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This is what a movement looks like

by Michael G. Smith

While much of the left has been bemoaning the demise of the antiwar movement and fighting to reinvigorate the opposition to American warmongering that was so evident before the war began, millions of immigrants and their allies have poured into the streets to fight the racist stench emanating from Congress and demand real justice and dignity for all workers. This incredible movement for immigrants’ rights, which seemed to spring up out of nowhere but actually has its roots in decades of immigrant-bashing, right-wing vigilantes patrolling the border and the continued super-exploitation of millions of undocumented workers, has given us a glimpse of what a real movement against the war could look like.

This raises an obvious question: given the continued unpopularity of both President Bush and his war on Iraq, why is the antiwar movement so unable to produce the kind of numbers, momentum and political depth as its immigrants’ right counterpart? In other words, with Bush’s approval rating at 36% and 57% of Americans now calling the war a mistake, what the hell is wrong with the antiwar movement?

The fight to end the occupation of Iraq is paralyzed by the twin paradoxes of the antiwar movement: as more and more Americans turn against the war, the movement gets smaller and smaller; and as Americans move leftward on the issue of the occupation, much of the leadership of the antiwar movement is actually moving to the right.

These contradictions have played themselves out in numerous ways over the past year and a half, with the most striking aspect being the antiwar leadership’s (near) unanimous support for John Kerry in 2004, a candidate who not only voted for the war and said that he would do it again but who also called for more troops to be sent to Iraq and argued that Bush had not been tough enough on the Iraqi people.

More recently, the third anniversary of the invasion passed with barely a whisper of protest. Amazingly, even with a solid majority of Americans now against the war, there was no national demonstration called on the anniversary against the occupation. Instead, local demonstrations were held in cities large and small around the country, with numbers that can only be called disappointing given the unpopularity of the war.

ANSWER, one of the principal national antiwar organizations, was able to mount regional protests in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Seattle, along with a youth march in New York, but did not attempt a national demonstration in either Washington, DC or New York similar to the ones on previous anniversaries of the war.

Even more significantly, United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ), the other main antiwar group in the country and decidedly to the right of ANSWER, explicitly told people to not attend even the regional demonstrations because of its ongoing feud with ANSWER. Instead, they called for even more fractured local demonstrations on March 18th, and dubbed March 20th, the actual anniversary of the invasion and a Monday, as a day to “call your Congressional representative to keep the pressure on Congress.”

These are problematic strategies on several fronts. To let the anniversary of the war pass without a national expression of opposition can be seen only as a sign of weakness. Many Americans would be hard pressed to know that a majority of their fellow citizens share their antiwar views, simply because there has been no visible expression of that opposition. Local and regional demonstrations have their place, to be sure, but to miss out on such an obvious opportunity to showcase antiwar voices, and thus give confidence to the millions of Americans who want to see the occupation end but feel isolated in that sentiment, is a tragedy.

Moreover, UFPJ’s orientation on Congress is sorely misplaced. It represents a move rightward, from putting people in the streets and building a genuine movement that demands immediate withdrawal to pressuring Congress to pass legislation for “strategic redeployment” or “gradual withdrawal.” This is especially disconcerting given the leftward trend in American public opinion on the question; a recent Gallup poll pegged support for withdrawing troops at 64%, with 28% favoring immediate withdrawal, which is particularly impressive given the lack of any coherent opposition to Bush and the war from either Democrats or the antiwar movement.

You cannot build an antiwar movement by appealing to warmongers, demobilizing the movement to get warmongers elected and then telling people that the best thing they can do is to stay at home and let those same warmongers in Congress sort it out.

The national demonstration that UFPJ did call, set for April 29th in New York, is shaping up to be little more than a pep rally for the Democratic Party. This is not the space to review the sordid history of the Democrats and the Iraq War; needless to say, relying on an avowedly pro-war and pro-imperialism party to end the war and occupation is a sadly mistaken strategy.

UFPJ’s recent endorsement of Rep. John Murtha’s “antiwar” resolution–which is more accurately a shuffling of U.S. troops around the Middle East rather than actually bringing them home, and is meant to bolster U.S. aims in the Middle East, not to curtail them–is equally unfortunate. Murtha, long known as a staunch hawk, is hardly the person to be carrying the banner of the antiwar movement.

Politics is, at heart, what you think is wrong with the world and how you think we should go about fixing it (thanks to Sharon Smith for the formulation). The demise of the antiwar movement shows that it’s not enough to have an arrogant, incompetent and wholly unpopular president, nor is it enough to see a majority of Americans actually turn against the war; in short, politics matter. In this case specifically, the discussion around what should be done to end the war–the liberals’ answer of reliance on the Democratic Party and congressional action vs. the left’s answer of a genuine movement in the streets combined with resistance to the occupation from both Iraqis and American soldiers–is dominated by the liberals, and thus far it has produced exceedingly bad results.

Ultimately, for the antiwar movement to succeed, we need a strategy that doesn’t rely on pro-war politicians to represent the antiwar movement and instead empowers the majority of Americans who are against the war and occupation to take matters into their own hands, build institutions that actually represent them, and use the power of the working class here at home and soldiers resisting in Iraq to bring the troops home.

So how does the immigrants’ rights movement play into all this? First, this incredible turn of events can serve as an example to the antiwar movement, to that 57% of Americans who think the war was a mistake but have been so tragically let down by their “leaders.” Let us see what a real movement looks like, one independent of the party of killing slightly fewer Iraqis and deporting slightly fewer undocumented workers, and from that let us all conclude that, to paraphrase Eugene V. Debs, “There is nothing we cannot do for ourselves.”

Second, let us all realize that the immigrants’ rights movement has been as large, as politically conscious, as effective as it has been precisely because the Democratic Party never saw it coming. The compromises, half-measures and empty rhetoric of the Democrats and their liberal allies have thus far fallen on deaf ears, and it is the refusal of those in the streets to be co-opted and forced into the narrow confines of electoralism that is transforming the debate around immigration.

As Democratic politicians across the country have sickeningly tried to get to the front of this speeding train so they can apply the brakes as quickly as possible, pretending to be friends of immigrants and telling them that yes, really, a new Bracero program is basically the same as amnesty, we can start to get a sense of what it might look like were the politicians in Washington chasing us in the antiwar movement, trying to meet our demands, as opposed to the other way around.

Finally, let this immigrants’ rights movement put to rest any notion that America is a hopelessly right-wing country, that the Democratic Party is the best we can hope for or that the old-fashioned idea that ordinary people can fight for their own emancipation and in the process build their own movements and organizations is somehow quaint or outdated. It is, in fact, the only thing that has ever changed the world, and it is the only thing that ever will.

Also appearing in http://www.counterpunch.org/smith04212006.html
and http://www.mrzine.org

Published with permission of Michael G. Smith

More:
June 23, 2005 – “Scott Ritter: US at War with Iran”
November 17, 2005 – “Scott Ritter speaks out against wars on Iraq and Iran”
Scott Ritter Archives

A Path to Peace with Iran

By Scott Ritter

04/20/06

It has been more than a week now since the Iranian government announced that it had “joined the nuclear club” by successfully enriching uranium, albeit for nuclear fuel, not a weapon. Once a nation has the capacity to enrich to the former, enrichment to the latter is simply a matter of time; the technology is the same. Iran’s declaration immediately made headlines around the world, with stunned punditry engaging in wild speculation about the potential ramifications of this turn of events. From a simple laboratory-scale enrichment experiment, a massive nuclear weapons program grew Pheonix-like from the ashes, prompting dire warnings from US Government officials such as Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation Stephen Rademaker, who told a press conference in Moscow, where he was visiting to discuss the Iranian nuclear issue with Russian officials, that Iran “…may be capable of making a nuclear bomb within 16 days.”

Rademaker was referring to the mathematical possibilities arising from Iran enriching uranium to weapons grade-levels at its centrifuge enrichment plant at Natanz, using a 50,000-centrifuge cascade system the United States and others say is capable of being installed at the facility. In a nod to the hypothetical nature of his outlandish remark, Rademaker did note that the Iranians have gone on record as only wanting to install a 3,000-centrifuge cascade at Natanz. In that case, Rademaker said, “We calculate that a 3,000-machine cascade could produce enough uranium to build a nuclear weapon within 271 days.” Apparently 271 days isn’t as terrifyingly sexy as 16 days, given that the majority of the media reported Rademakers initial statement.

In all fairness to Mr. Rademaker, the full 16 days window he postulated remains open, and so it is perhaps too harsh to pass criticism until it is known whether or not his prediction will come to pass. But I’ll wager a dime to a dollar that come 16 days — or even 271 days — the world will find Iran no closer to a nuclear bomb than it is today, because the reality is Iran does not possess an active, ongoing, viable nuclear weapons program. In all reality, Iran does not yet even possess the capability to enrich uranium on an industrial scale. Its claims regarding the laboratory-scale work that was conducted — a limited run of some 164 centrifuges which enriched Uranium hexafluoride gas (UF6) from 0.7% to 3.5% U235 — has yet to be verified by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is in the process of collecting samples of the enriched gas for further analysis.

The fact that the IAEA safeguard inspections are at play in Iran may in itself come as a surprise to most observers of the ongoing Iranian nuclear saga. Iran is still very much a member, in good standing, of the non-proliferation treaty, and all of its nuclear activities continue to be under the stringent monitoring of the IAEA safeguard inspectors, an odd reality for a nation only 16 days away from being able to replicate the American attack on Hiroshima, if Stephen Rademaker is to be taken seriously. It takes an extraordinary stretch of the imagination to have Iran fabricating a nuclear weapon right under the nose of IAEA inspectors who today manage an inspection process that is not only technologically advanced, but seasoned after years of sleuthing after nuclear weapons programs in Iraq, North Korea, South Africa and Iran. To liken these professionals, as is the habit of many in the Bush administration today, to “keystone cops” is like comparing the US Marine Corps to the Boy Scouts. The IAEA inspectors are the best in the world at what they do. The fact that they have not found a “smoking gun” to back up what has been to date nothing more than irresponsible speculation concerning the existence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program should ease the fears of those politicians and pundits prone to panic. Unfortunately, this has not been the case, and as a result the world finds itself inching ever closer to a tragically unnecessary war between the United States and Iran.

The problems that plague Washington DC on the issue of Iran are the same problems that haunt America overall regarding Iraq — no clear understanding of why we as a nation are doing what we are doing where we are doing it, and absolutely no system of accountability for those who are implicated, directly through their actions or indirectly through abrogation of duties and responsibilities, in embroiling America in such senseless conflict. There seems to be, especially among the so-called “anti-war” crowd, a tendency to blame the “system” for all that ails us, with a specific trend to isolate particular nodes of economic and/or political power for special indictment.

In this light, the current war in Iraq and the real possibility of war with Iran becomes the responsibility of “Big Oil,” the “Neo Cons,” the “Military Industrial Complex,” and more recently, the “Israeli Lobby.” There are more names one can add to the list; everyone, it seems, is to blame. Congress, while not getting a pass, does get special dispensation in so far that we can understand why the elected representatives of the people abrogate the trust and confidence we place in them by noting that they have fallen under the ever expanding control of “special interests,” namely the aforementioned power nodes that are to blame for everything. Likewise, since these power nodes also control the mainstream media, one can begin to understand why it is that the pro-war message trumps the anti-war message every step of the way.

Of course, there is much merit in all of the above arguments. There are in fact special interest groups (the so-called “power nodes”) which exude influence, both in terms of influencing the legislative agenda of elected officials as well as the overall “thematic” of mainstream media, far in excess of that which is healthy in an ostensibly representative democracy. But it is wrong, and futile, to simply blame these power nodes, or the institutions they have come to so heavily influence. These power nodes did not simply appear out of nowhere. They are a product of American history and culture, a manifestation of the reality that, even more so than the processes of representative democracy, America is a product of unadulterated capitalism.

All that is good and bad about our society today stems from that basic truth. The American capitalist system exists to make money, and that money ends up concentrated in the hands of a few, while the majority of Americans toil in support of this massive capital generating behemoth. As a nation over time we have tinkered with the American system (imperfectly, it may be argued) in a way that seeks to protect the civil liberties of the individual. But in the end we are compelled not to bite the hand that feeds us, and the corporation for the most part has benefited at the expense of the citizen. Some would argue that the gains of the corporation translate into the gains of the citizen. This is true, as long as there remains a system of checks and balances through the vehicle of the rule of law that stays the hand of excessive greed at the expense of individual rights. But in the end the strongest proponent of individual rights must be the individual citizen, and when the system of capitalism dulls the attraction of citizenship based upon the rule of law (a process that is extraordinarily time consuming and difficult) with the allure of consumer-based creature comforts delivered to the masses, the individual is faced with an up-hill struggle of immense proportions that cannot be won unless a helping hand is offered by the very system of capitalism the individual is struggling against.

In short, America as a nation is genetically constructed in a manner that places a premium on greed. However, the DNA that drives this greed gene requires a compliant host, which we could call the American citizenry, if it is to survive. There has always been a complicated Kabuki-type dance occurring between the American corporation and the American citizen, with a Constitutionally mandated system of governance, replete with pre-programmed checks and balances, serving as puppet master in an effort to preserve a relative balance. But, as President Eisenhower foretold when warning America about the ascendancy of the military-industrial complex back in the 1950′s, if this delicate balance is disrupted, the system is in danger of collapsing.

The American system has been in collapse for many decades now, with the rise of corporate power occurring in direct relationship with the demise of concept and reality of individual citizenship. How America as a nation reacted to the horrific events of September 11, 2001 clearly put the manifestation of this collapse on center stage. Americans for the most part remained mute and motionless as the rights of the individual were infringed on irrationally by the so-called Patriot Act. The various economic and political power nodes, once held in check by a Congress which at one time recognized its responsibilities to the individual citizen, now ran rough shod over the elected representatives of the people by exploiting the fear of the people generated by the people’s own ignorance of the world they lived in. In short, the current war in Iraq, and the looming war with Iran, can be explained as a manifestation of American capitalism gone mad.

Some might argue that this very definition in itself provides justification for a total rejection of the current manifestation of the American system, and the need to seek a new path or direction. There are those in the anti-war movement today who articulate such an argument. I, for one, am not prepared to embrace this way of thinking. I recognize both the good and bad inherent in the difficult blending of capitalistic greed and individual humanism that is modern America, and accept that this system is the best model in existence today, as long as it maintains a system of checks and balances that keeps the forces of excessiveness under control. In likening America to a biological entity suffering from genetic mutation, I not only attempt to identify the problem, but also the cure.

The delicate balancing act that exists between capitalism and individual rights is a pre-requisite for American national survival. Right now this system is out of balance, and America is teetering down a path of self-destruction. Fortunately, like most biological beings, there is an internal mechanism that recognizes when a system is out of alignment, and seeks to make the appropriate adjustments in time to forestall its demise. Since America is, first and foremost, a capitalist system, it is to capitalism that one must look to for these adjustments. We got the first inklings of this very sort of attitudinal wake-up call just this week, when Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, a Republican of distinction who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called for the Bush administration to “cool it” on the issue of Iran.

Senator Lugar did not base his arguments on grand ideological principles of peace and justice, but rather the more base passion of prosperity. Speaking before an audience at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC, Senator Lugar warned that a confrontation between the United States and Iran over its nuclear programs could trigger economic collapse at home and abroad should Iran’s oil and gas resources be withdrawn from the global energy market. With global consumption of oil on the rise, not only in the United States but also developing economies such as China and India, spare production capacity has dwindled from 10 percent in 2002 to less than two percent today, Lugar noted. If Iran pulled its oil and gas resources from the market, or had them pulled indirectly through sustained US military intervention, the global energy market would be thrown into a crisis the likes of which have never been seen.

Senator Lugar spoke of the threat that exists simply if the price of oil is sustained at the $60 a barrel level, noting that Americans paid 17 percent more for energy in 2005 than in the previous year, an increase which accounted for more than a third of the American trade deficit. “If oil prices remain at $60 a barrel through 2006, we will spend about $320 billion on oil imports this year.” As of this writing, oil prices were just above $70 per barrel, with the Iranian government noting that in their opinion the price of oil was still below its “real value.” What Lugar did not engage in directly, but referred to obliquely, was that the forces of capitalism which drive America also drive the global oil market, and that if America, which currently consumes 25 percent of the world’s oil, engages in actions with Iran that disrupt the global oil market, the competition which fuels speculative oil pricing would go out of control as the United States, Europe, China and India competed to lock down energy supplies they all need to survive. Lugar spoke of his concerns over oil prices sustained at $60 per barrel. Imagine the consequences of sustained oil prices of $100 per barrel, or more.

This reality is understood not only by Senator Lugar, but also various conservative foreign policy figures, including those who articulated in favor of war with Iraq. Influential persons such as Richard Haas and Richard Armitage have come out recently in favor of broad diplomatic and economic engagement with Iran, versus the extreme confrontational approach of the Bush White House. These conservatives are loathe to take the lead on such a volatile issue on their own initiative. Instead, their posturing away from confrontation with Iran is more likely a manifestation of the reality that the conservative capitalist circles they operate in are becoming increasingly nervous about the damage such confrontation could bring to the economic system that currently sustains them.

It is said that politics makes for strange bedfellows. If there is to be any hope of forestalling a disastrous war between the United States and Iran, there must be an internal realignment of the delicate Kabuki dance between capitalism and individualism in America that seeks to sustain the American way of life, versus destroy it. Today, many in the anti-war movement decry conservative capitalists as being the source of all that ails America, and the nurturing point which feeds the various economic and political power nodes that produce the variety of special interest groups the anti-war movement likes to pin responsibility for war in Iraq (and the possibility of war with Iran) on. Likewise, this total disconnect between many of those that populate the anti-war movement and the conservative circles in which Richard Lugar, Richard Haas, and Richard Armitage operate in means that there is no tendency on the part of these conservatives to reach out to the anti-war movement for help in forestalling a conflict both sides agree is wrong for America.

Many in the anti-war movement seem to recognize that there is a need to expand the base of this movement to be much more inclusive of mainstream America. I suggest that the pace of current events dictate a much more dramatic solution — that the anti-war movement begin to reach out to the very institutions that it condemns and make common cause for the preservation of a way of life — the unique blend of corporate capitalism and individual rights — that is at risk from the policies of the Bush administration. It is not likely that there will be many points of agreement on the long-term path that America should take regarding achieving the ideal balance between these two competing, and somewhat contradictory, concepts. But one thing is certain: if the Bush administration has its way regarding war with Iran, both concepts will be put at risk in the chaos which will follow.

© 2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.

Published by persmission of Scott Ritter and Independent Media Institute, http://www.alternet.org/

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Please sign the open letter on-line

President Robert A. Corrigan, Ph.D.
San Francisco State University
1600 Holloway Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94132

(415) 338-1381
corrigan@sfsu.edu

Dear Dr. Corrigan:

On Friday, April 14 ten SFSU students protested military recruitment at the university’s career fair. Campus police interrupted their protest and physically took the students from the school’s gymnasium where they were protesting. The police then notified the students that they were banned from campus.

You officially confirmed the ban that same day, and the campus chief of police notified students that if they returned to campus prior to April 28th, they would be “subject to immediate arrest.” When the students called to request a hearing, they were told they would have to wait until May.

We were glad to hear – for the sake of the students – that you withdrew the ban three days later, on Monday. Several students who lived or worked on campus became instantly homeless or unemployed by your arbitrary action. At this point, the students are waiting for the other shoe to drop, as they have heard no word as to whether disciplinary proceedings will come next. Students report that the university waited over a week to notify students of charges against them in a previous situation.

The world has witnessed a full display of intimidation tactics by SFSU against the students, from rough behavior when the police physically removed nonviolent students from the career fair, to your serving notice on them that they were banned — without a prior hearing — from campus for 2 weeks. Any pretense of due process was thrown out the window when your office informed them that they could not have a hearing until after their banishment ended. Now, they face the prospect of discipline. And for what?

They distributed anti-military recruitment leaflets, talked to recruiters and potential recruits, and chanted phrases such as, “Killing Iraqis is no career! Recruiters are not welcome here!” We understand that the chants were loud, but that the students were peaceful and committed to nonviolence.

We also understand that the police aggression came as a shock to the students, who hadn’t planned to get arrested or cited, and who were not given any warning prior to detainment. Reportedly, police rapidly lined up in front of the students, intimidated them and began physically pulling students out of the career fair. Students say that this behavior breached a police policy against mishandling students.

This incident at SFSU has come at a time when students nationwide are facing oppression for protesting this academic year. We have heard of the recent incident at UC Santa Cruz where police roughed up two female students who were leaving at the end of the protest. Earlier this academic year, student protesters were threatened with serious discipline at Holyoke Community College (MA), George Mason University (VA), Kent State University, Wisconsin at Madison, Hampton University (VA), and Pace University (NY). In each case, the university backed down in the face of an international outcry against repression of peaceful protests against war and military recruitment. Such an outcry is building now concerning SFSU’s actions.

As the students have pointed out, SFSU is a university with a legacy of protests, starting with the student strike of 1968. The 10 students with Students Against War, a chapter of the Campus Antiwar Network (CAN), were exercising their rights to free speech and carrying forth the proud tradition of students before them.

Indeed, this is not the first time SFSU has sought to suppress the speech of its students dissenting from recruitment to the war in Iraq. Just over a year ago, on March 9, 2005, according to “A New Battleground on Campuses” by Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, a member of CAN’s national coordinating committee, “200 students rallied against recruitment on campus in protest of the war and the discriminatory Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, ultimately driving recruiters out of the campus career fair with their peaceful chanting and placards. The SFSU administration then decided to single out two student groups (among the six sponsors) and three students for disciplinary action.” Both student groups were put on probation and had their funding eliminated. The three students, meanwhile, have never had their cases resolved – with SFSU neither disciplining them, nor being willing to forgo its claim to discipline them in the future for their protest last spring. The lack of punishment so far may be attributable to the international outrage provoked by the case, as well as a sister case on the same day, where three students and a staff member at City College New York (CCNY) were assaulted by campus security, arrested, and banned from campus during a peaceful protest against military recruiters at their career fair. The community response to both cases led to the CCNY administration, and the New York District Attorney’s office, dropping all charges.

Let’s not forget what these students – “the SFSU 10?” – were protesting. They were protesting the military’s recruiting students into ‘careers’ that would foster death, destruction and injustice. They were trying to protect their fellow students from serious risks of their being among the tens of thousands of US troops killed, maimed or traumatized in Iraq. They were trying to protect students from participating in war crimes – a war in which 100,000 or more Iraqis have been killed, according to the peer reviewed Lancet study; a war in which the US uses uranium, a radioactive neurotoxin, in munitions; a war in which 1 in 4 combat marines admitted to having killed a civilian, with 8 in 10 having reported seeing injured women or children whom they were unable to help (Boston Globe, July 1, 2004).

These horrors and crimes are not cited in military recruitment materials. Instead, students are fed lies about military careers and benefits.

If anything, the protesters should be praised. You should be joining them in condemning recruitment that enables the continued occupation and destruction of Iraq. You should support students who are trying to protect their peers from the untold physical and mental risks of war, whether it’s this one or the one that the US is planning against Iran. You should be proud of students who will not condone hate against their peers by a homophobic and sexist military.

Further, SFSU professes to be part of and to care about the Bay Area community. Do you care what your community thinks about the war and military recruitment? As Bonnie Weinstein of the Bay Area United Against the War has pointed out in a letter to you, in November, 2005, the voters of San Francisco voted to stop the war in Iraq and to bring troops home immediately, and they voted to get the military out of San Francisco schools. And, in the San Francisco Unified School District, 95 percent of parents signed the district’s Opt-Out form, making it clear that they don’t want the military in contact with their children. As she wrote in her letter, “the least that all school administrations could do is actively fight the No Child Left Behind Act and stand in full support of all those who protest the militarization of our schools and the ongoing presence of the military whenever they show up.”

We stand in defense of the SFSU protesters and call on you to take no disciplinary action against them and to apologize to them for violating of their civil liberties and human rights. We believe the university should also compensate any of the group who may have become homeless or otherwise suffered economic hardship because of the SFSU actions. And we invite you to join us as we renew our efforts to build the movement to end this war, bring all the troops home now, and institute reparations for the people of Iraq.

Sincerely,

the undersigned:*

Ahmed Shawki, editor, International Socialist Review and board member of the National Council of Arab Americans;
Alan Maass, editor of Socialist Worker newspaper;
Annie and Buddy Spell, Covington Peace Project_Covington, LA;
Anthony Arnove, author, “Iraq: The Logic of Withdrawal,” co-editor with Howard Zinn, “Voices of a People’s History of the US;”
Betsy Corner, Wmass activist and tax resister, she was a subject of the documentary film “An Act of Conscience;”
Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War;
Brian Kelly, student organizer and victim of repression; Pace University Campus Antiwar Network and Students for a Democratic Society;
S. Brian Willson, Humboldt Bay Veterans For Peace; Arcata (CA) Nuclear Free Zone and Peace Commission;
Camilo Mejia, war resister who spent six months in military prison for refusing to return to Iraq;
Carolyn Fuller, Senior Analyst/ Programmer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology;
Charles Jenks, Chair of Advisory Board, Traprock Peace Center;
Charles Peterson, member of the International Socialist Organization and student victim of repression at Holyoke Community College;
Charlie Jackson for Texans for Peace;
Christopher Schwartz, Co-president of the UNI Students for Social Justice; Coordinating Committee member of the Campus Anti-War Network (CAN); President of Cedar Valley United for Peace & Justice; Publisher of The Legacy; Editor and Chief of College Not Combat; Organizing Committee of the Midwest Social Forum;
Cindy Sheehan, co-founder of Gold Star Families for Peace and mother of Casey Sheehan, who died in Iraq;
Dahr Jamail, indepdendent journalist;
David Rovics, progressive songwriter and musician;
Dave Stratman, Editor, NewDemocracyWorld.com;
David Swanson, co-founder, AfterDowningStreet.org, DontAttackIran.org;
Denis Halliday, former UN Assistant Secretary General who resigned in protest as the UN’s Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq;
Dennis Kyne, Gulf War veteran and activist;
Dirk Adriaensens, coordinator of SOS Iraq and member of the Executive committee of the Brussells Tribunal;
Dorinda Moreno, hitec aztec communications co-moderator, indyiraqaction, central coast diversity alliance;
Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, NYU, national coordinating committee of Campus Antiwar Network;
Eric Ruder, writer, Socialist Worker;
Gabriele Zamparini, independent filmmaker, writer and journalist living in London; co-producer with The Cat’s Dream;
Hans-Christof von Sponeck, former UN Assistant Secretary General who resigned in protest as the UN’s Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq;
Jacob Flowers, Director, Mid-South Peae and Justice Center, Memphis;
John Robinson, Hampton University Black Campus Progressives, he and others faced repression for protesting at the university;
Hadi Jawad, Crawford Peace House;
Josey Foo for San Juan Peace Network (New Mexico);
Judy Linehan, MFSO mother of Iraq War Veteran;
Kathy Kelly, Voices of Creative Nonviolence;
Katrina Yeaw, SAW/CAN at San Francisco State University, studying in Italy;
Kelly Dougherty, co-founder Iraq Veterans Against the War;
Kevin Ramirez for the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors and Military Out of Our Schools-Bay Area;
Kristin Anderson, student organizer, SAW/CAN, SFSU;
Lindsey German, convener, Stop the War Coalition (UK);
Marc Herold, Professor, Departments of Economics and Women’s Studies, University of New Hampshire;
Medea Benjamin, cofounder, Global Exchange and CODEPINK;
Michaelann Bewsee, Director, Arise for Social Justice (MA);
Michael Smith, Bay Area activist; a founding member of the Campus Antiwar Network who faced campus repression as a member of the “Berkeley 3;”
Natylie Baldwin, Mt. Diablo Peace & Justice Center;
Nick Mottern, National Director of Consumers for Peace, ExxonMobil War Boycott;
Nikki Robinson, student organizer, KSAWC/CAN, Kent State University;
Norman Solomon, author of “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death;”
Paola Pisi, professor of religious studies (Italy) and editor of uruknet.info;
Pav Akhtar, Convenor, NUS (UK) Internationalism Campaign;
Phil Gasper, Chair, Department of Philosophy & Religion, Nortre Dame de Namur University;
Randy Kehler, veteran of the peace movement and co-founder of the Traprock Peace Center (1979), the National Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign and the Working Group on Electoral Democracy;
Sanford Russell, veteran and moderator of BoycottUS yahoo group;
Sara Flounders, International Action Center co-director;
Sharon Smith, author of “Women and Socialism: Essays on Women’s Liberation;”
Sheila Rosenthal, Lafayette Area Peace Coalition (Indiana);
Sunny Miller, Executive Director, for Traprock Peace Center;
Tariq Khan, George Mason University student and Air Force vet assaulted and arrested for peaceful protest;
Dr. Thomas Fasy, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine;
Thomas F. Barton, editor of “GI Special;”
Tim Carpenter, National Director, Progressive Democrats of America;
Todd Boyle, Washington Truth in Recruiting;
Todd Chretien, Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate in California;
Valley Reed, March to Redeem the Soul of America, Texas;
Vicky Steinitz, Associate Professor (retired), U Mass/Boston;
Ward Reilly, SE National Contact – Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Baton Rouge;
Wes Hannah, Cornell University, Campus Antiwar Network national Coordinating Committee;
William McAvinney, Information Architect, MIT

*Affiliations are for identification purposes only, except as indicated.

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DOES IRAN’S PRESIDENT WANT ISRAEL WIPED OFF THE MAP AND DOES HE DENY THE HOLOCAUST?

AN ANALYSIS OF RHETORIC IN MEDIA ON ITS WAY TO WAR AGAINST IRAN – COMMENTING ON THE ALLEGED STATEMENTS OF IRAN’S PRESIDENT AHMADINEJAD

Authors: Anneliese Fikentscher and Andreas Neumann (Germany), Translation to English: Erik Appleby

Bush frankly speaks of ‘threat to Iran’. Is this a Freudian slip? He speaks of ‘military might’ against Iran: “But now that I’m on Iran, the threat to Iran, of course — (applause) — the threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel. That’s a threat, a serious threat. It’s a threat to world peace; it’s a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I’ll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel, and — (applause.)” George W. Bush, US-President, 2006-03-20 in Cleveland (Ohio) in an off-the-cuff speech (source: www.whitehouse.gov) But why does Bush speak of Iran’s objective to destroy Israel?

DOES IRAN’S PRESIDENT WANT ISRAEL WIPED OFF THE MAP?

To raze Israel to the ground, to batter down, to destroy, to annihilate, to liquidate, to erase Israel, to wipe it off the map – this is what Iran’s President demanded – at least this is what we read about or heard of at the end of October 2005. Spreading the news was very effective. This is a declaration of war they said. Obviously government and media were at one with their indignation. It goes around the world.

But let’s take a closer look at what Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said. It is a merit of the ‘New York Times’ that they placed the complete speech at our disposal. Here’s an excerpt from the publication dated 2005-10-30:

“They say it is not possible to have a world without the United States and Zionism. But you know that this is a possible goal and slogan. Let’s take a step back. [[[We had a hostile regime in this country which was undemocratic, armed to the teeth and, with SAVAK, its security apparatus of SAVAK [the intelligence bureau of the Shah of Iran's government] watched everyone. An environment of terror existed.]]] When our dear Imam [Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Iranian revolution] said that the regime must be removed, many of those who claimed to be politically well-informed said it was not possible. All the corrupt governments were in support of the regime when Imam Khomeini started his movement. [[[All the Western and Eastern countries supported the regime even after the massacre of September 7 [1978] ]]] and said the removal of the regime was not possible. But our people resisted and it is 27 years now that we have survived without a regime dependent on the United States. The tyranny of the East and the West over the world should have to end, but weak people who can see only what lies in front of them cannot believe this. Who would believe that one day we could witness the collapse of the Eastern Empire? But we could watch its fall in our lifetime. And it collapsed in a way that we have to refer to libraries because no trace of it is left. Imam [Khomeini] said Saddam must go and he said he would grow weaker than anyone could imagine. Now you see the man who spoke with such arrogance ten years ago that one would have thought he was immortal, is being tried in his own country in handcuffs and shackles [[[by those who he believed supported him and with whose backing he committed his crimes]]]. Our dear Imam said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map and this was a very wise statement. We cannot compromise over the issue of Palestine. Is it possible to create a new front in the heart of an old front. This would be a defeat and whoever accepts the legitimacy of this regime [Israel] has in fact, signed the defeat of the Islamic world. Our dear Imam targeted the heart of the world oppressor in his struggle, meaning the occupying regime. I have no doubt that the new wave that has started in Palestine, and we witness it in the Islamic world too, will eliminate this disgraceful stain from the Islamic world.”
(source: www.nytimes.com, based on the publication of ‘Iranian Students News Agency’ (ISNA) — insertions by the New York Times in squared brackets — passages in triple squared brackets will be left blank in the MEMRI version printed below)

It’s becoming clear. The statements of the Iranian President have been reflected by the media in a manipulated way. Iran’s President betokens the removal of the regimes, that are in power in Israel and in the USA, to be possible aim for the future. This is correct. But he never demands the elimination or annihilation of Israel. He reveals that changes are potential. The Shah-Regime being supported by the USA in its own country has been vanquished. The eastern governance of the Soviet Union collapsed. Saddam Hussein’s dominion drew to a close. Referring to this he voices his aspiration that changes will also be feasible in Israel respectively in Palestine. He adduces Ayatollah Khomeini referring to the Shah-Regime who in this context said that the regime (meaning the Shah-Regime) should be removed.
Certainly, Ahmadinejad translates this quotation about a change of regime into the occupied Palestine. This has to be legitimate. To long for modified political conditions in a country is a world-wide day-to-day business by all means. But to commute a demand for removal of a ‘regime’ into a demand for removal of a state is serious deception and dangerous demagogy.

This is one chapter of the war against Iran that has already begun with the words of Georg Meggle, professor of philosophy at the university of Leipzig – namely with the probably most important phase, the phase of propaganda.

Marginally we want to mention that it was the former US Vice-Minister of Defence and current President of the World Bank, Paul D. Wolfowitz, who in Sept. 2001 talked about ending states in public and without any kind of awe. And it was the father of George W. Bush who started the discussion about a winnable nuclear war if only the survival of an elite is assured.

Let’s pick an example: the German online-news-magazine “tageschau.de” writes the following about Iran’s president on 2005-10-27: “There is no doubt: the new wave of assaults in Palestine will erase the stigma in countenance of the Islamic world.” Instead of using the original word ‘wave’ they write ‘wave of assaults’. This replacement of the original text is what we call disinformation. E.g. it would be correct to say: “The new movement in Palestine will erase the stain of disgrace from the Islamic world.” Additionally this statement refers to the occupation regime mentioned in the previous sentence.

As a precaution we will examine a different translation of the speech – a version prepared by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), located in Washington:

“They [ask]: ‘Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?’ But you had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved. [[[...]]] “‘When the dear Imam [Khomeini] said that [the Shah's] regime must go, and that we demand a world without dependent governments, many people who claimed to have political and other knowledge [asked], ‘Is it possible [that the Shah's regime can be toppled]?’ That day, when Imam [Khomeini] began his movement, all the powers supported [the Shah's] corrupt regime [[[...]]] and said it was not possible. However, our nation stood firm, and by now we have, for 27 years, been living without a government dependent on America. Imam [Khomeni] said: ‘The rule of the East [U.S.S.R.] and of the West [U.S.] should be ended.’ But the weak people who saw only the tiny world near them did not believe it. Nobody believed that we would one day witness the collapse of the Eastern Imperialism [i.e. the U.S.S.R], and said it was an iron regime. But in our short lifetime we have witnessed how this regime collapsed in such a way that we must look for it in libraries, and we can find no literature about it. Imam [Khomeini] said that Saddam [Hussein] must go, and that he would be humiliated in a way that was unprecedented. And what do you see today? A man who, 10 years ago, spoke as proudly as if he would live for eternity is today chained by the feet, and is now being tried in his own country [[[...]]] Imam [Khomeini] said: ‘This regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem] must be eliminated from the pages of history.’ This sentence is very wise. The issue of Palestine is not an issue on which we can compromise. Is it possible that an [Islamic] front allows another front [i.e. country] to arise in its [own] heart? This means defeat, and he who accepts the existence of this regime [i.e. Israel] in fact signs the defeat of the Islamic world. In his battle against the World of Arrogance, our dear Imam [Khomeini] set the regime occupying Qods [Jerusalem] as the target of his fight. I do not doubt that the new wave which has begun in our dear Palestine and which today we are also witnessing in the Islamic world is a wave of morality which has spread all over the Islamic world. Very soon, this stain of disgrace [i.e. Israel] will vanish from the center of the Islamic world – and this is attainable.”
(source: http://memri.org, based on the publication of ‘Iranian Students News Agency’ (ISNA) — insertions by MEMRI in squared brackets — missing passages compared to the ‘New York Times’ in triple squared brackets)

The term ‘map’ to which the media refer at length does not even appear. Whereas the ‘New York Times’ said: “Our dear Imam said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map” the version by MEMRI is: “Imam [Khomeini] said: This regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem] must be eliminated from the pages of history.”
MEMRI added the following prefixed formulation to their translation as a kind of title: “Very Soon, This Stain of Disgrace [i.e. Israel] Will Be Purged From the Center of the Islamic World – and This is Attainable”. Thereby they take it out of context und by using the insertion ‘i.e. Israel’ they distort the meaning on purpose. The temporal tapering ‘very soon’ does not appear in the NY-Times-translation either. Besides it is striking that MEMRI deleted all passages in their translation which characterize the US-supported Shah-Regime as a regime of terror and at the same time show the true character of US-American policy.

An independent translation of the original (like the version published by ISNA) yields that Ahmadinejad does not use the term ‘map’. He quotes Ayatollah Khomeini’s assertion that the occupation regime must vanish from this world – literally translated: from the arena of times. Correspondingly: there is no space for an occupation regime in this world respectively in this time. The formulation ‘wipe off the map’ used by the ‘New York Times’ is a very free and aggravating interpretation which is equivalent to ‘razing something to the ground’ or ‘annihilating something’. The downwelling translation, first into English (‘wipe off the map’), then from English to German – and all literally (‘von der Landkarte löschen’) – makes us stride away from the original more and more. The perfidious thing about this translation is that the expression ‘map’ can only be used in one (intentional) way: a state can be removed from a map but not a regime, about which Ahmadinejad is actually speaking.

Again following the independent translation: “I have no doubt that the new movement taking place in our dear Palestine is a spiritual movement which is spanning the entire Islamic world and which will soon remove this stain of disgrace from the Islamic world”.

It must be allowed to ask how it is possible that ‘spritual movement’ resp. ‘wave of morality’ (as translated by MEMRI) and ‘wave of assaults’ can be equated and translated (like e.g tagesschau.de published it).

DOES IRAN’S PRESIDENT DENY THE HOLOCAUST?

“The German government condemned the repetitive offending anti-Israel statements by Ahmadinejad to be shocking. Such behaviour is not tolerable, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier stated. [...] Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel proclaimed Ahmadinejad’s statements to be ‘inconceivable’” (published by tagesschau.de 2005-12-14.

But not only the German Foreign Minister Steinmeier and the Federal Chancellor Merkel allege this, but the Bild-Zeitung, tagesschau.de, parts of the peace movement, US-President George W. Bush, the ‘Papers for German and international politics’, CNN, the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation, almost the entire world does so, too: Iran’s President Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust.

What is this assertion based on? In substance it is based on dispatches of 2 days – 2005-12-14 and 2006-02-11.

“The Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has stepped up his verbal attacks against Israel and the Western states and has denied the Holocaust. Instead of making Israel’s attacks against Palestine a subject of discussion ‘the Western states devote their energy to the fairy-tale of the massacre against the Jews’, Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday in a speech at Zahedan in the south-east of Iran which was broadcasted directly by the news-channel Khabar. That day he stated that if the Western states really believe in the assassination of six million Jews in W.W. II they should put a piece of land in Europe, in the USA, Canada or Alaska at Israel’s disposal.” – dispatch of the German press agency DPA, 2005-12-14.

The German TV-station n24 spreads the following on 2006-12-14 using the title ‘Iran’s President calls the Holocaust a myth’: “The Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has stepped up his verbal attacks against Israel and called the Holocaust a ‘myth’ used as a pretext by the Europeans to found a Jewish state in the center of the Islamic world . ‘In the name of the Holocaust they have created a myth and regard it to be worthier than God, religion and the prophets’ the Iranian head of state said.”

The Iranian press agency IRNA renders Ahmadinejad on 2005-12-14 as follows: “‘If the Europeans are telling the truth in their claim that they have killed six million Jews in the Holocaust during the World War II – which seems they are right in their claim because they insist on it and arrest and imprison those who oppose it, why the Palestinian nation should pay for the crime. Why have they come to the very heart of the Islamic world and are committing crimes against the dear Palestine using their bombs, rockets, missiles and sanctions.’ [...] ‘If you have committed the crimes so give a piece of your land somewhere in Europe or America and Canada or Alaska to them to set up their own state there.’ [...] Ahmadinejad said some have created a myth on holocaust and hold it even higher than the very belief in religion and prophets [...] The president further said, ‘If your civilization consists of aggression, displacing the oppressed nations, suppressing justice-seeking voices and spreading injustice and poverty for the majority of people on the earth, then we say it out loud that we despise your hollow civilization.’”

There again we find the quotation already rendered by n24: “In the name of the Holocaust they created a myth.” We can see that this is completely different from what is published by e.g. the DPA – the massacre against the Jews is a fairy-tale. What Ahmadinejad does is not denying the Holocaust. No! It is dealing out criticism against the mendacity of the imperialistic powers who use the Holocaust to muzzle critical voices and to achieve advantages concerning the legitimization of a planned war. This is criticism against the exploitation of the Holocaust.

CNN (2005-12-15) renders as follows: “If you have burned the Jews why don’t you give a piece of Europe, the United States, Canada or Alaska to Israel. Our question is, if you have committed this huge crime, why should the innocent nation of Palestine pay for this crime?”

The Washingtonian ‘Middle East Media Research Institute’ (MEMRI) renders Ahmadinejad’s statements from 2005-12-14 as follows: “…we ask you: if you indeed committed this great crime, why should the oppressed people of Palestine be punished for it? * [...] If you committed a crime, you yourselves should pay for it. Our offer was and remains as follows: If you committed a crime, it is only appropriate that you place a piece of your land at their disposal – a piece of Europe, of America, of Canada, or of Alaska – so they can establish their own state. Rest assured that if you do so, the Iranian people will voice no objection.”

The MEMRI-rendering uses the relieving translation ‘great crime’ and misappropriates the following sentence at the * marked passage: “Why have they come to the very heart of the Islamic world and are committing crimes against the dear Palestine using their bombs, rockets, missiles and sanctions.” This sentence has obviously been left out deliberately because it would intimate why the Israeli state could have forfeited the right to establish itself in Palestine – videlicet because of its aggressive expansionist policy against the people of Palestine, ignoring any law of nations and disobeying all UN-resolutions.

In spite of the variability referring to the rendering of the statements of Iran’s President we should nevertheless note down: the reproach of denying the Holocaust cannot be sustained if Ahmadinejad speaks of a great and huge crime that has been done to the Jews.

In another IRNA-dispatch (2005-12-14) the Arabian author Ghazi Abu Daqa writes about Ahmadinejad: “The Iranian president has nothing against the followers of Judaism [...] Ahmadinejad is against Zionism as well as its expansionist and occupying policy. That is why he managed to declare to the world with courage that there is no place for the Zionist regime in the world civilized community.”

It’s no wonder that such opinions do not go down particularly well with the ideas of the centers of power in the Western world. But for this reason they are not wrong right away. Dealing out criticism against the aggressive policy of the Western world, to which Israel belongs as well, is not yet anti-Semitism. We should at least to give audience to this kind of criticism – even if it is a problematic field for us.

2006-02-11 Ahmadinejad said according to IRNA: “[...] the real holocaust should be sought in Palestine, where the blood of the oppressed nation is shed every day and Iraq, where the defenceless Muslim people are killed daily. [...] ‘Some western governments, in particular the US, approve of the sacrilege on the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), while denial of the ‘Myth of Holocaust’, based on which the Zionists have been exerting pressure upon other countries for the past 60 years and kill the innocent Palestinians, is considered as a crime’ [...]”

The assertion that Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust thus is wrong in more than one aspect. He does not deny the Holocaust, but speaks of denial itself. And he does not speak of denial of the Holocaust, but of denial of the Myth of Holocaust. This is something totally different. All in all he speaks of the exploitation of the Holocaust. The Myth of Holocaust, like it is made a subject of discussion by Ahmadinejad, is a myth that has been built up in conjunction with the Holocaust to – as he says – put pressure onto somebody. We might follow this train of thoughts or we might not. But we cannot equalize his thoughts with denial of the Holocaust.

If Ahmadinejad according to this 2006-02-11 condemns the fact that it is forbidden and treated as a crime to do research into the Myth of Holocaust, as we find it quoted in the MEMRI translation, this acquires a meaning much different from the common and wide-spread one. If the myth related to the Holocaust is commuted to a ‘Fairy Tale of the Massacre’ – like the DPA did – this can only be understood as a malicious misinterpretation.

By the use of misrepresentation and adulteration it apparently succeeded to constitute the statements of the Iranian President to be part and parcel of the currently fought propaganda battle. It is our responsibility to counter this.

Concluding:

A dispatch by Reuters confirms 2006-02-21: “The Iranian Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki has [...] repudiated that his state would want the Jewish state Israel ‘wiped off the map’. [...] Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been misunderstood. ‘Nobody can erase a country from the map.’ Ahmadinejad was not thinking of the state of Israel but of their regime [...]. ‘We do not accredit this regime to be legitimate.’ [...] Mottaki also accepted that the Holocaust really took place in a way that six million Jews were murdered during the era of National Socialism.”

The next step is to connect the Iranian President with Hitler. 2006-02-20 the Chairman of the Counsil of Jews in France (Crif) says in Paris: “The Iranian President’s assertions do not rank behind Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’”. Paul Spiegel, President of the Central Counsil of Jews in Germany, 2005-12-10 in the ‘Welt’ qualifies the statements of Ahmadinejad to be “the worst comment on this subject that he has ever heard of a statesman since A. Hitler”. At the White House the Iranian President is even named Hitler. And the German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel as well moves over Iran’s President towards Hitler and National Socialism by saying 2006-02-04 in Munich: “Already in the early 1930′s many people said that it is only rhetoric. One could have prevented a lot in time if one had acted… Germany is in the debt to resist the incipiencies and to do anything to make clear where the limit of tolerance is. Iran remains in control of the situation, it is still in their hands.”

All this indicates war. Slobodan Milosevic became Hitler. The result was the war of the Nato against Yugoslavia. Saddam Hussein became Hitler. What followed was the war the USA and their coalition of compliant partners waged against Iraq. Now the Iranian President becomes Hitler.

And someone who is Hitler-like can assure a hundred times that he only wants to use nuclear energy in a peaceful way. Nobody will believe him. Somebody like Hitler can act within the scope of all contracts. Acting contrary to contract will nevertheless be imputed to him. “Virtually none of the Western states recognize that uranium enrichment is absolutely legal. There is no restriction by contract or by the law of nations. Quite the contrary: Actually the Western countries would have the duty to assist Iran with these activities, according to the Non-Proliferation Treaty. As long as a state renounces the bomb it is eligible for technical support by the nuclear powers.” (Jörg Pfuhl, ARD radio studio Istanbul 2006-01-11) But – all this does not count if the Head of a state is stigmatized as Hitler.

***

Submitted by the authors for publication by Traprock on April 19, 2006
Article originally published on authors’ website: http://www.concernedphotography.com/iran-statements

Written on Good Friday, April 14, 2006

Youth
 
 
seven is too young to hear
that daddy won’t come home
years go by but still can’t fill
the time you spent alone
 
fourteen is too young to care
about saving innocent lives
to campaign hard to stop a war
based on naught but lies
 
twenty is too young to fight
a battle that’s not ours
while government officials hide
like god-forsaken cowards
 
fifty is too young to bear
the weight of wooden crosses
for those collapsed along the road
under their heavy losses
 
one hundred is too young to wake
from nightmares of the past
no matter how many years go by
these scars will always last
 
one thousand lifetimes is too few
to understand the pain
a mother knows when she finds out
her child’s died in vain
 
I am too young to write these words
for all which we aspire
but my my pen never have rest
’till peace replaces fire

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Don’t Attack Iran Petition

Don’t Attack Iran

By Cindy Sheehan

Fresh from a resounding victory in Iraq, George Bush swaggered onto the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and boldly and confidentally declared victory. It was a pretty war, it was a clean war, it looked stunning in all of its shock and awe. Wow, never was there such a swift and amazing American victory and it all looked so damn glamorous on CNN!

As fake as his codpiece was, so was his “cakewalk” of an invasion. Over 2000 thousand dead soldiers, billions of wasted dollars, thousands of maimed young people, innocent Iraqis dead by the hundreds of thousands, still no consistent electricity or clean water in their country, later, and this swaggering imbecile of a “leaker in chief” has the nerve to be trying to sell all of us on a new war in Iran.

Do the warped neocons with their puppet president think that we are all stupid? Fool us once, shame on us, fool us,—well, we just can’t be fooled again.

“But our objective is to prevent them from having a nuclear weapon,” GWB, on Iran, 04/10/06 at Johns Hopkins University. So, let me get this straight, in order to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear, or “nucular” weapons, we will use tactical nuclear weapons on them! The continued hypocrisy of this regime is absolutely breathtaking!

Even having nuclear weapons is crazy, but talking about deploying them is sheer insanity. Retired General, Anthony Zinni said on CNN today that Iran would not just sit back and do nothing if attacked: they have the means and the capability to retaliate. Our young people in Iraq would be sitting ducks along with Israel and our supply of natural gas and oil could be greatly compromised. I have an even scarier reason: I, and others, believe that using tactical nukes in Iran could start WWIII or IV. With all of the “Left Behind” religious fanatics praying for Armageddon, this thought is made even scarier by the fake believers in the White House who are exploiting the neo-Christian idea that Jesus was a war monger and anything our great leader does is okay, because he is a Christian man!

By putting the focus on nuclear strikes we are also forgetting the appalling destructive power that conventional weapons wield. We must not even, for one moment, contemplate a conventional invasion in Iran either. No matter how George Bush lies about how rosy things are in Iraq, they aren’t, and Iraq is proof that war of any kind is a horribly tragic way to solve problems.

We must not believe BushCo or anything they say about Iran. He has lied through his teeth so many times before: From WMD and terrorism in Iraq to the fact that no one could “anticipate” the levees breaking in New Orleans. He was the leaker of the documents that outed Valerie Plame, while he promised us that the leaker would be punished. We must not allow him to frighten us into this one.

The doctrine of preemptive war is an abominable doctrine, especially when we have such a vacuum of leadership in this country that rubberstamps any maniacal thing that this president wants to do. We cannot allow our leaders to destroy the world by jousting with windmills that are no threat to our safety, or our way of life.

We must elect leaders that will get at the root causes of terrorism and not pretend that every terrorist can ever be killed to satisfy some kind of primeval bloodlust that flows through the war machine’s veins. When our leaders go terrorist hunting, they kill innocent men, women and children and they, themselves, become the very thing that they are trying to teach us to loathe.

Please go to Don’t Attack Iran and sign the petition to our “fearless with other people’s lives” leaders and tell them that you do not support an attack on Iran. We members of Gold Star Families for Peace, Code Pink Women for Peace, Traprock Peace Center, AfterDowningStreet.org, Democract.com , Progressive Democrats of America, The Velvet Revolution, and Global Exchange urge you to sign the petition prohibiting our leaders from committing more war crimes and crimes against humanity in our names. We must loudly repudiate the crimes lest we be accused of them also.

We cannot allow an attack on Iran. We must restore sanity to our country if it’s not too late already.

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Bush is considering a nuclear strike on Iran – what are we going to do about it?

Friends,

Seymour Hersh reports in The New Yorker that President Bush is considering using nuclear weapons as part of a U.S. military strike against Iran.

See http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060417fa_fact

Despite the disaster in Iraq, there has been almost no Congressional opposition to attacking Iran. Senators John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Evan Bayh, and Joseph Lieberman have all said they would support using military force as a “last resort” to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. When lawmakers say that, “last” resorts tend to come first, after the dance of non-negotiable negotiations has quickly played out.

On May 6, 2004, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a resolution authorizing President Bush to use “any and all appropriate means” to prevent Iran from prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Given Bush’s sweeping view of his power as Commander in Chief, it is not clear whether he would feel he needed any further Congressional authority to bomb Iran. Congress must reclaim its Constitutional authority immediately.

The consequences of bombing Iran could be as far-reaching and ultimately devastating as the invasion of Iraq. Iran today is far stronger than Iraq was in 2003, and it might retaliate by trying to mine the Strait of Hormuz (through which much of the world’s oil passes), attack Saudi oil production, and create greater chaos in Iraq, especially among its majority Shiites. In response, the United States could find itself drawn further into war. A U.S. attack could kill many thousands of Iranians. It would also incite retaliation and terrorism in the Middle East and globally.

Thank you.

David Keppel
Bloomington, Indiana

http://www.traprockpeace.org/david_keppel/

Charles Jenks
Deerfield, MA
Traprock Peace Center

Please sign a petition initiated by Cindy Sheehan at: http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/iran

This petition is hosted by After Downing Street and supported by Gold Star Families for Peace, CODE PINK, Progressive Democrats of America, Democrats.com, Traprock Peace Center, Global Exchange, Velvet Revolution, Democracy Rising, Truthout, OpEdNews, the Backbone Campaign and ConsumersforPeace.org. National and International organizations are invited to join this list. Email david@davidswanson.org

The Petition reads:

Dear President Bush and Vice President Cheney,

We write to you from all over the United States and all over the world to urge you to obey both international and U.S. law, which forbid aggressive attacks on other nations. We oppose your proposal to attack Iran. Iran does not possess nuclear weapons, just as Iraq did not possess nuclear weapons. If Iran had such weapons, that would not justify the use of force, any more than any other nation would be justified in launching a war against the world’s greatest possesor of nuclear arms, the United States. The most effective way to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons would be to closely monitor its nuclear energy program, and to improve diplomatic relations — two tasks made much more difficult by threatening to bomb Iranian territory. We urge you to lead the way to peace, not war, and to begin by making clear that you will not commit the highest international crime by aggressively attacking Iran.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/iran

###

Talking Points for Congress on Iran

We are gravely concerned by reports that President Bush is considering a military strike on Iran to set back its suspected nuclear weapons program. We are particularly alarmed to learn that such a strike reportedly might involve bunker busting U.S. nuclear weapons. For the United States to use nuclear weapons would break the taboo on their use that has existed since Nagasaki and open Pandora’s Box to nuclear wars, nuclear proliferation, and nuclear terrorism. Whatever the weapons used, such an attack would be provocative and reckless. We strongly oppose it. We call for vigorous diplomacy, including direct U.S. – Iranian negotiations, and toughened inspections under the International Atomic Energy Agency.

• Under Article One of the Constitution, Congress has the responsibility to vote on declarations of war. Congress disastrously abdicated that responsibility in October 2002 when it voted to authorize President Bush to use force against Iraq. Members of Congress afterwards claimed they thought the President would use that authority to negotiate. It must not repeat this mistake with Iran. On May 6th, 2004, the House of Representatives authorized the President to use “any and all appropriate means” to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Congress must make clear that President Bush does not have authority to bomb Iran without coming to Congress and seeking a declaration of war.
• As in the Iraq case, hard liners are making highly selective use of partially leaked intelligence information of dubious reliability – often, as in the Iraqi case, from exiles. Meanwhile, many independent experts believe that Iran is at least several years and perhaps a decade away from being able to produce nuclear weapons. As Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has suggested, Congress should insist that intelligence information be declassified and made available for scrutiny.
• The Administration and Congress appear to have thought even less about the possible consequences of attacking Iran than they did with Iraq. Yet these could include ten thousand casualties in the American air strike, as well as Iran’s mining the Strait of Hormuz, attacking Saudi oil production, and creating greater chaos in Iraq. A CIA report finds that terrorism would grow in the aftermath of a strike. Congress must hold rigorous, open hearings on the possible costs – human, political, economic, fiscal – of attacking Iran.
• The United States must give priority to non-proliferation, engage Iran in direct negotiations, and renounce the policy of regime change. We cannot expect to reach a diplomatic solution with a government we are trying to destabilize. The regime change agenda also weakens international support for our concern about proliferation. Authentic Iranian dissidents such as Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi warn that U.S. support risks making them look like traitors. Congress must defeat bills such as the Iran Freedom and Support Act (S.333), which are provocative and are a hidden gift to the regime. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s statement that Israel should be “wiped off the map” is totally unacceptable. A U.S. attack on Iran, however, would only make Mr. Ahmadinejad a hero in Iran and beyond and would incite Islamist terrorism in the Middle East and globally.
• To persuade Iran to forgo nuclear weapons, and to curb proliferation globally, the United States must change its own military and nuclear policies. President Bush’s preemption doctrine gives countries such as Iran an incentive to get nuclear weapons as a deterrent: after all, Mr. Bush invaded non-nuclear Iraq, not nuclear North Korea. The Nuclear Posture Review endorses U.S. nuclear attacks against non-nuclear states, in violation of all the understandings of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The Treaty is a grand bargain, in which non-nuclear countries renounce nuclear weapons and in return existing nuclear states are obliged to work towards nuclear disarmament. Yet the Bush Administration is exploring a new generation of “usable” nuclear weapons. In addition, Iran is both motivated and – in the eyes of many in the Middle East – legitimized in its possible pursuit of nuclear weapons by the Israeli arsenal of (an estimated) 200 nuclear weapons. United Nations Security Council Resolution 687, sponsored by the U.S. and Britain, commits us to seek a nuclear weapons free Middle East. (Israel is far better able to defend itself by conventional weapons than it was when it first sought a nuclear arsenal.)

References:

Congressional votes on Iran and pending legislation: See http://thomas.loc.gov and type “Iran” in the search field. To find the 2004 vote, specify May 2004 in the time entry.

Dubious intelligence information: See the article, “Exiles,” by Connie Bruck in the March 6th issue of The New Yorker. http://www.iran-interlink.org/files/News4/Mar06/NewYorker060306.htm A governmental National Intelligence Estimate in the summer of 2005 estimated that Iran is a decade away from a bomb. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101453.html For the analysis of independent expert Joseph Cirincione – and a call to declassify intelligence information behind nuclear allegations – see http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101453.html

Consequences of war: See Paul Rogers, “Iran: Consequences of a War,” Oxford Research Group, March 2006. http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.uk/publications/briefings/IranConsequences.htm See also Michael J. Mazarr (of the National War College), “Attacking Iran Is a Bad Idea.” The New Republic, August 15, 2005 http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050815&s=mazarr081505 Dana Priest, “Attacking Iran May Trigger Terrorism,” The Washington Post, April 2, 2006.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/01/AR2006040100981.html

Negotiate on the nuclear issue rather than pursuing regime change: See Jessica Tuchman Matthews, “Speaking to Tehran, With One Voice,” The New York Times, March 21, 2006. http://www.carnegieendowment.org/publications/index.cfm?fa=print&id=18159 See also F. Stephen Larrabee (RAND Corporation), “Defusing the Iranian Nuclear Crisis,” Orange County Register, March 9, 2006. http://www.rand.org/commentary/030906OCR.html For Iranian dissident (and Nobel Laureate) Shirin Ebadi’s views, see http://www.masnet.org/aroundworld.asp?id=544 See also Shirin Ebadi and Hadi Ghaemi, “The Human Rights Case Against Attacking Iran,” The New York Times, February 8, 2005 http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F00A17FF345F0C7B8CDDAB0894DD404482 An account of the CIA-sponsored 1953 coup against Iranian Premier Mohammad Mossadegh appears in Stephen Kinzer, All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 2003.

To curb nuclear proliferation, the United States must change its own military and nuclear policies. For information on preemption, see Steven C. Welsh, “Preemptive War and International Law,” Center for Defense Information, March 16, 2006 http://www.cdi.org/news/law/preemptive-war-031606.cfm For an analysis of the Bush Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review, see Jaya Tiwari, “Dr. Strangelove Meets the Pentagon,” Physicians for Social Responsibility http://www.psr.org/home.cfm?id=nuclear_posture On how U.S. nuclear policy undermines the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, see Eric Weiss (of GlobalSecurity.org), “Nonproliferation Treaty at Risk,” The Decatur Daily (why wasn’t this in The New York Times?), May 21, 2005 http://www.psr.org/home.cfm?id=nuclear_posture For an analysis of United Nations Security Council Resolution 687 of 1991, calling for a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East, and its relevance to the Iran crisis, please see Peace Action’s briefing http://www.psr.org/home.cfm?id=nuclear_posture See also the Federation of American Scientists’ briefing http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/

David Keppel
keppel@sbcglobal.net

The article, with talking points and references, is posted at David Keppel’s blog at

http://www.traprockpeace.org/david_keppel/

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Veterans-Survivors March…Mobile To New Orleans
Beauty Defined In Epic Action

by Ward Reilly

Dave Cline of VVAW and VFP called me, and a few others, back in December, and asked what I/we thought about organizing a march along the (Katrina-affected) Gulf Coast, to commemorate the third anniversary of the war in Iraq, in the mold, no pun intended, of the civil rights marches of the 60`s.

We had been tossing around different ideas about what action to take for the third anniversary of the Iraq disaster, ever since we had marched together in Washington back in September of 2005, and it was time to make a decision, so we did. The “Veterans-Survivors March….Mobile to New Orleans” was born. We were “Walkin` To New Orleans!”

Stan Goff took the bull by the horns, and started putting together a team to organize this huge undertaking, and in January we got down to business. Goff, a retired Special Forces Master Sergeant, and member of VVAW, VFP, and MFSO, put together a budget and supply list, and we got to work organizing this incredible adventure. We set up a website, and started a series of conference calls, formed committees and a task force. The team involved is too large to list, but they know who they are, and what we accomplished together. In the end, EVERY participant was what made it work.

Veterans For Peace of Mobile, Alabama, led by veteran Paul Robinson, put out the “official” call to march, and the work began. We knew that we were already late in organizing an adventure of this scope, but we were determined that it was a great idea, that being to try and tie the war in Iraq, and its staggering cost, to the virtual abandonment of the Gulf Coast and the city of New Orleans.

If the Bush administration had trillions of dollars to destroy and “re-build” Iraq, why wasn’t that same administration doing anything-and-everything possible to help the (destroyed) cities in our own country? As we had put on the event t-shirts, “Every bomb dropped on Iraq, explodes along the Gulf Coast”. This was a play on Dr. Martin Luther Kings words during the Viet Nam War, when he said that “every bomb dropped on Hanoi, explodes in Harlem”.

We kicked around a few different names for the march, and a few different logos, and in the end, we decided on the “Veterans-Survivors March”, with the theme of “Walkin` To New Orleans”, a Fats Dominos song of the same title. “Fats” lost everything to Hurricane Katrina, and he lived in the infamous “Lower 9th Ward” of New Orleans.

We decided to start the 130 mile march on Tuesday, March 14th, and to end the march in New Orleans on March 19th, the third anniversary of our nations invasion of Iraq, a country that did absolutely NOTHING to the USA. And we marched…and we bussed…and we marched some more.

Our message was simple enough…”Let’s stop the war, and rebuild our own nation, NOW.” We chose for a march logo a picture done by Perry O`Brien of IVAW, that of a combat soldier and a civilian woman, walking side-by-side into the sunset.

We also decided that it was imperative for “Iraq Veterans Against the War” to lead and speak as representatives for this action, and LEAD AND SPEAK they did! Press coverage locally was outstanding, with front-page photos and articles in EVERY city we marched through, from Mobiles’ “Press Register”, to “The Mississippi Press” and finally in the “Times Picayune” of New Orleans.

We were on local TV, and on many live radio shows around the country, such as in Colorado, where KVNF Public Radio did live broadcasts. If there was one disappointment, it was in our (failed) national press in covering the march, but the good news was that we got killer international press, with “Aljazeera” covering us for the last three days, and BBC, CNN, and a Japanese press agent were with us, also. In other words, the people of Iraq and the rest of the world got to see U.S. veterans of the Iraq and Afghan Wars, speaking the TRUTH about those wars, a major coupe for us. There were also at least 5 documentary film crews with us.

IVAW took the lead each and every day, proudly carrying theirs`, and the marches`, banners. They led with grace, and they led with the TRUTH. They also did a fabulous job of sharing their experiences, with their own brand of intense poetry and music. That so many of their members came from around the country is tribute to their commitment, and their beauty on stage, and in being interviewed, was ” icing on the cake.” At least 25 IVAW members made the trip.

The Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans did a superb job of speaking, and an even better job of performing. One after another, they went on stage and shined during the “Veterans Art Collective”, which took place on Saturday night, the 18th, at the Vietnamese village in New Orleans East, where we camped the last night. The Art Collective was organized by IVAWs own Michael Cuzzort, a Louisiana native who lives near New Orleans. It would be a disservice to say that any act was better than any other, because they were truly ALL inspired.

It is still hard for me to understand how they can rap out multi-paragraphed lyrics, with deep emotion, without even a lyrics sheet, or how they can articulate so much meaning and their heart-felt words, straight from memory.

Some of the participants in the “Veterans Art Collective” were Josh Dawson, who emceed and performed. Joe Hatcher and Garrett Reppenhagen did several (Iraq War based) poems, Dave Cline jammed with Ward Reilly, Josh Dawson, and Ethan Crowell. Billy Mitchell, a Nam-era vet, and co-founder of “Gold Star Families For Peace”, read a poem about his son, who was KIA the same day as Casey Sheehan, whose mother Cindy also joined us for a portion of the march. Charlie Anderson played a fine song. Fernando Braga did a poem about Katrina, and Stephen Potts did his (now infamous) speech, comparing holding-farts-in to not speaking out.(How’s that for COMPLETE coverage?)

Dave Cline then took the stage once more for an incredible song about “touching The Wall”…I must add that there were late-night drum sessions that went into the wee hours of the morning, each and every night, and that it was incredibly gratifying to see all those young vets having fun and realizing that there IS some semblance left of the nation they were supposed to be fighting for. They were “home” for the first time since they went away to impose Bush`s war-crime-policies on the Iraqi and Afghani people.

The other good news about the march is that we made contact, REAL contact, with the black and Vietnamese communities that Bush and Cheney’s “class warfare” have most affected. Truthfully, the issues down here along the gulf-coast are issues of gentrification and the stealing of the land of the poorest of our citizens, and NEVER BEFORE have so many white Americans gone into the homes and communities of the black citizens in the deep south.

On Saturday, a team of 10 vets gathered in New Orleans, at the house of a veteran that had lost everything to Katrina, and we worked with the “Arabi Wrecking Krewe” of New Orleans, gutting out his house, and cleaning his yard, truly helping another veteran/citizen/Katrina survivor, which was also part of our mission.

We shared their music, their churches, and their food, as they fed us, laughed with us, cried with us, and loaned us their land to rest our weary heads (and feet). Day after day we took care of each other and loved one another, and we started something that will spread like wildfire. The locals had the chance to mingle with people that LOVED and RESPECTED them as true equals, and the marchers and locals alike came together in the realization that we must stand together against a common enemy, an enemy not of color, but of class.

Yes, we did it…and the hardest part of the trip was saying goodbye to all of those that formed this incredible family, our TRIBE of peace-makers, on this fabulous journey, from Mobile to New Orleans.

Until we meet again, March On, and PEACE OUT.

Sponsors of march were:

Veterans For Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Military Families Speak Out, Gold Star Families For Peace, S.O.S. (Savin’ Our Selves), MIRA(Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance), Bayou Liberty Relief, CAWI of Baton Rouge, C3 of New Orleans, Common Ground Collective, Peoples Hurricane Relief Fund