Mandela Speaks Out

So Mandela is not as naive as it seems in other reports. In this Newsweek interview he speaks pretty plainly. Bush et al don’t like the UN because they perceive it to be run by black people and gets in the way of some of their unilateral wars. And it’s okay for Israel to have nukes, because it’s “white”, whereas it’s not okay for Iraq to have nukes, because it’s “black”. And Mandela can’t trust Cheney, because Cheney fought to keep Mandela imprisoned.

Of course, Mandela is way too late to stall this war. It’s already begun. Indeed, in a sense it never ended. US and British planes have been flying attack runs, and frequent bombing runs, every week for ten years. And now close on 400K US and NATO troops encircle Iraq. What’s being debated in the US now is really the deployment of the invasion force, and the divvying of the political and economic spoils afterwards. Seymour Hersh noted this last December, and I noted it last October.

we have been bombing Iraq whenever we feel like it for the last 10 years. Nobody likes that, least of all the Iraqis, and but lot of other people besides … We have accepted responsibility for the death of 500,000 Iraqi children – Edward Peck, former US Ambassador to Iraq

Earlier here.