As more news about Benazir Bhutto’s assassination comes out, clearly implicating the Musharraff regime in the murder, our tax dollars are going toward paying Lockheed Martin for weapons to Pakistan.
“Washington, Jan 1 – The US Defence Department has awarded a $498.2 million contract to Lockheed Martin Corp to supply 18 F-16 aircraft to Pakistan just ten days after the US Congress slapped restrictions on military aid to Islamabad.
Lockheed will sell 12 F-16C plus six F-16D planes to Pakistan under the contract, the department announced in a list of defence contract awards Monday, but did not say how soon the fighter jets would be delivered.”
Pakistan -under the Musharraf regime – continues to given aid and comfort to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, the very people who attacked this nation on 9/11. Prior to the attack on my country, Pakistan’s then-chief of the ISI wired money to one of the 9/11 hijackers and had an American journalist murdered:
“If the 9-11 Commission is really looking for a smoking gun, it should look no further than at Lieutenant-General Mahmoud Ahmad, the director of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) at the time.
In early October 2001, Indian intelligence learned that Mahmoud had ordered flamboyant Saeed Sheikh – the convicted mastermind of the kidnapping and killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl – to wire US$100,000 from Dubai to one of hijacker Mohamed Atta’s two bank accounts in Florida.”
Let’s run down some of the facts about Pakistan for a moment:
- An ISI agent murdered an American journalist.
- An ISI chief financed the 9/11 hijackers, who murdered over three thousand Americans.
- Musharraf and his regime have created a haven for al Qaeda, who continue to murder American soldiers.
- The pro-Democracy candidate running against Musharraf was just assassinated
And yet nearly half a billion dollars of OUR money is going toward paying Lockheed Martin to deliver yet more weapons to the ISI-Musharraf regime. It is bad enough that Lockheed is selling weapons to a regime that has such close ties to terrorism, but that we have to pay for this purchase is absolutely astonishing.
It is even more shocking considering that just 10 days ago, Congress put restrictions on military sales to Pakistan. Someone clearly put some pressure to get this deal passed despite growing concern of Musharraf’s violent actions and Congressional restrictions to aid. Who brokered this deal?
Was it Jack Abramoff from behind his prison cell who was a paid lobbyist (with our money) to Pakistan? After all, he was helping out with the F16 issue before 9/11. Somehow, maybe the prison element, rules Abramoff out.
Was it Lynn Cheney, the Vice President’s strange other half, who helped push this deal through? After all, she was on the Board of Directors for Lockheed Martin right up to 9/11. But she has moved on to penning lesbian soft porn, which likely keeps her rather busy.
Could it be Dick Cheney’s son-in-law, Phillip J. Perry, “who had, while working for a law firm, represented Lockheed with the Department of Homeland Security, had been nominated by Bush to serve as general counsel to the Department of Homeland Security.” That all depends on what his current lobbying slate looks like. Is he still a registered lobbyist for Lockheed Martin? I don’t know. Do you? With so much secrecy, is it possible to know anything about this all Un-American family?
No, I think Dick Cheney likely called up HIS State Department and HIS Defense Department to help US part with OUR money. Because how else are we to account for the billions in aid to Pakistan, pushed through by Dick Cheney during the tenure of the Bush administration?
Lockheed Martin, as well as the other Cheney affiliated companies like Halliburton, have long profited from un-American activities, anti-Democratic activities, all out human rights abuses the world over.
Enough is enough. If the ISI and Musharraf want those jets, then they will have to purchase them on their own dime. Unless al Qaeda is no longer a threat (I may have missed the memo) or Pakistan has given their house guests the boot (another memo I may have missed), then the continued funding of the Musharraf-ISI is treason. I think we, the citizens of America, have a right not to be forced to fund treason. I would even say we have a duty to prosecute traitors. But what do I know? I am just an American citizen, a tax paying citizen. Why should I have a say in what other people do with my money?
http://www.atlargely.com/2008/01/as-more-news-ab.html