agents of the Libyan intelligence services on charges of having masterminded the
bombing of Pan America flight 103 in the skies above Lockerbie, Scotland, on December
21, 1988. These indictments continued a process of blatant political manipulation of the
Lockerbie tragedy, in which 270 persons lost their lives, including some important
figures of the US intelligence community. For reasons which are set forth in detail
elsewhere [fn 8], any explanation of the Lockerbie massacre which does not prominently
establish the responsibility of the governments of Syria and Iran can only be considered a
political whitewash. The Bush administration has consistently carried out such a
whitewash, covering up for such guilty parties as Ahmed Jibril, Hafez Qassen
Dalkamoni, President Hafez Assad of Syria, and Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani.
Bush is obviously committed to covering up for such malefactors as Assad and
Rafsanjani so as not to jeopardize Anglo-American geopolitical machinations in the
Middle East. Right after the Lockerbie disaster, president-elect Bush grandiloquently
pledged "to seek hard and punish firmly and decisively those who did this....if we can
ever find them." [fn 9]
Bush's bathos was the clear signal that a coverup had already been ordered. According to
press accounts, the obstruction of justice was the direct result of an agreement between
Bush and Thatcher, each of whom had received intelligence reports targetting Iran and
possibly other parties. Thatcher's argument was reportedly that the investigations had to
be "low-keyed" (in Thatcher's phrase) because it would be impossible to retaliate against
either Iran or Syria. Yet, here was a genuine act of war against the United States that had
resulted in the deaths of scores of innocent American citizens. Eighteen months later
Bush would commit about a third of total American military forces to punishing an
invasion which harmed neither the lives nor the property of Americans. But Hafez Assad
had been repeatedly endorsed in public by Bush's old mentor Henry Kissinger, and
Bush's own number two man at the State Department, the elephantine Lawrence
Eagleburger, had even praised the Syrian occupation of Lebanon on March 20, 1989.
Later on, Bush would have his own public fling with Hafez Assad, a valued ally in the
Gulf adventure.
On November 22, 1989, Bush answered a plea for justice from the families of the victims
with transparent rationalizations about the need to investigate thoroughly and
methodically. Then Bush added revealingly:
Regarding Iran, as I have said before, we are working to draw that country back into the
community of nations from which it has excluded itself for the last decade. This is a
gradual and deliberate policy. However, it can only be completed when Iran changes its
behavior by securing the release of US hostages and ending its support for terrorism. [fn
10]
All of which is Bushspeak for a coverup. But for our purposes here the main point is that
the November, 1991 decision by the Bushmen to pin the blame of Libya and Qaddafi is a
cynical strategem. The stage is now set for Bush to launch new bombing raids against
Libya at any time. This time, in contrast to the 1986 air raids, Bush's friend Tonton
Mitterrand might allow the raiders to use French airspace, something that was granted to