Category: News

I want to draw special attention to today’s Gareth Porter piece, which essentially describes a post-9/11 US foreign policy directly aimed at exacerbating the terrorist threat and convincing the Muslim world that America is against them. What’s worse, much of the leadership in Washington understands this, including and especially the intelligence community.

Porter cites the 2006 National Intelligence Estimate on Trends in Global Terrorism which said that the Iraq war was “breeding deep resentment of U.S. involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement.” It was also admitted, writes Porter, by former head of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center Robert Grenier who said the war “has convinced many Muslims that the United States is the enemy of Islam and is attacking Muslims, and they have become jihadists as a result of their experience in Iraq.” Night raids in Afghanistan, which have been ramped up by Obama to become one of the primary military approaches in the country, get the wrong person 50 percent of the time according to senior commanders in JSOC. Both former CIA Director Michael Hayden and former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair recognized that “hatred of America is increasing in Pakistan” because of the drone strikes, which kill exorbitant numbers of civilians.

The national security community and the political elite understand the effect of US policy very well. It’s really very difficult to have inside knowledge of how US policy manifests and not understand how it exacerbates hatreds toward America. The State Department cable I wrote about in which a hellish, overcrowded torture chamber in Iraq in 2006 held 1,400 Iraqis, many of whom were illegally detained, was certainly known about in the higher echelons of our government. Prisoners there were beaten by US-supported Iraqi interrogators to the point of broken bones and lesions, tortured by a hook and pulley contraption, threatened with anal rape and forced to fellate their interrogators…it would be a remarkable achievement if those who understood these facts didn’t understand how counterproductive it was.

Or take the recent report from Human Rights Watch which details “serious abuses, such as killings, rape, arbitrary detention, abductions, forcible land grabs, and illegal raids” by US-supported militias like the Afghan Local Police (ALP). In March 2011, General Petraeus told the US Senate that the ALP is “arguably the most critical element in our effort to help Afghanistan develop the capacity to secure itself.” This “critical element” is known among many local Afghans to have abducted and raped a 13 year old boy, beat a number of other boys senseless, and have even hammered nails into the feet of at least one boy. Ordinary Afghans know this. US national security planners know they know it. And many in the upper echelons of the American political system know it will breed future horrors and threats to America. They’re not stupid. They’re irrational.

As Porter mentioned, and as any close reader of these issues knows, individual actors within the national security elite can know and understand how dangerous are these aggressive, murderous policies toward the Muslim world. But the system within which they operate is structured such that their actions don’t align with their quiet admission of blowback. The system is one in which the military and corporate sectors are closely aligned and both have a perceived interest in expansion, by whatever means; coupled with a political and national security establishment seeking to maintain dominance, at all costs. Add to that the last, essential ingredient of a largely ignorant public which is – on the whole – quite taken with nationalism, big government, and militaristic state-worship. With this, these (again, not stupid) individuals seem to swim with the tide and maintain their status as opposed to suggesting America alter its policy to avoid committing atrocities and inciting hatred, and thus endangering America.

At the GOP debate last night:

Veterans for Peace (VFP), a progressive organization if ever there was one, took the courageous step of voting for the “impeachment of President Barack H. Obama for war crimes” at its annual national convention in Portland Oregon in August. The resolution, which called on Congress to immediately begin impeachment proceedings, passed with a majority vote. If you did not read of this, you are a victim of the gatekeepers on the “Left” and the usual censorship of the mainstream media.

The resolution sounds the death knell for the view that advocates of Obama’s impeachment are no more than Right wing, Racist Birthers. Thus, David Swanson, a leader of the Impeach Bush movement, after a pro forma denunciation of Obama, wrote recently in response to charges of hypocrisy: “I can’t get 20 people into the streets to demand Obama’s impeachment (and if I did, they’d want him impeached for being born in Africa to aliens from Planet Socialism….” Is that VFP, David?

The VFP resolution is stark testimony that Swanson is dead wrong and that the tide is turning against the war criminal Obama even among his most faithful followers. A call for impeachment, whatever the prospects for success, makes crystal clear that the antiwar community regards the President as a criminal – whether that President is Bush or Obama. And it puts a stop to the nasty tactic of shutting up impeachment advocates by calling them racists.

The impeachment resolution is modeled on another that VFP passed some years ago calling for impeachment of Bush. The anti-Obama resolution merits reading in full here. It has telling additions to the one targeting Bush. It opens thus: “Whereas, President Obama, on 19 March 2011, committed a criminal act by ordering the U.S. military to war in Libya without first obtaining the consent of the U.S. Congress in a direct violation of the U.S. Constitution.” Bush told lies to get us into war. Such is his arrogance that Obama, acting in the Democratic tradition of Harry S. Truman in the Korean war, did not even bother to lie. He simply went ahead and trampled on the Constitution without pretense.
The seventh in the list of reasons for impeachment is a tight summary: “Whereas, millions upon millions of Iraqi, Afghani, Pakistani, Yemeni, Somali, and Libyan civilians have been maimed, poisoned, displaced from their homes, and killed in a direct result of ongoing, illegal acts of war by the United States.”
It concludes “Therefore Be It Resolved that Veterans For Peace call on the U.S. House of Representatives to immediately begin impeachment proceedings against President Barack H. Obama for failure to uphold his sworn oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America from all enemies foreign and domestic, and for his commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity, obstruction of justice and the violation of numerous national and international laws, treaties and conventions.”

This victory of the VFP rank and file who submitted the resolutions did not come easily. It took three years. The first such resolution was written shortly after Obama took office, on his fourth day ordering Hellfire missiles to strike Pakistan, killing dozens of civilians including three children. That prompted Tom Santoni of the Central FL VFP chapter to pen a principled impeachment resolution. It was taken up at the national convention the following August and was supported by the admirable Adam Kokesh who was at a meeting next door of VFP’s sister organization, Iraq Veterans Against the War. But the VFP leadership, that is the Board, voted against it, thus requiring a two-thirds vote of the membership. This bit of gate keeping worked, and the resolution failed at the August convention. Santoni quit in disgust, a big loss to VFP. The Central Florida chapter tried again in 2010 under the leaderhship of its co-chair Phil Restino. This time Gold Star mother Cindy Sheehan endorsed the resolution, but again it failed. Finally, this year the Central FL chapter once again submitted the resolution and this time the board did not vote it down! The unstoppable Restino reached out to all 128 VFP chapters urging support and passage. And spontaneously Jesse Perrier of Boston’s Smedley Butler chapter of VFP arose and gave an impassioned speech that brought down the house and won the day. The resolution passed.

Now what about the implementation? The Impeach Bush resolution was pushed aggressively in 2005 running up to the 2006 election when Dems were running on the promise of impeachment, on which they promptly reneged, most notoriously John Conyers, the poster Congressperson for impeachment. Mike Ferner, at the time executive director of VFP, made an indignant Bush-bashing speech for impeachment in front of the White House. You can view it in all its glory. A hard copy letter with the signature of the VFP president was mailed to each member of the House calling for impeachment.
How about the present resolution? Mike Ferner opposed it in the floor debate at the August convention. There has been no rally and none is planned – not in front of the White House or anywhere else. This time a FAX of the resolution has been sent to the House members without signature of the President. Currently the Central FL chapter is trying to send snail mail letters on its own to every House member – once it gets the signature of the president.

Unfortunately this story can be repeated in different ways in a variety of “progressive” organizations with leadership more loyal to Dems than to antiwar principle. This writer has witnessed it himself in organizations like PSR and United for Justice and Peace. But the ground is shifting, and much to its credit VFP has led the way.

John Walsh can be reached at John.Endwar@gmail.com. He thanks Phil Restino, co-chair of Central Florida Vets for Peace and Jesse Perrier of the Smedley Butler Brigade of Vets for Peace in Boston for their help. He attempted to reach a voice against the resolution but received no reply.

***

Text of VFP Resolution to Impeach.
IMPEACHMENT OF PRESIDENT BARACK H. OBAMA FOR WAR CRIMES?Whereas, Barack H. Obama is Commander In Chief of the U.S. Armed Forces and the head of the Executive Branch of the United States government, and
Whereas, President Obama, on 19 March 2011, committed a criminal act by ordering the U.S. military to war in Libya without first obtaining the consent of the U.S. Congress in a direct violation of the U.S. Constitution, and
Whereas, the illegal U.S. invasion, bombing and occupation of Iraq initiated by the Bush administration continues under the Obama administration; and
Whereas, the U.S. government is currently engaged in illegal wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Libya, and President Obama pledged to increase the number of military personnel and tax dollars spent on the these wars, and
Whereas, the U.S. military used and continues to use depleted uranium munitions, cluster bombs and white phosphorous in densely populated areas in violation of U.S. laws and international laws and treaties prohibiting the indiscriminate killing of civilians; and,
Whereas, the Geneva Conventions specifically prohibit the use of especially injurious weapons and materials causing unnecessary harm that remain active and lethal after battle, and over large areas of land, and
Whereas, large numbers of babies born in Iraq and Afghanistan suffer life-long illness and deformity like severe disfigurements and brain damage, Down’s syndrome, and weak hearts doctors state are caused by the U.S. military’s massive and widespread use of toxic and radioactive materials, and
Whereas, millions upon millions of Iraqi, Afghani, Pakistani, Yemeni, Somali, and Libyan civilians have been maimed, poisoned, displaced from their homes, and killed in a direct result of ongoing, illegal acts of war by the United States, and
Whereas, illegal, immoral and counterproductive detainee torture and brutalization at the hands of the U.S. military’s Immediate Reaction Force continue at Guantanamo under the Obama administration and in particular, the torture of Pfc. Bradley Manning at Quantico, Virginia, and
Whereas, President Obama is an accessory after the fact in obstructing justice by failing to order the Department of Justice to initiate investigations into numerous and blatant U.S. war crimes committed by the Bush administration, for which it is manifestly accountable under the law, and
Whereas, millions of Americans, including Veterans For Peace and Prosecute Them Now, supported the impeachment of Bush/Cheney for the same war crimes that are being committed now by Obama in violation of the U.S. Constitution, U.S. federal laws, the United Nations Charter, the Hague Convention, the Geneva Conventions, The United Nations Convention Against Torture and the Nuremberg Tribunal Charter, and
Whereas, Veterans For Peace and Prosecute Them Now are committed to the stated mission to restrain our government from intervening overtly and covertly in the internal affairs of other nations, to seek justice for veterans and victims of war, to increase public awareness of the exact costs of war, and to abolish war as an instrument of national policy;
Therefore Be It Resolved that Veterans For Peace call on the U.S. House of Representatives to immediately begin impeachment proceedings against President Barack H. Obama for failure to uphold his sworn oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America from all enemies foreign and domestic, and for his commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity, obstruction of justice and the violation of numerous national and international laws, treaties and conventions.
Approved at the 2011 VFP National Convention?

Radley Balko, simply one of the best journalists around, has a new piece up at the Huffington Post on the militarization of domestic police departments, especially since 9/11. Unsurprisingly, the numbers show the terrorist attacks served merely as a pretext for the power-grabbing martial response, which was directed mostly at Americans.

New York magazine reported some telling figures last month on how delayed-notice search warrants — also known as “sneak-and-peek” warrants — have been used in recent years. Though passed with the PATRIOT Act and justified as a much-needed weapon in the war on terrorism, the sneak-and-peek was used in a terror investigation just 15 times between 2006 and 2009. In drug investigations, however, it was used more than 1,600 times during the same period.

…September 11 also brought a new source of funding for military-grade equipment in the Department of Homeland Security. In recent years, the agency has given anti-terrorism grants to police agencies across the country to purchase armored personnel carriers, including such unlikely terrorism targets as Winnebago County, Wisconsin; Longview, Texas; Tuscaloosa County, Alabama; Canyon County, Idaho; Santa Fe, New Mexico; Adrian, Michigan; and Chattanooga, Tennessee. When the Memphis suburb of Germantown, Tennessee — which claims to be one of the safest cities in the country — got its APC in 2006, its sheriff told the local paper that the acquisition would put the town at the “forefront” of homeland security preparedness.

Read the whole piece for all the unsettling details. What Balko also includes is the steady rolling back of the Posse Comitatus Act, which basically prohibits the federal government from using the military for domestic law enforcement. I’ve written before about how US foreign policy towards Latin America diligently prevents there being any such limitations. We strongly encourage and implement drug and law enforcement policies which bolster the military, causing all sorts of trouble for millions of ordinary Latin Americans. But Balko details the slow creep over the past few decades of the militarization of American police.

Another creeping example of the blurring of the lines between the civil criminal sphere and the war zone is the yet-to-be-passed provision in an omnibus Pentagon spending measure that would shift all terrorism cases immediately into the military sphere. Under the law, which will be voted upon later this month, arrested terror suspects would be placed under military custody rather than being left to civilian law enforcement agencies like the FBI.  As written, the measure wouldn’t apply to American citizens, although that was supposed to be the case for Guantanamo too, despite American citizens being held there without civilian trials. If passed, legislation like this is just a first step to expanding such treatment to ordinary Americans for god knows what else.

Update: I should have included (1) the fact that there are thousands of known instances of law breaking by the government in PATRIOT Act law enforcement behavior and (2) the drone war has extended to the drug war as well, perhaps the most spectacular illustration of war-on-terror-induced militarization of almost everything.

Yesterday there were two “security threats” where F16 fighter jets were scrambled to escort airliners after “terror threats” were declared.

In the widely-reported “breaking” story, a pair of fighter jets were scrambled to escort an American Airlines jet into New York’s JFK airport. Three people were reported “detained.”

We now learn that the pilot became spooked by passengers’ frequent trips to and from the restroom. Federal air marshals aboard flight 34 from Los Angeles to JFK were able to resolve the situation when the passengers complied with their instructions, police officials said. The pilot then radioed that the situation was under control and the plane landed safely. Three male passengers were questioned upon arrival (not really “detained”), but no charges were filed against them, authorities said.

The second incident requiring fighter jets involved two people aboard that plane were “allegedly behaving suspiciously,” according to the FBI spokesperson in Denver, Dave Joly. The plane was met in the Detroit airport by law enforcement and taken to a remote area for a security screening, but no explosives were found, Joly said.

Instead, the “suspicious behavior” was two people “making out” in the bathroom mid-flight, law enforcement sources told ABC News. Three people were taken into custody for questioning (three?), Frontier Airlines said in a statement, but no arrests have been made in that case either.

Thank goodness for the federal government keeping us safe!