I've been reading a book about the Israeli Mossad, their version of our CIA, titled Gideon's Spies. It tells the behind-the-scenes stories of some of the exploits of that fabled intelligence service, including many of the details about the numerous assassinations they've carried out. They're pretty brutal, for sure. Which begs the question, do the ends ever justify the means? Is assassination ever right / justified?
Let's be clear here: This isn't something that only the Israelis, with their backs to the sea, do to stay alive. James Bond ^, the legendary British MI6 agent does it all the time....I've seen him! The fact is, the British do it, the French do it, the Russians certainly do it, and so do many, many other countries. Including your good 'ol USA.
Our difference is we are rich enough and powerful enough that we can (usually ?) pay others to do our dirty work, enabling us to maintain "plausible deniability". Just like we don't torture terror suspects....but we do send them to Jordan, or Egypt, or Kazakhstan for a pleasant visit with those nice folks.
I remember my mom telling me "two wrongs don't make a right". True, but if one of those wrongs is so heinous, and the consequences will be so catastrophic, THEN would another "wrong" be justified?
Yes, Israel has whacked scientists from Syria and Pakistan and Iran (and probably elsewhere) who were actively working on perfecting nuclear weapons, weaponized germs, etc, weapons those countries have vowed to use to "wipe Israel off the map". And all indications were they weren't just idle threats. Honestly, I can grudgingly understand the Israeli's actions.
To use that same logic, if the US or the UK or France or Germany knew of a dastardly plot about to come to fruition, and if the country harboring the plotters couldn't be trusted to squash it, should we go in and "neutralize" the threat?
And where is that fine line between "yes", and "let's wait and see"? And if "let's wait and see" prevails, what happens if they're wrong and the result is another 9/11? Do those who erred on the side of restraint deserve responsibility for the catastrophe? Would you have the cojones to "wait and see"? And if you were too quick to say "go for it" (think GW Bush vs Iraq), what then?
Let's face it, making leadership decisions is a tough business! (That's why they all leave office with gray hair.)
To you, is this a black and white issue, or is there a big gray area? (Pun intended.)
S
I've been reading an interesting book about the Israeli Mossad (their version of our CIA), Gideon's Spies, written by Gordon Thomas. What I found out for the first time was the circumstance behind the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II back in 1981.
It seems that while the Pope was recovering from his wounds he became obsessed with finding out who was actually behind the attempt on his life. A Turkish militant, Mehmet Ali Agca, carried out the actual attack, but the consensus opinion was that he was not sufficiently intelligent to pull it off by himself.
Before Agca's attack on the Pope he killed a Turkish newspaper editor who published flattering pieces on the West. Agca was arrested, but was soon sprung from jail by The Gray Wolves, an Islamic extremist group, and went underground. He sent a letter the next day to the Turkish press threatening just about everyone, including "the infidel in Rome", "the Commander Pope", and "the Commander of the Crusades", all of course referring to Pope John Paul II. The suspicious part was that these terms were much too eloquent to be used by the barely literate Agca.
The Pope's confidant and the Vatican's virtual Secretary of State (my title), Cardinal Luigi Poggi, was sent out to ask questions. That's when the Israeli Mossad began checking their data base and found that the terms "infidel in Rome, Commander Pope, and Commander of the Crusades" were originally used by the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Intense digging pieced together that the plot was indeed hatched in Iran.
Two years after the attempt on his life, the Pope visited the man in prison who shot him where he pointedly asked him if Khomeini was responsible, and Agca admitted that yes, it was true. The Pope forgave Agca and even gave him a rosary crafted in silver and mother-of-pearl.
Pope John Paul II later said during a speech to workers at an Olivetti factory in Ivrea, Italy, "What the Koran teaches people is aggression; what we teach our people is peace. Of course, you always have human nature which distorts whatever message religion is sending, but even though people can be led astray by vices and bad habits, Christianity aspires to peace and love."
"Islam is a religion that attacks. If you start by teaching aggression to the whole community, you end up pandering to the negative elements in everyone. You know what that leads to: such people will assault us."
How could this have gotten past by me, the news junkie that I am? Did you know this?
S
