[Peace] News notes 2005-03-13

[C. G. Estabrook]

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	Notes from last week's "global war on terrorism,"
	for the AWARE meeting, Sunday, March 13, 2005.
	(Sources provided on request; a paragraph followed
	by a bracketed source is substantially verbatim.)
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	"An outbreak of demonstrations, elections under Israeli or
	American occupation, or a negligible constitutional change can be
	called a 'wave of democratization.' Media spin will make it
	possible to inflate this democracy to the dimensions of an
	historic process. Then it will be possible to conceal the
	continuation of the occupation, the poverty, the neglect and the
	want -- and everyone will feel terribly positive..."
	[Meron Benvenisti, Haaretz]

[1. NEOCONS] Displaying their contempt for the UN, the USG appointed
Neocon nutjob John Bolton as the new ambassador to the UN.  The Bush
administration also transferred oil company executive and corporate tool
Zalmay Khalilzad from being ambassador to Afghanistan to head the world's
largest US embassy, in Baghdad.
	The WSJ on Friday describes the Quadrennial Review in the
Pentagon, which gives shape to Rumsfeld's vision of transforming the
military into a "proactive" force. But there was little coverage of a
major conference in Spain on terrorism, on the anniversary of the train
bombings that killed almost 200 people. At the conference, UNSG Annan
launched a fierce attack on Britain and the US for weakening human rights
in the name of the war on terror. In a Spanish radio address, financier
George Soros described how the GWOT was creating anger and resentment
around the world
	On the same day that US troops guarding US ambassador Negroponte's
dinner party shot and killed the Italian rescuer of Giuliana Sgrena, US
troops also shot and killed a Bulgarian soldier; in spite of strained
relations, the Bulgarian Ministry of Defense said Friday it is confident
that thousands of United States forces will be deployed as early as this
year in Bulgaria and neighboring Romania to support American-led missions
in Iraq and around the world.
	An American sergeant gave an interview to a Saudi newspaper in
which he said that he participated in the operation that captured Saddam
Hussein, but that Saddam was actually captured the day before and that
"the public version of his capture was fabricated," by a Pentagon public
relations team. NYT reports today on the administration's general practice
of flooding the airwaves with propaganda that looks like news.
	And in Britain, the cabinet secretary this week astonished
politicians by disclosing that Britain went to war against Iraq on just
one page of legal advice from Lord Goldsmith, the attorney general.

[2. MILITARY] An Army historian reports that the US had lost control in
Iraq three months after the invasion; Juan Cole argues that it's foreign
occupation that has produced radical Muslim terrorism; and guerrillas
detonated another bomb near the al-Sadeer Hotel in downtown Baghdad on
Wednesday, wounding 30 American "contractors" [mercenaries]: that the
guerrillas can strike at will this way, twice in as many days, underscores
how out of control the situation is, says Cole. Le Monde reported Monday
that Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the cleric who leads the United Iraqi Alliance,
rejects a long-term presence for US troops in Iraq.
	The active-duty Army missed its February recruiting goal by more
than 27%, the first time in almost five years that had happened. Black
Army recruits are down 41 percent since 2000. To deal with the shortage,
Rep. Jim Gibbons of Nevada called for liberals to be used as human shields
in Iraq; he later apologized for plagiarizing his remarks.  Three students
at City College in NY were arrested Wednesday during a protest against
military recruiters on campus -- chanting anti-war slogans in front of a
National Guard table.

[3. TORTURE] Turning to something that the military can do well, we find
that accounts of torture and abuse -- in Iraq and in the CIA's secret
prisons around the world -- continue to flood out. More documents released
by the ACLU on Friday (obtained under FOIA), describe substantiated
incidents of torture and abuse by US Marines in different prisons,
including mock executions of juveniles, burning prisoners and making them
dance with electrical charges. See <www.aclu.org/torturefoia>. The NYT
describes how two Afghan prisoners who died in American custody in
Afghanistan in December were chained to the ceiling and beaten to death by
US soldiers.
	The Pentagon is planning to transfer hundreds of detainees being
held at Guantanamo Bay, where they were supposed to be out of reach of
American courts, to foreign prisons in Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Yemen
-- where they will be. In Iraq, the US is now imprisoning more than 10,000
people -- the highest count since the war began.
	Last Sunday's NYT had an important article that has not been
commented on: immediately after 911 Bush signed a memo that purported to
give CIA expansive interrogation power by executive fiat -- an impeachable
offense. On Wednesday Human Rights Watch urged the United Nations
Commission on Human Rights to condemn Washington for the "systematic use
of torture and mistreatment" of detainees overseas.
	Children held by the US Army at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison included
one boy who appeared to be about 8 years old, the former commander of the
prison told investigators, according to a transcript released this week,
and Florida National Guard soldiers filmed themselves kicking a wounded
prisoner and waving the arm of a corpse.
	The Pentagon has issued another (8th) whitewash of its treatment
of prisoners, this ascribed to an Admiral Church; the WP notes that Church
did not interview Rumsfeld or any other top official; Sen. Carl Levin
criticized Church for failing to examine the role played by the CIA,which
hid detainees from the Red Cross and carried out the secret renditions; at
the same time, Pentagon documents made public on Thursday indicated the US
military in Iraq and the CIA actually signed an agreement on keeping
"ghost detainees" off the books and concealing them from international
observers.
	But our Congressional representatives were complacent: Rep. James
Talent of Missouri said that he did not "need an investigation to tell me
that there was no comprehensive or systematic use of inhumane tactics by
the American military, because those guys and gals just wouldn't do it."
	Meanwhile here at home, the Justice Department's Office of the
Inspector General said this week it had "found a disturbing pattern of
discriminatory and retaliatory actions against Muslim inmates" by the
warden and guards at an unnamed federal prison; and the FBI reports that
it can find no al-Qai'da sleeper cells in the US.

[4. MEDIA] Major media continue to trumpet the new dawn of democracy in
the Middle East, but Bush almost blew it this week by saying that in
Lebanon a free election cannot be carried out under occupation; apparently
that can happen in Palestine and Iraq, though.  Arriving at a Manhattan
dinner party with a military escort in a fleet of black SUVs, ASOD Paul
Wolfowitz answers the admiring comment, "Who would have thought that 8
million Iraqi citizens would turn out to vote?" by insisting, "I did!"
	The most respected television newsman in the US -- Jon Stewart of
the Daily Show -- suggested this week that maybe Bush was right all along;
and MoveOn.org -- a supposedly liberal Democratic party front organization
-- decided that it would not oppose the American occupation of Iraq.  FOX
News now has over twice as many viewers as CNN; and -- in a sign of its
continuing abjection -- the BBC has bowed to an Israeli demand for a
written apology for failing to submit for censorship an interview with the
nuclear whistleblower, Mordechai Vanunu.

[5. ECONOMY] The Senate approves the transfer of wealth from the poor to
the rich via the bankruptcy laws (both Durbin and Obama vote nay), and
Greenspan continues the trend by calling for the income tax to be replaced
with a consumption tax.  The US approves $5 billion in loans and loan
guarantees to the China National Nuclear Corp to finance the building of
nuclear power plants in China by US firms.

[6. LAW] Bush and Blair deserve life sentences for war crimes and genocide
in Iraq, according to an international lawyers' panel, apparently little
reported in the US. With much effort, Blair gets a new law on prior
restraint through Parliament, and Canada, with fewer restrictions on civil
rights that the US or the UK, moves to remove those it has.
	The International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled last year
that the convictions in the US of 51 Mexicans -- now on death row --
violated the Vienna Convention, ratified by the United States in 1969; so
this week the Bush administration pulled out of the specific part of the
Vienna Convention that death penalty opponents have used to fight the
capital sentences for foreigners.
	On Friday the DC Court of Appeals considered a case against Henry
Kissinger for conspiring with military officials in Chile to assassinate
Gen. Rene Schneider in 1970, in the lead-up to the other 911, the coup
against Chilean democracy on 9/11/73.

[7. POLLS] A new poll by the Program on International Policy Attitudes
finds that the American public would significantly alter the Bush
administration's recently proposed federal budget. Presented a breakdown
of the major areas of the proposed discretionary budget and given the
opportunity to redistribute it, respondents made major changes. The most
dramatic changes were deep cuts in defense spending, a significant
reallocation toward deficit reduction, and increases in spending on
education, job training, reducing reliance on oil, and veterans. These
changes were favored by both Republicans and Democrats, though the changes
were generally greater for Democrats. [PIPA]

[8. IRAN] The NYT reports that a commission due to report to President
Bush this month will describe American intelligence on Iran as inadequate
to allow firm judgments about Iran's weapons programs, but that doesn't
deter Vice President Cheney, who said Friday that if Iran doesn't live up
to its "international obligations to forego a nuclear program, then
obviously we'll have to take stronger action." Iran's president said that
wealthy nations cannot keep today's technology for themselves alone and
that Iran must be prepared to defend itself if necessary, but they would
postpone temporarily uranium enrichment to show the world it is not trying
to create nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, there's more saber-rattling from
Israel; and for the the first time since February 2004 the US will have
three major aircraft carrier groups stationed in and around the Middle
East.

[9. ISRAEL] Haaretz reports that Israeli governments have built and
expanded 105 illegal West Bank settlement outposts in a flagrant violation
of official policy and promises to the United States, an official inquiry
in Israel found Wednesday.
	Thirty-seven percent of American Jews said that they were "often
disturbed" by Israeli policy, and the Israeli army denied high-level
security clearance to soldiers who play Dungeons & Dragons...
	A US government report suggested that there are more Palestinians
than Israelis in Israel and the occupied territories. Israel plans to
terminate all employment for Palestinians in Israel by 2008.

[10. LATIN AMERICA] Iranian President Mohammad Khatami arrived in
Venezuela Thursday; Venezuela is buying $120M of helicopters from Russia.
	In Guatemala, police fired tear gas and water cannons at hundreds
of demonstrators who battled with police in the capital city during
protests against a new free-trade agreement with the United States.
	Bolivian President Carlos Mesa won an effective vote of confidence
after threatening to resign on Monday, rallying the country's political
class against the likes of Evo Morales, ridiculed by the NYT as a "coca
chewing Amymara Indian leader who would nationalize Bolivia's industries,
[and] stop payment of its foreign debt."
	In Mexico, Subcomandante Marcos, spokesman for EZLN (the
Zapatistas), calls for nonviolent actions against the plot to remove
Mexico City Governor Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) from the 2006
presidential race.
	President Nestor Kirchner has told Argentines to boycott
Anglo-Dutch energy giant Shell for hiking its gasoline prices this week.

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   C. G. Estabrook <www.newsfromneptune.com>
   "News from Neptune" (Saturdays 10-11AM), and
   "From Bard to Verse: A Program of the Spoken Arts"
   (Saturdays noon-1PM) on WEFT, Champaign, 90.1 FM,
   Community Radio for East Central Illinois
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