Fort Pinocchio and its soldiers

The White House, the Pentagon and CIA headquarters must have more
professional liars per square foot than any other buildings in the
world! To many liars, like the commander in chief, lying is second
nature, but most have been specially trained at Public Affairs Liars
School.

This school churns out hundreds of government-trained liars each
year. Upon graduation, the newly certified Pinocchios join the
world-class prefabricators’ club, right up there with Pentagon Head Liar
Kenneth Bacon, an absolute master at shading and evading and spinning
and thinning
the truth.

This bunch of liars — from Bacon to the newest flack PFC in the
field — is about the strength of an Army light division with an annual
budget that could keep an Air Force fighter/bomber wing running for a
year. Sadly, many of these liars are soldiers who have sworn on a bible
to serve their
country faithfully.

Their primary targets are the very citizens they serve. We give them
our tax dollars so they can snow us, in order to get more tax dollars.
Get it? I’ve been lied to by these dealers of deceit for years. Most of
the time, I catch ’em because of great sources — serving soldiers who
care about
our country and the truth.

Here are some recent Pentagon lies to help you spot them too:

Lie: The U.S. Navy fired 75 Tomahawk missiles at terrorist targets in
Afghanistan and Sudan on 20 August.

Fact: The Navy fired 132 Tomahawks missiles. It lied about the number
because they used a sledgehammer to swat a fly and because Tomahawk
missiles cost between $1 and $2 million a pop — sticker prices vary
depending on which Pentagon liar you ask. They don’t want you to know
that the cost of Tomahawking a terrorist ran $5 million a corpse.

Lie: The reason there was a rush to attack the mostly CIA built
targets at the very hour Monica Lewinsky was providing graphic testimony
concerning President Clinton’s “inappropriate behavior” was that —
coincidentally, of course — terrorist leader Osama bin Laden was
meeting with his chieftains in Afghanistan at just that time.

Fact: bin Laden knew of the attack at least 24 hours before the first
missile thumped down, while sources tell me the commanders’ meeting was
made up to justify the urgency/timing.

Lie: Tomahawks were used to destroy a secret chemical plant in Sudan
that was making a key ingredient for a lethal nerve gas. The liars
described this plant as a high security facility, guarded by armed
soldiers.

Fact: Intelligence sources say there’s not one scrap of evidence that
this plant produced any precursor chemicals for nerve gas. American and
British engineers who built and subsequently ran the plant report it
produced medicine and veterinary drugs and was guarded by one night
watchman with a habit of sleeping on the job.

Lie: Terrorist leader bin Laden financed the chemical plant.

Fact: Our intelligence community can’t find the slightest money trail
to prove bin Laden bankrolled the plant. When all’s shaken out, besides
our having spent several hundred million to punch a few craters in
terrorist training areas that can be quickly replaced for a few thousand
bucks, we’ll probably end up coughing up another $100 million to replace
the “lethal weapons’ factory” that wasn’t exactly lethal.

Lies got us into Vietnam when we were told that our ships were
attacked by Red PT boats in 1964 in the Tonkin Gulf. Now, after all the
death and destruction, we know this isn’t true. But it doesn’t remove
the pain that lie brought to millions of innocent people.

The Gulf War was one big lie from beginning to inconclusive end.
Smart weapons weren’t smart, nor were the politicians and generals who
lied about how and why the war ended the way it did.

There’s an old saying that truth is the first casualty of war. It’s
about time we the people demanded that the lying stop. And it should
start with the president of the United States, who — protest though he
and the Military Industrial Congressional Complex may — clearly was not
a straight shooter when he tried to eliminate bin Laden with extreme
prejudice last month.

David Hackworth

Col. David H. Hackworth, author of "Steel My Soldiers' Hearts," "Price of Honor" and "About Face," saw duty or reported as a sailor, soldier and military correspondent in nearly a dozen wars and conflicts -- from the end of World War II to the fights against international terrorism. Read more of David Hackworth's articles here.