How
the Press & the CIA
Killed Gary Webb's Career
Today's
Stories
January 13,
2005
Gary Leupp
"Fighting
for the Work of the Lord": Christian Fascism in America
January 12,
2005
Robert Fisk
Fear
Stalks Baghdad
Josh Frank
The
Farce of the DNC Contest
Jack Random
Casualties
of War: the Untold Stories
John Roosa
Aceh's Dual Disasters: the Tsunami and Military Rule
Carol Norris
In the Wake of the Tsunami
Mike Whitney
Pink Slips at CBS
Alan Farago
Can
the Everglades be Saved?
Paul Craig
Roberts
What's
Our Biggest Problem in Iraq...the Insurgency or Bush?
January 11,
2005
Tom Barry
The
US isn't "Stingy"; It's Strategic: Aid as a Weapon
of Foreign Policy
James Hodge
and Linda Cooper
Voice
of the Voiceless: Father Roy Bourgeois and the School of the
the Americas
Linda S. Heard
Farah Radio Break Down: Joseph Farah's Messages of Hate and Homophobia
Derrick O'Keefe
Electoral Gigolo?: Richard Gere and the Occupied Vote
Gila Svirsky
A Tale of Two Elections
Harry Browne
Irish
"Peace Process", RIP
January 10,
2005
Ramzy Baroud
Faith-Based
Disasters: Tsunami Aid and War Costs
Talli Nauman
Killing
Journalists: Mexico's War on a Free Press
Uri Avnery
Sharon's Monologue
Dave Lindorff
Tucker
Carlson's Idiot Wind
Dave Zirin
Randy
Moss's Moondance
Dave Silver
Left Illusions About the Democratic Party
Charles Demers
Plan Salvador for Iraq: Death Squads Come in Waves
William A.
Cook
Causes
and Consequences: Bush, Osama and Israel
January 8 /
9, 2005
Alexander Cockburn
Say,
Waiter, Where's the Blood in My Margarita Glass?
John H. Summers
Chomsky
and Academic History
Greg Moses
Getting Real About the Draft
Walter A. Davis
Bible Says: the Psychology of Christian Fundamentalism
Victor Kattan
The EU and Middle East Peace
John Bolender
The Plight of Iraq's Mandeans
Robert Fisk
The Politics of Lebanon
Fred Gardner
Situation NORML
Joe Bageant
The Politics of the Comfort Zone
Mickey Z.
I Want My DDT: Little Nicky Kristof Bugs Out
Ben Tripp
CounterClockwise Evolution
Ron Jacobs
Elvis and His Truck: Out on Highway 61
Saul Landau
Sex
and the Country
Rep. Cynthia McKinney
Time to End the Blackout
Ellen Cantarow
NPR's Distortions on Palestine
Richard Oxman
Bageantry Continued
Poets' Basement
Gaffney, Landau, Albert, Collins
January 7,
2005
Omar Barghouti
Slave
Sovereignty: Elections Under Occupation
Kent Paterson
The Framing of Felipe Arreaga: Another Mexican Environmentalist
Arrested
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Old
Vijay Merchant and the Tsunami
David Krieger
Cancel the Inauguration Parties
Gideon Levy
New Year, Old Story
Dave Lindorff
Ohio Protest: First Shot Fired by Congressional Progressives
Christopher
Brauchli
Privatizing the IRS
Roger Burbach
/ Paul Cantor
Bush,
the Pentagon and the Tsunami
January 6,
2005
Brian J. Foley
Gonzales:
Supporting Torture is not His Greatest Sin
Greg Moses
Boot
Up America!: Gen. Helmly's Memo Leaks New Bush Deal
Petras / Chomsky
An
Open Letter to Hugo Chavez
Alan Maass
The Decline of the Dollar
Dave Lindorff
Colin Powell's Selective Sense of Horror
Jenna Orkin
The EPA and a Dirty Bomb: 9/11's Disastrous Precedent
P. Sainath
The
Tsunami and India's Coastal Poor
January 5,
2005
Alan Farago
2004:
An Environmental Retrospective
Winslow T.
Wheeler
Oversight
Detected?: Sen. McCain and the Boeing Tanker Scam
Jean-Guy Allard
Gary Webb: a Cuban Perspective
Fred Gardner
Strutting, Smirking, As If The Mad Plan Was Working
David Swanson
Albert Parsons on the Gallows
Richard Oxman
The Joe Bageant Interview
Bruce Jackson
Death
on the Living Room Floor
January 4,
2005
Michael Ortiz
Hill
Mainlining
Apocalypse
Elaine Cassel
They
Say They Can Lock You Up for Life Without a Trial
Yoram Gat
The
Year in Torture
Martin Khor
Tragic
Tales and Urgent Tasks from the Tsunami Disaster
Gary Leupp
Death
and Life in the Andaman Islands
January 3,
2005
Ron Jacobs
The
War Hits Home
Dave Lindorff
Is
There a Single Senator Who Will Stand Up for Black Voters?
Mike Whitney
The Guantanamo Gulag
Joshua Frank
Greens and Republicans: Strange Bedfellows
Maria Tomchick
Playing Politics with Disaster Aid
Rhoda and Mark
Berenson
Our Daughter Lori: Another Year of Grave Injustice
David Swanson
The Media and the Ohio Recount
Kathleen Christison
Patronizing
the Palestinians
January 1 /
2, 2005
Gary Leupp
Earthquakes
and End Times, Past and Present
Rev. William
E. Alberts
On "Moral Values": Code Words for Emerging Authoritarian
Tendencies
M. Shahid Alam
Testing Free Speech in America
Stan Goff
A Period for Pedagogy
Brian Cloughley
Bush and the Tsunami: the Petty and the Petulant
Sylvia Tiwon
/ Ben Terrall
The Aftermath in Aceh
Ben Tripp
Requiem for 2004
Greg Moses
A Visible Future?
Steven Sherman
The 2004 Said Awards: Books Against Empire
Sean Donahue
The Erotics of Nonviolence
James T. Phillips
The Beast's Belly
David Krieger
When Will We Ever Learn
Poets' Basement
Soderstrom, Hamod, Louise and Albert
December 31,
2004
Farrah Hassen
The
Palestinian Right of Return: a View from Syria
Dave Lindorff
US Air's Bold New Idea: Work for Your Boss for Free!
George Capaccio
Tsunami Hits Iraq
Mike Whitney
Iraq v. Tsunami: Media Duplicity
Peter Phillips
The Tsunami and the Corporate Media: Waves of Hypocrisy
Christopher
Deliso
War
and the Tsunami: Putting It in Perspective
December 30,
2004
Lila Rajiva
Unnatural
Disaster? Earthquakes, Tsunamis and Nuclear Testing
Robert Fisk
The
Ghosts of Vietnam
Roger Burbach
Argentina
v. the IMF
Stan Cox
9/11 and 12/26: How to React
Walter Brasch
Bush and Tsunamis: Heartless in Crawford
Christopher Brauchli
Empire of the Misers
Alexandra Spieldoch
NAFTA Through a Gender Lens: "Free Trade" Pacts and
Women
Paul Kincaid Jameison
Grief, Relief and the Stingy West
Dan Bacher
The Water Kings of California
Paul Craig
Roberts
Unbecoming
Conduct
December 29,
2004
Dave Lindorff
Us,
Stingy?: It's All Relative
M. Shahid Alam
America
and Islam: Seeking Parallels
Ronald D. Hoffman
Tsunamis
and Nuclear Power Plants
Sam Bahour
/ Todd May
Elections
Without Democracy
Fred Gardner
Ricky Does 60 Minutes
Ali Khan
Who's Feeding the Bin Laden Legend?
John Hansen
Family Farms Are Being Fed to Corporate Sharks
Sam Lewin
How the Justice Department Continues to Screw the Sioux
Richard Oxman
As Time Goes By With Andy Goldsworthy
Mickey Z.
A Wave of Questions: Putting a Disaster in Context
Website of the Day
Banking While Muslim
December 28,
2004
Brian Cloughley
The
Chief Weirdo at the Pentagon: Rumsfeld Must Go
Joshua Frank
Privacy Piracy? What Howard Dean May Bring to the DNC
Jessica Leight
The
Chilean Miracle: Less Than Meets the Eye
Dave Lindorff
A
Shameful Response to Disaster
John Walsh
Disappearing the Anti-War Movement at the NYTs
Dave Zirin
The Death of Reggie White: an Off the Field Obituary
Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
Be Careful Not to Get Too Much Education: It's Happened to a
Lot of Good Christians
Ron Jacobs
Iran
2004: The Resistance and the Western Anti-War Movement
December 27,
2004
M. Junaid Alam
"Civilization
v. Barbarism": an Interview with Noam Chomsky
Michael Donnelly
Greens and Greenbacks: How Nonprofit Careerism Derailed the "Revolution"
Greg Moses
Texas Election Scandal: Forty Faxes and a Whisper
Toni Solo
Colombia's Appalling Vista: Justice With Eyes Wide Open
Brian Kwoba
Blaming the Victims of the 2004 Elections
Genna Goodman-Campbell
Honduras Validates Its Banana Republic Status, Again
Mike Whitney
Disappearing Act: Fallujah and the Media
Ari Shavit
"Zionism Has Exhausted Itself": an Interview with Amos
Elon
Richard Oxman
Reflections on a Handful of Activists
Saul Landau
James
Cason's Cuban Delusions
December 25
/ 26, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Yup,
It's Moral Outrage Time
Diane Christian
The Christmas Christ
Dr. Susan Block
Faith-Based Sex
Gary Leupp
Rumsfeld, His Critics and the Draft
Ron Jacobs
Music in Wartime
Elaine Cassel
Articles I Didn't Write
Jim Minick
Beyond Organic
Poets Basement
Louise, Landau, Orloski, Albert
and Collins
December 24,
2004
Diane Christian
Winning:
Rummy and John Milton
Chad Nagle
Ukraine's
Real Underdog
Saul Landau
My Friend Richard Barnet
Greg Moses
Ramsey Muniz Speaks
Joe DeRaymond
The Endless War in Colombia: a View From Within
Borzou Daragahi
Iraq's Christians: Tolerated by Saddam; Targets Under Occupation
Mike Whitney
Rummy's Quagmire of Lies
Francis A. Boyle
O Little Town of Bethlehem: Another Christmas Under Occupation
William Loren
Katz
Florida 1837: Christmas Eve Resistance to the First US Occupation
December 23,
2004
Chad Nagle
Report
from Kiev: Yushchenko's Not Quite Ready for Sainthood
David Smith-Ferri
The
Real UN Disgrace in Iraq
Bill Quigley
Death
Watch for Human Rights in Haiti
Mickey Z.
Crumbs
from Our Table
Christopher Brauchli
Merck's Merry X-mas
Greg Moses
When
No Law Means No Law
Alan Singer
An
Encounter with Sen. Schumer: a Very Dangerous Democrat
David Price
Social
Security Pump and Dump
Website of the Day
Gabbo Gets Laid
December 22,
2004
James Petras
An
Open Letter to Saramago: Nobel Laureate Suffers from a Bizarre
Historical Amnesia
Omar Barghouti
The Case for Boycotting Israel
Patrick Cockburn / Jeremy Redmond
They Were Waiting on Chicken Tenders When the Rounds Hit
Harry Browne
Northern Ireland: No Postcards from the Edge
Richard Oxman
On the Seventh Column
Kathleen Christison
Imagining
Palestine
Website of the Day
FBI Torture Memos
December 21,
2004
Greg Moses
The
New Zeus on the Block: Unplugging Al-Manar TV
Dave Lindorff
Losing
It in America: Bunker of the Skittish
Chad Nagle
The View from Donetsk
Dragon Pierces
Truth*
Concrete
Colossus vs. the River Dragon: Dislocation and Three Gorges Dam
Patrick Cockburn
"Things Always Get Worse"
Seth DeLong
Aiding Oppression in Haiti
Ahmad Faruqui
Pakistan and the 9/11 Commission's Report
Paul Craig
Roberts
America
Locked Up: a System of Injustice
December 20,
2004
Gary Leupp
Japan
in Iraq
Robert Fisk
An
Army Without Compassion
Uri Avnery
The Mountain and the Mouse
Francisco Letelier
My Case Against Pinochet
Patrick Cockburn
The Polls of Fear
Bill Conroy
Charles Bowden on the Legacy of Gary Webb: "He Drew Blood"
Yoshie Furuhashi
Chokeholds of a Giant: Attacking Wal-Mart's Supply Chain
David Swanson
Media Blackout of Bush's War on Labor
Chad Nagle
Did Yushchenko Poison Himself?
December 18
/ 19, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Why
They Hated Gary Webb
Saul Landau
Gen.
Pinochet Should Also Face Charges in DC
Patrick Cockburn
Losing
Mosul: Once They Called It a Model for the Occupation
Douglas Valentine
Wolves
and Revolution in Venezuela: a Caracas Romance
Ray McGovern
Laughing Dragon, Dancing Bear: the New China / Russia Alliance
Fred Gardner
DEA Upholds Grower's Marijuana Monopoly
Jean-Guy Allard
Locked Up Naked in a Hole Within a Hole: Have the Cuban 5 Been
Tortured in US Prisons?
Ron Jacobs
Drifters Escape, Again: Encounters with Berkeley's Police
Raymond G.
Helmick, S.J.
The Law and Peace in the Middle East
Sean Sellers
Values Voters, Desperate Housewives and Sweatshop Tacos
Lee Sustar
Christmas
on the Picket Line at CNH: "They Want to Break Our Unions"
Richard Thieme
Webb's Wife: "Gary Was Never the Same After They Attacked
Him"
Sam Bahour
WANTED:
Middle East Negotiator
Joshua Frank
The
Spin Doctor: an Interview with Mickey Z.
Dave Lindorff
A Man Who Confers with God Should Have Good Hearing
Stan Cox
What Kids Cost: Dallas v. Delhi
Chris Frasier
Farming By Numbers: More Poets, Fewer MBAs
Poets' Basement
Katz, Melek, Harley, Albert and Ford
December
17, 2004
Cockburn /
St. Clair
CounterAttack:
How the Press and the CIA Killed Gary Webb's Career
Dave Lindorff
Racism:
Philly Style
Dan Bacher
Bush Abandons Salmon Restoration
Marisa Jacott
NAFTA and the Environment: Trade Still Runs Roughshod
Francis Thicke
How Now, Industrial Cow?
Rupert Cornwell
The Inuit Strike Back
Website of the Day
Franz Boas Unrolls Over in His Grave
December
16, 2004
Michael
Neumann
How We Became Barbarians
Merlin
Chowkwanyun
An Interview with Ralph Nader
Gabriel
Espinoza Gonzales
The Dubious Career of John Bolton
Christopher
Brauchli
Louis Freeh's New Gig: Usurer
Patrick
Cockburn
Allawi's Pre-Election Ploy: Putting "Chemical Ali"
on Trial
Mike
Whitney
Gearing Up for a Draft?
Walter
Brasch
Hillbilly Humvees and Rumsfeld's New Physics
Bill
Conroy
How Gary Webb Saved My Ass from the FBI
Website
of the Day
Saturday Memorial for Gary Webb
December
15, 2004
Robert
Fisk
Who Killed Baha Mousa?
Jennifer
Van Bergen
The Monster Under the Bed
Heather
Gray
Will the Real Christians Please Stand?: a Personal Testimony
Dave
Lindorff
The DNC, Albright and the Iraq Elections
Luis
Hernandez Navarro
To Die a Little: Migration and Coffee
in Mexico and Central America
Joshua
Frank
The Ohio Recount: an Exercise in "Dumbocracy"
Greg
Moses
Eighty-Sixing Civil Rights in Ohio?
George
Caffentzis
The Petroleum Commons
December
14, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
DNC Meddling in the Ukraine Elections
Larry
Birns / Seth DeLong
Haiti is Unraveling and No One is Saying
Anything
Richard
Thieme
My Last Talk with Gary Webb: "I Knew It Was the Truth and
That's What Kept Me Going"
Patrick
Cockburn
A Year After Saddam's Capture, Iraq
is Getting Worse
Chris
Floyd
Client State: Moral Values and Voluntary Servitude in Bush's
America
Akiva
Eldar
A One-time Hanukkah Miracle
Burbach
/ Cantor
The Legacy of Pinochet: Kissinger
and the Teflon Tyrant
December
13, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Gary Webb: a Great Reporter, Trashed
by the CIA's Claque
David
Phinney
"Contract Meal Disaster" for Iraqi Prisoners: Rancid
Food Sparked Abu Ghraib Riots
Paul
Craig Roberts
A Dose of Non-Delusional Reality
for Douglas Feith
M.
Junaid Alam
The War is the War Crime
Robert
Jensen
The US Has Lost the Iraq War...and That's a Good Thing
Richard
Oxman
Kafkaesque Lessons for the Left
Greg
Moses
Send No Messengers of Defeat
Douglas
Lummis
The Pentagon's Neurosis: Fallujah
Gulag
December
11 / 12, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Running an Empire on the Cheap
Ron
Jacobs
The Drugs of War: Getting High in the Green Zone?
Saul
Landau
Listening and Talking to God About
Invading Other Countries
Gary
Leupp
Bush's Capital
Sharon
Smith
The Horrible Toll on US Troops
Dave
Lindorff
Deja Vu All Over Again: 5,000 Desertions and Counting
Uri
Avnery
The Boss Has Gone Crazy
Jude
Wanniski
The Neo-Con Smear on Kofi Annan: What Food-for-Oil Scandal?
Heather
Gray
How the South Became Republican: an Interview with John Egerton
Patrick
Cockburn / Ken Sengupta
Fallujah: the Homecoming and the Homeless
John
Pilger
Return to Kosovo: Calling the Humanitarian Bombers to Account
Joshua
Frank
All the Rage: Mr. Solomon, Say You're Sorry
Ben
Tripp
O Canada!: the Truth About the Election of 2004
John
Stanton
God Speaks!
Laura
Nathan
Porn Stars are People, Too: a Talk with Christi Lake
Poets'
Basement
Capaccio, Davies, Louise, Ford and Albert
Website
of the Day
Fallujah Photos: Killed in Their Beds
December
10, 2004
Ralph
Nader
President Bush, Stop Destroying the
Mosques of Iraq
Greg
Moses
Whitewashing Voter Fraud
Nicole
Colson
Rebellion in the Ranks: Grunts Are Resisting Stop-Loss Orders
Frederick
B. Hudson
"They Still Got Those Dogs": A New Book Probes Old
Civil Rights Lessons
Patrick
Cockburn
Iraq's Insurgents Oppose the Occupation, Not the Elections
Kathy
Kelly
From Haiti to Iraq: Burying Water
December
9, 2004
Greg
Moses
Ask Not Who Bankrolled Fallujah
Joshua
Frank
Cobb and the Ohio Recount: Vote Fraud as Fundraiser!
Ralph
Nader
An Open Letter to Bush: It's Time to
Disclose the Real Casualty Figures
Lee
Sustar
Bhopal: the Making of a Disaster
Tom
Barry
Restrictionist Resurgence
Mickey
Z.
Sander Hicks and the 9/11 Truth Movement
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush in the Bubble
Mark
Donham
Why are House Democrats Trying to
Deny Cynthia McKinney Seniority?
Gary
Corseri
On the Anniversary of John Lennon's Death, 2012
Paul
de Rooij
The Voices of Sharon's Little Helpers
December
8, 2004
Ralph
Nader
Will the Real Michael Moore Ever Re-Emerge?
Ann
Harrison
The Ohio Recount: Reluctant Officials
and Few Rules
Paul
Craig Roberts
War Crime
Dave
Lindorff
They've Got a Secret: Inside the $40 Billion Black Budget for
Spying
Patrick
Cockburn / Andrew Buncombe
CIA Warning on Iraq: Fallujah Did Not Break the Back of the Insurgency
Col.
Dan Smith
Rules of Engagement in Iraq
Emily
Alves / Michael Johnson
Paradise Lost: Corruption and Clientelism in Costa Rica
Richard
Oxman
The Dylan Bob Wouldn't Mention: Up With Dylan Thomas
Ron
Jacobs
In Fallujah, Freedom Isn't Free
December
7, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
Running Battles in Baghdad
Behrooz
Ghamari
Lost Muslim Voices of Dissent
Dave
Lindorff
American Fantasies: Psst! Hey Buddy,
Did You Hear How Well the War's Going?
Joshua
Frank
Dean at the DNC?
Richard
Oxman
Down with Dylan: the Insufferable Interview
Ray
McGovern
All Mosquitoes, No Swamp
John
Chuckman
The Invasion of Hallifax: The Imperial Wizard Visits Canada
James
Petras
Latin America: the Empire Changes Gears
Website
of the Day
ToxMap: Who's Poisoning You
December
6, 2004
Paul
Craig Roberts
Paranoia and Pre-emption: Is the
Bush Administration Certifiable?
December
4 / 6, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Politicize the CIA? You've Got to
be Kidding
Joe
Bageant
Dining with the Rhinos
Alan
Maass
Reporting from the Ground in Iraq: an Interview with Patrick
Cockburn
Brian
Cloughley
Democracy, Bush-style, in the Gulf
Laura
Carlsen
Latin America Shifts Left
Lenni
Brenner
Jefferson, Madison, Bush and Religion
Anna
Ioakimedes
Brazil's Haitian Mission: Doing God's Work or Washington's?
Uri
Avnery
Widow of Opportunity?
Fred
Gardner
Supreme Court Hears Medical Pot Case
Dave
Zirin
Steroids to Heaven
Jackie
Corr
Mining Camp Blues: the Red State Variation
Don
Fitz
Will Greens Abandon IRV?
Lucy
Herschel
"Art can be a Weapon of the Oppressed": an Interview
with Artist Anthony Papa
Richard
Oxman
No Angels in America: Bashing the Gay Play
Ron
Jacobs
Holiday Greeting Card
Poets'
Basement
Collins, Albert, LaMorticella
December
3, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Lie Then Escalate
Ben
Tripp
Fun With Boycotts: How to Shop in a
Time of Crisis
Joe
Allen
Murder in El Salvador: the Assassination of Teamster Organizer
Gilberto Soto
Matthew
B. Riley
Human Rights Court Fails Lori Berenson
Meir
Shalev
In the End, It is the Violin that Wins
Bob
Wing
The White Elephant in the Room: Race and Election 2004
Christopher
Brauchli
When McCain Bit His Tongue
Sasan
Fayazmanesh
The EU, the US, Israel and Iran
December
2, 2004
Tito
Tricot
No Justice in Chile: I'm a Torture
Survivor in a Country Where Torturers Still Run Free
Behzad
Yaghmaian
The Murder of Theo Van Gogh and Muslim Migration
Dr.
Susan Block
Lana and Me: Meetings with Remarkable Apes
Frank
/ Chowkwanyun
Liberalism and Its Bounds
Lee
Sustar
Standoff in Ukraine: the Bad v. the Corrupt
Patrick
Cockburn
Another Grim Record in Iraq
Mark
Engler
Seattle at Five
Michael
Donnelly
Something Stinks in South Bend: the Firing of Tyrone Willingham
Nate
Collins
The Bay Area Mall on an Ohlone Burial Grounds
Saul
Landau
The Assassination of Danilo Anderson
December
1, 2004
Phillip
Cryan
Associated with Whom? Rightist Bias
in Wire Coverage of Colombia
Dave
Zirin
What's the Matter with "Leon"?:
Budweiser's Racist Commercial
Ghali
Hassan
Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation:
200 Children Die Every Day
Donna
J. Volatile
Beware Western Nations Threatening "Democracy"
Patrick
Cockburn
How Saddam Tried to Arm the Insurgency
Nick
Meo
Chemical War Over Afghanistan
Mike
Ferner
The Battle of Toledo
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Shame and Determination on Global AIDS Day: 40 Million and Rising
Kathy
Kelly
Looking the Other Way: the Real Crimes
of the UN in Iraq
November
30, 2004
Jennifer
Van Bergen
The Veil of Secrecy
Toni
Nelson Herrera
Meeting Kurtz: When Art is a Crime
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Bush Delusions: Successful at Incompetence
Patrick
Cockburn
The Insurgency Strikes Back: There Are No Safe Havens in Iraq
Chuck
Munson
WTO Protests Five Years Later: Seattle Weekly Trashes Anti-Globalization
Movement
Adam
Williams
Citizenship Sold: Back to Business in Indiana
Gregory
Elich
A Dangerous Turn in the US Plans for
North Korea
Website
of the Day
Read Lynne Cheney's Lesbian Novel Online!
November
29, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Blowback in Ukraine: The Hand of
the CIA?
Omar
Barghouti
"The Pianist" of Palestine:
Roadblock Concerto at Gunpoint
Mike
Whitney
The US Media and Fallujah: How to
Market a Siege
Uri
Avnery
The Abu Mazen Style: "Give Me
Some Credit!"
Matt
Vidal
Globalization and Economic Inequality: a Look at the Numbers
Patrick
Cockburn
An Interview with Iraq's Foreign
Minister
Alan
Farago
Sex Change and Salvation: God, Girly Men and Endocrine Disrupters
Justin
Huggler
Bhopal 20 Years Later
Antony
Loewenstein
How Australia Reported Arafat's Death and Legacy
Gary
Leupp
Ukraine: Poll Results Aren't the Real
Issue
Website
of the Day
Mosul: Images from a Kill Zone
November
27 / 28, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Torture & Neo-Liberalism with
Sycorax in Iraq
Alexander
Cockburn
What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa?
Fred
Gardner
Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court
Kathy
Kelly
What We Can Control
Diane
Christian
The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts"
Gary
Leupp
One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea
Lenni
Brenner
Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York
Times
Ron
Jacobs
Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of
the AMS Clerics
Joshua
Frank
An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd
Toni
Solo
The Murder of Danilo Anderson
Saul
Landau
Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are
No Cure for Homophobia
Justin
Taylor
Empire's Lawless Opportunities
Amos
Harel
The Case of Captain R.
Walter
A. Davis
Tabloid Justice
Stephen
Hendricks
God's Kind of Men
Poets'
Basement
Albert, LaMorticella and Ford
November
26, 2004
Peter
Feng
Gavin Newsom: Man or Machine?
Greg
Moses
It's the White Vote, Stupid
Liaquat
Ali Khan
The Devil's Work: Bush's Minority Appointments
Michael
Mandel / Gail Davidson
Why Bush Should Be Banned from Canada: a Memo to the Ministry
of Immigration
Dave
Lindorff
Nation of Sheep, Turkey of an Election: Urkrainians Show the
Way
Gary
Corseri
When Black Friday Comes...
Paul
Craig Roberts
Whatever Happened to Conservatives?
Website
of the Day
Iraq Pipeline Watch
November
25, 2004
Willliam
Loren Katz
Giving Thanks to Whom?: "Thanks
to God We Sent 600 Heathen Souls to Hell Today"
Mitchel
Cohen
Why I Hate Thanksgiving
Mike
Ferner
An Uncommon Mom
November
24, 2004
Gila
Svirsky
License to Kill: the Example of Violence
is Set by the State
Winslow
T. Wheeler
The
Other Mess in Congress
Christopher
Brauchli
The Company He Keeps: the Syndicate of Tom Delay
Dave
Lindorff
Double Standards on Exit Polls: Hypocrisy Sans Irony
Ron
Jacobs
The Occupation of Iraq is the Root of t he Problem
Ken
Sengupta
Witnesses: War Crimes in Fallujah
Diana
Barahona
The Final Holocaust or Why I Voted for Ralph Nader
John
L. Hess
Safire the Shameless
Jason
Leopold
Did Harvard Hire (Another) War Criminal?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Mark of McCain: the Senator Most Likely to Start a Nuclear
War
Map
of the Day
Now and Then: 2004 v. 1860
November
23, 2004
Forrest
Hylton
Bush and Uribe at the Beach
November
22, 2004
Dave
Zirin
Fight Night in the NBA: Selective Outrage
in Detroit
Paul
Craig Roberts
On to Iran: We Won't Get Fooled Again?
Michael
Mandel / Gail Davidson
Why Bush Should be Banned from Canada
Kathie
Helmkamp
Our Son: a Marine Who Won't Kill
Ken
Sengupta
The Triangle of Death: "This is Now the Most Dangerous Place
in Iraq"
Mike
Whitney
Greenspan's Hammer
Roger
Burbach
Why They Hate Bush in Chile
Website
of the Day
Fed Up with Government Lies and Corporate Spin?
November
20 / 21, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
The Poisoned Chalice
Todd
May
Religion, the Election and the Politics of Fear
Abbas
Ahmed Ibrahim
The Horrors of Fallujah: a First-Hand Account
Kevin
Zeese
Mishandling Nader
Landau
/ Hassen
After Arafat
Tom
Barry
The Vulcans Consolidate Power: The Rise of Stephen Hadley
Fred
Gardner
Pot Shots: Ask Dr. Todd
Justin
E.H. Smith
Triumph of the Will: the Sequel
Carl
Estabrook
Where We Are Now
Gary
Leupp
Imperial History-Making vs. Reality-Based Thought: a Dialogue
Dave
Lindorff
Apocalypse Soon
Jenna
Michelle Liut
Plans Colombia and Patriota: Wanton Wastes of Money, Manpower
and Lives
Mickey
Z.
The Granma Moses of Radical Writing: an Interview with William
Blum
Greg
Moses
The Same Old Struggle Against Imperial America
Sharon
Smith
Abortion Rights and the Election: What Now?
Ron
Jacobs
Sandwiches and Car Bombs
Ben
Tripp
Raising d'Etre: Finding Money in Hollywood These Days
Richard
Oxman
Basketbrawl Two Pointer: Iraq Rules!
Gilad
Atzmon
Politics and Jazz
Poets'
Basement
LaMorticella, Albert, Ford, & Anon.
Website
of the Day
Voice of the Forest
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
January 12, 2005
Down the Memory Hole
Hearts
and Minds, Revisited
By
MARK CHMIEL and ANDREW WIMMER
The ultimate victory will depend
on the hearts and minds
of the people who actually live out there.
--Lyndon Johnson, on Vietnam
There is no peace because there
are no peacemakers. There are no makers of peace because the
making of peace is at least as costly as the making of war
as least as exigent, at least as disruptive, at least as liable
to bring disgrace and prison and death in its wake.
--Daniel Berrigan, on the peace
movement
In the months before the election, there
was a lot of talk about the Vietnam War, some concerning where
George W. Bush had been during that time, some dealing with what
John Kerry had done, both in Vietnam and back at home. At the
Democratic Convention, John Kerry declared himself proud to have
served in Vietnam-consigning to Orwell's memory hole his post-war
activism against the war. In a campaign where he had to be seen
as strong to rival Bush's macho (yet fumbling) discourse, Kerry
conveniently let that conscientious part of his own past slip
away. (That "forgetting" is at least congruent with
his support of the current war in Iraq and his enthusiasm not
to withdraw but to stay and win.) And, of course, Kerry uttered
the infamous non sequitor that even if he had known there
were no WMD beforehand, he would still have gone into Iraq had
he been President.
Gore Vidal's apt subtitle for
his latest book is "Reflections
on the United States of Amnesia." John Kerry wanted
to be the Commander in Chief of this land of Amnesiacs, and he
certainly offered himself as role model for abject forgetting.
Much nonsense was spewed forth
at both ends of the political spectrum with each trying to trump
the other when it came to proving militarist bona fides.
The press can never resist a good martial tune, and so we all
pretended, for what we told ourselves would be just a moment,
that an illegal invasion and immoral occupation could be set
right by a few more troops and better armor on the Bradley Fighting
Vehicles. The price we will pay for this collective amnesia
will be enormous, though we have only begun to see the faint
outline of its contours.
A stirring antidote to such
amnesia is the 1974 Oscar-winning documentary by director Peter
Davis, Hearts and Minds. Each semester in his Social
Justice theology course at Saint Louis University Mark shows
his students this film, which has been recently reissued in
the Criterion series on DVD. Some students, in their early twenties, share
observations of how hard it is for their relatives fathers
and uncles, mostly to speak about their experience in Vietnam.
Some have testified that these men, now in their fifties and
sixties, are still suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
For them, and their families, the Vietnam War is not yet over,
there is not yet healing. The war lives on, enfleshed yet mostly
mute, and still dreadful, with a new generation.
And yet hardly a week goes
by that we don't come across-in newscasts, on the Internet, in
newspapers-a pious invocation of our efforts to win Iraqi "hearts
and minds," harking back to Vietnam, and willfully forgetting
that our military efforts there (where we learned to "destroy
the village in order to save it") killed 3.5 million Vietnamese
before they came to an end.
This year's political campaigning
allowed Americans to indulge in one of our favorite cultural
pastimes, playing the impartial observer, interested only in
sitting back and hearing both sides of every issue. It appeals
to our American sense of fairness at the same time that it absolves
us of ever taking responsibility for what is being done in our
name.
Truth is, Hearts and Minds
isn't about two sides, you see that there were so many sides
and perspectives, American, French, and Vietnamese. Hearts
and Minds has a lot of interviews and segments with U.S.
soldiers, both on the ground in Vietnam, as well as after they've
returned, triumphant, as in the case of Lt. George Coker, a POW
hero, or Eddie Sowders, who went AWOL, and turned himself in
after a hard life underground. Of course, you have to see and
hear these men in the whole context of the film, but they offer
some reflections that are something more than just a history
lesson about the 1960s and 70s.
Here is how Sergeant William
Marshall puts it:
You know, you let us all go
off to war and said, "Yea, team," you know, "fight
in Vietnam," and all this kind of shit, in 1965 through
1968. Now 1968 comes along, and it's "Boo, team, come on
home," and all this shit, you know, "and don't say
nothing about it, because we don't wanna hear about it, because
it's upsetting around dinner time, you know." Well, goddamn,
it upset me for a whole goddamned year; it upset a lot of people
to the point where they're fucking dead, you know, and all this
shit. Now you don't wanna hear about it, well I'll tell you about
it everyday, make you sit down and puke in your dinner, you dig,
because you got me over there, and now you done brought me back
here, and you wanna forget it, so somebody else can go do it
somewhere else? Hell no, nuh-huh, you're gonna hear it all, everyday,
as long as you live, because, hey, it's gonna be with me as
long as I live, when I get up in the morning, when John gets
up in the morning, when a lot of dudes that's sitting around
here, their gut hurts cause they got shot there. I gotta put
on an arm and a leg because it ain't there no more, you dig.
And my man here has got a hole in his stomach, he can't work
right, you know. Now you do something about that, make that all
disappear, you dig, you know, make it all go away with the six
o'clock news, turn it off, you know or switch it to another channel
and all that shit. The hell with that, you dig, it's here, it's
for real, and it's gonna happen again unless these folks just
get up off their ass and realize that it has happened.
Beginning November 8th, just
a few short days after the election of George W. Bush to a second
term as president, and with hardly a peep from anyone in the
United States, the city of Fallujah was first cordoned off, then
systematically emptied of its nearly 300,000 residents (with
few in the press ever wondering where they might have gone) and
finally reduced to rubble.
The Boston Globe's Anne
Barnard was embedded with a task force from the Army's 1st Infantry
Division in Fallujah. As American forces besieged the city,
Lieutenant Colonel Paul Newell told her, 'This is the first time
since World War II that someone has turned an American armored
task force loose in a city with no restrictions." After
two weeks of assault, Barnard writes:
Captain Paul Fowler sat on
the curb next to a deserted gas station. Behind him, smoke rose
over Fallujah. His company of tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles
had roamed the eastern third of the city for 13 days, shooting
holes in every building that might pose a threat, leaving behind
a landscape of half-collapsed houses and factories singed with
soot.
''I really hate that it had
to be destroyed. But that was the only way to root these guys
out," said Fowler, 33, the son of a Baptist preacher in
North Carolina. ''The only way to root them out is to destroy
everything in your path."
In a piece that appeared in
CounterPunch in late December, Mike Whitney fills in some
of the details:
The results have been devastating.
Over 250,000 people have been expelled from their homes and the
city has been laid to waste. The US military targeted the three
main water treatment plants, the electrical grid and the sewage
treatment plant; leaving Fallujans without any of the basic services
they'll need to return to a normal life.
Most of the city's mosques
have been either destroyed or seriously damaged and entire areas
of the city where the fighting was most fierce have been effectively
razed to the ground.
So far, the army has only removed
the dead bodies from the streets; leaving countless decomposed
corpses inside the ruined buildings. A large percentage of these
have been devoured by packs of scavenging dogs. The stench of
death is reported to be overpowering.
This was the destruction of
the city in order to save it, carried out in broad daylight,
a brazen "fuck you"? (Last spring the words were scrawled
by a Marine on the bridge where the bodies of the 4 contract
workers had been hung. More recently, Fallujans returning to
examine the rubble have found similar slogans. )
Twenty-four hours before the
siege began, Globe reporter Barnard was sitting in on
a military strategy session when she wrote:
''The first time you get shot
at from a building, it's rubble," Capt. Paul Fowler told
his platoon leaders. ''No questions asked."
Suspected enemy buildings were
to be ''cleared by fire" before troops entered. ''No boots
on the ground unless you're looking for body parts," Fowler
said.
One short week later she was
writing:
Corporal Martin Szewczyk surveyed
families' blankets and snapshots strewn on the floor by troops
looking for weapons. ''I feel bad," he said. ''These were
poor people."
''I think it's going to get
hotter for a while, when people come back and see what we did,"
said Specialist Todd Taylor, 21.
Thirty years ago, Randy Floyd
was a bombardier, just back from having completed 98 bombing
missions in Vietnam. When we first meet him early in the documentary
Hearts and Minds, he talks about his upbringing and the
prelude to his decision to join the military:
I'm from Duncan, Oklahoma,
which is about ninety miles south of here. And I've lived around
several places: Missouri, Chicago, Detroit, Germany. By the time
I got out of high school, I was very conservative. At Duncan
High School we had bought, the high school had bought, a John
Birch package on Communism, so we studied Communism via the John
Birch Society, with the big red map with the flowing out of the
disease and learned how Karl Marx was a very cruel man and used
to make his family suffer and so forth. So when I got out of
high school, I thought basically that Teddy Roosevelt was what
this country needed and FDR kind of sold us down the drain to
the Commies.
Later we see and hear Floyd
describing his reason for being in Vietnam, and what he loves
about flying aircraft:
It can be described much like
a singer doing an aria, he's totally into what he's doing, he's
totally feeling it, he knows the aria, and he's experiencing
the aria, and he knows his limits, and he knows whether he's
doing it and doing it well. Flying an aircraft can be a great
deal like that. You can tell when the aircraft feels just right,
you can tell it's about to stall. I can tell where I can't pull
another fraction of a pound, or the airplane will stall and flip
out and spin on me. I would follow a little pathway on something
like a TV screen in front of me that would direct me right, left
or center, follow the steering, keep the steering symbol centered,
I'd see a little attack light when we'd step into attack. I could
pull the commit switch on my stick and the computer took over,
the computer figured out the ballistics, the air speed, the slant
range, and dropped the bombs when we got to the appropriate point,
in whichever kind of attack we'd selected, whether it be flying
straight and level, or tossing our bombs out. So, it was very
much a technical expertise thing, I was a good pilot, I had a
lot of pride in my ability to fly.
Back in April, when Fallujah
came under siege for the first time by American troops in explicit
and angry retaliation for the brutal killing of four American
contract workers, Tony Perry, an embedded reporter for the Los
Angeles Times, wrote a story entitled "Snipers are Strategic
Weapons in Fallujah." His account captures (and glorifies)
some of the same spirit of the noble warrior committed to his
craft.
Taking a short breather, the
21-year-old Marine corporal explained what it is like to practice
his lethal skill in the battle for this city.
While official policy discourages
Marines from keeping a personal count of people they have killed,
the custom continues. In nearly two weeks of conflict here, the
corporal from a Midwestern city has emerged as the top sniper,
with 24 confirmed kills. By comparison, the top Marine Corps
sniper in Vietnam killed 103 people in 16 months.
''It's a sniper's dream,"
he said last week in polite, matter-of-fact tones. ''You can
go anywhere, and there are so many ways to fire at the enemy
without him knowing where you are.
''Sometimes a guy will go down,
and I'll let him scream a bit to destroy the morale of his buddies,"
the Marine corporal said, ''then I'll use a second shot."
''As a sniper your goal is
to completely demoralize the enemy," said the corporal,
who played football and ran track in high school and dreams of
becoming a high school coach. ''I couldn't have asked to be in
a better place. I just got lucky: to be here at the right time
and with the right training."
Writing during the same week
last April, but from a perspective that makes her less sanguine
about the sniper's art, humanitarian aid worker Jo Wilding made
this entry in her online blog immediately after a harrowing trip
from Baghdad to bring supplies to the besieged city:
We pile the stuff in the corridor
and the boxes are torn open straightaway, the blankets most welcomed.
It's not a hospital at all but a clinic, a private doctor's surgery
treating people free since air strikes destroyed the town's main
hospital. Another has been improvised in a car garage. There's
no anaesthetic. The blood bags are in a drinks fridge and the
doctors warm them up under the hot tap in an unhygienic toilet.
Screaming women come in, praying,
slapping their chests and faces. Ummi, my mother, one cries.
I hold her until Maki, a consultant and acting director of the
clinic, brings me to the bed where a child of about ten is lying
with a bullet wound to the head. A smaller child is being treated
for a similar injury in the next bed. A US sniper hit them and
their grandmother as they left their home to flee Falluja.
The lights go out, the fan
stops and in the sudden quiet someone holds up the flame of a
cigarette lighter for the doctor to carry on operating by. The
electricity to the town has been cut off for days and when the
generator runs out of petrol they just have to manage till it
comes back on. Dave quickly donates his torch. The children are
not going to live.
"Come," says Maki
and ushers me alone into a room where an old woman has just had
an abdominal bullet wound stitched up. Another in her leg is
being dressed, the bed under her foot soaked with blood, a white
flag still clutched in her hand and the same story: I was leaving
my home to go to Baghdad when I was hit by a US sniper. Some
of the town is held by US marines, other parts by the local fighters.
Their homes are in the US controlled area and they are adamant
that the snipers were US marines.
Meanwhile, Perry concludes
his piece in the Los Angeles Times:
Unlike most Marines, the sniper
sees his enemy before killing him. The enemy has a face. Most
combatants get only a glimpse of their enemies. The distance
is too great, the spray of bullets too rapid. But the sniper,
with time to set up his shot, sees his victim more clearly through
a powerful scope: Their faces, their eyes, the weapons in their
hands. And their expression when the bullet hits "their
center mass."
"You have to have a combat
mind-set," said the corporal. Unlike other infantry troops,
the sniper thus has a greater confidence that his shot is not
as likely to hit a civilian or a "friendly." Witnesses
inside Fallujah claim that many of the more than 600 Iraqis believed
killed in the city during the siege have been non-combatants,
including a large number of women and children.
The corporal hopes to get back
home by late fall in time to take his girlfriend to a college
football game and go deer hunting with his father. "When
I go hunting for whitetail, it's for food and sport," he
said. "Here, when I go hunting, it's personal, very personal."
In the spring of 1971, John
Kerry made something of a name for himself as the young Vietnam
vet who appeared before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
and spoke from his heart, recounting the horrors that burdened
him and thousands of his fellow veterans:
The country doesn't know it
yet, but it has created a monster, a monster in the form of millions
of men who have been taught to deal and to trade in violence,
and who are given the chance to die for the biggest nothing in
history; men who have returned with a sense of anger and a sense
of betrayal which no one has yet grasped.
We saw Vietnam ravaged equally
by American bombs as well as by search and destroy missions,
as well as by Vietcong terrorism, and yet we listened while this
country tried to blame all of the havoc on the Viet Cong.
We rationalized destroying
villages in order to save them. We saw America lose her sense
of morality as she accepted very coolly a My Lai and refused
to give up the image of American soldiers who hand out chocolate
bars and chewing gum.
We learned the meaning of free
fire zones, shooting anything that moves, and we watched while
America placed a cheapness on the lives of Orientals.
We watched the U.S. falsification
of body counts, in fact the glorification of body counts. We
listened while month after month we were told the back of the
enemy was about to break. We fought using weapons against "Oriental
human beings," with quotation marks around that. We fought
using weapons against those people which I do not believe this
country would dream of using were we fighting in the European
theater or let us say a non-third-world people theater
Over the Thanksgiving holiday,
traditionally a slow news period in the U.S., headlines appeared
in the European press revealing the use of "mysterious weapons"
in Fallujah with reports coming from a number of sources of artillery
rounds that created screens of fire that could not be extinguished
with water and of "melted bodies." Paul Gilfeather,
political editor for London's Daily Mirror wrote:
U.S .troops are secretly using
outlawed napalm gas to wipe out remaining insurgents in and around
Fallujah. News that President George W. Bush has sanctioned the
use of napalm, a deadly cocktail of polystyrene and jet fuel
banned by the United Nations in 1980, will stun governments around
the world.
The story went largely unreported
in the United States, however, perhaps because the use of napalm
by U. S. troops during the war's initial assault on Baghdad in
the spring of 2003 had already been at first denied, then spun,
and finally vanished down the memory hole. Andrew Bunscombe,
writing in August 2003 for The Independent (again, a British
paper), tells the story:
American pilots dropped the
controversial incendiary agent napalm on Iraqi troops during
the advance on Baghdad. The attacks caused massive fireballs
that obliterated several Iraqi positions.
The Pentagon denied using napalm
at the time, but Marine pilots and their commanders have confirmed
that they used an upgraded version of the weapon against dug-in
positions. They said napalm, which has a distinctive smell, was
used because of its psychological effect on an enemy.
A 1980 UN convention banned
the use against civilian targets of napalm, a terrifying mixture
of jet fuel and polystyrene that sticks to skin as it burns.
The US, which did not sign the treaty, is one of the few countries
that makes use of the weapon. It was employed notoriously against
both civilian and military targets in the Vietnam War.
The upgraded weapon, which
uses kerosene rather than petrol, was used in March and April,
when dozens of napalm bombs were dropped near bridges over the
Saddam Canal and the Tigris River, south of Baghdad.
"We napalmed both those
[bridge] approaches," said Colonel James Alles, commander
of Marine Air Group 11. "Unfortunately there were people
there ... you could see them in the [cockpit] video. They were
Iraqi soldiers. It's no great way to die. The generals love napalm.
It has a big psychological effect."
At the time, the Pentagon insisted the report was untrue. "We
completed destruction of our last batch of napalm on 4 April,
2001," it said.
[But] the Pentagon said it
had not tried to deceive. It drew a distinction between traditional
napalm, first invented in 1942, and the weapons dropped in Iraq,
which it calls Mark 77 firebombs. They weigh 510 lbs, and consist
of 44 lbs of polystyrene-like gel and 63 gallons of jet fuel.
Officials said that if journalists
had asked about the firebombs their use would have been confirmed.
A spokesman admitted they were "remarkably similar"
to napalm but said they caused less environmental damage.
Our attachment to napalm is
a long one, with each war affording an opportunity for product
enhancement. Here is an American pilot talking about the joys
of napalm while America was attempting to "liberate"
Vietnam:
"We sure are pleased with
those backroom boys at Dow. The original product wasn't so hot
if the gooks were quick they could scrape it off. So the
boys started adding polystyrene now it sticks like shit
to a blanket. But then if the gooks jumped under water it stopped
burning, so they added Willie Peter [white phosphorus] so's to
make it burn better. It'll even burn under water now. And just
one drop is enough, it'll keep on burning right down to the bone
so they die anyway from phosphorus poisoning."
Glenn Chapman, a chemical engineer
who worked in military engineering at the Lincoln and
Draper Labs at MIT commented in the course of lecture recently,
"I've said that I'm not in a position to offer any general
moral guidelines, but at that time it seemed clear to me that
if I had to choose, rather than work as a chemical engineer for
Dow, it would be better to make a living selling heroin to schoolchildren."
Let's go back to Hearts
and Minds. About an hour and a half into the film, we return
to a reflective Randy Floyd, sitting on his porch:
During the missions, after
the missions, the result of what I was doing, the result of this
game, and this exercise of my technical expertise, never really
dawned on me. That reality of the screams or the people blown
away, or their homeland being destroyed, just was not a part
of what I thought about We as Americans have never experienced
that, we've never experienced any kind of devastation. When I
was there, I never saw a child that got burned by napalm. I didn't
drop napalm but I dropped things just as bad. I dropped CBUs,
which can't destroy anything, it's meant for people, it's an
anti-personnel weapon. We used to drop canister upon canister
of these things with two hundred tumbling little balls in there
about this big around with about 600 pellets in each ball that
would blow out as soon as it hit the ground and shred people
to pieces. They couldn't be gotten out in many cases. People
would suffer; they would live, but they would suffer, often they
would die afterwards. This would cause people to have to take
care of them.
But I look at my children
now. And I don't know what would happen, what I would think about-if
someone napalmed them.
After a minute of pained silence,
the interviewer asks Floyd, "Do you think we've learned
anything from all this?"
I think we're trying not to.
I think I'm trying not to, sometimes. I can't even cry
easily, from my manhood image. I think Americans have tried,
we've all tried very hard to escape what we've learned in Vietnam,
to not come to the logical conclusions of what's happened there.
The military does the same thing. They don't realize that people
fighting for their own freedom are not going to be stopped by
just changing your tactics, you know, adding a little more sophisticated
technology over here, improving the tactics we used last time,
not making quite the same mistakes, you know I think history
operates a little different than that. I think those kind of
forces are not going to be stopped. I think Americans have worked
extremely hard not to see the criminality that their officials
and their policy makers have exhibited.
It seems, though, that for
the most part the work of forgetting is not really all that hard.
Winning hearts and minds is what it's all about. All about
being American. It's what we do. Exporting democracy, liberating
others from life under tyrants, winning hearts and minds. It's
the American dream writ large. It pervades our thinking, and
it endures as our favorite self-image, despite all we've ever
heard or learned since Vietnam. (Or perhaps precisely because
of what we've heard!) We are good people who perennially and
universally do good things.
A few weeks back, as most of
America was engaged in holiday celebrations, the Australian Broadcasting
Company carried this story on its website:
About 8,000 people have been
admitted to the former rebel bastion of Fallujah in the four
days since residents were allowed in to assess the damage from
last month's military offensive, a US spokesman said on Monday.
With most of the city badly
damaged in last month's ferocious street battles, the US-backed
Iraqi Government is allowing residents back in to view their
homes one neighbourhood at a time.
He stressed that while some
of those admitted had opted to stay in the city, most had left
after viewing their homes.
Residents have lined up at
checkpoints around Fallujah, gripping their identification papers,
as they seek to head home after months of violence that climaxed
in last month's US-led assault.
"I passed through very
complex procedures before entering the city, U.S. soldiers took
my fingerprints and checked my eyes, and then asked for more
than one document to prove that I am resident of Hay Al Andalus
in Fallujah," 30-year-old Mohamed Jaleel told the Chinese
news agency Xinhua. "I found my house was completely ruined
and I do not know what to do or how to bring my family because
the city is not livable and most of houses were destroyed and
the city lacks basic services," he said.
This same story was recounted
with details of numbing similarity by most everyone to whom reporters
spoke.
"When I returned, I found
four corpses, and I told U.S. forces and the Iraqi National Guards,
but no one paid attention to me. I had to drag them out of the
ruin and put them in the street," 33-year-old Shafeeq Mehdi
said. "I cannot take my family to the house, because all
the furniture is destroyed and the city lacks services, in addition
to my frustrated spirit after I had seen horrible and sad scenes
in the city, which became a ghost city," he said.
"Would Allah want us to
return to a city that animals can't live in?" said Yasser
Satar as he saw his destroyed home. "Even animals who have
no human sense and feelings cannot live here," he said,
crying. "What do they want from Fallujah? This is the crime
of the century. They want to destroy Islam and Muslims. But our
anger and resistance will increase."
62-year-old Nasir Hamdan said
that he had experienced many battles and seen a lot of tragedies,
but he had never seen such destruction and ruin as that in Fallujah.
"I would rather stay in a tent than to stay in a ruined
city with only U.S. soldiers and dogs roaming around the city,
and I would endure cold and hunger rather than entering such
a city."
"We are three brothers
and all of us have lost our homes. I really don't know how we
will start our life again inside this city. I have decided to
search for a place in the capital because this city cannot offer
a minimum of living conditions for a year. It's a complete disaster,"
Abbas Jumailli, a father of five preparing to leave Fallujah,
told IRIN with anger in his eyes.
And, finally, this account
from Yasser Abbas Atiya, who though he had sworn he would rather
"sleep on the streets of his beloved hometown of Fallouja"
than stay in the squalid Baghdad shelter, had seen enough within
thirty minutes of his return. He left in disgust with no plans
to go back:
"I couldn't stand it,"
the grocer said. "I was born in that town. I know every
inch of it. But when I got there, I didn't recognize it. I thought,
'This is not my town,' " Atiya said Tuesday after going
back to the abandoned Baghdad clinic his family shares with nearly
100 other displaced Falloujans. "How can I take my family
to live there?"
As Atiya and his brothers traveled
through the city and saw the destruction, they braced for the
worst. When he caught a glimpse of his roof, Atiya's first emotion
was relief. The house was still there.
As they drew closer, however,
Atiya and his brothers began to curse. A gaping hole in the two-story
house appeared to have been caused by a tank, whose tracks were
visible in the mud, he said. Most of the furniture was smashed.
"Half my house was demolished," Atiya said.
In the kitchen, cabinets had
been ripped from the walls, he said. Others were emptied of their
contents, which lay in heaps on the floor.
"Every dish was broken,
every cup, every plate, as if someone had just stood there breaking
one dish after another," said Atiya's brother Raaid Abbas,
37. "Why?"
The brothers don't know who
ransacked the house, but they blame American troops, who they
say left muddy boot prints.
At this point, it may be instructive
to turn to some photographs taken by residents of Fallujah who
returned recently to survey their homes and to search for loved
ones. The pictures they took, before corpses were buried, have
been anxiously shared among other refugees from the city who
have not been able to return to see for themselves.
http://tinyurl.com/7y7he
Grim statistics that health
care workers have begun to compile these past couple of weeks
are now available. Early reports provide data from only the
first six of Fallujah's twenty-seven residential neighborhoods
to which residents have returned thus far:
Emergency teams from the Fallujah
Hospital have recovered 700 bodies of Iraqis from the ruins of
houses destroyed in the US offensive on the city. Among the 700
bodies were 504 bodies of women and children; the rest elderly
and middle aged men.
Dr. Tamir Salih al-'Ani, who
is in charge of the morgue in Fallujah General Hospital has reported
that emergency teams from the Fallujah Hospital have recovered
700 bodies of Iraqis from the ruins of houses destroyed in the
course of the US aggressors' offensive on the city. Dr. Salih
confirmed that among the 700 bodies were 504 bodies of women
and children. The rest are the bodies of elderly and middle aged
men.
Dr. Salih explained that the
bodies were dug out from the ruins on the streets of Fallujah,
recovered from rooftops, and dug out of gardens. Many of the
dead perished in barbarous ways, their bodies burned by American
chemical weapons.
By contrast, United States
military officials were offering this more upbeat assessment
in the aftermath of the siege:
"We are attacking reconstruction
efforts with the same grit, sweat and determination used to eliminate
the malicious threat posed by the terrorists and insurgents,"
said Lt. Col. Dan Wilson, deputy operations officer of the 1st
Marine Expeditionary Force in Fallujah. "We want to help
the residents, so they will be able to live in peace and enjoy
the privilege of voting in the upcoming elections."
Military officials expressed
sympathy with the plight of returning residents but said the
blame should rest with militants who took control of the city
and continued to hide among the population.
"Our forces never intentionally
damage structures or homes," said Wilson, the deputy operations
officer. "After all, we, in partnership with the interim
Iraqi government, will be at the forefront of assisting in the
restoration and cleanup of Falluja."
Michael Ware, Baghdad bureau
chief for Time magazine, who has been in Fallujah during
the fighting said "the name of the game is deny the population
to the insurgents. That's what we're trying to do, win hearts
and minds. But we're not winning them."
But there are signs that among
the more candid, the language of "hearts and minds"
has already given way to a naked realpolitik that offers
no such pretense. General George W. Casey, the commander-in-chief
of coalition forces in Iraq, told an embedded reporter for The
Economist, "Our broad intent is to keep pressure on
the insurgents as we head into elections. This is not about
winning hearts and minds; we're not going to do that here in
Iraq. It's about giving Iraqis the opportunity to govern themselves."
Casey's comment appears in the context of a story that reports
on daily life under U.S. occupation:
In Ramadi, the capital of central
Anbar province, where 17 suicide-bombs struck American forces
during the month-long Muslim fast of Ramadan in the autumn, the
marines are jumpy. Sometimes, they say, they fire on vehicles
encroaching within 30 metres, sometimes they fire at 20 metres:
"If anyone gets too close to us we fucking waste them,"
says a bullish lieutenant. "It's kind of a shame, because
it means we've killed a lot of innocent peopleIt gets to a point
where you can't wait to see guys with guns, so you start shooting
everybody...It gets to a point where you don't mind the bad stuff
you do."
"Sometimes it works in
the insurgents' favour," admits Rick Sims, a chief warrant
officer. "Because by the time we've shot up the neighbourhood,
then the guys have torn up a few houses, they're four blocks
away, and we just end up pissing off the locals."
On Monday, January 17, we as
a nation will remember the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King,
Jr. Politicians and government officials will weigh in and selectively
quote the Baptist preacher (recalling Shakespeare's line that
"the devil can cite Scripture for his purpose"). They
will necessarily be selective because even the Nobel Peace Prize-winning
King must be consigned to the memory hole. Sure, King's "I
have a dream" rhetoric will be repeated from coast to coast,
but the King who was a relentless critic of the Vietnam War will
not be cited, invoked, or praised by the architects and cheerleaders
of the current war for the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.
So, on the King holiday, meditate on these incendiary lines,
not likely to be part of a sound-bite on a television newscast
near you:
We are at the moment when our lives must be placed on the line
if our nation is to survive its own folly. Every man of humane
convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions,
but we must all protest.
Now there is something seductively
tempting about stopping there and sending us all off on what
in some circles has become a popular crusade against the war
in Vietnam. I say we must enter the struggle, but I wish to go
on now to say something even more disturbing.
The war in Vietnam is but a
symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and
if we ignore this sobering reality we will find ourselves organizing
"clergy and laymen concerned" committees for the next
generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala and Peru.
They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will
be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching
for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without
end unless there is a significant and profound change in American
life and policy. So such thoughts take us beyond Vietnam, but
not beyond our calling as sons of the living God. I am convinced
that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution,
we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We
must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to
a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit
motives and property rights are considered more important than
people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and
militarism are incapable of being conquered.
Recall Sergeant William Marshall
who presciently noted in Hearts and Minds, "it's
gonna happen again unless these folks just get up off their ass
and realize that it has happened." Fallujah has happened.
And how and where shall we place our lives on the line this
time?
Additional photographs: http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/
Mark Chmiel and Andrew Wimmer teach at
Saint Louis University and work with the Center for Theology
and Social Analysis (www.ctsastl.org).
They can be reached at: wimmera@slu.edu
Weekend Edition
Features for November
27 / 28, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Torture & Neo-Liberalism with
Sycorax in Iraq
Alexander
Cockburn
What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa?
Fred
Gardner
Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court
Kathy
Kelly
What We Can Control
Diane
Christian
The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts"
Gary
Leupp
One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea
Lenni
Brenner
Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York
Times
Ron
Jacobs
Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of
the AMS Clerics
Joshua
Frank
An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd
Toni
Solo
The Murder of Danilo Anderson
Saul
Landau
Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are
No Cure for Homophobia
Justin
Taylor
Empire's Lawless Opportunities
Amos
Harel
The Case of Captain R.
Walter
A. Davis
Tabloid Justice
Stephen
Hendricks
God's Kind of Men
Poets'
Basement
Albert, LaMorticella and Ford
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