Friday, February 22, 2008

 

UK Busted!


After years of denial, Britain has finally admitted that American planes were allowed to land on British territory to refuel during rendition flights in 2002. British Prime Minister David Milliband said this week that "contrary to earlier explicit assurances," the CIA had confirmed using an American-operated airfield on the British Territory of Diego Garcia.
Apparently the CIA "forgot" that they had done this when a few years ago the British public was up in arms over the idea.
How hard can it be to remember where these flights landed? Surely someone must be in charge.
As Tony Blair has stepped out of politics in the UK and gone into running the world, and Dubya's days are numbered, it seems a lot of skeletons will be crawling out of the collective cupboards.
Tomorrow, according to the UK Telegraph, a former SAS soldier will spill the beans on how the SAS detained and interrogated rendered prisoners. If what he says proves to be true it will unmask the Blair government for the lying lap dogs that everyone already knows they are. There is no way on earth Blair could claim he knew nothing if what Ben Griffin said is true.


Although the CIA attributed its earlier denials to a “flawed records search,” the admission could add to the animosity the government here has aroused over its alliance with the United States in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Miliband’s statement prompted protests from members of Parliament of various parties and from British-based human rights groups that have contended for years that Britain was a knowing or unknowing partner in the American use of rendition flights. The term gained much of its notoriety from the American practice after Sept. 11, 2001, of transporting terrorism suspects secretly to other countries for interrogation.
The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Gen. Michael V. Hayden, informed British officials of the 2002 flights last week during a visit to London. He issued a statement Thursday to the agency’s staff in Washington saying a fresh review of agency records had shown that the CIA had erred in assuring Britain previously that “there had been no rendition flights involving their soil or airspace” since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Miliband said that he had received a personal apology from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and that she had told him she shared his “deep regret” about the earlier false denials.
Hayden said in his statement, “That information, supplied in good faith, turned out to be wrong.”
He added: “That we found this mistake ourselves, and that we brought it to the attention of the British government, in no way changes or excuses the reality that we were in the wrong. An important part of intelligence work, inherently urgent, complex and uncertain, is to take responsibility for errors and to learn from them.”
Miliband told the House of Commons he was “very sorry indeed” to have to revise the Labor government’s repeated assurances that it knew of no American rendition flights involving British airspace or airfields. The British assurances, in 2005, 2006 and 2007, were given, among others, by Tony Blair, who said in 2005 as prime minister that he was “not prepared to believe” that the Americans had broken faith with Britain over the issue.
“The House and its members will be deeply disappointed at this news, and about its late emergence,” Miliband said.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown, visiting Brussels, Belgium, spoke in similar terms. “It is unfortunate that this was not known, and it was unfortunate it happened without us knowing that it had happened,” he said.
Comments:
Ben Griffin is a British hero of the most definitive kind.

Before our nation too abseils into the mire of illegal conduct the US administration wantonly embrace, men and women of valour must step forward, assuredly risking becoming the target of mudslingers and shills alike. They demonstrate true courage in speaking-out against that which they clearly and correctly see to be wrong.

Without such stalwart resistance, everything of value that defines the British people and nation will be blurred and eventually lost.

Far from undermining the effectiveness of our forces, Ben Griffin stands firm to remind others less worthy that they will not undo that with has generations to affirm.
 
hear hear
I just hope he isn't suicided on some lonely common.
 
eh. We'll see. If he is such a good dude why din he talk when toni was in charge?
 
I doubt he will make any difference at all. The UK has been doing a number of illegal things during the war, such as aiding the US use cluster bombs in Afghanistan and also, I believe, in Iraq. That was clearly against the UK's agreement not to use these weapons. So I would say that the nation has already abseiled.
 
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