill discusses include the outsourcing of the war on terror including an in depth look at the role of Blackwater (which the author has presented in his previous book, Blackwater: the Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army), the strange case of Raymond Davis, the killing of Osama Bin Laden and many others. What is unique in this work has been Scahill’s access to many of the characters he presents, the impeccable research, and the ability to put forth material in a logical and cohesive manner. From my own readings what is presented in Dirty Wars is historically accurate and his conclusions are extremely scary as we continue the war on terror in the future. I recommend this amazing narrative of the history of “targeted killing” and other policies of our government to those who are concerned about America’s reputation in the world and what kind of nation we would like to be in the years to come.

[Simon Wood · Rating 5 out of 5]

MURDER INC. INTERNATIONAL

Journalist, Jeremy Scahill, author of the best selling expose of leading mercenary corporation "Blackwater", has in his sights a somewhat larger prey in "Dirty Wars": namely the series of Covert Wars the United States has run in parallel with its more overt ones in Iraq and Afghanistan since 9/11.

The book begins by looking at precedents and experiences of U.S. covert operations and wars in the post-Vietnam War era, particular regard is giving to the Reagan administrations attempts to subvert the restrictions congress placed on its ability to act covertly in Central America, during which not a few of the figures in the Bush II administration (eg. John Negroponte) gained experience that would be put to chilling effect in years to come (see Greg Grandin's "Empire's Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism" for a detailed look at the continuity between Reagan's Central/Latin American warriors and the Bush II years). The attacks of September 11th 2001 are of course the turning point - the "Pearl Harbour" moment that the Neo-Cons have waited for arrives with a bang - all sorts of plans are dusted off and put into action: from augmenting the power of the presidency at the expense of congressional oversight (restricted after the debacle of the Vietnam War and the Nixon administration), the curtailing of freedoms (from torture, illegal imprisonment, the right to due process, freedom of information) in the name of national security, to the launching of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (which had approximately zero to do with the on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon). The two personalities in the Bush II administration that Scahill focuses on are Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld (see Andrew Cockburn's excellent "Rumsfeld: An American Disaster" for a fine summary of Rumsfeld's career). Both played a critical role in pushing forward the military solution in response to the attacks of 9/11 - an expansive military response that was eventually to regard the world as a battlefield where U.S. forces can go anywhere, at anytime, to conduct operations, regardless of issues of sovereignty, human rights or international law.

So beyond the disastrous wars in Afghanistan (now well into its thirteenth year) and Iraq the American military and the C.I.A. moved to conducting covert operations in a growing list of countries. The two which Scahill particularly focuses on are Somalia and Yemen. He makes a convincing case that American actions in both countries were destabilising: for example in Somalia the US used Warlords to implement its program of capturing and assassinating alleged al-Qaeda operatives, in reality providing them with the means to create increasing levels murder and mayhem, and the context for a largely indigenous Islamic backlash in the form of the Islamic Courts Union, which the United States - in cahoots with Ethiopia - consequently attacks; this in turn creates space for the most radical elements of the I.C.U. - Al Shahab - who have links with Al Qaeda to come to the fore, thus creating an excuse for more intervention, more drone and special ops forces attacks, and more deaths... This is the disaster of American intervention. It is not only countries but individuals that are radicalised: the case of the American Anwar Awlaki is interwoven with the larger tale of institutions, governments and wars: over the course of "Dirty Wars" he changes from a Muslim who plays the part of an interlocutor between Islam and America, who condemned the attacks of 9/11 in mainstream U.S. media to one who - after spending time in a Yemeni jail at U.S. request - is alleged to have become an active member of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (albeit in the realm of propaganda) and is eventually - despite being an American citizen - murdered in a drone attack. Unaccountably and with no explanation, his 16 year old son, along with a number of his young cousins, are murdered in a further drone attack a number of weeks later.

Scahill covers the change from Bush to Obama (see Tariq Ali's "The Obama Syndrome: Surrender At Home, War Abroad" for an excellent short review of the Obama phenomena towards the end of his first term). His argument that there was a great deal of continuity between the two administrations is convincing, as is his point that the Obama administration carried the logic of covert actions and the doctrine of a world-wide battlefield against "terrorism" further than the Bush II administration, for example there were more drone strikes in the first year of the Obama than in all the years of Bush. Other subjects covered include an account of the assassination of Bin Laden; the formation of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula; covert operations in Iraq and Afghanistan (which eventually spread to Pakistan); the infighting and jurisdictional turf wars between different American military/foreign policy institutions such as the CIA/State department and the Special Operations Forces/Defence department; the torture regimes (Guantanamo/Abu Ghraib and so on including the lesser known base at Baghdad airport where special ops forces conducted torture) as well as the extraordinary rendition (polite terms for kidnap followed by outsourced torture) program; and the Night Raids in Afghanistan and Iraq, often the fruit of flawed intelligence which caused the deaths of innocents and further ratcheted up hostility towards the U.S. among the people of both countries.

In "Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield" Jeremy Scahill has shown himself to an accomplished journalist and writer, he has collated his own original work along with a great deal of work from other writers, to create what must surely be the best single volume of material on the American Global War on "Terror". It has some limitations despite 520 pages of text, in particular geographically where coverage is concentrated on Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan with occasional forays into neighbouring countries but no coverage of for example American actions in the Philippines, or other locations in the far east. Otherwise this is a fantastic book, that sheds a great deal of light on the murderous and murky world of Covert Actions as conducted by the United States in the post 9/11 era that I wouldn't hesitate to recommend.

[Jerome Otte · Rating 5 out of 5]

The phrase "dirty wars" isn't very clear in meaning. Scahill is a reporter whose chronological narrative is gripping and revealing but virtually commentary-free. Any observations on the facts related tend to come in the form of quotations from experts and those involved. So, there isn't anywhere in the book that explicitly explains what a "dirty war" really is. The point Scahill seems to be trying to make is that the CIA-JSOC "kill campaign" creates more enemies than it eliminates, a point worthy of exploration, but one Scahill doesn't return to very often as the book progresses.

The focus of the book is on operations that were once more secretive than they are today: kidnapping, rendition, secret-imprisonment,and targeted killing. "This is a story," reads the first sentence of the book, "about how the United States came to embrace assassination as a central part of its national security policy." It's a story about elite CIA, military and mercenary forces operating under even less Congressional or public oversight than the rest of the U.S. military, a story about the Joint Special Operations Command and the CIA, and not about the "shock and awe" bombing of Baghdad or the activities of tens of thousands of soldiers occupying Iraq or Afghanistan.

The type of war recounted is variously identified in the book as dirty, dark, black, dark-side, small, covert, black-ops, asymmetric, secret, twilight, and -- in quotation marks -- "smart." At one point, Scahill describes the White House, along with General Stanley McChrystal, as beginning to "apply its emerging global kill list doctrine inside Afghanistan, buried within the larger, public war involving conventional U.S. forces." But part of Scahill's story is how, in recent years, something that had been considered special, secretive, and relatively unimportant has come to occupy the focus of the U.S. military. In the process, it has lost some of its stigma as well as its secretiveness. Scahill refers to some operations as "not so covert." It's hard to hide a drone war that is killing people by the thousands. Secret death squad night raids that are bragged about in front of the White House Press Corps are not so secret.

Scahill details the operation to kill Anwar al-Awlaki, the American citizen-turned-al-Qaeda leader through the use of a drone. The point Scahill seems to want to make is that the rapid expansion of the CIA-JSOC "killing machine" is a potential threat to the lives of every American citizen and nobody is off-limits in such a war. I doubt that to be the case. Drone strikes, for the most part, take place mainly in Pakistan, Yemen, and SOmalia, unstable countries with whom we lack a solid relationship with a strong, stable government. If these nations had internal stability, we could simply go after al-Qaeda using their local security forces and maintain a much lower profile. However, since these nations lack stability and don't trust their own military and security forces, they allow the US to quietly take out HVTs with drones.

I don't think, in the end, that Scahill is suggesting that other wars, or other parts of wars, are clean. In fact, he characterizes the Obama administration's growing use of dirty war tactics as "the fantasy of a clean war." The term "clean" has been used in Washington, D.C., to distinguish killing from imprisonment-and-torture. Scahill's book should make clear to every reader that there is nothing clean about a war fought by death squad, drone, and missile strike -- any more than any other war. They're all dirty, filthy, nasty enterprises. They're not silver bullets; drone strikes and special-operations raids will only be as effective as the intelligence that leads to them. And despite their politicization, intelligence failures are a problem that will never be "solved", since intelligence collection always comes down to humans.

Scahill writes that the 2008 Bombay attacks were carried out by Lashkar e Jhangvi when it's a well known fact that it was carried out by Lashkar-e Taiba. He also writes that President Carter ordered that the Iran hostage-rescue mission be aborted, but that decision was in fact made by the ground commander, Charlie Beckwith. Scahill also caricatures the CIA's Vietnam-era Phoenix program as a campaign of pure assassination, even though the majority of Phoenix's targets were captured or induced to defect.

In all, this was a great work on a world that Americans rarely get a glimpse of, except in movies and thriller novels that usually ignore the many nuanced complexities and limits of the targeted-killing approach.

[Ahmed Omer · Rating 5 out of 5]

من المصادفات العجيبة اثناء قراءتي لهذا الكتاب, نُفذت عملية قتلت فيها نوار أنور العولقي ولاحقا أكدت الادارة الامريكية انها ومن معها من المدنيين كانوا جهاديين! المخيف بشأن الحرب على الارهاب ان الامر لم يعد يحتاج لأدلة او براهين , يتم اسقاط تهمة انك ارهابي وتقتل انت وعائلتك ونسوة جيرانك واطفالهم !
المشكلة التي يستعرضها الكتاب هي انه فقط بمجموعة غير مثبتة من الادلة الظرفية المقدمة من اطراف استخبراتية-والتي توصفها الادارة الامريكية انها غير ذات ثقة مثل استخبارات اليمن وباكستان مثلا - يعطى الضوء الاخضر لتنفيذ الاغتيالات والتي تطال المدنيين باستمرار وتصنع التطرف بصورة جلية , الى جانب دعم حكومات قمعية لا تحترم اي حقوق لرعاياها. قدم جيرمي سكاهيل الكثير من الادلة المترابطة واجتهد في تحقيق متقن وهذا الكتاب مرجع لتطور العمليات في الكثير من البقاع.
يروي جيرمي سكاهيل قصة موازية لمسار الكتاب وهي اغتيال الابن الاكبر لأنور العولقي ليس من أجل ماهو عليه -هو ليس ارهابي- بل من أجل ما يمكن ان
يصبح عليه ولاحقا قتلت اخته "نوار" في شهر مارس الماضي من هذا العام .. ضبابية مصطلح الارهاب تجعله تهمة جاهزة لكل مخالف , في خمسينات القرن العشرين كان الشيوعي هو الارهابي وقبله كان الياباني من هنا يمكن ان نصطلح على ان الارهابي : " هو كل من يضاد الادارة الامريكية فقط .
بمزيد من التخصيص يمكن ان يُقال ان الارهاب فعل إسلامي فقط! تطهير قوات ميانمار للروهينقا لا ينظر له بأنه شي , جرائم جزب العمال الكردستاني لا ينظر لها بأنها إرهاب انما الارهاب عند داعش فقط , الحشد الشعبي لا يُسأل عن شي في حين الموصل والرقة هي حواضن الارهاب ! قتل المئات من مسلمي افريقا الوسطى لا يشكل معضلة للمجتمع الدولي أنما الخطر كل الخطر من بوكو حرام !
وكذا يُقال في تناول اجهزة الاعلام , يحصل تطفيف في ممارساتها بكثرة ,, يتم الاطناب في الحديث عن داعش وبالكاد تذكر جرائم الكراهية ضد المسلمين التي تخلف ضحايا في بعض الاحيان لكنها تنسى سريعا , بالفعل ندين اي اعتداء على الامنين بلا شك لكن التناول الاعلامي يصور طرف واحد على انه الشيطان اللا متناهي ضد حمائم العالم ! ولا استطيع ان استقصي كل الممارسات لكن ما يغيظ حقا هو ان يُنظر اليك كـ موسوس يحمل عقدة مؤامرة ينظر من خلالها للاشياء
أخطر ما قدمه جيرمي سكاهيل في هذا التحقيق هو علاقة بعض اطراف الاستخبارات بطالبان , انا في خاصة نفسي لا أشك ان كثير من التفجيرات التي تنسب للمنظمات الجهادية هي من صنع اجهزة استخباراتية يظل اختراق سكاهيل لاحد عملاء جهاز الاستخبارات الامريكية وكشف تنسيقه مع بعض اجهزة طالبان مجرد تأكيد لظن توثق عندي واعتقد ان اي متابع لبواطن ما يجري يستطيع ان يلمس اليد الخفية, لا أنكر وجود متطرفين لكن أكثر ما ينسب لهم ليس صنيعهم هم أقل مما يصور عنهم .. استخبارات تلك الدول تراقب كل شئ لا يمكن لمجموعة هواة ان تضرب شتى العواصم بتلك الصورة مالم يتغافل عنهم وتلك التفجيرات
لا تخدم قضية المسلمين , القاعدة العامة هي انه متى ما التبس عليك شي انظر من المستفيد . كل التفجيرات صنعت رأي عام مضاد للمسلمين, ساهمت في صعود اليمين المتطرف ,لم يعد هنالك ترحيب باي لاجئ ,وجرائم الكراهية في ازدياد.. النقطة المحورية بشأن هؤلاء الجهاديين لا يوجد الى الان اي تنظيم جهادي ارسل ولو حجر الى اسرائيل في حين تطال ايدي التنظيمات الجهادية كل العالم ,, علامة الاستفهام هذه تدلل بوضوح الى طبيعة ان هذه التنظيمات تحوى اغرار في مقتبل العمر مع قيادة مخترقة ان لم تكن مصنعة بايدي استخبارات عدة دول ولا ننسى ان بداية تنظيم القاعدة كانت على يد الادارة الامريكية والمملكة العربية من اجل احتواء التقدم السوفيتي في اسيا . في نظري أن اكبر مشكلة هي اننا بتنا نصدق اننا ارهابيين وان كل من يكره الظلم المسلط على بعض حواضر المسلمين اصبح ينظر له كجهادي او مشروع ارهابي!
كل التقدير والشكر لجيرمي سكاهيل ..

[Mehrsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Drones, torture, clear violations of human rights abroad. Scahill catalogues how it happened over time, how it was justified, and what was done. It went from Bush to Obama and hardly abated. Such an important book

[Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield", by Jeremy Scahill, takes a detailed look at the U.S. "War on Terror", at the initial decisions which brought us there under the Bush Administration, and how it's been continued and extended, albeit under a different name, under the Obama Administration. The book provides an extensive look at Special Forces, conventional forces, CIA targeting, night raids, and drone strikes, not only in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also in diverse locations such as Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, etc.

I found Scahill's coverage of American-born Anwar al-Awlaki, known for his anti-American speeches after his move to Yemen following the World Trade Tower attack of 9/11, particularly interesting. I knew little of his background, and not much more about the effects of his speeches other than what I remember reading in the newspaper after he became targeted as a jihadist recruiter. I either had forgotten, or never knew of his influential role on the Tsarnaev brothers (Boston Marathon bombers), on U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan (the Fort Hood massacre shooter) , on Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab (the underwear bomber), on Faisal Shahzad (the Times Square bomber) and others. And while Anwar al-Awlaki was killed in a drone strike, his speeches apparently still resonate as demonstrated by his reported influence on the recent Boston Marathon bombing a year and a half after his death.

The drone strike against al-Awlaki and others are discussed in some detail. More importantly, Scahill discusses this "dark side" of American war-fighting, and reveals the human and political consequences of these "dirty wars" the U. S. tries to keep mostly hidden. Scahill points out the down side of increased armed drone attacks, not only in terms of their use against American Citizens without judicial review, but in particular due to the inexact targeting of such strikes and the frequent "collateral damage" taken on non-combatant civilians including women and children. While the Administration frequently emphasizes the "precision" of these weapons, we've all read about situations in which targeting intelligence was faulty, or guidance systems failed, resulting in unfortunate deaths of innocent civilians. And when those unfortunate mistakes occur, survivors or family members of slain victims who had no ties to terrorism often turn to vengeance and hatred of the U.S. as a result.

Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense under Bush, had previously questioned if the U.S. was eliminating terrorists faster than the Imams and Madrassas were creating them. Scahill's book asks the same question in a slightly different way, i.e., are our anti-terrorist methods (night raids, drone strikes) creating more and more new terrorists much faster than our ability to eliminate individual terrorists here and there. It doesn't appear that this question will be answered any time soon.

[Á · Rating 4 out of 5]

Horrific.

In Dirty Wars Jeremy Scahill presents a strong case that ties the Global War on Terror to continued regional instability (Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq) abroad, the elimination of principles surrounding assassination, unaccountable combatants, and the abrogation of American citizen's right to due process at home and overseas. The string of policies that brought us to this place cannot be solely tied to the Bush Administration. Scahill asserts that while many of the processes in place have their roots with the Bush Administration, the Obama Administration has doubled down on those processes. "Obama had already authorized as many drone strikes in ten months as Bush had in his entire eight years in office." (p. 251)

This is a dense book that won't leave the reader feeling positive about the future. Americans are more likely to die in a car accident (1-in-108, see note 1), or via lightning strikes (1-in-126,158, see note 1) than in a terror attack (1-in-20,000,000, see note 2). Yet in the name of national security we have unleashed a global campaign of torture, indiscriminate drone strikes (see note 3), and the elimination of due process for Americans at home and abroad. Furthermore, the legal language used to justify assassination is couched in such vague terms as to render any justification given as just (see note 4).

In the epilogue Scahill leaves us with this chilling statement:

"Today, decisions on who should live or die in the name of protecting America's national security are being made in secret, laws are interpreted by the president and his advisers behind closed doors and no target is off-limits, including US citizens." (p. 520)

There's not much to add to that.


Note 1: http://www.nsc.org/news_resources/inj...
Note 2: http://swampland.time.com/2013/05/06/...
Note 3: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/...
Note 4: http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/doj-let...

[Sky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm sincerely torn on this one. Scahill is clearly a great story-teller, but that may actually be part of the problem. Instead of presenting the last 15 years as a messy history of US attempts to respond to the threat of terrorism, he seems to frame the whole thing as a single, on-going co-conspiracy by both Bush and Obama. While I recognize that this is a compelling narrative, I just don't think that the thread of history is ever as clean as Jeremy presents it here.

The further along I got, the less and less it felt like a history of the US war on terrorism and the more it felt like an extended magazine article. It also seemed to get progressively more conspiratorial as it progressed. I don't know if this was my personnel reading, if Scahill's politics changing as he continued writing, or if it was something else entirely.

The bottom line is that if you are interested in this topic and have a background in this area I would highly recommend this book to give you a left-leaning slant on the last 15-years. But, you should also take the whole book with a grain of salt (or a wad of qat).

As an added bonus it was very cool to see multiple quotes in this book from an array of very smart people that I'm honored to count among my friends.

[Aaron Shields · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you can get past Scahill's obvious political bent and use of leftist sources throughout to bolster his point, even as a conservative, you can't get past how shady and brutal the US has become in fighting terrorism. So much info in this book, it's incredible, thus the 5 rating. Probably not quite on the level of Coll's Ghost Wars and Wright's Looming Tower simply because of the political bent and obvious opinion inserted throughout, yet I commend Scahill for caring enough about this underreported material to write this exposé. Powerful stuff. And horrifying at times. My only question: how should the US best fight terrorism?

[Pam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dirty Wars is an excellent, highly detailed chronicle of the U.S."Global War on Terror." The reason why I give it 3 stars instead of 4 or 5 is not Jeremy Scahill's writing style, which is superb. It is mainly because it is a bit too dense with facts and figures. The 521 pages contains A LOT of cruise missile statistics, etc. and it became a bit tedious. The parts I liked the best are those in which personalities come alive, such as Anwar Awlaki and his father Nasser. I wanted more of them! Nonetheless..I recommend it!

[أحمد الحمدان · Rating 3 out of 5]

انتهيت من قراءة كتاب (حروبٌ قذرة) ويقع في (818) صفحة من ترجمة ونشر: شركة المطبوعات ومن تأليف: جيريمي سكاهيل وهو مراسل لمجلس الأمن القومي في مجلة "ذا نيشن" وقد تصدر الكتاب قائمة "نيويورك تايمز" للكتب الأكثر مبيعاً، وقد حوّل الى فلم وثائقي ورشح هذا الفلم لجائزة الأوسكار وعدة جوائز أخرى.

وقد أستغرق العمل على هذا الكتاب 4 سنوات ما بين 2009-2013، وقد تنقل المؤلف الى عدة دول للقاء المسؤولين السياسيين والدبلوماسيين ورجال استخبارات وأمراء حرب ومعتقلين سابقين وشهود عيان وأهالي وأقارب ضحايا طائرات بلا طيار أو العمليات الخاصة الأمريكية في باكستان وأفغانستان واليمن والصومال.

واستند المؤلف الى العديد من المراجع من: الوثائق والمقابلات والكتب والمقالات والمجلات والأبحاث والتقارير مما جعل نعوم تشومسكي يصف كتابه بأنه" تحقيقات صحافية مذهلة" أو كما قال أيضًا الصحفي الأمريكي كريس هايس: "لم ينجح صحافي مثله في العالم بإظهار حقيقة الحرب ضد الإرهاب بعهد أوباما. هذا الكتاب إنجاز باهر لابد من قراءته مهما تكن توجهاتك السياسية".

والمؤلف قد أصدر كتابًا مستقلًا عن الشركة الأمنية الخاصة "بلاك ووتر" بعنوان: (بلاك ووتر أخطر منظمة سرية في العالم) وأيضًا هو من ترجمة ونشر: شركة المطبوعات، تستطيع أن تعتبره أنه جهد مكمل لهذا الكتاب أو توطئة له.

تكلم المؤلف في الابتداء بشكل مستطرد عن قضية (البيروقراطية الأمريكية) في اتخاذ القرار، وأن بسبب تجارب السابقة مثل اتخاذ الرئيس –رأس السلطة التنفيذية- قرارات بشكل أحادي تمثلت في الغارات على لاوس وكمبوديا، والتنصت على مقر اللجنة الوطنية للحزب الديمقراطي في فندق وترغيت، ودعم الإطاحة بالرئيس الاشتراكي سلفادور أليندي المنتخب ديمقراطيًا والتسبب بموته، والتجسس الداخلي ضد مواطني الولايات المتحدة.

هذه تجارب جعلت المشرعين الأمريكان في الكونغرس يشنون حملة لتقيد السلطة التنفيذية، فألزموا الرئيس أن يقوم بالتشاور مع الكونغرس قبل إقحام القوات المسلحة الأمريكية في أعمال عدائية ويلزم الرئيس أن يبلغ الكونغرس خطيًا قبل 48 ساعة من القيام بعمل عسكري استخباراتي، وشكلوا لجنة سميت باسم رئيسها وهي لجنة تشريش للتحقيق في انتهاكات السلطة التنفيذية وتمخضت هذه اللجنة عن تكليف لجان من الكونغرس للإشراف قانونيًا على عمليات الاستخبارات الأمريكية بما في ذلك الأعمال السرية، وقد أقر الكونغرس في وقت لاحق قانون يطلب فيه من البيت الأبيض تقدم تقارير عن جميع برامج التجسس إلى لجان الاستخبارات داخل الكونغرس.

وثم في زمن الرئيس كلنتون فرض آليات رقابية إضافية كما أنشأ نظاماً قضائيًا صارمًا للمصادقة على العمليات السرية المهمة، فاقتراح الرئيس لعمل سري ما يجب أن يذهب الى وكالة الاستخبارات المركزية ويراجع قانونيًا من قبل المستشار العام داخلها ثم عدة لجان داخلها لمراجعته قانونيًا أيضًا ثم يرجع الى المستشار العام ليصدقه ثم يرجع الى البيت الأبيض ثم يوضع الاقتراح أما فريق العامل المشترك بين الوكالات داخل السلطة التنفيذية، ثم بعد ذلك يدفع الى الرئيس ليصدقه ويدخل حيز التنفيذ.

تجريد السلطات التنفيذية من العمل بشكل أحادي وإخضاعها لرقابة السلطة التشريعية، أثار سخط من يُسمون "بالمحافظين الجدد"، فراوا أن هذه البيروقراطية واللفة الطويلة لاتخاذ القرار هي خطر أشد من خطر الإرهاب نفسه، وقد صعد هؤلاء وتبوئوا مراكز في السلطة مع فوز جورج بوش في انتخابات عام 2000، وكان من أبرز وجوه هذا الفريق هم نائب الرئيس "ديك تشيني" ووزير الدفاع "دونالد رامسفيلد"، وضعوا خطة أو في أذهانهم خطة لتغير هذا الوضع، وجاءتهم الفرصة الذهبية مع أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر، فلما الكونغرس فوض الرئيس وأعطاه سلطات كبيرة في محاربة الارهاب ردًا على أحداث 11-9، فالكثير من هذه القيود قد زالت وأطلقت أياديهم.

فرمموا ما يسمى بـ(القيادة المشتركة للقوات الخاصة) كقوة عسكرية واستخباراتية في آن واحد لا تخضع لرقابة الكونغرس، ولا تحتاج التصديق لعملياتها الى هذه اللفة الطويلة، فكانت هذه القوة لا تخضع للإشراف ولا الرقابة ولا المسائلة وحتى لو اضطروا للذهاب الى القضاء فإن إدارة البيت الأبيض سوف تستخدم حق امتياز "أسرار الدولة" لوأد الدعوة القضائية.

فالمؤلف ركز على هذا الذراع (القيادة المشتركة للقوات الخاصة) أكثر من تركيزه على (وكالة الاستخبارات المركزية)، لأن دورها خفي أكثر وسري أكثر، ربما بخلاف كتاب (حروب الظل) لمارك مازيتي، وأظهر تقاطع عمل هاتين الجهتين مع بعض والذي أدى الى شيء من النزاع الداخلي لمحاولة طرف أن يهمين على الساحة ويحتكرها له، وأدى هذا الى نجاة بعض المطلوبين مثل الدكتور أيمن الظواهري فرصدته الأجهزة الاستخباراتية عام 2005 ولكن النزاع بين الطرفين –أيهما يقوم بعملية الاغتيال- أدى الى إلغاء العملية واختفاء الظواهري عن الرادار الى يومنا هذا.

ولكن القيادة المشتركة للقوات الخاصة أبرز إشكاليتها أنها تعمل بشكل مستقل دون التنسيق مع الوكالة المركزية أو القوات النظامية التقليدية، وهذا يؤدي الى إفشال خطط وبرنامج هاتين الجهتين أحياناً، فلما يكون الجيش يريد أن يحسن علاقته مع السكان المحليين كجزء من استراتيجيته، ثم تقوم القيادة المشتركة بعمل من طرف واحد استنادًا على مصدر استخباراتي مغلوط ويؤدي هذا الى قتل أبرياء أو قتل أحد أكبر المتعاونين معهم وأهله (كما ذكر في فصل: ليلة في غارديز) فهذا يؤدي الى تذمر الناس وغضبهم وهذا يؤدي بالضرورة الى افشال خطط واستراتيجية الجيش نفسه.

وفي صفحات متأخرة من الكتاب أثبت المؤلف أن هذا التغير تم إقراره وأصبح محل اجماع بين الحزبين وأن كلاهما لا يريد ان يرجع الوضع كما هو سابقًا! وكيف أن الرئيس الديمقراطي أوباما الذي أنتقد سلفه بوش كيف أنه لم يسر على طريقة فحسب بل زاد من آلية هذا العمل.

***

فأنت في ظني راح تستفيد بمعرفة دور الوكالات الأمنية الأمريكية وكيفية اتخاذ القرار وكيف تتداخل السلطات مع بعضها البعض وكيف يمكن أن تتملص سلطة من سلطة ما وتتحايل عليها، وكيف أن تجيش الرأي العام حول قضية ما مثل حصول تسريبات من السلطات العليا ولكن دون طرح أدلة باتهام أطراف ما باتهامات معينة دون أدلة حتى لترسخ في أذهان النخبة والعامة (فلان إرهابي وأنه متورط في كذا وكذا) وتأتي الصحف وتنقل هذا السبق من المسؤول الأمني في صفحها فيتشكل الرأي العام على أن هذا الشخص لابد أن يفتك به، دون أن تطرح هذه السلطة أدلتها أو تدينه واذا جُرّت للقضاء استخدمت امتياز "أسرار الدولة والأمن القومي".
***
فالمؤلف على ضوء هذه التصرفات يقول أن السياسة الأمريكية – من خلال سرده لأحداث الصومال واليمن وأنور العولقي- كلاهما أدت الى نتائج عكسية، فبدلًا من أن تقضي على الإرهاب زادت من نشاطه، فالسياسة الأمريكية أعطت مفعول عكسي فضلًا أنها انتهكت القانون الأمريكي وتحايلت عليه.

فمثلًا – الصومال – كانت حركة الشباب ذو التوجه الجهادي جزء بسيط من كيان "اتحاد المحاكم" وهو الكيان الحاكم للصومال بعد مرحلة أمراء الحرب، فمن أجل القضاء على الجهاديين الدوليين، أعطت أمريكا الضوء الأخضر لأثيوبيا لغزو الصومال وأمدتها وساعدتها، وسقطت حكومة المحاكم والوجوه المعتدلة فيها، وبرزت حركة الشباب كقوى كبرى ورأس حربة للدفاع عن الصومال أمام الغزو الأثيوبي وزاد نفوذها بشكل كبير جدًا، فبدلًا من أن تكحلها عمتها!

وأما –أنور العولقي- فكان شيخًا معتدلًا مناوئًا للتوجهات الجهادية، وكان يسكن في أمريكا وحث المسلمين لانتخاب بوش، وأستضيف بعد أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر في عدة قنوات وصحف من أجل تبيض صفحة المسمين من هذه العمليات، وأستدعي لحفل غداء في وزارة الدفاع البنتاغون، وحث المسلمين للتبرع ودعم ضحايا الحادي عشر من سبتمبر إلخ ... ولكن تصرفات الحكومة الأمريكية ضد المسلمين في أمريكا واستخدامها للقوة الغير مبرر وإعطائها إيحاء أنهم تعاديهم لأجل أنهم مسلمين ثم حصل بعدها غزو العراق، فتشكلت قناعات لدى العولقي أن أمريكا ضد الإسلام نفسه وليست ضد الارهابيين، ثم تصرفات مكتب التحقيق الفيدرالي مع أنور والتضيق عليه ثم حتى لما خرج من أمريكا لم يتركوه في حالة وضغطوا على الحكومة اليمنية لتعتقله، كل هذا جعلهم يحولوه هذا الشخص الى أكبر محرض وداعٍ الى الجهاد في العالم الغربي، وأغلب العمليات الجهادية أو العمليات التي أحبطت في الدول الغربية أغلب أفرداها تراهم متأثرين بخطابات أنور العولقي وعلى سبيل المثال: عملية فاروق عبد المطلب ومحاولته إسقاط الطائرة في ليلة الكريسمس، وعملية الضابط الأمريكي نضال حسن الي أقام مجزرة في الجنود الأمريكيين المتوجهين الى أفغانستان.

فصور السياسة الأمريكية لمكافحة الارهاب على أنها تزيد الارهاب ولا تضعفه. أي أنها ذو سياسة فاشلة.

ولكن لماذا صور الموضوع على انه انتهاك للقانون الأمريكي؟!

هو في حادثة أنور العولقي كان أنور مواطنًا أمريكيًا، يحق له المثول أمام القضاء وأن لا يحكم عليه بالإعدام وهو مواطن أمريكي إلا بعد حكم قضائي، ولكن الي حصل أنه وضع على قائمة الاستهداف دون أي محاكمة، فهم يقولون لو تساه��نا في هذا الموضوع ومع هذه الصلاحيات في الابتداء، فقد تتوسع مع الزمن على أيدي الرؤساء اللاحقين، وقد يقتلوا الأمريكان تحت بند السرية ودون محاكمة، وطالما وضع على قائمة الاستهداف وقتل دون محاكمة فهو قتل غير أخلاقي وغير قانوني وزادت قناعتهم مع اغتيال عبد الرحمن العولقي (وهو مواطن أمريكي وابن أنور) وهو ليس له أي علاقة بالإرهاب أو الجهاد وقد قتل هو وأبناء عمومته بعد أن لعبوا مع بعض وكان في سن الـ16 سنة.
***

أَ .., [08.12.18 15:35]
وأما موضوعات تداخل الدبلوماسية مع العمل السري الاستخباراتي، فتراه بارزًا حديث المؤلف عن اليمن وباكستان، وأما اليمن، فهي سياسات علي عبد الله صالح التي تعطي الضوء الأخضر للتدخل الأمريكي المباشر في اليمن، مقابل مساعدات مالية، تقتضي هذه السياسة في البداية أن كلما يحصل قصف صاروخي أمريكي تتدعي الحكومة اليمنية أنه منها لا من الأمريكان، فأعطت الضوء الأخضر للأمريكان لتسرح وتنتهك سيادة أراضيها وجوها وبحارها وثم تتحمل الحكومة اليمنية عقبات اللوم والعتاب لقتل المدنيين مقابل ملايين من الدولارات!!، والكتاب ركز على اللقاءات التي حصلت وما كشفته وثائق الويكليكس والتسريبات الإعلامية ليكمل واقع الصورة في اليمن.

وأما في باكستان فالموضوع مختلف، تقريبًا المؤلف تكلم في ثلاثة فصول بشكل مطول عن تضارب الاجهزة الاستخباراتية في باكستان ما بين جهاز الاستخبارات الداخلي الباكستاني ووكالة الاستخبارات المركزية الأمريكية وكلاهما جلس يضرب في الآخر من تحت الحزام، وذلك لظن الباكستانيين، أن دخول العملاء الأمريكان بأعداد كبيرة في باكستان هدفه ليس محصور في محاربة الارهاب، بل لمحاولة التجسس والإحاطة بالسلاح النووي الباكستاني، فهم ينظرون إليهم على أنهم تهديد محتمل، فيتعاملون معهم في مكافحة الارهاب، ولكن علاقتهم متوترة وهذا التوتر ادى الى كشف الطرفين للأسماء الحقيقية لرؤساء الاستخبارات من خلال التسريبات الصحفية!

والي حصل أن الأمريكان تجسدت لهم قناعة أن العمل المنسق داخل باكستان مع الاستخبارات الباكستانية لا فائدة منه بل قد يضر ولا ينفع ولابد من العمل من طرف واحد (وهذا حصل مثل عملية أبوت آباد لاغتيال زعيم القاعدة)، وفي فصل (حصن أبوت آباد) تكلم المؤلف بشكل موجز ومختصر عن عملية الي نفذتها القيادة المشتركة للقوات الخاصة باغتيال زعيم القاعدة بن لادن، وكيف أن القوات العسكرية أعطت ترخيص لتدمير أي قوة باكستانية تعترض طريقها، وفي هذا الفصل وفي هامش صفحة 667 نصح المؤلف بكتاب (ليس يومًا سهلًا) لـمارك أون، وهو أحد الأفراد القوات الخاصة الذي شارك في عملية أبوت آباد، ووصفه بأنه" أفضل كتاب في هذا المجال لغاية الأن".

وفي فصلين عن (قضية رايموند دافيس) تكلم عن الأزمة الدبلوماسية التي حصلت بين البلدين بسبب صدام أجهزة الاستخبارات، قام عميل أمريكي بقتل 2 من عملاء الاستخبارات الباكستانية، فحصلت أزمة سياسية بين البلدين، وبسببها علق عمل طائرات بلا طيار لفترة، وضغطت أمريكا ورمت بكل ثقلها من أجل استعادة جاسوسها، وأنت تقرأ هذا الفصل تذكر قصة القس الأمريكي أندرو برونسون والذي كان معتقلًا في تركيا، وكيف أمريكا فرضت عقوبات على تركيا من أجله رغم أن هنالك الكثير من المعتقلين الأمريكان في أنحاء العالم ولم تتخذ أمريكا معهم نفس الاجراء، وتستفيد أيضًا أن السفارات ماهي إلا منبع التجسس وغطاء له.

***

- ربما ما يعيب على المؤلف أنه غير مجيد للعربية كما يبدو، وهو أنه عندما يقف عند البيانات الجهادية يستشهد بمصادر وسيطة ترجمت هذه المواد وأحياناً أخطأت فيها، أو أحياناً قد أعطت صورة ناقصة، فلما أستطرد المؤلف مثلًا في ذكر سيرة فازول لكان من الأريح والأجدى أن يذهب الى مذكراته التي نشرت بالعربية بعنوان: (الحرب على الاسلام) بدلًا من المصادر المترجمة أو الوسيطة ولا يذهب الى تلك المصادر إلا عندما يذكروا شيء غير موجود في المذكرات.

- ترجمات شركة المطبوعات لم تكن جيدة لهذا الكتاب، ووقعت في أخطاء لا يقع فيها المبتدئ وأبسطها الخطأ في ترجمة أحد آيات القرآن كقولهم في الكتاب [قال الله: ويلهم المؤمنين القتال" ] والصحيح: "وحرض المؤمنين على القتال". و[الذئب المنعزل] والصحيح: "الذئب المنفرد." و[أبو شدا] والصحيح: "أبو شدة". والكثير من هذه الملاحظات. التي يبدو أن المترجم قصر نفسه عن ترجمة كتاب ضخم كهذه فقام يترجم أي كلام، والمشكلة أن الكتاب أُخضع للمراجعة والتدقيق من قبل (وفيق زيتون) وكان كذلك، فكيف لو لم يكن مراجعًا؟! فذلك من كان يجيد الإنجليزية فمن الأفضل أن يقرأه بلغته الأصلية هروبًا من أخطاء الترجمة وتحريف المعاني.

- الكتاب يعطيك انطباع أن لمعرفة ما يحصل في دهاليز الأمن في بعض الأمور لا يحتاج الى انتظار 50 سنة لرفع السرية عن الوثائق؛ بل فقط تحتاج الى متابعة حثيثة لكبريات الصحف الأمريكية للوقوف على التسريبات، وعدم النظر الى الصحف وتسريباتها يعني أن الكثير فد فاتك وسوف يفوتك، فالنظر الى الصحف والوقوف على تقاطع التوجهات داخل أمريكا في هذه القضايا مما يجعل الطرف الآخر على علم كيف وأين يتحرك.

[Kⲁrim Hⲁlim · Rating 4 out of 5]

استمتعت جداً بهذه الرحلة الطويلة
هي حقاً حروب قذرة
هل أمريكا هي سبب هذه القذارة؟ بالطبع لا
لولا التحالفات والانقسامات في بنية التحالف العربي والإسلامي لصارت أمريكا عاجزة
ولكن حكامنا كان لهم رأي آخر

اشتمل الكتاب على تنصيب جورج بوش الإبن ومن بعده باراك أوباما
مروراً بالحادي عشر من سبتمبر وما تلاه من سياسات
حقيقة لا أدري كيف تم كشف كل هذه المعلومات وكيف تم تفصيلها في كتاب للرأي العام

لم أكن أتوقع أن تكون اليمن والصومال هما بؤرتا معظم الأحداث
لم أجد دوراً مميزاً لمصر في كل تلك الأحداث، على النقيض وجدت تحالفات مع حكام اليمن وباكستان وأمراء الحرب في الصومال وغيرهم

الكتاب عبارة عن مفاجآت وحقائق يعقبها تعليق القارئ بـ يا ولاد التيييييييييييييييييييت

[Kitchener · Rating 5 out of 5]

Killing Our Way To Victory

The predominant post-presidency maxim delivered to the public by George W. Bush has been that 'history will ultimately judge' him. This is true enough, and actually, the closemouthed nature of his presidential afterlife has served to mitigate many of the criticisms levied against him. Or maybe it's just time passing. With each new day I tend to view Bush as less evil than weak, and Rumsfeld, Cheney, and all of Daddy Bush's neo-con buddies as more evil than human. But anyway, President Bush, the self-proclaimed freedom lover, made a lot of poor decisions and issued a good many sweeping orders in the post-9/11 climate of fear that the squinty-eyed power freaks in Washington will continue to utilize most probably until the end of our lifetimes. Future U.S. presidents will inherit a streamlined process for assassinating enemies of America, perceived or real, citizens or not. And in the history books, Obama will be the first president that imposed something resembling the full power of these forces upon the world.

Jeremy Scahill's Dirty Wars is a comprehensive and focused journalistic account of the various world events and U.S. actions that, when taken together, can do nothing but support his dual-pronged thesis that, 1) the administration's current targeted killing strategy creates more terrorists/enemies than it neutralizes, and 2) certain actions taken against persons outside of declared battlefields or of U.S. citizenship have been unconstitutional. Are our drone strikes, assassinations, renditions, and black sites actually aiding the cause of groups like al-Shabab in Somolia, AQAP in Yemen, and the Taliban in Pakistan/Afghanistan? Are we the world's shining beacon on the hill, or aren't we?

While Dick Cheney has been twirling his high-tech umbrella in the sewers of Gotham, mumbling to himself about how the President's weakness and naivete are making us "less safe," Obama has been busy taking advantage of America's temporary (and that is the word that scares me the most) advantage in drone technology to wage a myopic, and practically borderless shadow war. Scores of once innocent civilians in the region of the world most prone to radicalization now view us as Israel views Hezbollah. Missile lobbers. And with each new day that passes I find it harder to believe that the history books will look back kindly on President Obama's foreign policy.

----------

In Light of Recent Events

Scahill rounds out his Acknowledgements thusly: "As of this writing, Yemeni journalist Abdulelah Haider Shaye remains locked up in a prison in Sana'a, in part due to the intervention of the White House. He should be set free." And now he has been.

[محمود هشام · Rating 5 out of 5]

انتهيت بفضل الله من قراءة هذا الكتاب، وقُدر لى أن أنهيه اليوم 11-9-2016 أي بعد خمسة عشرة سنة على أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر، في كل ذكرى كان دومًا يتم إثارة سؤال مهم: ما هي مشروعية أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر؟ وإن كانت أمريكا مجرمة فما ذنب المدنيين، أو تحديدًا ما ذنب العاملون في برجي التجارة الذي يدار من خلالهم الحروب الاقتصادية والمعلنة ضد المسلمين في أنحاء العالم؟.

لكن أرى أن هناك سؤال مهم يجب أن يتم طرحه للإنصاف: ما مشروعية قتل المسلمين العُزل من نساء حوامل وأطفال في غارات الطائرات بدون طيار؟ وإدارة أوباما ترفض أن تخرج دليل واحد قانوني بالتوصيف الأمريكي لقتل هؤلاء العزل؟، وكانت الإجابة: أن الرئيس ومتشاريه هم من يحددون من يجب أن يقتل دون إعلان دلائل ومعلومات استخبراتية عن مشروعية هذه العمليات التي يقتل فيها مسلمون عزل في بيوتهم في أفغانستان والصومال واليمن وباكستان؟

قال جيو شارلي جونسون في محاضرة في أوكسفورد عن مشروعية الاغتيالات والاعتقال مفتوح المدى والتعذيب: بأن هذه أمور عادية كانت تحدث في الحروب القديمة، وأن هذه الأمور ضد القاعدة كما يجب أن ننظر إليها - أنها أمور طبيعية في الصراع المسلح التقليدي -، فكان تبرير كل تلك العمليات أن هذه حرب وصراع مسلح تقليدي.

هذه المبررات التي اتخذتها إدارة أوباما لتبرير الحروب القذرة: لا يتقبلها عاقل، وإن كان ينظر للقاعدة على أنها إرهاب، فإن أمريكا هي رأس الإرهاب، بل عدد من قتلوا على يد الأمريكان أعظم بأضعاف مضاعفة ممن قُتل على يد القاعدة.

نظرتي للإرهاب والعالم ووجودي تغيرت تمامًا على المستوى المنطقي الذي احتاج لبراهين دومًا على ما يحدث، وعلى مستوى وجداني الذي كان يشعر ببعض الورع تجاه الأمريكان، لكن بعد قراءة هذه الصفحات صرت اسأل نفسي: من يقفون على المنابر ويقولون: إننا نحارب الإرهاب ويدعون لولاة أمورهم، ألم يعلموا أن أمريكا قد أنشأت قاعدة سرية في السعودية للطائرات بدون طيار التي قتلت المدنيين وتقتلهم كل يوم في اليمن؟.

أذرع الإعلام والحك��مات والمثقفين والشيوخ من يقفون على المنابر ويخطبون لمحاربة الإرهاب هم كاذبون لاشك، أو مجرد حمقى يتم التلاعب بهم، فمن يطلع على سياسات الحرب الأمريكية القذرة وتوثيق جرائمهم، لا يقف لحظة ليقول نحن حلقاء الأمريكان، لكن الحقيقة من يقرأ عن على عبد الله صالح ومعاونة السعودية ومصر وغيرها للأمريكان يعلم أكيدًا أن هذه الحكومات خائنة عميلة قتلت مواطنيها في سبيل الأموال والمساعدات العسكرية في خيانة تاريخية لا مفر منها.

إن هذا الكتاب يجب أن يُقرأ ويُقرأ ويُقرأ....لكي نرى ما لم نكن نراه وندرك ما لا ندركه في مجالس العلم وشرح المتون، فإن لم يقترن العلم الشرعي ب��قه الواقع وإدراك ما يحدث حولنا، فنحن حمقى ولن نكون إلا حفنة من الأغبياء الذين لن يفقهوا شئ!..

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield as a title perfectly sums up what this book is about.
The book details the events pre-911 that dealt with the USA's relationship with assasinations and how Obama has made it the tool in the war with terrorism.

This book is completely factual and lets no one off the hook in terms of idealogy whether it is religious or political. Scahill displays the aggressive, nasty and illegal tatics from both presidents Bush and Obama. The book begins with the a little history of Cheney, Rumsfeld and the like who waited in the wings to push the policies after 9/11 and how Obama has progressed them beyond their wildest dreams. Obama embraced the use of special forces to assasinate rather than capture suspected terrorists. Unlike Bush, the media has been largely forgiving and has often covered up his crimes.

The problem of illegally detaining people without due process was waived away with simply murdering them...

The book weaves Anwar Awlaki's tale in between the chapters. We get a sense of who he was and how a moderate American Muslim became more radical in his views. The tragic story of his teenaged son being killed and the atrocious lies told by multiple sources in the government and media to cover it up. How many terrorists are created from the drones, cluterbombs and harassment of Muslims and those living in Africa? Not to mention the counterinsurgencies the CIA, JSOC and the US installed dictators caused the powerless living in Yemen, Somalia and the rest of East Africa.


I was particularly horrified but captivated by Schahill's connections to events like the blackwater agent Raymond Davis arrest in Pakistan. Once he was removed from custody the drone strikes on the citizens of Pakistan commenced. The sheer lawlessness our officials undertake and how they hide under these agencies that are not subjected to any oversight.
When anyone tries to question the legality Obama hides behind state secrets. There aren't any civilian casualties because they are disguised as "military" aged males.

Dirty Wars sums up how dirty this war truly is as it is designed to never end.

[Gaston Gordillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a must-read book to understand the imperial present, as well as the moral bankruptcy of the Obama administration in embracing and radicalizing the Dick Cheney doctrine. The narrative is not necessarily stellar (it is a bit repetitive at points) but the book is solid, well-argued, convincing, and gripping throughout. More importantly, the book reveals a world that is systematically censored in the mainstream media (which, as Scahill shows, simply parrots what the White House tells them to say). An important observation, made by some critics of the book, is that the United States has been engaged directly or by proxy in myriad forms of imperial-state terrorism for generations, from the Phillipines in the early 1900s to Central America in the 1980s. In other words, this "dark" side of US imperialism is far from being a recent deviation from a noble tradition. Scahill, to his credit, does mention the cases of Central America and Vietnam (especially the Plan Phoenix of political assassinations). Yet what is historically new about the past decade, and what this book examines in detail, is the replacement of large-scale military operations run by the military (and publicly debated in the media) with an invisible, ghostly war fought by death squads assassinating people all over the world and responding only to the President of the United States. And this is a president, as we know, who claims that it's legal to kill those who he (and him alone) deems worth killing. Scahill's Dirty Wars is a very valuable, extremely-well researched and courageous document that should be widely read and debated.

[Jack Keaton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jeremy Scahill is one of the best investigative journalists in the English-speaking world. His reporting is thorough--the notes to "Dirty Wars" is over 80 pages. Scahill’s findings are an indictment of the Bush and especially the Obama Administrations, not to mention our compliant lawmakers and a corporate media that goes along for the ride. It is chilling to read that U.S. efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and the rest of the world are not defeating Al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations, but inspiring them!

[Leena · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an exposé on the moral and political disasters of American foreign covert operations post-9/11 as part of the “global war on terror”. It has become common knowledge that the United States committed crimes against humanity in the name of counterterrorism, but I never quite grasped the depths of American evil until reading this book. Abu Ghraib may be the most famous example of American international operations of terror, but it barely scratches the surface. This book focuses on Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, Pakistan, and Afghanistan as the theaters of covert American intervention that resulted in torture, instability, and the deaths of innocents by the millions.

This book explains the rise and reign of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), a covert intelligence and assassination unit under direct command of the Executive Branch that operates with no accountability to the rest of the government, invented after 9/11. JSOC was the bullet that the Bush and Obama Administrations shot into the Middle East and Africa to carry out their dirty work, essentially treating the world as a battlefield and anyone with a loose tie to “terrorist organizations” as a viable target for torture and murder. JSOC has imprisoned and killed innocent people around the world with absolute impunity. The descriptions of the despicable acts of torture that JSOC committed have kept me up at night. I highly encourage everyone to read this book as an exposé of the evils and hypocrisy of American empire.

This book is so detailed and so engrossing I could not put it down. It’s chilling descriptions of America’s crimes gave me goosebumps every time I picked it up.

[Bryan Alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dirty Wars describes America's war on terror, with a specific focus: campaigns and operations waged by special forces from 2001-2011. It's a detailed, impassioned, sometimes frightening book, and one of best accounts I've read of what has become the longest war fought by the United States.

Scahill focuses on the CIA and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSCOC), whose powers and relationship developed rapidly during the post-9-11 decade. The Bush administration expanded JSOC's resources and ambit, partly to create a force without the CIA's political baggage. In so doing Bush created a secret war-fighting machine with little accountability and significant capacity for human rights abuse.

Dirty Wars is critical of this phase, but become scathing when the Obama team takes office. Scahill takes the pre-White House Obama at his word, allowing for the possibility of ending Bush-era abuses. Instead, Scahill argues, the Obama administration confirmed and extended Bush's global war apparatus (250 331). Black sites, rendition, collateral damage, secret actions without oversight, the use of mercenaries all continued or grew (252, 295, 473). Worse, perhaps, is that Obama's war policies elicited less criticism domestically than did Bush's. For example, "[t]he fact that the president had authorized an assassination strike against a US citizen went almost entirely unchallenged by Democrats and Republicans alike." (314)

To make this case Dirty Wars traces campaigns and operations throughout the Middle East and Africa, including Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Yemen. The non-Iraq chapters are especially useful, given how much American attention focused on Baghdad during this period. Scahill outlines developments very clearly, drawing characters and politics in a very accessible way. The American war on terror had enormous impacts on these countries that didn't often win a great deal of journalistic attention. I especially found useful Scahill's explanation of our involvement in Ethiopia's invasion of Somalia (2006-7), and the long-running relationship between Yemen's wily leader and American efforts against al Qaeda.

Paralleling these major movements is a biography of Anwar Awlaki, an American assassinated by drone strikes. Scahill uses Awlaki's tale to humanize the often complex and shadowy special forces operation, giving us a believable human character. The author also argues that the Obama administration erred (at best) or simply lied (at worst) in proclaiming Awlaki to be a serious threat to the United States.

The charges Scahill levels against two American administrations are not new, at least not to those of us who've followed the wars and/or who pay attention to critical/left observers, but Dirty Wars does a fine job of building up the evidence. Namely: many war on terror efforts backfired, expanding hostility to American power and swelling jihadist ranks, as with turning Al-Shahab into a major Somali player (229). Other efforts succeeded in reducing al Qaeda forces, but gave rise to massive popular unrest, perhaps sowing the seeds for anti-American politics for decades to come, as occurred in Pakistan. The strategy of targeting individuals made American openly embrace assassination as a tool of statecraft (as opposed to doing it with deniability), including sober legal arguments for whacking US citizens without a trial (for example). The wars also built up an Orwellian/Phildickian apparatus of death:

the kill list became a form of "pre-crime" justice in which individuals were considered fair game if they met certain life patterns of suspected terrorists... [I]t was no longer necessary for targets to have been involved with specific plots or actions against the United States... At times, simply being among a group of "military-aged males" in a particular region of Pakistan would be enough evidence... to trigger a drone strike. (352)

There is also the idea of acting against a person solely due to their speech. Scahill cites a chilling Eric Holder (Obama administration attorney general) commentary on the necessity of "neutralizing" someone for their online activity (403); this concept seems to have won more support in the US this year, with bipartisan advocates including Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

(Perhaps the weirdest moment concerns the publication of a jihadist magazine's first issue:

The sixty-seven page issue only contained four actual pages of the magazine. The other sixty-three contained a computer code that, when deciphered, turned out to be cupcake recipes featured on the popular US daytime talk show Ellen, hosted by gay comedian Ellen DeGeneres. It is unclear how the file was corrupted, though some reports suggested it was a cyberattack by anti-AQAP hackers, MI-6, or the CIA itself. (378)

)

And yet... I was inclined toward these views before I began Dirty Wars, and was confirmed in them by the book. But there was little in the way of counter-argument. We don't get much sense of why American leaders would select these strategies; those rationales are murky, or mockable. There's no sense of how effective they were, at least in terms of the goals they sought. For example, Charlie Savage apparently sees the underwear bomber affair as playing a major role in driving the Obama team towards a hardline on terror, partly due to fears of being help culpable for similar attacks (one review). Scahill doesn't see this challenge, at least not in this book.

Dirty Wars is a large book crammed with information. I initially thought to read it quickly, but there is no padding here. It's worth every reader's careful attention.

[Ahmed Hussein Shaheen · Rating 5 out of 5]

ربما يجب على كل شخص قراءة هذه الكتاب لأنه يكشف لنا الكثير مما تخفية او على الأقل تحاول أن تخفيه حكومة الولايات المتحدة من جرائم وانتهاكات للقوانين والأعراف الدولية
وربما يمكن تلخيص كل هذا العمل البديع بنفس كلمات الكاتب وهي كالتالي تقريبًا
أن ما فعلته وتفعله الولايات المتحدة في العالم من قتل واغتيال وتدمير وكيل بمكيالين لم يقلل من الأخطار التي ستواجهها أمريكا بل زاد عدد اعدائها حول العالم بشكل كبير

أنصح به وبشدة

[Denise · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gripping, insightful and chilling all at once. Through excellent, meticulous research, Scahill digs into the multitude of controversies and abuses, lies and cover-ups, circumvention of laws and appalling disregard for human life and human rights that have characterized the so-called War on Terror and continue to do so.

[Sylvia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had to make myself read this book. Given some of the work I do, I felt it was important, but I literally made myself read 20 to 30 pages everyday no matter what. It's well told, well argued, and well-documented, but it is indeed a somber topic and it is 500+ pages.

I hope people read this book or at least pay close attention to the news concerning what we are doing in the name of the 'War on Terror'. Yes, I do believe there is/are real threat(s) and that we as a nation need to be vigilant and prepared, but equally I think we need to take the time to discuss as a people what the implications of the following are: the War on Terror, "kill lists", the killing of American citizens without trial (under what circumstances might it be Ok?), War when the battlefield is global/will this forever make us at War, is it OK to kill an accused terrorist on a street in a nation where we are not at war?. We certainly were not OK with KBG killings with umbrella tips in London a few years back. If we do bad things even just once in a while, how do we condemn other nations for doing the same?

It seems to me there needs to be public debate and some basic consensus on what is OK, but equally I am aware that there are good reasons for not always letting all the world know precisely what we are willing or not willing to do. As a citizen, I am also concerned about how large the 'shadow defense/security industry has become' and with its growth its power and influence. I hope that we never forget President/General Eisenhower's warning of the need for continued vigilance on the military industrial complex, which now has a shadow component that might very well be even be larger than the visible one. Finally, the actions of Cheney and Rumsfield still appall me.

I've told myself that I need to learn more about the Middle East, a region about which I know so little. I just finished The Septembers of Shiraz, a fabulous book and am in the middle of The Burgess Boys, which is centered on an incident involving Muslims in a small Maine town - also very good. I promise to write these up soon.