House arrest is tipped for Suu Kyi
SCMP - Monday, September 22, 2003
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in in Bangkok and Yangon
Aung San Suu Kyi's recovery from surgery may provide Myanmar's generals with a convenient option of shifting the democracy leader from secret detention to house arrest, analysts and diplomats said at the weekend.
The feisty opposition leader underwent a three-hour operation on Friday that was described as both major and semi-urgent by her personal physician Tin Myo Win, re-igniting international concerns about her health.
Dr Tin Myo Win said on Saturday she was recovering well after the surgery, carried out to treat gynaecological and other unspecified conditions, and was walking around. He could not give a timeframe for her discharge.
Ms Suu Kyi, 58, has been held incommunicado by Myanmar's military rulers at a secret location since being detained after her supporters were attacked by a junta-sponsored mob on May 30.
Since then and until her admission into the privately-run Asia Royal hospital last Wednesday, the only outsiders to see the leader have been the UN special envoy to Myanmar, Razali Ismail, and representatives from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Red Cross officials saw her on September 6 and said that she was "well".
Analysts are now waiting to see what the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), which has not yet commented on Ms Suu Kyi's hospital treatment, will do when she is deemed fit enough to leave the clinic.
"Nobody knows here what will happen after she recovers. We don't have any information or any indication [from the junta]," an Asian diplomat said.
"They may say that for her to have good treatment, she should stay at her house rather than a government guesthouse."
The junta is under intense pressure from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) to release Ms Suu Kyi ahead of the regional group's summit in Bali on October 7.
Indonesia's former foreign minister Ali Alatas arrived in Myanmar yesterday to negotiate Ms Suu Kyi's release. Indonesia is the current chair of Asean.
Her continued detention during the summit would severely embarrass Asean, which faced international criticism in 1997 for admitting Myanmar as a member.
A source in Yangon said last week that Mr Razali would travel to Yangon next week for a 48-hour visit, sparking further anticipation that the junta may offer concessions before the Asean meeting.
The junta's shifting of Ms Suu Kyi from secret detention to house arrest "could buy them some credibility and maybe dilute international pressure, if not completely, then a little bit," said Sunai Phasuk of rights group Forum Asia.
"It would be good for Mr Razali, who is trying to get people to be patient with the SPDC, and good for Asean before the summit to see that they are giving a concession," he said.
"It's a win-win way out for everyone," he added, noting however that there would be an ongoing fight to secure her complete release and democratic reform in Myanmar, which has been ruled by the military for four decades.
A move back to her famed lake-side residence would begin a third stint of house arrest for Ms Suu Kyi, who has already spent 7<120>1/2<121> years confined to her home by the military.
Still, analysts suspect that access to her would be very much restricted and she would most likely not have access to diplomats.
Debbie Stothard of regional network Altsean-Burma agreed that the generals may send Ms Suu Kyi home, but noted it would not be long before pressure built up for her to be freed again.
"It's been generally expected that her detention would be commuted to house arrest, and this provides an opportunity to do so on humanitarian grounds," she said.
"But unless there are actual reforms and actual dialogue taking place towards reform, Asean is going to be constantly put in this position of having to defend the military regime because they can detain her as they like," Ms Stothard said.
"If her detention is actually commuted to house arrest, it is a sign that international pressure is working."
The move, however, is unlikely to satisfy the international community, including Myanmar's harshest critic, the United States.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in in Bangkok and Yangon
Aung San Suu Kyi's recovery from surgery may provide Myanmar's generals with a convenient option of shifting the democracy leader from secret detention to house arrest, analysts and diplomats said at the weekend.
The feisty opposition leader underwent a three-hour operation on Friday that was described as both major and semi-urgent by her personal physician Tin Myo Win, re-igniting international concerns about her health.
Dr Tin Myo Win said on Saturday she was recovering well after the surgery, carried out to treat gynaecological and other unspecified conditions, and was walking around. He could not give a timeframe for her discharge.
Ms Suu Kyi, 58, has been held incommunicado by Myanmar's military rulers at a secret location since being detained after her supporters were attacked by a junta-sponsored mob on May 30.
Since then and until her admission into the privately-run Asia Royal hospital last Wednesday, the only outsiders to see the leader have been the UN special envoy to Myanmar, Razali Ismail, and representatives from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Red Cross officials saw her on September 6 and said that she was "well".
Analysts are now waiting to see what the ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), which has not yet commented on Ms Suu Kyi's hospital treatment, will do when she is deemed fit enough to leave the clinic.
"Nobody knows here what will happen after she recovers. We don't have any information or any indication [from the junta]," an Asian diplomat said.
"They may say that for her to have good treatment, she should stay at her house rather than a government guesthouse."
The junta is under intense pressure from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) to release Ms Suu Kyi ahead of the regional group's summit in Bali on October 7.
Indonesia's former foreign minister Ali Alatas arrived in Myanmar yesterday to negotiate Ms Suu Kyi's release. Indonesia is the current chair of Asean.
Her continued detention during the summit would severely embarrass Asean, which faced international criticism in 1997 for admitting Myanmar as a member.
A source in Yangon said last week that Mr Razali would travel to Yangon next week for a 48-hour visit, sparking further anticipation that the junta may offer concessions before the Asean meeting.
The junta's shifting of Ms Suu Kyi from secret detention to house arrest "could buy them some credibility and maybe dilute international pressure, if not completely, then a little bit," said Sunai Phasuk of rights group Forum Asia.
"It would be good for Mr Razali, who is trying to get people to be patient with the SPDC, and good for Asean before the summit to see that they are giving a concession," he said.
"It's a win-win way out for everyone," he added, noting however that there would be an ongoing fight to secure her complete release and democratic reform in Myanmar, which has been ruled by the military for four decades.
A move back to her famed lake-side residence would begin a third stint of house arrest for Ms Suu Kyi, who has already spent 7<120>1/2<121> years confined to her home by the military.
Still, analysts suspect that access to her would be very much restricted and she would most likely not have access to diplomats.
Debbie Stothard of regional network Altsean-Burma agreed that the generals may send Ms Suu Kyi home, but noted it would not be long before pressure built up for her to be freed again.
"It's been generally expected that her detention would be commuted to house arrest, and this provides an opportunity to do so on humanitarian grounds," she said.
"But unless there are actual reforms and actual dialogue taking place towards reform, Asean is going to be constantly put in this position of having to defend the military regime because they can detain her as they like," Ms Stothard said.
"If her detention is actually commuted to house arrest, it is a sign that international pressure is working."
The move, however, is unlikely to satisfy the international community, including Myanmar's harshest critic, the United States.
George Soros funds plan to block President Bush
Sat Sep 13th, 2003
George Soros, most often described as a billionaire philanthropist, once shared some of the political values of US President George W Bush. For example, they both wanted ''regime change'' in Iraq.
But Soros went further: he has also been gunning for Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, Libya's Muammar el-Qaddafi, Burma's Gen Than Shwe and Turkmenistan's president-for-life Saparmurat Niyazov.
And now Soros has made a full political circle: he wants to see a ''regime change'' in the United States.
A long-time pro-democracy advocate and a sometimes currency speculator, Soros is openly backing a non-governmental initiative called 'Americans Coming Together' (ACT) aimed at stopping Bush in his bid for a second term as president of the United States.
Campaign contribution
ACT is planning to spend about US75 million to mobilise US voters to defeat Bush in the next presidential elections in November 2004.
Described as a counter-cultural investor whose net worth is more than US$5 billion, Soros has already contributed about US$10 million to the anti-Bush campaign.
Six other philanthropists have chipped in a total of about US$12 million, while US$8 million dollars have been contributed by trade unions.
Soros, who is chairman of the Open Society Institute (OSI) which promotes multi-party democracy worldwide, thinks that Bush and his aggressive unilateral foreign policy is doing more harm than good to the United States.
He also believes the president has neither the intellectual capacity nor the political prowess to guide the United States on a sound foreign policy course.
Bush's policies are bound to be wrong ''because they are based on a false ideology'', he told students last month in a commencement address at the Paul H Nitze School of Advanced International Studies in Washington.
He sees striking similarities between the US president and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, both of who believe in military power to achieve their political objectives.
The idea that might is right, advocated by both leaders, cannot be reconciled with the idea of an open society, Soros told the students.
A mockery
A strong advocate of the concept of an ''open society'', he argues that neo-conservatives in the Bush administration have made a mockery of the values of freedom and democracy - all in the name of fighting terrorism.
The battle against terrorism, he says, cannot be accepted as the guiding principle of US foreign policy, and Soros wants Washington to play a more constructive role in the progress of humanity.
''What will happen to the world if the most powerful country on earth - the one that sets the agenda - is solely preoccupied with self-preservation?'' he asked.
''Acting as the leader of a global open society will not protect the United States from terrorist attacks,'' he warned, ''but by playing a constructive role, we can regain the respect and support of the world, and this will make the task of fighting terrorism easier.''
While he favoured the removal of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, Soros thinks that one of Bush's biggest foreign policy debacles is the war on Iraq.
He has pooh-poohed the idea that the Bush administration is fostering democracy by invading and occupying the Middle East nation.
''Democracy cannot be imposed from the outside,'' he argued. ''I have been actively involved in building open societies in a number of countries through my network of foundations. Speaking from experience, I would never choose Iraq for nation building,'' he added.
Mobilise civil society
Soros says his primary aim in getting involved with ACT is to mobilise civil society and convince people to go to the polls next year ''and vote for candidates who will reassert the values of the greatest open society in the world''.
The anti-Bush campaign is gathering support from anti-war groups, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and academics.
''The Soros initiative should gain support as the situation in Iraq worsens, and as the public becomes more aware that President Bush took us to war based on false information about Iraq's weaponry and about its connection to terrorist groups,'' John Quigley, professor of law at Ohio State University, told IPS.
''A president who initiates war on such (false) premises should not be re-elected,'' said Quigley.
''There is no question that if you really look at the deeper situation (about the Bush administration), George Soros is right,'' says Rob Wheeler, organiser of the Uniting for Peace Coalition and U.N. Representative of the Association of World Citizens.
''The president and his administration is surely leading the country in a 'false and dangerous situation' and they must be stopped,'' he told IPS.
''The question is, really, what issues ACT will focus on and how tough they will be on the president,'' he added.
The Hungarian-born Soros says he is not backing any candidate for the US presidency.
Besides Bush, Soros also targets US Attorney General John Ashcroft, author of the Patriot Act, a highly controversial law that has restricted civil liberties in the guise of fighting terrorism.
Anyone who opposes the Patriot Act, says Ashcroft, is giving aid and comfort to the enemy. Ashcroft's remarks have prompted a rejoinder from Soros: ''These are views of extremists, not adherents to an open society.''
Defeat communism
A graduate of the London School of Economics, Soros says one of his political pursuits was to defeat communism and transform former closed societies in the Soviet Union into open societies.
Last week, he closed down his operations in Russia, where he spent over US1 billion promoting democracy in a country that was the cradle of communism. Russia, he said, had weathered all its crises, and needs no outside support to survive.
Still, the OSI is known to spend over US$450 million annually to create open societies in several developing nations and Eastern European countries.
Ironically, although his anti-Bush campaign has strong supporters in the current US anti-war movement, Soros is still vilified by anti-globalisation groups, who criticise him for his strong advocacy of free market economies and the global capitalist system.
As a currency trader, he is accused of making his fortune by manipulating markets, mostly in developing countries. He is known to have made US$1 billion on a single day by speculating on the British pound.
In an article in 'Covert Action Quarterly' last year, Heather Cotton said that Soros' foundations and financial machinations are partly responsible for the destruction of socialism in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
''He has set his sights on China. He was part of the full court press that dismantled Yugoslavia,'' she writes.
Soros' role, she said, is to tighten the stranglehold of globalisation and the ''New World Order'' while promoting his own financial gain.
'Don't blame me'
Cotton writes that while anti-globalisation forces were freezing in the streets outside New York's Waldorf Astoria Hotel in February 2002, Soros was inside addressing the World Economic Forum, the traditional platform for the world's economic elites.
''As the police forced protesters into metal cages on Park Avenue, Soros was extolling the virtues of the 'open society'."
As chairman of Soros Fund Management, Soros built a huge fortune doubling as a speculator in international currency and financial markets.
He has been accused of profiting unfairly in foreign markets, including developing country markets such as Thailand, and was lambasted by Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad for currency speculation that contributed to the 1997 Asian economic crisis.
At a meeting at the University of Pennsylvania, Soros was asked how he reconciles his two roles in life: philanthropist and ruthless speculator.
Pleading innocence, he said the cash crises he has been blamed for were really caused by government policies, not his speculative actions. ''I was used as a scapegoat for government actions,'' he added, pointing out that he is known in China as ''the crocodile''. - IPS
George Soros, most often described as a billionaire philanthropist, once shared some of the political values of US President George W Bush. For example, they both wanted ''regime change'' in Iraq.
But Soros went further: he has also been gunning for Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, Libya's Muammar el-Qaddafi, Burma's Gen Than Shwe and Turkmenistan's president-for-life Saparmurat Niyazov.
And now Soros has made a full political circle: he wants to see a ''regime change'' in the United States.
A long-time pro-democracy advocate and a sometimes currency speculator, Soros is openly backing a non-governmental initiative called 'Americans Coming Together' (ACT) aimed at stopping Bush in his bid for a second term as president of the United States.
Campaign contribution
ACT is planning to spend about US75 million to mobilise US voters to defeat Bush in the next presidential elections in November 2004.
Described as a counter-cultural investor whose net worth is more than US$5 billion, Soros has already contributed about US$10 million to the anti-Bush campaign.
Six other philanthropists have chipped in a total of about US$12 million, while US$8 million dollars have been contributed by trade unions.
Soros, who is chairman of the Open Society Institute (OSI) which promotes multi-party democracy worldwide, thinks that Bush and his aggressive unilateral foreign policy is doing more harm than good to the United States.
He also believes the president has neither the intellectual capacity nor the political prowess to guide the United States on a sound foreign policy course.
Bush's policies are bound to be wrong ''because they are based on a false ideology'', he told students last month in a commencement address at the Paul H Nitze School of Advanced International Studies in Washington.
He sees striking similarities between the US president and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, both of who believe in military power to achieve their political objectives.
The idea that might is right, advocated by both leaders, cannot be reconciled with the idea of an open society, Soros told the students.
A mockery
A strong advocate of the concept of an ''open society'', he argues that neo-conservatives in the Bush administration have made a mockery of the values of freedom and democracy - all in the name of fighting terrorism.
The battle against terrorism, he says, cannot be accepted as the guiding principle of US foreign policy, and Soros wants Washington to play a more constructive role in the progress of humanity.
''What will happen to the world if the most powerful country on earth - the one that sets the agenda - is solely preoccupied with self-preservation?'' he asked.
''Acting as the leader of a global open society will not protect the United States from terrorist attacks,'' he warned, ''but by playing a constructive role, we can regain the respect and support of the world, and this will make the task of fighting terrorism easier.''
While he favoured the removal of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, Soros thinks that one of Bush's biggest foreign policy debacles is the war on Iraq.
He has pooh-poohed the idea that the Bush administration is fostering democracy by invading and occupying the Middle East nation.
''Democracy cannot be imposed from the outside,'' he argued. ''I have been actively involved in building open societies in a number of countries through my network of foundations. Speaking from experience, I would never choose Iraq for nation building,'' he added.
Mobilise civil society
Soros says his primary aim in getting involved with ACT is to mobilise civil society and convince people to go to the polls next year ''and vote for candidates who will reassert the values of the greatest open society in the world''.
The anti-Bush campaign is gathering support from anti-war groups, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and academics.
''The Soros initiative should gain support as the situation in Iraq worsens, and as the public becomes more aware that President Bush took us to war based on false information about Iraq's weaponry and about its connection to terrorist groups,'' John Quigley, professor of law at Ohio State University, told IPS.
''A president who initiates war on such (false) premises should not be re-elected,'' said Quigley.
''There is no question that if you really look at the deeper situation (about the Bush administration), George Soros is right,'' says Rob Wheeler, organiser of the Uniting for Peace Coalition and U.N. Representative of the Association of World Citizens.
''The president and his administration is surely leading the country in a 'false and dangerous situation' and they must be stopped,'' he told IPS.
''The question is, really, what issues ACT will focus on and how tough they will be on the president,'' he added.
The Hungarian-born Soros says he is not backing any candidate for the US presidency.
Besides Bush, Soros also targets US Attorney General John Ashcroft, author of the Patriot Act, a highly controversial law that has restricted civil liberties in the guise of fighting terrorism.
Anyone who opposes the Patriot Act, says Ashcroft, is giving aid and comfort to the enemy. Ashcroft's remarks have prompted a rejoinder from Soros: ''These are views of extremists, not adherents to an open society.''
Defeat communism
A graduate of the London School of Economics, Soros says one of his political pursuits was to defeat communism and transform former closed societies in the Soviet Union into open societies.
Last week, he closed down his operations in Russia, where he spent over US1 billion promoting democracy in a country that was the cradle of communism. Russia, he said, had weathered all its crises, and needs no outside support to survive.
Still, the OSI is known to spend over US$450 million annually to create open societies in several developing nations and Eastern European countries.
Ironically, although his anti-Bush campaign has strong supporters in the current US anti-war movement, Soros is still vilified by anti-globalisation groups, who criticise him for his strong advocacy of free market economies and the global capitalist system.
As a currency trader, he is accused of making his fortune by manipulating markets, mostly in developing countries. He is known to have made US$1 billion on a single day by speculating on the British pound.
In an article in 'Covert Action Quarterly' last year, Heather Cotton said that Soros' foundations and financial machinations are partly responsible for the destruction of socialism in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
''He has set his sights on China. He was part of the full court press that dismantled Yugoslavia,'' she writes.
Soros' role, she said, is to tighten the stranglehold of globalisation and the ''New World Order'' while promoting his own financial gain.
'Don't blame me'
Cotton writes that while anti-globalisation forces were freezing in the streets outside New York's Waldorf Astoria Hotel in February 2002, Soros was inside addressing the World Economic Forum, the traditional platform for the world's economic elites.
''As the police forced protesters into metal cages on Park Avenue, Soros was extolling the virtues of the 'open society'."
As chairman of Soros Fund Management, Soros built a huge fortune doubling as a speculator in international currency and financial markets.
He has been accused of profiting unfairly in foreign markets, including developing country markets such as Thailand, and was lambasted by Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad for currency speculation that contributed to the 1997 Asian economic crisis.
At a meeting at the University of Pennsylvania, Soros was asked how he reconciles his two roles in life: philanthropist and ruthless speculator.
Pleading innocence, he said the cash crises he has been blamed for were really caused by government policies, not his speculative actions. ''I was used as a scapegoat for government actions,'' he added, pointing out that he is known in China as ''the crocodile''. - IPS
Cambodia rues heavy price of WTO status
Saturday, September 13, 2003
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Cambodia had paid a heavy price for its newly sealed WTO membership, its Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh said, in remarkably frank criticism of the admission process.
"We believe that the package of concessions and commitments that we have to accept certainly goes far beyond what is commensurate with the level of development of a least-developed country like Cambodia," Cham Prasidh told ministers from the World Trade Organisation who backed Cambodia's accession, along with that of Nepal, on Thursday.
"For the sake of national reconciliation and peace in Cambodia, we paid heavy prices and now, for the sake of world integration, we had to pay another heavy price," Cham Prasidh said.
But he added: "We do accept the challenges, because we see the benefits of joining the world trading system."
At a press conference following his remarks, Mr Cham Prasidh was asked about the reaction of his WTO ministerial colleagues to his address.
Cham Prasidh said many of them had told him "this was the first time they had heard an acceding country telling the truth".
The minister said he hoped his frankness would help spare other least developed countries the same difficulties. While he declined to elaborate on what Cambodia had been asked to do in exchange for WTO admission, the British humanitarian group Oxfam said the country, which is 80 per cent agricultural, had been required to provide less protection for its agricultural sector than had the United States, the European Union and Canada.
The report also said certain WTO members insisted Cambodia substantially revise an initial offer on market access in agricultural and industrial products.
That demand, it added, contradicted an earlier WTO pledge to exercise restraint in seeking further market access concessions from least-developed countries that want to join the world body.
"The scandal is that powerful members of the WTO have asked more concessions from Cambodia than they have asked from themselves," said Phil Bloomer of Oxfam.
A WTO press release issued following the approval of Cambodia's candidacy quoted Cham Prasidh, but omitted criticism of the accession process.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Cambodia had paid a heavy price for its newly sealed WTO membership, its Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh said, in remarkably frank criticism of the admission process.
"We believe that the package of concessions and commitments that we have to accept certainly goes far beyond what is commensurate with the level of development of a least-developed country like Cambodia," Cham Prasidh told ministers from the World Trade Organisation who backed Cambodia's accession, along with that of Nepal, on Thursday.
"For the sake of national reconciliation and peace in Cambodia, we paid heavy prices and now, for the sake of world integration, we had to pay another heavy price," Cham Prasidh said.
But he added: "We do accept the challenges, because we see the benefits of joining the world trading system."
At a press conference following his remarks, Mr Cham Prasidh was asked about the reaction of his WTO ministerial colleagues to his address.
Cham Prasidh said many of them had told him "this was the first time they had heard an acceding country telling the truth".
The minister said he hoped his frankness would help spare other least developed countries the same difficulties. While he declined to elaborate on what Cambodia had been asked to do in exchange for WTO admission, the British humanitarian group Oxfam said the country, which is 80 per cent agricultural, had been required to provide less protection for its agricultural sector than had the United States, the European Union and Canada.
The report also said certain WTO members insisted Cambodia substantially revise an initial offer on market access in agricultural and industrial products.
That demand, it added, contradicted an earlier WTO pledge to exercise restraint in seeking further market access concessions from least-developed countries that want to join the world body.
"The scandal is that powerful members of the WTO have asked more concessions from Cambodia than they have asked from themselves," said Phil Bloomer of Oxfam.
A WTO press release issued following the approval of Cambodia's candidacy quoted Cham Prasidh, but omitted criticism of the accession process.
Rich and poor square off over world trade rules
Saturday, September 13, 2003
REUTERS in Cancun, Mexico
Rich countries, under pressure to slash farm subsidies, are searching for weaknesses in a new alliance of poor nations bent on rewriting world trade rules.
Developing countries, which say trade rules are rigged against them, are becoming increasingly assertive within the 146-member World Trade Organisation.
At a WTO ministerial conference in Cancun, Mexico, they brusquely rejected demands led by the European Union and Japan for new guidelines to govern foreign direct investment (FDI). "This is an exercise in futility," Malaysian Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz said of the plan for investment rules.
The rhetoric reflected the deep divisions on a host of issues that ministers need to narrow by tomorrow to revive stalled global trade talks. The World Bank claims the talks, if successful, could lift 144 million people out of poverty.
Agriculture is the most critical issue in Cancun because it is the mainstay of most poor countries.
They blame the US$300 billion doled out mainly by the United States and the EU to their farmers each year for pricing poor farmers out of world markets.
A new coalition of 21 developing countries has sprung up to demand the scrapping of those subsidies - without promising more access to their own markets.
Diplomats said the initiative showed the growing clout of poor states in the WTO. "This is a significant shift in the dynamic structure of this organisation," said Australian Trade Minister Mark Vaile.
As hard bargaining continued, the US took a lead in trying to undermine the fledgling group, which includes China, Brazil, India and South Africa. "It's really unclear to us what is the unifying principle there among those countries," said Deputy US Trade Representative Peter Allgeier.
"You've got some of those countries that were among the most ambitious countries for agricultural reform. Then it goes across the spectrum . . . to countries that have not been advocates of reform."
Another senior US official asked rhetorically what a backer of farm reform such as Brazil had in common with India, which is loath to cut the high tariffs shielding its markets.
Diplomats said the subtext of Washington's message was that, with the 2004 US presidential election looming, the US would find it hard to improve on what it sees as a generous offer that has already drawn political fire.
"It can't be a one-way street whereby the United States agrees to eliminate subsidies but the rest of the world does nothing," said Chuck Grassley, who chairs the US Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over trade matters.
Similarly, proposed reforms to the EU's US$100 billion farm programme have gone over badly in some EU member states, especially France.
Diplomats said the risk for poor states is that if they refuse the offer now on the table, the Cancun talks will fail and they will be saddled with the current set of subsidies for several more years.
REUTERS in Cancun, Mexico
Rich countries, under pressure to slash farm subsidies, are searching for weaknesses in a new alliance of poor nations bent on rewriting world trade rules.
Developing countries, which say trade rules are rigged against them, are becoming increasingly assertive within the 146-member World Trade Organisation.
At a WTO ministerial conference in Cancun, Mexico, they brusquely rejected demands led by the European Union and Japan for new guidelines to govern foreign direct investment (FDI). "This is an exercise in futility," Malaysian Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz said of the plan for investment rules.
The rhetoric reflected the deep divisions on a host of issues that ministers need to narrow by tomorrow to revive stalled global trade talks. The World Bank claims the talks, if successful, could lift 144 million people out of poverty.
Agriculture is the most critical issue in Cancun because it is the mainstay of most poor countries.
They blame the US$300 billion doled out mainly by the United States and the EU to their farmers each year for pricing poor farmers out of world markets.
A new coalition of 21 developing countries has sprung up to demand the scrapping of those subsidies - without promising more access to their own markets.
Diplomats said the initiative showed the growing clout of poor states in the WTO. "This is a significant shift in the dynamic structure of this organisation," said Australian Trade Minister Mark Vaile.
As hard bargaining continued, the US took a lead in trying to undermine the fledgling group, which includes China, Brazil, India and South Africa. "It's really unclear to us what is the unifying principle there among those countries," said Deputy US Trade Representative Peter Allgeier.
"You've got some of those countries that were among the most ambitious countries for agricultural reform. Then it goes across the spectrum . . . to countries that have not been advocates of reform."
Another senior US official asked rhetorically what a backer of farm reform such as Brazil had in common with India, which is loath to cut the high tariffs shielding its markets.
Diplomats said the subtext of Washington's message was that, with the 2004 US presidential election looming, the US would find it hard to improve on what it sees as a generous offer that has already drawn political fire.
"It can't be a one-way street whereby the United States agrees to eliminate subsidies but the rest of the world does nothing," said Chuck Grassley, who chairs the US Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over trade matters.
Similarly, proposed reforms to the EU's US$100 billion farm programme have gone over badly in some EU member states, especially France.
Diplomats said the risk for poor states is that if they refuse the offer now on the table, the Cancun talks will fail and they will be saddled with the current set of subsidies for several more years.
Reasons to fear U.S.
NOAM CHOMSKY
Amid the aftershocks of recent suicide bombings in Baghdad and Najaf, and countless other horrors since Sept. 11, 2001, it is easy to understand why many believe that the world has entered a new and frightening "age of terror," the title of a recent collection of essays by Yale University scholars and others.
However, two years after 9/11, the United States has yet to confront the roots of terrorism, has waged more war than peace and has continually raised the stakes of international confrontation.
On 9/11, the world reacted with shock and horror, and sympathy for the victims. But it is important to bear in mind that for much of the world, there was a further reaction: "Welcome to the club."
For the first time in history, a Western power was subjected to an atrocity of the kind that is all too familiar elsewhere.
Any attempt to make sense of events since then will naturally begin with an investigation of American power - how it has reacted and what course it may take.
Within a month of 9/11, Afghanistan was under attack. Those who accept elementary moral standards have some work to do to show that the United States and Britain were justified in bombing Afghans to compel them to turn over people suspected of criminal atrocities, the official reason given when the bombings began.
Then, in September, 2002, the most powerful state in history announced a new National Security Strategy, asserting that it will maintain global hegemony permanently.
Any challenge will be blocked by force, the dimension in which the United States reigns supreme.
At the same time, the war drums began to beat to mobilize the population for an invasion of Iraq.
And the campaign opened for the mid-term congressional elections, which would determine whether the administration would be able to carry out its radical international and domestic agenda.
The final days of 2002, foreign policy specialist Michael Krepon wrote, were "the most dangerous since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis," which historian Arthur Schlesinger described, reasonably, as "the most dangerous moment in human history."
Krepon's concern was nuclear proliferation in an "unstable nuclear-proliferation belt stretching from Pyongyang to Baghdad," including "Iran, Iraq, North Korea and the Indian subcontinent." Bush administration initiatives in 2002 and 2003 have only increased the threats in and near this unstable belt.
The National Security Strategy declared that the United States, alone, has the right to carry out "preventive war" - preventive, not pre-emptive - using military force to eliminate a perceived threat, even if invented or imagined.
Preventive war is, very simply, the "supreme crime" condemned at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals.
>From early September, 2002, the Bush administration issued grim warnings about the danger that Saddam Hussein posed to the United States, with broad hints that Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda and involved in the Sept. 11 attacks. The propaganda assault helped enable the administration to gain some support from a frightened population for the planned invasion of a country known to be virtually defenceless - and a valuable prize, at the heart of the world's major energy system.
Last May, after the putative end of the war in Iraq, President Bush landed on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and declared that he had won a "victory in the war on terror (by having) removed an ally of Al Qaeda."
But Sept. 11, 2003, will arrive with no credible evidence for the alleged link between Saddam and his bitter enemy Osama bin Laden. And the only known link between the victory and terror is that the invasion of Iraq seems to have increased Al Qaeda recruitment and the threat of terror.
The Wall Street Journal recognized that Bush's carefully staged aircraft-carrier extravaganza "marks the beginning of his 2004 re-election campaign," which the White House hopes "will be built as much as possible around national security themes." If the administration lets domestic issues prevail, it is in deep trouble.
Meanwhile, bin Laden remains at large. And the source of the post-Sept. 11 anthrax terror is unknown - an even more striking failure, given that the source is assumed to be domestic, perhaps even from a federal weapons lab.
The Iraqi weapons of mass destruction are still missing, too. For the second 9/11 anniversary and beyond, we basically have two choices. We can march forward with confidence that the global enforcer will drive evil from the world, much as the president's speechwriters declare, plagiarizing ancient epics and children's tales.
Or we can subject the doctrines of the proclaimed grand new era to scrutiny, drawing rational conclusions, perhaps gaining some sense of the emerging reality.
The wars that are contemplated in the war on terror are to go on for a long time.
"There's no telling how many wars it will take to secure freedom in the homeland," the president announced last year.
That's fair enough. Potential threats are limitless. And there is strong reason to believe that they are becoming more severe as a result of Bush administration lawlessness and violence.
We also should be able to appreciate recent comments on the matter by Ami Ayalon, the 1996-2000 head of Shabak, Israel's General Security Service, who observed that "those who want victory" against terror without addressing underlying grievances "want an unending war." The observation generalizes in obvious ways.
The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation.
The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the people of the United States, who can shape the future.
* Author Noam Chomsky is a political activist and professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[Source:The Toronto Star 7/9/03]
Amid the aftershocks of recent suicide bombings in Baghdad and Najaf, and countless other horrors since Sept. 11, 2001, it is easy to understand why many believe that the world has entered a new and frightening "age of terror," the title of a recent collection of essays by Yale University scholars and others.
However, two years after 9/11, the United States has yet to confront the roots of terrorism, has waged more war than peace and has continually raised the stakes of international confrontation.
On 9/11, the world reacted with shock and horror, and sympathy for the victims. But it is important to bear in mind that for much of the world, there was a further reaction: "Welcome to the club."
For the first time in history, a Western power was subjected to an atrocity of the kind that is all too familiar elsewhere.
Any attempt to make sense of events since then will naturally begin with an investigation of American power - how it has reacted and what course it may take.
Within a month of 9/11, Afghanistan was under attack. Those who accept elementary moral standards have some work to do to show that the United States and Britain were justified in bombing Afghans to compel them to turn over people suspected of criminal atrocities, the official reason given when the bombings began.
Then, in September, 2002, the most powerful state in history announced a new National Security Strategy, asserting that it will maintain global hegemony permanently.
Any challenge will be blocked by force, the dimension in which the United States reigns supreme.
At the same time, the war drums began to beat to mobilize the population for an invasion of Iraq.
And the campaign opened for the mid-term congressional elections, which would determine whether the administration would be able to carry out its radical international and domestic agenda.
The final days of 2002, foreign policy specialist Michael Krepon wrote, were "the most dangerous since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis," which historian Arthur Schlesinger described, reasonably, as "the most dangerous moment in human history."
Krepon's concern was nuclear proliferation in an "unstable nuclear-proliferation belt stretching from Pyongyang to Baghdad," including "Iran, Iraq, North Korea and the Indian subcontinent." Bush administration initiatives in 2002 and 2003 have only increased the threats in and near this unstable belt.
The National Security Strategy declared that the United States, alone, has the right to carry out "preventive war" - preventive, not pre-emptive - using military force to eliminate a perceived threat, even if invented or imagined.
Preventive war is, very simply, the "supreme crime" condemned at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals.
>From early September, 2002, the Bush administration issued grim warnings about the danger that Saddam Hussein posed to the United States, with broad hints that Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda and involved in the Sept. 11 attacks. The propaganda assault helped enable the administration to gain some support from a frightened population for the planned invasion of a country known to be virtually defenceless - and a valuable prize, at the heart of the world's major energy system.
Last May, after the putative end of the war in Iraq, President Bush landed on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and declared that he had won a "victory in the war on terror (by having) removed an ally of Al Qaeda."
But Sept. 11, 2003, will arrive with no credible evidence for the alleged link between Saddam and his bitter enemy Osama bin Laden. And the only known link between the victory and terror is that the invasion of Iraq seems to have increased Al Qaeda recruitment and the threat of terror.
The Wall Street Journal recognized that Bush's carefully staged aircraft-carrier extravaganza "marks the beginning of his 2004 re-election campaign," which the White House hopes "will be built as much as possible around national security themes." If the administration lets domestic issues prevail, it is in deep trouble.
Meanwhile, bin Laden remains at large. And the source of the post-Sept. 11 anthrax terror is unknown - an even more striking failure, given that the source is assumed to be domestic, perhaps even from a federal weapons lab.
The Iraqi weapons of mass destruction are still missing, too. For the second 9/11 anniversary and beyond, we basically have two choices. We can march forward with confidence that the global enforcer will drive evil from the world, much as the president's speechwriters declare, plagiarizing ancient epics and children's tales.
Or we can subject the doctrines of the proclaimed grand new era to scrutiny, drawing rational conclusions, perhaps gaining some sense of the emerging reality.
The wars that are contemplated in the war on terror are to go on for a long time.
"There's no telling how many wars it will take to secure freedom in the homeland," the president announced last year.
That's fair enough. Potential threats are limitless. And there is strong reason to believe that they are becoming more severe as a result of Bush administration lawlessness and violence.
We also should be able to appreciate recent comments on the matter by Ami Ayalon, the 1996-2000 head of Shabak, Israel's General Security Service, who observed that "those who want victory" against terror without addressing underlying grievances "want an unending war." The observation generalizes in obvious ways.
The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation.
The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the people of the United States, who can shape the future.
* Author Noam Chomsky is a political activist and professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[Source:The Toronto Star 7/9/03]
Reasons to fear U.S.
NOAM CHOMSKY
Amid the aftershocks of recent suicide bombings in Baghdad and Najaf, and countless other horrors since Sept. 11, 2001, it is easy to understand why many believe that the world has entered a new and frightening "age of terror," the title of a recent collection of essays by Yale University scholars and others.
However, two years after 9/11, the United States has yet to confront the roots of terrorism, has waged more war than peace and has continually raised the stakes of international confrontation.
On 9/11, the world reacted with shock and horror, and sympathy for the victims. But it is important to bear in mind that for much of the world, there was a further reaction: "Welcome to the club."
For the first time in history, a Western power was subjected to an atrocity of the kind that is all too familiar elsewhere.
Any attempt to make sense of events since then will naturally begin with an investigation of American power - how it has reacted and what course it may take.
Within a month of 9/11, Afghanistan was under attack. Those who accept elementary moral standards have some work to do to show that the United States and Britain were justified in bombing Afghans to compel them to turn over people suspected of criminal atrocities, the official reason given when the bombings began.
Then, in September, 2002, the most powerful state in history announced a new National Security Strategy, asserting that it will maintain global hegemony permanently.
Any challenge will be blocked by force, the dimension in which the United States reigns supreme.
At the same time, the war drums began to beat to mobilize the population for an invasion of Iraq.
And the campaign opened for the mid-term congressional elections, which would determine whether the administration would be able to carry out its radical international and domestic agenda.
The final days of 2002, foreign policy specialist Michael Krepon wrote, were "the most dangerous since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis," which historian Arthur Schlesinger described, reasonably, as "the most dangerous moment in human history."
Krepon's concern was nuclear proliferation in an "unstable nuclear-proliferation belt stretching from Pyongyang to Baghdad," including "Iran, Iraq, North Korea and the Indian subcontinent." Bush administration initiatives in 2002 and 2003 have only increased the threats in and near this unstable belt.
The National Security Strategy declared that the United States, alone, has the right to carry out "preventive war" - preventive, not pre-emptive - using military force to eliminate a perceived threat, even if invented or imagined.
Preventive war is, very simply, the "supreme crime" condemned at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals.
>From early September, 2002, the Bush administration issued grim warnings about the danger that Saddam Hussein posed to the United States, with broad hints that Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda and involved in the Sept. 11 attacks. The propaganda assault helped enable the administration to gain some support from a frightened population for the planned invasion of a country known to be virtually defenceless - and a valuable prize, at the heart of the world's major energy system.
Last May, after the putative end of the war in Iraq, President Bush landed on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and declared that he had won a "victory in the war on terror (by having) removed an ally of Al Qaeda."
But Sept. 11, 2003, will arrive with no credible evidence for the alleged link between Saddam and his bitter enemy Osama bin Laden. And the only known link between the victory and terror is that the invasion of Iraq seems to have increased Al Qaeda recruitment and the threat of terror.
The Wall Street Journal recognized that Bush's carefully staged aircraft-carrier extravaganza "marks the beginning of his 2004 re-election campaign," which the White House hopes "will be built as much as possible around national security themes." If the administration lets domestic issues prevail, it is in deep trouble.
Meanwhile, bin Laden remains at large. And the source of the post-Sept. 11 anthrax terror is unknown - an even more striking failure, given that the source is assumed to be domestic, perhaps even from a federal weapons lab.
The Iraqi weapons of mass destruction are still missing, too. For the second 9/11 anniversary and beyond, we basically have two choices. We can march forward with confidence that the global enforcer will drive evil from the world, much as the president's speechwriters declare, plagiarizing ancient epics and children's tales.
Or we can subject the doctrines of the proclaimed grand new era to scrutiny, drawing rational conclusions, perhaps gaining some sense of the emerging reality.
The wars that are contemplated in the war on terror are to go on for a long time.
"There's no telling how many wars it will take to secure freedom in the homeland," the president announced last year.
That's fair enough. Potential threats are limitless. And there is strong reason to believe that they are becoming more severe as a result of Bush administration lawlessness and violence.
We also should be able to appreciate recent comments on the matter by Ami Ayalon, the 1996-2000 head of Shabak, Israel's General Security Service, who observed that "those who want victory" against terror without addressing underlying grievances "want an unending war." The observation generalizes in obvious ways.
The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation.
The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the people of the United States, who can shape the future.
* Author Noam Chomsky is a political activist and professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[Source:The Toronto Star 7/9/03]
Amid the aftershocks of recent suicide bombings in Baghdad and Najaf, and countless other horrors since Sept. 11, 2001, it is easy to understand why many believe that the world has entered a new and frightening "age of terror," the title of a recent collection of essays by Yale University scholars and others.
However, two years after 9/11, the United States has yet to confront the roots of terrorism, has waged more war than peace and has continually raised the stakes of international confrontation.
On 9/11, the world reacted with shock and horror, and sympathy for the victims. But it is important to bear in mind that for much of the world, there was a further reaction: "Welcome to the club."
For the first time in history, a Western power was subjected to an atrocity of the kind that is all too familiar elsewhere.
Any attempt to make sense of events since then will naturally begin with an investigation of American power - how it has reacted and what course it may take.
Within a month of 9/11, Afghanistan was under attack. Those who accept elementary moral standards have some work to do to show that the United States and Britain were justified in bombing Afghans to compel them to turn over people suspected of criminal atrocities, the official reason given when the bombings began.
Then, in September, 2002, the most powerful state in history announced a new National Security Strategy, asserting that it will maintain global hegemony permanently.
Any challenge will be blocked by force, the dimension in which the United States reigns supreme.
At the same time, the war drums began to beat to mobilize the population for an invasion of Iraq.
And the campaign opened for the mid-term congressional elections, which would determine whether the administration would be able to carry out its radical international and domestic agenda.
The final days of 2002, foreign policy specialist Michael Krepon wrote, were "the most dangerous since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis," which historian Arthur Schlesinger described, reasonably, as "the most dangerous moment in human history."
Krepon's concern was nuclear proliferation in an "unstable nuclear-proliferation belt stretching from Pyongyang to Baghdad," including "Iran, Iraq, North Korea and the Indian subcontinent." Bush administration initiatives in 2002 and 2003 have only increased the threats in and near this unstable belt.
The National Security Strategy declared that the United States, alone, has the right to carry out "preventive war" - preventive, not pre-emptive - using military force to eliminate a perceived threat, even if invented or imagined.
Preventive war is, very simply, the "supreme crime" condemned at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals.
>From early September, 2002, the Bush administration issued grim warnings about the danger that Saddam Hussein posed to the United States, with broad hints that Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda and involved in the Sept. 11 attacks. The propaganda assault helped enable the administration to gain some support from a frightened population for the planned invasion of a country known to be virtually defenceless - and a valuable prize, at the heart of the world's major energy system.
Last May, after the putative end of the war in Iraq, President Bush landed on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and declared that he had won a "victory in the war on terror (by having) removed an ally of Al Qaeda."
But Sept. 11, 2003, will arrive with no credible evidence for the alleged link between Saddam and his bitter enemy Osama bin Laden. And the only known link between the victory and terror is that the invasion of Iraq seems to have increased Al Qaeda recruitment and the threat of terror.
The Wall Street Journal recognized that Bush's carefully staged aircraft-carrier extravaganza "marks the beginning of his 2004 re-election campaign," which the White House hopes "will be built as much as possible around national security themes." If the administration lets domestic issues prevail, it is in deep trouble.
Meanwhile, bin Laden remains at large. And the source of the post-Sept. 11 anthrax terror is unknown - an even more striking failure, given that the source is assumed to be domestic, perhaps even from a federal weapons lab.
The Iraqi weapons of mass destruction are still missing, too. For the second 9/11 anniversary and beyond, we basically have two choices. We can march forward with confidence that the global enforcer will drive evil from the world, much as the president's speechwriters declare, plagiarizing ancient epics and children's tales.
Or we can subject the doctrines of the proclaimed grand new era to scrutiny, drawing rational conclusions, perhaps gaining some sense of the emerging reality.
The wars that are contemplated in the war on terror are to go on for a long time.
"There's no telling how many wars it will take to secure freedom in the homeland," the president announced last year.
That's fair enough. Potential threats are limitless. And there is strong reason to believe that they are becoming more severe as a result of Bush administration lawlessness and violence.
We also should be able to appreciate recent comments on the matter by Ami Ayalon, the 1996-2000 head of Shabak, Israel's General Security Service, who observed that "those who want victory" against terror without addressing underlying grievances "want an unending war." The observation generalizes in obvious ways.
The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation.
The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the people of the United States, who can shape the future.
* Author Noam Chomsky is a political activist and professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[Source:The Toronto Star 7/9/03]
The Importance of Losing the War
By Jonathan Schell, The Nation and TomDispatch.com
September 5, 2003
The basic mistake of American policy in Iraq is not that the Pentagon - believing the fairy tales told it by Iraqi exile groups and overriding State Department advice - forgot, when planning "regime change," to bring along a spare government to replace the one it was smashing. The mistake was not that, once embarked on running the place, the administration did not send enough troops to do the job. Not that a civilian contingent to aid the soldiers was lacking. Not that the Baghdad museum, the Jordanian Embassy, the United Nations and Imam Ali mosque, among other places, were left unguarded. Not that no adequate police force, whether American or Iraqi, was provided to keep order generally. Not that the United States, seeking to make good that lack, then began to recruit men from the most hated and brutal of Saddam's agencies, the Mukhabarat.
It is not that, in an unaccountable and unparalleled lapse in America's once sure-fire technical know-how, Iraq's electrical, water and fuel systems remain dysfunctional. Not that the administration has erected a powerless shadow government composed in large measure of the same clueless exiles that misled the administration in the first place. Nor is it that the administration has decided to privatize substantial portions of the Iraqi economy before the will of the Iraqi people in this matter is known. Not that the occupation forces have launched search-and-destroy operations that estrange and embitter a population that increasingly despises the United States. Not that, throughout, a bullying diplomacy has driven away America's traditional allies.
All these blunders and omissions are indeed mistakes of American policy, and grievous ones, but they are secondary mistakes. The main mistake of American policy in Iraq was waging the war at all. That is not a conclusion that anyone should have to labor to arrive at.
Something like the whole world, including most of its governments and tens of millions of demonstrators, plus the UN Security Council, Representative Dennis Kucinich, Governor Howard Dean, made the point most vocally before the fact. They variously pointed out that the Iraqi regime gave no support to al-Qaeda, predicted that the United States would be unable to establish democracy in Iraq by force (and that therefore no such democracy could serve as a splendid model for the rest of the Middle East), warned that "regime change" for purposes of disarmament was likely to encourage other countries to build weapons of mass destruction, and argued that the allegations that Iraq already had weapons of mass destruction and was ready to use them at any moment (within forty-five minutes after the order was delivered, it was said) were unproven.
All these justifications for the war are now in history's ash heap, never to be retrieved - adding a few largish piles to the mountains of ideological claptrap (of the left, the right and what have you) that were the habitual accompaniment of the assorted horrors of the twentieth century.
Recognition of this mistake - one that may prove as great as the decision to embark on the Vietnam War - is essential if the best (or at any rate the least disastrous) path out of the mess is to be charted. Otherwise, the mistake may be compounded, and such indeed is the direction in which a substantial new body of opinion now pushes the United States.
In this company are Democrats in Congress who credulously accepted the Bush administration's arguments for the war or simply caved in to administration pressure, hawkish liberal commentators in the same position and a growing minority of right-wing critics.
They now recommend increasing American troop strength in Iraq. Some supported the war and still do. "We must win," says Democratic Senator Joseph Biden, who went on "Good Morning America" to recommend dispatching more troops. His colleague Republican John McCain agrees.
The right-wing Weekly Standard is of like mind. Others were doubtful about the war at the beginning but think the United States must "win" now that the war has been launched.
The New York Times, which opposed an invasion without UN Security Council support, has declared in an editorial that "establishing a free and peaceful Iraq as a linchpin for progress throughout the Middle East is a goal worth struggling for, even at great costs." And, voicing a view often now heard, it adds, "We are there now, and it is essential to stay the course." Joe Klein, of Time magazine, states, "Retreat is not an option."
"Winning," evidently, now consists not in finding the weapons of mass destruction that once were the designated reason for fighting the war, but in creating a democratic government in Iraq - the one that will serve as a model for the entire Middle East. Condoleezza Rice has called that task the "moral mission of our time." Stanford professor Michael McFaul has even proposed a new Cabinet department whose job would be "the creation of new states." The Pentagon's job will be restricted to "regime destruction;" the job of the new outfit, pursuing a "grand strategy on democratic regime change," will be, Houdini-like, to pull new regimes out of its hat.
On the other hand, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which recently produced a report on the situation in Iraq, thinks a big part of the problem is bad public relations and counsels "an intense communications and marketing campaign to help facilitate a profound change in the Iraqi national frame of mind."
These plans to mass-produce democracies and transform the mentalities of whole peoples have the look of desperate attempts - as grandiose as they are unhinged from reality - to overlook the obvious: First, that people, not excluding Iraqis, do not like to be conquered and occupied by foreign powers and are ready and able to resist; second, that disarmament, which is indeed an essential goal for the new century, can only, except in the rarest of circumstances, be achieved not through war but through the common voluntary will of nations. It is not the character of the occupation, it is occupation itself that in a multitude of ways the Iraqis are rejecting.
The practical problem of Iraq's future remains. The Iraqi state has been forcibly removed. That state was a horrible one; yet a nation needs a state. The children must go to school; the trains must run; the museums must open; murderers must be put in jail. But the United States, precisely because it is a single foreign state, which like all states has a highly self-interested agenda of its own, is incapable of providing Iraq with a government that serves its own people. The United States therefore must, to begin with, surrender control of the operation to an international force.
It will not suffice to provide "UN cover" for an American operation, as the administration now seems to propose. The United States should announce a staged withdrawal of its forces in favor of and in conjunction with whatever international forces can be cobbled together. It should also (but surely will not) provide that force with about a hundred billion or so dollars to do its work - a low estimate of what is needed to rebuild Iraq.
Biden says we must win the war. This is precisely wrong. The United States must learn to lose this war - a harder task, in many ways, than winning, for it requires admitting mistakes and relinquishing attractive fantasies. This is the true moral mission of our time (well, of the next few years, anyway).
The cost of leaving will certainly be high, but not anywhere near as high as trying to "stay the course," which can only magnify and postpone the disaster. And yet - regrettable to say - even if this difficult step is taken, no one should imagine that democracy will be achieved by this means. The great likelihood is something else - something worse: perhaps a recrudescence of dictatorship or civil war, or both. An interim period - probably very brief - of international trusteeship is the best solution, yet it is unlikely to be a good solution. It is merely better than any other recourse.
The good options have probably passed us by. They may never have existed. If the people of Iraq are given back their country, there isn't the slightest guarantee that they will use the privilege to create a liberal democracy. The creation of democracy is an organic process that must proceed from the will of the local people. Sometimes that will is present, more often it is not. Vietnam provides an example. Vietnam today enjoys the self-determination it battled to achieve for so long; but it has not become a democracy.
On the other hand, just because Iraq's future remains to be decided by its talented people, it would also be wrong to categorically rule out the possibility that they will escape tyranny and create democratic government for themselves. The United States and other countries might even find ways of offering modest assistance in the project; it is beyond the power of the United States to create democracy for them. The matter is not in our hands. It never was.
Jonathan Schell, the Harold Willens Peace Fellow of the Nation Institute, is the author of the recently published "The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People" (Metropolitan). Source The Nation 22/9/03. Read more at TomDispatch.com.
September 5, 2003
The basic mistake of American policy in Iraq is not that the Pentagon - believing the fairy tales told it by Iraqi exile groups and overriding State Department advice - forgot, when planning "regime change," to bring along a spare government to replace the one it was smashing. The mistake was not that, once embarked on running the place, the administration did not send enough troops to do the job. Not that a civilian contingent to aid the soldiers was lacking. Not that the Baghdad museum, the Jordanian Embassy, the United Nations and Imam Ali mosque, among other places, were left unguarded. Not that no adequate police force, whether American or Iraqi, was provided to keep order generally. Not that the United States, seeking to make good that lack, then began to recruit men from the most hated and brutal of Saddam's agencies, the Mukhabarat.
It is not that, in an unaccountable and unparalleled lapse in America's once sure-fire technical know-how, Iraq's electrical, water and fuel systems remain dysfunctional. Not that the administration has erected a powerless shadow government composed in large measure of the same clueless exiles that misled the administration in the first place. Nor is it that the administration has decided to privatize substantial portions of the Iraqi economy before the will of the Iraqi people in this matter is known. Not that the occupation forces have launched search-and-destroy operations that estrange and embitter a population that increasingly despises the United States. Not that, throughout, a bullying diplomacy has driven away America's traditional allies.
All these blunders and omissions are indeed mistakes of American policy, and grievous ones, but they are secondary mistakes. The main mistake of American policy in Iraq was waging the war at all. That is not a conclusion that anyone should have to labor to arrive at.
Something like the whole world, including most of its governments and tens of millions of demonstrators, plus the UN Security Council, Representative Dennis Kucinich, Governor Howard Dean, made the point most vocally before the fact. They variously pointed out that the Iraqi regime gave no support to al-Qaeda, predicted that the United States would be unable to establish democracy in Iraq by force (and that therefore no such democracy could serve as a splendid model for the rest of the Middle East), warned that "regime change" for purposes of disarmament was likely to encourage other countries to build weapons of mass destruction, and argued that the allegations that Iraq already had weapons of mass destruction and was ready to use them at any moment (within forty-five minutes after the order was delivered, it was said) were unproven.
All these justifications for the war are now in history's ash heap, never to be retrieved - adding a few largish piles to the mountains of ideological claptrap (of the left, the right and what have you) that were the habitual accompaniment of the assorted horrors of the twentieth century.
Recognition of this mistake - one that may prove as great as the decision to embark on the Vietnam War - is essential if the best (or at any rate the least disastrous) path out of the mess is to be charted. Otherwise, the mistake may be compounded, and such indeed is the direction in which a substantial new body of opinion now pushes the United States.
In this company are Democrats in Congress who credulously accepted the Bush administration's arguments for the war or simply caved in to administration pressure, hawkish liberal commentators in the same position and a growing minority of right-wing critics.
They now recommend increasing American troop strength in Iraq. Some supported the war and still do. "We must win," says Democratic Senator Joseph Biden, who went on "Good Morning America" to recommend dispatching more troops. His colleague Republican John McCain agrees.
The right-wing Weekly Standard is of like mind. Others were doubtful about the war at the beginning but think the United States must "win" now that the war has been launched.
The New York Times, which opposed an invasion without UN Security Council support, has declared in an editorial that "establishing a free and peaceful Iraq as a linchpin for progress throughout the Middle East is a goal worth struggling for, even at great costs." And, voicing a view often now heard, it adds, "We are there now, and it is essential to stay the course." Joe Klein, of Time magazine, states, "Retreat is not an option."
"Winning," evidently, now consists not in finding the weapons of mass destruction that once were the designated reason for fighting the war, but in creating a democratic government in Iraq - the one that will serve as a model for the entire Middle East. Condoleezza Rice has called that task the "moral mission of our time." Stanford professor Michael McFaul has even proposed a new Cabinet department whose job would be "the creation of new states." The Pentagon's job will be restricted to "regime destruction;" the job of the new outfit, pursuing a "grand strategy on democratic regime change," will be, Houdini-like, to pull new regimes out of its hat.
On the other hand, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which recently produced a report on the situation in Iraq, thinks a big part of the problem is bad public relations and counsels "an intense communications and marketing campaign to help facilitate a profound change in the Iraqi national frame of mind."
These plans to mass-produce democracies and transform the mentalities of whole peoples have the look of desperate attempts - as grandiose as they are unhinged from reality - to overlook the obvious: First, that people, not excluding Iraqis, do not like to be conquered and occupied by foreign powers and are ready and able to resist; second, that disarmament, which is indeed an essential goal for the new century, can only, except in the rarest of circumstances, be achieved not through war but through the common voluntary will of nations. It is not the character of the occupation, it is occupation itself that in a multitude of ways the Iraqis are rejecting.
The practical problem of Iraq's future remains. The Iraqi state has been forcibly removed. That state was a horrible one; yet a nation needs a state. The children must go to school; the trains must run; the museums must open; murderers must be put in jail. But the United States, precisely because it is a single foreign state, which like all states has a highly self-interested agenda of its own, is incapable of providing Iraq with a government that serves its own people. The United States therefore must, to begin with, surrender control of the operation to an international force.
It will not suffice to provide "UN cover" for an American operation, as the administration now seems to propose. The United States should announce a staged withdrawal of its forces in favor of and in conjunction with whatever international forces can be cobbled together. It should also (but surely will not) provide that force with about a hundred billion or so dollars to do its work - a low estimate of what is needed to rebuild Iraq.
Biden says we must win the war. This is precisely wrong. The United States must learn to lose this war - a harder task, in many ways, than winning, for it requires admitting mistakes and relinquishing attractive fantasies. This is the true moral mission of our time (well, of the next few years, anyway).
The cost of leaving will certainly be high, but not anywhere near as high as trying to "stay the course," which can only magnify and postpone the disaster. And yet - regrettable to say - even if this difficult step is taken, no one should imagine that democracy will be achieved by this means. The great likelihood is something else - something worse: perhaps a recrudescence of dictatorship or civil war, or both. An interim period - probably very brief - of international trusteeship is the best solution, yet it is unlikely to be a good solution. It is merely better than any other recourse.
The good options have probably passed us by. They may never have existed. If the people of Iraq are given back their country, there isn't the slightest guarantee that they will use the privilege to create a liberal democracy. The creation of democracy is an organic process that must proceed from the will of the local people. Sometimes that will is present, more often it is not. Vietnam provides an example. Vietnam today enjoys the self-determination it battled to achieve for so long; but it has not become a democracy.
On the other hand, just because Iraq's future remains to be decided by its talented people, it would also be wrong to categorically rule out the possibility that they will escape tyranny and create democratic government for themselves. The United States and other countries might even find ways of offering modest assistance in the project; it is beyond the power of the United States to create democracy for them. The matter is not in our hands. It never was.
Jonathan Schell, the Harold Willens Peace Fellow of the Nation Institute, is the author of the recently published "The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People" (Metropolitan). Source The Nation 22/9/03. Read more at TomDispatch.com.
ISRAELI TERROR
John Pilger
In the news we get, only the Palestinians are described as terrorists, and yet the Israelis have a long history of terrorism - both before and since the founding of the Jewish state.
At least three Israeli Prime Ministers have been involved in campaigns of terror.
Menachem Begin was the commander of the terrorist group that blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in 1946, killing 96 people. He was Israeli Prime Minister in the '70s and '80s. He once described a massacre as "a splendid act of conquest".
Yitzak Shamir was Prime Minister until 1992. He had been a leader of a Jewish group called the Stern Gang which carried out a string of assassinations.
The present Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, has long been involved in terror. In 1983, he was found indirectly, but personally, responsible for a civilian massacre by Lebanese militia in two Palestinian refugee camps. At least 800 innocent men, women and children were murdered in cold blood, most of them Palestinians, after Sharon ordered his men to allow the militiamen access to the camps.
Israel's denials
John Pilger interviewed Dori Gold, Senior Adviser to the Israeli Prime Minister, and asked why Israel fails to condemn its own leaders for their terrorist acts in the same way as they condemn anti-Israeli terrorist acts. Here is a transcript of this conversation:
It's hard to see the difference between what the Israelis call 'counter-terrorism' and terrorism. Whatever the target, both involve the killing of innocent people. This is what happened when Prime Minister Sharon sent tanks into Bethlehem earlier this year. Amjad Abu Laban, a Palestinian resident of Bethlehem, describes one such incident:
Foreign sponsorship of Israeli terror
Israel's occupation of Palestine would not be possible without the backing of America. In the oil-rich Middle East, Israel is America's deputy sheriff, receiving billions of dollars along with the latest weapons: F-16 aircraft, bombs, missiles, Apache helicopters. Today Israel is the fourth largest military power in the world, and it has nuclear weapons.
Although America is Israel's main arms supplier, it's not widely recognised that Britain also fuels the conflict here, even though it condemns Israel for its illegal occupation. During the first 14 months of the Palestinian uprising, the Blair government approved 230 export licences for weapons and military equipment to Israel.
The categories these covered included large calibre weapons; ammunition; bombs; and vital parts for military aircraft that almost certainly included American-supplied combat helicopters. You may have seen these Apache gunships on the news, firing missiles at densely populated areas. Tony Blair has said, 'we are doing everything we can to bring peace and stability to the Middle East'.
Mustafa Barghouthi is a Palestinian who is all too familiar with the violence facilitated by the Israel's American-supplied weapons. He described the scene when Apache helicopters attacked the area in which he lives:
In the news we get, only the Palestinians are described as terrorists, and yet the Israelis have a long history of terrorism - both before and since the founding of the Jewish state.
At least three Israeli Prime Ministers have been involved in campaigns of terror.
Menachem Begin was the commander of the terrorist group that blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in 1946, killing 96 people. He was Israeli Prime Minister in the '70s and '80s. He once described a massacre as "a splendid act of conquest".
Yitzak Shamir was Prime Minister until 1992. He had been a leader of a Jewish group called the Stern Gang which carried out a string of assassinations.
The present Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, has long been involved in terror. In 1983, he was found indirectly, but personally, responsible for a civilian massacre by Lebanese militia in two Palestinian refugee camps. At least 800 innocent men, women and children were murdered in cold blood, most of them Palestinians, after Sharon ordered his men to allow the militiamen access to the camps.
Israel's denials
John Pilger interviewed Dori Gold, Senior Adviser to the Israeli Prime Minister, and asked why Israel fails to condemn its own leaders for their terrorist acts in the same way as they condemn anti-Israeli terrorist acts. Here is a transcript of this conversation:
John Pilger: When those Israelis, who are now famous names, committed act of terrorism just before the birth of Israel, you could have said to them, nothing justifies what you've done, ripping apart all those lives. And they would say it did justify it. What's the difference?
Dori Gold: I think we have now, as an international community, come to a new understanding. I think after September 11th the world got a wake-up call. Because terrorism today is no longer the mad bomber, the anarchist who throws in an explosive device into a crowd to make a point.
Terrorism is going to move from the present situation to non-conventional terrorism, to nuclear terrorism. And before we reach that point, we have to remove this scourge from the Earth. And therefore, whether you're talking about the struggle here between Israelis and Palestinians, the struggle in Northern Ireland, the struggle in Sri Lanka, or any of the places where terrorism has been used, we must make a global commitment of all free democracies to eliminate this threat from the world. Period.
JP: Does that include state terrorism?
DG: No country has the right to deliberately target civilians. As no organisation has a right to deliberately target civilians.
JP: What about Israeli terrorism now?
DG: The language of terrorism, you have to be very careful with. Terrorism means deliberately targeting civilians, in a kind of warfare. That's what the terrorism against Israeli schools, coffee shops, malls, has been all about. Israel specifically targets, to the best of its ability, Palestinian terrorist organisations.
JP: All right, when an Israeli sniper shoots an old lady with a cane, trying to get into a hospital for her chemotherapy treatment, in front of a lot of the world's press for one, and frankly we'd be here all day with other examples, isn't that terrorism?
DG: I don't know the case you're speaking about, but I can be convinced of one thing. An Israeli who takes aim - even an Israeli sniper - is taking aim at those engaged in terrorism. Unfortunately, in every kind of warfare, there are cases of civilians who are accidentally killed. Terrorism means putting the crosshairs of the sniper's rifle on a civilian deliberately.
JP: Well that's - that's what I've just described.
DG: That is what - no. I can tell you that did not happen.
JP: It did happen. And - and I think that's where some people have problem with the argument that terrorism exists on - on one side. Your definition is absolutely correct, about civilians. And those suicide bombers are terrorists.
DG: If you mix terrorism and counter-terrorism, if you create some kind of moral obfuscation, you will bring about not just a problem for Israel, but you will bring ab - bring about a problem for the entire western alliance. Because we are all facing this threat.
It's hard to see the difference between what the Israelis call 'counter-terrorism' and terrorism. Whatever the target, both involve the killing of innocent people. This is what happened when Prime Minister Sharon sent tanks into Bethlehem earlier this year. Amjad Abu Laban, a Palestinian resident of Bethlehem, describes one such incident:
"We had, a. private hospital director who was going from the hospital in Al Hadr to Bethlehem to get supplies for his hospital. His plate number was known to the soldiers, his name was known to the soldiers and they knew that he is the director of a hospital. But he was shot. By a high velocity bullet."
Foreign sponsorship of Israeli terror
Israel's occupation of Palestine would not be possible without the backing of America. In the oil-rich Middle East, Israel is America's deputy sheriff, receiving billions of dollars along with the latest weapons: F-16 aircraft, bombs, missiles, Apache helicopters. Today Israel is the fourth largest military power in the world, and it has nuclear weapons.
Although America is Israel's main arms supplier, it's not widely recognised that Britain also fuels the conflict here, even though it condemns Israel for its illegal occupation. During the first 14 months of the Palestinian uprising, the Blair government approved 230 export licences for weapons and military equipment to Israel.
The categories these covered included large calibre weapons; ammunition; bombs; and vital parts for military aircraft that almost certainly included American-supplied combat helicopters. You may have seen these Apache gunships on the news, firing missiles at densely populated areas. Tony Blair has said, 'we are doing everything we can to bring peace and stability to the Middle East'.
Mustafa Barghouthi is a Palestinian who is all too familiar with the violence facilitated by the Israel's American-supplied weapons. He described the scene when Apache helicopters attacked the area in which he lives:
"We saw Apache helicopters circling in the sky above our heads. Then shooting a missile. The rockets fell just 200 metres from our house. All our windows were shuttered. I had a child in front of me, my daughter, who was 11 years old, shivering from fear. Worried, frightened to death. And I could do nothing to protect her.
"And you don't know whether in the second minute you or your daughter would be dead. That feeling of impotence is indescribable and I will never forget it."
Political reform will come slowly, academic cautions
Saturday, September 6, 2003
NAILENE CHOU WIEST in Beijing
The mainland's new leadership is sending mixed signals on political reform, one of China's most prominent intellectuals has said, leading social commentators to revise earlier estimates of the pace of change in light of current crackdowns.
Cao Siyuan, a recognised proponent of political reform and privatisation in China, said that after six months of permissiveness, authorities were tightening the screws on public expression.
He does not need to look far for proof. For the first time in a decade, security personnel were following him and had bugged his phone, he said. His speaking engagements had been cancelled under various pretexts, he added.
He said the surveillance began at the end of July, about six weeks after he organised a seminar on constitutional reform held in Qingdao.
The change of leadership had inspired hopes that - unlike previous amendments made behind closed doors - the current one would be more open in discussion and responsive to public demands, he said.
But it was clear from the first preparatory meeting that the scope of change would be limited. National People's Congress Chairman Wu Banggu called the current constitution a "good" one that needed only minor adjustments to meet the changing times.
A senior academic who spoke at the seminar said publicising the seminar on the internet and collecting signatures endorsing an amendment proposal had crossed the line of what was allowed.
"The authorities are wary of any kind of mobilisation. You can talk freely in small or large groups, but trying to mobilise support for a cause is forbidden."
With his personal freedom of speech and movement curtailed, Mr Cao doubts whether the new leaders are any different from their predecessors in wielding control through the state security apparatus.
"I don't think we can attribute all this muzzling of public voices to a shadowy faction allied to the conservative old leaders," Mr Cao said.
A veteran editor agreed. "The new leadership has come under tremendous pressure from the public to deliver changes which it is not capable of," he said. "They need to slam on the brakes from time to time."
A 54-part television series, Marching Towards the Republic, was banned from being repeated because its themes of republicanism and constitutional reform had found a deeper resonance than the government had expected.
Journalists who attended the conference said left-leaning intellectuals strongly opposed raising the protection of private property to the same "sacred and inviolate" level as for state property. Open debates could quickly polarise the issue, putting the government on the spot to "defend the indefensible", or reconcile many contradictions inherent in the current hybrid system, they said.
In missives sent by the Communist Party's Central Publicity Department, open discussion of constitutional reform was said to "confuse the public", thereby raising false expectations, they said.
The senior scholar who attended the seminar said the protracted process of liberalising and tightening of control was likely to continue for another year or so.
If the leaders did not want to travel down the path of the reformists Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, they must proceed cautiously, he said.
NAILENE CHOU WIEST in Beijing
The mainland's new leadership is sending mixed signals on political reform, one of China's most prominent intellectuals has said, leading social commentators to revise earlier estimates of the pace of change in light of current crackdowns.
Cao Siyuan, a recognised proponent of political reform and privatisation in China, said that after six months of permissiveness, authorities were tightening the screws on public expression.
He does not need to look far for proof. For the first time in a decade, security personnel were following him and had bugged his phone, he said. His speaking engagements had been cancelled under various pretexts, he added.
He said the surveillance began at the end of July, about six weeks after he organised a seminar on constitutional reform held in Qingdao.
The change of leadership had inspired hopes that - unlike previous amendments made behind closed doors - the current one would be more open in discussion and responsive to public demands, he said.
But it was clear from the first preparatory meeting that the scope of change would be limited. National People's Congress Chairman Wu Banggu called the current constitution a "good" one that needed only minor adjustments to meet the changing times.
A senior academic who spoke at the seminar said publicising the seminar on the internet and collecting signatures endorsing an amendment proposal had crossed the line of what was allowed.
"The authorities are wary of any kind of mobilisation. You can talk freely in small or large groups, but trying to mobilise support for a cause is forbidden."
With his personal freedom of speech and movement curtailed, Mr Cao doubts whether the new leaders are any different from their predecessors in wielding control through the state security apparatus.
"I don't think we can attribute all this muzzling of public voices to a shadowy faction allied to the conservative old leaders," Mr Cao said.
A veteran editor agreed. "The new leadership has come under tremendous pressure from the public to deliver changes which it is not capable of," he said. "They need to slam on the brakes from time to time."
A 54-part television series, Marching Towards the Republic, was banned from being repeated because its themes of republicanism and constitutional reform had found a deeper resonance than the government had expected.
Journalists who attended the conference said left-leaning intellectuals strongly opposed raising the protection of private property to the same "sacred and inviolate" level as for state property. Open debates could quickly polarise the issue, putting the government on the spot to "defend the indefensible", or reconcile many contradictions inherent in the current hybrid system, they said.
In missives sent by the Communist Party's Central Publicity Department, open discussion of constitutional reform was said to "confuse the public", thereby raising false expectations, they said.
The senior scholar who attended the seminar said the protracted process of liberalising and tightening of control was likely to continue for another year or so.
If the leaders did not want to travel down the path of the reformists Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, they must proceed cautiously, he said.
