[Peace-discuss] News notes 040718

[C. G. Estabrook]

        Notes from last week's "war on terrorism" --
        for the AWARE meeting, Sunday, July 18, 2004.
        (Sources indicated at the ends of paragraphs;
        unsourced text and titles are mine.)

I've been on the road for two weeks -- Pittsburgh, New York & Boston --
seeing old friends and talking to people in bars, and I come away from
this unscientific poll shocked at how uninterested the tertiary
bourgeoisie seems to be with the matters that bring us together on Sunday
nights -- few political buttons, bumper stickers, demonstrations or
conversations of any political stripe.  At the same time, and perhaps more
importantly, people further down the socio-economic ladder seem quite
interested: a recent CNN poll found that 8 percent of Americans said they
had seen "Fahrenheit 9/11," & an additional 48 percent say they plan to
see it.

That may in part be due to the circumstances discussed on the front page
of the NYT this morning -- wages aren't keeping pace with inflation:
non-management workers are earning a little over 1 percent less today than
they did a month ago. That's the biggest one-month drop in hourly earnings
since the recession of 1991. The reason for the decline, according to the
NYT: relatively high unemployment means there's little pressure on
businesses to raise wages.

The Bush administration nevertheless has to be pleased with its situation
in mid-July, for the following reasons:

	[1] It's won its war in Iraq, when you understand that is war aim
was that announced by the State Department's mouthpiece, Thos. Friedman,
at the time of the 1991 invasion of Iraq: what the US wanted then and now
is Saddam Hussein's regime without Saddam Hussein.  Now it has
"Saddam-lite," the CIA Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.  The Sydney Morning
Herald reports that Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, "pulled a pistol and
executed as many as six suspected insurgents at a Baghdad major crimes
unit just days before Washington handed control of the country to his
interim Government, according to two people who allege they witnessed the
executions." Correspondent Paul McGeough discusses his article, which was
also published in Australia's The Age. McGeough, who has left Iraq, said:
"If you have a story like this, it's not a good idea to remain in the
country." McGeough found his sources "independently, neither knew that the
other was interviewed and neither was paid." [CURSOR 7/18]
	On July 15th alone, 23 more people lost their lives in Iraq from
car bombs mortars, other attacks. In addition, oil exports to Turkey
stopped after resisters hit the oil pipeline. [Zeman, Turkey] In the other
occupation this week, 13 Palestinians, mostly civilians, including a
child, a woman and 2 old men, were killed by Israeli troops. [EI]

	[2] The administration has got the Senate to deep-six the
potentially explosive torture investigation and instead concentrate on the
window-dressing issue of gay marriage. The Independent reports on a May
speech by Seymour Hersh to the American Civil Liberties Union, in which he
said that the US. government has videotapes of American soldiers
sodomizing young male prisoners at Abu Ghraib, "and the worst part is the
soundtrack, of the boys shrieking. And this is your government at war."
[CURSOR 7/18] But that's under the rug now, because of course that's where
the Democrats want it, too.

	[3] The administration with the support of liberal Democrats like
our senator has got $12 billion dollars for tobacco farmers while the $15
billion promised with mush fanfare to fight AIDS has largely not appeared,
while what money is available has been used to prevent foreign countries
from getting cheap drugs for elsewhere instead of buying expensive ones
form big US drug companies.  So the Bush administration has aided two of
its domestic constituencies -- big pharma and big farming -- of course
with active connivance of the Democrats.

	[4] Meanwhile, the feckless Democrat presidential campaign attacks
Bush from the Right, with Kerry saying the US needs twice as many spies
for the War on Terrorism. And the supposed "peace movement" within the
Democrat party, the Kucinich campaign , rolls over and kicks it tiny feet
in the air at the Democrat platform meetings in Miami. Two right wing
Clinton/Bush war criminals, Sandy Berger and Rand Beers, write the foreign
policy plank. The Randy-Sandy show represents everything AWARE is against.
	The platform resolves to uphold the close relationship between the
United States and Israel. It also negates a Palestinian refugee "right of
return" to Israel and says the armistice line ending Israel's 1948 War of
Independence (the Green Line) cannot be the basis for negotiations between
Israel and the Palestinians, thus recognizing some Israeli claims to the
West Bank.

	[5] And finally, although it's looking like they may not need it,
the administration's October Surprise plans are proceeding apace.  Amid
Chicken-Little threats of terrorist attacks at election time, there has
been a recent increase in FBI interrogations of Arab-Americans -- both
Arab immigrants and American citizens. Subjects have been questioned on a
variety of topics, including their opinion of the Iraq war. [SLATE 7/17]
	Not only has the administration got people seriously discussing
postponing the election (as they once got people seriously discussing
torture), they continue to set up potential targets, notably the other
points on the Axis of Evil, Iran and Korea. The 9/11 commission's final
report, which is scheduled to be released on Thursday. will claim
[according to Time magazine] that Iran cooperated with al-Qaida. [SLATE
7/18] And the Democrats support this from the right; their platform says
the Bush administration's policies "have failed to take effective steps to
stop the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs." (So they can hardly
oppose such "effective steps" as October Surprise bombings.)
	A senior US official told the Times (UK) that the US will mount a
concerted attempt to overturn the regime in Iran if President Bush is
elected for a second term.  He hinted at a possible military strike
against Iran's nuclear facilities, saying that there was a window of
opportunity for destroying Iran's main nuclear complex at Bushehr next
year that would close if Russia delivered crucial fuel rods. To destroy
Bushehr after the delivery would cause huge environmental damage. The rods
would allow the Iranians to obtain enough plutonium for many dozens of
nuclear weapons, he said.  [TIMES/UK 7/16]
	Quietly and with minimal coverage in the US. press, the Navy
announced that from mid-July through August it would hold exercises dubbed
Operation Summer Pulse '04 in waters off the China coast near Taiwan. This
will be the first time in US. naval history that seven of our 12 carrier
strike groups deploy in one place at the same time. {At a minimum, a
single carrier strike group includes the aircraft carrier itself (usually
with nine or 10 squadrons and a total of about 85 aircraft), a guided
missile cruiser, two guided missile destroyers, an attack submarine and a
combination ammunition, oiler and supply ship.} Normally, the United
States uses only one or at the most two carrier strike groups to show the
flag in a trouble spot. In a combat situation it might deploy three or
four, as it did for both wars with Iraq. Seven in one place is unheard of.
Operation Summer Pulse '04 was almost surely dreamed up at the Pearl
Harbor headquarters of the US. Pacific Command and its commander, Adm.
Thomas B. Fargo, and endorsed by neocons in the Pentagon. It is doubtful
that Congress was consulted. This only goes to show that our foreign
policy is increasingly made by the Pentagon ... Needless to say, the
Chinese are not amused. They say that their naval and air forces, plus
their land-based rockets, are capable of taking on one or two carrier
strike groups but that combat with seven would overwhelm them. So even
before a carrier reaches the Taiwan Strait, Beijing has announced it will
embark on a crash project that will enable it to meet and defeat seven US.
carrier strike groups within a decade. There's every chance the Chinese
will succeed if they are not overtaken by war first. [Chalmers Johnson]
	Naval and Marine Corps Forces from Argentina, Bolivia, Chile,
Ecuador, Dominican Republic, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and the United
States, and observers from Mexico conducted the first multinational
amphibious assault in Salinas, Peru, July 4. Whom could they be thinking
of?

	***

THE CLIENT WILL IGNORE THE COURT, AS THE US DID. The International Court
of Justice ... found the present route of the separation fence or wall to
be a serious and egregious violation of international law. In an interview
given last weekend, Israeli Chief of Staff Moshe (Bogie) Ya'alon contested
the applicability of international law. Such a system was appropriate for
the conditions of World War II, he declared, but not for the present war
on terror. Apparently, as Ya'alon envisions it, in this war the armed
forces are bound only by their own law. Indeed, a battle is being waged in
the world today over the status of international law ... [with] the US and
Israel are agitating for its nullification... [Tanya Reinhardt].
Meanwhile,
 --US Presbyterians vote to divest from "apartheid" Israel (Forward);
 --New Zealand imposes sanctions on Israel, jails Mossad spies (BBC);
 --Israel helped mislead US on Iraq -- Senate report (Forward); and
 --Kerry's brother assures Israel of unconditional allegiance (Ha) [EI].

BUT THEY'RE HARD TO TELL APART... The New Standard's Chris Shumway
distills recent news reports that dispute White House claims that Abu
Musab Al-Zarqawi was the direct link between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein,
and that he "gets instructions from al-Qaeda," as President Bush said this
week. [CURSOR 7/18]

WOULD COLIN POWELL LIE TO US? Memos from last week's Senate intelligence
report detail how "analysts found dozens of factual problems in drafts" of
Secretary of State Powell's pre-war presentation to the U.N. And while
"many of the claims considered inflated or unsupported were removed,"
reports the Los Angeles Times, "the speech he ultimately presented
contained material that was in dispute among State Department experts."
[CURSOR 7/18]

SNEAK THIEVES. As an initial U.N. audit sharply criticizes the coalition's
management of billions of dollars in Iraqi oil revenue, the head of the
auditing board says the Bush administration is withholding information on
$1.4 billion in contracts awarded to Halliburton, and has failed to
produce a list of other companies that have obtained no-compete contracts.
Information on Halliburton is also being withheld from a White House bio
page. [CURSOR 7/18]

SNEAK THIEVES (II). President Bush's AIDS initiative, announced over 17
months ago, is "belatedly getting under way," reports the New York Times.
A GAO report cites the administration’s refusal to buy generic drugs as
complicating its roll-out. And Health GAP says "Bush is selling
compassion... but the real agenda of the White House has been to create a
slush-fund for US. drug companies." [CURSOR 7/18]

YOU CAN'T SAY THAT. Trespassing charges have been dropped against two
"Love America, Hate Bush" t-shirt wearers, arrested before a July 4 speech
by President Bush in Charleston, West Virginia. The article reports that
according to the mayor, "Law enforcement officers told the couple to take
the shirts off, cover them or get out." [CURSOR 7/18]

BRIT COVER-UP EVEN BETTER THAN OURS. The Independent sums up the
conclusions of the Butler report: "The intelligence: flawed, The dossier:
dodgy, The 45-minute claim: wrong... Iraq's link to al-Qaeda: unproven,
The public: misled, The case for war: exaggerated, And who was to blame?
No one." [CURSOR 7/15]

WE'VE GOT THE SAME CHOICE... Responding to President Bush's line that "I
had a choice to make: Either take the word of a madman, or defend
America," The Progressive's Matthew Rothschild writes, "Bush didn't have
to take the word of a madman. He could have taken the word of the U.N.
weapons inspectors, but he chose not to." Maureen Dowd calls Bush's
statement, "Nonsense... It's just like the president's other false
dichotomies: You're either with us, or you're with the terrorists."
[CURSOR 7/15]

LEAVING A SINKING SHIP? Attorney General Ashcroft launches another public
relations offensive to defend the USA Patriot Act, releasing a new report
claiming to show that the "Act continues to save lives." The Center for
American Progress calls the report 'Unpatriotic Propaganda' and asks if
Ashcroft deliberately misled the 9/11 commission. [CURSOR 7/15] Rep. Tim
Johnson votes FOR the Sanders amendment that would limit some secret
police activity under the Patriot Act.

SNEAK THIEVES (III). A Los Angeles Times article on how Iraq war boosters
are cashing in, focuses on former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, calling
him "a prominent example of the phenomenon, mixing his business interests
with what he contends are the country's strategic interests." Woolsey
recently joined the board of advisors of BioDefense Corporation, which has
developed Mail Defender technology to destroy anthrax in the mail.
Embracing the theories of Laurie Mylroie, he was among the first to
falsely tie Iraq to the 9/11 attacks and blame it for the anthrax attacks.
[CURSOR 7/15]

THE BIGGEST SNEAK THIEVES? Ken Lay reveals that he and President Bush may
be using the same lawyer [perhaps a CIA asset].

DEJA [EXPLETIVE DELETED] VU. A Republican senator offers a Nixonian
defense of Vice President Cheney, who has inspired a new line of
merchandise: "Dick Cheney is not a crook," said Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC)
[CURSOR 7/15]

AND, FINALLY, US LAW INVITES RIDICULE AGAIN THIS WEEK: BOOBY FISHER,
MARTHA STEWART, WILLIAM JANKLOW

OLD NEWS... On Friday [July 9], the Senate Intelligence Committee released
a damning 511-page analysis that found the pretext for the US. invasion on
Iraq was based on bad intelligence and fabricated information. Iraq did
not have unmanned aircraft to disperse weapons of mass destruction. Iraq
was not collaborating with Al Qaeda. Iraq did not reconstitute its nuclear
weapons program. Iraqi did not have a fleet of seven mobile labs used to
manufacture deadly biological weapons. The Senate also found that Saddam
Hussein's army had been weakened significantly after the first Gulf War
and posed little threat to US interests in the Middle East. The report
found many of the most alarming claims about Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction were handed to the US by defectors. Even after the report,
President Bush continued to defend the invasion, which has now cost the
lives of 1,000 coalition troops and tens of thousands of Iraqis. He said
"We removed a declared enemy of America, who had the capability of
producing weapons of mass destruction." The leading Democrat on the
intelligence committee Jay Rockefeller said Congress would not have
authorized the war if it had known then what it knows now. He called what
happened one of the "most devastating.. . intelligence failures in the
history of the nation." The New York Times described the report as the
harshest congressional indictment of U.S. intelligence agencies since the
Church Committee report of the mid-1970s on CIA abuses of power. The
Senate has yet to issue its report on how the Bush administration handled
the intelligence on Iraq. That report is not expected until after the
election. David Corn of the Nation reports that while the CIA exaggerated
the threat posed by Iraq, the Bush administration in turn exaggerated what
the CIA was saying. Corn writes "Bush and his lot overstated the
overstatements of the intelligence community." Corn points out that the
CIA's National Intelligence Estimate said Iraq had an extensive biological
weapons program, Bush turned around and said Saddam Hussein was sitting on
a "massive stockpile" of biological weapons. When the CIA said Iraq was
developing unmanned drones, Bush warned that Iraq already had a growing
fleet of the vehicles and that the fleet could attack the United States.
In addition Senator Rockefeller and two fellow Democrats wrote in the
report that the Bush administration ignored the CIA's findings that Iraq
was not collaborating with Al Qaeda. While the report is being dubbed as a
bipartisan product, a major divide has emerged over how much the Bush
administration pressured intelligence analysts to read the intelligence to
fit the administration's policy. In an addendum to the report, the CIA
ombudsman told the committee that he felt the 'hammering' by the Bush
Administration on Iraq intelligence was harder that he had previously
witnessed in his thirty-two-year career with the agency.  [DN]