Category: News

The U.S. and Japan have come to an agreement on the relocation of about 9,000 U.S. Marines that will leave their bases in Okinawa, with about 5,000 transferred to Guam and the rest spread among other locations in the region like Hawaii, Australia, etc. This is just one part in the Obama administration’s broader imperial plan to boost American military and naval presence in Asia-Pacific to counter China’s regional influence. I wrote about this agreement earlier in the week, so read on to find out about how the citizens of both Japan and Guam have resisted the Defense Department’s meddling on their land.

I wanted to point out some key quotations from defense officials on this so-called strategic ‘pivot’ to Asia the Obama administration laid out months ago. It’s interesting, they’re very frank about what is happening. Other measures that Washington takes to expand the global military empire come with exhaustive propaganda about why it must be done. In Latin America, the war on drugs is the pretext to support undemocratic regimes and maintain a military presence throughout the region. In the Middle East, its usually about “terrorism” or a single dangerous regime that presents an existential threat.

But there are no such lies when it comes to expansion in Asia-Pacific. Nobody is screaming about any threats, or rogue nations, or criminal networks or terrorism. They’re just admitting the sole purpose is to expand the military presence without the justification of any military threat.

Here’s one senior defense official explaining:

Well, as you know, one of the goals of the administration in Asia is to create a — to build a presence in the Asia-Pacific that’s more geographically distributed.  And I think this agreement is part and parcel of that.  When you look at it in combination with our plans to build a rotational presence in Australia, what you have are sort of an ongoing ability for U.S. forces to be visible and present in multiple places across the region at any given time.  And we think that that presents advantages in building relations with partner countries; helping to respond to, for example, humanitarian emergencies; and as needed, respond to contingencies.

And again:

This new posture that we’ve created results in a more operationally effective presence across the region through Marine Air-Ground Task Forces, which we call MAGTFs — in multiple locations.  So in multiple locations, we’ll have combinations of command, ground, air and logistics capable of deploying and operating together in a — in a self-contained way.  So that’s what the presence on Guam will be like, it’s what the presence on Okinawa will be like, as well as other locations in the region.

No “Hitler-reincarnated” is needed, I guess, for expanding the empire in Asia. The crafters of U.S. foreign policy are openly admitting that this “presence” is reason enough in itself. It’s kind of like what BBC reporter Jonathan Beale described onboard the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Gulf’s Strait of Hormuz last February: “This carrier and these [fighter] jets are more than just a show of force, they’re here to send a clear message to Iran as to who really controls these waters.”

A similar show is being played out off the coast of the Philippines. Armed Chinese and Filipino naval vessels have been standing off for about two weeks after a dispute about territorial claims in contested waters. This standoff happened just days before the U.S. and the Philippines engaged in new military exercises included in a new agreement facilitating greater U.S. military and naval access to the Philippines. The U.S. has a security agreement with the Philippines promising we’ll defend it against any threats. Not only is Washington playing World Policeman, but they’re making sure China never has the ability to declare its very own Monroe Doctrine.

We want to deter potential adversaries (China) from daring to grow their economies or build up their militaries. Those are strictly American prerogatives. And defense officials don’t mind admitting it.

From what I can tell, the pre-trial hearing of Bradley Manning is a moral mockery that will be looked upon with shame by future generations.

As I wrote on Thursday, the military judge in Bradley Manning’s pre-trial hearing refused to dismiss the criminal charges as requested in a motion from Manning’s defense attorneys. In seeking the dismissal, Manning’s lawyers argued that prosecutors were too slow to share required information with the defense, and that they should therefore be inadmissible.

Not only that, but the defense protested the most serious charge Manning faces, that of “aiding the enemy.” The Uniform Code of Military Justice’s definition of aiding the enemy says that a perpetrator, “without proper authority, knowingly … gives intelligence to or communicates or corresponds with or holds any intercourse with the enemy, either directly or indirectly.”

Manning’s defense argued the charge of aiding the enemy is unreasonable. “Because the enemy had access to Internet and may go to the website, they are indirectly aiding the enemy?” Manning’s defense attorney David Coombs asked.

The judge still refused to dismiss the charge, although she warned the prosecution that the burden is on them to prove Manning knowingly aided al-Qaeda. This is a tall order which seems designed to make the prosecution fail in this endeavor. But I don’t think it’s right to be implying the judge stuck it to the prosecution, as some reports are doing. She could have just dismissed the ridiculous charge.

Kevin Gosztola at FireDogLade has some superb reporting on the Manning pre-trial, which makes it even clearer to me what a mockery of the rule of law this ordeal is. As Gosztola reports, whether Manning did any harm is “irrelevant.” Sigh.

In the case of Pfc. Bradley Manning, who is accused of releasing classified information to WikiLeaks, the government presented a motion during court proceedings today to prevent the defense from discussing “harm” or lack of “harm” done by leaks in its case.

The government’s motion (which no member of the press will ever get to personally read because these proceedings do not have that kind of transparency) argued Judge Col. Denise Lind should not let the defense raise the issue of harm until the sentencing portion of the trial because “actual harm or damage” is “not relevant” and lack of harm is “not relevant to any defense available.”

Maj. Ashden Fein argued “no element” of the charges against Manning require “actual damage to be proven.” He added: “Whether the accused knew or thought he knew which documents and information would cause actual harm to the United States is irrelevant to his specific acts for which he is charged.”

That these proceedings can advance without everybody involved constantly asking themselves why Manning is being tried as opposed to the war criminals he allegedly exposed through his leaks says everything there is to say about the trial, I think.

The big, bad, dangerous North Korea actually paraded fake missiles to scare Washington. And it apparently worked since Washington spent so much time hysterically denouncing the country for its pathetic failure of a missile test launch last week.

Analysts who have studied photos of a half-dozen ominous new North Korean missiles showcased recently at a lavish military parade say they were fake, and not very convincing ones, casting further doubt on the country’s claims of military prowess.

…the weapons displayed April 15 appear to be a mishmash of liquid-fuel and solid-fuel components that could never fly together. Undulating casings on the missiles suggest the metal is too thin to withstand flight. Each missile was slightly different from the others, even though all were supposedly the same make. They don’t even fit the launchers they were carried on. “There is no doubt that these missiles were mock-ups,” Markus Schiller and Robert Schmucker, of Germany’s Schmucker Technologie, wrote in a paper posted recently on the website Armscontrolwonk.com that listed those discrepancies. “It remains unknown if they were designed this way to confuse foreign analysts, or if the designers simply did some sloppy work.”

It turns out that, not only are they mock-ups, but they are mock-ups of weapons they aren’t working on for real.

Theodore Postol, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and former scientific adviser to the US Chief of Naval Operations, said the Taepodong-2 design remains the more real future threat — though even that remains at least a decade away — and the KN-08 is simply a smoke screen. “I believe that these missiles are not only mock-ups, but they are very unlikely to be actual mock-ups of any missiles in design.”

Check out the rest of the article. It goes into some history of North Korea’s previous displays of toy weapons in the 1990s. Here’s the Daily Mail on it and the Los Angeles Times. Also see my piece from last week on the hypocritical posture the U.S. has towards North Korea’s nukes.

This is the 75th anniversary of the bombing of Guernica. Indignation about bombing civilians seems like such a historic relic.

Unfortunately, this atrocity seems to have been almost completely forgotten in the United States. Perhaps the last time that the most famous momento of that slaughter got any attention was when Colin Powell was shilling at the United Nations in 2003 to whip up support for bombing Iraq.

Here’s an outtake from Maureen Dowd’s excellent New York Times column (February 5, 2003) on that absurdity:

Powell Without Picasso
By MAUREEN DOWD
When Colin Powell goes to the United Nations today to make his
case for war with Saddam, the U.N. plans to throw a blue cover
over Picasso’s antiwar masterpiece, “Guernica.”

Too much of a mixed message, diplomats say. As final
preparations for the secretary’s presentation were being made
last night, a U.N. spokesman explained, “Tomorrow it will be
covered and we will put the Security Council flags in front of
it.”

Mr. Powell can’t very well seduce the world into bombing Iraq
surrounded on camera by shrieking and mutilated women, men,
children, bulls and horses.

Reporters and cameras will stake out the secretary of state at
the entrance of the U.N. Security Council, where the tapestry
reproduction of “Guernica,” contributed by Nelson Rockefeller,
hangs.

The U.N. began covering the tapestry last week after getting
nervous that Hans Blix’s head would end up on TV next to a
screaming horse head.
______

Geez, I wonder what they would do that painting if Obama was speaking in that venue.

There are two narratives on the Syria conflict rising to the top of the headlines the past few days. First, the ceasefire brokered by UN envoy Kofi Annan has failed. Second, Western powers are eager to escalate their interventionist policies. Both narratives are premature, I think.

Yes, considerable violence has continued despite the ceasefire. But overall, the violence seems to have decreased compared to before the ceasefire. Those in Washington thirsting for a comprehensive military intervention like Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman pushed this “ceasefire failed” narrative mere days after it was announced, eager to pretend Washington has no other choice but war.

And it’s true that Western powers, particularly the U.S., Britian and France, are increasingly hinting at some sort of imminent intervention. The Obama administration is allegedly considering what actions it could take beyond the “non-lethal” aid already being sent to the opposition forces and the French Foreign Minister expressed intentions to push for war at the UN Security Council. But the inability for even people like McCain and Lieberman to put forth the “greeted as liberators” and “piece of cake” justifications for military action is indicative of the general understanding that intervening in Syria would be very costly for the U.S. (not to mention Syrians).

Marc Lynch of George Washington University has been one of the leading voices against direct intervention in Syria, as I wrote about here. Yesterday he gave a testimony to before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia on what U.S. policy towards Syria should be. He eloquently reiterated his opposition to the the perilous proposals to intervene.

Nobody expects the current diplomatic path to quickly or easily end the conflict in Syria, but military intervention does not offer a compelling alternative.  There are no cheap or easy forms of military intervention which would quickly bring down the regime of Bashar al-Assad or effectively protect Syrian civilians. Military half-measures, including safe zones, humanitarian corridors and arming the Syrian opposition, would likely spread the violence and increase the numbers of Syrian dead without increasing the likelihood of regime collapse.  An initially limited intervention would most likely pave the way to more direct and expensive involvement comparable to the experience in Iraq.

He goes into details for each one of those points, but I especially want to draw attention to his analysis of launching an air campaign against the Assad regime. With whitewashed memories of Libya still crisp in people’s minds, bombing from the sky tends to strike people as foolproof. But Lynch points out that this would “likely begin with significant initial air strikes to eliminate air defenses,” but that “many Syrian anti-aircraft capabilities are located in or near urban areas, which means that significant civilian casualties could result from any attempt to eliminate them.” And that’s not all: there are important precedents for why “air power” and enforced “safe zones” would fail.

Using air power to protect civilians and defend the opposition within safe areas or humanitarian corridors is even more complex.  Such safe areas could most easily be established and protected along the Turkish border, but most of the threatened civilians live in other parts of Syria. Humanitarian corridors would be extremely difficult to protect, and could create a new refugee crisis if desperate civilians rush into designated safe zones or neighboring countries. Protecting either would require a serious commitment of resources. Declaring a safe area without defending it effectively would only repeat the painful mistakes of history. In Bosnia, thousands of people were murdered in Srebrenica and other designated safe areas when peacekeepers lacked the means to protect them. Even historical “successes” are sobering. Operation Provide Comfort, established in northern Iraq after 1991, was envisioned as a short-term crisis response, but turned into a 12-year commitment that ended only when the United States invaded Iraq in 2003. Creating and protecting a safe area in Syria would therefore require a significant and lengthy investment of troops and resources, and would not likely hasten Assad’s collapse.

Lynch thinks the Annan plan could successfully end the bloodshed, if allowed to run its course. This all depends on whether or not the warmongers win out, but as of right now, I don’t see full-on military intervention happening.

———————————————–

In reference to the McCain-Lieberman push to intervene, Lynch says “It is not enough to demonstrate that the cause of intervention is just,” because the intervention would have consequences directly counter to the supposed “humanitarian justification” touted by the hawks. What still fascinates me is how readily the hawks – particularly the leadership of the GOP – admit that a war on Syria would really be about eliminating Iran’s ally and gaining more control over the Middle East. I wrote about this back in February. It’s amazing, really. They’re not even embarrassed to sing their imperial dogma loud and clear.