[Peace] News notes 2005-01-02

Mon Jan 3 20:44:10 CST 2005

        ========================================================
        Notes from last week's "global war on terrorism" [GWOT],
        for the AWARE meeting, Sunday, January 2, 2005.
        (Sources provided on request; a paragraph followed by a
        bracketed source is substantially verbatim.)
        ========================================================

	"Our only political party has two right wings, one called
	Republican, the other Democratic.  But Henry Adams figured all
	that out back in the 1890s.  'We have a single system,' he wrote,
	and 'in that system the only question is the price at which the
	proletariat is to be bought and sold, the bread and circuses.'"
	--Gore Vidal

[1. ATTACKS] In Iraq, the death toll from fighting since Monday has risen
above 100. In Baghdad, 30 people died when a house exploded during a
police raid.  The blast destroyed up to 10 neighboring houses. In Mosul,
US forces came under repeated attacks by Iraqi fighters in the form of car
bombs and ambushes. In response, US warplanes carried out air strikes
killing at least 25 Iraqis. The Los Angeles Times reports many of the
residents of Fallujah who were allowed to return home are now leaving
because the city was so devastated by the US assault. One resident said,
"I was born in that town. I know every inch of it. But when I got there, I
didn't recognize it." Today at least 19 Iraqis -- 18 of them National
Guardsmen -- are killed in a car bomb, and Israeli forces launch a new
incursion into northern Gaza. A new tape purportedly from al Qaeda leader
Osama bin Laden backed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the Islamist network's
leader in Iraq, Al Jazeera television reported Monday. It said the tape,
which the station did not air, also discussed the upcoming Iraqi
elections. [REUTERS 12/27] The biggest and most important party coalition
in Iraq, which will almost certainly form the next government, has
explicitly stated in its platform that it wants a specific timetable
announced for withdrawal of US troops from the country. [Juan Cole]

[2. MILITARY] Nearly 1 million members of the U.S. armed forces have been
deployed to Iraq, Afghanistan and other danger zones since the September
11 terror attacks, and almost a third of them have been sent more than
once, figures released by the Pentagon show. [WT] The NYT leads today with
the observation that families of American troops killed in Iraq are often
divided over the justness of the war.  Iraq War conscientious objector
Jeremy Hinzman has a website ... The rightwing has been all atwitter with
Hinzman bashing lately. [AMLEFT] The WP points out that "the Bush
administration is preparing plans for possible lifetime detention of
suspected terrorists, including hundreds whom the government does not have
enough evidence to charge in courts.  [The Pentagon] which holds 500
prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, plans to ask the U.S. Congress for $25
million to build a 200-bed prison to hold detainees who are unlikely to
ever go through a military tribunal for lack of evidence." [REUTERS]

[3. TORTURE] "Fresh Details Emerge on Harsh Methods at GuantÃ¡namo," says
the NYT.  It confirms some of the accounts in other recent disclosures
about procedures at GuantÃ¡namo: the November report in which the Red
Cross complained privately last summer to the United States government
that the procedures at GuantÃ¡namo were "tantamount to torture";
memorandums from F.B.I. officials, most of which were released in December
as part of a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union; and
another set of interviews with The Times in October in which other former
GuantÃ¡namo officials described coercive and abusive techniques regularly
employed there.  One detainee, a suspected accomplice of the 9-11
hijackers, is said to have been tranquilized, blindfolded and put on a
plane in order to fool him into thinking he had been transferred into the
custody of the Egyptian secret police. Other tactics included giving
prisoners forced enemas and sexual taunts and temptations by female
interrogators. [NYT] The Justice Department is issuing a rewritten legal
memo on the definition of torture, backing away from its own assertions
prior to the Iraqi prison abuse scandal that torture had to involve
"excruciating and agonizing pain." The 17-page document states flatly that
torture violates U.S. and international law and omits two of the most
controversial assertions made in now-disavowed 2002 Justice Department
documents: that President Bush, as commander in chief in wartime, had
authority superseding U.S. anti-torture laws and that U.S. personnel had
several legal defenses against criminal liability in such cases. In
addition, the memo clearly states that U.S. personnel involved in
interrogations cannot contend that their actions were motivated by
national security needs or other reasons. Most of the original memos were
signed by then-assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, now a judge on the
9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in San Francisco. [AP] Six Navy
SEALs and two of their wives filed a lawsuit against The Associated Press
and one of its reporters for allegedly revealing their identities in
photos published in early December, according to a press release from the
plaintiffs. The AP allegedly removed photos from a web-site and published
in a story stating that the pictures "could be" the earliest evidence of
possible prisoner abuse in Iraq, the plaintiffs contend. The SEALs argue
that the pictures "actually depict special warfare operators' standard
procedures during covert operations. The Iraqis shown being captured in
the photographs were leaders of anti-coalition attacks and Saddam
loyalists ... the SEALs showed more respect for the insurgents and
terrorists that they were apprehending by obscuring their faces than the
AP did for the Navy SEALs who were in Iraq risking their lives."  [E&P]
Hoping to bring capital punishment to the supposedly liberal state of
Massachusetts, Gov. Mitt Romney is preparing to file a death penalty bill
early next year that he says is so carefully written it will guarantee
only the guilty are executed [sic]. [AP]

[4. UNILATERALISM] Once-bitter rivals Russia and China will hold a massive
joint military exercise on Chinese territory next year involving
submarines and possibly strategic bombers, Russia's defense minister said
Monday ... China has become the No. 1 customer for Russia's defense
industry ... Officials with Russia's state arms-trading company,
Rosoboronexport, said last week that China was expected to sign new
contracts next year to purchase Russia's most advanced fighter jets.  
Both nations frequently have spoken about their adherence to a "multipolar
world," a term that refers to their opposition to a perceived U.S.
domination in global affairs.  Russian officials allege that the United
States improperly influenced Ukraine's elections by funding ... Russia
could respond to the falling out with the West over Ukraine's presidential
election by trying to forge a closer partnership with China and India, the
second-biggest customer of Russia's military industrial complex.  During
his visit to India earlier this month, Putin pushed for a trilateral
summit with leaders of India and China and assailed U.S. "dictatorship of
international affairs." [AP]

[5. PROPAGANDA] The Pentagon has created its own 24-hour television
channel to cut out the middle man â€” the national media. Created with $6
million in congressional funds, the Pentagon Channel earlier this year
began airing full coverage of defense press conferences and other
programming targeted at U.S. troops. "We carry all of the briefings from
start to finish with no editorial content," said [the Pentagon]; briefing
footage is then fully archived at the channel's Web site,
www.pentagonchannel.mil ... The Pentagon Channel contains 100 percent
military content, with the goal of being a pure conduit of information for
the troops.  "'Why I Serve' has brought viewers inside the Walter Reed
Army Medical Center for interviews of soldiers who've lost limbs," [a
spokeswoman] said. "It just stops you in your tracks" [sic] ... The
Pentagon Channel is headquartered in Alexandria with the AFRTS, which
broadcasts to 177 countries, more than any other network ... She pointed
people to the Web site, www.americasupportsyou.com, for information about
the program, which highlights citizens, businesses and groups undertaking
projects to support the troops, especially those deployed in the war on
terrorism. [WT]

[6. SPIES] A senior level Central Intelligence Agency official within the
intelligence department has resigned, becoming the sixth official to leave
the agency since Porter Goss took over as CIA director in September.
According to a New York Times report, a 21-year veteran of the CIA, Jami
Miscik served as deputy director for intelligence and was the agency's
director of analysis since 2002, notably tasked with preparing reports for
President George W. Bush, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP). The Times
reported that Miscik was forced out and would be the first major change
within the directorate of intelligence under Goss, reports Reuters.  The
top two officials at the CIA's clandestine unit resigned in November.
Goss, a former congressman who chaired the House Intelligence Committee,
has appointed his former House aides to top positions within the Agency.
[MASNET]

[7. MEANNESS] The US has been shamed into increasing its announced relief
aid to tsunami victims several times; its pledge now amounts to 1/420 of
the amount spent in Iraq so far.  The U.S. spends what it promised on the
relief effort in less than two days in Iraq. Bush is also being criticized
for failing to say anything about the devastation caused by the tsunami.
Bush was vacationing at his ranch in Texas and -- unlike German Chancellor
Schroeder -- decided not to cut his vacation short.  Juan Cole writes that
Bush has lost a unique opportunity to reach out to the Muslim world by
showing compassion in a time of tragedy.  Indonesia, one of the nations
hardest hit, is the most populous Muslim country in the world.  "If Bush
were a statesman he would have flown to Jakarta and announced his
solidarity with the Muslims of Indonesia," says Cole.  One official
described Bush's silence as "kind of freaky."  Earlier in the week, UN
relief coordinator Jan Egeland, accused wealthy nations of being "stingy"
with foreign aid.  So on Wednesday, Bush spoke out and criticized Egeland
by describing him as "very ill-informed." But in terms of percentage of
its national income, no modern industrialized nation gives less in
humanitarian aid than the United States. Last year it shared less 1/7th of
one percent of its national income.

[8. HAITI] In Haiti, the U.S.-backed government announced Tuesday it would
financially reward the country's former soldiers including those who
participated in the coup that overthrew the democratically elected
president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The government plans to give the former
soldiers the equivalent of 10 years of back pay. Aristide disbanded the
military a decade ago. [DN]

  =================================================
  C. G. Estabrook
  "News from Neptune" (Saturdays 10:00-11:00AM) and
  "From Bard to Verse: A Program of the Spoken Arts"
  (Saturdays noon-1:00PM) on WEFT Champaign 90.1 FM
  ----Community Radio for East Central Illinois----
  113 North Market Street  ----  Champaign IL 61820
  =================================================