On militarism

During the US wars in Indochina, a tumult of protest and activism at Stanford brought many momentous changes to the university. Among these was the banishment of the ROTC from campus. But recently, the suggestion has been made in the faculty senate that the ROTC return to campus; a committee has been formed to investigate the matter. These developments have provoked much discussion, including among current and former campus antiwar activists.

In this discussion, even among activists, I have been a little surprised as to which arguments have and have not been made. In particular, one argument seems to have been missing: the argument against militarism. This is a glaring omission, and the argument should be made. And so I think it is worth chiming in with my view, to present my version of this argument. As I consider anti-militarism an involved question, this is long; read in your own time!

* * *

At present, one of the main arguments keeping ROTC off campus is its anti-queer prejudice, enforced through the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy. But it would be deeply deficient, in my view, to oppose military recruiting, ROTC, etc, on campus merely for such reasons. It may be enough to add in the history of US foreign policy, as some have noted: what the US military does, has done, and will do if things continue on their current course --- these are all shocking and reason enough to oppose its presence on campus anywhere.

But these are the easy arguments. The argument against militarism is a bit more difficult to make, strategically, I would say, but it is a deeper one and in the end it goes to the heart of the system we oppose in opposing wars such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Nobody has yet made the argument against militarism per se, but I think someone must. Such an argument may appeal to activists more than others. But I think that is not just a quirk of us strange creatures. I think it is because this argument is correct, because we are right when we make this argument. It is an argument that is deeply offensive to received conventional barbaric wisdom: there are formidable propaganda forces at work to instill and indoctrinate the population with the opposite view, and formidable cultural forces at work to demonize it. Anti-militarism is a dangerous set of ideas, threatening to power, poorly understood by the population at large, and easily demonized in current cultural conditions. Reactionaries will have no trouble trying to paint anti-militarism as a bunch of "hippies" making peace signs and drawling "war is bad" as their sole argument against militarism. But that is all the more reason to make the argument, make it clearly, and make it well. In my view there will be no end ot the vast worldwide injustice and destruction such as currently seen in Iraq and Afghanistan until not only these particular wars, but the systems and institutions supporting them, are all effectively opposed and neutralised. Militarism is an integral part of this system.

So, why oppose militarism? The argument is much stronger than the mere observation that war is bad.

* * *

When we speak of militarism we speak of many things. Perhaps it is not even a well-defined term. I am afraid I cannot give you a one-sentence definition of militarism. Let me give some overview of what I mean when I say I oppose militarism.

Militarism is integrally connected to a substantial part of the State apparatus, the Congress, and the economy at large. It is a principal instrument of State foreign policy; indeed, for the US, the principal instrument. In this sense the US State is heavily invested in militarism.

Militarism plays a prominent role in culture. Its operations are affected by, and in turn affect, gender relations, race relations, class, and sexuality. In general, the size, freedom, and legitimacy of a military is a measure of a society's readiness to embrace illegitimate force: it is therefore a measure of uncivilization. As the US is a nation of about 1/20 of the world's humans and 1/2 of its military spending, the level of uncivilization is clear.

Militarism is fundamentally connected to authoritarianism; and its obverse, obedience. The military is the instrument of brute force at the international level, and it often acts lawlessly (more on this below). As long as there is a strict chain of command, ideal soldiers in existing militaries are mindless automatons carrying out orders. Even when the orders are pure murder. Albert Einstein put this best:

He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, senseless brutality, deplorable love-of-country stance, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action! It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.

Militarism is fundamentally connected to patriarchy and homophobia. This is hardly a controversial statement, at least at the cultural level. By its nature, any culture of fighting wars and killing will celebrate aggressive, macho aspects of human nature. With that comes the entire cultural-historical legacy of women's oppression and queer oppression. There is a fundamental cultural, psychological, and philosophical connection between militarism, patriarchy, and homophobia. But to attack only the most obvious aspects of this homophobia, such as the "Don't ask don't tell" policy, must necessarily rest upon the most anaemic of analyses.

The military's daily duties are to train killers and to find the optimal implementation of destruction and murder. In this sense, institutional and habitual, there is a fundamental and obvious connection between militarism and death --- spiritual death as well as physical destruction of property and of the living organism. As a military acquaintance of mine once said, "What we do is kill people and break their stuff." The military is a machine for the creation of monsters --- and I think many within the military realise this. There has been a long process within the military of optimizing the process by which the instinct to avoid killing another human being can be overcome --- or better, overlaid with conditioning to kill without thinking, without the impulses of humanity kicking in, leading naturally to massive psychological trauma.

This process of monster-creation is not just obvious from the training sessions where recruits yell "Kill kill kill!". The military is the cultural and institutional embodiment of death. And a culture of worship of the military is a necrophiliac culture. The unthinking applause for a marine is not only applause of reflexive obedience and willing subjugation to authority and the State --- it is also applause for death. It is human society cheering itself into its own grave.

All of these give rise to deeper questions. The antipathy towards mindless murderous obedience must necessarily give rise to an uneasiness between anti-militarists and the military, and potentially the individuals within it. And it leads to some deep reflections on the nature of the military, as an institution, and its legitimacy. So let me make some comments on these questions, which are somewhat involved, but I think some things can be said.

* * *

In general, the relationship between the anti-war movement and the military has always been somewhat uneasy. On the one hand, the testimonies of anti-war soldiers are often powerful and moving. A soldier telling of their experiences, participating in atrocities, forced into impossible moral decisions, stumbling upon catastrophe, ordered unwillingly into barbarism, is powerful to hear. Nobody knows the horrors of war more than the people who participate in them. Moreover, anti-war soldiers appeal powerfully to mainstream audiences for whom the military is a sacred institution and the (false) patriotism of "serving one's country" is the highest moral virtue. And, even if they may have initially signed up for reason of this false, barbaric moral anti-virtue of flag-waving patriotism, anti-war soldiers are in general deeply moral people: they have come to oppose an institution (or at least its practices) to which they signed up voluntarily, and they have suffered all the consequences of opposing a powerful institution from the inside. The testimonies at the Winter Soldier conferences in the US, over recent years, were powerful beyond words. (Of course, this is the reason they were blacked out of the mainstream media.)

But on the other hand, there is no getting around the fact that every soldier is a trained killer. And, in the absence of conscription, in the absence of aggressive external military threat, every soldier is a trained killer who willingly signed up to be a trained killer, for reasons that may be difficult to justify. Of course the reasons given are usually not sadistic: but even commonly-given reasons like "serving one's country", "patriotic duty", or family tradition, all collapse upon the slightest examination. It is trite to have to say in the 21st century that we should have no loyalty to any country but to humanity, to justice, to the moral good; that you don't have to do what your dad did; that patriotism in the form of worship of a flag is a moral idiocy; that nationalism beyond the liberation of oppressed groups and societies, and the preservation of cultural heritage, is provincial nonsense --- but we must continue to say it. Of course this is not a complete set of reasons why people join the military. Given the absence of economic opportunities for people in many parts of the US, the military offers good prospects. Given the general level of ignorance about the history of US foreign policy, it's not surprising that the military is regarded as a noble institution: it offers discipline, it abhors waywardness and indirection, it knocks you into shape. In lands of unemployment, drug use, and street violence, military violence and adventure is hardly a worse alternative. In peacetime, it is a safe (physically as well as economically) way to get through university or college. Many people in the military, even in the US, I am sure could not give a rat's arse about flag-waving bullshit. Of course I cannot second-guess the reasons of every military recruit. But the point remains: there is tension between any soldier and antiwar politics.

This tension is a source of continual struggle for movements against war and militarism; but struggle is good, struggle maintains vitality.

Soldiers themselves are one thing; but they are individuals, and they are often good people. In opposing militarism, however, we focus more on the military institution itself, than the soldier as individual. In general, in all social analysis, we must draw a distinction between institutions and the people who occupy them. This is an obvious point but it is often lost, and usually missing from mainstream analysis --- institutional analysis goes to the root of the system, is inherently radical, and it leads to too many disturbing conclusions. In opposing militarism we are not prejudiced against soldiers. In opposing the State we are not prejudiced against every public sector employee. In opposing turbo-capitalism we are not prejudiced against every bank employee. In opposing capitalism per se we are not prejudiced against every property owner, manager, rich person or boss. People are people, and if nothing else they are redeemable; institutions, being the systems, habits, roles occupied by people and to which they must conform, require no such sympathy. Militarism is a point of view against certain institutions, roles, and cultures within society, rather than individuals, and although this is a difficult point for many people to understand, it is an elementary one. All institutional analysis is, formally at least, independent of the individuals holding positions within that institution.

Thus, if the military, as an institution, causes horrid effects on the individuals within it; tends to engage in atrocities, violence, overthrow of legitimate popular governments --- these are good reasons to oppose militarism; they are in my view largely valid reasons. But we can say something more fundamental about the nature of the military itself.

* * *

Having made the qualification that we speak of institutions rather than people, let us make no bones about it. What is the military, as a social institution?

The military is the State's will to power. It is, by definition, the instrument by which the State exerts brute physical force over the world. All force is prima facie illegitimate --- reasonable minds may differ, I would say, about when physical force can be justified; they may differ on whether it is ever justified on the scale writ large of war. At the small-scale level there are clear situations where physical force can be justified, for instance pushing a person out of the path of an oncoming train. But the burden of justification on those who advocate force is always heavy, and it is rarely borne out. Any military institution is, therefore, a prima facie illegitimate institution. Its right to exist depends on proof that the world, at the international level, is so savage that standing armies are required. Indeed the world at the international level is savage, but much of this is caused by the US military, not prevented by it. Peacekeeping efforts are another matter, and may even bear out the need for a military. But anyone who says that a military is necessary must do so with a heavy heart and a tear in their eye. Anyone who says that a military is a desirable institution is confused or sadistic.

Therefore, the military is dangerous; it demands massive institutional checks and balances on it. As long as it exists, the savagery of the military's animating purpose must be tamed by some countervailing dynamic. We must ask: what are the countervailing dynamics against violence and the use of force? We see these from the smallest interpersonal level to the most global scale. I think that analysing this question at the individual scale has important implications for the question at the global scale.

At the interpersonal level, violence is prevented by many mechanisms. In the first instance, it is prevented by social norms, habits and social respectability: it is not polite to start arguments, or to fight. And while social respectability, in its more class-based and elitist forms, may be putrid, at a minimum it prevents the use of force. Beyond that we have psychology and social dynamics, reason and culture: we have evolved as social animals, we know instinctively how to get along, or at least avoid the worst confrontations; and we can be convinced to avert them. Beyond that again we have the law, acting upon society to restrain it: in most quarters it is stronger to say that someone is breaking the law, than to say that they are behaving badly; note that the force of law, while resting upon the threat of judicial punishment, acts quite independently of the State which implements it. The law, in this sense, is not a moral code of what should and should not be done, but a set of prohibitions on the worst deviations from moral conduct; this is as juridical law should be, for not every immorality deserves judicial punishment. But as a final sanction against violence, there is State authority, acting with its usual brute force --- and often worse violence than that which it is supposed to prevent --- through its constabulary or para-military forces. The need for a police force, like a military, can only be justified upon the basis that society is not yet sufficiently advanced to be free of violent conflict of its own accord; since most societies are shockingly unjust, such conflict is inevitable, and the role of the police force will be to maintain power and privilege. The argument for an *armed* police force, however, is much weaker than the argument for a police force per se; recall that many of the most peaceful contemporary societies are those in which most police are routinely armed with nothing more than a stick. In a good society, the withering away of the State precisely means that there is no need for police to repress conflicts arising from injustice; that the law is internalised, and acts through the force of individual reason than through coercive State action; that people take control over their own lives and learn to live with each other. It is in this sense that anarchism is the highest possible form of human social organisation, and the most optimistic political philosophy. It may be a vision unlikely to be achieved except in the long term; but it is a positive vision nonetheless, a direction towards which we aim.

But the same applies at the local level of police forces and sheriffs, as at the global and international level of national militaries. The State institutions supposedly designated to prevent violence --- the police, the para-militaries, the courts --- may not achieve their goals, and they may often cause more violence than they prevent. But in the democracies, the State's coercive power over its citizens is severely curtailed under the law. If the State wants to punish you, it must have a clearly defined crime to charge you with; it must tell you what you are charged with; it must inform you of your rights; it must provide you with a lawyer; your must be heard in public before an independent judge and a jury of peers; you must be able to testify or not testify in your defence; the burden is on the State to prove beyond all reasonable doubt that its charges are borne out, and otherwise you are free. These are fantastic achievements of centuries of struggle, limiting the violent apparatus of the State, civilizing the State from its natural condition of lawless authoritarianism.

In a similar way, while militaries still exist, as a minimal step, they must be tamed by force of law, the law governing the use of violence in international relations. International law is only minimally developed; it is still in embryonic form; the world at the global level lags centuries behind many nations in its political development. But it has already developed a minimal set of rules for the use of force; these exist in customary international law, in various national and international court judgments, in treaties and conventions and the UN Charter. Moreover its content is appropriate and mostly defensible: it takes the minimal position that the use of force is prima facie illegal, unless some justification can be found. The only justifications recognised are self-defence and the vote of the UN Security Council --- these are not without their problems, particularly the Security Council --- but the general prohibition on war is sound.

There is no supra-national State to enforce international law; this law, by its nature, it must depend upon its internalisation and political pressure, rather than State coercion, for its implementation. International law is constrained to act only in its most legitimate form, by the power of its moral force. There are increasingly judicial mechanisms at the international level, but these are still embryonic.

In every national military, then, this force of law must act. It is true that there are some checks on the US military, included under the US Constitution: the military is under civilian control; Congress is given the power to declare war; and so on. Needless to say, these are utterly ineffective today. Every general should be a professor of international law, not just a connoisseur of the forms of destruction and domination. Every soldier should be given courses on not only international humanitarian law and the laws of war (as occurs in some militaries now) but also the public international law of when force can and cannot be used in international relations. Every soldier, every officer, and more importantly every general, should be put on trial or court-martialed for every violation of the UN Charter and conventions against the use of force in international relations. Every soldier should be free to refuse to participate in a campaign or an operation breaching these laws --- and arguably should have even more personal freedom over their own role in the military. Operational considerations aside, every order within the military must rest upon consent. Every army should not be a formation of automatons under arms and mindlessly obeying orders, but a free citizen militia, in the original sense of the word, implying individual choice and autonomy. This is all, of course, only to the extent any standing army should exist at all, as long as the world remains barbaric at the international level.

As long as a military does not possess these basic features of civilization, it should be regarded as an illegitimate institution. At the very least, it does not belong in any other civilized institution, such as a university.

* * *

If nothing else, we should remember the following: the abolition of ROTC from some university campuses, such as Stanford, was an awesome achievement, an advanced achievement, far more advanced a victory than would be, say, not permitting torturers and instigators of aggressive war to teach classes celebrating their crimes. It may be true that the victory was in part a lucky turn of history, caught up in the details and the currents of the time. That does not diminish the scale of the victory. If, thirty, forty years later, all the arguments have been forgotten, all the activists have moved on, and everyone has gone to sleep while we regress backwards to militarism, what hope is there?

Have no doubt about it: the fight for a better world is a fight not only against the most obvious injustices like aggressive war, war crimes and torture. They may be in one's face at Stanford but they are very much the tip of the iceberg. The fight for a better world is also a fight against militarism, against patriarchy, against homophobia, against racism, against class division, and against hierarchies of illegitimate power --- not only the tyrannical military chain of command, but also the tyrannical orders of the boss in every capitalist workplace all the way through to the web of mechanisms by which State and corporate power holds the world in economic and spiritual chains.

Whether to focus only on the tip of the iceberg, or to focus on deeper aspects of the system, is an important and difficult strategic choice --- the question must be constantly revisited and the approach re-negotiated within a movement. I understand that antiwar groups often focus on the easy questions at the tip of the iceberg. There is good reason for that: with political action, one wants to win concrete gains. Educating the population in a culture of obedience and worship of authority, where dissent is marginalised and ridiculed, is a difficult process, and one does not want to alienate the audience immediately by proceeding first to the most challenging questions. Starting with a radical critique may do more than alienate the mainstream; it may lead to marginalisation and a loss of perceived legitimacy among the more establishment sectors of progressive movement --- even if the analysis is sound, even obvious, even correct at the level of scientific truth.

Much conventional wisdom collapse upon the slightest examination. We all know that we live in a world of Sunday truths, repeated unthinkingly, utter nonsense. Reflexive support, admiration, veneration of the flag, the geographical nation, the State, the military, are among the worst of these. They must be overcome.

And war is bad too.

Self-determination and Afghanistan

Self-determination is a central principle of international law.

In the case of Afghan self-determination it's probably also useful to point out that there is a sizeable Afghan peace movement, very courageous and principled, which the antiwar movement in the US should support. Malalai Joya, one of the leaders of this movement, has to be one of the bravest women in the world, confronting warlords, living under constant death threats, but continually speaking out against war and occupation. If Afghan self-determination is to mean anything, it must include voices like hers.

If the US government is to have any policy inside Afghanistan, it should include measures to (legally!) strengthen the position of those like Joya, rather than undermine them by propping up the Afghan "government" and escalating violence. The US decision to escalate seems to have come after much deliberation as to which type of bombing, which type of killing, which military tactics will serve US interests. the deliberations seems to have included all possible voices except those who advocate withdrawal and de-escalation, including the Afghan peace movement, the majority of the US population, and (I understand) most of the Afghan population. Obama's escalation has come precisely without considering the position of the Afghan peace movement, which is for an escalation in hospitals, schools, economic assistance, and aid.

That is, the decision to escalate is only possible because the US debate entirely excludes the voices of those on the receiving end of the policy; vastly increased levels of violence and military operations,  now similar to the height of the Soviet occupation, are only possible on the condition that self-determination be excluded as an axiom of US foreign policy, just as it is included as an axiom of international law.

The antiwar movement in the large, and measuring it

http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/measurenonprofit

I read this article and thought it was interesting. I had some comments on it, which pertain to the antiwar movement at large, so I thought I would share them. Make of them what you will.

1. Measuring is good when possible!

Being a scientist (and a mathematician at that), I like data. Observing and measuring is good. If you can find things to measure, more power to you.

However, I can see some difficulties in the context of the antiwar movement. In particular, some things are hard to measure; and more, some important or essential things that an activist group should be doing, might have completely zero short-term measurable effect. Some details follow.

2. The scale of antiwar goals.

To stop, or even prevent, a single war is a massive, world-historic event. To reduce the US national military budget, say to a level comparable to the rest of the world, even more so: that amounts to a total restructuring of the economy. To stop militarism, more so again: that is a culture and an economic and institutional inertia written deeply into american life. And, to stop jingoistic patriotism --- the insane loyalty to a single geographic region with some arbitrary boundaries denoting the fates of long forgotten kings, emperors and imperialists who once carved up the earth for themselves --- indeed amounts to a complete change of american life: so that every wave of the flag is met with curiosity or stupefaction, rather than with cheers and tears; so that the "american" in american life it more or less ceases to exist, to the extent it denotes anything more than a geographic location.

Make no mistake, the antiwar movement has these as goals, and not just in the US, but everywhere. They are not complete goals --- a world with all these achieved might still be one of rank inequality, authoritarianism, and thwarted human life. One might argue they are best pursued alongside others --- perhaps it can only be done along with a restructuring of the rules of international trade, greater international economic and political integration, debt forgiveness, the satisfaction of humanitarian and economic needs and so on; or more radically, the restructuring of the global economy, economic democracy, north-south reparations, finding a better economic alternative to capitalism, etc.

Nonetheless, the broad antiwar goals are goals for the long term. They chart a course for human history. Their time-frame is measured in centuries --- even as the insanity and potential for catastrophe is so great as to demand that they be achieved now. Thus, one expects progress to be slow, even negligible; but one wishes, and needs, it to be done now.

Of course there are more local and immediate goals too, but the big picture must always be kept in mind, where measurable progress can be expected to be indistinguishable from zero even in the best possible case.

3. Sometimes vast changes happen unpredictably --- in the meantime, ideas are important.

Events like the founding of the United Nations and the end of the cold war were world-changing --- and entirely unpredictable a few years beforehand. Nobody would have advocated the second world war, or (say) the invasion of Afghanistan, in order to achieve these goals. The end of the second world war was indeed the impetus for the founding of the UN, but it is a superficial reading of history to regard that as the sole cause. These were not mere elite decisions, not merely the brokering of power by beloved leaders.

The creation of the United Nations built upon a century of pacifist organising and activism, the advocacy of various schemes of international integration, agitation for the outlawing of war (achieved in 1928 by the Briand-Kellogg pact, and today binding on all nations as customary international law), and the work of organisations like the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom. Nobody could have measured any progress whatsoever towards international integration until the first world war led to the League of Nations; and after its demise, again, until the second world war led to the UN. History is unpredictable, but the course of history depends upon the ideas and institutions that are in existence; the power of those ideas; and the balance of forces those ideas and their supporting institutions have at their disposal. By measurability standards the WILPFs and the Bertha von Suttners of the world are clearly zero or close to it. By the standards of history, they are monumental.

The conclusion must be that in political activism, the mere propagation of ideas --- perhaps even the mere existence of active organisations working for those ideas --- is of value in itself. Having an organisation, having people willing to meet regularly, putting time into the cause, in itself is something. Of course, the more people doing it, the wider the ideas spread, and the more clearly they are formulated and powerfully they are expressed, the better. Some of this may be measurable. But much of it surely cannot.

In any case I think, in the activist context, the proposition that no measurable effect implies no political effect is not always true.

4. Sometimes vast changes happen after long struggles --- at the beginning, nothing was measurable.

An insistence on measurability would have stopped people speaking out against the Vietnam war for many years --- as I recall, Kennedy first sent troops in around 1963 but the protest movement did not pick up until the end of the decade. Recall the stories of Chomsky and fellow activists going to speak every weekend, I think at the Boston Common --- with a significant police presence, not to beat up the antiwar protestors (as we see more usually today!), but to protect Chomsky and company from being beaten up by pro-war onlookers. An absolutely hopeless situation --- and disorganised at that --- but without this sort of persistence, the later massive movement could never have arisen.

More generally, the situation for most serious activists --- those antagonistic to power, to received ideology, and not subservient to some faction of power (like the CAP Shwarz refers to) --- almost always seems hopeless. Power is strong by definition, it has legions of unthinking supporters, and no shortage of subservient academics, pundits, and intellectuals. Challenging a political and intellectual hegemony is tough work! The best approach however seems clear: have a realistic analysis, but do what is required for the cause and for the good. As Gramsci put it: pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.

History shows that it can be done. And, often it is drastic. The pace of change can quicken, dramatically. Ideas can be widespread, and regarded as good, just as impractical. Many people are not prepared to act until they believe that others are prepared to act. Political action is self-referential, at least at first, its philosophy is logically circular, as with much of social life --- but it happens. And it cannot happen without an impetus that is non-measurable up to the instant it occurs, collapsing the nesting of logical brackets, and making a reality of the common knowledge that we think other people think we think they think.

5. The local situation may also make measurability hard.

None of this is to say that measurable effects should not be noted where possible, just that good work may not always have short-term measurable consequences. For campus organising, I can think of some sorts of measurements that could be made. But thinking about it, the same problems seems to apply even to goals local to a single campus. Getting the local war criminal prosecuted would be monumental in US history. Stopping, or placing further institutional limits on, military research would be a massive shift in the direction of the whole university --- one can well argue, at least to a first approximation, that Stanford built itself into a world-class institution precisely by taking government money for military-related research. Moreover, current military research on campus is institutionally protected by white-washed reports and "academic freedom" and runs together with the vast sums of "defence"-related money supporting the economy of not just Stanford, but the entire country --- military Keynesianism.

In addition, arguably the low-lying fruit (no classified research on campus, no ROTC on campus, for example) have already been won by movements long ago (well, the 1970s!).

But, the general idea seems fine. Activist groups should have identifiable goals, visions, and so on. And activist groups should not be wasting their limited time and resources by doing things which do not help their cause --- or by not helping their cause as much as they potentially could.

I would just say to be on guard that too much of a focus on short-term measurability could potentially detract from the sort of cultural and ideological change that is, in the long run, central to any antiwar, or anti-imperialist, or pacifist mission, and which seems nigh impossible to measure objectively.

Rice's nonsense on torture

Oh wow, I only got around to watching this video now, and from some of the comments I thought she must have been making some half-convincing arguments... nope!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijEED_iviTA&feature=channel_page


Well, first we upgrade al Qaeda to tyrants, okay. Then one gets the impression that the US homeland was not attacked in WWII. Those little incidents at Pearl Harbor and on the Aleutian islands are called bombing and occupation, to most people.

Then we are informed that 500,000 deaths in WWII is "no!" Why? Perhaps we should have got the figure correct to the precise soldier?



The problem with the internet is that you can actually find obscure references instantaneously. In this case, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) report on Guantanamo. Turns out, with ten seconds of google:

* the OSCE people were only allowed in on the condition of not actually interviewing any detainees! These same conditions were rejected by other human rights organisations, like Amnesty.

* and, the guy who led the OSCE team, Alain Grignard, with the Belgian federal police, thought detaining prisoners for years with trial was a form of "psychological torture".

http://intelligence-summit.blogspot.com/2006/03/osce-guantanamo-better-than-belgian.html

"Did you know that? Alright, no, well wait a second, if you didn't know that, maybe before you make allegations about Guantanamo, you should read."




But it gets better!

CR: "The ICRC also had access to Guantanamo, and they made no allegations about inerrogations about Guantanamo. What they did say is that they beleived indefinite detention..."

What sort of access did the ICRC have? Does anybody remember? Like, there were some prisoners that were deliberately kept away from the ICRC? And, like, this was such an official policy that it was actually written into the operating manual for the prison, there was an official level given to each prisoner, and the top level were kept away from the ICRC?

In fact, you can read various versions of the manual online.

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Chaplain,_Red_Cross_Muzzled_at_Gitmo_in_2004

In any case, with its access, the ICRC did write a detailed report, which was leaked recently. Perhaps you might actually like to read what the ICRC *did* have to say.

http://www.nybooks.com/icrc-report.pdf

From the introduction, the very first paragraph:

"The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has consistently expressed its grave concern over the humanitarian consequences and legal implications of the practice by the United States (US) authorities of holding persons in undisclosed detention in the context of the fight against terrorism. In particular, the ICRC has underscored the risk of ill-treatment, the lack of contact with the outside world as a result of being held incommunicado, the lack of a legal framework, and the direct effect of such treatment and conditions on the persons held in undisclosed detention and on their families."

It's clearly a glowing report, with sections entitled "Suffocation by water", "Prolonged stress standing", "Beatings by use of a collar", "Beating and kicking", "Confinement in a box", "Prolonged nudity", and so on. And clearly none of this involves any allegations about interrogations, surely.

And here is an example of non-allegations about interrogations, from the summary, section 1, page 5:

"as outlined in Section 4 below, and as concluded by this report, the ICRC clearly considers that the allegations of the fourteen [detainees interviewed] include descriptions of treatment and interrogation techniques --- singly or in combination --- that amounted to torture and/or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."

Can't you see there are no allegations about interrogation?



And this is fantastic:

CR: "By definition, if it was authorised by the President, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture."

I didn't know we had monarchists left in this country!

Hmm, I wonder which article of the Convention has the "President said so" defence? Dang, that could have come in handy for Pinochet's lawyers when he was being extradited for torture under the same convention! Pity he didn't notice that provision, having been President of Chile and all, since by definition anything he authorises doesn't violate the convention!

Civilian Casualties in Iraq?

We have a densely argued discussion of the available evidence andliterature review in footnote number 30 of our open letter:

http://www.stanford.edu/group/antiwar/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Condi_coalition_letter_draft#cite_note-29

(Why does the link for footnote 30 ends in "note-29". I think I blame computer scientists who like to begin counting at 0 rather than 1.)

(If you go there, all the references are hyperlinked, they are not here)

"
See Opinion Research Business and Just Foreign Policy for these estimates. This far exceeds the Iraq Body Count number of around 90,000, which only counts deaths reported by multiple crosschecked media reports: see their information page. The US government has not made any serious study of deaths in Iraq during the war and occupation. Perhaps the closest is Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq, Report to Congress by Department of Defense, September 2008, at p.22. However, as noted in the December 2007 version of this report, there are many deaths for which "the Coalition does not have visibility, in particular, murders and deaths in locations where Coalition forces are not present": at p.18. See the Congressional Research Service report Iraqi Civilian Casualties Estimates, Hannah Fischer, January 12, 2009, for some further discussion. The Just Foreign Policy figure is an extrapolation of an epidemiological-style cluster study study published in the prestigious British medial journal The Lancet, which obtained a figure of 426,000-794,000 for the period March 2003 - July 2006: Gilbert Burnham, Riyadh Lafta, Shannon Doocy et al., "Mortality After the 2003 Invasion of Iraq: A Cross-Sectional Cluster Sample Survey," The Lancet, October 21, 2006, 368 (9545), pp. 1421-1429. The UK Ministry of Defence's chief scientific advisor called the survey "close to best practice" and "robust": High Death Toll Backed, Newsday, March 27, 2007.
"

The Just Foreign Policy website estimate is currently 1,320,110... it's a rough estimate based on extrapolation from the Lancet study.
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq/iraqdeaths.html

Remarks at dinner

These are my prepared remarks, what I said was some approximation to these.

Hi, I'm Dan. I'm a grad student here in the mathematics department. Thanks for coming.

We are here today because we're concerned.

We're here today to make a peaceful and nonviolent statement that we are deeply concerned about what's going on at this university, and more broadly what's going on in this country and the world.

I would ask everybody here to treat everybody else, including people who disagree with us, with the respect they are entitled to.

But our concern today is not any ordinary concern. It's a concern that goes to the heart of what it means to live in a humane society.

Some things are so morally abhorrent that no society can condone them and call itself civilized.

Some actions amount to crimes. But some actions go beyond mere crimes.

Such as torture. Such as the waging of aggressive war.

Some actions so shock the conscience, they so strike at the heart of what it means to be human, that we consider them crimes not just against the victim, not just against the law, but against every human being. Torture, war, they ruin the human soul, they break lives, they lessen us all.

And I think what brings us here today is our concern that there is substantial evidence – growing by the day, with every newly released report and memo – that a tenured faculty member here at Stanford has been:

firstly, a principal participant in the planning and propaganda efforts of an aggressive war waged in supreme violation of international law;

and secondly, an explicit authorizer of brutalities which have long been widely understood as torture.

War and torture. Hundreds of thousands, millions of ruined lives. A tenured faculty member. That is the situation which confronts us here today.

* * *

Let me tell you what this is not about.

This is not personal. Maybe, if you live here at Roble, you might take this personally. But I have nothing personal against anybody, here at Stanford, or anywhere; and I hope that you don't either. We are not attacking anyone on a personal basis, but we do want to see accountability where there is evidence of involvement in extremely serious crimes.

Second, this is not about beliefs; this is about actions. If there's a faculty member who makes a statement I disagree with, well, we can respectfully and politely disagree. If there's a faculty member who makes a statement that is shocking and offensive – we might respectfully but not politely disagree. Maybe we might even be moved to protest. Freedom of speech protects unpopular views, as it protects protest; academic freedom protects intellectual inquiry.

But here, today, we are in a different category. We have a professor who did not merely advocate for brutalities like waterboarding – but authorised them. A professor who did not merely cheerlead for war, but was involved in official planning and propaganda efforts of that war, at the highest levels. These are not things to respectfully disagree about. These are not experiences to learn from. These are crimes to be prosecuted.

What do we do, if the authorities are not prosecuting --- whether in US courts, overseas, or internationally?

What does it say about us, about our campus, if we let this pass?

What does it say about us, about our campus, if we ignore the evidence of these monstrous crimes and have a dinner party instead?

* * *

Let's just briefly review some of the evidence.

You probably all know that our professor was National Security Adviser and chair of the National Security Council's Principals Committee. We now know that this committee authorised specific instances of waterboarding – and the discussions there were so detailed they were "almost choreographed". Moreover, our professor was not a passive participant; according to the report, she was "decisive". She told the CIA: "This is your baby. Go do it."

Now, in the last week, a declassified narrative from the Senate Intelligence Committee reveals that our professor became on July 17, 2002, so far as we know, the first high-ranking US official explicitly to authorize the brutal drowning technique known as waterboarding.

Now, torture is a crime under international law, under US law, there's an international treaty about it. It's very clear. There's no defence of protecting national security. There's no defence of intelligence chatter. Read the convention. Article 2 says that "No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture". There are some things that, if you are minimally civilized, if you respect minimal human rights, you just don't do. The evidence suggests that it also doesn't work very well, but that's not the point; it's just wrong, and it's a crime.

However, there are these "torture memos". More of these have come out last week. Our professor assures us that everything she authorized was legal, and these memos provide the legal argument. Well, just go and read these memos and see what you think about the reasoning. Don't be afraid of legalese, this stuff speaks for itself.

Take the memo of August 1, 2002, which was released last week. August 2002, just after our professor authorised waterboarding. The conclusion: waterboarding, and all other desired techniques, not torture.

So, how is waterboarding not torture? Well, there might be a bunch of legal precedents that it is, going right back to the Spanish-American war, 1898, but somehow the lawyers didn't find them.

Anyway, the reasoning is pretty good. The statute says that to be torture, waterboarding must "inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering". But you see, waterboarding only – only! -- involves the panic of imminent death from drowning! That's not actual physical pain, you see. Okay, but what about actual physical suffering? The physiological response of drowning seems like physical suffering to me! But no, you see, we are informed, that's not how it works. The phrase "pain and suffering" in the defintion of torture must be understood as a single concept, not "pain", not "suffering", but "pain-and-suffering". So, there's no pain, might be suffering, but there's no "pain-and-suffering". Get it?

And so it goes on.

The requirement in the War Crimes act is for "specific intent". So, says the memo, you have to actually explicitly specifically intend to inflict severe pain or suffering! If you intend anything else, it can't be torture! You just have to believe in good faith of something other than that you are inflicting severe pain or suffering. Your belief doesn't even have to be reasonable. And --- and this is a key point --- your good faith belief that you didn't actually specifically intend to inflict severe pain or suffering can be established by reliance on experts. Like legal advice. Like this very memo.

And this is the way to regard these memos. They were regarded as a "Golden Shield". They were written to get torturers out of jail. And producing fallacious legal arguments, reinterpreting the law to justify conduct that was previously clearly torture, has another name: aiding and abetting torture.

And there's plenty more. Go and read it, I'm just scratching the surface. Especially read the bit about putting someone in a box with insects.

So every time our illustrious professor talks about how everything was assuredly legal, that is the reasoning it's based on. It's ridiculous, it's unbelievably bad, it has been rescinded as an embarrassment, and it is aiding and abetting torture

And, our professor can't claim any ignorance about this. We know from the recently released report of the Senate Armed Services Committee, that through 2002-2003, she was present at several meetings in the White House at which Mr. Yoo, her Berkeley colleague, provided legal advice. So she has heard it. She knows how bad it is. And yet, the evidence is that she was decisive regardless.

* * *

Torture is one thing, and it's terrible. But I'm sorry, my friends, there are worse things in the world than torture. A full-scale war is much, much worse.

War is generally illegal, has been illegal since 1928. It can only be justified, legally, in two circumstances: as self-defence from imminent attack, or with authorisation from the UN Security Council under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. That doesn't necessarily make it moral, or good, but makes it legal. That's international law. Very simple. And neither condition was satisfied in the case of Iraq. So it's illegal. It's aggressive war.

And the waging of aggressive war is not just a crime. It's a crime against the world, a crime against humanity, the same crime for which the Nazis were tried at Nuremberg. Countries don't invade other countries in the 21st century. That belongs to a world long past, that belongs in past ages of barbarism.

So the invasion of Iraq is not to be regarded as a mistake, or a blunder, but, to quote the Nuremberg tribunal, it is "the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." That is the position at international law, reaffirmed ever since.

Well, what is the role of our illustrious professor?

She was one of the "five Administration officials most responsible for providing public information and shaping public opinion on Iraq", and central to policy formulation and execution. Here I'm quoting a Congressional Committee and leading reports. She was among the topofficials promoting, planning, and eventually perpetrating the war.

Smoking guns and mushroom clouds. That's our professor.

The Center for Public Integrity has calculated that, overall, the Bush administration made 935 public false statements about the national security threat posed by Iraq. Of those 935, our illustrious professor made 56 false statements.

Aggressive war, and a breathtaking tragedy. Hundreds of thousands have died as a result of the war – by some estimates, well over a million. Over 4 million refugees. Lives broken across an entire region of the planet. A humanitarian catastrophe, and still ongoing.

That's our professor, who's having dinner parties in dormitories.

* * *

In the end, for us here at Stanford, I think it comes down to asking –

What sort of a world do you want to live in? and

What sort of a campus do you want to study in?

The horrors are not over. Violence in Iraq continues. War in Afghanistan escalates. Bombings in Pakistan escalate. Foreign policy goes on with the new President, as it has gone on for a long time, and it is not pretty. Before Iraq and Afghanistan there were interventions, just to name a few – in Panama, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Libya, Grenada, Angola, Guatemala, Iran; the list goes on, and it's bipartisan.

There is plenty to push the President on. And on the question of prosecuting torture, he is possibly wavering, he's been hedging.

He needs some backbone. But we can help to give him some backbone. Imagine what a message a strong stand by Stanford students on campus could send.

Because for us, this is not an abstract question. For us, this question has come home – today, it has come home for dinner.

I think it's important to realise that, in calling for prosecutions, we are not looking for retribution. The most important thing is to make sure that the horrible episodes we have seen – war, torture, aggression, violations of international law – do not happen again. How do you ensure they do not happen again? By letting anybody who is thinking of doing it again know that if they do it again, they will be prosecuted. And how do you ensure that? By prosecuting those who did it this time. The best way to put the past behind us is for people to face accountability now.

It's also the law – article 12 of the Convention Against Torture requires investigations, whenever there is reasonable ground to believe torture has been committed.

But we have to ask ourselves some questions:

How can we change a culture where such a professor considers herself able to invite herself over to dinner, where dozens will sign up adoringly?

Somehow we have to grow up. We have to realise that not every adult around here, not every authority figure, is someone to look up to.

Somehow we have to get people to think about their place in the world, their place at this university, and the place of this university in the world. Considering the role of this university in the power structures of society, what do we want it to be? And how can we make it so?

So I invite you to join with us, work with the coalition that is coming together to work on this issue, to work for justice, for accountability, and for peace.

After all, we all live here. It is the responsibility of all of us.

War Criminals of Tomorrow

An awesome video by a friend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6O2KeDPTh3o

"Condoleezza Rice is back at Stanford University. What does it mean for the Stanford community to accept an alleged war criminal on their campus? What does the pipeline of war criminals to universities mean for students everywhere? Please read about Rice's alleged crimes during the past 8 years: http://www.stanford.edu/group/antiwar/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Condi_coalition_letter_draft and support the movement on Stanford's campus to hold Rice and former Bush administration officials accountable..."

On dinner parties and war criminals

"Oh, your prudery; oh, your squeamish respectability; all the abominations are allowed to *happen*, but no one may mention them. Delicate women must not know anything or say anything about blood and filth... There is nothing indecent about death and killing as far as you are concerned, you well brought up little ladies..."

"[T]he way [respectable] conversation customarily handles a new movement that strives to create a big upheaval: with an expression of prudent doubt and reservation, gentle ridicule, condescending recognition of the noble cause --- and all of that against a background of unmoving, rigid indifference."

--- Bertha von Suttner, 1889

Fwd: John Bolton, April 14th, 5pm: The Coming War on Sovereignty

With Rice on present faculty, Rumsfeld immediate past "Distinguished Visiting Fellow", Powell given recent fawning invitation, who's next?

John Bolton! Speaking April 14, 2009, at Stanford.

In May 2008, the British journalist George Monbiot attempted a citizen's arrest on Bolton. Monbiot's indictment, which he attempted to serve on Bolton, appeared in the British press:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/2042636/John-Bolton-charge-sheet-George-Monbiots-list-of-accusations.html

Monbiot appeared on Democracy Now afterwards.
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/30/alleging_war_crimes_british_activist_writer

"This is not an ordinary political mistake which was committed in Iraq. This was the supreme international crime, which led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Those people were not killed in the ordinary sense; they were murdered. And they were murdered by the authors of that war, who are the greatest mass murderers of the twenty-first century so far."

Topic: "The Coming War on Sovereignty", no less. Presumably that means arguing against international criminal indictments that may be issued against those involved in the commission of vast war crimes, like himself. As far as sovereignty is concerned --- a central principle of international law --- it is precisely the principle most egregiously violated by aggressive wars. Bolton has already participated in waging war on sovereignty and sovereign nations. The "coming war on sovereignty" he presumably refers to is, in fact, a legal and political struggle to restore the most basic aspect of sovereignty --- the prohibition on invading other nations --- by making accountable those who violate this most fundamental obligation of international law.

One imagines that, as a criminal defendant, Bolton would be making a very similar speech about the illegitimacy of law. Except there he would be laughed out of court and into prison, instead of being received with polite applause in a prestigious law faculty.

Bolton's involvement in perpetrating war on Iraq, as detailed by Monbiot, however pales in comparison to the role of Rice, as detailed in the open letter.
http://www.stanford.edu/group/antiwar/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Condi_coalition_letter_draft

Relevant articles & videos

Some articles and videos of relevance for those interested in peace and justice.

1. San Francisco --- your tax dollars at work.

Footage of police violence at SF antiwar rally last weekend. About 2:50 in.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWlSbdCmPcU

"The State is authority, it is force, it is the ostentatious display of and infatuation with Power. It does not seek to ingratiate itself, to win over, to convert. Every time it intervenes, it does so with particularly bad grace. For by its very nature it cannot persuade but must impose and exert force."
-- Mikhail Bakunin


2. Afghanistan escalation

The good and the bad of President Obama's plan for Afghanistan
From Peace Action West
http://www.groundswellonline.org/groundswell/2009/03/the-good-and-the-bad-of-president-obamas-plan-for-afghanistan.html


3. Iran

White House ducks issue of Iran request
The White House has given a cautious response devoid of any real
content to an Iranian call for concrete change in US policy toward
Tehran.
http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=89471&sectionid=351020101


4. Sri Lanka

The silent horror of the war in Sri Lanka
Arundhati Roy
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4331986.cms

Guardian investigations in Gaza

Gaza war crimes investigation
Civilians, medics and investigators talk to the Guardian about
allegations of war crimes during Israel's 23-day campaign in Gaza
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/series/gaza-war-crimes-investigation

Under attack: how medics died trying to help Gaza's casualties
Israeli military says medical staff 'take the risk upon themselves'
(Including video)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/23/gaza-war-crimes-medics

Keeping the flame alive

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2009/03/26/18583436.php

These Colors Won't Run... Afghanistan

This construction of "run" had never occurred to me before. Rather reminds me of the other construction of "Operation Enduring Freedom", the official name of the invasion of Afghanistan --- to endure means to suffer. And, I saw a similarly subversive and humorous construction recently:

The government official asks, "Do you advocate the overthrow of the US government by force or violence?"

"Hmmm... Well, not violence, so I suppose I have to choose force then."

These Colors Won't Run... Afghanistan
Mar 25, 2009
By Norman Solomon
http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/commentaries/3814

The Herd strikes again

These have been around for a while now, but still, songs about history, US foreign policy, and war, are always interesting.

The first one in particular is one of the most educational music videos I've ever seen (read the headlines!).

And we you knew you were frauds
But onwards we went to war
Nothing could be said to convince you
We've already seen it before
...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n65x_cSHSHE

I'm a Starship Trooper
This is my letter to dad, transferred from Saigon to Baghdad
and now I'm dead
...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG9773tnvac

Shoes ahoy

Pictures now on the wiki.
http://www.stanford.edu/group/antiwar/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Protest_at_Condoleezza_Rice%27s_inaugural_%22public%22_address

Also linked from the main page antiwar.stanford.edu under "Past events".

Afghan public opinion

The views of the populations invaded, bombed, or otherwise on the receiving end of US foreign policy are rarely discussed in the US mainstream. That is, of course, outrageous, and as of the last few days we have another case in point.

As far as I know, there has been no public study by the US government or media of what the Afghan "beneficiaries" of its policies think of it.

The usual US voluntary censorship regime aside, that's actually somewhat surprising, since the evidence suggests that the news could be spun positively for the foreign invaders. When it has been studied, the Afghan public is largely in favour of the foreign presence, although universally condemning night house raids and air strikes (precisely the part of the invasion that is expanding). The foreign presence is associated with foreign aid, reduced crime, and the local militias and police are often corrupt and incompetent; at least, this is what the evidence suggests. If one goes into the detail, however, the evidence suggests that the Afghan population strongly supports negotiations with the "Taliban", possibly a coalition government including them: that is, a political solution.

("Taliban", used to describe opponents of the Karzai "government", is a terrible term which fails to capture the heterogeneous and complex nature of the conflict --- recently leaked documents on wikileaks show how the word "Taliban" is deliberately used inaccurately in this blanket fashion, for propaganda purposes, in NATO public relations.)

In essence, then, the Afghan public is strongly opposed to a policy of expanded bombing and airstrikes, such as Obama and NATO are implementing right now.

This silence on Afghan opinion within the US, despite the potential for positive spin, suggests that, so far as US media and political elites are concerned, Afghan people are not simply uninteresting or irrelevant as far as policymaking is concerned, but do not arise the first place as a voice to be considered --- they are "unpeople", arising only tangentially as the recipients of bombs and missiles and the source of public relations difficulties.

On Wednesday, a coalition of humanitarian groups released a report on Afghan views of "security". They report that they could not visit as many parts of the country as in their previous 2004 report --- and even though they could only visit less violent parts of the country, in contrast to a general mood of optimism in 2004, "the picture painted today is bleak". They call for international organisations to recognise that Afghans "consistently identify poverty and unemployment as the driving forces behind insecurity and call for these issues to be addressed as a priority."

Study: Afghans View Security as Deteriorating Humanitarian groups call on U.N. forces to increase focus on civilians
Press release: http://www.care.org/newsroom/articles/2009/03/Afghanistan-HRRAC-report-security-research.asp?s_src=170960110000&s_subsrc=
Report: http://www.care.org/newsroom/articles/2009/03/Afghanistan-HRRAC-report-security-research.pdf?s_src=170960110000&s_subsrc=

Just google-news-ing now, I could find this report covered in the UK,
Canadian and Australian press, but not a single article in the US,
apart from a triumphalist neo-con journal applying the aforementioned
spin.

Afghans losing hope: aid groups
http://www.theage.com.au/world/afghans-losing-hope-aid-groups-20090319-93cb.html
Afghans' sense of security evaporating, poll shows
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/19/afghanistan-nato

The most recent previous study of Afghan public opinion, so far as I
know of, is a Canadian one from 2007:

http://erg.environics.net/media_room/default.asp?aID=653

See also discussion by Noam Chomsky on this topic in his recent article in Z Magazine:

Elections 2008 & Obama's "Vision"
What we can expect in 2009, given both parties are well to the right of the population
http://www.zmag.org/zmag/viewArticle/20424

On the legal side, the invasion of Afghanistan was as much an aggressive war as Iraq, waged in supreme violation of international law, the same crime for which the Nazis were hanged at Nuremberg. Was it in self-defence following the terrorist atrocities of September 11, 2001? Of course not --- international law grants a (very limited) right to self-defence, not to retaliation and vengeance; if it was permissible to invade Afghanistan on this ground, then it must also have been permissible to invade Saudi Arabia, Germany, and much else. Was there UN Security Council authorisation? No. Peacekeepers were later authorised --- as they were after the initial invasion of Iraq. The first Afghan peacekeeping force was authorised December 2001, two months after the initial invasion. As we all should recall, the invasion began in October 2001, with humanitarian organisations forced to pull out, warning of mass starvation in the millions. Fortunately, that appears not to have happened --- but that was the assessment at the time, and the assessment in the face of which the US decided to invade anyway. The possibility of mass starvation is no matter when it applies to "unpeople".

The proper way to deal with such vast criminal acts as the September 11 attacks would have been to bring the perpetrators to criminal trial. Indeed, there were offers from the Taliban to extradite Bin Laden for criminal process.

Nonetheless, war continues and escalates, bringing with it the certainty of escalating civilian casualties. This is "the good war".

Closed Zone

Interesting video.

http://www.closedzone.com/

Bennis on Iraq Withdrawal

Good analysis by Bennis of the antiwar movement's situation now. From ZNet.

Contested Terrain: Obama's Iraq Withdrawal Plan and the Peace Movement
Mar 08, 2009 By Phyllis Bennis
URL: http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/commentaries/3797

Raytheon recruitment day

There was an email sent to all students in the mathematics department, essentially advertising for Raytheon... My response.

Woah.

Well, if it's legitimate to advertise for controversial weapons manufacturers on an email list for mathematics students, it's certainly also legitimate to provide some critical information about them. Hey, they might be "virtually indistinguishable" from the CIA and NSA, according to the Washington Post, they might have their top lobbyist at #2 in the Pentagon, but still, I don't think they've completely taken over the mathematics department yet...

They may produce cruise missiles, bunker buster missiles, anti-missile missiles, and other missiles used to kill lots of people, but hey, that's legal, right? They may even produce missiles used by military forces in serious and massive violation of international law -- but that's not their responsibility, right? They might produce missiles which deliver cluster bombs -- declared illegal by 95 countries -- but hey, the US isn't one of them, right? They produce crazy experimental microwave-ray weapons to disperse peaceful protests, but that keeps the rabble in line... right? They might supply surveillance equipment for the wall in occupied Palestine, declared illegal by the International Court of Justice, but that surely gets lost among the yearly $3 billion in US aid to Israel... right? Their subsidiary might have purchased the airline used by the CIA for covert activity in southeast Asia, and then used it in Mexico in a program which Congress called a "shambles", but that doesn't mean anything... right? And they might have supplied explosives devices to a repressive Argentinian government in its US-supported dirty war, but that should be well down the memory hole by now... right? And then there is all that overstating of costs, falsifying records, terrible labor practices, and other legal liabilities, but hey, what good corporation doesn't... right?

Nonetheless, I'm sure none of this matters, because there may be interesting mathematics in designing their products.

Anyway, below are some interesting links for further critical information. BTW, I'm happy to provide sources or discuss any of the claims in the above: most of them are in the articles below. They are all serious claims.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Raytheon
http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/?lid=141
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11096
http://www.corpwatch.org/section.php?id=13
http://www.ruckus.org/warprofiteers/cards/clubs/eight.html
http://www.crocodyl.org/wiki/raytheon

The uses of the world: On "foreign policy debate"

The most powerful person in the world is one who is chosen democratically, somewhat. It's not the case that everyone affected has a say – and there are volumes written on the extraordinary flaws and outrages of the system that produces the decision – but there is an election. At every such election, there is an opportunity for a society to decide for itself its trajectory within the world – and, when the society is the most powerful in the world, to determine in substantial part the trajectory of the world.

It's now well into the twenty-first century. Societies are richer than ever before, we have more options than ever before; our technology and our knowledge can build the world we want to see. We know everything. And yet, societies are beset by crises, cowed in fear, uncertain about the future, and united in our pessimism. We know nothing.

But in a democratic society, people can decide for ourselves; inform themselves, understand, decide, and act. In a democratic society, all ideas proceed forth, filter through, clash, synthesize, and the compelling passions of human desire resolve themselves into some semblance of a plan. A democratic society is a self-determined society, with institutions to carry out collective understandings and decisions; at the highest level, a democratic society is a planned, a self-planned society. Your individual plan for your own life is democracy, a tyrannical democracy, and rightly so; our collective plan for our society is substantive democracy, and the highest expression of human society. You are nothing more than the effect you have on the world; the world should be nothing more than the synthesis of the best the human race can produce.

What is the plan for the world? There being no institution to decide this question consciously, the nearest question we have is – what is the plan of the richest and most productive society on earth, with respect to the world? What is our orientation to the world? We have no right to a say over the rest of the world – but our orientation to the world matters crucially. What is the world we want to see, and how do we want to get there? And, in the context of a democratic election to determine who shall have the power to make decisions on these issues – how will those questions be answered? What visions will be presented, what shall be made of the possible uses of the world?

It's now the twenty-first century – there is no excuse for isolation, for cultural ignorance, for racism or the denigration or fear of those far away, or different. At least not in the richest society in the world – it's all on the internet. The conclusion is inescapable that there are no exotic people. Similarly, there is no excuse for the most basic of human needs going unfulfilled: hunger, preventable disease, homelessness, displacement and war became indefensible long ago. Everybody wants to get on in life; everybody wants a world free of hunger, disease, and suffering; everybody wants a life neither nasty, brutish, nor short; everybody wants a better world for their children. It is trite – it is embarrassing to say it.

And yet the world which does not satisfy these most basic needs, when such goals are within the power of the world community, is also an embarrassment. The universal imperative of moral reciprocity demands that we treat others as we would be treated ourselves. And it tragically, embarrassingly, fails still. Are you embarrassed to live in this world? Are you proud to be one of the humans: this rich, extraordinary, complex, beautiful, tender species – this paragon of animals? Or are you embarrassed to be one of these poor, pathetic, abject, cowering, vicious animals – this quintessence of dust?

It is always overblown to talk about human destiny, and to apply Shakespearian hyperbole to human nature; but nor is it far-fetched, today. Choices made today may irrevocably change the course of human development; and the debate on foreign policy between presidential candidates in the most powerful nation in the world is arguably the closest forum currently existing where one might see a conscious democratic discussion about the trajectory of the world.

What shall we do? What shall we do to achieve the coming together of all peoples? What shall we do to deal the final blows to preventable disease and hunger? What shall we do to achieve a truly global society – a human society worth the name? What shall we do to achieve a true globalization – not just the flow of capital and goods; not just the cessation of wars; but the creation of a true, integrated global community? What could we achieve?

These are crucial questions to be discussed in the context of a democratic election in the most powerful nation in the world. Not to decide the questions for the world – but to determine the orientation of this society towards their answer, in recognition of the rights and the dignity of all peoples. They go further – they lead to deep and searching questions about the nature of the world and its future.

What relevance does the nation state have in the present? What justification is there for the concept of sovereignty – the idea that the absolute and final power in all matters legal and political should reside within the nation state, with its possibly arbitrary borders and whatever hodgepodge of social fragments lies hemmed in between them? What can be done to achieve the self-expression and self-determination of the global society – with institutions at the appropriate levels for the decisions that need to be made, from the individual and the municipal, to the regional and the global?

What is the appropriate basis upon which the world should operate? The United Nations? A federation? A parliament? Or are clashing sovereign nation states with populations that have much in common still the best arrangement possible – for the time being? International law, with its current customary minimum essential to civilization – fundamentally, start no wars, respect sovereignty, respect self-determination, and respect the United Nations – should it be expanded above this minimum, and more thoroughly applied?

How is one society to approach the problems of the day? In other words, what is to be the foreign policy of this nation? What sort of foreign policy would you like to see? Or better, what sort of international policy – for today there are no foreigners, only those who live outside the arbitrary borders of our nation – would you like to see?

So, when two main contenders for the election to most powerful person in the world come together and debate their visions for the world – their orientation to the world – on September 26, 2008, in a debate specifically about foreign policy, what was the vision we saw of the human community?

Of the human family, peace on earth, and a vision for the world – nothing.
Of globalization, cultural interconnection, about worldwide understanding – nothing.
Of the contemporary place of the medieval legal concept of sovereignty – nothing.

Perhaps, then, we should lower our expectations.

Of the United Nations – nothing.
Of worldwide hunger and preventable disease – nothing.
Or, even, of multilateralism? Nothing.
Or, at the least, of international law? Nothing.

Did they even suggest any policies chosen because of accordance with international law? No – from maintaining a war waged in supreme violation of international law; to escalating an occupation which daily bombs civilians from afar; to crossing borders for unilateral attacks; to threatening nations about their nuclear programs without once mentioning the International Atomic Energy Agency.

What a vision is this, then, of the uses of the world. Weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable, all.

But still, it is true that we have a choice.

We have a choice – we can have an open-ended commitment to war in Iraq; or a timetable to bring home “combat brigades”, leaving about half the military troops still there – and all corporate mercenary forces.
We have a choice – to attack Pakistan with more consent from president “Kardari” (sic, McCain), or less.

From there, it only gets better.

We have a choice – to escalate war in Afghanistan, or to escalate war in Afghanistan.
We have a choice – to escalate the military budget, or to escalate the military budget.
We have a choice – to threaten Iran, or to threaten Iran.
We have a choice – Venezuela is a rogue state, or Venezuela is a rogue state.
We have a choice – ally with Georgian atrocities against Russian atrocities; or ally with Georgian atrocities against Russian atrocities.
We have a choice – enlarge NATO and threaten Russia; or enlarge NATO and threaten Russia.
We have a choice – provoke and waste resources with missile “defense” systems; or provoke and waste resources with missile “defense” systems.

And those are the major issues. Those are the uses of the world. In the debate of the great men, in the visions of the hopes of the world, that is where the discussion begins and ends.

But to a more important vision – to you, what of this society and this earth? What is in your vision? Is it a vision of threats and bullies, of guns and bravado – is it the world operating, as it does today, as a giant version of the mafia? Is it a vision of enemies to be defeated, and victories to be won? Is it a vision of one nation predominant over the rest? Is it a vision where the assumption always holds that your government has the right to attack anywhere on earth it sees fit? Is it a vision of international lawlessness? Is there any hope? Are we forever to escalate wars, provoke, threaten, and reign – even when the world is as rich, as educated, and as enlightened as it is today? Is it merely a sterile promontory, this world, a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours? Does anything really matter at all?

Or is it, rather, this world, this planet, before the stars, a spaceship tracking an extraordinary course, a small planetary community struggling to make its way in the universe, a family about to put aside its squabbles – upon a brave overhanging firmament, an excellent canopy, a majestical roof fretted with golden fire – what is it?

What is the debate a democratic society should be having? What is the change we should believe in?

It is childlike, of course, to look upon the world with such a view. But the naivete of children looking upon the world is not to be denigrated – for it is rarely false. And growing up should never mean abandoning a vision for the future – for it is only with such vision that we stand a chance of getting there.

Do they care?

Do you truly believe the American people care about Afghan civilians who are killed in airstrikes? Are you in this anti-war effort because you think American people would truly care about international law, the Constitution, and brown skinned people if given the opportunity? Who are you fighting for?

These are searching questions. I do actually think the answers are yes, yes, and yes. The philosophical question aside, there is factual evidence to bear on the questions of the attitudes of the US population. The US public is not the same as what you see on television; its thoughts are not necessarily the same as those of media pundits and the major parties; the insanity of elect-o-tainment and "drill, baby, drill" is not the same as the everyday lives of everyday people.

At a time when polls of the US public regarding the election seem to be moving in the direction of McSame, it may actually be refreshing to see what Americans think about various important issues in the world. The US population has a notorious reputation for factual ignorance; but that does not necessarily mean that its moral sense is clouded. Polls on actual issues are very rarely reported on; quite apart from distractions, rhetoric, bluster, posturing, distortions and lies, when the MSM goes to polls they are usually horse-race polls of the candidates; when polls on issues are discussed, they are usually on whatever topic has been rabidly propagandized recently, and asked in the framing of elite media discussion. Of course, whatever polls say, our job is the same; if the polls showed a depraved population that would be just more reason to work harder.

So some data is below. A fairly random selection, but I think there is evidence there to support most of an answer of "yes, yes and yes" to these questions. A great website to see on these matters is http://www.americans-world.org/default.cfm, on American attitudes to the world. Most of the data below I got from there. One has to be careful with poll results but I think some general thrust can be discerned here. They are loosely organised, not very well organised.

It might be a bit much to say that this is enough to restore one's faith in humanity, but they may be somewhat reassuring. Then imagine what the results would be if the media were actually informing the population of what's going on. And also imagine how people feel, giving answers in some cases which go against everything the media and both parties tell them. I actually think there are some fantastic nuggets in there.

Who am I fighting for? I don't consider it a fight. To me it is more a matter of being able to look in the mirror. If it is a fight for anything, it is a fight to save the future; that the world can operate according to the bulk of the poll results below. In a democratic society, that should be automatic. So why are we not there yet?


A. Foreign bases:

1. Is the US military presence in the middle east a "stabilizing force" or "provokes more conflict than it prevents"?
53% say it provokes more conflict (33% stabilizing).

2. Permanent bases in Iraq?
At least two-thirds say no consistently.

3. A "major military presence in the Arabian peninsula…even if such a presence near Islamic holy sites may been seen as provocative to Muslims"?
44% yes, 39% no.
But if "a majority of people in the Middle East want the US to remove its military presence there, do you think the US should or should not remove its military presence?"
59% yes (37% no).

4. "If most people in East Asia want the US to reduce its military presence there", should the US do so?
55% thinks so (38% not).


B. US role in the world, unilateral vs multilateral

1."Since the US is the most powerful nation in the world, we should go our own way in international matters not worrying too much about whether other countries agree with us or not."
Two-thirds reject this statement, consistently, over recent years.

2. "The US is playing the role of world policeman more than it should be."
At least two-thirds agree consistently; three-quarters in recent years.

3. "The US should be playing the role of world policeman"?
Consistently majorities say no (at least 57% since 1991).

4. Asked to choose between whether "the U.S. should continue to be the preeminent world leader in solving international problems", or "The U.S. should do its share in efforts to solve international problems together with other countries", or "The U.S. should withdraw from most efforts to solve international problems,"...
... an overwhelming majority (at least 70%) consistently choose the second option.

5. Should the US play "a shared leadership role" or "the single world leader"?
About three-quarters has consistently wanted the shared role.

6."The United States has a responsibility to fight violations of international law and aggression around the world, even without the cooperation of its allies;" or "the United States should work only in a coordinated effort with its allies to fight violations of international law and aggression around the world"?
Consistently at least 60% want the cooperation of allies.

7. Is it important that US foreign policy take into "account the views and interests of other countries"?
90% say yes.
But, on the other hand, should we "what we think is best for our own interests even if other nations oppose us."
79% say yes.

8. "When the United States acts alone against terrorism, it makes itself a bigger target than when it cooperates with other nations in a coordinated crackdown on terrorism".
71% agree.

9. Is it important to US foreign policy "Cooperating with other countries on problems like the environment or control of diseases"?
95% say yes (70% very important, 25% somewhat).



C. International institutions

1. Working with international institutions? Will "it... be increasingly necessary for the US (United States) to work through international institutions", or are "international institutions... slow and bureaucratic, and often used as places for other countries to criticize and block the US. It is better for the US to try and solve problems like terrorism and the environment on its own instead"?
Consistently in recent years at least two-thirds wants the multilateral approach.

2. Do these international institutions need to be strengthened?
The WTO – 63% yes (30% no).
The World Court – 56% yes (29% no).
The WHO – 80% yes (15% no).
NATO – 61% yes (29% no).
The IMF – 42% yes (38% no).
The World Bank - 49% yes (39% no).

3. Should the US "contribute troops to U.N. efforts to help defend U.N. members if they are attacked?"
69% say yes (23% no).

4.Support "working through the UN to strengthen international laws against terrorism and to make sure UN members enforce them"?
Consistently overwhelming majorities (>85%) agree.

5."Trial of suspected terrorists in an International Criminal Court"?
Consistently over 80% agree.

6."The use of military force is more legitimate when the United Nations (UN) approves it."
Consistently at least two-thirds agree.

7."If countries were to feel that they could attack each other whenever they thought it was best, the world would soon fall into chaos and conflict. It is very important for the US to set a good example to other countries by getting UN approval for taking military action."
71% find this argument convincing.

8."When vital interests of our country are involved, it is justified to bypass the UN."
62% agree.



D. Giving up sovereignty (!!!)

1."For certain problems, like environmental pollution, international bodies should have the right to enforce solutions."
60% agree (17% disagree).

2. Should the US participate in the International Criminal Court?
Consistently at least two-thirds say yes.

3. Should the US "make the commitment to accept the decisions of the World Court?"
57% say yes.

4. "In the event that the UN has evidence that there is an international terrorist group operating in a country", should the UN Security Council be able to "requiring the country to allow a UN-sponsored police force to enter the country and conduct investigations?"
70% say yes.
To "freeze the assets of the suspected terrorist group?"
85% say yes.
"Requiring the country to provide intelligence on the suspected terrorist group?"
88% say yes.
"Requiring the country to arrest the suspected terrorist group?"
87% say yes.
"Sending in an international military force to capture the suspected terrorist group, if the country refuses to do so?"
82% say yes.


E. Global warming

1."Do you think the U.S. should or should not participate in the Kyoto agreement to reduce global warming"?
Consistently at least two thirds say yes. (When offered a "no opinion" option things are murkier however.)

2."Do you think President Bush favors or opposes the U.S. participating in the Kyoto agreement to reduce global warming?"
The population is generally split evenly about 45%-45%.

3."As you may know, George W. Bush has decided that the US (United States) should withdraw its support from the global warming agreement adopted in Kyoto, Japan in 1997. Do you approve or disapprove of this decision?"
32% approve, 51% disapprove.


F. Nuclear weapons

1."Do you favor or oppose the goal of eventually eliminating all nuclear weapons"?
82% say yes.

2.Should the US sign "a treaty with other nations to reduce and eventually eliminate all nuclear weapons, including our own?"
70% say yes (24% no).

3.Should the US participate in the comprehensive test ban treaty?
86% say yes.

4.Should the US participate in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty?
78% say yes.
(The question included a brief description of the treaty. Then it asked: Did you know it existed? 51% say yes.)


G. Moral motivations for foreign policy

1. "How important is each of the following to you personally as a reason for the US (United States) to be active in world affairs?" (0 not important at all, 10 extremely important)
"I want to help people who have less than we do--no matter what country they live in." - 6.85 mean (26% say 10).
"We have a moral obligation to help people in other countries who have less than we do." - 6.41 mean (20% say 10).
"I have a religious belief that we should try to help the disadvantaged wherever they are" - 6.9 mean (33% say 10).
"We have a responsibility to leave a better world for future generations." - 8.93 mean (62% say 10).

2. Should we "only send aid to parts of the world where the US has security interests" or "When hunger is a major problem in some part of the world we should send aid whether or not the US has a security interest in that region."
63% choose the second option.

3. Should the US "use its power to make the world be the way that best serves US interests and values", or "coordinate its power together with other countries according to shared ideas of what is best for the world as a whole"?
Consistently over three quarters choose the global option.

4.Should the US "sometimes... be willing to make some sacrifices if this will help the world as a whole", or should the US "not make sacrifices in an effort to help the world as a whole".
Consistently over three quarters choose the altruistic option.

5."The United States should look beyond its own self-interest and do what's best for the world as a whole, because in the long run this will probably help make the kind of world that is best for the US."
71% agree.

6.Should the US "think in terms of being a good neighbor with other countries, because cooperative relationships are ultimately in the best interests of the United States", or should it "Not worry about what others think, but just think in terms of what is best for the US, because the world is a rough place."
79% choose the cooperative option.

7"It is nice to think that joining in international efforts makes a more stable world. But in fact, the world is so big and complex that such efforts only make a minimal difference with little benefit to the US. Therefore, it is not really in the US interest to participate in them."
39% agree, 58% disagree.

8."When thinking about things like UN peacekeeping, whenever it can, the US should look beyond its own self-interest and do what's best for the world as a whole, because in the long run this will probably help make the kind of world that is best for the US."
75% agree.

9."If people in other countries are making products that we use, this creates a moral obligation for us to make efforts to ensure that they do not have to work in harsh or unsafe conditions", or "it is not for us to judge what the working conditions should be in another country".
74% agree on the moral obligation.

10."As we become more involved economically with another country that we should be more concerned about the human rights in that country."
73% agree.


H. Defense spending

1.Asked to choose between whether "the US [should] spend a larger percentage of its...GNP on defense than its allies" or whether "all of the industrialized countries should spend about the same percentage of
their national income or GNP on defense"...
80% choose the latter.

2.The US defense budget should be based on which of the following: spending enough for the US to "protect itself, but not to protect other countries"; to "protect itself and other countries all on its own"; or "itself and to join in efforts to protect countries together with allies or through the UN".
69% choose the last option.


I. Afghanistan

1.(Asked on 19 September 2001.) Is it important to "get the support of the United Nations -- including a vote of the Security Council -- supporting our response to the attacks, even if this means exercising more restraint than we'd like".
54% say very important, a further 30% say somewhat important.

2.(In November 2001.) Offered two positions: "In the current military action in Afghanistan, it would be better if more countries would join with us, because then it would be an international effort, not just an American one." Or, "it would be better NOT to get more countries involved, because if we did the operation would get bogged down by having to make decisions together with these other countries."
73% wanted more countries involved.

3. (Sept 5-10, 2008, after heavy propagandizing by both major party Presidential candidates for escalation) "Do you favor, oppose, or neither favor nor oppose increasing U.S. troop strength in Afghanistan?"
51% favour, 41% oppose

4. (July 2008) "Would you favor or oppose sending additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan to fight al Qaeda and Taliban terrorist operations in that country?" (Note wording to fight "terrorist operations", declared enemies)
59% favour, 38% oppose

5. (July 2008) "Thinking now about Afghanistan, all in all, considering the costs to the United States versus the benefits to the United States, do you think the war in Afghanistan was worth fighting, or not?"
51% worth it, 45% not

6. General approval ("Do you approve or disapprove of the U.S. military action in Afghanistan?" "Do you favor or oppose the U.S. War in Afghanistan?")
Dec 07: 56% approve, 41% not
Mar 07: 53% approve, 41% not
Jan 07: 44% favor, 52% oppose
Sep 06: 50% favor, 48% oppose
Aug 06: 56% approve, 41% not

7. "Do you think the U.S. should or should not be contributing troops to a UN peacekeeping force in Afghanistan?"
67% should, 25% should not