The last week has been rather frustrating for the proponents of Barack Obama’s phony “war on terror” and efforts to beat the war drums against Iran. On both fronts, major setbacks have called into question these dual pillars of Washington’s international policy. Last Wednesday, a jury in New York City acquitted Ahmed Khaifan Ghailani on 284 of 285 charges related to the terrorist bombing of the U.S. embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Ghailani, who was abducted in Pakistan in 2004 and handed over to the CIA, was chosen by the White House as a test to see if civil courts could be used as a “legal” cover for the indefinite detention of suspected “enemy combatants” who were tortured until they “confessed” to the “crimes” assigned to them by Washington. Ghailani himself was taken by the CIA to a “black prison” in Poland and repeatedly tortured until he “confessed.”  After two years of this, he was taken to the Guantánamo concentration camp, where he has been since.

Ghailani still faces a possible 20-year sentence because of the single conviction on a conspiracy charge, but even that is moot since he is still considered an “enemy combatant,” and, according to the judge in the case, he will be indefinitely detained “until hostilities between the United States and Al Qaeda and the Taliban end, even if he were found not guilty.”

On the same day, an exclusive report on the TruthOut website has called into question the authenticity of “documents” that Washington and other countries are using as “proof ” of Iran’s nuclear weapons program — documents fueling the march toward invasion and war.

These “laptop documents,” allegedly taken from a computer stolen by unknown operatives inside Iran, are supposed to show schematics of a missile re-entry vehicle that can accommodate a nuclear warhead and reports about the testing of a high-explosive detonator.

However, the conical re-entry vehicle shown in the “laptop documents” had already been abandoned by Iran the year before the alleged 2003 date of the schematic in favor of a “baby nipple” shaped vehicle that was more aerodynamic. As well, reports about the testing of a detonator that could fit inside a missile, included among the “laptop documents,” was conveniently “revealed” at a time when most experts, including in the CIA and International Atomic Energy Agency, were saying it would take years for Iran to develop such a device.

There is also evidence now that the “unknown operatives” who coordinated the release of this information were agents of the Israeli Mossad working with members of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq, an Iranian Islamist group. Mossad agents would give the “intelligence” to groups like MK, who would then give it to the IAEA, the U.S. and other countries. Two Israeli authors called it intelligence “laundering” designed to give the reports an air of fact.

The “laptop documents,” much like the use of the civil court for Ghailani, were meant to give a “legal” cover to the agenda of the corporatist American ruling classes. Without that figleaf, it will be much more difficult to manufacture enough “public opinion” to support either the methods by which evidence is gathered for the “trials” of suspected “terrorists,” or the buildup for U.S. military intervention, up to invasion and occupation,  against Iran.

Throughout the nine years of the so-called “war on terror,” the regime in Washington, regardless of party, has built up more than the proverbial house of cards. The entire company town built by the “war on terror” industry is made of this substandard, flimsy material, and even the smallest gust of truth can cause substantial damage. However, the ruling classes are quick to rebuild, using the same crappy materials they’ve always used. Food for thought.