Ghost Troop Home Page April Fools Part 4
November 25, Email to the BBC
Dear BBC (and copied
British media), my name is Captain Eric Holmes May, formerly of U.S. Army Military
Intelligence, currently self-mobilized to defend the U.S. Constitution against
abuses by the administration of George W. Bush, particularly those abuses of
our First Constitutional Amendment, which guarantees our people the right to
the truth about the war. Like Dr. Kelly (R.I.P.), I am a prominent critic
of the way information has been handled going into (and staying in) Iraq.
I am a true Texan, unlike
the resident of Pennsylvania
Avenue, who is a child of privilege from the Northern U.S. states.
Boy George merely affects rugged Texas individualism and cowboy manners to
impress his Yankee friends. [Editor’s
emphasis, in all cases] I know him
through friends, and thought about writing speeches for him back when he was
the governor of Texas,
a desecration, but I digress…
To come to the main point,
since the war began, I have published two strategic essays in my city’s
newspaper, the Houston Chronicle. The
first (April 3, Visions
of Stalingrad, claim victory in Iraq now) examined the
military/historical situation before we reached Baghdad and predicted a quicksand war, into
which we would slip deeper and deeper with no good result, risking WWIII. The second (July 8, Worried
about quicksand of war in Iraq) called the president a
liar, and called for Congressional investigators to get to the bottom of his
lies.
I believe that both
these editorials were exceptional in their boldness at the time, and have since
become truer by the week. [Agreed --Editor]
I also believe that they establish a point the American media fears to
make: that the only failure of U.S.
intelligence originates between the ears of George Bush. I’ll attach my published geopolitical essays
and let you be the judge. I have written
more Iraq essays since the two I cited, but no one will publish them. They’re attached as well. Let me know how you like knowing more than the
American media wants to know, or at any rate, acknowledge.
By the way, I’ll also
attach a few letters I sent to the New York Times, various Senators, various
media and even the president himself back in July. There’s one for Dr.
Kelly in there as well.
You see, I believed in the first week of July that the sane forces of
moderation were about to put the brakes on the runaway jingoism of George and
Tony, so I hurled myself into the fray to stop them. The bully boys of war fought back, though,
didn’t they? Yep, it was in the second
week of July that my contacts urged me to go underground. It was July 17, in fact, twelve hours before Dr. Kelly’s
suiciding, that I did so. I stayed
underground for three months, and have only recently begun to move about freely
again, hoping that my criticism (ongoing and widely read) of the president has
been so outright that I’m a sort of American political dissident, and thereby
(hopefully) too prominent to be or suicided,
accidented, or randomly homicided. Isn’t it amusing to expand the vocabulary to
accommodate new concepts? I’ll bet
George Orwell would be amused...
My other purpose in
writing is to let you know what’s happening in Houston, the Bush Team home
town. Well, last week the Quisling
Houston Chronicle published two editorials, while George and Tony were plotting
more trouble and Michael Jackson was amusing folks so they wouldn’t think about
things overseas…
The first was entitled LONG HAUL, U.S.
presence in Iraq
will be neither short nor easy (November 19). An excerpt:
“Many in this country and
around the world urge the United States
to turn Iraq
back to the Iraqis. But to paraphrase
Secretary of State Colin Powell: Who is
there to turn it back to? Without an Iraqi
government that works for all Iraqis, without stable institutions and equal
laws for all, Iraq
would collapse into chaos and civil war without a strong American
presence. Until the Iraqis are able to
carry the ball, the United States
is going to have to keep its troops in Iraq. We are going to have to go the distance, no
matter how long or costly in lives, or fail completely.”
Yep, my friends, they
cleverly avoided the word escalation. I’ll give ‘em credit for that much sense and
talent – and not a damn bit
more. The second editorial was BUSH IN BRITAIN, President, Blair, have
little choice but to hang tough (November 22). Another excerpt:
“Some Brits understandably
fear the bombing attacks on British interests in Turkey
signal a turning point for the terrorists, who will now go after Britain for its strong support of President Bush
and the United States. That may be true, because nations that stand
and fight are more likely to get hurt than those that refuse to confront global
terrorism. Interestingly, the growing
personal closeness between Bush and Blair appears to follow the same lines as
that unusually warm friendship that developed between Winston Churchill and
Franklin Roosevelt in the darkest days of World War II. Bush has made a point to the world of
emphasizing his close feelings for Blair, stating at one conference that ‘It’s
my honor to be standing by the side of a friend.’ Blair noted that while Bush was a rightist
Republican and he was the leader of a left of center political party, they were
standing shoulder to shoulder against terrorism.”
Yep, they’re thawing out
WWIII in the Texas
papers. Here’s my summary of their
insipidness in a couple of cowboy poems:
Parallels
So it
was “Franklin and Winston for World War Two!”
and
now it’s “George and Tony for World War Three!”
Well,
folks, is all of this clear to you?
Because
all of it’s damn sure clear to me!
Wait! One more.
This one for the ghosts of Byron and Kipling, who would be having a ball
writing about Iraq:
Cooking
Something Up
Mix
George and Tony
for
our recipe…
Now
add Sharony!
Voila! World War Three!!!
I hope it all amuses. Wasn’t it Shakespeare who said that to those
who feel, life is a tragedy, while to those who think, it is a comedy? You know what Captain May sez?
DOWN WITH KING GEORGE!!!
Yeah, that’s my Carthago delenda est. It used to be patriotic to say it on my side
of the Atlantic, but it’s treasonable here in
the colonies nowadays, with an inherited monarchy back in power and all. Boys and girls of the British media, I hope
I’ll have the pleasure of meeting you one of these days. Shucks, we don’t know each other a bit, and
it took me two decades and a national crisis to stop loving American
journalism. Will y’all be my new
friends?
Be good, and tell Mrs.
David Kelly that I’ll be visiting
her after the infowar is over. I’ll
hand-deliver the letter I wrote her husband.
He and I have many things in common…
Captain Eric H. May, MI, USA
Houston, Texas
PS: Please note that this letter is addressed to
my friends Thom Shanker of the New York Times, and Chase Untermeyer, a former
assistant secretary of the Navy under President Reagan and a Bush family friend. Please feel free to call them to confirm any
details of my writings or further our trans-Atlantic conversation. Ciao.
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