The retrans site, otherwise known as a retransmission site, was a communications post set up on a plateau overlooking the town of Al Qaim. This communications site was there to provide communications between the main base at the railroad station where we were stationed and an outpost in Husaybah, Iraq, where Bravo Company’s area of operations took place. We would encounter mortar fire on a daily basis. Most of the time, we would return this fire with mortar fire of our own. Some of the time, the counter-battery would call in a specific location for us to exchange fire. On occasion, when the counter-battery could not call in a specific location, our unit would fire upon the town anyway, sometimes in the hills off to the west of the town where we thought the mortar fire was coming from and other times straight into the town of Al Qaim itself, onto buildings, houses and businesses. Because of the lack of personnel at the retrans site, very rarely, if ever, did we conduct a battle damage assessment report to report civilian deaths and destruction. So almost all the time these incidents went unreported and not investigated. This was not an isolated incident, as well.


Another mission our platoon was tasked to take on was that of transporting prisoners from our detention facility on base back to the desert. The reason I say the desert and not their town is because that is exactly where we would drop them off, in the middle of nowhere. Now, most of these men had obviously been deemed innocent, or else they would have been moved to a more permanent detention facility and not released back into the local population. Our unit engaged in punching, kicking, butt stroking or generally harassing and abusing these very prisoners until the point at which our unit would be take them in the middle of the desert, miles from their respective homes, and at times throw them out of the back of our Humvees, all the while continually punching, kicking and at times even throwing softball-sized rocks at their backs as they ran away. This, once again, was not an isolated incident.


Possibly the most disturbing of what took place in Iraq was the mishandling of the dead. On several occasions, our convoy came across bodies that had been decapitated and were lying on the road, sometimes for weeks. When encountering these bodies, standard procedure was to run over the corpses, sometimes even stopping and taking pictures, which was also a standard practice when encountering the dead in Iraq—this, along with neglecting to account for many of those who were killed or wounded. On one specific occasion, after I had personally shot a man attempting to flee while planting a roadside bomb, we drug his body out of the ditch he was laying in, and we subsequently left that body—slide please—we subsequently left that body to rot in the field, where we saw this man up to a week later.


These are just a few of the disturbing and unacceptable stories I could share with you from my time in Iraq. Others would include continually dehumanizing Iraqis by referring to them as “hajis” or “sand niggers.” Even the racist and sexist nature that exists within the military itself, which was obviously—overtly obvious on a daily basis. I could also tell story upon story of families being destroyed as a result of an occupation that unfortunately should have never taken place. Several members of my platoon—several members of my platoon went through divorces and/or separations, many of the time with children involved.


I could also testify to the overwhelming majority of those I served with who did not think dying in Iraq was honorable or acceptable, nor did they enjoy or want to go back to Iraq a second or third time. Unfortunately, because of personal circumstances, whether they be financial or family issues, many indeed were deployed up to three times during their four-year enlistment. In fact, many, including myself, at times did not have intention of helping the Iraqis. Because of the hostile intent, as well as the loss of lives close to us, our best friends, our unit had a general disdain and distaste for Iraqis and their country. Further, our unit, for the most part, did not trust our command and had a general mistrust and distaste of this occupation from its inception onward.


I could also speak to the personal attacks veterans, including myself and many others, had to encounter once we were willing to be treated for PTSD within our unit. The idea of being a real Marine that does not complain when coming back home and who sucks it up and just does the job that we were tasked to do, this mentality resulted in many of the Marines I served with, including myself, turning to drugs and alcohol to cope with the horrors of this bloody occupation.

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AMY GOODMAN: Marine Corps rifleman Vincent Emanuele testifying before Congress. We’ll be back with more from Winter Soldier on the Hill in a minute.


[break]


AMY GOODMAN: We return now to Winter Soldier on the Hill and to war veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan testifying before Congress about the horrors of war.


ADAM KOKESH: I think my background can best be summarized by a form that I filled out 9 June, 1999 at the military entrance processing station after enlisting in Santa Fe, New Mexico, entitled “Why I Joined the Marine Corps." I feel a responsibility to take part in the national defense in some way. For whatever short amount of time or whatever miniscule part of it that I am, I would like to do my part, and I feel the Marine Corps is the best way for me to do it. I am also joining for the experience in self-growth that comes with being a Marine. The experiences are priceless, and many cannot be had anywhere else. I would only hope that anyone considering joining the military today for those reasons of which I am very proud of realize that they have a higher calling than serving their country: to restore faith in our system of governance, before they make themselves ready to fight and kill and die in the United States of America, knowing that they may end up dying for a lie.


I joined the Marine Corps. I shipped to boot camp June 18, 2000, and checked into my reserve unit at the end of that year after completing artillery training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and went to college at Claremont McKenna in Southern California.


And in the run-up to the war, I believed the narrative that was being put forth by this administration. I believed what Colin Powell said at the UN. And still, I believed that the war would not be in this nation’s best interest and was against it from the beginning.


But after the war, after the invasion, at the beginning of the occupation, I felt that what we were doing was cleaning up our mess and genuinely responsible foreign policy and trying to do good by the Iraqi people, so I volunteered to go with a civil affairs unit. And in the two weeks between being activated and deploying to Iraq, I learned that what we were doing in civil affairs was going to be working with the Iraqi people on schools and mosques and clinics and water projects, and to me it sounded like exactly what the President was promising that we would be doing in Iraq. And I was very excited about that. I thought that we were going to be the tip of the spear. And I had to go to Iraq myself to found out that that was not the case and that the greatest enemies of the Constitution are not to be found in the sands of Fallujah, but rather right here in Washington, D.C.


When I—on our way into Iraq, I was issued this rules of engagement card that is supposed to be the gold standard of conduct and use of force for the military in the occupation of Iraq. They couldn’t even cut the card square. But if I may, it begins with “Nothing on this card prevents you from using deadly force to defend yourself. Section one. Enemy military and paramilitary forces may be attacked, subject to the following instructions. Positive identification is required prior to engagement. PID is, quote, ‘reasonable certainty,’ unquote, that your target is a legitimate military target. If no PID, contact your next higher commander for decision. Section one, delta. Do not fire into civilian populated areas or buildings unless the hostile force is using them for hostile purposes or if necessary for your self-defense.” Section three reads, “You may detain civilians if they interfere with mission accomplishment, possess important information or if required for self-defense.” It says at the end, “Remember, attack only hostile forces and military targets.” And at the very end, it says, “These ROE will remain in effect until your commander”—and then the rest of that sentence is actually cut off here.


And that just goes to show that not only are the rules of engagement, as they’re strictly outlined by this card, to contradict themselves and to be confusing and to put Marines in a situation where their morals, as defined by those rules, are put at odds with their survival instincts. And I think that it’s fundamentally criminal to put brave young Americans in that situation.


I was attached to Golf Company 2/1, my civil affairs team, before the siege of Fallujah, and we were called with them to support them in the blocking of the two bridges over the Euphrates River on the west side of Fallujah after four Blackwater security agents were killed and had their bodies burned and strung up on the northern bridge in April of 2004.


Shortly after arriving there—first slide, please—there was a checkpoint shooting to the west of our position where a man coming home from work at the end of the day did not see the newly emplaced Humvee, desert-colored, against the desert background, manned by Marines wearing desert-colored camouflage. And a Marine there decided that he was approaching at too fast a rate of speed and emptied into the vehicle with a .50-caliber machine gun. We later justified this by saying that there were—that hearing the vehicle burning afterwards, there were rounds cooking off from the heat, although it’s clear from this picture and from every other examination that there were no rounds in the vehicle cooking off that would have made punctures in the outer body of the vehicle. Next slide, please. The second round or the round that hit this Iraqi gentleman in his chest, hit him so hard that it broke his chair and knocked him back in his seat.


Next slide, please. The vehicle was dragged into our compound where we were sleeping, as you can see in the background where the vehicles are parked in this picture. This is a picture that I’m very ashamed of, having posed with this dead Iraqi as a trophy picture. But what felt awkward to me at the time was not that—not so much that I was taking the picture, but rather that I had not killed this man, and I was almost—I was taking a trophy of someone else’s kill. And my entire team was present for this, including a major, and numerous members of my team took similar pictures. At the first Winter Soldier investigation in 1971, one of the Vietnam veterans held up a similar photograph and said, “Don’t ever let your government do this to you. Don’t ever let your government put you in a position where this attitude towards death and this disregard for human life is acceptable or common.” And yet, we are still doing this to service members every day, as long as the occupation

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continues.


Next slide, please. At one point during the siege of Fallujah, it was decided that we were going to allow women and children to leave the city. We thought this was the most magnanimous thing we could have done, and yet our rules were to let only women and children out. And so, any male over the age of fourteen or, as we were told, anyone who was old enough to be in your fighting hole was too old to get out of the city, was turned away. And so, my responsibility during this time at certain points was to go out on this bridge and turn away families. And like I said, we thought this was the most magnanimous thing we could have been doing. However, it’s clear that we’re giving these families an impossible choice, whether they could stay together with their families intact or split their families up and hope that half of them end up with something better. But all that we had to offer them was literally the mosque across the street, good luck. And what happened there can only be described as either the deliberate or careless creation of internally displaced refugees.


During the siege of Fallujah, our rules of engagement changed so often that we were often uncertain of them. And at one point, anyone who was described as a suspicious observer would be a legitimate target: anyone holding a cell phone, binoculars or, at one point, anyone out after curfew. And this led to an incident where Marines were firing at firefighters and cops silhouetted against a fire that our indirect fire had caused who were trying to help out the civilians that were being affected by that fire.


After the siege of Fallujah, my team was tasked with setting up a checkpoint at the Civil Military Operations Center at Fallujah, where we detained various personnel at snap VCPs during the summer of 2004, many of whom were harassed unnecessarily. One such person had a bag of cash in his back seat and was harassed by human intelligence officers before being released. And their abuse of him was such that they were even reprimanded by a higher officer, but they determined that there was no reason to detain him, and he was let go. If that money was not intended for the insurgency before this incident, I have to assume that it was afterwards.


I realized that we in civil affairs were a fig leaf. We were there to make the occupation look good. We even came up with a slogan to justify our existence to the infantry commanders that we had to beg to be able to get out and do our missions. And it was "We care, so that you don’t have to.”


If there are any questions from members of Congress as to the particulars of any incident that I have mentioned here, I would be happy to provide names of all personnel and units involved, dates and grid coordinates. I hope that my testimony has helped shed light into some of the shadows that make up our collective denial of the occupation of Iraq. As a country, we have allowed fear to overwhelm us and have failed ourselves by allowing this criminal occupation to have ever happened.


You do not have to have served to see how recent pressures on the military are making us weaker as a country. You do not have to have witnessed the occupation firsthand to see its absurdity. And you do not have to be an expert on international relations to see the disastrous effects of our foreign policy. Ignorance, propaganda and distraction have made up the last refuge of those Americans who would rather remain in denial about our current state of affairs. Now that we are facing the truth and the majority of America is at least nominally against the occupation of Iraq, what fate will we claim for our nation? For some, their silence will be their hypocrisy, and their inaction will be their complicity with the destruction of our great union.


But I have an unwavering faith in my country, and I know that the self-righting ship of the United States of America will one day regain its course, but only with the great toil, courage

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and sacrifice that it demands of its Winter Soldiers. I am proud to call myself one of them today.


JAMES GILLIGAN: My name is James Gilligan. I served a four-year and a two-year contract honorably for the United States Marine Corps. While on active duty, I achieved the rank of corporal and was promoted in the Individual Ready Reserve to the rank of sergeant. I was deployed in Kuwait and later in the initial assault five years ago to Iraq for Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 with the 2nd Marine Division, 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion, H&S Company, CEB Main, and served as a member of the Nuclear-Biological-Chemical Reconnaissance team for the Combat Engineer Battalion Main. Later in the same month of returning home, I deployed to United States Naval Base, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, with 3/6 Weapons Company, CAAT platoon. I was assigned to the joint operations center and later on the fence line. I personally observed Camp X-Ray from the outside and later once inside. In 2004, I was deployed with the same unit to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.


I have testimony on all three deployments to be entered into the record. However, today, in a message of solidarity with IVAW, we’re only going to talk about and speak about Iraq. I am also a number of that 120 a week. I, in 2007, tried to take my life, as well. I feel deep regret and remorse for what we’ve done in Iraq and on the global war on terror. This is my testimony.


Kuwait and Iraq, 2003, the initial invasion was to be a mechanized breach, or a “mick lick” [MCLC]. It’s a tub of C-4 on a high-tension rope with a detonation cord inside. It fires on a rocket over a minefield and is used in counter-landmine warfare to make a lane which trucks can drive through. We practiced this maneuver twice in Kuwait and never performed it.


It was on the oral history review DSIT AE 015 conducted January 14th of 1991, an interview between Major Dennis P. Levin of the 130th Military History Detachment and Major Walter Wilson, Jr. S-3, 1st Battalion, 504th Infantry. It was quoted right away.


Major Levin: “The primary focus of this interview is the training relative to the Iraqi strong point that was constructed on the Ali Range. And I am interested in what preparation you had before the training operation, and then if you could just kind of take me through the operation as it went.”


Major Wilson replied back with: “The main preparation we did, other than issuing a formal operations order, was to rehearse it twice before we actually conducted the attack. And also we had about two officer professional development classes on the Iraqi strong point and what it consists of, and how we would envision taking it down.”


This tactic was in the works prior to the invasion twelve years later. We were issued the same warning orders, and instead of breaching under fire, we breached the country twice by road, the second time by UN security car through UN—back to Kuwait and back onto the Iraqi roads. This was all due to the incompetence on the leaders of the convoy commander. I am sure, without fail, that we were the only unit in history to have ever invaded a country and invaded it all in ten minutes twice.


It was then that we drove on through the day and continued unhindered for most of the next two days, while American air power pounded the hell out of Iraqi armor and buildings with depleted uranium rounds. The amount of destruction was tremendous, and we watched once while in a traffic jam as a pair of Apaches laid rockets and gunfire into the heart of a city a few kilometers in the distance. Without a doubt, I have been in and around buildings destroyed by depleted uranium rounds, as well as vehicles, armored personnel carriers, tanks and corpses.


During the invasion, we were also exposed to severe sandstorms, which meant that we were breathing in sand for days, sand that more than likely contained depleted uranium. I went for forty-seven days without a shower in the initial invasion, and I could buy a PlayStation 2 game in a post exchange before I could even shower, because our contractors were already making bases and had a routine supply line, while we were sleeping out in the open. Almost daily, I found Iraqis who spoke English, whose questions were who we were and how long we were to be there.


Today is the Conscientious Objector Day, May 15th, and the day that honors those who choose not to fire their weapons. They do go to combat sometimes by force of their command. We were just a week before the flight to Kuwait when I saw my first sergeant chew someone out about his CO status. I heard the first sergeant say, “What if those f-blank ragheads came into your home and raped your daughter and tortured and murdered your wife?” I was shocked to hear the bravery in the young lance corporal’s voice as he told the first sergeant, “No, I don’t know what I would do. Why? Would we do that to them?”


Destroying Iraqi property was such a pleasure for some, but for me one day it was orders. I was ordered to take Lance Corporal Jerome with me as security, and I received orders via inter-squad radio to destroy a civilian’s pickup truck. I slashed as much as I could, and I kicked in the windshield for good measure. It was later with regret that I thought that this might have been this man’s livelihood.


Looting during the initial invasion was rampant. Nearly everyone had something: rugs, pens, pictures, you name it, anything you could find that would fetch a price. Later, I had to surrender to US Customs officials, military liaison, my pins with Saddam’s head on the design. They wanted them back, because all uniform items were to be confiscated for the rebuilding and reconstituting of the Iraqi army. Meanwhile, we were running over guns and blowing up weapons caches. Slides. Those that

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didn’t bought their souvenirs on the street, some of which were probably stolen.


That’s a picture of me as a tunnel rat in Afghanistan.


Next slide. For some members in my unit, it was the Iraqi atomic energy facility that was most profiting. It was there that I was told that members of my unit had breached a safe containing gold coins. I was not on that foot patrol, which took place deep within the compound. However, I was shown the coins later from fellow NCOs in my platoon.


When I deployed, it was with two sappy armor-protected plates, yet I was ordered to give one to a fellow Marine from 1st Combat Engineer Battalion who had not deployed with one. Such was the case for a majority of the junior NCOs and below from 1st CEB, deploying with inadequate armor. During the initial invasion, in fact, my Humvee had plastic doors.


We never found evidence of weapons of mass destruction while on patrol with the Nuclear-Biological-Chemical Warfare chief warrant officer and fellow members of my reconnaissance team.


Early May, while trying to win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people, we were surrounded by a crowd of non-hostile Iraqis. I witnessed my first sergeant for H&S Company as he exited the Humvee without any backup or support. He ran down a male Iraqi child who was maybe seven to eight years old and lifted him in the air, hand choking the boy. With his pistol already drawn, he pointed into the child’s head and neck area, threatening and screaming shouts of profanity. As a result of this, the mood in the truck was dead silence until we returned to our campsite.


Thank you very much.



AMY GOODMAN: Marine Corporal James Gilligan served in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. We’ll have more from the Winter Soldier on the Hill hearings in a minute.


[break]


AMY GOODMAN: We return to Winter Soldier on the Hill and to war veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan testifying before Congress about the horrors of war. This is California Congressmember Barbara Lee questioning former Army Sergeant Kristofer Goldsmith.


REP. BARBARA LEE: Now, I know part of the psychology of war is to dehumanize people so that the atrocities that are required—the atrocities that are committed, that those atrocities would bear minimal emotional impact on the soldier. How does this affect the mental health of those who have to do these things? And how do we need to move forward to make sure that suicide attempts don’t occur and that post-traumatic stress syndrome is minimized and that we could really help with the psychology and the psychological needs of our veterans? Because all of you talked about, and we saw and we witnessed on the slides, this dehumanization process in action, and that’s part of war. And I don’t know how they train our young men and women for this, but that’s what occurs, and so we have to figure this out and what we can do to help when you come home.


KRISTOFER GOLDSMITH: Yes, Congressman. Something that was brought up to me by a very good friend of mine sitting behind me, Mathis Chiroux, just mentioned maybe two weeks ago, and it was something I never thought about, was that every enlistee spends a week of basic training, or at least a few days, doing bayonet training. And we are putting a bayonet, a knife on the end of a rifle, and we repeatedly stab a dummy that looks like a human being and yell "Kill!” with every movement, yell—


REP. BARBARA LEE: This is part of your training?


KRISTOFER GOLDSMITH: Yes, that is the basis of the military on a broad scale. That is the basis and the first step to dehumanization towards the enemy and the acceptance to kill is—there’s a very popular thing that the drill sergeants require us to say. I remember the first time I heard it, I refused to say it, and it wasn’t because I didn’t want to be a soldier, it was because I thought it was weird. And the response to the question, “Soldiers, what makes the green grass grow?" and the response is “Blood, blood, blood, Drill Sergeant!” So I would like to allow Geoffrey to go on how we can move past that

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GEOFFREY MILLARD: You asked in your question, Congresswoman, what can you do to move forward with veterans coming home with scars that can’t be seen by the eye, ones of mental wounds. Well, in Iraq Veterans Against the War, we didn’t wait for the VA. We started a counseling group called Homefront Battle Buddies. In the Washington, D.C. chapter, which I’m the president of, we meet every Sunday at the Washington, D.C. office, our home, to meet for our Homefront Battle Buddies. That program is expanding nationally. We in Iraq Veterans Against the War have a saying, that we’re not going to wait for politicians to end the war. We ended the war every day in what we do. We also do the same when it comes to our other goals, including taking care of veterans: we’ve started counseling groups.


But what you can do, start simply with getting more Iraq veterans into college with the GI Bill. Even myself, with an honorable discharge and nine years of service, I’m not eligible under the current GI Bill for any benefits. The GI Bill is the start, but also making sure that the Veterans Administration is fully funded, making sure that there is no waiting list for PTSD care. We have seen multiple suicides this year alone on veterans who have been waiting on a waiting list to get mental healthcare at a VA. This is inexcusable. There should never be a waiting list for any veteran, especially not one so young coming home from Iraq, when they ask for mental healthcare. These are the types of things that while we move forward in Iraq Veterans Against the War, the Congress can certainly move more funding into the VA, more funding into our veterans as they come home and out of the occupation. Thank you.


REP. MAXINE WATERS: Let me just try and focus for a moment on Fallujah. I know that there have been a lot of—a lot of confrontations and a lot of fighting in different areas. But for some reason, Fallujah loomed large at the point that we were learning about it and the images that we were seeing coming back about Fallujah. And it looked as if our military was going door-to-door, kicking down doors and shooting anything that moved. Is that a correct assumption? Could you just describe a little bit what happened in Fallujah?


ADAM KOKESH: I believe what you’re referring to was the second battle of Fallujah in November. I was there for the first battle, when the primary military action was the siege of the city, and I was there for the whole interim period in the summer. I left in September of 2004.


But what I saw was that at the Civil Military Operations Center where I worked is that we created the Fallujah Brigade and handed over security of the city to this brigade of Iraqi Security Forces. And we knew, and I as a sergeant knew and all of my Marines knew, that by June of 2004 we were essentially arming and equipping the insurgency in Fallujah by providing supplies for what we called the Fallujah Brigade. And we waited until August to disband—announce that we were disbanding the Fallujah Brigade and ask that members turn in their American-issued ID cards and uniforms and weapons, and told them that if they didn’t, they would never get another federal job. And the reason we were able to say that was because despite the handover of power happening on June 28, we were still handling all payroll for the Iraqi Security Forces, at least where I was.


And we didn’t go into the city of Fallujah for the second battle until after the presidential elections of 2004, because I believe that the President knew he could not get elected with the headline of twenty Marines dead in downtown Fallujah, which I believe is what it would have been had we gone through when we knew, at least by our thinking at the time, that we would have had to go through Fallujah. And not only did numerous Americans die unnecessarily in that battle, because as ignorant as people were to what it meant that there were eight battalions poised outside of the city of Fallujah, the insurgents knew, and they were ready for the soldiers that went in. And as it was, almost a hundred Americans lost their lives in that battle. But not only that, numerous Marines died every single day maintaining that loose cordon of Fallujah throughout the summer of 2004.


But what it’s made clear is that this administration has chosen a policy for this country that values looking good over doing right. And as soon as you choose looking good over doing right, you will fail miserably at both. It is what we are doing as a country right now. It is what our leadership is doing. And it is what the Democratic Party has done, since it took power in 2006, when it decided that it would be more concerned with looking good than doing right, in terms of the policy towards Iraq, in order to secure an advantage for the 2008 election. My apologies to members of the Democratic Party in the room, but it is clear to me that that policy of looking good over doing right has been established firmly by this administration and has poisoned not only the military culture but our entire society and political

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leadership, as well.


REP. MAXINE WATERS: So would you conclude that in Fallujah, when our soldiers went in, that whatever the command was, whatever the instructions or the orders were, that some of our soldiers who died there died because of a poor command, a lack of—


ADAM KOKESH: I think the manipulations that led to the unnecessary deaths in Fallujah happened at the highest policymaking levels. There were State Department personnel present during the negotiations that created the Fallujah Brigade at my facility, and it is those manipulations of the process that led to those deaths. I don’t think even the generals who were conducting that—those battles had any say in the timing or the actual conduct, really, of those engagements.


REP. MAXINE WATERS: Thank you. And finally, the civilians who died there who were in those houses, where it appeared that our soldiers were sent to kick down the doors and to shoot anything that was moving, can—is it reasonable to conclude that that policy was not a good policy, that people died needlessly, soldiers and civilians?


ADAM KOKESH: Well, in terms of kicking down doors, I believe you’re referring again to the second battle of Fallujah, so I’m not going to try to comment on that.


REP. MAXINE WATERS: OK, OK.


ADAM KOKESH: But the way that the siege was handled absolutely led to the unnecessary innocent deaths of civilians. And one of the things we were tasked with at our Civil Military Operations Center was paying of Silatia payments, or battle damage claims, as we called them. And we distributed a couple million dollars that way. I was interviewed by Al Jazeera, because doing something like this was historically unprecedented. But we would turn around and pay people what it would cost to rebuild their homes, had we destroyed their home by accident, so somebody coming to our facility filing a claim might get $25,000 for the home that we accidentally dropped a bomb on, and $2,500 for the son that was killed in that accident. And that just goes to show the relative value of life that Americans have or the value that Americans place on Iraqi lives based on that policy that we carried out there.


REP. KEITH ELLISON: There is this sort of assumption, this base-level assumption when you go out and talk to folks and when you talk to people around here, that if there was a precipitous or a quick withdrawal from Iraq, that it would lead to more chaos than exists today, and that you also hear, as a corollary to that, that, you know, we—that that’s why we have to somehow stay until we, quote-unquote, “win.” Could you all address that assumption squarely, that somehow we are the glue holding Iraqi society together?


LUIS MONTALVAN: Yeah, I’d like to answer that—what’s that? Yeah, I’d like to answer that, since I was a member of the Iraq Enterprise Institute, which contrived the surge and I was vehemently against. And—what did I say? I’m sorry, the American Enterprise Institute. Sometimes my brain doesn’t—the synapses don’t fire.


But, you know, there is a misconception that staying in Iraq is vital to our national security interests and that a precipitous withdrawal, as you mentioned, Congressman, will lead to further chaos both in Iraq and in the Middle East. First of all, that’s an assumption, an assumption that has been made time and time again by the highest echelon of our general officers, who, I might remind you again, have consistently lied and misrepresented the situation on the ground in Iraq for the better part of five years. That having been said, there is no doubt that a withdrawal from Iraq is going to increase bloodshed and humanitarian refugees and suffering.


The question is, ought we to be there? Ought we to continue to fund billions of dollars, of American taxpayer dollars, toward an endeavor with no clearly defined end state for an unknown period of time? It’s my belief that a withdrawal of the majority of conventional forces in Iraq will in fact force the hand, and it might not be in the type of way that we would all like—there will be violence, no doubt about it—but it will force the hand of the tribal, ethnic and sectarian leaders to sort out their matters on their own, while we should be maintaining the sovereign borders of Iraq so as to prevent Middle Eastern—to prevent the civil war in Iraq to further growing into a Middle Eastern regional war.


REP. KEITH ELLISON: Do you gentlemen agree, or—


ADAM KOKESH: Well, from my experience, it is clear that every specter that has been raised in terms of potential consequences of a withdrawal from Iraq is worse the longer we stay there, every single one, most notably the “follow us home” argument, because the more enemies we make over there, which we are making every day, the more there will be to follow us home.


We call for the immediate withdrawal of all occupying forces. And what that means, most importantly, to me is the immediate end to the occupation—that is to say, the forceful interference with Iraqi sovereignty, which we are doing every time we go out the gates and impose martial law through our presence. But we also advocate reparations for the Iraqi people and recognize that we do have an obligation to the country of Iraq and that a continued diplomatic presence there in order to ensure that that leads to the kind of rule of law and stability and prosperity that the Iraqi people deserve is ensured.


REP. KEITH ELLISON: What does things like Abu Ghraib and other abuses that have been described—what does that do to the average Iraqi, who may not hold any animus toward the United States or US soldiers, but after their cousin, uncle or aunt or wife has been abused or outraged—what does that do to them? And what does that do to your security?


JAMES GILLIGAN: That’s an excellent question. When you meet an Iraqi teenage male on the street, you’re not meeting your average American male. You’re meeting an Iraqi male who has experienced a conflict, an occupation, that has been going on for the past five years in his homeland, in his neighborhood, in his streets, in his schools. So when you meet these people on the streets, you’re meeting people that—I mean, they know what’s up. They know, you know, exactly what the Marine Air Wing is capable of. They know exactly what, you know, our prison systems are like. They know exactly what our responses are going to be to gunfire, mortar fire, sniper attacks, etc. And they’re doing it, and they’re doing it good. They’re doing it consistently, and they’re trying to continue this resistance, and this act of resistance is not going to end until we are actually out of that country.


ADAM KOKESH: I served—I was manning a checkpoint or running a checkpoint at the Civil Military Operations Center when the Abu Ghraib scandal broke, and I had to go out the next day and face crowds of Iraqi people. And for us, it was—it felt as though we had been betrayed by the policy that resulted in that scandal occurring the way it had and that that was the environment that we were facing, that we still—the new challenge that I had that day was to go out and still convince the Iraqi people that we were there to help them.



AMY GOODMAN: Former Sergeant Adam Kokesh testifying before Congress, along with other Iraq and Afghanistan veterans at the Winter Soldier on the Hill hearings.



Democracy Now.org

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In India, two top political figures have resigned days after a deadly attack on the city of Mumbai left at least 172 dead and hundreds injured. On Wednesday attackers armed with automatic weapons and a vest of grenades targeted multiple locations in Mumbai including two luxury hotels, a restaurant, a hospital, the city’s largest train station, a movie theater, and a Jewish center. The dead included 18 foreigners. Hostages were held for up to 60 hours as Indian forces battled the gunmen inside multiple locations including the historic Taj Mahal hotel. Indian officials believe the coordinated raids were carried out by as few as 10 gunmen who arrived in the city by boat.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh: “We have had terrorist attacks before also. But this attack was different. It was an attack by highly trained and well-armed terrorists targeting our largest city."

India Raises Security To “War Level”
The Guardian newspaper reports the Indian government has raised the country’s security to a “war level” saying it had certain proof of a Pakistani link to the Mumbai attacks. India’s official news agency is reporting that the government was considering suspending the four-year-old peace process with Pakistan. Pakistan’s government condemned the Mumbai assault as a “barbaric act of terrorism” and denied involvement. Some Indian officials are blaming the attacks on the militant group Lashkar-e-Taib which has longstanding relationships with Pakistan’s security establishment. Indian author and new age guru Deepak Chopra appeared on CNN and said U.S. foreign policy in the region had radicalized many in the region.

Deepak Chopra: “What we have seen in Mumbai has been brewing for a long time, and the war on terrorism and the attack on Iraq compounded the situation. What we call ‘collateral damage’ and going after the wrong people actually turns moderates into extremists, and that inflammation then gets organized and appears as this disaster in Bombay. Now the worst thing that could happen is there’s a backlash on the Muslims from the fundamental Hindus in India, which then will perpetuate the problem. Inflammation will create more inflammation.”

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Iraqi Parliament Approves Security pact With U.S.
Iraq’s parliament has approved a landmark security pact with the United States that paves the way for U.S. forces to withdraw by the end of 2011. The deal could mark the beginning of the end of a U.S. military presence in Iraq that began with the 2003 invasion. The security pact has been opposed by Shiite cleric Moqtada Al Sadr and some Sunni groups in part because it allows U.S. forces to remain for another three years. In a compromise, lawmakers agreed to hold a national referendum on the security pact in July. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al Malaki. described the pact as one of the best achievements that will help recover Iraq’s sovereignty.

Nouri Al Malaki: “We have achieved one of our greatest achievements by signing the agreement of withdrawal of foreign forces from Iraq, to get back our sovereignty that we lost two decades ago, and I congratulate the Iraqi people.”

Obama To Introduce National Security Team
President-elect Barack Obama plans to officially introduce Senator Hillary Clinton as his nominee to be Secretary of State today. He is also expected to name retired General James Jones to be National Security Adviser and to announce that Robert Gates will remain as Secretary of Defense. Jones is the former commander of NATO. Since retiring he has served on the boards of Chevron and Boeing. Obama will also announce Eric Holder for Attorney General, Janet Napolitano for secretary of Homeland Security and Susan Rice to become ambassador to the United Nations.

Obama Defends Selection Of Top Aides
On Wednesday Obama defended his decision to surround himself with many former Clinton administration officials and other Washington insiders despite campaigning on a message of change.

President-Elect Barack Obama: “What we are going to do is combine experience with fresh thinking. But understand where the—the vision for change comes from first and foremost. It comes from me. That’s my job, is to provide a vision in terms of where we are going and to make sure, then, that my team is implementing it.”

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The Washington Post reports the U.S. military expects to station 20,000 uniformed troops inside the United States by 2011 to help state and local officials respond to assist in homeland security. The Pentagon’s plan calls for three rapid-reaction forces to be ready for emergency response by September 2011. The first 4,700-person unit, built around an active-duty combat brigade based at Fort Stewart, Ga., is already available to be deployed domestically.

400 Nigerians Killed in Christian-Muslim Clashes
In Nigeria, over 400 people have died in the city of Jos after clashes between Christians and Muslims following a disputed local election. The Red Cross estimates 7,000 people have fled their homes. Churches and mosques were reportedly burnt to the ground during the fighting.

Labor Department Pushes Rule Change on Toxic Substances in Workplace
The New York Times reports the Labor Department is racing to complete a new rule that would make it much harder for the government to regulate toxic substances and hazardous chemicals to which workers are exposed on the job. The proposal would, in many cases, add a step to the lengthy process of developing standards to protect workers’ health. Public health officials and labor unions said the rule would delay needed protections for workers, resulting in additional deaths and illnesses. The rule change has been strenously opposed by President-Elect Barack Obama. The Labor Department proposal is one of about 20 highly contentious rules the Bush administration is planning to issue in its final weeks.

U.S. War Resister Seeks Asylum in Germany
A U.S. war resister who fought in Iraq has applied for asylum in Germany saying the Iraq war was illegal and that he could not support the “heinous acts” taking place. Andre Shepherd has been living in Germany since going AWOL last year. On Thursday Shepherd say: “When I read and heard about people being ripped to shreds from machine guns or being blown to bits by the Hellfire missiles I began to feel ashamed about what I was doing. I could not in good conscience continue to serve.” Andre Shepherd is believed to be the second U.S. soldier to seek asylum in Germany since the start of the Iraq war.

Stampede of Shoppers Kill Worker At Wal-Mart
In Long Island, New York, a worker at Wal Mart died after being trampled to death by a stampede of shoppers on Friday, the traditional first day of the holiday shopping season. The 34-year-old worker Jdimytai Damour was killed after a crowd of 2,000 broke down store doors and ran over him shortly before the store’s scheduled 5 a.m. opening. Four shoppers were injured in the stampede including a pregnant woman. Nassau County police were trying to determine what happened during the stampede, but said it was unclear if there would be any criminal charges. Shoppers at Wal-Mart described a chaotic scene at the store.

Lisa Williford: “It was mayhem. It was mayhem. It was a real mob. It was a real mob and I was on the line at 10 minutes to four, so it was at least four or five-thousand before I had even got here. So I think that people were anxious. I’m going to get in. I’m going to get in. I’m going to get in and I don’t think the security that they had was enough to calm the crowd or make the crowd feel like you’re going to get your turn.”

National Day of Mourning Held on Thanksgiving
In Massachusetts, members of the United American Indians of New England held a protest on Thursday to mark the National Day of Mourning. The day is observed by many Native Americans and their supporters in protest of the traditional Thanksgiving holiday. Speakers included Juan Gonzalez, representing the consulate of Mayan Elders.

Chris Matthews Seen As Possible Senate Candidate
And in political news, rumors have it that MSNBC host Chris Matthews is considering a run for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania against Republican Arlen Specter. Matthews is a Philadelphia native and once served as an aide to House Speaker Tip O’Neill.

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