Former Drone Operator turned Whistleblower: “I saw men, women and children die”

by Ezra Van Auken

American drones have been a problem around the world since their inception in the early 2000s; in the past year or so, the advocacy against drones has increased immensely. This could be partly due to the acceleration of drone strikes that have occurred in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Libya – along with Afghanistan. Within the drone world has come about a whistleblower to the operations.

Former United States drone operator, 27-year-old Brandon Bryant from Montana worked for nearly a decade flying predator drones. A turn for the worst made Bryant decide that the predator drone job wasn’t the best job for him after conducting and witnessing the killing of a child in Afghanistan. “I saw men, women and children die during that time,” Bryant explained to Spiegel Online. The former drone pilot went on to say, “I never thought I would kill that many people. In fact, I thought I couldn’t kill anyone at all.”

Replaying his experience, Bryant noted that after killing his first two men by drone strike, he then “cried on his way home” from work. The 27-year-old commented about how he felt lost from sanity, “I felt disconnected from humanity for almost a week.” Shockingly, Bryant detailed the accounts of a time he mistakenly, but by orders, killed a young boy in Afghanistan.

Before the hellfire missile hit the target and the mud-roofed house was destroyed, a boy walked around the corner. Bryant recalled asking, “Did we just kill a kid?” In response, his operational partner said, “Yeah, I guess that was a kid.” As the Guardian reported, “One day he collapsed at work, doubling over and spitting blood. The doctor ordered him to stay home, and not to return to work until he could sleep more than four hours a night for two weeks in a row.”

If more honorable and moral individuals who have been in the drone business were to come out about what is going on, I’m positive we would hear more of the same stories.

Without much transparency from the Obama administration regarding drones, it is likely that these practices will not change anytime soon. For instance, Obama’s counterterrorism advisor, John Brennan is looking forward to an expansion of overseas drone use. Brennan explained earlier this year, “There are aspects of the Yemen program that I think are a true model of what I think the U.S. counterterrorism community should be doing.”

Members in Washington including Rep. from Texas, Ron Paul and Rep. Dennis Kucinich have been heavy advocates for reforming the drone programs and learning more about what the drones are doing overseas.

Image Reference
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/12/17/report-regulatory-mess-may-hold-up-domestic-drone-revolution
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PCMLE: 2011 – A Year of Youth Mobilization & Struggle

En Marcha, January 5, 2012

The crisis of capitalism and its effects on the world worsened in the 2011, the demonstrations, protests and launched shots of places young people and made them key players in an intense struggle against unpopular regimes and policies demanding democracy, freedom and better living conditions.

The first country to move was Tunisia, which together with the leftist movement led to the overthrow of dictator Ben Ali Zine el Abidinee, for the January 14 fight was the center of Egypt against Mubarak’s government, who left office in spite of the help they received from U.S. imperialism, under pressure from workers, youth and workers in the streets demanding his departure.

As a Sunday May 15 young men called themselves the “outraged” completely filled Puerta del Sol in Spain and 150 seats, meeting under the cry of “real democracy now.” Despite trying to be evicted by the police, the youth confessed to have no more fear, “The voice of the people is not illegal,” shouted the protesters after hearing this news. They realized that failure is not the economy, is not corruption, is the capitalist system that unleashes the infamous dictatorship download the crisis on the shoulders of the people sparking outrage in Spain.

Education was the right on to South America, high school students in Argentina were the first at the Southern Cone ignited massive mobilizations in Buenos Aries expanding to the rest of the country, they ceased not put on alert the government of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.

The Chile government repression stirred the minds of students and workers who were brutally suppressed, the style Pinochet, the student movement called for a national day of action twice for 18 and 19 October, and demonstrated in different cities, to demand a free, quality education, looking at new measures as “cacerolazo” already reaching 7 months of continuous protest.

By September hundreds of young Americans filled the area of​Trinity Place in New York, meeting under the slogans “Enough of corruption,” “curb cuts” and “do not market our future.” Despite the police evicted the outskirts of the Wall Street Center. There is no force to press the voice of young people and so many fans of all ages acted on behalf of “a new society that gives priority to people over the economic and political interests.”

The youth became in 2011 an example of combat. Threats and other attacks on freedom not undermined the rebellious spirit of youth, much less have failed to intimidate his liberating power. Spain, Greece, Libya, England, Chile and the U.S. were built and continue to ignite the flame of youth protest and the workers and peoples and give added strength to continue fighting for higher wins.

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Enver Hoxha on Israel & Arab Liberation: “The Anti-Imperialist Struggle of the Arab Peoples is Just”

THURSDAY
MAY 25, 1967

Israel, a state spawned by imperialism and reactionary Zionism in the Near East, is like a pistol amidst the Arab peoples and states, in this zone of economic and military importance. This region has been a centre of clashes between British, French, American and various other imperialists.

While oppressing the Arab peoples, trampling their freedom, independence, rights and sovereignty underfoot, all these wolves have mercilessly exploited the wealth of the countries which make up this region, and in order to perpetuate this exploitation they have built up a broad network of agents, some of whom they placed at the head of these peoples and defended with their colonial armies and their gun-boat diplomacy. However, with the passage of time, through the struggle of the Arab peoples themselves, which is part of the general struggle against nazi-fascism yesterday and against imperialism today, these peoples won their freedom and independence, created and consolidated their sovereign states. Some of them, however, are headed by cliques of capitalists and mediaeval feudal lords, who not only keep their peoples under savage oppression, but are blind tools, sold out to the British and American imperialists.

The king of Jordan, from a family traditionally agents of Britain, the former monarch and Imam of Yemen, the king of Saudi Arabia and others, are of this type. Today Israel and Jordan are two allegedly independent states, but in reality they are two hotbeds of danger created by American and British imperialism, which hinder the Arab peoples in the development and strengthening of their independence. Israel has continually provoked the Arab countries, has continually created armed border incidents, has attacked Egypt and Syria and has the tendency to expansion and domination. Recently it has provoked Syria and is preparing for war.

There is a smell of oil and gunpowder. Whenever the interests of the imperialist monopolies in this zone are threatened, the provocateur Israel launches military actions. This is what occurred when the Suez Canal was nationalized by Egypt, this is what is occurring now when the interests of the Anglo-American monopolies and the routes to their oil concessions are threatened.

Herein, in the efforts of the big monopoliesto plunder the wealth, especially the oil, of the Arab countries of the Middle East, lies the essence of the conflict between the imperialist powers and the Arab countries and peoples. Therefore, the struggle of the Arab peoples to throw off the savage political-economic yoke of imperialism as quickly as possible is just.

Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Algeria have risen against Israel and also against its allies. Will they come to grips? For known reasons this cannot be answered, but in any case, Egypt expelled the UNO troops, those international gendarmes who defended the Americans and Israeli’s interests, from Sinai. It is threatening to blockade the Strait of Tiran which would leave Israel only one entry open, that on the Mediterranean. The American and British imperialists and the revisionist traitors are in diplomatic movement. All of them are waving the olive branch, all «wailing» about the defence of the freedom and independence of the peoples, all of them writing and sending telegrams and messages to this address or that, but all of them hide the truth that with all this deafening clamour, the American, British and French imperialists, the Soviet revisionists, the Titoites and the others, are defending nothing but their own dirty interests to the detriment of the Arab peoples. Openly or behind the scenes, all of them are exerting and will go on exerting a thousand forms of pressure on the Arab countries, so that the latter retreat from the defence of their rightsand capitulate! We shall see how this blackmail will end.

UNO and U Thant, Tito and Brezhnev continue to play their diabolical two-faced role, because they are afraid they are being exposed. Apparently, Tito has lost all credit in Nasser’s eyes, since he is not making much noise on the basis of their former «friendship». Nasser has understood what Tito really is.

The Soviet revisionists, sometimes as allies of the Americans, sometimes as their rivals, will try to play the role of the two-faced intermediary, the role of arbiter between the Arabs and the Anglo-Americans, adjudicating on the proportions to which American and British interests should prevail. The vile role they are playing is obvious. Their main and only aim is to divide the spheres of influence, and to hinder the just  national liberation and anti-imperialist wars of the Arab peoples.

We have defended and will continue to defend the just anti-imperialist cause of the Arab peoples who have seen, are seeing, and will see that small socialist Albania is not afraid of imperialists and revisionists and that it will always be a sincere and loyal friend of the Arab countries, in good times or bad.

From “Reflections on the Middle East”

PCMLE: “The real emancipation of the peoples is the revolution and socialism”

From En Marcha, #1545
Organ of the Central Committee of the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador
August 19 to 25, 2011

As part of the work that the International Conference of Marxist-Leninist Parties and Organizations is carrying out, last July a meeting of the Latin American parties took place. At the meeting were the Revolutionary Communist Party of Brazil, the Communist Party of Colombia (Marxist-Leninist), the Communist Party of Labor of the Dominican Republic, the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador, the Communist Party of Mexico (Marxist-Leninist) and the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Venezuela.

After evaluating the work that these parties are carrying out in each of the countries and discussing the most important events that are taking place in the region and the world, the meeting approved a Political Declaration that we reproduce below.

U.S. imperialism and its European allies: France, England, Spain, Italy, are trying to manipulate the just struggle of the Arab peoples, to channel the indignation of the working masses and the youth towards a change of names, maintaining the economic and social structures and the weight of dependency.

After reviewing the latest events in our countries, in Latin America and the world we declare:

1. The stories told by imperialism claiming that there is a recovery from the crisis are falling apart every day, with the increasing numbers of unemployed, the decrease in production, the worsening of the fiscal deficits and the increase in the foreign debt in most of the countries of Europe, in Japan and the U.S.A., which seriously affect the supposed stability of the capitalist system and sharpening its inherent contradictions. This prolonged crisis that is affecting all the countries of the world shows not only the failure of the recovery policies implemented by imperialism, but also the decay of the system, which is mortally wounded and incapable of guaranteeing the well-being and freedom for which humanity is struggling.

2. The struggle of the working class, the working people, the youth and the peoples is spreading all over the world. Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Jordan, Syria, Yemen and other countries of North Africa and Asia Minor are an example of the struggle against the reactionary dictatorships and governments, who with the applause of the bourgeoisies and the imperialist powers have sunk these peoples into the deepest crisis, hunger and the cruelest misery, despite the immense wealth generated by the exploitation of oil, gas and other natural resources. In addition, with the complicity of the UN they resort to military intervention, to the bombing of the civilian population in Libya, using the pretext of the fight against tyranny, all with the aim of guaranteeing the established order and the continuity of all its profits that are the product of colonization and exploitation of these peoples. We completely reject the foreign intervention in Libya. It is up to the Libyan people themselves to resolve the problems of their country. No more military aggression and intervention in Afghanistan and Palestine! We Communists raise the banner of self-determination, sovereignty, well-being and freedom!

3. Active and valiant opposition to imperialism and the reactionary governments is also alive in Europe. In Greece, Turkey, Italy, Spain, Ireland, France, England and other countries of Europe there has been a general rejection of the reduction in wages, the pension reforms, the increase in taxes, privatizations and the reduction of the budgets for health care, education, housing and in general of all the legislative programs by which the crisis is being placed on the shoulders of the working masses. Numerous strikes and mobilizations are showing an important revival of the working class and youth that is again speaking out for unity and the political initiative to confront the recovery policies and to reject the reactionary governments. The great mobilizations of youths that are taking place in Spain and other European countries deserve particular mention, which show the exhaustion of bourgeois democracy and the search for roads to social liberation.

4. In Latin America the struggle continues, it is showing a greater advance and development. The structural adjustment policies implemented by most of the governments in the last years have not achieved their expected objectives, much less do they represent measures aimed at the well-being of the masses. The different struggles that are developing in our countries calling for higher wages, labor stability, respect for the right to association, negotiation, collective contracts and strikes, the rejection of outsourcing, the demands for health care and education, greater rights and liberties are arousing the ever greater participation of numerous organizations on the continent that do not kneel before the measures of the bourgeois governments and that struggle for political freedom for the people. The student youth in Chile together with the working masses and the Mapuche people are carrying out large mobilizations in defense of freedom, public education and democracy. The desire for change is breaking through in our various countries, large contingents of the masses are participating in the political struggle and are taking up the banner of working for the victory of democratic and progressive governments that really promote the defense of sovereignty, respect of human rights, well-being and political freedom. The democratic and anti-imperialist tendency in Latin America is an unquestionable fact that is opening the way, is growing and offering numerous possibilities for the advance of the revolution.

5. The rise through elections of several democratic and progressive governments in Latin America constitute important steps in that direction. Nevertheless today, the existence and continuity of these governments is threatened by the rightist offensive of imperialism and the local bourgeoisies that have not given up the privileges that they have enjoyed in our countries for centuries. The offensive of imperialism and the oligarchies has reversed the direction of several of those governments, which have been transformed into open defenders of the capitalist system, of foreign domination; into a form of the old ways of governing, into those who carry out repression against the working masses and the youth, into prettifiers of representative democracy and promoters of developmentalist and reformist measures. In fact, these governments and history show that real change, the social revolution and national liberation cannot be carried through to the end under the leadership of bourgeois and petty bourgeois classes and parties. That responsibility belongs to the working class, the working masses, the peoples and the youth, to the revolutionary party of the proletariat, to the genuinely revolutionary organizations and parties.

6. Imperialism, its allies and servants, the local bourgeoisies in all the countries are persisting in their reactionary policies of repressing the struggle of the working masses, of the indigenous peoples and the youth by fire and sword, at the time that they try to co-opt the social movement by means of social welfare policies and one reform or another. One expression of those policies is the presence of U.S. imperialist troops and those of their Latin American servants in Haiti. In the same way it is continuing the trade embargo against Cuba and actions aimed at subverting the Venezuelan process. The persecution, jailing and assassination of social fighters and revolutionaries are irrefutable testimony of the fact that the struggle continues and that repression, however harsh and bloodthirsty it may be, cannot do away with the ideals and the determination to fight for social and national liberation. We emphatically express our solidarity with the comrades who are suffering repression and torture in Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, Paraguay and Peru. In particular we demand the freedom of the Ecuadorean student leader Marcelo Rivera, who remains in prison, accused and condemned as a terrorist by the Correa government, for defending university autonomy.

7. The betrayal by the government of Rafael Correa and the struggle of the Bolivian workers against “the gasolinazo” in Bolivia are making clear not only the real limitation of these governments, but also the need to make clear to the working class and the social and mass organizations what is the real road to social change. Experience shows that neither reformism nor class conciliation can lead to change. Real change, the genuine emancipation of our peoples is the revolution and socialism, which is only possible if there is a revolutionary political vanguard capable of pushing through a genuinely revolutionary program at the head of the struggles of the working class, the working masses and the peoples.

8. The continuity and development of the struggle of the workers, the peoples and the youth in the countries of Latin America is guaranteed by historical tradition and the present combats, the perspective is the developing along the road of the social revolution. Our Continent is and will be the scene of great liberating struggles and we Marxist-Leninist communists will fulfill and affirm our position as shock troops of the revolution and socialism.

9. The strengthening of the right-wing, corporatist and social welfare policies in most of the governments of Latin America will not make us back down from the search for true social and national emancipation. We Marxist-Leninist parties of Latin America reiterate our commitment to link ourselves boldly and decisively to the struggles that the working class, the working people, the peasantry, the youth, the women and the peoples in general are developing, as well as our irrevocable decision to advance in the unity and leadership of their struggles, winning them for the revolution and socialism.

10. We make the words of Lenin ours: “If in the course of the struggle we win the majority of the workers to our side – not only the majority of the exploited, but the majority of the exploited and oppressed – we will really win”.

July, 2011