Picnic in Chechnya

Photographs of Grozny (Dzhokhar), Chechnya

"Minutka Square. Few remained to live in the bombed apartment blocks. These men collect metal to sell."

Being Logical

Mr Brown, the new UK Prime Minister, declared in his first interview from 10 Downing Street that "Terrorism is not an act of faith; it is an act of evil."

I agree. The use of terror against civilian populations is evil. Whether in London or Baghdad, Glasgow or Jenin.

As for so-called "Islamist terrorists", I remain yet to be convinced that they really exist. And aren't merely the invention of certain interested organisations. If these Muslim fanatics love their religion so ardently, why would they flout its basic tenets so grossly? It simply doesn't make sense. Why target women and children rather than the government or military?

Make no mistake. The calculated murder of women and children brings no benefit to Islam. But it is too good to be true for Mr Brown and his ilk. Who gains?...

The Shocking and Awful Truth

"This document contains an in-depth analysis of the concept of “Shock and Awe” warfare as set forth by its architects and authors in “Shock and Awe: Achieving Rapid Dominance,” a book published by the National Defense University (December 1996), an institution funded by the Pentagon. The concept came into the news recently when on January 24, 2003 CBS News reported and confirmed that the Shock and Awe concept was the basis for the U.S. war plan for Iraq.

"Conventional warfare exists based on particular established, “tried and true” doctrines, which are specific concepts that function as guidelines for planning and executing military operations. “Shock and Awe” was proposed in 1996 by its planners as a “revolutionary” new doctrine based on the idea that it might be possible to defeat an adversary’s will itself – essentially to so rapidly overwhelm all aspects of his being with destruction and fear so that he is demoralized, confused, and hopeless; so that he risks no further pain.

"Shock and Awe is notable in another way: the plan explicitly calls for targeting of civilian infrastructure such as “water supplies, food processing and sanitation.” The destruction of Iraq’s water supply during the 1990-91 Gulf War resulted in a health and sanitation crisis, which was well-documented by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency while the crisis progressed. These important declassified documents are reviewed and cited in the context of Shock and Awe’s heavy emphasis on the destruction of an adversary’s water supplies, sanitation facilities, and power grids. It is this priority of Shock and Awe, along with its fundamental prerequisite of “imposing an overwhelming level of Shock and Awe,” which will make it so controversial.

"With that in mind, it is of significant interest that the mainstream American corporate media have chosen to all but ignore the substance of Shock and Awe. Media coverage to date has mostly avoided close scrutiny of Shock and Awe’s original text.

"When there has been reporting on Shock and Awe it has sometimes centered on the fact that the plan’s key architect and author, Harlan K. Ullman, revealed in an interview on CBS News January 24, that 300-400 cruise missiles would strike targets in Baghdad on the first day of a Shock and Awe war. (During the first Gulf War, which lasted 39 days, a total of 325 cruise missiles were launched.) On the second day, another 300-400 missiles would strike Baghdad. And with the 1,500 or more conventional “smart” 1-ton bombs, and high numbers of “e-bombs,” some have said it would be 10 times the amount of ordnance dropped during the entire Gulf War – al in about 48 hours.

"Coupled with the fact that a fundamental tactic of Shock and Awe is to destroy non-military zones and facilities (see discussion below), suddenly the level of destruction takes on a new significance. Consider this excerpt from the text:

'Shock and Awe are actions that create fears, dangers, and destruction that are incomprehensible to the people at large, specific elements/sectors of the threat society, or the leadership. Nature in the form of tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, uncontrolled fires, famine, and disease can engender Shock and Awe. The ultimate military application of Shock and Awe was the use of two atomic weapons against Japan in WW II.'"

The "Shock and Awe" Experiment

So, "Shock and Awe" is the military code-name for warfare aimed at killing and terrifying the civilian population. Pure terrorism.

Poison Dust

During the current Iraq War, the U.S. use of radioactive DU weapons increased from 375 tons used in 1991 to 2200 tons. Geiger counter readings at sites in downtown Baghdad record radiation levels 1,000 and 2,000 times higher than background radiation. The Pentagon has bombed, occupied, tortured, and contaminated Iraq. Millions of Iraqis are affected. Over one million U.S. soldiers have rotated into Iraq. Today, half of the 697,000 U.S. Persian Gulf War troops from the 1991 war have reported serious medical problems and a significant increase in birth defects among their newborn children.

Depleted Uranium in Iraq

Chechen War Photos

These beautifully shot photos show the harrowing reality of the Chechen War.

The Chronicles of Hell

The "Shock and Awe" Fallout

RADIATION detectors in Britain recorded a fourfold increase in uranium levels in the atmosphere after the “shock and awe” bombing campaign against Iraq, according to a report. Environmental scientists who uncovered the figures through freedom of information laws say it is evidence that depleted uranium from the shells was carried by wind currents to Britain.

Government officials, however, say the sharp rise in uranium detected by radiation monitors in Berkshire was a coincidence and probably came from local sources.

The results from testing stations at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) in Aldermaston and four other stations within a 10-mile radius were obtained by Chris Busby, of Liverpool University’s department of human anatomy and cell biology.

Each detector recorded a significant rise in uranium levels during the Gulf war bombing campaign in March 2003. The reading from a park in Reading was high enough for the Environment Agency to be alerted.

Busby, who has advised the government on radiation and is a founder of Green Audit, the environmental consultancy, believes “uranium aerosols” from Iraq were widely dispersed in the atmosphere and blown across Europe.

UK radiation jump blamed on Iraq shells (The Times)

US Dirty Bombs

'Doctors in southern Iraq are making comparisons to the birth defects that followed the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in WWII. They have numerous photos of infants born without brains, with their internal organs outside their bodies, without sexual organs, without spines, and the list of deformities goes on and on. Such birth defects were extremely rare in Iraq prior to the large scale use of DU Weapons. Now they are commonplace. In hospitals across Iraq, the mothers are no longer asking, "Doctor, is it a boy or girl?" but rather, "Doctor, is it normal?"'

Depleted Uranium Dust in Iraq and Afghanistan

A little-known fact. Four million pounds of radioactive uranium was dropped on Iraq in 2003 alone. US missiles, smart bombs, dumb bombs, bullets, tank shells, cruise missiles all contain high amounts of radioactive uranium. Its half-life is 4.5 billion years.

The UMRC (Uranium Medical Research Center) found hundreds of Afghan civilians suffering acute symptoms of radiation poisoning and chronic symptoms of internal uranium contamination. And deformed newborn babies. News they won't show on the TV.

Rewritten Geography

"Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist. Not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushua in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not a single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population."

David Ben Gurion, quoted in The Jewish Paradox, by Nahum Goldmann, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1978.


"[They] killed between 80 to 100 Arabs, women and children. To kill the children, they fractured their heads with sticks. There was not one house without corpses. The men and women of the villages were pushed into houses without food or water. Then the saboteurs came to dynamite the houses. One commander ordered a soldier to bring two women into a house he was about to blow up...Another soldier prided himself upon having raped an Arab woman before shooting her to death. Another Arab woman with her newborn baby was made to clean the place for a couple of days, and then they shot her and the baby. Educated and well-mannered commanders who were considered "good guys"...became base murderers, and this not in the storm of battle, but as a method of expulsion and extermination. The fewer the Arabs who remained, the better."

Testimony of an Israeli soldier who participated in the massacre at al Duwayma Village on October 29, 1948. Published in Davar, June 9, 1979. Quoted in Censored 2005, Peter Phillips & Project Censored.