[Peace-discuss] News notes, 3rd week in June 2008

[C. G. Estabrook]

SUNDAY 22 JUNE 2008. [On this date the Battle of Deptford, near London, brought 
to an end the Cornish Rebellion of 1497, a popular uprising by the people of 
Cornwall against the war taxes of King Henry VII Tudor. (A priest with the 
surname Estebrok was involved.) The Cornish had little sympathy for English wars 
against Scotland:  most Cornish were not English speakers and to this day see 
themselves as different from the "Sawsnek" (whom they sometimes call by the 
Cornish word "emit" = ant). One of the leaders, Thomas Flamank, a lawyer from 
Bodmin, was quoted as saying, "Speak the truth and only then can you be free of 
your chains" -- before he was hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn.]

[1] US TORTURE POLICY. It was revealed on the weekend that the CIA operated a 
secret black site prison in Poland, where they held the alleged 9/11 mastermind 
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other prisoners. While being held at the secret 
prison, Mohammed was waterboarded 100 times during a two-week period. Overseeing 
Mohammed’s interrogation was Deuce Martinez, a longtime narcotics agent who had 
no formal interrogation skills and didn’t speak Arabic. Martinez has since left 
the CIA. He now works for the company Mitchell Jessen & Associates, run by two 
former military psychologists who advised the CIA on interrogations. Martinez 
also interrogated Abu Zubaydah, who was held at a secret prison in Thailand. [DN] 	
	The story of 100 waterboardings by an administration that says it doesn't 
torture capped a week that the journalist Chris Floyd called
“...one of the most extraordinary weeks in modern American history. The many 
isolated streams of evidence about the Bush Administration's torture system -- 
and the direct responsibility of the Administration's highest officials for this 
vast crime – have now converged into a mighty flood: undeniable, unignorable, 
pouring through the halls of Congress and media newsrooms, lashing at the walls 
of the White House itself. In the course of the past few days, a series of 
events has laid bare the stinking sepsis at the heart of the Bush Regime for all 
to see.
	“It began last Sunday with the launch of a remarkable series by McClatchy 
Newspapers, detailing the torture, brutality, injustice and murder that has 
riddled the Bush gulag from top to bottom. Then came fiery Senate hearings, in 
which long-somnolent legislators finally bestirred themselves to confront and 
denounce some of the torture system's architects, including Dick Cheney pointman 
William Haynes III, who was left reeling, shuffling, dissembling – and bracing 
for perjury charges after his blatantly mendacious testimony.
	“Companion hearings in the House produced stunning confirmation of mass murder 
in the Bush gulag – a bare minimum of 27 killings, among the 108 known cases of 
death among Terror War captives. This evidence came from rock-solid 
Establishment figure Col. Larry Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Colin 
Powell. (Of course, as many captives have been and are being held in "secret 
prisons," and an untold number of others have been hidden from the Red Cross, 
there is no way of knowing at this point how many prisoners have actually died 
or been murdered – or even how many prisoners there are in the gulag.)
	“And while the McClatchy series and Congressional hearings were going forward, 
a retired major general of the United States Army directly and openly accused 
the commander-in-chief of committing a war crime: authorizing "a systematic 
regime of torture." Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba – forced out of the service in 2006 
for trying to honestly investigate the atrocities at Abu Ghraib – was 
unequivocal in his statement in a new report by Physicians for Human Rights:
	"'After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and 
reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to 
whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question 
that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will 
be held to account…The commander-in-chief and those under him authorized a 
systematic regime of torture'...
	“It has indeed been a remarkable week in American politics. But I fear that the 
most remarkable thing about it will turn out to be that it had no lasting effect 
at all.” [CHRIS FLOYD]
	The chair of the Senate Armed Forces Committee Carl Levin has accused top Bush 
administration officials of sanctioning the use of harsh interrogation 
techniques used at Guantanamo, Iraq and Afghanistan.  During a hearing on 
Tuesday, Levin revealed a senior CIA lawyer told Pentagon staff at Guantanamo in 
2002 that torture is “basically subject to perception.” CIA attorney Jonathan 
Freedman said in 2002, “If the detainee dies, you’re doing it wrong.” Levin also 
revealed military psychologists played a role in devising the military’s 
interrogation routines. [DN]
	During Tuesday’s hearing, the Pentagon’s former general counsel William Haynes 
was repeatedly questioned about his role in authorizing interrogation techniques 
that amount to torture according to many legal and human rights groups. During 
two hours of testimony, Haynes responded to dozens of questions by saying he 
could not recall or remember details about the process of approving the 
interrogation techniques. Democratic Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island blasted 
Haynes’ role in authorizing torture. [DN]
	The Senate also released documents Tuesday confirming the US military hid the 
locations of some prisoners from the International Committee of the Red Cross in 
order to cover up the torture of prisoner. [DN]
	Former guards and detainees whom McClatchy interviewed said Bagram was a center 
of systematic brutality for at least 20 months, starting in late 2001. Yet the 
soldiers responsible have escaped serious punishment.  The public outcry in the 
United States and abroad has focused on detainee abuse at the U.S. naval base in 
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, but sadistic 
violence first appeared at Bagram, north of Kabul, and at a similar U.S. 
internment camp at Kandahar Airfield in southern Afghanistan...
	A Senate investigation has concluded that top Pentagon officials began 
assembling lists of harsh interrogation techniques in the summer of 2002 for use 
on detainees at Guantanamo Bay and that those officials later cited memos from 
field commanders to suggest that the proposals originated far down the chain of 
command. [WP]

[2] US WAR POLICY.  The Democratic Party-controlled House has passed a $162 
billion war-funding bill to keep funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The 
bill was approved by a vote of 268-155. As the House approved the war-funding 
bill, a protester in the visitor’s gallery began throwing red-stained dollars at 
lawmakers.  But President Obama will not have to ask congress for money to 
continue the war right away.
	The NYT reports the Army official who managed the Pentagon’s largest contract 
in Iraq says he was ousted from his job when he refused to approve paying more 
than $1 billion in questionable charges to the former Halliburton subsidiary 
KBR. Charles Smith said that he was forced from his job in 2004, after informing 
KBR officials that the Army would impose escalating financial penalties if they 
failed to improve their chaotic Iraqi operations. Although KBR’s performance in 
Iraq has come under fierce criticism from lawmakers, the Pentagon recently 
awarded the company part of a ten-year $150 billion contract in Iraq. [DN]
	KBR had the Army over a barrel: if the Army refused to pay KBR's inflated bills 
(more than $1B in unjustified costs), KBR threatened to shut off payments to its 
subcontractors, which in turn would stop feeding the army in Iraq.  Of course, 
the fact that KBR was then a subsidiary of Halliburton didn't hurt its 
bargaining position either; the Halliburton board knew what it was doing when it 
gave Dick Cheney $80 million he wasn't contractually entitled to as he moved 
from its executive suite to the White House. [Mark Kleiman]
	Meanwhile, the Pentagon’s Inspector General is accusing KBR of overcharging the 
Navy in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. [DN]

[3] THEATERS OF THE US MIDEAST WAR.  It's important to realize that the US has 
been conducting a generation-long war from the Mediterranean to the Indus 
valley, from the Horn of Africa to Central Asia – a circle around the Persian 
Gulf with a 1500-mile radius.  That war will continue in the coming 
administration, unless there is serious opposition at home and abroad. It has 
several theaters:

[A] AFPAK. The Pakistani military is so angry over US airstrikes on its soldiers 
last week it is threatening to postpone or cancel a US program to train a 
paramilitary force, the New York Times reports. Some Pakistani officials are 
convinced the US attack was deliberate.

[B] IRAN. The NYT Friday described a June Israeli military exercise that "U.S. 
officials" say "appeared to be a rehearsal for a potential bombing attack on 
Iran's nuclear facilities." ... According to [a 2006 MIT paper], in a strike on 
Iran's nuclear facilities Israel would be interested in three targets - the 
enrichment facility at Natanz, the conversion facility at Esfahan and the heavy 
water plant at Arak ... Col. Sam Gardiner says, "I would call the Israeli strike 
'disruptive' rather than 'destructive'" ... If Gardiner's analysis is correct, 
then Michael Gordon's New York Times article is deceptive, perhaps deliberately 
so. It's part of a campaign of pressure on Congress and European governments - 
likely orchestrated with the Cheney faction of the Bush Administration - to 
forego real negotiations with Iran, and to push towards U.S. military 
escalation. If we don't act, the Israelis will, the argument will be - 
neglecting the fact that no Israeli action is possible without a green light 
from Washington.  Next week, Congress may consider on its suspension calendar a 
resolution promoted by AIPAC that effectively endorses a naval blockade against 
Iran - an act of war. [JFP]

[C] IRAQ. War in Iraq now failing to capture even one percent of the "newshole."
	The Bush administration is pressuring the Iraqi government to approve a 
security agreement that resembles a failed 1930 treaty between Britain and Iraq, 
ending the British Mandate,  that prompted years of nationalist revolt and 
unrest in Iraq, writes Karl Meyer for the New York Times. Under the 1930 pact, 
Iraq had to consult Britain on security issues and allow it the use of Iraqi 
airports, ports, railways and rivers. Two major military bases were leased to 
the British, who were empowered to station their forces throughout Iraq. British 
personnel were granted immunity from local prosecution.
	Iraq’s foreign minister said U.S. and Iraqi officials reworded a proposed White 
House commitment to defend Iraq against foreign aggression to avoid submitting 
the deal for congressional approval, the Washington Post reports. Zebari said 
“our lawyers and their lawyers” had determined they could avoid the ratification 
problem with a pledge to “help” Iraqis defend themselves. Rep. Delahunt called 
the change “a distinction without a difference.”
	The Independent of London reports the Bush administration has accepted that 
foreign contractors in Iraq will no longer have immunity from Iraqi law under a 
new security agreement now under negotiation.
	A US military judge has dismissed charges against another Marine connected to 
the massacre of twenty-four Iraqi civilians in Haditha. Lt. Col. Jeffrey 
Chessani had been accused of failing to investigate the killings. Of the eight 
Marines originally charged, only one still faces prosecution. Six Marines have 
won dismissals of their charges and one has been cleared at court-martial.

[D] ISRAEL. Israel has agreed to an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire with Hamas for 
six months, the New York Times reports. Israel is expected as part of the deal 
to ease the economic blockade of Gaza.

[E] LEBANON. Israel offered to start talks with Lebanon on withdrawal from the 
Shabaa Farms, the New York Times reports. In the past Lebanon has said Israel 
must withdraw from occupied territory before talks can begin.

[4] LATIN AMERICA. The European Union has agreed to scrap its sanctions against 
Cuba.

[5] EUROPE. Irish “no" to the EU constitution d/b/a "the Lisbon Treaty."

[6] ECONOMY. “The risks of financial collapse are receding, but the system is 
still far from healthy. The U.S. economy has probably been in recession for 
about six months, but I don't think the major issue right now is the state of 
the business cycle; we're likely to see several years of stagnation and general 
trouble. The likelihood of a boom, either an uneven one like the 1980s or a 
manic one like the late 1990s, is very small. But the U.S. economy is not going 
down the drain, or to hell in a handbasket, or suffering its death agony, or 
anything like that.” [HENWOOD]
	In San Francisco, over 1,000 protesters rallied outside a health insurance 
industry convention Thursday to demand the creation of a single-payer healthcare 
system. The demonstration targeted America’s Health Insurance Plans, an industry 
group. Other protests calling for single-payer were held across the country. 
Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader addressed a rally in New York: 
“The Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences estimates that 
18,000 Americans die every year because they can’t afford health insurance. Now, 
nobody dies in Canada, Belgium, France, Germany, England because they can’t 
afford health insurance, because they all have health insurance.”
	NYT obliquely acknowledges that there might just be something to suspicions 
that the war was about oil now that the oil majors are returning to their old 
stomping grounds in Iraq...

[7] MEDIA. The University of Michigan Press is ending its controversial 
relationship with Pluto Press at the end of this year. As of December 31, it 
will no longer distribute titles for Pluto Press, a London-based independent 
publisher. Pluto counts Noam Chomsky among its authors and espouses what it 
calls a "radical political agenda." The Michigan press took fire last year for 
one of Pluto's books, Overcoming Zionism, by Joel Kovel, a professor of social 
studies at Bard College. The pro-Israel lobbying group StandWithUs spearheaded a 
vocal protest, attacking the book as "a polemic against Israel"...
	Freedom of the press is on trial in Canada. The trial is before a court with 
the Orwellian title of the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal. The accused 
are Maclean's magazine and author Mark Steyn. The crime: In mocking and biting 
tones, they wrote that Islam threatens Western values.  Had Steyn written that, 
given the Crusades, colonial atrocities in Africa and the slave trade, 
Christianity had been on balance a curse, he would not be in the dock. In the 
United States, these charges would have been tossed out by any federal judge, 
who would have admonished the plaintiffs that, here in America, we have a First 
Amendment.  The United States, however, is an isolated exception, as Western 
nations seek to impose wider restrictions on what has come to be called "hate 
speech."  Questioning the Holocaust is a crime in Canada and Europe, as British 
historian David Irving discovered when he was sentenced to prison in Austria. To 
say the Armenian massacres of 1915-1924 were an attempt at genocide is a crime 
in Turkey.

[8] COURTS. A federal appeals court said that the US military improperly labeled 
a Chinese Muslim held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, an enemy combatant and ordered 
that he be released, transferred or granted a new hearing. The ruling by the US 
Court of Appeals is the first time a federal court has weighed in on the issue 
of a Guantanamo prisoner's classification and granted him the opportunity to try 
to secure his release through civilian courts. A lawyer for Huzaifa Parhat, who 
has been kept virtually incommunicado for more than six years, said Parhat's 
legal team would seek to have him freed immediately. [SMH]

[9] CONGRESS. Leaders in the Democratic-controlled House and Senate have agreed 
to rewrite the nation’s surveillance laws and to give what amounts to legal 
immunity to phone companies that took part in the Bush administration’s secret 
domestic surveillance program. The bill has been described as the most 
significant revision of surveillance law in three decades. The legislation gives 
the government new powers to eavesdrop on both domestic and international 
communications. One provision would allow the government to wiretap Americans 
for up to a week without a court order. [DN]
	“[Friday]  morning, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 293-129 to pass a 
version of the revision to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that 
ACLU opposed ... Our U.S. Representative Tim Johnson was the only Republican to 
vote no." (Rep. Ron Paul was not voting.) Also voting "no" were the newest 
member of the Illinois delegation, Bill Foster, and long-time civil liberties 
advocates Danny Davis, Jesse Jackson Jr. and Jan Schakowsky (Bobby Rush is ill 
and was not voting). [ACLU-CU]
	This Monday, the fight moves to the Senate. Senator Russ Feingold says the 
"deal is not a compromise; it is a capitulation." Barack Obama announced his 
partial support for the bill, but said, "It does, however, grant retroactive 
immunity, and I will work in the Senate to remove this provision so that we can 
seek full accountability for past offenses."
	Last year, after phone calls from MoveOn members and others, Obama went so far 
as to vow to "support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive 
immunity for telecommunications companies." Will he keep his word? You could ask 
him to block any compromise that includes immunity for the phone companies that 
helped the administration break the law. Obama's campaign phone is 866.675.2008.


[10] PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN. Barack Obama (who has been busy this week bolstering 
"Blue Dog" supporters of executive tyranny* and appointing a gaggle of dim 
warhawks, has-beens and imperial factotums as his national security team) – has 
given every indication he sees the Administration's high crimes as "dumb 
policies" that don't require any legal redress:
	Obama says that any decision to pursue "investigation" of "possibilities" of 
"genuine crimes" would be "an area where I would exercise judgment." He stressed 
the need to draw a distinction between "really dumb policies and policies that 
rise to the level of criminal activity." He said he would not want "my first 
term to be consumed by what would be perceived by Republicans as a partisan 
witch hunt."
	He then tied his thinking on torture, illegal wiretapping, aggressive war and 
all the other depredations of the Bush Regime to his stance on impeachment:  "I 
often get questions about impeachment at town hall meetings. And I've often 
said, I do not think that would be something that would be fruitful to pursue. I 
think impeachment should be reserved for exceptional circumstances."
	In other words, very strong, credible, evidence-based charges of launching a 
criminal war of aggression based on deception is not an "exceptional 
circumstance" worthy of the investigative and prosecutorial process of 
impeachment. It might just be a "very dumb policy." Very strong, credible, 
evidence-based charges of knowingly, deliberately creating a regimen of 
systematic torture is not an "exceptional circumstance" worthy of impeachment; 
it might not even be worth further investigation by the Justice Department. It 
too could just be a "dumb policy" that we should forget about – especially if 
Republicans are going to make a fuss about it.
	In any case, it is obvious that to Obama, "what we already know" does not 
constitute "exceptional circumstances" – otherwise he would already be pressing 
for criminal investigation, via the impeachment process or by calling for a 
special prosecutor… He pretends that it is still an open question – "an exercise 
of judgment" – whether these crimes should even be investigated further, much 
less prosecuted. He pretends – or even worse, actually believes – that we are 
not in the grip of "exceptional circumstances," but are apparently just rolling 
along with business as usual, aside from a few "dumb policies" which he will 
tinker with and set right. [FLOYD]
	*Obama endorsed John Barrow, the most reactionary Democrat in Congress, in a 
primary pitting him against Regina Thomas, a progressive state Senator.  I 
wasn't in the slightest bit surprised. No one who recalls Obama's enthusiastic 
endorsement of Joe Lieberman against Ned Lamont could possibly be surprised. 
Obama, like McCain and Clinton, is a professional politician. One of their basic 
tenets is the Incumbency Protection Racket. That Barrow is running ads 
everywhere in the district is a tribute to the powerful grassroots campaign 
Regina Thomas is waging... and to the polling his campaign just completed that 
shows he's going to get his head handed to him by constituents who know he 
represents the corporations and the elite power structure, not everyday 
Georgians. Look at his first TV commercial and how he chooses GOP talking points 
to lean on -- eliminating "the death tax" and scapegoating immigrants. [FDL]

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