WORKERS WORLD EDITORIAL

The beginning of history—again

Remember the end of history? Once the USSR fell in 1990, there wasn’t supposed to be anything but capitalism forever after. This month marks 88 years since the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, and exactly 100 years since the first Russian Revolution in 1905, which brought a new political formation into the world: workers’ soviets, or councils.".... Now, there is talk of "socialism of the 21st century"!

As ‘fragging’ case worried Pentagon

U.S. offensive kills many civilians in Iraq

By John Catalinotto

Fragging: what goes around, comes around

It is no surprise then, that the Pentagon’s brutal policies are coming back to haunt them.

In a hearing in Kuwait on Nov. 1 and 2, Staff Sgt. Alberto B. Martinez was charged with the murder of West Point graduate Capt. Philip Esposito and 1st Lt. Louis E. Allen at Forward Operating Base Danger, near Tikrit, Iraq, on June 7. Martinez may face the death penalty.

The deaths were first reported as the result of fire from Iraqi resistance forces. According to expert witnesses, however, the fatal wounds were more consistent with injuries from a Claymore anti-personnel mine and fragmentation grenades.

Soldiers killing their officers with fragmentation grenades became a regular event during the war in Vietnam. Between 1969 and 1971 alone, the Army reported 600 separate “fragging” incidents, which caused 82 deaths and 651 injuries.

It was not only personal grievances against selected officers that motivated the Vietnam-era fragging, but the overall anti-war political climate and the unwillingness of African-American troops to tolerate racism. Officers who were considered too aggressive in moving troops into battle or who had treated enlisted soldiers in a racist way were especially at risk.

Though a witness testified that Martinez said he hated Esposito, no explicit political or personal reason was given to explain Martinez’s alleged motive.
Attorneys for the accused argued that at the time of the deaths, the U.S. was not officially at war—President George W. Bush had announced over a year earlier that the war with Iraq was over. Their motion that Martinez be tried in a civilian court was denied.

The first fragging of the U.S. aggression against Iraq took place just before the March 20, 2003, invasion. Last April, Sergeant Hasan Akbar of the Army’s 101st Airborne Division was convicted of the murder of two officers and attempted murder in the wounding of 14 other soldiers. Akbar was sentenced to death.

Remembering the rise and fall of Falluja

The Guardian
Wednesday 9th November, 2005

One year ago this week, US-led forces launched a devastating assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja. The mood was set by Lt Col Gary Brandl: "The enemy has got a face. He's called Satan. He's in Falluja. And we're going to destroy him."

The assault was preceded by eight weeks of aerial bombardment. US troops cut off the city's water, power and food supplies, condemned as a violation of the Geneva convention by a UN special rapporteur, who accused occupying forces of "using hunger and deprivation of water as a weapon of war against the civilian population". Two-thirds of the city's 300,000 residents fled, many to squatters' camps without basic facilities.

As the siege tightened, the Red Cross, Red Crescent and the media were kept out, while males between the ages of 15 and 55 were kept in. US sources claimed between 600 and 6,000 insurgents were holed up inside the city - which means that the vast majority of the remaining inhabitants were non-combatants.

On November 8, 10,000 US troops, supported by 2,000 Iraqi recruits, equipped with artillery and tanks, supported from the air by bombers and helicopter gunships, blasted their way into a city the size of Leicester. It took a week to establish control of the main roads; another two before victory was claimed.

The city's main hospital was selected as the first target, the New York Times reported, "because the US military believed it was the source of rumours about heavy casualties". An AP photographer described US helicopters killing a family of five trying to ford a river to safety. "There were American snipers on top of the hospital shooting everyone," said Burhan Fasa'am, a photographer with the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation. "With no medical supplies, people died from their wounds. Everyone in the street was a target for the Americans."

The US also deployed incendiary weapons, including white phosphorous. "Usually we keep the gloves on," Captain Erik Krivda said, but "for this operation, we took the gloves off".

By the end of operations, the city lay in ruins. Falluja's compensation commissioner has reported that 36,000 of the city's 50,000 homes were destroyed, along with 60 schools and 65 mosques and shrines. The US claims that 2,000 died, most of them fighters. Other sources disagree. When medical teams arrived in January they collected more than 700 bodies in only one third of the city. Iraqi NGOs and medical workers estimate between 4,000 and 6,000 dead, mostly civilians - a proportionately higher death rate than in Coventry and London during the blitz.

The collective punishment inflicted on Falluja - with logistical and political support from Britain - was largely masked by the US and British media, which relied on reporters embedded with US troops. The BBC, in particular, offered a sanitised version of the assault: civilian suffering was minimised and the ethics and strategic logic of the attack largely unscrutinised. Falluja proved to be yet another of the war's phantom turning points. Violent resistance spread to other cities. In the last two months, Tal-Afar, Haditha, Husaybah - all alleged terrorist havens heavily populated by civilians - have come under the hammer.

Falluja is still so heavily patrolled that visitors have described it as "a giant prison". Only a fraction of the promised reconstruction and compensation has materialised. Like Jallianwallah Bagh, Guernica, My Lai, Halabja and Grozny, Falluja is a place name that has become a symbol of unconscionable brutality.

As the war in Iraq claims more lives, we need to ensure that this atrocity - so recent, so easily erased from public memory - is recognised as an example of the barbarism of nations that call themselves civilised.

AGENT ORANGE

“…Those who unleashed this
most terrible chemical attack in human history
must acknowledge the consequences of their actions.
They are the American Government and
the factories that produced and profited from the
herbicides used during the Viet Nam War…”

(Dang Huyen, Vietnam EconomicTimes, March 2004)

Power Über Alles

By Paul Craig Roberts

The Bush administration wants the power to detain indefinitely anyone it declares to be an enemy combatant or a terrorist without presenting the detainee in court with charges. In England the power to arrest people and to hold them indefinitely without charges was taken away from kings centuries ago. Bush apparently thinks he is the reincarnation of an absolute monarch.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10972.htm

Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this.
- Lt Gen William Boykin, speaking of G. W. Bush, New York Times, 17 October 2003

God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith, deep and unshakeable faith, that he was sent to us by God to save Germany.
- Hermann Goering, speaking of Hitler

"I went down on my knees and prayed to Almighty God for light and guidance … and one night late it came to me this way.… We could not leave (the Philippines) to themselves--they were unfit for self-government--and they would soon have anarchy and misrule over there worse than Spain's was.… There was nothing left for us to do but take them all and educate the Filipinos, and uplift and Christianize them."
- President William McKinley

A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side.
- Aristotle

Professor thinks bombs, not planes alone, toppled WTC:

The physics of 9/11 — including how fast and symmetrically one of the World Trade Center buildings fell — prove that official explanations of the collapses are wrong, says a Brigham Young University physics professor.
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635160132,00.html


Professor Has Theory About 9/11 Attacks:

A BYU professor has developed a new (?) theory about the terrorist attack in New York on September 11, 2001. He believes planes alone did not bring down the world trade center.
http://kutv.com/topstories/local_story_314234334.html

Update on "What is Depleted Uranium?"

(see my later posting)

A point of correction. DU is NOT a "low level" radioactive waste product left over from nuclear power reactors, as I first stated. It is actually a waste product left over from mineral processing, the enrichment process. Whilst in theory, it is less radioactive than the uranium ore mined at Roxby Downs, it does not mean that is is safe to humans or the environment. It is best kept underground. (I have now corrected this on the posting).

A snippet from http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/du.htm

"Depleted uranium [DU] results from the enriching of natural uranium for use in nuclear reactors. Natural uranium is a slightly radioactive metal that is present in most rocks and soils as well as in many rivers and sea water. Natural uranium consists primarily of a mixture of two isotopes (forms) of uranium, Uranium-235 (U235) and Uranium-238 (U238), in the proportion of about 0.7 and 99.3 percent, respectively. Nuclear reactors require U235 to produce energy, therefore, the natural uranium has to be enriched to obtain the isotope U235 by removing a large part of the U238. Uranium-238 becomes DU, which is 0.7 times as radioactive as natural uranium. Since DU has a half-life of 4.5 billion years, there is very little decay of those DU materials."

Another interesting page is

http://cseserv.engr.scu.edu/StudentWebPages/IPesic/ResearchPaper.htm

Blowin' in the Wind

is the latest contribution by David Bradbury as an activist film maker. This is a film about the effects of depleted uranium used in Bosnia and Iraq. The film also suggests that depleted uranium has been used on Australian soil during joint military exercises with the US.

For crits of the film see:
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/movietime/stories/s1441643.htm (Radio National)

http://www.abc.net.au/atthemovies/txt/s1489013.htm (At The Movies)

http://webdiary.smh.com.au/archives/kerryn_higgs/001351.html (Margo Kingston)

http://www.newmatilda.com/home/articledetailmagazine.asp?ArticleID=1063&HomepageID=110 (Evan Shapiro, New Matilda.Com)


Cheers
Jeanie Lucas
SecretaryNOWAR
Adelaide, South Australia
nowar@ihug.com.auwww.nowar-sa.net

First Latin American gathering of worker-recovered factories:
Chavez announces further expropriation

By Jorge Martin
Caracas Wednesday, 02 November 2005

"This is an historical gathering. For the first time workers from occupied factories from across the continent are meeting together"

(Serge Goulart, United Workers’ Council of Brazilian group of occupied factories)

"We have shown how the workers can run the companies, and this means we can run society as well"

(Ricardo Moreira, PIT-CNT, Uruguay)

More than 400 people from 235 worker occupied factories and 20 different national trade union centres participated in the "First Latin American Gathering of Worker Recovered Factories" in Caracas on October 27-29.This was truly a historical meeting, the first time that workers involved in factory occupations in different countries met to discuss their problems, share their experiences and draw political conclusions from their struggle. And such a meeting could only take place in revolutionary Venezuela where it had the support of Chavez’s Bolivarian government.

.....Asked about the debate president Chavez has opened up on "socialism of the 21st century", Serge Goulart replied: "The Venezuelan Revolution is extraordinary in that it confirms what the Marxists had always said. It started as a struggle against imperialism and for national sovereignty. But then we saw the working class entering the scene in the struggle against the sabotage of the oil industry and the revolution went further, as it did with the nationalisation of Venepal on January 19 this year. It started as an anti-imperialist struggle, but it either becomes socialist or it will be crushed. (…) The question will be posed of the nationalisation of the banks and the multinationals and that can only be carried out by the workers".

Orlando Chirino, National Coordinator of the Venezuelan UNT explained the context in which these factory occupations were taking place: "This is a symptom of the degeneration of capitalism which leads to a process of deregulation, flexibilisation and increased exploitation of the workers. Capitalism
no longer plays the progressive role it once played." .....

Both Chirino and the trade union representatives of Venezuela’s state-owned electricity company CADAFE, stressed that worker-management was enormously progressive and was "the only way of defeating bureaucratism and corruption which are threatening the Bolivarian Revolution"......

To read the full inspirational story:
http://www.marxist.com/gathering-worker-factories021105.htm

New Poll:
Majority of Americans Support Impeachment

By a margin of 53% to 42%, Americans want Congress to impeach President Bush if he lied about the war in Iraq, according to a new poll
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4421

First casualty of war
By Eric Alterman

We know now, thanks to one brave and dogged historian at the National Security Agency, that after the famed Gulf of Tonkin "incident" on Aug. 4, 1964 — in which North Vietnam allegedly attacked two American destroyers — National Security Council officials doctored the evidence to support President Johnson's false charge in a speech to the nation that night of "open aggression on the high seas against the United States of America." http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10877.htm

What is "depleted uranium"?

Some important points to consider:

* DU is a radioactive waste product left over from enriching uranium for use in nuclear power reactors, which can then be turned into a devastating weapon of war.

* It is only "depleted" of U-235, but still full of radioactive U-238 - the main isotope in natural uranium.

* DU is an extremely dense, heavy metal that is used in everything from armour-piercing shells, to tank armour, sniper bullets, landmines, bunker buster bombs, artillery rounds and linings in thermonuclear warheads.

* DU actually sharpens as it travels through the air in shells or missiles, and remains sharp once it hits and penetrates its target. It then heats up and ignites, creating a furiously hot ball of dust, gas and schrapnel.

* DU is also a highly toxic metal, like lead or mercury, as well as being radioactive. The danger comes from breathing it in or swallowing it, or being hit by schrapnel that can't be removed. The wind has no boundaries, so no corner of the globe is safe.

* As it burns, DU sends up smoke containing fine particles of uranium oxide, which can lodge in the lungs, organs and bones, giving out a steady dose of radiation. Contaminated dust can blow onto agriculture, and pass into the food chain. The particles are so small they can pass easily into the cell nucleus, and can cause mutations. Of course, they pass straight through a gas mask.
* DU can kill countless millions of people for centuries to come - radioactive DU has a half-life of 4.5 billion years!

* Thousands of tonnes of DU have been used by the West in Kosovo, Serbia, Afghanistan and Iraq. Battlefields go back to being people's homes, and soldiers go home, but the "walking death" goes with them always.

* The long-term effect of DU weapons is a "virtual death sentence", according to Arthur Bernklau, executive director of Veterans for Constitutional Law in New York.

* The US, UK (& Australia?) have been using DU weapons in Iraq since the first Gulf War in 1991. Since the 2003 invasion, it is estimated that perhaps 2200 tons of DU have been spread around Iraq (UKAEA).

* DU is a cause of cancers, various diseases and horribly deformed babies into future generations, for the local people and the soldiers who use them. Doctors in Iraq estimate birth defects have increased by 2-6 times, and 3-12 times as many children have developed cancer and leukaemia since 1991.

* The US uses DU shells during military training, including in host nations, without necessarily telling them at the time (e.g. Puerto Rico, Japan). Australia has signed an agreement to increase the use of Australia as a US military training and testing site.

* Bombing other countries with radioactive waste is a monstrous war crime against humanity, and the global environment. As one Vietnam War medic puts it: "Uranium weapons are like Agent Orange on steroids."

* DU munitions violate the Geneva Convention, and are classified by a United Nations resolution as illegal weapons of mass destruction, "incompatible with international humanitarian and human rights law." The EU has twice called for DU weapons to be banned.

* Britain and the US not only used DU in this current Iraq war, they dramatically increased its use - from a minimum of 320 tons in the 1991 Gulf War to a minimum of 1500 tons in this one. Before it was mainly used in anti-tank weapons, but now has been extended to guided missiles and large bombs used in Iraq's cities.

* Far from banning DU, the US and Britain have stepped up their denials of the harm from this radioactive dust, as even more of their own troops become seriously ill.

* The military-industrial complex is hooked on DU and won't take kindly to a challenge. Expect lies and misinformation about DU from our powerful "friends" who wish to continue using it as a weapon of mass destruction in wars!

* That the scientific evidence of the terrible consequences of DU has been officially ignored or dismissed may be no accident. A US report, leaked in late 1995, allegedly says:

"The potential for health effects from DU exposure is real; however it must be viewed in perspective...the financial implications of long-term disability payments and healthcare costs would be excessive."

And that's the least of our worries!

Sources:

Melbourne Age newspaper 'Good Weekend' magazine, October 22, 2005.
'Uncensored' magazine, NZ - Vol 1 Number 1, Spring 2005 - which lists many references. www.uncensored.co.nz

Further information:

Low Level Radiation Campaign www.llrc.org

James Denver http://www.coastalport.com/05/04/09.htm

Washington hid damaging Vietnam finding
By Scott Shane in Washington

The US National Security Agency has kept secret a 2001 finding by its own historian that its officers deliberately distorted critical intelligence during the Tonkin Gulf episode that helped precipitate the Vietnam War.

The historian's conclusion was the first serious accusation that the agency's intercepts were falsified to support the belief North Vietnamese ships attacked US destroyers on August 4, 1964....

Most historians have concluded in recent years there was no second attack, but they have assumed the agency's intercepts were unintentionally misread, not purposely altered.

The research by Robert Hanyok, the agency's historian, was detailed four years ago in an in-house article that remains secret, in part because agency officials feared its release might prompt uncomfortable comparisons with the flawed intelligence used to justify the war in Iraq, according to an intelligence official.

"This material is relevant to debates we as Americans are having about the war in Iraq and intelligence reform."

For the complete article:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10836.htm


First casualty of war
By Eric Alterman

We know now, thanks to one brave and dogged historian at the National Security Agency, that after the famed Gulf of Tonkin "incident" on Aug. 4, 1964 — in which North Vietnam allegedly attacked two American destroyers — National Security Council officials doctored the evidence to support President Johnson's false charge in a speech to the nation that night of "open aggression on the high seas against the United States of America."

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10877.htm

From TomDispatch
a project of the Nation Institute

To send this to a friend, or to read more dispatches, go to tomdispatch.com

Tomgram: De la Vega, Bush's War, a Case of Presidential Fraud?

[Note to Tomdispatch readers: For Elizabeth de la Vega's analysis of the Libby indictment, click here.]

It's the day after, of course. I. Lewis ("Scooter") Libby, immediately praised by the President ("Scooter has worked tirelessly on behalf of the American people and sacrificed much in the service to this country."), his resignation accepted with "deep regret" by the Vice President ("He has given many years of his life to public service and has served our nation tirelessly and with great distinction."), is gone.

David Addington, Cheney's counsel and an extreme believer in unfettered presidential power, is evidently at the top of the list to succeed him as vice-presidential chief of staff. Addington, who was involved in Cheney's Plame discussions, has a Cheneyesque pedigree.

As the Washington Post's Dana Milbank described him in October 2004:

"Where there has been controversy over the past four years, there has often been Addington. He was a principal author of the White House memo justifying torture of terrorism suspects. He was a prime advocate of arguments supporting the holding of terrorism suspects without access to courts. Addington also led the fight with Congress and environmentalists over access to information about corporations that advised the White House on energy policy…Colleagues say Addington stands out for his devotion to secrecy in an administration noted for its confidentiality."

(For the larger administration picture, as it relates to the Plame case, check out the latest graphic at Tompaine.com, Dick and Don's Cabal.)

Meanwhile, Special Counsel Fitzgerald's case remains "open," as he indicated rather quietly in his news conference yesterday. On the significance of this, oddly enough, James Moore, author of Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, and Ann Coulter seem to agree.

As Moore puts it:
"Special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald must surely just be at the beginning of rendering justice. An indictment or two will hardly serve to answer the critical questions. The leak and any lies to the grand jury were most likely motivated by a deep and abiding fear that a much greater crime was at risk of being uncovered. Karl Rove is vindictive, yes. But he is not stupid. Rove would never risk treason unless he thought it served a political purpose. And this was the most important political purpose of all: protecting his most precious asset, George W. Bush."

And here's Coulter:
"O'BRIEN: So there you have it, Karl Rove apparently escaping indictment, but that's the good news. The bad news is, on goes the investigation. What are your thoughts on that one?
COULTER: That is like the worse possible outcome… Let's just get it done one way or the other this Friday. Either they get indicted and they leave, or they're not indicted and it's over. To stay under investigation --- that is not the best possible outcome."
Click here to read more of this dispatch.