[Peace-discuss] Bill Blum's report

[Morton K. Brussel]

FYI

  The Anti-Empire Report
Some things you need to know before the world ends
February 3, 2007


by William Blum

Full Spectrum Dominance
It is not often that the empire is put in the position of one its  
victims, in fear of the military and technical prowess of another  
country, forced to talk of peace and cooperation, just as Iraq and  
others, hoping to put off an American attack, were forced to do over  
the years; just as Iran now. No, China is not about to attack the  
United States, but the Chinese shootdown of a satellite (an old  
weather satellite of theirs) in space on January 11, has made a US  
attack on China much more dangerous and much less likely; it's made  
the empire's leaders realize that they don't have total power to make  
any and all other nations do their bidding.

Here's how the gentlemen of the Pentagon have sounded in the recent  
past on the subject of space.

"We will engage terrestrial targets someday -- ships, airplanes, land  
targets -- from space. ... We're going to fight in space. We're going  
to fight from space and we're going to fight into space." -- General  
Joseph Ashy, Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Space Command, 1996[1]

"With regard to space dominance, we have it, we like it, and we're  
going to keep it." -- Keith R. Hall, Assistant Secretary of the Air  
Force for Space and Director of the National Reconnaissance Office,  
1997[2]

"US Space Command -- dominating the space dimension of military  
operations to protect US interests and investment. Integrating Space  
Forces into warfighting capabilities across the full spectrum of  
conflict. ... During the early portion of the 21st century, space  
power will also evolve into a separate and equal medium of  
warfare. ... The emerging synergy of space superiority with land,  
sea, and air superiority will lead to Full Spectrum Dominance. ...  
Development of ballistic missile defenses using space systems and  
planning for precision strikes from space offers a counter to the  
worldwide proliferation of WMD [weapons of mass destruction]. ...  
Space is a region with increasing commercial, civil, international,  
and military interests and investments. The threat to these vital  
systems is also increasing. ... Control of Space is the ability to  
assure access to space, freedom of operations within the space  
medium, and an ability to deny others the use of space, if required."  
-- "United States Space Command: Vision for 2020", 1997[3]

"Space represents a fundamentally new and better way to apply  
military force" -- U.S. Strategic Command, 2004[4]

And now along comes China, with the ability to make all this proud  
talk look somewhat foolish. At a State Department press briefing a  
week after the shootdown, the department's deputy spokesman Tom Casey  
stated, presumably without chuckling: "We certainly are concerned by  
any effort, by any nation that would be geared towards developing  
weapons or other military activities in space. ... We don't want to  
see a situation where there is any militarization of space." He spoke  
of the "peaceful use of space", and was concerned about the threat to  
"modern life as we know it", because "countries throughout the world  
are dependant on space based technologies, weather satellites,  
communications satellites and other devices".

A reporter asked: "Has the United States conducted such a test  
destroying a satellite in space?"

Yes, said Casey, in 1985. But that was different because "there was a  
Cold War that was being engaged in between the United States and the  
Soviet Union" and there were much fewer satellites moving about space. 
[5]

Cong. Terry Everett, senior Republican on the House armed services  
subcommittee on strategic forces, said China's test "raises serious  
concerns about the vulnerability of our space-based assets. ... We  
depend on satellites for a host of military and commercial uses, from  
navigation to ATM transactions."[6]

Even prior to the Chinese test, the Washington Post pointed out: "For  
a U.S. military increasingly dependent on sophisticated satellites  
for communicating, gathering intelligence and guiding missiles, the  
possibility that those space-based systems could come under attack  
has become a growing worry. ... The administration insists that there  
is no arms race in space, although the United States is the only  
nation that opposed a recent United Nations call for talks on keeping  
weapons out of space. ... Although the 1967 U.N. Outer Space Treaty,  
signed by the United States, allows only peaceful uses of space, some  
believe that the United States is moving toward some level of  
weaponization, especially related to a missile defense system."[7]

Tom Casey, the State Department spokesperson, tried his best to give  
the impression that the United States has no idea why China would do  
such a thing -- "We would like to see and understand and know more  
about what they're really trying to accomplish here." ... "exactly  
what their intentions are" ... "questions that arise about what  
Chinese intentions are" ... "not only the nature of what they've  
done, but the purpose and intent"[8]

But the United States can well imagine what China's intention was.  
The Chinese were responding to the efforts of the Bush  
administration, and the Clinton administration before them, to  
establish and maintain US military supremacy in space and to use that  
supremacy as a threatening, or actual, weapon. Beijing wished to put  
Washington on notice that in any future conflict with China the  
United States will not be dealing with Iraq or Afghanistan, or  
Yugoslavia, Panama or Grenada.

"But what did anyone expect?" asks Lawrence Martin, columnist for The  
Globe and Mail of Canada. "For several years, China, Canada, and  
virtually every country in the world have been urging the United  
States to enter into an arms-control treaty for outer space. Leave  
the heavens in peace, for god's sake. Come together and work  
something out. It's called collective security. ... Mr. Bush and Mr.  
Cheney showed no interest in a space treaty. Their national space  
policy is essentially hegemony in the heavens. They oppose the  
development of new legal regimes or other measures that restrict  
their designs. A UN resolution to prevent an arms race in space was  
supported by 151 countries with zero opposed. The U.S. abstained. It  
wants strategic control."[9]


The ideology of the ruling class in any society is one that tries to  
depict the existing social order as "natural".
In 1972 I traveled by land from San Francisco to Chile, to observe  
and report on Salvador Allende's "socialist experiment". One of the  
lasting impressions of my journey through Latin America is of the  
strict class order of the societies I visited. There are probably  
very few places in the world where the dividing lines between the  
upper and middle classes on the one hand and the lower class on the  
other are more distinct and emotionally clung to, including Great  
Britain. In the Chilean capital of Santiago I went to look at a room  
in a house advertised by a woman. Because I was American she assumed  
that I was anti-Allende, the same assumption she'd have made if I had  
been European, for she wanted to believe that only "Indians", only  
poor dumb indígenas and their ilk, supported the government. She was  
pleased by the prospect of an American living in her home and was  
concerned that he might be getting the wrong impression about her  
country. "All this chaos," she assured me, "it's not normal, it's not  
Chile". When I relieved her of her misconception about me she was  
visibly confused and hurt, and I was a little uncomfortable as well,  
like I had betrayed her trust. I made my departure quickly.

There's the classic Latin American story of the servant of a family  
of the oligarchy. He bought steak for his patrón's dog, but his own  
family ate scraps. He took the dog to the vet, but couldn't take his  
own children to a doctor. And complained not. In Chile, under  
Allende, there was a terribly nagging fear amongst the privileged  
classes that servants no longer knew their place. (In Sweden, for  
some years now, they have been able to examine children of a certain  
age -- their height, weight, and various health measurements -- and  
are then not able to tell which social class the child is from; they  
have ended class warfare against children.)

In the 1980s, in Central America, servants rose up in much of the  
region against their betters, the latter of course being  
unconditionally supported with Yankee money, Yankee arms, even Yankee  
lives. At the end of that decade the New York Times offered some  
snapshots of El Salvador:

Over canapes served by hovering waiters at a party, a guest said she  
was convinced that God had created two distinct classes of people:  
the rich and people to serve them. She described herself as  
charitable for allowing the poor to work as her servants. "It's the  
best you can do," she said.  The woman's outspokenness was unusual,  
but her attitude is shared by a large segment of the Salvadoran upper  
class.
The separation between classes is so rigid that even small  
expressions of kindness across the divide are viewed with suspicion.  
When an American, visiting an ice cream store, remarked that he was  
shopping for a birthday party for his maid's child, other store  
patrons immediately stopped talking and began staring at the  
American. Finally, an astonished woman in the check-out line spoke  
out. "You must be kidding," she said.[10]
The same polarization is taking place now in Venezuela as Hugo Chávez  
attempts to build a more egalitarian society. The Associated Press  
(January 29, 2007) recently presented some snapshots from Caracas: A  
man of European parents says that at his son's private Jewish school  
some parents are talking about how and when to leave the country. The  
man wants a passport for his 10-year-old son in case they need to  
leave for good. "I think we're headed toward totalitarianism." A  
middle-class retiree grimaces at what she sees coming: "Within one  
year, complete communism. ... What he's forming is a dictatorship."   
The fact that Chávez is himself part indígena and part black, and  
looks it, can well add to their animosity towards the man.

I wonder what such people think of George "I am the decider" Bush and  
his repeated use of "signing statements", which effectively means a  
law is what he says it is, no more, no less; his Patriot Act, and his  
various assaults on the principle of habeas corpus, to name but a few  
of the scary practices of his authoritarian rule.

Chuck Kaufman, National Co-Coordinator of the Washington-based  
Nicaragua Network, was part of a group which visited Venezuela last  
fall. Following is part of his report:

Venezuela is politically polarized. We witnessed the extremes of this  
during a dinner with lawyer and author Eva Golinger. Some very drunk  
opposition supporters recognized Golinger as author of The Chávez  
Code and a strong Chavez partisan. Some of them surrounded our table  
and began screaming at Golinger and the delegation, calling us  
"assassins" "Cubans," and "Argentines." The verbal abuse went on for  
long minutes until waiters ejected the most out-of-control anti- 
Chávez woman. We were later told that she worked in the Attorney  
General's office, highlighting one of the many contradictions arising  
from the fact that Chávez' Bolivarian revolution came into power  
democratically through the ballot box rather than by force of arms.  
Armed revolutions generally sweep opponents out of government jobs  
and places of influence such as the media, but in Venezuela many in  
the opposition are still in the civil service and most of the media  
is virulently anti-Chávez.[11]
I admire Hugo Chávez and what he's trying to do in Venezuela, but I  
wish he wouldn't go out of his way to taunt the Bush administration,  
as he does so frequently. Doesn't he know that he's dealing with a  
bunch of homicidal maniacs? Literally. Someone please tell him to  
cool it or he will endanger his social revolution.


Liberalism's best and brightest
A report in the Washington Post, headlined "Soldier's Death  
Strengthens Senators' Antiwar Resolve", informs us that Senators  
Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) and John Kerry (D-Mass.) have been rather  
upset upon learning of the death in Iraq of an Army Captain whom they  
met on a visit to the country in December, and who made a strong  
impression upon them. Dodd has been "radicalized", the story says,  
and Kerry has been "energized" in his opposition to the war.

Why, it must be asked, does it take the death of someone they met by  
chance to fire up their anti-war sentiments? Many millions of  
Americans, and many millions more around the world, have protested  
the war vehemently and passionately without having met any of the  
war's victims. What do these protestors have inside of them that so  
many members of Congress seem to lack?

"This was the kind of person you don't forget," said Dodd. "You  
mention the number dead, 3,000, the 22,000 wounded, and you almost  
see the eyes glaze over. But you talk about an individual like this,  
who was doing his job, a hell of a job, but was also willing to talk  
about what was wrong, it's a way to really bring it to life, to  
connect."[12]

Dear reader, is it the same for you? Do your eyes glaze over when you  
read or hear about the dead and wounded of Iraq?

Neither senator has apparently been "energized" enough to call for  
the immediate withdrawal of American forces from Iraq. That would be  
too "radical".

This gap -- emotionally and intellectually -- between members of  
Congress and normal human beings has been with us for ages of course.  
The anti-Vietnam War movement burst out of the starting gate back in  
August 1964, with hundreds of people demonstrating in New York. Many  
of these early dissenters took apart and critically examined the  
administration's statements about the war's origin, its current  
situation, and its rosy picture of the future. They found continuous  
omission, contradiction, and duplicity, became quickly and wholly  
cynical, and called for immediate and unconditional withdrawal. This  
was a state of intellect and principle it took members of Congress --  
and then only a minority -- until the 1970s to reach. The same can be  
said of the mass media. And even then -- even today -- our political  
and media elite viewed Vietnam only as a "mistake"; i.e., it was "the  
wrong way" to fight communism, not that the United States should not  
be traveling all over the globe to spew violence against anything  
labeled "communism" in the first place. Essentially, the only thing  
these best and brightest have learned from Vietnam is that we should  
not have fought in Vietnam.


In the land where happiness is guaranteed in the Declaration of  
Independence
"Think raising the minimum wage is a good idea?"
"Think again."

That was the message of a full-page advertisement that appeared in  
major newspapers in January. It was accompanied by statements of  
approval from the usual eminent suspects:
      "The reason I object to the minimum wage is I think it destroys  
jobs, and I think the evidence on that, in my judgment, is  
overwhelming." Alan Greenspan, former Federal Reserve Chairman
      "The high rate of unemployment among teenagers, and especially  
black teenagers, is both a scandal and a serious source of social  
unrest. Yet it is largely a result of minimum wage laws." Milton  
Friedman, Nobel Prize-winning economist[13]

Well, if raising the minimum wage can produce such negative  
consequences, then surely it is clear what we as an enlightened and  
humane people must do. We must lower the minimum wage. And thus enjoy  
less unemployment, less social unrest. Indeed, if we lower the  
minimum wage to zero, particularly for poor blacks ... think of  
it! ... No unemployment at all! Hardly any social unrest! In fact --  
dare I say it? -- What if we did away with wages altogether?

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises  
in moral philosophy: that is, the search for a superior moral  
justification for selfishness." John Kenneth Galbraith


Some little-known items from my old files
Here is US General Thomas Power speaking in December 1960 about  
things like nuclear war and a first strike by the United States: "The  
whole idea is to kill the bastards! At the end of the war, if there  
are two Americans and one Russian, we win!" The response from one of  
those present was: "Well, you'd better make sure that they're a man  
and a woman."[14]

Edward R. Murrow is of course a much-honored newsman and "legendary  
broadcaster". There's the annual Edward R. Murrow Award for  
Excellence in Public Diplomacy, with nominations made by the State  
Department, and there's the recent acclaimed film about Murrow, "Good  
Night, and Good Luck", amongst many other tributes. In 1960, CBS  
aired "Harvest of Shame", a documentary made by Murrow, which was  
lauded for exposing the terrible abuses endured by migratory farm  
workers in the United States. The following year Murrow left  
broadcasting to become the director of the United States Information  
Agency, whose raison d'être was to make the United States look as  
good to the world as it does in American high school textbooks. Thus  
it was that when the BBC planned on showing "Harvest of Shame" in the  
UK, Murrow called them in an effort to suppress the broadcast, saying  
it was for US domestic use only. But the film was shown in the UK.[15]

One could wax cynical about Jimmy Carter as well; for example, while  
in the White House he tried hard to sabotage the Sandinista  
revolution in Nicaragua; even worse, Carter supported the Islamic  
opposition to the leftist Afghanistan government in 1979, which led  
to a decade of very bloody civil war, the Taliban, and anti-American  
terrorism in the United States and elsewhere. However, I think that  
overall Carter was closer to a decent human being than any post-World  
War Two president. In 1978 he invited 1960s anti-war activist and  
leader of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Tom Hayden, to the  
White House. (Think George W inviting Michael Moore.) As recounted by  
Hayden, in their private conversation he said to Carter: "You are the  
elected President of the United States, yet I'm concerned that you  
have less power than the chairmen of the boards of the large  
multinational corporations -- men we don't elect or even know."
      "After looking pensively out the Oval Office window, President  
Carter nodded and said, 'I believe that's right. I've learned that  
these last 12 months'."[16]


NOTES

[1] "Aviation Week and Space Technology" (New York), August 5, 1996,  
p.51

[2] Speaking to the National Space Club (Washington, DC), September  
15, 1997

[3] Excerpts are in the same sequence as found in the August 1997  
brochure beginning on page 1.

[4] March 2004, www.stratcom.mil/fact_sheets/fact_sm.html. In 2002,  
the U.S. Space Command was merged with the U.S. Strategic Command.

[5] State Department Press Briefing, January 19, 2007, www.state.gov/ 
r/pa/prs/dpb/2007/79056.htm

[6] Associated Press, January 19, 2007

[7] Washington Post, December 17, 2006; p.12

[8] See note 5

[9] January 25, 2007 p.A19

[10] New York Times, October 7, 1990, p.10

[11] For the full report of October 28, 2006, see www.vensolidarity.org

[12] Washington Post, January 30, 2007, p.3

[13] To see the advertisement -- www.MinimumWage.org

[14] Fred Kaplan, "The Wizards of Armageddon" (1983), p.246

[15] Google <murrow "harvest of shame" bbc>

[16] San Francisco Chronicle, March 4, 1978


William Blum is the author of:
Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War 2
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower
West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir
Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire
        Portions of the books can be read, and copies purchased, at  
<www.killinghope.org >
Previous Anti-Empire Reports can be read at this website.
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