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[written in August 2004:] Trying to revive this site (but making no promises; “real life” has an infuriating habit of demanding time away from larger and more interesting questions) and found this pretty much forgotten analysis of the infamous Nicholas Berg beheading video, never published because I hadn’t finished compiling the links to various questions and comments. Here it is, then, for what it’s worth, in its half-completed state (unlinked statements can be googled):

Sunday, May 22, 2004

Anomalies, inconsistencies, editing and lies destroy the credibility of the video of the murder of Nicholas Berg

I am convinced that the official administration line, the “finding” of a CIA “investigation,” that Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi is the person who decapitated Nicholas Berg, is an out and out lie, put forth to divert attention from the Abu Ghraib prison atrocities and in an attempt to reignite nationalistic fervor against “al Qaeda.”

• Berg’s body was found over the weekend of May 8th; his family was notified by Monday the 10th and broke down upon learning about the video—yet the video did not appear on the internet until the 11th, and the statement accompanying it is dated May 11. The discrepancies in the timeline and reporting of the discovery of the body, noted merely as “showing signs of trauma,” and notification of the family are very troubling.
• Al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian, was reported killed in the bombing of Falluja in April 2003 after being unable to escape a U.S. bomb attack because of a prosthetic leg. Berg’s killer was very much alive and not limping and furthermore none of the killers had a Jordanian accent.
• Why would the notorious al-Zarqawi, who allegedly wishes our blood to run cold at the very sound of his name (assuming for the sake of argument that he is indeed alive) identify himself in the communique that accompanies the video but then have his face covered? Granted, yes, he could have written the thing and somebody else read it. Granted, he could have ordered the killing (from the great beyond?).
• A Russian speaker noted on an internet forum that one of the assassins was heard speaking Russian:

  The terrorists in Berg’s beheading video are communicating to each other in Russian! One of them tells to the executioner who was cutting Berg’s head: “Davay pozhivee!” meaning “Do it quicker!”, or “Hurry up!” in pure unaccented Russian. Initially, I thought I was the only one who noticed it, but other Russian speakers confirmed it as well independently from me. . . . BTW, “Allah o Akbar” they pronounce not with Arabic, but with a Russian-like accent.

  Others have written that they do not hear any Russian even after repeated listenings, so I mention it merely as a matter of curiosity that bears further investigation.

• Nicholas Berg looks calm, serene, not in fear of his life, as though among “friends” or allies he felt were routinely questioning him and maybe posing him in some weird video—but nothing he felt threatened by. He is unmanacled and sitting in a white plastic lawn chair identical to those seen in Abu Ghraib prison photos, in front of a wall curiosly similar in color to the walls in those photos, and in an orange prison jumpsuit identical or almost identical to U.S.-issue garb worn by prisoners at Guantanamo Bay Concentration Camp. Circumstantial evidence, but in contrast to the setup of the Daniel Pearl photos: a blue blanket hung in the background, Pearl sitting on the ground, wrists in chains, wearing his own clothes and looking truly fearful and resigned.
• The knife used is pathetically small. There is also a serious lack of blood that would accompany the beheading of a living person whose heart would be pumping in adrenaline-rushed struggle and fear, especially such an amateurish and drawn-out beheading accomplished by sawing rather than chopping.
• The exposed flesh of the murderers looks pasty-white and they look quite well fed, not like people who have been running and hiding and living by their wits—who have probably had to cut off the heads of many chickens and goats and would not do it by sawing. The hand holding Daniel Pearl’s head, by contrast, is lean and brown.
• The body language of the assassins is all wrong. One comment, somewhere (sorry, I can’t find the link now), was that one or two looked to be standing at “parade rest,” a decidedly American stance. I found this message, in the “Comments” at the end of Berg Video—Smoking Gun? at Marc Perkel Rantz very enlightening:

  Pro Bush here but something is definitely off about this video. I made myself watch it. having been married to a Muslim man . . . I can tell you that there is [something] off about the demeanor of the men standing while the statement is read. . . .

  Muslims are trained their whole lives to stand and listen as prayer commences. Prayer is done five times a day in countries outside the US. When I visited Egypt the imam called prayer five times daily. You hear it where ever you are. . . .

  You don't need to watch the actual execution. You just need to watch the demeanor of the video to notice that two of the men are swinging back and forth on their feet like American men do. The guy on the end tosses his gun over his shoulder and they are not paying attention to what is being said.

  This posture is probably why the Iraqis are so certain that the video is fake. Muslims stand with their hands at their waist one over the other, in fact, the way hands are folded is quite specific. I used to get snapped at by women in the mosque all the time. I still don't know which way it is.

  Also when you say allah hu akbar most people raise their hands to their ears.

  . . . I don't know what is going on with this video. I watched it waiting to confirm the stupidy of the conspiracy claims only to find myself in agreement. . . .

  Posted by Lolijume at May 21, 2004 06:22 PM

• Even without these anomalies and mysteries, the apparent use of 2 cameras, with different date stamps, and the very fact that editing was done, destroy the credibility of the video in and of themselves. Wouldn’t a true execution for revenge be recorded from start to finish with no “editing”—for just that reason, to make the point that it was real? Wouldn’t someone intent on making the point that he is real scary and beyond any standard of decent behavior record his worst deeds in crystal clarity? Fourteen-year-old kids fooling around with a videocam after school could do better than this blurry and ambiguously obscure piece of work.
• The oddly convenient timing of such a despicable, horrifying and repulsive act seems very suspicious. World sympathy was thoroughly with the Iraqis, with the Abu Ghraib prison photos appearing in newspapers around the globe, and it seems, well, hard to believe that “al Qaeda” would break that momentum with an act that even an Iraqi noted “benefited only Bush.”
• The apparent ease with which the CIA “confirmed” that the killer was Zarqawi, within 24 hours, is laughable. On what did they base this conclusion? On the sound track of the video, the masked nonJordanian speaker saying that is who he is? This is the same CIA that said Saddam Hussein had tried to get yellowcake uranium from Niger for nuclear weapons, and indeed had WMDs poised for instantaneous destruction of the planet.
• The administration’s bald-faced lie that Berg was never in U.S. custody, counter to Berg’s own e-mails and remarks as well as an e-mail to the Berg family from the U.S. ambassador in Iraq, just completely destroys any lingering doubts I could have had about the authenticity of this video.

I started to put together a much more complete critique—in fact, that is why this posting is late; the research and the compiling of links is time consuming—but discovered a great deal of the work already done in Nick Berg’s Killing: 50 Fishy Circumstances, Contradictory Claims, and Videotape Anomalies at Kuro5hin.org, “a site for people who want to discuss the world they live in.”

Another good analysis: Nick Berg’s ‘Beheading’ a False Flag at ToppleRummy.org, with 42 Problems with the Video and Official Story and a link to the video itself, “the best copy of the video we were able to find.”

Also note these:

Berg beheading: No way, say medical experts, by Ritt Goldstein, Asia Times, May 22, 2004

Nick Berg Beheading. Many links to musings and theories at rense.com—a few admittedly outlandish but for the most part, as a whole, substantiating the fact that things just ain’t what they seem on that video.

The Terrible and Strange Death of Nick Berg, khilafah.com, May 16, 2004

Bloggers doubt Berg execution video, by Lawrence Smallman, aljazeera.net, May 14, 2004

Mr. Berg was Alive—Video/Audio Analysis: the writer, who analyzed the video frame by frame in Windows MovieMaker, concludes that Nicholas Berg (if indeed that’s who it even was, which is also in question) was alive at the time of the beheading. Read for yourself and see if you agree (I do not).

Multitudinous overwhelming cries for Rumsfeld’s resignation

A small sampling of responses to an invitation from BBC News to comment on whether Rumsfeld should resign in light of revelations of abuse and torture at Iraqi prisons:

He should be charged with war crimes. [He] and Cheney are also partly responsible for the horrific Vietnam war while they were in Nixon's cabinet. Break chains of power. The same greedy, rich, white males have been leading us for years. Getting rich of deaths/wars and lying to the public about it. Let this be a precedent and get mad men like this out of positions of power.—Rob, Providence, US

Ironically, as Secretary of Defence, he has put Americans in more danger than ever before. Unfortunately, I don't think he has the integrity to resign.—Sally, New York, USA

I am a Korean War veteran. I love my country. Never in my lifetime have I seen such widespread hatred and disdain for America and Americans. These are zealots and cowards are running our country, starting with Bush and Cheney and they should all apologize to every American people and to the entire world.—Dr Philip Vargas, Falls Church, Virginia, USA

Rumsfeld is the apex of an arrogant, military lobby in USA—a bunch of people who have no concern for human rights, freedom liberty and moral values which were seen as the inseparable ideology of USA. The entire Bush administration, with the exception of a few (like Colin Powell) must resign and save the image of USA.—Antony Panakal, Camorino, Switzerland

Will Rumsfeld resigning clear the real issue at stake... I think not. These mistreatments are bound to happen in a country where the intruder is not wanted. I think America should focus on getting out of Iraq very soon; clearly their methods and policies are not working. There is only one conclusion for the US occupation in Iraq or any Muslim country... disaster.—Yahya Aly Reza, Lahore, Pakistan

The Mideastization of the US, or: Rumsfeld Must Resign
Juan Cole
Informed Consent, Friday, May 7, 2004

The Bush administration keeps talking about bringing democracy to the Middle East, but a key element in democracy is always the accountability of public officials to the public. That is why we have elections, that is why we have a division of powers, that is why Congress can impeach the executive and the Supreme Court could order Nixon to hand over his tape recordings. When high officials commit improprieties, they must resign. When they run a loose ship and it founders on the shoals of scandal, they must resign. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz must resign. It is the only way the United States can recover even a shred of credibility in the wider world, at a time when this country desperately needs the esteem and the cooperation of allies and friends. . . .

To move on, America needs Rumsfeld to resign his post
The Scotsman, May 7, 2004

. . . there seems little or nothing to be gained by Mr Rumsfeld’s continuing in his current role.

Nothing in his evidence to the electrifying hearing held by the Senate armed services committee yesterday suggested that the systematic abuse of prisoners had been taken seriously enough when the allegations emerged. . . .

. . . for all the slickness and artful simplicity of Mr Rumsfeld’s answers yesterday, his assertion that the military acted with all due haste and thoroughness simply does not convince. Under the devastating questioning of the decorated war hero Senator John McCain, he sounded evasive and facile, even if the windier statements in this extraordinary piece of political theatre prompted a virtuoso’s repertoire of contrite verbal gestures. . . .

Resign, Rumsfeld
Responsibility for errors and indiscipline needs to be taken at the top
The Economist, May 6, 2004

YOU are fighting against international terrorists in a battle that both they and you describe as being one about values. You fight a war against Saddam Hussein at your initiative, not his, and you say that it is a war about law, democracy, freedom and honesty. A big metaphorical banner hangs above both wars proclaiming that your aim is to bring freedom, human rights and democracy to the Arab world. All of that sets admirably high standards for the conduct of your forces as well as of your government itself. Now, however, some of your own armed forces are shown to have fallen well below those standards. What do you do? . . .

But maybe not surprising, though, considering that even those at the very top are having a major problem with Herr Rumsfeld:

Dissension Grows in Senior Ranks on War Strategy
U.S. May Be Winning Battles in Iraq But Losing the War, Some Officers Say
Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post, May 9, 2004

Deep divisions are emerging at the top of the U.S. military over the course of the occupation of Iraq, with some senior officers beginning to say that the United States faces the prospect of casualties for years without achieving its goal of establishing a free and democratic Iraq. . . .

Some officers say the place to begin restructuring U.S. policy is by ousting Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, whom they see as responsible for a series of strategic and tactical blunders over the past year. Several of those interviewed said a profound anger is building within the Army at Rumsfeld and those around him.

A senior general at the Pentagon said he believes the United States is already on the road to defeat. “It is doubtful we can go on much longer like this,” he said. “The American people may not stand for it—and they should not.”

Asked who was to blame, this general pointed directly at Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz. . . .

For more facts and insight into the depth of Rumsfeld’s complicity and absolutely depraved indifference and incompetence, see Chain of Command: How the Department of Defense mishandled the disaster at Abu Ghraib, by Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker, May 9, 2004.

Bush has created a global network of extra-legal and secret US prisons with thousands of inmates

This is the new gulag
Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday, May 6, 2004, The Guardian

. . . Bush has created what is in effect a gulag. It stretches from prisons in Afghanistan to Iraq, from Guantánamo to secret CIA prisons around the world. There are perhaps 10,000 people being held in Iraq, 1,000 in Afghanistan and almost 700 in Guantánamo, but no one knows the exact numbers. The law as it applies to them is whatever the executive deems necessary. There has been nothing like this system since the fall of the Soviet Union. The US military embraced the Geneva conventions after the second world war, because applying them to prisoners of war protects American soldiers. But the Bush administration, in an internal fight, trumped its argument by designating those at Guantánamo “enemy combatants.” Rumsfeld extended this system—“a legal black hole,” according to Human Rights Watch—to Afghanistan and then Iraq, openly rejecting the conventions.

Private contractors, according to the Toguba report, gave orders to US soldiers to torture prisoners. Their presence in Iraq is a result of the Bush military strategy of invading with a relatively light force. The gap has been filled by private contractors, who are not subject to Iraqi law or the US military code of justice. Now, there are an estimated 20,000 of them on the ground in Iraq, a larger force than the British army.

It is not surprising that recent events in Iraq centre on these contractors: the four killed in Falluja, and Abu Ghraib's interrogators. Under the Bush legal doctrine, we create a system beyond law to defend the rule of law against terrorism; we defend democracy by inhibiting democracy. . . .

Emperor Bush is truly a “uniter”

Iraq’s Shiites, Sunnis Form Anti-Occupation Body
Samir Haddad
Islam Online, May 8, 2004

BAGHDAD, May 8 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies)—Iraq’s Sunnis and Shiites formed Saturday, May 8, a pan-religious body to stream efforts for ending the occupation.

The United Iraqi Scholars Group—which appointed a 16-strong leadership panel—has vowed to boycott any political group set up by the United States and called for a stronger army than the small force envisioned by the US-led occupation authority, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

After a five-hour conference, attended by 500 Iraqis from across the political spectrum, the group said its agenda was based on “legitimate resistance to end the occupation” and keeping Iraq united.

It deemed all laws passed or to be enacted under the yoke of occupation “illegal” and demanded an end of occupation as soon as possible.

The new body, grouping Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds, pressed for sidelining the U.S.-appointed Governing Council and called for a meeting with U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi. . . .

Will The Glorious Chimp recognize this as the godsend it is and graciously withdraw his occupying forces—or, true to form, call these “terrorists” and “insurgents” and step up the holocaust? Sadly, it is only too easy to predict the disdain with which the bumbler and war criminal will treat this apparently legitimate body in this “democracy” he is supposedly establishing in Iraq.

And relevant to that, check out The Misunderestimated Man: How Bush Chose Stupidity, by Jacob Weisberg, from the introduction to Molly Ivins’ The Deluxe Election-Edition Bushisms: The First Term, in His Own Special Words:

. . . The most obvious expression of Bush's choice of ignorance is that, at the age of 57, he knows nothing about policy or history. After years of working as his dad's spear-chucker in Washington, he didn't understand the difference between Medicare and Medicaid, the second- and third-largest federal programs. Well into his plans for invading Iraq, Bush still couldn't get down the distinction between Sunni and Shiite Muslims, the key religious divide in a country he was about to occupy. Though he sometimes carries books for show, he either does not read them or doesn't absorb anything from them. Bush's ignorance is so transparent that many of his intimates do not bother to dispute it even in public. . . .

The increasingly fast falling-apart of BushCo:

Biggest and most damning revelation in Bob Woodward’s new book, Plan of Attack, is that before confiding in his own Secretary of State Colin Powell about his intention to go to war with Iraq, our treasonous “president” gave Cheney and Rumsfeld permission to inform Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan about his decision to wage war on Iraq. They even showed him a top-secret map of the war plan.

The original goal, brilliantly drawn out by Joshua Micah Marshall in Talking Points Memo, was to seize Iraq’s southern oil fields—a task mandated to Centcom only two weeks after 9/11.

Also noted in Woodward’s book: BushCo diverted money approved by Congress to fight terrorism to prepare for the invasion of Iraq—which as we all know had no real role in the events of 9/11 or any connection with al Qaeda.

Considering the fact that under George W. Bush are 6 convicted felons recycled from the treasonous Iran-Contra debacle (remember that? when the unconscionable sleazebags, beholden to no laws but their own, sold contraband arms to Iran to finance death squads in Central America), none of this should come as any surprise. Also let it be noted that the same Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar assisted the Reagan administration on the sly by sending $2 million a month to the Nicaraguan Contras.

Is there no illegal, greedy, contemptible action by this administration that the complicit Congress won't condemn? Pity that the memories of American voters are so short—and so uncritical.