Does the Boston Bombing remind us of something?

By Omid Shams

The wily Shafts of state, those Juggler's Tricks Which we call deep Design and Politicks (As in a Theatre the Ignorant Fry , Because the Cords escape their Eye Wonder to see the Motions fly) ... Methinks, when you expose the Scene, Down the ill-organ'd Engines fall; Off fly the Vizards and discover all, How plain I see thro' the Deceit! How shallow! and how gross the Cheat!. . . Look where the Pully's ty'd above! Oh what poor Engines move The Thoughts of Monarchs, and Design of States, What pretty Motives rule their Fates!. . . Away the frighted Peasants fly, Scar'd at th' unheard-of Prodigy. . . Lo, it appears! See, how they tremble! How they quake! Swift, Ode to the Honourable Sir William Temple, 1689. The first and the most common reaction to Boston Bombing is, of course, a shock. The second natural response, then, would be the confusion. These are the goals of Boston Bombing: shock and confusion, derived from two simple questions: who? and why? Considering that neither a person nor a group has claimed responsibility for the attack, it would be the States job to reveal who did this and why. Killing people in one of the friendliest events of our world wont leave a doubt that it is an act of madness and barbarism. Therefore, all we need is rationality to protect us from such a grave danger; we need the truth and justice. And who is representing the rationality in this world? Of course, it is the State and only the State. It is the State that has enough power to create the truth and to bring the justice by any means. We like the truth but it is just a secondary issue. We want justice and it doesnt matter if it has anything to do with the truth. And by justice we mean the need for culprit and severe punishment; that is all. We dont care how we get that justice or how the State will do it for us. If we have them (culprit and punishment), then the State will have our permission for its

actions, whatever they would be. In the other words, the main beneficiary of such an attack is the State. The panic created by such an attack, immediately, gathers the whole nations support under the governments flag that lets the rulers to make unobjectionable decisions that in different situations would cause lots of questions. As in every criminal investigation, we have to search for the motivations at first. The question why may lead us to answer the question who. We must ask: who benefits from killing innocent people in one of the most powerful countries in this world? There is no symbolism in Boston Bombing. And we know that the symbolism in terrorist attacks that dont aim a certain person, government or organization is characteristic. When you dont want to eliminate a certain person, then, you intend to imply something. The signs of Boston Bombing cannot be compared to 9/11 attack, for example. In 9/11 the economic and military bases of the United States Empire was aimed. There were civilian casualties, but it was not the main point. The main point was to bring, symbolically, a giant down on his knees. Although, in 9/11 also we can ask same question of the real beneficiary, but we must admit that, at least, the scenario, the style and the symbolism were totally different with the recent attack. In Marathon Bombing the whole thing is about cruelty and evilness. The question is who benefits of such an absolute evilness. Until now, the only beneficiary of this event is the U.S government. It suddenly found a horrifying, mysterious, and extremely evil public enemy. And we all know how much the American government loves the new brand evil adversary. We have nothing but guesses based on beneficiaries. What kind of organization or person can benefit from a tragic event that inflamed the global anger against the doer/doers and brought widespread sympathy for the victims? We may say a person or a group drowned in madness. And this madness seemingly happened to be serving the American government nowadays. The similar madness, which is strangely increasing its occurrence, played a vital role in U.S gun control policy and intensifying the police state in the name of the security. Marathon Bombing played the same role from the seconds after it happened. In addition, the title of unclaimed terrorist attack gives the government, as the only official source authorized to find the truth and bring the justice, the opportunity to use the event as a powerful weapon against those we will know in the future. Of course, it is not a fact but it is possibility and governments strengthen this possibility, simply by preventing the independent international investigations of similar cases, unless a decade later. Gianfranco Sanguinetti divides the act of terrorism as offensive and defensive actions. Offensive terrorism is usually hopeless and reactionary methods, mostly doomed to fail, used by organizations or persons who have no other way to resist against absolute power. When we are talking about terrorism we must be aware of polluting and confusing atmosphere in which the debates on the term terrorism take place. These days we le t the media and military

or security officials to determine the meaning of this term and also the persons involved with this kind of action. Hence, we see, in many cases, that a national or revolutionary resistance involved with armed struggle is considered as a terrorist organization. Well, the language is the power and power is in the hands of those who can speak louder. When the power speaks, terms like torture can be easily transformed into enhanced Interrogation Techniques . On the defensive terrorism Sanguinetti argues that it is always and only States which resort to defensive terrorism, because they are deep in some grave social crisisThe defensive terrorism of States is practiced by them either directly or indirectlyIf States resort to direct terrorism, this must be directed at the populationIf, however, States decide to resort to indirect terrorism, this must be apparently directed against themselvesThe outrages accomplished directly by the detached corps and parallel services of the State are not usually claimed by anybody, but are each time, imputed or attributed to some or other convenient culprit (On Terrorism and State). The direct action happened two days ago in Bostons Marathon and the indirect attack appeared today as ricin poisonous letter for president Obama. Are we claiming that Boston Bombing is a false flag operation? Not yet, simply because we dont have enough proofs. But we have convincing proofs for same claim in similar attacks that happened before. The most similar cases are the Piazza Fontana Bombing and assassination of Aldo Moro, which helped the Italian government to accuse and get rid of the several left winged, anarchist and then fascist figures and organizations for decades ((it is funny, isnt it?). Then, recently, the useless and belated truth was revealed: Operation Gladio. Operation Gladio was an anti-communist stay-behind secret operation of NATO led by CIA that masterminded the Piazza Fontana and was involved in assassination of Aldo Moro. (1) Now, just hours after the Marathon Bombing, the enthusiastic media began the project of fictional antagonizing with reports such as a Saudi suspect in police detention or, by saying nonsenses as what the ridiculous reporter of an Italian TV channe l said: the bomb was made by pins and round metals. I think it is similar to the roadside bombs that are used in Afghanistan. Are we saying that CIA did this? We dont know yet and they dont need to do that by themselves. Let me suggest an example: In November 17, 1986, Georges Besse, the head of Renault car factory was assassinated by far left organization, Action Direct. Later the whole group were arrested, convicted and sent to jail. They refused to defend themselves in the court. But the point is that Georges Besse happened to be, at the same time, the head of the largest Uranium enrichment project of French government, Eurodif, in which the Iranian former regime had invested about one billion dollar in 1974. The interesting point is that Georges Besse was

killed in the middle of unsuccessful negotiation between French government and Islamic regime of Iran on returning the Iranians money and the large amount of enriched uranium, which the French government had refused to give it to Iran. Surprisingly, right after the assassination of Georges Besse and several other bombings in France, the French government made agreement with Irans regime and returned a large part of the money (nobody knows about the possible delivery of enriched uranium which was the most important part of the contract for Iranian officials). And may be by coincidence, two French hostages Philippe Rochot and Georges Hansen, who had been taken by Lebanese militants, were freed after the agreement between Iran and France(2). French government never accused Irans secret service for assassination of Georges Besse. But Irans regime was the only beneficiary of the obvious bespoken operation that sent its message and met its goal. Now, we cannot be sure of anything. We can just wait and watch that how and toward what purpose the U.S government and its mega image factories direct this new spectacle.

Notes:

1- [1] The bombing of a busy bank in Milan's Piazza Fontana on 12th December 1969, which resulted in the deaths of 16 people and 88 serious injuries, signaled the beginning of the "Strategy of Tension" -- the general aim of this strategy, developed in the face of working class militancy, was to create a heightened sense of disorientation, fear and atomization amongst the general population, leading to an increased identification with the authority of the state. While some initially may have hoped that this would lead to a military takeover, this strategy became a more general response in periods of social unrest and political crisis uniting fascists, conservatives, and democrats. The Piazza Fontana bombing took place within the context of escalating class struggle and deepening social crisis of the 'Hot Autumn'. After the bombing the authorities turned their attention to anarchist circles with remarkable speed. Anarchists, including Pietro Valpreda and railway worker Giuseppe Pinelli, were held for questioning in connection with the bombings. Pinelli 'jumped' to his death from the fourth floor office of the police station he was being questioned in. The police had been holding Pinelli illegally for three days. According to the police account, when confronted with "overwhelming evidence" of his involvement in the bombing, Pinelli jumped to his death, as he did so shouting "This is the end of anarchism!" (Pinelli's murder prompted Dario Fo to write his satirical play, The Accidental Death of an Anarchist.) After the state's farcical attempt to pin the blame on anarchists fell apart, the finger was pointed at fascists. The 'fascists' behind the bombing turned out to work for the Italian secret state. The cover-up of the Piazza Fontana bombing would last decades. A short flyer entitled Is the Reichstag Burning? was posted in Milan a few days after the bombing. The authors of this text including Sanguinetti -- denounced the bombing as a state provocation, unlike the vast majority of the Left at the time, who generally accepted police and

media lies at face value. In 2000, the 300 pages parliamentary concluded that U.S government was involved with terrorist attacks in Italy 1969. Also CIA documents released in 2006 approved the claim. See Willan, Philip. "US 'supported anti-left terror in Italy' http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2000/jun/24/terrorism , The Guardian, June 24, 2000. Also see: Lee, Christopher. CIA Ties With Ex-Nazis Shown (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601555_pf.h tml Washington Post, June 7, 2006. 2- see: Dominique Lorentz, Atomic Republic, Documentary, 2001, Arte Television.