A caller to the WAOK program “On Point with Juandolyn Stokes” laid out some inconvenient truths about America’s war actions similar to Russia.
He enumerates inconvenient truths
Too often, we do not get sufficiently introspective. I think the evil invasion of Russia on Ukraine allows us to do so. Is it the time? Absolutely. Why? Because it gives a view of what an attack looks like, feels like, and smells like in real-time.
Any invasion that we are not a party to requires one to view implicitly how evil and good are defined. For the current one, it is easy. Russia, aka Putin, is wrong. Ukraine did nothing that merited an invasion. It is often not that clear because propaganda and lies confuse many.
We have invaded many countries with similar savagery that has gone unreported are lied about over and over. I have a personal experience as a born Panamanian with the United States’ invasion of Panama, a tiny country without a navy, air force, and a small defense force.
For several decades, the Panamanian dictator, a CIA agent, decided to buck his master. The U.S. had always known the dictator was a capitalist who facilitated America’s drug use demand just like the capitalists in the U.S. export drugs and substances that can harm or pleasure. They used that as a pretext to arrest Noriega. Just like the U.S. correctly accused Russia of creating false events to justify an invasion, false flags, they did the same in Panama City. They planned the raid and then started events for the rationale. The similarities of execution are astounding.
I wrote the piece “I see George H.W. Bush through my Panamanian eyes, and the deaths he caused were unforgivable,” when Bush Sr. died that explained the Panamanian invasion. I said the following then.
Sometime after 12:00 AM on December 20th, 1989 all hell broke loose in the cities of Colon, Panama City, and David. The American military targeted the three main Panamanian Cuarteles in the provinces of Colon, Panama, and Chiriqui respectively.
The Cuarteles in Colon and Panama City are in densely populated areas. Missiles from many understood-to-be the-test-run of the stealth fighter along with helicopters and C-130 gunships decimated the Cuarteles and the surrounding buildings and tenements. Thousands of poor people live nearby, and the bombing and missile attacks decimated them. There was no way to get an accurate count of the dead nor was there any interest in doing so. They were just hauled off and dumped like debris.
During the hours of hell, my dad, rest his soul, was running around in his house in Arc Iris scared to death, less than three miles from the concentrated bombings and missile attacks. Then there was one tall building, a 15 story building that the military claim had snipers aiming at their flying assets. They sent missiles into that building where civilians lived.
During the occupation portion of the invasion, the military blocked the movement of people from Arco Iris to Colon. Unable to speak Spanish they opened fire on a Panamanian attempting to go into Colon to get insulin to his wife. Many atrocities were committed throughout the country.
For decades, this type of invasion has been the modus operandi for the superpowers. Citizens of the countries invaded were collateral damage to the invader. They were victims in the eyes of the rest of the world. What has always been missing is the assertion that humanity is more important than a testosterone-driven win.
As the caller in the clip explained, given the number of times the American military directed by our politicians has executed similar behavior with more enormous death tolls and suffering, we do not have the moral authority to accuse. We are responsible for supporting the aggrieved and atoning for our past.