Snubbing Iran, Courting Catastrophe

Even Ahmadinejad’s freedom to build up anti-U.S. feeling–and who would have thought we could make Ahmadinejad look good–plays into the administration’s distorted reasoning. The administration will use his rhetoric to support its refusal to negotiate and bolster our case for mandatory sanctions. The administration rejected Ahmadinejad’s letter to President Bush offering to negotiate as insincere, referring to its insulting tone. Since when are negotiations limited to friendly interlocutors? We are negotiating with North Korea, in spite of ongoing inflammatory statements and documents.

The U.S. seems determined to set rhetorical parameters for its critics. Bush ended arms sales to Venezuela for not being “helpful” on terrorism–partly on the grounds of President Hugo Chavez’s anti-American rhetoric. Apparently, if you don’t support Bush you are soft on terrorism. The U.S. ratcheted up its own anti-Venezuelan rhetoric: the acting assistant secretary for arms control told a congressional committee the U.S. was “concerned” that Chavez wants to build a military “that can fight against the United States.” The administration will take statements by Ahmadinejad or Chavez as proof of hostile intentions to the U.S. and meet them with threats to take preemptive action–including military–on the basis of those asserted intentions.

The U.S. demands that its targets do what the U.S. says and only use language approved by the U.S. This is what passes for a security doctrine. This doctrine, as it has played out over Bush’s term in office, is fundamentally at odds with the peaceful resolution of conflicts. Unilateralism, with its inevitable linkage to the threat or use of force, is at the heart of the administration’s refusal to negotiate. Such unilateralism cannot possibly enhance U.S. security or the security of others. By doing anything he can to avoid international negotiations, organizations, laws and customs, Bush is gaming the system–against U.S. interests.

Elizabeth Spiro Clark | TomPaine.com (read more. . .)

May 24th, 2006 || PermaLink

Old Hands Against War

Perhaps the question is not what makes young people different, but what makes so many of their elders as they are? In the 1950s, Americans learned to live with a vivid sense of imminent disaster. Children glimpsed it under their desks, during ”duck and cover” drills. What was at issue, in that fresh era of nuclear anguish, was nothing less than the end of the world. That is why, through the 1960s dramas of Berlin, Cuba, and Vietnam, the watchword became ”Apocalypse Now!” Western civilization had long taken its narrative paradigm, the literary theorist Paul Ricoeur suggests, from a biblical framework that begins with Genesis and concludes with Apocalypse, but suddenly that scheme had entered history. You did not have to be a nut case to feel the wind blowing in from the Endtime.

It was not the draft that sparked the peace movement of that era or ”youthful idealism,” but this awareness of nuclear threat. ”Ours [is] the first generation to live with the possibility of worldwide cataclysm,” declared the foundational Port Huron Statement in 1962. That generation, with reason, saw the cataclysm coming. Unbridled fear for — and of — the near future is what drove so many of them into the streets, at first during the Vietnam protests of their youth and then, as they approached middle age, for the Nuclear Freeze movement (nearly a million demonstrators in New York in 1982).

The conclusion of the Cold War was foolishly designated ”the end of history” by some, yet there was a definite termination of the pervasive dread that had shaped consciousness. In America, it served the purposes of the national security establishment, and of the economic and political interests that depended on it, to encourage citizens to believe that nuclear Armageddon no longer threatened. With that pressure off, worries about war, even as the United States promptly went to war in Panama and Iraq, seemed passe. The catastrophe of 9/11 fell upon the national mind like an instance of the Apocalypse, as if the clouds rising up over New York were mushroom-shaped after all, but when that emergency passed, transcendent fear was sublimated — domesticated — under the numbing label ”terrorism.”

It takes a habit of the heart to feel antiwar anguish now, and that is what has driven so many gray-haired ones into the streets. Not that the young care less, nor that they are more readily anesthetized. Older people, for better and worse, are grooved thinkers. It is not to our credit that we’ve been here, done this. We still recognize a worldwide cataclysm when it threatens, especially when mainly from Washington. And no, as it turns out, we never got over it.

James Carroll | Boston Globe  (read more. . .)

May 23rd, 2006 || PermaLink

Message for ‘08 Dems: Only cowards think we’re at war

Democrats can’t be faulted for staying silent in the moments immediately after 9/11, when Bush established the wartime paradigm. We count on Presidents to refrain from exploiting moments of national crisis for personal and political benefit — Bush let us down. There was simply nothing Democrats could have done to stop Bush from savaging our Democracy while the Twin Towers were still burning and America was reeling emotionally.

But now it is the duty of all patriots to put America back how it’s supposed to be, and this time that job falls to Democrats. The 2008 presidential race is the only forum in which this can happen, because it is the only time an individual leader will be able to take a stand on this, personally take the Republicans to task, and explain his or her position fully to the people.

Every Democrat taking part in the ‘07-’08 primary spectacle will have a choice to make: accept the Republican war paradigm, pretend it’s not there, or challenge it head on. Only by challenging it head on will a Democrat be able to win both the primary and the general election.

We need a Democrat in ‘08 to say: “If you want to live in fear, then vote for one of them. If you want to stand tall, and show the terrorists that we don’t give a damn about them, then come with me.”

Until that happens, we’re going to loose every argument about the Constitution, civil liberties and anything else — because you just can’t win arguments against the logic of, “You don’t want to DIE DO YOU?”

Zack Exley | huffingtonpost (read more. . .)

May 22nd, 2006 || PermaLink

“The Road Not Taken” to Peace

Condoleezza Rice is not a negotiator. Negotiation has come to mean weakness during the Bush administration. And so, Rice has taken what negotiation experts call a “fixed pie” approach – any gain by the other side is a loss for the people she represents (and they aren’t us). Loss is not what the U.S. does or anything that could be construed as such. We are in the business of crafting win perceptions from obvious defeats.

Why would Rice take an anti-negotiation stance? Is she incapable? Her track record before working in the Bush administration suggests otherwise. The simple answer is that she works with and for people who prefer bullying and war. Negotiation for them is something one pretends to do or leaves to other countries. When it fails, as it inevitably must when so little is done to facilitate success, the only option is to walk away or attack.

This administration does not walk away from the threats it chooses to notice. It walks away from global warming, Katrina victims, Darfur, and a host of other atrocities. “We do not negotiate with terrorists,” is ludicrous banter because, frankly, we do not negotiate with anyone who does not do as we say. Show me a true negotiation expert in the Bush administration. Such people are visibly absent. Those remaining know how to walk a step or two behind the president, something even our guests are forced to do. They know where to place flags and how to meet and greet. But they do not participate in critical international dialogue. Bolton at the U.N. can’t negotiate his way out of a paper bag. And to many leaders of other countries, Rice is the wake-up-call before the hit man arrives. Nice suits, nice smile, nothing new to offer.

Kathleen Reardon | huffingtonpost  (read more. . .)

May 21st, 2006 || PermaLink

Make Me an Instrument of Peace

Being an instrument of peace is immensely more important than working for peace. Our entire lives must radiate this peace. We must be peace to have peace. I am coming into an understanding of this as I strive for true and lasting peace. Being anti-war is not enough. If we are solely anti-war, when the war is over the movement will be over. While we are congratulating ourselves on our victories for bringing the troops home, our government in cahoots with the war machine (I am also beginning to understand that the war machine and the government are two different sides of the same worthless coin) is already planning the next war and the next way to kill our children and spread death and destruction for profit!

Non-violence should always be the means we use to solve problems, from our nuclear family life all the way up to the office of the most powerful person in the world. Peace is not an absence of conflict, but resolving conflict non-violently.

Where there is hatred let me show love.

Hatred and frustration are the fuels of violence and terrorism. Our mis-leaders exploited the tragedy and devastation of 9/11 to attack two innocent countries that didn’t attack the US. After 9/11, if our so-called President had taken a course of action that reflected what he claims to believe in, he would have evaluated our policies towards the people of the Middle East and seen how he could have solved them intelligently and non-violently. Of course, we needed to bring the perpetrators of the 9/11 crimes against humanity to justice, but not commit crimes against humanity of our own. Jesus said: “It is written, an eye for an eye, but I say, turn the other cheek.” I have never believed that Jesus meant for us to let ourselves be slapped silly for peace, but I believe that he meant for us to put on an attitude of understanding and compassion for the slapper that transcends our humanness and forces us to look inwards and pull out of us all of our humanity and love that solves problems non-violently and with courage and integrity.

I also am convinced that religious fundamentalism is the root and cause of much of the violence throughout history and even up until today. The leaders of our world know and exploit the fact that humans will blindly and brainlessly follow a religious symbol into war more quickly and readily than we will follow a flag or standard. If we espouse or claim a doctrine, then we must also deeply know in our minds and hearts the teachings of the prophets of that religion: Whether the prophet was Jesus, Mohammed or Moses. We should never allow ourselves to follow false prophets to doom: Especially false prophets who claim that the Universal Creator has told him to ravage a country and kill its people.

Cindy Sheehan | CommonDreams (read more. . .)

May 20th, 2006 || PermaLink

Smart Defense

The U.S. should align its spending with approaches that have real promise for achieving security. The task force suggests a $10 billion increase in spending for overseas economic development; a $1 billion increase in U.S. contributions to international organizations, $1.8 billion in additional funds for diplomatic operations; tripling what is allocated for proven nonproliferation programs like those designed to lock down or destroy excess nuclear weapons and bomb-making materials around the world; $8.8 billion more for alternative energy sources; and a $10 billion increase in spending on the nation’s basic public health infrastructure.

They assert that this diversification can be accomplished by reallocating money already in the Pentagon budget. Among the systems they propose trimming or eliminating are: the F-22 combat aircraft, the Virginia-class submarine, the DD(X) destroyer, and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. These Cold War-era systems eat up billions in the Pentagon budget and are irrelevant to the threats posed in the 21st century. Additionally, the task force proposes cutting the unnecessary and unworkable Star Wars program from $10.4 to $2.4 billion per year, and reducing nuclear weapons spending from $18 billion per year to $5 billion per year.

In an era of war that pits the $3 million Bradley fighting vehicle against a $3 improvised-explosive device, the project to expand the definition of security (and increase number of tools we have to build it) could not be more timely. At a time when the Democratic leadership is too timid to propose cuts in our bloated military budget, the USB report-which humbly suggests that reallocating some of that funding will be a more judicious use of taxpayer money and a more effective defense of the homeland-deserves as large an audience as possible.

Frida Berrigan | TomPaine  (read more. . .)

May 19th, 2006 || PermaLink

Murtha: Marines killed civilians “in cold blood”

In March, Time described an incident in the western Iraqi town of Haditha — the worst alleged case of U.S. troops deliberately killing civilians in Iraq. Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, 20, was killed in the early morning of Nov. 19, 2005, by a roadside explosive device. In the hours that followed, Marines searched three houses, killing a total of 23 people. According to Time, the Marine Corps’ initial report claimed that 15 civilians had died in the same blast that killed Terrazas — and another eight insurgents were killed after a subsequent firefight with Marines.

But Murtha contended Wednesday that the military’s initial report was wrong. “There was no firefight,” he said. “There was no IED [improvised explosive device] that killed these people.”

Last month, the Marine Corps relieved of command three officers who oversaw the military unit responsible for the Iraqi deaths at Haditha — Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment.

Murtha, widely known as a foreign-policy hawk, grabbed the national spotlight last fall when he suddenly called for the orderly withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. His press briefing Wednesday was a six-month follow-up to that initial call for withdrawal. The Pennsylvania Democrat argued that part of the responsibility for the Haditha killings lay with the Pentagon leadership, who had stretched soldiers too thin. “These guys are under tremendous strain — more strain than I can conceive of — and this strain has caused them to crack under situations like this,” Murtha said.

The psychological strain Murtha described has been well documented. Veterans describe the violence of war as having a numbing effect on soldiers, making it possible to carry out otherwise unthinkable acts. This is especially true when a fellow soldier has been killed. “Once you reach that point, all sorts of restrictions you may place on yourself are removed,” says Rion Causey, a medic in the infamous Army platoon known as Tiger Force, which may have killed as many as several hundred unarmed civilians in the central highlands of South Vietnam in 1967. Causey did not participate in the atrocities.

Murtha visited the Haditha region in August, three months before the incident. According to Murtha, a U.S. general there said at the time, “I don’t have enough troops to do my mission.”

Michael Scherer and Mark Benjamin | Salon  (read more. . .)

May 18th, 2006 || PermaLink