Selves and Others

A major diplomatic and political conflict has exploded between Colombia and Venezuela after the revelation of a Colombian government covert operation in Venezuela, involving the recruitment of Venezuelan military and security officers in the kidnapping of a Colombian leftist leader. Following an investigation by the Venezuelan Ministry of Interior and reports and testimony from journalists and other knowledgeable political observers it was determined that the highest echelons of the Colombian government, including President Uribe, planned and executed this onslaught on Venezuelan sovereignty. (...)

Last November the United States began its pre-Iraqi election offensive with a full-scale assault on Falluja, then said to be the center of the resistance to the coalition occupation and the Iraqi interim government. With newly trained Iraqi government troops showcased in the attack, U.S. commanders intended to break the back of the resistance. Instead, Falluja furnished additional evidence that the United States still does not comprehend the nature of its adversaries.

The attack on Falluja made rapid progress, with the weeklong battle ending in mopping up efforts. But the insurgents had disappeared, not fought, except for those left to keep the Americans occupied. Other insurgent groups simultaneously made numerous attacks of their own in Baghdad, Mosul, and elsewhere, including the car-bombing of a heavily protected convoy bearing Amb. Charles A. Duelfer, director of a principal U.S. intelligence unit, the Iraq Survey Group. With total numbers of American casualties (killed and wounded) having passed 10,000, and more than a thousand deaths in Iraq since July 2003—when an overconfident President George W. Bush exclaimed "Bring "em on!"—how is it possible that Americans have yet to understand the enemy? (...)

[January/February 2005 pp. 18-20 (vol. 61, no. 01)]

WASHINGTON, Jan 25 (IPS) - Despite the millions of dollars spent by the U.S. and other nations to improve their performance, Iraqi police still routinely abuse and often torture detainees, according to a report released Tuesday by Human Rights Watch (HRW)..

Methods of torture include routine beatings using cables, hosepipes and other implements; kicking, slapping, and punching; prolonged suspension from the wrists with hands tied behind the back; electric shocks to sensitive parts of the body, including the earlobes and genitals; and being kept blindfolded or handcuffed continuously over several days, according to the 93-page report. (...)

Kidnapping has become the crime of choice amongst Iraqi criminal gangs. With 70% unemployment in “liberated” Iraq, crime is running rampant, with organized crime enjoying a free hand amidst the terrible security situation.

The families of the kidnapped are at times forced to pay up to several million dollars ransom-unless they want to receive pieces of their loved ones, or even their dead bodies.

While media attention has focused heavily on the kidnapping of Westerners, the kidnapping of Iraqis, in particular Iraqi women, is much more common. (...)

[January 24, 2005]

ARBIL, Northern Iraq, Jan 25 (IPS) - Arbil is normally a quiet place. Capital of the Kurdish autonomous area in Northern Iraq, the city of 800,000 has largely avoided the bloodshed of 22 months of war and occupation.

Kurdish fighters here fought alongside the United States in the initial invasion. Since the fall of Saddam, the area has been governed by Kurdish leaders, whose followers provide security. There are no American soldiers on the streets, and no humvee patrols. The area had not seen a single American attack since the invasion.

Until this month, that is. (...)

I’ve just had an email from a friend in the Green Zone. He has not set foot outside the compound since he’s been there, and probably never will. Helicopter to and from the airport only. Welcome to free Iraq, and especially to liberated Falluja.

The New York Times reported that "Residents trickling back to Falluja . . . enter a desolate world of skeletal buildings, tank-blasted homes, weeping power lines and severed palm trees. Sullen and anxious, tens of thousands of residents have passed through stringent checkpoints to find out . . . whether their homes and shops were reduced to rubble or merely ransacked . . . people have to file through huge coils of razor wire and a gantlet of armed marines to pick up their supplies. On the road . . . Lt. Col Patrick Malay . . . watched the scene with satisfaction. "This is how I like it, just like Disneyland," he said. "Orderly lines and people leave with a smile on their face"." (...)

A week before the elections, the streets of Baghdad are rife with confusion about candidates, calls for boycotts and the ever-present fear of violence.

BAGHDAD, IRAQ - With the Iraqi elections less than a week away, all eyes are focused on the likelihood of "spectacular attacks," the intimidation of voters, and whether Sunni Muslims, who have long requested a postponement, will show up at the polls at all.

But one of the most common question one hears from Iraqis - from Sunni and Shiite, from those who will vote and those who swear they won’t - is: Who are the candidates? (...)

The Iraqi elections provide the American people with an opportunity to consider whether they want to continue the obdurate path chartered by the Bush Administration or, instead, go in another direction. To chose the path not taken, we will first have to learn to set limits.

If you’ve been in therapy, or know therapists, you understand that a classic therapeutic challenge is learning how to set limits; for example, how to escape an abusive relationship. The citizens of the United States are stuck in a dysfunctional relationship with the Bush Administration, one that shows many of the classic patterns of abuse: We have been lied to and our resources squandered, yet we keep coming back hoping for the "goodies." For Americans to escape this abuse, we must set limits with Bush and company. (...)

By any standard, the ongoing American occupation of Iraq is a disaster. The highly vaunted US military machine, laurelled and praised for its historic march on Baghdad in March and April of 2003, today finds itself a broken force, on the defensive in a land that it may occupy in part, but does not control. The all-out offensive to break the back of the resistance in Falluja has failed, leaving a city destroyed by American firepower, and still very much in the grips of the anti- American fighters.

The same is true of Mosul, Samarra, or any other location where the US military has undertaken "decisive" action against the fighters, only to find that, within days, the fighting has returned, stronger than ever. (...)

As long as the Bush administration continues to trot out the bogus claims of Iraq’s WMD capacity, we will continue to challenge them. This time, Vice President Dick Cheney is basing his claim that Iran is a threat on Iraq’s alleged nuclear capacity before we invaded. McGovern-who spent more than 20 years in the CIA-explains how outraged intelligence analysts are reacting to Cheney’s most recent embellishment of the known facts.

Abstract: Past US Cold War policies - aid to "Islamic fundamentalism" and encircling Moscow by promoting European integration and bolstering China - are complicating US imperialism’s continued hegemony. Several new key developments threaten US global domination: the weakening dollar, decline in US economic power relative to China, growth in China’s military and economic power and its economic leadership in Asia, the EU’s refusal to aid the US in its current military adventures, growing trade tensions between the US and the EU, the EU’s strong dissatisfaction with numerous US economic, military and domestic policies, increased revelations about global corruption by US multinationals, growth of the anti-monopoly left in Latin America, and imperial overstretch that prevents other military interventions in different parts of the world. These challenges to US global power may also lead to the decline of the far right in the US.

The Wall Street Journal describes the pittance set aside for veteran’s benefits as "Congress’ generosity" as the Republican-controlled Congress and Bush Pentagon get set to slash billions more from Veterans Administration’s (VA) programs. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal (1-25-05), Pentagon official David Chu, in a mockery of the contribution of veterans, defended a new round of cuts by ironically describing funding for programs like veterans’ education and job training, health care, pensions, VA housing and the like as "hurtful" to national security.

Despite Republican pretense that spending increases for the VA budget under the Bush administration have been large, new spending neither has matched inflation over the same period nor does it keep pace with growing need. (...)

Social Security isn’t broken, but Washington is full of reformers looking to fix it. Many, especially those who favor privatization, claim that the retirement of baby boomers and budget problems will cause the Social Security Trust Fund to run out of money within anywhere from the next decade to the next 40 years. Ideologically driven claims rather than facts, however, lie at the heart of the pro-privatization arguments. (...)

We speak with Matt Rothschild of The Progressive Magazine who analyzes President Bush’s second inaugural address. Rothschild finds that in addition to the many explicit references to God, Bush’s speech contained even more hidden allusions to the Bible.

A writer at The Times counted 27 references to freedom in Bush’s inaugural speech. The speech contained not one reference to his ugly war in Iraq, but for hundreds of thousands of Iraqis the only freedom established by Bush’s invasion was their freedom to miserable deaths or future lives as cripples.

Bush promised he would bring freedom to the world’s dark corners. It is worth noting that none of the world’s people asked Bush to assume such a task, and every poll of those living outside the United States shows Washington now widely regarded as one of the world’s darkest corners, a source of fear itself rather than freedom from fear. (...)

We take a look at President Bush’s inaugural address with Gore Vidal, one of America’s most respected writers and thinkers and the author of more than 20 novels and 5 plays. Vidal says, "If the United States does go abroad to slay dragons in the name of freedom, liberty and so on, she could become dictatress of the world, but in the process she would lose her soul."

If you’re going to end tyranny in the world, writes George Soros, you have to respect and understand how open societies work. Bush does not-and his inaugural address shows this clearly. While Bush is right when he says what goes on inside other countries is of vital interest to the United States, intervention can only be successful if there are clearly established rules, which in turn require international law and institutions.

When it came to media consolidation, outgoing FCC chairman Michael Powell was a hands-off guy-so much that he allowed the largest media consolidation in history to happen on his watch. But when indecency is involved, Powell’s legacy has been one of über-involvement. From the $550,000 fine for CBS’s wardrobe malfunction to an ever-narrowing filter for obscenity, former George magazine editor Richard Bradley explores Powell’s tenure as content censor in chief.

Most Americans hold these truths to be self-evident: Torture is wrong; attacking another country that hasn’t attacked you is wrong; occupying another country with your army and imposing your will on its people is wrong. These policies are not only immoral. They are illegal.

Most Americans believe that even the highest government officials are bound by law. They reject Attorney General-designate Alberto Gonzales’ view that the law is whatever the President says it is - that if the President says something isn’t torture, then it’s O.K. to order it. (...)

"Agitation: discussion meant to arouse or increase dissatisfaction with things as they are and produce changes; work of an agitator." Webster’s New World Dictionary

Progressive Democrats of America (PDA), an outgrowth of the Kucinich for President campaign, just concluded a large, successful national conference in Washington, D.C. Over 500 spirited, determined activists from all over the country came to the University of the District of Columbia for 48 hours of speeches, panels (too many!), workshops and informal person-to-person networking. The panels, the heart of the conference, were focused on issues like Iraq, Israel/Palestine, voting rights/electoral reform, defending social security, universal health care, progressive media, racism, veterans issues and progressive spirituality. (...)

In a talk to activists on January 21st in Michael Moore’s country, Justin Podur underscored that Canadians didn’t seem to be coming to grips with the political demographics of their nation. He noted that the median income was around $18,000...median family income, $50,000. Adding up all vestiges of aboriginal people, visible minorities, and undocumented working people, Justin calculated that they totaled one-sixth of the population...as against 25 million white people. (...)

Starting in July, East Jerusalem Palestinians will be denied freedom of movement into Ramallah, Binyamin region brigade commander Col. Mickey Edelstein has confirmed to Machsom Watch, a voluntary women’s group that monitors checkpoints.

By then, the separation wall in the area, a series of tall cement plates that he calls a "barrier," will be completed. The Qalandiya checkpoint will be moved off the Jerusalem-Ramallah road and upgraded into a terminal.

Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem who want to go to Ramallah will have to request to do so at the checkpoint, he explained. Machsom Watch says its members have been told that the brigade scheduled a discussion this week on the arrangements for passage in the coming period, until the "barrier" is completed. (...)

We are still in the initial stage of the new move being led by Arafat’s successor. Abu Mazen is conducting himself wisely and courageously, and he clearly wants to stop the bloodshed.

The terror attack at the Karni crossing that left six Israelis dead was followed behind the scenes among Israel’s leadership by a heated argument on the manner of response, details of which have been kept, for the most part, from the public at large.

The media repeatedly reported that the prime minister told the Israel Defense Forces that it had free rein to take any action it deemed necessary to protect Israeli communities. At the same time, media reports spoke incessantly of one alternative being a large-scale military operation in the northern Gaza Strip, with the objective of pushing back the Qassam rocket and mortar firers out of range. (...)

What is the legal difference between hiring a helicopter for use in a coup against a west African government and sending supplies to the Chechen rebels? If there isn’t one, why isn’t Mark Thatcher in Belmarsh? Conversely, why aren’t the "foreign terrorist suspects" in Belmarsh prison free and, like Thatcher, at large in London? Why is an alleged engagement in foreign military operations called terrorism one moment and business the next?

The question is an important one, for mercenaries are becoming respectable again. On Thursday Tim Spicer, Britain’s most notorious soldier of fortune, will speak at the School of Oriental and African Studies. Last month he addressed a conference at the Royal United Services Institute. Last year one of the companies he runs won a $300m contract from the US government for security work in Iraq. He moves through the establishment like the boss of any other corporation. (...) [page 21 | Comment]

Just five survivors remain today from the three Soviet divisions which liberated Auschwitz concentration camp in January 1945. I am the youngest - I was only 19 when the war ended. But the events of 60 years ago are as fresh in my memory as if they happened yesterday.

I come from Vinnitsa in Ukraine. But my mother took me to Moscow in 1934 because of famine. In the summer of 1941 I went to help my grandad in Ukraine with his vegetable garden. I arrived on Saturday June 21, and the next day we took his cow to the market. At noon, we heard on the loudspeaker that war had begun. Money became worthless immediately. We could have got twice as much for the cow, but it was too late. (...) [page 21 | Comment]

A large sandstorm has covered Baghdad in a yellow shroud for the past five hours. The streets are still flooded with water and sewage from the morning’s rain. The sky is shaking with explosive thuds every few minutes - or are those rumbles of thunder?

Hopping between sewage pools is a man in his early 50s, wearing an old blue jacket and a pair of torn brown trousers. His shirt is buttoned up and his grizzled hair laid flat on his head. Thick glasses rest on his nose. (...) [page 8 | G2 features]

A renowned expert in caring for torture victims has condemned the decision by police to arrest and detain four men who return to Britain today after spending up to three years in Guantánamo Bay.

The four Britons have been held without charge or trial and their supporters fear they have been tortured by their American captors, who accused them of being terrorists.

The decision to arrest them on their return was taken by the country’s top police officer, Sir John Stevens, in the face of protests by Muslim groups. (...) [page 6 | UK News]

Twenty-three inmates at the US detention facility in Guantanamo Bay staged a mass suicide attempt in 2003 by trying to hang or strangle themselves.

US military confirmation of the mass suicides came yesterday as the families of four Britons detained without charge for three years by the US authorities waited for their loved ones to arrive home from the prison on Cuba. The four will be arrested by anti-terrorist police officers as soon as they are released from American custody. (...)

in Jerusalem

The US envoy to the Middle East, William Burns, is expected to arrive in Jerusalem tomorrow to discuss an appeal by the new Palestinian leadership for American support in securing Israeli respect for a ceasefire.

Mr Burns is due to meet the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, on Thursday.

Mr Abbas has spent the past week in talks with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which have agreed to suspend attacks on Israeli targets while he seeks international guarantees for a permanent ceasefire. (...)

His avuncular face stares from posters across Baghdad. One posted on a window by the front entrance of the Yarmouk hospital also has smaller pictures of a religious dignitary and a woman wearing a headscarf.

Iyad Allawi, the Iraqi interim Prime Minister, is appealing to voters as a strong man who brings order to his war-ravaged country. The presence of the cleric and woman on the poster are designed to show that he is a secular candidate but still has religious supporters. (...)

in Baghdad

The Iraqi interim government yesterday claimed to have captured "the most lethal ally" of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, making the announcement days before Iraqi voters are due to go the polls on Sunday.

But there was widespread scepticism in Baghdad at the government’s sudden breakthrough in its pursuit of bombers just before the elections. (...)

in Baghdad

So frightened were Iraqi policemen injured in a suicide bomb attack on the offices of the Prime Minister’s party yesterday that even in hospital they clutched their sub-machine guns and refused to remove their black ski masks.

Baghdad is increasingly gripped by a mood of terror in the days leading up to the election on 30 January. There are fewer and fewer cars on the streets as people decide to stay at home. The better off have already left for Jordan, Syria and the Gulf. (...)