Tag Archives: Soldiers

That’s how many Black Hawk Down?

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COLO. SPRINGS- A spectacular migration of Army attack helicopters traversed the city sky yesterday, flying south to Ft Carson where they will catch trains to faraway winter fear-breeding grounds in the news.
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It took only one Black Hawk Down to terminate US ground operations in Somalia. If you’re hoping such a milestone could be a benchmark for Iraq or Afghanistan, unfortunately “hawk” also denotes the plurality. How many Black Hawk have to go down before Americans cry uncle? This week we are nearer to finding out.

I know I’m mixing Apaches with Chinooks, but I’m grouping all multi-million-dollar vertical-flight aircraft together obviously to note that the US lost three over the weekend in Afghanistan, with a commensurate record setting loss of US soldiers. Which will prove the more alarming?

Earlier in the week, Brazilian paramilitary forces lost a helicopter in a gunfight over a Rio slum, where a war is suspected to have been declared on the poor in preparations for the 2016 Olympics. The significance of sophisticated weaponry downed by common insurgency tactics is not going uncelebrated.

Isn’t it interesting how the official reaction, whether you’re a spokesman for the Brazilian military or Israel’s is to deny any possibility that the aircraft might have been struck by enemy fire? Uniformly that it the denial, which almost always proves untrue. As if even the cause of the crash matters. What’s probably critical to military strategists is that opponents not receive accurate feedback about the effectiveness of whatever tactics they used.

Meaning armchair strategists have no reliable information to go on, other than to keep a tally.

Armed UAS drones need no defending

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Predator Unmanned Attack VehicleI was curious about the etymology of the term “drone” applied to military (& DHS) Unmanned Aerial Surveillance aircraft, these days, mostly Armed. Obviously Armed UAS are not named after the stingless unproductive bees whose task it is to impregnate the queen, nor lazy idlers, nor clueless computer sales techies, nor thankless menial worker drones. Anyone who’s been around Radio Controlled model planes knows drones are named for the sound they make, a steady drone as they labor across the sky. While military aerial surveillance predates the Wright Brothers, and RC model airplanes have been around for half that time, it took the advent of asymmetric warfare to open the window to military drones. Their constant buzz offering the most intractable reason.

By “asymmetric” I do not mean the US intelligence code for off-textbook warfare, for counter-insurgency methods outside von Clausewitz etiquette. I mean the inherency they obscure, war between foes lopsided.

Look at a drone’s design. It’s more Gossamer Condor than military aircraft. Obviously an unmanned vehicle comprises fewer mechanical systems because it doesn’t need to propel, nor sustain, a crew of human beings. It might need less armature for the same reason, except of course, today’s drones are of high value in their own right. So why no armament?

Why too, no powerful jet engines or swept wings for aeronautic superiority? This drone looks about as robust as a paper glider. Laymen can distinguish bombers from jet fighters, as they can trucks from a race cars. I’d say the military drone resembles more a stick insect than its accidental namesake the bee. Do Armed UASs have no need for evasive maneuver capability?

I’ll ask another obvious question, why do drones carry no customary insignia designating to whose side it belongs? In particular this element would be of primary importance when encountered by other aircraft.

But a drone doesn’t encounter enemy aircraft, nor allied aircraft who might confuse it for belonging to an adversary, because drones operate where aerial supremacy is already absolute. The key to a drone’s military usefulness is that there is no opponent to shoot it down.

An Armed UAS can drone all it wants, taking its sweet time laying siege to defenseless objectives and other targets of opportunity. The US Predator or Reaper models can glide when they want to surveil in silence, although otherwise their motors project their presence with the deliberate imposition of a school hall monitor. It is more efficient to deter the placing of IEDs than to try to catch insurgents in the act.

Meanwhile all civilians are terrorized by the sound, associating it with sudden, unpredictable and often unjustified destruction and death.

The WWII German Stuka dive bomber had inverted gull wings which were thought to produce a horrifying wail as the notorious aircraft attacked city populations, Guernica among them. In fact the sound was produced by a siren the Nazis called Jericho’s Trumpet, mounted purposefully to spread fear on the ground. Like modern drones, the Stuka were not designed to fend off attackers from the sky.

Before the fighter planes of WWI, artillery spotters would rise in balloons to survey the enemy trenches. From these tethered balloons, artillery strikes could be directed with increasing accuracy. These remote eyes in the sky were the rudiments of aerial surveillance, the precursors to today’s Armed UAS. The balloons were manned obviously, and they weren’t armed, but the spotters they held aloft were despised much as drones are today. When WWI biplanes eventually came along to pick off the balloonists like sitting ducks, the soldiers in the trenches were jubilant.

When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, the Taliban had been fortified by the US military. We’d helped the Taliban destabilize the region, to force Russia’s hand in rushing to restore order to its southern neighbor. We wanted to draw the Russian troops in before we assisted the Afghan insurgency with the real weapons it needed to combat their invaders’ superior fire power. When Bin Laden’s Mujihadeen and the Taliban got US Stinger Missiles, the Russians could no longer deploy their helicopter gunships with impunity and the end drew near.

Eventually whoever drew the US into its war on Islam, is going to start distributing the means to take the US out. It might be Stinger Missiles or a modern equivalent. Eventually someone will develop sympathy for the victimized Muslims of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Gaza (add Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, etc) and help them flick the killer drones from the sky.

Would attacking the drones provide retribution enough, knowing that the real operators are safe in virtual cockpit command centers located safely within US homeland borders. Would it be sufficient to keep clearing the skies of drones, or will our victims have to weed US drones from the roots?

Will the drones prove as easily replaceable as GIs? The American Public keeps count of its lost soldiers, but in no way has this stanched the flow of fresh reinforcements. We do not count expended ordnance, or expensive equipment fallen casualty. Would such tallies discourage the war mongers or encourage weapons industry stockholders?

The American public has shown itself mostly contemptuous of the economic-draft soldiers who man today’s volunteer army, the deaths accumulate, but working poor are expendable. What about those who joined the military to clean up their act? We don’t want those back. After years of war, the public is already seeing too much PTSD, without contemplating bringing all of it home.

Perhaps instead Americans will react to a casualty list of aeronautic losses, maybe for reasons of pure economics. How many helicopters and jets we are losing adds to the federal deficit. But the losses of big equipment might offer the same decision making information we glean from the higher value chess pieces. Rooks and knights represent offensive capability. Hopes for victory or a draw hinge on which of those you have left. No one capitulates based on a count of their pawns. The cumulative tallies will reflect which way the tide is going. Military drones may be worth zero lives, but their destruction will signal an insurgence indomitable.

Barack Obama Nobel Prizefighter

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Barack Obama action figure James BondAt what line in the sand will we be able to say for certain that President Obama’s hope bubble is a bust? Half of you are laughing at my naivety, the others are hushing me with your fingers crossed. Will it take a nuclear attack on Iran? More bailout? Less health? For example, when will we know whether Obama will be more a Kissinger Peace Laureate than a Mandela? A decision on Afghanistan? We have it already.

The BBC is reporting that as the US thanked Britain for recommitting forces to NATO in Afghanistan, it assured its British allies that Obama would soon be substantially increasing our own military forces. The announcement is to be made next week, the surge, 45,000 more soldiers. The White House emphatically denies this story, stating that President Obama “had not yet made a decision on troop numbers” and “would make up his mind in the coming weeks.”

And there’s your answer. And we’ve had it for awhile.

I’ll bet as a supporter of Barack Obama, you had made up your mind on Iraq and Afghanistan before you elected the hope candidate. You probably based your support for Senator Obama on the intuition that a young man smart as that had already made up his mind too, certainly on the moral issues.

What does it mean now, that Obama might be still thinking on it?

If Obama had made up his mind, or has, he’s struggling now to make up his mind about how to tell you.

Withdrawing from Iraq and Afghanistan is not ethically complicated. Financially it’s a tough move because you’ve got all those war contractor profiteers who’ve got to be weened cautiously. But there is no intermediary way. So long as the US retains authority, it’s an occupation. So long as one US company is collecting reconstruction funds, the US is serving its own interests. Rationalizations to remain as peacekeepers are just excuses to keep our hand in the till. There is no peacekeeping role for the US. We must get out, and proffer gobs of restitution.

You know who should get the Nobel Peace Prize? The Nobel committee. For their valiant hopeful effort, at the risk of looking foolish. They merit at least a nomination for Time Magazine Persons Of The Year.

Top 10 secret armies of the CIA

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Found this on the web, will try to retrace provenance, worth a read: The United States have a well known history of providing military support to countries in need. But from time to time, the US Government has provided secret forces. While many are successful, there have also been a number of failures. This is a list of the ten top secret armies of the CIA.

1. Ukrainian Partisans
From 1945 to 1952 the CIA trained and aerially supplied Ukranian partisan units which had originally been organised by he Germans to fight the Soviets during WWII. For seven years, the partisans, operating in the Carpathian Mountains, made sporadic attacks. Finally in 1952, a massive Soviet military force wiped them out.

2. Chinese Brigade in Burma
After the Communist victory in China, Nationalist Chinese soldiers fled into northern Burma. During the early 1950s, the CIA used these soldiers to create a 12,000 man brigade which made raids into Red China. However, the Nationalist soldiers found it more profitable to monopolise the local opium trade.

3. Guatemalan Rebel Army
After Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz legalised that country’s communist party and expropriated 400,000 acres of United Fruit banana plantations, the CIA decided to overthrow his government. Guatemalan rebels were trained in Honduras and backed up with a CIA air contingent of bombers and fighter planes. This army invaded Guatemala in 1954, promptly toppling Arbenz’s regine.

4. Sumatran Rebels
In an attempt to overthrow Indonesian president Sukarno in 1958, the CIA sent paramilitary experts and radio operators to the island of Sumatra to organise a revolt. With CIA air support, the rebel army attacked but was quickly defeated. The American government denied involvement even after a CIA b-26 was shot down and its CIA pilot, Allen Pope, was captured.

5. Khamba Horsemen
After the 1950 Chinese invasion of Tibet, the CIA began recruiting Khamba horsemen – fierce warriors who supported Tibet’s religious leader, the Dalai Lama – as they escaped into India in 1959. These Khambas were trained in modern warfare at Camp Hale, high in the rocky mountains near Leadville, Colorado. Transported back to Tibet by the CIA operated Air American, the Khambas organised an army number at its peak some 14,000. By the mid-1960s the Khambas had been abandoned by the CIA but they fought on alone until 1970.

6. Bay of Pigs Invasion Force
In 1960, CIA operatives recruited 1,500 Cuban refugees living in Miami and staged a surprise attack on Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Trained at a base in Guatemala, this small army – complete with an air force consisting of B-26 bombers – landed at the Bay of Pigs on April 19, 1961. The ill-conceived, poorly planned operation ended in disaster, since all but 150 men of the force were either killed or captured within three days.

7. L’armee Clandestine
In 1962, CIA agents recruited Meo tribesmen living in the mountains of Laos to fight as guerrillas against Communist Pathet Lao forces. Called l’armee Clandestine, this unit – paid, trained, and supplied by the CIA – grew into a 30,000 man force. By 1975 the Meos – who had numbers a quarter million in 1962 – had been reduced to 10,000 refugees fleeing into Thailand.

8. Nung Mercenaries
A Chinese hill people living in Vietname, the Nungs were hired and organised by the CIA as a mercenary force, during the Vietnam war. Fearsome and brutal fighters, the Nungs were employed throughout Vietnam and along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The Nungs proved costly since they refused to fight unless constantly supplied with beer and prostitutes.

9. Peruvian Regiment
Unable to quell guerrilla forces in its eastern Amazonian provinces, Peru called on the US for help in the mid-1960s. The CIA responded by establishing a fortified camp in the area and hiring local Peruvians who were trained by Green Beret personnel on loan from the US army. After crushing the guerrillas, the elite unit was disbanded because of fears it might stage a coup against the government.

10. Congo Mercenary Force
In 1964, during the Congolese Civil War, the CIA established an army in the Congo to back pro-Western leaders Cyril Adoula and Joseph Mobutu. The CIA imported European mercenaries and Cuban pilots – exiles from Cuba – to pilot the CIA air force, composed of transports and B-26 Bombers.

11. The Cambodian Coup
For over 15 years, the CIA had tried various unsuccessful means of deposing Cambodia’s left-leaning Prince Norodom Sihanouk, including assassination attempts. However, in March, 1970, a CIA-backed coup finally did the job. Funded by US tax dollars, armed with US weapons, and trained by American Green Berets, anti-Sihanouk forces called Kampuchea Khmer Krom (KKK) overran the capital of Phnom Penh and took control of the government. With the blessing of the CIA and the Nixon administration, control of Cambodia was placed in the hands of Lon Nol, who would later distinguish himself by dispatching soldiers to butcher tens of thousands of civilians.

12. Kurd Rebels
During the early 1970s the CIA moved into eastern Iraq to organize and supply the Kurds of that area, who were rebelling against the pro-Soviet Iraqi government. The real purpose behind this action was to help the shah of Iran settle a border dispute with Iraq favourably. After an Iranian-Iraq settlement was reached, the CIA withdrew its support from the Kurds, who were then crushed by the Iraqi Army.

13. Angola Mercenary Force
In 1975, after years of bloody fighting and civil unrest in Angola, Portugal resolved to relinquish its hold on the last of its African colonies. The transition was to take place on November 11, with control of the country going to whichever political faction controlled the capital city of Luanda on that date. In the months preceding the change, three groups vied for power: the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). By July 1975, the Marxist MPLA had ousted the moderate FNLA and UNITA from Luanda, so the CIA decided to intervene covertly. Over $30 million was spent on the Angolan operation, the bulk of the money going to buy arms and pay French and South African mercenaries, who aided the FNLA and UNITA in their fight. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, US officials categorically denied any involvement in the Angolan conflict. In the end, it was a fruitless military adventure, for the MPLA assumed power and controls Angola to this day.

14. Afghan Mujaheedin
Covert support for the groups fighting against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan began under President Jimmy Carter in 1979, and was stepped up during the administration of Ronald Reagan. The operation succeeded in its initial goal, as the Soviets were forced to begin withdrawing their forces in 1987. Unfortunately, once the Soviets left, the US essentially ignored Afghanistan as it collapsed into a five-year civil war followed by the rise of the ultra-fundamentalist Taliban. The Taliban provided a haven for Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, the perpetrators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

15. Salvadoran Death Squads
As far back as 1964, the CIA helped form ORDEN and ANSESAL, two paramilitary intelligence networks that developed into the Salvadoran death squads. The CIA trained ORDEN leaders in the use of automatic weapons and surveillance techniques, and placed several leaders on the CIA payroll. The CIA also provided detailed intelligence on Salvadoran individuals later murdered by the death squads. During the civil war in El Salvador from 1980 to 1992, the death squads were responsible for 40,000 killings. Even after a public outcry forced President Reagan to denounce the death squads in 1984, CIA support continued.

16. Nicaraguan Contras
On November 23, 1981, President Ronald Reagan signed a top secret National Security Directive authorising the CIA to spend $19 million to recruit and support the Contras, opponents of Nicaragua’s Sandinista government. In supporting the Contras, the CIA carried out several acts of sabotage without the Congressional intelligence committees giving consent – or even being informed beforehand. In response, Congress passed the Boland Amendment, prohibiting the CIA from providing aid to the Contras. Attempts to find alternate sources of funds led to the Iran-Contra scandal. It may also have led the CIA and the Contras to become actively involved in drug smuggling. In 1988, the Senate Subcommittee on Narcotics, Terrorism, and International Operations concluded that individuals in the Contra movement engaged in drug trafficking; that known drug traffickers provided assistance to the Contras; and that ‘there are some serious questions as to whether or not US officials involved in Central America failed to address the drug issue for fear of jeopardizing the war effort against Nicaragua’.

17. Haitian Coup
In 1988, the CIA attempted to intervene in Haiti’s elections with a ‘covert action program’ to undermine the campaign of the eventual winner, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Three years later, Aristide was overthrown in a bloody coup that killed more than 4,000 civilians. Many of the leaders of the coup had been on the CIA payroll since the mid-1980s. For example, Emmanuel ‘Toto’ Constant, the head of FRAPH, a brutal gang of thugs known for murder, torture, and beatings, admitted to being a paid agent of the CIA. Similarly, the CIA-created Haitian National Intelligence Service (NIS), supposedly created to combat drugs, functioned during the coup as a ‘political intimidation and assassination squad.’ In 1994, an American force of 20,000 was sent to Haiti to allow Aristide to return. Ironically, even after this, the CIA continued working with FRAPH and the NIS. In 2004, Aristide was overthrown once again, with Aristide claiming that US forces had kidnapped him.

18. Venezuelan Coup Attempt
On April 11, 2002, Venezuelan military leaders attempted to overthrow the country’s democratically-elected left-wing president, Hugo Chavez. The coup collapsed after two days as hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets and as units of the military joined with the protestors. The administration of George W. Bush was the only democracy in the Western Hemisphere not to condemn the coup attempt. According to intelligence analyst Wayne Madsen, the CIA had actively organised the coup: ‘The CIA provided Special Operations Group personnel, headed by a lieutenant colonel on loan from the US Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, to help organise the coup against Chavez.

Acacia Park sidewalk chalk memorial to US soldiers killed in Afghanistan

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COLO. SPRINGS- It took three hours for over a dozen students from Colorado College and Palmer High School to chalk the names and ages of the 869 US casualties of the war in Afghanistan.

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Mark made an excellent video at CSAction.
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8 yrs in Afghanistan, still boot-counting

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How is Colorado Springs marking the 8th year of war in Afghanistan? Couple choices. Visiting priest-activist Louie Vitale will speak at Colorado College on the THE MORAL DIMENSION OF DRONE WARFARE.
The moral dimension of drone war
CC students were dissuaded from hosting a peace rally on campus which might have interfered with the week’s homecoming activities. Instead, beginning at 1PM Wednesday, the CC students will chalk the sidewalks of Acacia Park with the names of the 869 US soldiers killed in the Afghan campaign. Coloradans For Peace will join the boot- counting but will commemorate Afghan deaths, whose number is “n/a.”

Picture of Israeli worth 20 Palestinians

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Galid Shalit kidnapped by Hamas in 2006At first glance the trade betrayed a racist inequity. This week Israel agreed to release twenty Palestinian women in exchange for one Israeli held captive by Hamas. Not for the release of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, just for proof that he was still alive.

What is the worth of one Israeli? At first his captors demanded the release of all Palestinian women and girls. Later they asked for the release of 1,000 detainees. But the relative values are reversed. Shalit is the lone POW held by Palestine. Israel incarcerates an estimated 11,000, most detained for obstructing the construction of the Apartheid Wall. Exchanging Shalit would represent a trade of 100% for 9%. Don’t worry, Israel’s occupation forces can always capture more.

Gilad Shalit is the first IDF soldier captured by the Palestinians since 1994. Israel on the other hand, with the collaboration of Fatah, can arrest civilians whenever they choose.

Shalit’s capture is an interesting story. Israel claims to have received warning of the eminent kidnap attempt. The day before, IDF soldiers raided a house belonging to a suspected Hamas militant. They arrested his two sons, a doctor and a lawyer. Their torture allegedly extracted details of a cross-border raid. As a result, technically I suppose you could say, their intelligence officers “received warning.” However Israel was unable to thwart the tank operator’s capture.

Shalit has served as the pretext for many ensuing incursions into Gaza, at a great cost to Palestinian lives. Draw your own conclusions.

Israel propagates this story to assert that Gilad Shalit was “kidnapped,” invoking a litany of international laws which Israel wields against Hamas. With shameless hypocrisy, Israelis protest the inhumanities suffered by Shalit, ignoring the documentation of thousands of imprisoned Palestinian subjected to worse. The irony of Israel’s complaints becomes tedious: lack of International Red Cross access, parental visitation, regular correspondence, information of his exact whereabouts, etc. This in light of Israel’s refusal to permit oversight of its Palestinian detainees, or to denounce its tortures. What gall to decry the fate of one soldier, taken prisoner while on duty, with Israel’s demonstrated eagerness to expend ordnance and harass Palestinian civilians at whim.

Shalit has prompted Israel to launch aerial bombardments, and restrict border checkpoints in the effort to extort his release, or to pit Palestinian sentiments against Hamas, who refuse to release Shalit in spite of the collective punishment meted to its people.

The Israelis had reason to doubt that Gilad Shalit, captured by Hamas in 2006, was not dead. After all, the IDF was confident that their January incursion into Gaza had destroyed all known Hamas hiding places.

Military drones mirror public retreat

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CLOSE GUANTANAMO is being interpreted literally, meaning close just the facility, but move the detainees to illegal incarceration elsewhere. Likewise, BRING THE TROOPS HOME means pacing a withdrawal with an increased deployment of military drones to keep up the killing. That’s what the antiwar voice gets for pandering to the American preoccupation with only our own casualties. The latest Adbusters juxtaposes these surrogate killing machines with the western public’s retreat into virtual communities.

Pblks‘ Douglas Haddow had this to say in the latest issue, about the increasing use of surveillance attack drones, while the US withdraws “troops” from its militarized war zones.

…when we remove the humans from the equation — when war becomes literally inhuman — what’s left to debate? War crimes will become guiltless: a mere twisting of knobs. Slowly, with each OS update, innocent casualties will be curbed to an acceptable level. The Marine will be replaced by the computer programmer — a meek nerd so far from the action as to be absolved completely of its consequences.

With robots off fighting our wars for us, we’ll have nothing left to do but quietly sip our lattes and liten to our iPods. While somewhere, far off in the distance, a drone may or may not be dropping 50kg units of hellfire on some yet-to-be-named combatants. It’s not even post moral … it’s a Zen algorithm that melts steel.

This is a strange indicator of our retreat into the virtual when you consider that our so-called enemies are willing to sacrifice everything, their own bodies and very existence for a chance to kill one or two of our soldiers. We see their tactics as irrational, and they see us perhaps as we already are: machines.

US Senate represents Insurance, Israel

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Are you represented by a US senator? I doubt it. Today the Senate Finance Committee rejected Public Option amendments to the health care reform legislation; continued to vilify ACORN based on fraudulent accusations hyped the MSM; and thirty two senators signed a letter drafted by AIPAC, to urge Secretary of State Clinton to block further investigation of Israel for its crimes in Gaza based on the findings of the Goldstone Report.
 
Abolish the Senate! Does America have any use for a House of Lords?

Today five Democrats joined the ten Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee to reject a PUBLIC OPTION. The senators voting no were: Max Baucus (D-MT), Kent Conrad (D-ND), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Thomas Carper (D-DE), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Charles Grassley (R-IA), John Ensign (R-NV), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Jim Bunning (R-KY), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Pat Roberts (R-KS), Mike Enzi (R-WY), John Cornyn (R-TX)

Senator Rockerfeller promoted his public option saying that “the public option is on the march.” There should be more pitchforks than that on the march. Who are these rich bastards who lord over our representatives in Congress? It’s a House of Lords, representing America’s moneyed interests, against the needs of the common people.

Senators Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga) and Johnny Isakson (R-Ga) collected signatures last week to urge the GAO to investigate ACORN. I mention this letter because of similar source of today’s letter.

Isakson and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) circulated the letter to block the UN from taking action against Israel. The other senators, among them 16 Democrats, are: Charles Schumer (D-NY), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Carl Levin (D-MI), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Tim Johnson (D-SD), David Vitter (D-ND), Evan Bayh (D-IN), Mark Begich (D-AK), Benjamin Cardin (D-MD), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Byron Dorgan (D-ND), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Russ Feingold (D-WI), Dan Inouye(D-HI), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Arlen Specter (D-PA), Joe Lieberman (I-CT), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), James Risch (R-ID), Pat Roberts (R-KS), Susan Collins (R-ME), Jim DeMint (R-SC), John Ensign (R-NV), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Mike Johanns (R-NE), Roger Wicker (R-MS), John McCain (R-AZ), John Thune (R-SD), and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK).

Do these people represent the American People? Here is their letter sent on behalf of Israel:

Dear Madam Secretary,

We appreciate the State Department publicly raising significant concerns about the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission led by Justice Richard Goldstone. We believe it is critical that the U.S. continue to work very hard to block any punitive actions against Israel that this report mentions, whether at the Security Council or other U.N. bodies. The loss of innocent lives is unfortunate wherever it occurs – in Israel or in Gaza. But this biased report ignores many of the key facts, and this should be recognized by the international community.

We commend the State Department statements criticizing the one-sided mandate directing the Goldstone report and highlighting the real causes of the war between Israel and Hamas. In particular, we are gratified that the Department has very serious concerns about the report’s recommendations, including calls that this issue be taken up in international fora outside the Human Rights Council and in national courts of countries not party to the conflict. As the United Nations Human Rights Council moves toward a resolution on the Goldstone report, we trust you and your team will denounce the unbalanced nature of this investigation.

There are many serious flaws with the Goldstone report and the investigatory process. The Goldstone mission’s mandate was problematic from the start. The fact that the mission exceeded this mandate by also criticizing some of Hamas’ activities does not diminish the problem that the vast majority of the report focuses on Israel’s conduct, rather than that of Hamas. The report further fails to acknowledge Israel’s right to defend itself against terrorism and other external threats, a right of all UN Members under Article 51 of the UN Charter. The report ignores the fact that Israel acted in self-defense only after its civilian population suffered eight years of attacks by rockets and mortars fired indiscriminately from Gaza. Furthermore, the report does not adequately recognize the extraordinary measures taken by the Israel Defense Forces to minimize civilian casualties, which frequently put Israeli soldiers at risk.

As the State Department has stated, Israel is a democratic country, like the United States, with an independent judiciary and democratic institutions to investigate and prosecute abuses. The Israel Defense Forces have a reputation for investigating alleged violations of international law and its internal military code of conduct. As a law-abiding state, Israel is in the process of conducting numerous investigations for which it should be commended not condemned.

We hope you will succeed in your efforts to ensure that consideration of the report at the current meetings of the UN Human Rights Council will not provide an opportunity for Israel’s critics to unfairly use the Council and the report to bring this matter to the UN Security Council.

Sincerely,

Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand

Senator Johnny Isakson

For the record, here also is Isakson’s letter trying to bring heat to the poverty-rights advocacy group ACORN:

The Honorable Gene L. Dodaro
Acting Comptroller General
U.S. Government Accountability Office

Dear Mr. Dodaro,

I am writing to request that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) undertake a review of ACORN, otherwise known as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. For purposes of this letter, the term ACORN shall mean the organization itself, its subsidiaries, its affiliates, and the employees of all such organizations.

Any such investigation should:

(1) Analyze the business structure and organizational management of ACORN.

(2) Analyze ACORN’s compliance with state, local and federal law.

(3) Examine ACORN’s tax structure focusing on a delineation of what activities fall under their 501(c)3 umbrella and what, if any, do not.

(4) Compile a comprehensive list of all federal funding that ACORN has received since its inception; including, but not limited to, contracts, cooperative agreements, grants, appropriations and emergency funding.

(5) Examine grants or payments for services made by ACORN, its subsidiaries or affiliates.

(6) Examine grants or payments for services received by ACORN, its subsidiaries or affiliates.

Current voter fraud investigations in several states, prior fraud convictions, and new video showing apparent illegal activity by ACORN employees suggest that at the very least the organization warrants a top to bottom investigation on behalf of the taxpayer. Taxpayers deserve nothing less than a thorough and transparent accounting of ACORN’s activities.

Iraq slipper thrower killed outright

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US-patrol-fallujah-fallouja-falluja-iraqPoor Ahmed Latif, killed in Fallujah this week for throwing his slipper at a US patrol. News reports are calling Latif a copycat of Muntadhar al-Zaidi, on the occasion of the Iraqi shoe thrower’s release from custody. Reporters are also suggesting Latif was “mentally disturbed,” instead of simply profoundly disturbed, by a development that might disturb you too.

First however, a disturbing aspect of this incident which reporters are downplaying and which Latif lived but only briefly to experience. The US soldiers fired on Latif because they thought he’d thrown a grenade. What he threw never exploded, and in fact we only know it was a slipper because bystanders saw it, and because Latif had only one slipper when he was taken to the hospital. The American soldiers couldn’t confirm the account themselves because they hadn’t even looked for whatever came at them that didn’t explode. When the soldiers fired on Latif, he ran. Eventually their bullets overtook him.

What disturbed the now late Latif, enough to prompt him to defy the US soldiers with his slipper, was seeing an American patrol drive down the streets of Fallujah.

Maybe we think that indignation at US occupiers is commonplace in Iraq, and that Iraqis should be practiced by now at repressing their proud urge to throw down insults at hair-trigger Americans. Why now? Why Latif?

The thirty two year-old Latif was so angry to see the American patrol in Fallujah, because he thought that Iraqi cities were no longer under the jurisdiction of American troops. You probably thought that too.

Yet here they were patrolling Ahmed Latif’s neighborhood. Have you been told the US soldiers are still patrolling Fallujah? If Latif’s death can count for something, it can at least serve to alert you that American in Iraq have not moved out of the cities. But the media telling of the late slipper-thrower’s deed, are not elaborating on that detail.

NATO: First the good news…

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Afghanistan
The accessorizing of the headline with this map reminds of the body counts reported from Vietnam to temper the news of GI casualties, body counts which we understand now were grossly contrived. The same has held true for Iraq and Afghanistan. We don’t know if it’s “dozens,” or whether even the enemy were combatants, women or children. At least the three US soldiers didn’t die in vain.

Do we have a soft spot for mercenaries

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Norwegian Tjostolv Moland sentenced to death in Kisangani, DRCIt’s damning photograph. I sought it out after hearing the story of the two Norwegian mercenaries condemned to death in the Congo for the murder of their Congolese driver. Was their black companion killed in an attempt to rob the white adventurers, as they tell it? US news outlets asked Tjostolv Moland’s mothers about the picture of her son, which showed him smiling as he wiped blood from the driver’s seat of their pickup. The mother dismissed it as bad timing, she though her son was probably caught off guard, laughing at a joke unrelated to his morbid task. Boy can Americans relate.

Other US newspapers speculated about a fabled Norwegian propensity to laugh at adversity. They also described Norwegian diplomats scrambling to save the two boys from the gallows. It’s true that Norway doesn’t have a death sentence, and therefore does not condone it elsewhere. Otherwise US and BBC portrayal of Norwegian concern for the two mercenaries seemed at odds with Norway’s usual determined pacifism, so I was eager to hear from my relatives there.

The scoop? Contrary to US and UK sentiments and their projection of Norwegian concerns, there is no domestic sympathy for the two wayward boys. None.

The Norwegian public has become well aware that Moland and partner Joshua French have been traveling the Congo as mercenaries, and have been involved in other killings as well. The fact that Congolese courts are trying to extort a large fine from the Norwegian government, based on the accusation of the two travelers being agents of Norway, is due to documents which the two forged to pretend they had active duty contact with the Norwegian military.

In Norway, military service is compulsory. Every Norwegian male has a record of military service. It helps that Norway rarely involves itself with acts of aggression, sanctioned by a fraternity of nations or not. And when soldiers of fortune like Moland and French set about rampaging in Africa, it behooves Norwegian authorities to ensure that their military is not implicated by association.

How fitting that US and UK listeners should presume a reflexive maternal instinct to protect the two white boys, set upon by angry African opportunists. The boys might be mercenaries, but America and Britain have lots of those overseas. Hired guns, paid assassins, professional killers, why quibble with words?

The laws of war grant little grace for mercenaries, but that’s not what English-speaking supporters of imperial expansion want to believe. Mercenaries in the Neocon vernacular are called private contractors. They’re just ordinary soldiers who’ve escaped the poor pay of military service, to the entrepreneurial ranks of war-making free enterprise.

Attack Drones: Freedom is so fucked

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Armchair freedom fighters like me count on there remaining some parity between the forces of oppression and man’s inexorable drive to be free. Masses can repel the few, nonviolence can shame the hesitant, terrorism can haunt the genteel, IEDs can pick off the occupiers, training can dispatch the sentries, but how to overcome automatons? We’ve confronted impregnable drones in scifi movies, and now such drones have become reality. They’re bits of nothing in the air really, but a literal boatload of firepower has got their back.

The Economist reports that drones can monitor the activity of shoeboxes from an altitude of near-space, beyond the range of an RPG fired from a hot air balloon. A drone’s vulnerability remains its communications channels, but even intercepting those is outside the realm of non-military technology.

While drones reduce the exposure of real soldiers to harm’s way, they increase a military force’s effectiveness. Drones are lauded as cheaper to operate as conventional jet fighters, but in reality their functionality draws on greater resources. The Economist writes of a drone the size of a corporate jet called a Global Hawk, which requires a staff of 20 to 30 to operate. Many more than would be necessary inside a C130 gunship, but of course, almost all of them manning new killing devices.

So long as the empire has an unlimited budget to spend, Freedom Fighters are fucked, and terrorists will be the only recourse. The only target available to the adversary of a drone, is the command center which controls it. Be it in America, or a distant military base, that’s where the enemy will have to strike.

Or the American public will have to renounce the budget which affords this technology.

You may not be bothered by the notion that remote-operated drones can monitor human activities and rain destruction upon them when appropriate. The old, “what have I to fear if I’m doing nothing wrong?” Wait until you are the wrong side of the oppressors. Coca Cola kills union organizers in Colombia. Walmart would probably like to kill you in their parking lot if you are leaving with a shopping cart filled insufficiently relative to you debit card balance. They already know it, but a drone in their hands will give them the ability to find you.

Osama on Obama

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The usual channels have yielded another video from Osama bin Laden, wherein a still photo of the al-Qaeda godfather accompanies an audio “statement to the American people,” purportedly recorded June 4. Here is the full English translation of the 10 minute tape. First, two questions.

ONE: I find it interesting that the message echoes what most anti-imperialists already believe. From a Chavez, or Ahmadinejad, this text would be timid. Throw in the unverified nature of this transmission, the mystery of whether Osama lives, or whose interest he really served, and this new tape subverts somebody’s message, but whose?

For example, in the new tape, Osama bin Laden recommends three books. The NYT is quick to tell us that any recommendation from bin Laden is certainly unwelcome by any author. The books? The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, Jimmy Carter’s Palestine: Peace not Apartheid, and Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. The NYT just as quickly dismissed the titles as well.

TWO: Why does no one release the full translation of Osama’s message? Newspapers comment on his statements based on interpretations made by US intelligence contractors, who themselves do not release their translations to the public.

Are there no Arabic speakers who wish to translate bin Laden’s words for the international audience? Why is everyone content to hear what the US government says is Osama’s message?

Extracts the US media is reprinting of Osama’s message:

“Reasonable people know that Obama is a powerless man who will not be able to end the war as he promised, but rather, will continue it to the highest point possible.”

“The bitter truth is that the neoconservatives continue to cast their heavy shadows upon you.”

“Ask yourselves to determine your position: is your security, your blood, your children, your money, your jobs, your homes, your economy, and your reputation dearer to you than the security of the Israelis, their children and their economy?

“If you choose your security and cessation of war … this requires you to work to punish those on your side who play with our security.”

“The time has come for you to liberate yourselves from fear and the ideological terrorism of neo-conservatives and the Israeli lobby.”

“The reason for our dispute with you is your support for your ally Israel, occupying our land in Palestine.”

“If you think about your situation well, you will know that the White House is occupied by pressure groups.”

“Rather than fighting to liberate Iraq — as Bush claimed — it should have been liberated.”

“If you stop the war, then fine. Otherwise we will have no choice but to continue our war of attrition on every front… If you choose safety and stopping wars, as opinion polls show you do, then we are ready to respond to this.”

“You have only changed the faces in the White House.”

The full English translation, courtesy of the NEFA Foundation:

“All praise is due to Allah who created [the] creation for His servants and commanded them to justice, and who permitted those who have been unjustly treated to carry out similar vengeance against their oppressors…”

“O’ people of America, my speech to you is a reminder of the reasons behind [September] 11 and what took place in its aftermath in the form of wars, and claims, and the path to escape from its causes. Specifically, I draw attention to the families of those who were killed during these events, and those who have recently called for open investigations to determine the causes that led to them— this is your first step in the right direction amongst many steps that deliberately missed the path throughout eight years of little prosper that have passed you by. And it is correct that the American people should have sympathy for them, because the longer it takes you to recognize the real causes, the higher a price you will pay, needlessly. Thus, since the administration in the White House—one of the sides in this struggle— has appealed to you for years that war is necessary to ensure your security, then, to understand the truth, a wise man would want to heed and listen to both sides of the struggle, so lend me your ears.”

“First, I say: we have shown and declared many times over more than two and a half decades that our dispute with you [is based on] your support of your allies; the Israeli occupiers of our land in Palestine. It was this stance—along with other injustices—that moved us to carry out the events of September 11. If you realized the extent of our suffering caused by the injustices of the Jews backed by your administration, then you would understand that both of our nations are victims of the policies laid down by the White House, which in reality is nothing but a puppet in the hands of powerful interest groups, specifically big corporations and the Israel lobby.”

“And, the best voice who has tried to explain to you the reasons behind [September] 11 is one of your own citizens, the veteran former CIA agent whose conscience awoke in his eighth decade [of age] and he decided to tell the truth despite the pressure against him, and explained for you the message behind September 11. Thus, he carried out some actions for this purpose

specifically, from within that is his book titled, ‘Apology of a Mercenary.’ Similarly, with regards to the suffering of our people in Palestine, Obama recently confessed in his speech in Cairo to the suffering of our people there [in Palestine], under occupation and sanctions. And the matter becomes even clearer if you read what your former president Jimmy Carter has written about the Israeli discrimination against our people in Palestine, or had you listened to his statement some weeks ago, while visiting besieged and ravaged Gaza, when he said, ‘the people of Gaza are treated more like animals than human beings’…”

“And here we should pause for a moment, for anyone with an atom’s weight of mercy is compelled to sympathize with the suffering of the elderly, women, and children under the fatal siege, while above them the Zionists pour down burning American-made white-phosphorus bombs. Life there is miserable beyond any conception, such as the number of children who are dying in the hands of their fathers and doctors because of a lack of food, medicine, and basic electricity. It is truthfully a stain of shame on the forehands of all world politicians who facilitate this, and the people who ally with them with prior knowledge of their intentions—along with the influence from the Israeli lobby in America. The details regarding this have been clarified by two of your citizens, they are John Mearsheimer and Steven Walt in the book ‘The Israel Lobby in the United States.’ Upon reading these various suggested works, you will discover the truth and you will be terribly shocked by the scale of the deception that has been used against you. You will also discover that, even today, those who issue statements from inside the White House and claim that your wars against us are necessary for your security are the same ones who worked under the regime of Cheney and Bush, and marketed their former policies of fear to safeguard the interests of large corporations at the expense of your blood and economy. Truthfully, those are the ones responsible for forcing war upon you, not the mujahideen—as we are [merely] defending the right to liberate our land.”

“And should you consider your situation at some depth, then you will discover that the White House is actually occupied by interest groups, and that it [the White House] should have been liberated, instead of fighting to liberate Iraq as Bush claimed. The role of a White House leader in today’s atmosphere, regardless of his name, is like a train conductor who has no choice but to move forward on the rails laid down by interest groups—or else its path will be obstructed—and who lives in fear that his fate will be that of the former president [John F.] Kennedy and his brother.”

“The conclusion of my speech: it is time to liberate yourselves from the fear and mental terrorism that the neo-conservatives and the Israeli Lobby have used to manipulate you. Put the issue of your alliance with the Israelis up for debate and ask yourselves what your stance is: is your own security, blood, children, money, jobs, homes, economy, and reputation more important to you, or do you prefer the safety of the Israelis, their children, and economy? If you choose your own security and bring the war to a halt—and this is what the opinion polls have shown is most popular—then you must work and replace the hands of those from amongst you who have endangered our safety, and we are ready to respond to this decision in accordance with sound and just principles that have been previously mentioned. And here, there is an important point that requires attention regarding the war and stopping it: when Bush took power and appointed a secretary of defense who had assisted in killing two million suffering villagers in Vietnam, intelligent people predicted on that day that Bush was preparing for new massacres during his term in office, and this is what occurred in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then, Obama took charge and kept Cheney and Bush’s men—those from the senior leadership in the Pentagon—like Gates, Mullen, and Petraeus. Intelligent people understand that Obama is a weak man who cannot stop the war like he promised, but instead, he will postpone it to the greatest possible degree. If he was really in control, then he would have handed over leadership to the generals who have opposed this foolish war—like the former forces commander General Sanchez and the head of Central Command who was forced by Bush to resign shortly before leaving the White House because of his opposition to the war. Instead, he [Bush] appointed someone else who would press on after him.”

“Furthermore, Obama—under the pretext of his willingness to cooperate with the Republicans— has tricked you with a big fraud, as he kept the most important and most dangerous secretary— Cheney’s man—to continue the war. It will become clear to you over the coming days that you have changed nothing in the White House except faces—the bitter truth is that the neo-conservatives are still heavily shadowing you.”

“Returning back to the original point, if you stop the war, then so be it. But otherwise, it is inevitable that we will continue our war of extermination against you on all possible fronts, just as we annihilated the Soviet Union for a decade until it was dismantled, by the grace of Allah. So, go ahead and prolong this war as long as you want, but you are engaged in a miserable losing war for the interests of others that seems to have no end in sight. The Russian Generals—who were shaken by the battles in Afghanistan—warned you what the outcome of the war would be before it began, but you refuse to listen to those who advise you. This war is being financed through ghoulish interests, the morale of your soldiers is collapsing, and they are committing suicide on a daily basis to escape it. It is a failed war, Allah willing.”

“This is has all been prescribed for you by the doctors Cheney and Bush as medicine for the events of September 11, yet, the bitterness and loss this has caused is worse than that of the events themselves. The accumulated debt alone has almost led to the collapse of the entire American economy. It has been said, some illnesses are tolerated more than their medicine. And we, by the grace of Allah, continue to carry our weapons slung over our shoulders, fighting the evil powers in the east and west for thirty years, and in all that time, we have not recorded a single incident of suicide despite the global pursuit targeting us, praise be to Allah. This should tell you something about the righteousness of our doctrine and the justice of our cause. Allah-willing, we are moving forward on our path to liberate our land; patience is our weapon and we seek victory from Allah, and we will not abandon Al-Aqsa Mosque, as our grasp on Palestine is greater than our grasp onto our souls… Thus, you can lengthen the war as you desire, [but] by Allah, we will not compromise in the least over it.”

The original Arabic transcript:

????? ??? ???? ?????? ???????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ? ???? ??????? ?? ????? ?? ????? ??????.?????? ????? . .?????? ????? ???????? ? ????? ??? ????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ??? ??? ????? ?? ????? ???????? ??????? ?????? ?? ????? ? ?????? ?????? ??? ???????? ?? ??? ??????? ?????? ?????? ?????? ????? ????? ?????? ??????? ??? ?????? ?????? ?????? ?? ??????? ?????? ?? ??? ????? ????? ????? ?????? ?? ??? ???? ????? ???? ???? ??? ????? .????? ?????? ???????? ??? ?? ???? ????? ??? ??? ?????? ??????? ???? ??????? ????? ?????? ???? ???? ????? ? ??? ???? ????? ????? ?????? ??? ??? ???? ?????? ?? ????? ??? ???? ??? ?? ???? ??? ????? ?????? ????? ????? ? ??? ??? ???? ???? ??????? ?? ??????? ??? ???? ?????? ??????? ??????? ? ???????? ??????? .
????????? ???? : ???? ?? ?????? ?????? ?????? ????? ??? ???? ?? ????? ????? ?? ??? ?????? ???? ?? ????? ???????? ???????????? ???????? ?????? ?????? ? ??????? ??? ?? ??? ??????? ?????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ?????? ?????? ??? ? ??? ????? ??? ???????? ?? ???? ?????? ??? ????? ?? ???????? ??? ?????? ?? ??? ?????????? ????? ?????? ????? ?????? ? ????? ?? ?? ??????? ????? ?? ???? ?????? ????? ??????? ??????? ?????? ??????? ?????????? .???? ?? ???? ?? ???? ??? ????? ?????? ??? ?? ??? ???????? ?????? ??????? ?????? ?? ???? ?? ??? ????? ?????? ????? ?? ???? ?????? ???? ?? ???? ??????? ??? ????????? ? ????? ??? ????? ?????? ??? ???? ???? ??????? ???? ????? ???? ???? ????? ??????? : ( ?????? ????? ??????? ) .????? ???? ??? ????? ?? ?????? ????? ?? ?????? ? ??? ???? ?????? ?????? ?? ????? ?? ??????? ??????? ????? ???? ???????? ??? ???????? ??????? ? ?????? ????? ?????? ??? ????? ?? ???? ?????? ?????? ????? ?? ?????? ???????????? ??? ????? ?? ?????? ????? ?? ??????? ??? ?????? ??? ?????? ?????? ?????? ???? ??????? ???????? ????? ??? ??? : ” ?? ???? ??? ???????? ???? ???????? ???? ?? ????? ????? ” ? ?????? ???? ???? ??????.????? ????? ?????? ?????? ? ??? ??? ???? ?? ??? ????? ????? ???? ?? ???? ? ?? ???? ??? ?? ?????? ?? ????? ?????????? ?? ?????? ??????? ???????? ???????? ??? ?????? ?????? ? ???? ??? ??? ????? ???????? ????? ??????? ?????? ??????? ????????? ????? , ??????? ???? ??????? ????? ?????? , ??? ???? ??? ??????? ?????? ??? ???? ?????? ???????? ???? ?????? ??????? ??????? ???????? ? ???? ??? ???? ??? ?? ???? ???? ?????? ??????? ???? ??? ?????? ?? ????? ? ??? ???? ????? ????? ? ??????? ?? ?????? ?????????? ?? ?????? , ????? ?????? ??? ????? ?? ???????? ??? ??? ???????? ?????? ???? ?? ???? ( ?????? ?????????? ?? ???????? ??????? ) ? ???? ??????? ????? ???????? ??????? ??? ??????? ???????? ?????? ????? ???? ??????? ???? ???? ????? ???????? ????? ?? ????? ?????? ????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ??????? ?? ?????? ???? ?????? ?????? ???? ?? ?????? ??? ????? ????? ???? ??????? ??????? ??????? ??????? ??????? ?????? ??????? ?????? ??? ????? ??? ???? ?????? ????????? , ?????? ?? ?? ??????? ????? ?????? ????? ?????? ???? ????????? , ???? ???? ????? ?? ???? ?????? ????? .???? ?????? ?? ????? ????? ?????? ?? ????? ?????? ???? ?? ?????? ????? ???? ????? ????? ??? ?????? ????? ?? ?????? ?????? ?????? ??? ??? ??? ? ??????? ???? ????? ?????? ?? ??? ??????? ??? ????? ?? ???? ????? ???? ?? ???? ??? ?? ???? ??? ??????? ???? ?????? ?????? ????? ??? ???? ????? ????? ???? ?? ???? ????? ????? ?????? ?????? ???? ?????.??????? ????? : ?? ?????? ?? ??????? ?? ????? ???????? ?????? ???? ?????? ????? ????????? ????? ??????? ?????????? ? ?????? ??? ????? ?? ???????????? ??? ????? ?????? ???????? ?????? ??????? ?????? ?? ????? ??????? ???????? ???????? ???????? ??????? ????????? ??????? ??? ????? , ?? ??? ???????????? ???????? ????????? ? ??? ?????? ????? ?????? ?????? – ???? ?? ?????? ????????? ????? – ???? ????? ???? ????? ????? ??? ???? ???????? ?????? ?? ????? , ???? ??????? ??????? ?? ??? ?????? ??? ??? ????? ?????? ??? ????? .????? ???? ???? ????? ???????? ????? ????? ????? ???????? ??? ??? ????? ????? ??? ?????? ????? ?????? ?????? ???? ?? ???? ?? ??? ??????? ?? ???????? ?????????? ?? ?????? ? ????? ???? ??????? ?? ??? ???? ?????? ?????? ?? ???? ???? ?? ??? ?? ?????? ?????????? ? ?? ??? ????? ?????? ????? ??? ???? ????? ???? ?? ???????? ?????? ?? ????? ?????? ????? ????? ???????? ??? ??????? ?? ?????? ???? ?????? ?? ?????? ?? ???? ????? ??? ??? ?? ?????? ??? ???? ????? ????? ? ??? ??? ?? ?? ????? ??? ?????? ??????? ????????? ????????? ???? ????? ??????? ????? ?????? ?? ?????? ?????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ??????? ?????? ???? ????? ??? ??? ????????? ??? ??????? ????? ?????? ????? ????? ???? ??????? ????? ?????? ????? ??? ?? ?????? ?? ???? .????? ?? ?????? ??? ???? ???????? ??????? ?? ?????????? ? ??? ????? ????? ???? ??? ???? ??? ??? ????? ????? ?? ???? ????? ??????? ????? ? ??????? ??? ?? ?????? ???? ?? ?????? ?? ????? ?????? ??? ?????? ??? ?? ???????? ?????? ?? ?? ????????? ????? ?? ????? ????? ??????? ??????? ?????.
?? ?????? ??? ?? ??? ??? ?????? ????? ???? , ???? ?? ???? ?????? ???? ?????? ??? ?? ?????? ??? ????????? ??? ??? ???? ??????? ??????? ??? ???????? ??????? ????????? ???? ???? ??? ?? ???? ???? ???? ????? ????? ????? ??? ??? ? ??????? ?? ????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ????? ?????? ?????? ????? ????? ?? ???? ??? ?????? ?? ????? .????? ????? ??????? ????? ????? ?????? ??????? ?? ????????? ?????? ????? ??? ?? ??????? ? ?????? ?? ????? ???????? , ????? ??????? ??? ???????? ?????? ??????? ????? ????? ? ??????? ??????? ??????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ???? ? ??? ???? ?????? ???? ???? ????? . ????? ????? ????? ??? ???????? ????? ???? ????? ?????? ?????? ??? ? ????? ??????? ???????? ???? ?? ????? ??????? ????? ? ??? ?? ?????? ??????? ????? ???? ??????? ?????? ??? ? ??? ??? : ????? ?? ??? ?????? ????? .????? ???? ???? ????? ???? ?????? ??? ??????? ? ????? ?????? ???? ?? ????? ?????? ??? ?????? ??? ? ??? ??????? ????? ???? ?????? ????? ??? ???????? ??????? ??? ???? ????? ??????? ? ???? ?????? ?? ????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ? ???? ???? ???? ????? ?? ?????? ?????? ????? , ?????? ????? ??? ???? ????? ????? ? ??? ?????? ?? ??????? ??????? ??????? ???? ?? ?????? ???????? .???????????? ??? ?????? ?? ??????? ? ?????? ??? ?????? ???????? ?????? ..???? ???? ????? ?????? ???????? ?????? ????? ?????????? ???? ?????????? ?????
???????? ??? ?? ???? ????? .

US soldiers in Cuba before Guantanamo

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Life magazine cover showing US marines waterboardingWould you believe this is an issue of Life Magazine dated May 22, 1902? That’s water boarding! How is it that US military spokesmen now pretend our forces learned waterboarding from Korean prisons?

The cartoon on its cover depicts US marines waterboarding a captive in their effort to pacify the Cubans they’d just “liberated” from the Spanish. Watching in the background are the traditional western colonizers, often criticized by us for the brutality with which they repressed their foreign territories.

Between them, the Prussian tells the Brit:

“THOSE PIOUS YANKEES CAN’T THROW STONES AT US ANY MORE.”

Cartoons of US soldiers waterboarding a Cuban rebelThere it is in closeup. The arms bound at the elbows, the hands pinned, pressure applied to the stomach, a gun held to the poor Cuban’s head, a funnel put into his mouth, and water poured from a bucket marked “U.S. ARMY.”

IDF targets al-Jazeera on West Bank

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Al Jazeera reporter targeted by IDF in West Bank

Al Jazeera reporter Jackie Rowland is targeted by IDF in West BankDid you catch it on Democracy Now? Al-Jazeera reporter Jackie Rowland, broadcasting live from the West Bank covering the weekly Palestinian protests of the Israeli Apartheid Wall at Bil’in, was interrupted by the IDF. The protesters were accustomed to being shelled with tear gas, but this time the Israeli soldiers targeted the reporter.

Al Jazeera reporter targeted by IDF in West BankWhile she was on the air, the IDF soldiers repeatedly fired gas canisters, until she could no longer speak, and a cameraman had to come to her rescue with a spare gas mask.

Here’s the original footage:

The pornography of prosthetics

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Amputee pornIt was unavoidable. With untold thousands of US men and women returning from Afghanistan and Iraq with missing limbs, somebody was going to want to see that naked.

I wanted to see the naked figures. Specifically, how many servicemen have been injured, how many of them maimed? Strangely, those statistics are not exposed. Not accounting our soldiers’ sacrifices, to spare a public’s waning jingoist sensibilities, is the real exploitation.

The closest I could get were FOIA documents forced from the VA by Veterans for Common Sense. Current through May 2009, here are the figures as I understand them:

Of 1,101,971 total GWOT veterans, there are 405,022 veterans filing disability claims. (While we’re at it, let’s mention the VA records 4,702 in-service deaths, and 5,621 post-service deaths.)

Sorting past the 49,325 veterans who suffer “Limitation Of Flexion Of Leg” and 41,544 who have “Limited Motion Of The Ankle,” there are 10,179 who’ve applied for Traumatic Injury benefits. This number might include soldiers who’ve lost a limb, but only among the soldiers who were insured.

Servicemembers’ Group Life Insurance Traumatic Injury Protection (TSGLI) is a rider under Servicemembers’ Group Life Insurance (SGLI) that provides for payment to any member of the uniformed services covered by SGLI who sustains a traumatic injury that results in certain severe losses. Through May 31, 2009, 10,179 active duty servicemembers and veterans have applied for TSGLI. Of those, GWOT veterans filed 7,091 claims and 4,409 of those received benefits

I imagine medical supply companies must know the number of artificial limbs they’ve sold to the DoD or to the VA.

Who owns images of American dead?

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vietnam-wounded-marineAP photographer Julie Jacobson was reticent to publish her picture of dying US Marine Lance Cpl. Joshua Bernard. Though his father was opposed, the Associated Press overruled. But this was no victory for the public’s right to see a true reflection of war. The D.o.D. is still indignant, but I suspect Jacobson’s report was ultimately vetted in their favor. Military propagandists need to represent America’s growing losses in Afghanistan. Jacobson’s image provides their limited hangout. Like the other photographs of casualties which have escaped through embeds, the image of Lance Corporal Bernard is desaturated of blood, and the surrounding events fit the military endorsed narrative.

Have you noticed that all combat images coming out of today’s wars are drab and lifeless. Obviously this motif is not being applied to the PR shots of jets and military hardware, but scenes of soldiering in Iraq and Afghanistan are dusty and grey, like scenes from a dark virtual world.

The colors in Jacobson’s controversial photo are similarly under saturated. Earlier casualty pics have even been rendered as black and white, and this is no exercise of artistic license. Colorless images telegraph little resemblance to our real world lived in color. An emotional distance is created, most obviously like the detachment we feel looking into the past. Everything before the late sixties happened in monocrome. Early color photographs always shock children with the prospect that lives in generations past might have been been lived in a world of contemporary vibrance.

The photographs from Vietnam were helped by that nation’s lush tropical greens. Images of the wounded were all the more gripping –and demoralizing from the military’s point of view– because unlike in Korea and WWII, the blood was red.

Most images taken in Vietnam came through the military staff photographers. The unapproved subjects, which subverted the official face of the war, emerged from the cameras of independent journalists.

dying US marineJulie Jacobson facilitated the release of this picture, by letting slip two details pertinent to the official US narrative in Afghanistan. Would you believe, just prior to this engagement, friendly Afghans came out of their houses to tell the US soldiers where they could find the Taliban? Probably to ensure Corporal Bernard’s squad pointed their guns away from their homes, but that’s not how the story was spun. Jacobson recounts that these Afghans were eager to inform on the Taliban.

The jocular Jacobson records another telltale crowd-pleaser in the aftermath of the Taliban “ambush,” when she found herself flanked by Afghan National Army troops. When the firing started, Jacobson sought immediately the ranks of US soldiers, because the freakin’ ANA Afghans “aren’t very good.”

Today’s media embeds are basically a privatized signal corps. Their photos should belong to the taxpayers. Insinuations that military families should dictate what images can be used, in the event of death, is a cruel irony. Are the families consulted about what Uncle Sam wants to do with their loved one when he’s still alive? Millions of federal tax dollars are spent on our soldiers, all the more when they die. I have little sympathy for the families who couldn’t stand up for their children and protect them from the capricious whims of our military. There is absolutely no reason to ask their permission about what happens when their little soldier meets his/her calculable fate.

About Afghanistan, shoot the messenger

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OSPAAAL posterThis time let’s learn something from the travesty of Vietnam. The interests which drove US soldiers into the hamlets of Southeast Asia are directing the massacres today. We call them the hawks, as if war was mere blood sport. Though South Vietnamese collaborators were forced to flee for their lives from Saigon, their US cohorts were never held to account. This time as America extricates itself from terrorizing Afghanistan, let’s note those among us with blood on our hands and prosecute. Not the soldiers, but the warmongers in the charge: those commanders who every month reported the war “is still winnable” those propagandists who blamed the failure of occupation on waning public resolve, those politicians who rationalized inhumanity, and the war industrialists, all of them.

Atomic’s one handed coders rebrand Fallujah game as Six Hours in My Lai

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virtual rapeNMT has obtained screenshots from Atomic Games ‘Six Days in Fallujah,’ traded p2p and remarketed as Six Hours in My Lai. There was no budget to modify the OIF coalition uniforms to resemble the Vietnam GIs, but who’s looking at the clothing? Nostalgic vets will find the rape reenactments unremarkably familar. In reality the mayhem of My Lai and My Khe lasted 28 hours, not six, but industry research indicates that cyber ejaculators rarely have more than a six hour window before a landlady looks in on them.

Gaming studies remain inconclusive about whether virtual sex stimulation augments with cumulative scorekeeping. It will require a scientific leap before computer health levels can fortify a real-world refractory period. Otherwise virtual serial binges cannot build on themselves like the longer pyramid games of Civilization or World Of Warcraft.

okinawa schoolgirl rapeJapanese game publisher Konami, forced by civilian outcry to drop a distribution deal for Atomic’s Fallujah first person shooter, is pleased that the salient gangbang modules will find their way to end-user Marine Corps wannabes. Konami already has a bestselling Raper II title, an Okinawa schoolgirl adventure for American servicemen. Konami’s own one-handed programmers are set to adapt the Atomic code for the Japanese market. The human trafficking of Iraqi orphans into US contractor Army brothels becomes Korean Comfort Women; US combat depravity becomes The Rape of Nanking.

Deprived of being able to cash in on the Fallujah atrocity allure, Atomic Games is looking for sympathy from the Support the Troops crowd. Atomic laid off the soldiers on its staff, issuing this statement:

“We wish to assure the dozens of Marine veterans who have collectively invested hundreds of hours in this project that, while we have been badly wounded, we will fight on. The stories of your brothers’ courage and sacrifice in Fallujah must be shared with the world.”

By historical accounts, are they referring to the virtual sequences between the levels of action which act like silent movie inter-titles to link the running and jumping to a bigger story? Where the plot points are inviolate can be the only teaching moments in an otherwise chose-your-adventure killing spree. Where will there be opportunity for gamers to show courage and sacrifice with only a menu of rape and murder?

Let’s be clear. The Fallujah video game was not about soldiering. It did not mean to replicate the experience of 99.9% of the American soldiers who served in the battle for Fallujah. A first person shooter is not about following orders, falling in, or self-sacrifice. An FPS is about four wheeling a personal path of personal destruction. Atomic’s Six Days in Fallujah was a spring break for Grand Theft Auto sex tourists.

NMT is equally concerned about the lost Fallujah stories which may have been the narrative of the gameplay. The world should hear of the turning back all male refugees, of the White Phosphorous and sniper Free Fire Zones. The lost Fallujah action sequences no doubt exploited the armored vehicles crushing the Iraqi wounded, and the role of the helicopter gunships over the river, Red Bridge and the Fallujah hospital.

Antiwar COS -report from the front line

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Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009COLO. SPRINGS- Well, that wasn’t so hard. Our message was warmly received by soldiers who shook our hand in the staging area, and afterward we were thanked by others for what we are trying to do. Antagonism came from the crowd, but not as fiercely as we’d braced ourselves for. Eight years of horror has taken the edge off the “these colors don’t run” mentality. Hence the military imperative for parades like these. Our antiwar presence was all the more important to show the soldiers that some at home are fighting to rescue them. The rest of the attendees were giving them a “welcome home” as they did in 2004, and will keep doing only to redeploy them. The soldiers need to see more real support: a determination to stop these wars.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009

Compatriots of ours were circulating along the sidewalk with this flier:

We ask that you consider the costs of war
as you take part in this celebration.

War kills people. War hurts people.
War kills animals. War destroys things.
War devastates the environment.

This parade is a propaganda exercise
promoted by those who profit from war.

The money spent on war could go to
making friends instead of enemies.
Many of us are mourning today not celebrating.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Note the “American Furniture Warehouse” is the most prominent part of that “thank you” handout.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
This woman was trying to drown us out with cat whistles, until I took her picture.

More of our HEALTH CARE NOT WARFARE contingent stood further south on the corner, just out of frame.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Also not pictured:
LET’S NOT WORSHIP WAR, and U.S. OUT OF AFGHANISTAN,
and my banner backdrops WAR NO MORE and PEACE NOW.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
A young group made threats and tried to crowd us out, until the police intervened.

We were most appreciative of the officers’ prompt interventions, although one officer’s method was hardly comforting. He told one young lady, in a voice for us to overhear: “I know. If it were my choice I’d rip them from the sidewalk, but they have a right to be here.” We took that more as an expression of sympathy than an attempt to intimidate us.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Five officers all told, protected us, from leaping unto the parade route.

Coloradans4Peace condemn COS parade

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: COLORADANS-FOR-PEACE CONDEMNS COLORADO SPRINGS PRO-WAR PARADE.
 
–And why not? The rationales for the Iran and Afghanistan wars have been repudiated by the Obama administration. What place has this city to celebrate them? The wars have been declared illegal by international magistrates. How then can Americans presume to cheer their soldiers’ actions? Regardless the jingoism of the Colorado Springs community, to idealize militarism, while thousands of innocent civilians suffer under its boot every day, is unconscionable. A bigoted majority of Lamborn voters want to lynch a certain black man, should we give them a permit?

The antiwar message directed to whom?

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Cindy Sheehan may be glamping again. This time it’s Martha’s Vineyard, where Sheehan is prepared to lay siege to another presidential vacation. Which certainly highlights what’s become undeniable about Barack Obama. He heralds no change. And I’m not prepared to hope the effectiveness of petitioning our leaders has changed either. Bush answered to no one, Obama won’t even dance with them who thought they elected him. The antiwar message has no one’s ear. Let’s put it to the American people.

Who’s empowered our military commanders to direct their war crimes? We. Who’s encouraging our soldiers to execute their assigned tasks? We.

We “support the troops, not the war.” It’s the distinction between manslaughter and premeditated murder. In practice, we fully support the war effort. Of greater horror, by wishing to see the fighting wrapped up properly, we are prepared to condone the gravest brutality.

The war machine has coopted the word “peace.” The soldiers are “peacekeepers” after all. Peace has come to denote “world peace” actually, the Utopian spiritual quest. Like eternal salvation, world peace is paid lipservice, no one is so unreasonable as to expect its fulfillment.

In this life anyway, which defines the religious American’s aversion to participatory antiwar efforts.

I still am warmed when I see a peace symbol unexpectedly. They have become more ubiquitous, haven’t they? Now I see peace stickers on cash registers where cigarettes are sold.

We’re all for peace. It’s what America is doing abroad, via the Peace Corps or The Corps, pacification.

Red White and Brave Welcome Home

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Colorado Springs will be hosting a parade on August 29 to welcome troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Its predecessor was a 2004 victory parade, this one is billed as a Red White and Brave Welcome Home. You might shy from holding an antagonistic banner like “I DON’T WORSHIP WAR,” but imagine a message draped from a balcony along Tejon Ave! WELCOME HOME, NOW STAY HOME or WHAT HAPPENS IN IRAQ, STAYS IN IRAQ or my favorite, addressed to the 50,000-plus expected to attend: WE’RE CELEBRATING THE MURDER OF HOW MANY CIVILIANS?

This isn’t a Veterans’ Day parade right? It’s one thing to be honoring troops. This parade is an appreciation, a “go get’em” to soldiers returned from Iraq to be redeployed to Afghanistan.

This parade is about recruiting more soldiers. It’s to show prospective recruits that the community supports what they do and are thrilled to send them off again to Afghanistan.

Would protesting the event represent any significant population of Colorado Springs? Although the majority of even this city are against the continued conflicts, I’ve no doubt very few dare speak out against the wars.

That’s where to come out in protest of the glorification of militarism is not about a democratic representation. It’s about what’s right. If 99% of Pikes Peak area residents were just fine with blowing unfortunate Afghan and Iraqi children to bits, I would still object to their wanting to hold a public parade to celebrate it. Let the world see that not every last one of us in Colorado Springs gets off on the carnage we’ve been perpetrating for going on eight years.

India terror suspect arrested then shot

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chongkham sanjitA photographer in Manipur, India documented the arrest of terror suspect Chongkham Sanjit on July 23, and wound up witness to an execution. The pics are SFW: the death squad ducked their victim into the adjacent pharmacy. A red circle indicates the arrestee, the arrow in the photo below shows which way he is led to be killed.

chongkham sanjit

chongkham-sanjitNote the soldiers already blocking off the killing spot. The trigger man waits at far right in camouflage cap.

chongkham-sanjitSanjit is following cooperatively.

chongkham-sanjitAn officer pulls out his handgun.

chongkham-sanjit

chongkham-sanjit
Arrestee is suddenly pushed into vacated shop.

chongkham sanjitSanjit’s body is dragged from the shop.

chongkham sanjitDisplayed in military pickup truck, beside body of Rabina Devi, victim of the minutes earlier police crossfire.

Official story: Sanjit wounded four and killed bystander while resisting arrest.