University of Massachusetts Boston professor Paul Atwood blames US, ‘American intervention’ for 9/11 attack

A damning article published by The College Fix confirms the anti-American sentiment and lies about the 9/11 attacks, this time perpetuated by an American Studies professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

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Paul Atwood “teaches students that United States military intervention is the primary cause of terrorism in the world today” says a student, William Nardi, stating that he “was briefly enrolled in the Fall 2018 course”: The U.S. and Intervention in the Middle East.

Paul Atwood, a former Vietnam-era Marine turned anti-war protester touts that “President Obama, Bush before him and now Trump, and the mass media, have told the public incessantly that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were necessary to defeat Islamic terrorists and jihadists, and to protect the security of American citizens,” the course syllabus reads. “Today the U.S. is intervening in a number of other Muslim nations as well. For many citizens the origin of these wars is simple: The events of 9-11 justify anything. But since those terrible days many facts have surfaced that call into question the ‘official’ rationale for these wars.”

“In fact, since World War II, long before 9-11, the U.S. has been actively intervening throughout the region politically, economically, militarily, and culturally,” the syllabus adds. “Why? The original interventionism had nothing to do with terrorism. Indeed, many analysts argue that today’s American intervention is the primary CAUSE of terrorism.” (Emphasis added by student)

“… Most Americans refuse to believe that American policies and actions toward the Middle East have resulted in a great deal of death and suffering to indigenous populations, even well before the current wars,” the syllabus states. “… The U.S. has overthrown governments, assassinated leaders, propped-up brutal dictatorships …”

Atwood is a senior lecturer in the College of Liberal Arts and the author of “War and Empire: The American Way of Life.”

This is the books overview:

American history is not often truthfully told. Dispelling the myths that have bolstered national myth making, Paul Atwood attempts to show Americans that their history is one of constant wars of aggression and imperial expansion.

From the declaration of Independence to present day, War and Empire takes a panoramic view of US military history, explaining US actions in every major war, from early combat with aboriginal nations, imperialist conflicts with Spain, to the war on terror. The book shows that, far from being dragged reluctantly into foreign entanglements, America’s leaders have always picked its battles in order to increase their influence and power, with little regard for the American soldiers and ‘enemy’ civilians killed or made to suffer in the process.

This book is an eye-opening introduction to the American way of life for undergraduate students of American history, politics and international relations.

Nardi writes that “At one point Atwood told us he believes Kennedy’s assassination was an inside job. Frustrated, I finally spoke up in class, saying that’s Vladimir Putin’s Cold War theory too, and I don’t give conspiracy theories much weight.”

Other notables:

• ….we were required to read an article in The Progressive on “How the U.S. Intentionally Destroyed Iraq’s Water Supply.” In class, Atwood used this as an example of the atrocities Americans turn a blind eye to, saying the United States violated the Geneva Convention for oil money. Yet the article itself notes the United Nations was on board with these sanctions—not just the United States.
• 1948 quote from George Kennan, former Policy Planning Chief for the U.S. State Department, which read: “Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military establishment would have to go on substantially unchanged until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.”
• reading assignment was an interview by a French “social-democratic” paper asking Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, about the U.S. decision to fund anti-Soviet groups in Afghanistan, which he defended.
• students were given a couple political cartoons showing the rich eating the poor and criticisms of large multinational corporations. On the first day of class he also told us he voted for Bernie Sanders.
• Additional readings listed in the syllabus included a wide range of pro-Palestinian writings
• Atwood states in his syllabus that America has “effectively supported Israeli policies denying the Palestinian statehood originally mandated by the United Nations in 1947.”
• Atwood a writes for The Radical Teacher, a journal that bills itself as a “socialist, feminist, and anti-racist journal on the theory and practice of teaching.”