Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

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  • Students Challenge Regents on Arms Lab

    UCSB A group of students upset that the University of California continues to allow the development of nuclear weapons at UC-run laboratories confronted the UC Regents via teleconference Thursday.

    The students, including several from UCSB, say they oppose the regents’ management of the Lawrence Livermore lab in Northern California and Los Alamos National Laboratories in New Mexico.

    “When people are looking at the university and trying to learn from them, to have the university involved in something like this, it doesn’t set a good example,” said UCSB student Jacqueline Binger, a senior peace and security major. Ms. Binger is a member of the Coalition to Demilitarize the University of California, a student-led effort that collaborates with the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation of Santa Barbara.

    The group has asked that the regents stop developing weapons technology at the labs. They submitted a letter to them with that request March 20, but have not received a response. Because Thursday’s remarks were made in the public comment section of the meeting, there was no response from the regents.

  • The Meaning of Victory

    The Meaning of Victory

    “Day by day we are moving closer to Baghdad. Day by day we are moving closer to victory.”

    –George W. Bush, March 31, 2003
    With these words, Mr. Bush sought to reassure the American people that his war plan is working, moving us closer to “victory.” As the United States continues its heavy and unrelenting bombing of Baghdad and other Iraqi cities, inflicting death and suffering on the Iraqi people who we are supposedly liberating, we would do well to explore the meaning of victory. Thus far, few journalists, at least in the corporate mainstream US media, appear ready to do so. Those concerned with the path the war is taking might have added the following observations to Bush’s statement.

    Day by day we are killing more Iraqi civilians. One day US forces bomb a marketplace, killing 62 civilians. Another day a car carrying women and children is fired on by US troops, killing seven. An Iraqi mother describes watching her young children’s heads severed from their bodies. According to news reports, some 500 to 700 Iraqi civilians have died thus far, and many more Iraqi soldiers have been slaughtered.

    Day by day the “untold sorrow” mounts. One Iraqi man, whose family was killed by US bombing, cries out in pain, “God take our revenge on America!”

    Day by day more of our young soldiers are dying and being maimed in battle and military accidents. Between US and British troops, more than 60 coalition soldiers are dead. Is this our victory, killing more of “them” than they kill of “us”?

    Day by day we are spending more of our wealth on instruments of war as we relentlessly bombard Iraqi cities. Bush has asked for supplementary budget approval of $75 billion as a down payment on this war. This is in addition to the $400 billion already allocated for our military forces.

    Day by day we are destroying more of the infrastructure of Iraqi cities that we are already allowing US companies to bid on to rebuild. Perhaps we should return to less deadly ways of transferring taxpayer wealth to favored corporations.

    Day by day we are becoming more hated in the Middle East. Middle Eastern newspapers are printing these headlines, “Monstrous martyrdom in Baghdad” (Jordan), “Dreadful massacre in Baghdad” (Egypt), and “Yet another massacre by the coalition of invaders” (Saudi Arabia). Egyptian novelist Ezzat El Kamhawy writes, “This war is affecting civilians primarily. I did not expect to see civilians bombed and I feel exceedingly angry.” Throughout the Middle East, the people don’t seem to be celebrating our presence or our war, let alone our “victory.”

    Day by day we are creating more terrorists intent upon attacking the US and American citizens. “When it is over, if it is over, this war will have horrible consequences,” says Egyptian President Hosni Mubarek. “Instead of having one [Osama] bin Laden, we will have 100 bin Ladens.” Does this fit with Mr. Bush’s concept of “victory”?

    Day by day we are seeing the arrogance of the rush to war by the Bush administration. We have yet to see the Iraqis surrendering in large numbers and greeting the Americans as “liberators,” as the administration boldly claimed would happen. Perhaps Mr. Bush, so focused on victory and so lacking in historical perspective, has forgotten the US experience in Vietnam and the potency of nationalism in the defense of one’s country from outside invaders.

    Day by day the Bush administration is continuing to alienate most of our key allies. The members of the “coalition of the willing” that have actually provided troops in Iraq consist of only the UK, Australia, Poland and Albania in addition to the US. Not even the three countries whose leaders have vocally supported the war–Spain, Italy and Bulgaria–are providing military support.

    Day by day polls throughout the world are showing overwhelming opposition to the US invasion of Iraq, even in most of those countries where the governments are nominally supporting the US.

    Day by day we are watching the erosion of our constitutional system of government. Congress has shirked its constitutional responsibility to declare war, and it seems poised to give the president all the funds he is requesting for his war.

    Day by day, laws pressed by the Bush administration, such as the misnamed USA Patriot Act and planned supplements to this legislation, are undermining our Bill of Rights.

    Day by day Americans are being misled by our mainstream corporate media, which seems comfortable acting as cheerleaders for the war. When veteran war correspondent Peter Arnett said on Iraqi television what he took to be the obvious truth, that the US timetable was falling by the wayside in Iraq, he was summarily fired by NBC.

    Day by day Americans are expressing their support, but also their ignorance about the war. The polls inform us that 72 percent of Americans support the war, but at the same time 51 percent of Americans believe that Iraq attacked the World Trade Center, which is not true. Sixty-five percent of Americans cannot find Iraq on a map.

    Day by day we are ignoring other serious problems in the world, including the dangerous potential for war on the Korean peninsula and the possibility of North Korea’s further nuclear proliferation. The Bush administration ignores North Korea’s pleas for negotiations with the US and its constructive proposals for a mutual security treaty.

    Day by day we are using nuclear-tipped shells in this war to attack tanks and other armored vehicles. The “depleted uranium” in these munitions is transformed into fine dust particles upon impact, and the inhalation of these particles is thought to be responsible for the “Gulf War Syndrome” that has afflicted so many of our troops from the first Gulf War in 1991.

    Professor Doug Rokke, ex-director of the Pentagon’s depleted uranium project, has argued, “There is a moral point to be made here. This war was about Iraq possessing illegal weapons of mass destruction – yet we are using weapons of mass destruction ourselves. Such double standards are repellent.”

    Day by day we are moving closer to using nuclear weapons, the real ones. The Bush administration has promulgated a doctrine of reserving “the right to respond with overwhelming force – including through resort to all of our options – to the use of WMD [weapons of mass destruction] against the United States, our forces abroad, and friends and allies.” The reference to “all of our options” is meant to obliquely send the message that nuclear weapons use is an option.

    We don’t know whether Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, but we have no reason to believe that they would not use chemical or biological weapons as a last resort if they did. And we have no reason to believe that the Bush junta would not follow through on their threats to use “all of our options,” including nuclear weapons.

    Day by day the US economy is faltering. Since Bush came to office, the US has moved from large budget surpluses to large budget deficits. The stock markets have followed one major trend, downward, and the war seems to be exacerbating this trend.

    Day by day funding is being cut for education, health care, head start programs and other important social programs so that we can pay for war. In 2001, 41.2 million Americans had no health insurance. There has been a 43 percent rise in unemployment since Bush took office. Pell grants, which have funded college educations particularly for worthy minority students, are being cut back from covering 84 percent of the costs to 42 percent of the costs. While important social programs are being cut back or eliminated, Bush is pressing for a $700 billion tax break for the wealthiest Americans.

    Day by day the Bush administration is failing America’s veterans. The House of Representatives recently voted approval of a 2004 budget that will cut $25 billion over ten years from veteran’s health care and benefit programs. This came just one day after Congress voted overwhelmingly to “support our troops.”

    Day by day the most respected moral leaders in the world are speaking out against a war they find to be immoral and lacking in legitimacy. These leaders include The Pope, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former South African President Nelson Mandela.

    The Pope has repeatedly insisted that a preventive war has no legal or moral justification, and has called the war “a defeat for humanity.” Nelson Mandela has called Bush’s actions in Iraq “a tragedy.” “What I am condemning,” Mandela said, “is that one power, with a president who has no foresight, who cannot think properly, is now wanting to plunge the world into a holocaust.”

    As if to underline Mandela’s insights about him, Bush, according to Time magazine, told three US Senators as far back as March 2002, “F–k Saddam. We’re taking him out.”

    As we race toward the “victory” that Mr. Bush seems so confident will be achieved, what are the consequences likely to be?

    — There will be greater instability in the Middle East as the US attempts to occupy Iraq.

    — The US will be roundly hated in the Middle East and throughout the Muslim world.

    — Terrorism against the US will increase, including terrorism in the US.

    — Our guaranteed freedoms in the US Bill of Rights will continue to be reduced.

    — The US economy will be in shambles, with few social programs left intact.

    — US alliances of long duration will be difficult, if not impossible, to rebuild.

    — The likelihood of nuclear weapons proliferation and use will increase.

    Former US marine and UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter has doubts about Bush’s “victory”: “We find ourselves…facing a nation of 23 million, with armed elements numbering around seven million – who are concentrated at urban areas. We will not win this fight. America will lose this war.”

    But Mr. Bush tells us, “Day by day we are moving closer to victory.” General Tommy Franks, the commander of the US war effort, tells us, “The outcome is not in doubt.” In all likelihood, however, it will not be the outcome that Mr. Bush and his administration are anticipating, but one far worse for all of us. It is past time for the American people to wake up to the meaning of “victory.”
    * David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is the author of Choose Hope, Your Role in Waging Peace in the Nuclear Age (Middleway Press, 2002) and editor of Hope in a Dark Time, Reflections on Humanity’s Future (Capra Press, 2003).

  • Over 60 People Dead After US Bombs Iraqi Neighborhood in Hilla

    The London Independent is reporting that over 60 people, mostly civilians, have now died since the US bombed an impoverished Iraqi neighborhood in the town of Hilla, south of Baghdad. Hundreds of people are wounded.

    The London Guardian reports unedited TV footage from the Babylon hospital showed horrifically injured bodies heaped into pick-up trucks. Relatives of the dead accompanied them for burial. Bed after bed of injured women and children were pictured along with large pools of blood on the floor of the hospital.

    An Edinburgh-trained doctor at the hospital Nazim al-Adali, told the Guardian: “All of these are due to the American bombing to the civilian homes. He said there were not any army vehicles or tanks in the area.

    And Robert Fisk writes in today’s Independent:

    “The wounds are vicious and deep, a rash of scarlet spots on the back and thighs or face, the shards of shrapnel from the cluster bombs buried an inch or more in the flesh. The wards of the Hillah teaching hospital are proof that something illegal ­ something quite outside the Geneva Conventions ­ occurred in the villages around the city once known as Babylon.

    “The wailing children, the young women with breast and leg wounds, the 10 patients upon whom doctors had to perform brain surgery to remove metal from their heads, talk of the days and nights when the explosives fell “like grapes” from the sky.”

    Agence France Press correspondent Nayla Razzouk reported seeing cluster bomblets all over the neighborhood, but the Pentagon denied using cluster bombs on Hillah. However, the Pentagon has just admitted U.S. forces are using cluster bombs elsewhere in Iraq.

    Amnesty International yesterday condemned the Hilla bombing and U.S. use of cluster bombs. The human rights group warned, “The use of cluster bombs in an attack on a civilian area of al-Hilla constitutes an indiscriminate attack and a grave violation of international humanitarian law.”

  • Rep. Kucinich Calls for an End to the War on the Floor of the House

    Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH), a leader in the opposition to the War in Iraq within the House, issued the following statement on the House floor:

    “Stop the war now. As Baghdad will be encircled, this is the time to get the UN back in to inspect Baghdad and the rest of Iraq for biological and chemical weapons. Our troops should not have to be the ones who will find out, in combat, whether Iraq has such weapons. Why put our troops at greater risk? We could get the United Nations inspectors back in.

    “Stop the war now. Before we send our troops into house-to-house combat in Baghdad, a city of five million people. Before we ask our troops to take up the burden of shooting innocent civilians in the fog of war.

    “Stop the war now. This war has been advanced on lie upon lie. Iraq was not responsible for 9/11. Iraq was not responsible for any role al-Qaeda may have had in 9/11. Iraq was not responsible for the anthrax attacks on this country. Iraq did not tried to acquire nuclear weapons technology from Niger. This war is built on falsehood.

    “Stop the war now. We are not defending America in Iraq. Iraq did not attack this nation. Iraq has no ability to attack this nation. Each innocent civilian casualty represents a threat to America for years to come and will end up making our nation less safe. The seventy-five billion dollar supplemental needs to be challenged because each dime we spend on this war makes America less safe. Only international cooperation will help us meet the challenge of terrorism. After 9/11 all Americans remember we had the support and the sympathy of the world. Every nation was ready to be of assistance to the United States in meeting the challenge of terrorism. And yet, with this war, we have squandered the sympathy of the world. We have brought upon this nation the anger of the world. We need the cooperation of the world, to find the terrorists before they come to our shores.

    “Stop this war now. Seventy-five billion dollars more for war. Three- quarters of a trillion dollars for tax cuts, but no money for veterans ‘ benefits. Money for war. No money for health care in America, but money for war. No money for social security, but money for war. We have money to blow up bridges over the Tigris and the Euphrates, but no money to build bridges in our own cities. We have money to ruin the health of the Iraqi children, but no money to repair the health of our own children and our educational programs.

    “Stop this war now. It is wrong. It is illegal. It is unjust and it will come to no good for this country.

    “Stop this war now. Show our wisdom and our humanity, to be able to stop it, to bring back the United Nations into the process. Rescue this moment. Rescue this nation from a war that is wrong, that is unjust, that is immoral.

    “Stop this war now.”

  • Three British Soldiers Sent Home after Protesting at Civilian Deaths

    Three British soldiers in Iraq have been ordered home after objecting tothe conduct of the war. It is understood they have been sent home for protesting that the war is killing innocent civilians.

    The three soldiers – including a private and a technician – are from 16 Air Assault Brigade which is deployed in southern Iraq. Its task has been to protect oilfields.

    The brigade includes the Ist and 3rd battalions of the Parachute Regiment, the 1st battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment, a Royal Horse Artillery regiment, and a reconnaissance squadron of the Household Cavalry.

    The three soldiers, based in Colchester, Essex, face court martial and are seeking legal advice, defence sources said yesterday.

    The Ministry of Defence said it was not prepared to comment on individual cases. It said it had “no evidence” to suggest the soldiers had been sent home for refusing to fight.

    Soldiers could be returned home for a number of reasons, including compassionate and medical, as well as disciplinary grounds, defence sources said.

    But it is understood that the three soldiers have been sent home for complaining about the way the war is being fought and the growing danger to civilians.

    The fact that they are seeking legal advice makes it clear they have been sent home for refusing to obey orders rather than because of any medical or related problems such as shell shock.

    MoD lawyers were understood last night to be anxiously trying to discover the circumstances surrounding the order to send the soldiers home.

    Any refusal of soldiers to obey orders is highly embarrassing to the government, with ministers becoming increasingly worried about the way the war is developing.

    It is also causing concern to British military chiefs who are worried about growing evidence of civilians being killed in fighting involving American soldiers around urban areas in southern Iraq.

  • Student Coalition Demands Weapons Disarmament of Labs

    Coalition members stage press conference in protest of weapons of mass destruction research at the University of California

    Students from five UC campuses spoke out by the UC Office of the President building in Oakland on March 20 to demand an end to weapons of mass destruction research at the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore laboratories.

    Denied a face-to-face meeting with the UC Regents, students from the Coalition to Demilitarize the University of California held a press conference outside the Office of the President building in Oakland, California on March 20, demanding that the UC Regents discuss the UC’s involvement with weapons of mass destruction, or WMDs.

    Michael Coffey, representative from the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, explained that since the Regents meeting was cancelled, they hand delivered the letter to the Office of the President.

    “We had our own press conference. We went to the Office of the President building in downtown Oakland on 9 a.m. Thursday, March 21, the morning after the war broke out,” Coffey said.

    Michael Cox, coalition representative from UCLA, stated that the students want the UC relationship with the nuclear weapons lab changed.

    “We’re not seeking the termination of the long-held contract to run the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories-this is a last resort,” Cox said. “If the UC Regents don’t take steps to negotiate our demands, then we will call on the termination of the contract.”

    Under the leadership of the Department of Energy, the University of California manages three national laboratories: Los Alamos in New Mexico, Lawrence Livermore in California and the Lawrence Berkeley laboratory, also in California.

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation states that these laboratories “modify and monitor nuclear weapons.”

    Cox declared that the coalition is against the continual research and development of nuclear weapons.

    “We’re calling on any new research and development to stop completely,” Cox said. “[We’re] asking that the labs change functions from the efforts of proliferation to the international campaign of arms reduction and verification.”

    According to Tara Dorabji, a Tri-Valley CAREs spokeswoman, student leaders presented a letter requesting to “disarm and democratize the weapons labs” to the Regents secretary from four UC campuses.

    They requested a response to the letter by April 21.

    The coalition’s original plan was to meet directly with the UC Regents during their meeting.

    The UCOP office did not state a specific reason as to why the meeting was cancelled, but the Regent secretary stated that it was probably attributed to the outbreak of the war.

    “The students were promised a meeting, but despite being persistent [UCSC Chancellor MRC Greenwood] now will not meet with them,” Dorabji said.

    The coalition student group has partnered with local community organizations including Tri-Valley CAREs in Livermore, the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation in Santa Barbara and Western States Legal Foundation in Oakland.

    A press statement from the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation states the main belief of the Coalition to Demilitarize the UC, in that “no institution in the U.S. or abroad should continue to design and develop nuclear weapons.”

    Coffey attributes the coalition entirely to student efforts.

    “This campaign is student-led. Students let us know what type of support they need and we do our best to provide it,” Coffey said.

    According to Coffey, the coalition gives students a forum to discuss the role of nuclear weapons’ management by the UC. There are currently five UC schools involved: UCLA, UC Berkeley, UCSB, UCSD and UC Davis.

    “We had someone at UC Irvine, but she didn’t gain very much support there. I think administration didn’t give her a great response either,” Cox said.

    The main declaration from the coalition is the Unity Statement, outlining the “steps the UC Regents need to take, like disarming and democratizing the weapons labs, if they are to continue managing the National Labs.”

    “The abolition of all nuclear weapons is a core value uniting the group,” Dorabji said.

    UC Spokesman Jeff Garberson stated that there is much history behind UC’s involvement with the laboratories.

    “There’s a historical reason,” Garberson said. “The United States government has always asked the [University of California] to operate the labs.”

    According to Garberson, UC manages these national laboratories for historical reasons as well as for service to the public.

    “[The] first reason—historical precedence that the university has always managed the labs. The university has seen it’s operation of the labs as a public service. They do important national work, some for national defense, some of it not,” Garberson said.

    Garberson also stated that both the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore laboratories deal with national security. While the labs are involved in the design, research and maintenance of nuclear weapons, the weapons themselves are constructed elsewhere.

    Garberson said the UC Regents stand behind the laboratories and all of its work.

    “The university has always been willing and proud to manage the national labs,” Garberson said.

    In response to the UC involvement with nuclear weapons, UC President Richard Atkinson supported the UC in a July 2002 letter to Armin Tenner, a former UC professor and member of the International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation. “Ensuring these remaining weapons are safe and effective without nuclear testing is a challenging scientific problem—one that requires the efforts of outstanding technical experts such as those at the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories,” Atkinson said. “The University of California takes this responsibility very seriously.”

    Atkinson continued to say that the role of the UC with nuclear weapons is a significant one.

    “The University of California takes this responsibility very seriously. If the university did not manage these laboratories, the weapons would not, of course, go away,” Atkinson said. “But we would then worry more about the future of the planet.”

    Cox hopes that the coalition will soon be able to voice their opinions directly to the UC Regents.

    According to Cox, the March UC Regents meeting was rescheduled for later on this week through a teleconference meeting.

    “If they do allow time for public comment, then we will definitely be participating in that,” Cox said.

  • Chairman Perle Resigns

    Chairman Perle Resigns

    Richard Perle has resigned as chairman of the Pentagon Defense Policy Board, a group of influential advisors of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. Perle has been embroiled in a controversy over accepting money from a US corporation, Global Crossing, which sought Perle’s help in obtaining Defense Department approval of the sale of the company to Asian investors. Perle would reportedly receive $725,000 for his “work,” with $600,000 contingent upon him delivering the “goods.”

    Perle wrote in his resignation letter to Secretary Rumsfeld, “I have seen controversies like that before and I know that this one will inevitably distract from the urgent challenge in which you are now engaged.” Denying any wrongdoing (what’s wrong with being on the Defense Policy Board and lobbying for corporate clients?), Perle emphasized that he did “not wish to cause even a moment’s distraction” from the US war against Iraq.

    Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh recently published an article in the New Yorker suggesting that Perle had been inappropriately mixing business with pleasure when he had lunch in Marseilles in January with notorious arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi and a Saudi industrialist, Harb Saleh Zuhair. Perle found the report to be “monstrous.”

    Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, who is allowing Perle to remain a member of the Defense Policy Board (just not its chairman), had nothing but praise for Perle. “He has been an excellent chairman,” Rumsfeld said, “and has led the Defense Policy Board during an important time in our history.” Since Perle assumed the role of chairman in July 2001, Rumsfeld’s “important time” presumably refers to US efforts to fight against terrorism and its wars against Afghanistan and Iraq.

    Rumsfeld continued, “I should add that I have known Richard Perle for many years and know him to be a man of integrity and honor.”

    The Wall Street Journal reported in a March 27, 2003 article that other members of the Defense Policy Board may also have financial conflicts related to their business interests and policy advice to the government. Among those named in the article were former CIA Director James Woolsey, retired Admiral David Jeremiah, and retired Air Force General Ronald Fogelman.

    When Secretary Rumsfeld was asked for a comment on these potential conflicts of interest, the reporters were told that the Secretary was busy and unable to comment on the matter. In all fairness, the Secretary has been busy promoting and prosecuting the Bush administration’s preventive war against Iraq and handing out lucrative contracts to firms such as Vice President Cheney’s former firm, Halliburton, to rebuild Iraq after our missiles and bombs have destroyed it.
    * David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is the author of Choose Hope, Your Role in Waging Peace in the Nuclear Age (Middleway Press, 2002).

  • Shock But Not Awe

    Shock But Not Awe

    I write with a heavy heart. Our cause has shifted from trying to prevent a needless war to seeking to end an illegal war. The audacity of the Bush administration takes one’s breath away.

    The United States is bombing Baghdad, engaged in its “shock and awe” strategy. Shock yes, but there is no awe. To suggest awe reflects only the arrogance of the Bush militarists. US attacks on Iraq are shocking and awful.

    Shocking that we are at war in violation of international law and our Constitution.

    Shocking that our government is committing aggressive warfare, which is a crime.

    Shocking that a large majority of the US Congress has been so compliant and cowardly, handing over their responsibility to declare war to the president. By giving up their Constitutional powers, Congress is putting the future of our Republic in jeopardy.

    Shocking that Bush has demonstrated contempt for the strongly held positions of our allies, and hundreds of millions of their protesting citizens throughout the world.

    Shocking that Bush has shown such studied indifference to the millions of Americans who have taken to the streets in protest of his war plans.

    Shocking that the United States has attacked Iraq in defiance of the United Nations Security Council and with disregard for US obligations under the Charter of the United Nations.

    Shocking that the United States has acted in bad faith, having assured the other members of the Security Council at the time of passage of Resolution 1441 that it does not provide for an automatic recourse to war. John Negroponte, the US Ambassador to the United Nations, assured other members of the Security Council on the day that Resolution 1441 was passed: “Whatever violation there is, or is judged to exist, will be dealt with in the Council, and the Council will have an opportunity to consider the matter before any other action is taken.” What he apparently meant was that the Security Council would have a chance to endorse a US-led war against Iraq or be cast aside as irrelevant.

    Now we are faced with the challenge of ending this illegal war, and bringing those who are committing war crimes to justice. This must not be only victors’ justice, but justice that applies to all sides. As Bush and Rumsfeld have emphasized, following superior orders will not be a defense to the commission of war crimes. This should be so both for the Iraqi leadership and for the American leadership.

    The anger wells up at the hypocrisy and arrogance of the Bush administration. The two most powerful statements that I have seen recently in opposition to the war are Senator Byrd’s lamentation, “Today, I weep for my country…” and the expression of bitterness of Michael Waters-Bey, the bereft father of one of the US soldiers to die in a helicopter crash returning to Kuwait from a mission in Iraq. Mr. Waters-Bey said that he wanted to tell the president that “this was not your son or daughter. That chair he sat in at Thanksgiving will be empty forever.”

    There will be more killing and more deaths, more empty chairs. It is a time of sadness, as our country is losing its credibility and honor throughout the world. It is a time of tragedy that the militarists are having their day. It is a time of shock, but far from a time of awe. We will find a way back to decency, democracy and the rule of law. Until then, we must continue to express our dissent and opposition to this war, to policies of perpetual war, and to the diminishment of our democratic rights. We must also find a way to hold the guilty accountable for their crimes against peace and war crimes.
    * David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is the editor of Hope in a Dark Time, Reflections on Humanity’s Future (Capra Press, 2003).

  • Iraq Peace Team Reports on Civilian Causalities

    On March 22, Stewart Vriesinga and Wade Hudson toured a residential neighborhood about two blocks west of 14 July Bridge.Street, between Amar Bin Yasir Street and Jamiaa Street. They drove by an eight-to-twelve-foot-deep crater in the middle of a wide, divided street that connected these latter two streets. Traffic in the westerly direction was blocked. They saw large gardens on both sides of this crater. No building was within eyesight of the crater. Mr. Mohammed, IPT’s principal driver, said that the gardens were not public parks, but private gardens associated with private homes, one of which is owned by an uncle of his. Around the corner on Jamiaa street, many smaller homes had had all of their front windows blown out, presumably by a blast from the bomb that created the crater.

    Although this incident does not suggest either the strong possibility of civilian injuries or major damage to civilian infrastructure, it does illustrate once again that some bombs either do not hit their intended target or are directed to non-military targets.

    On March 22, April Hurley, Zehira Houfani, and Robert Turcotte saw, around the corner from a street with buildings that appeared to be governmental offices, a whole block of mixed residential-commercial units with almost all of their windows knocked out.

    On March 23, several IPT members, including Doug Johnson, Robert Turcotte, and Jooneed Jeeroburkhan went to the Alyarmouk hospital. This university teaching hospital, one of the largest and most modern in Iraq, is one of three medical centers prepared by the authorities to receive victims of the American attack; the two others are Al Mansur and Al Kindi hospitals. Many foreign doctors and surgeons, Americans included, are in Bagdad to offer their services to these hospitals in the war context.

    One of the patients was Rahab Wedad Mohammad, age 25,who had just come out of surgery under general anesthesia. Her right cheek was swollen and her right forearm was heavily bandaged. According to the lady doctor, she had severed tendons which they had to sew back, together with nerves and blood vessels, in the women’s section of the hospital.

    According to answers to our questions, Rahab was at her home, in the esidential district of Hayy Jamiya, when a bomb hit nearby. It was Saturday night, on the 3rd day of US bombing, and she was hit by shrapnel that severed the tendons on her right arm.

    Zaha Seheil lay quietly on a bed opposite. She is six years old. The doctor said that she was hit in the back, suffering spinal injury that has made her paraplegic. In the men’s section, Rusul Salim Abbas, 10 years old, had been hit by shrapnel in the chest and on the right hand. That was on Friday night, when the bombing was the heaviest for four hours continuously. <He went to close the door when he was hit, says Salim, his father, seated on the edge of his bed.

    Salah Mehdi, aged 33, was walking on the street Saturday night in the residential district of Amariya when a missile exploded nearby. <I just saw a huge fireball and I lost consciousness, he says with difficulty. He had been hit by shrapnel in the stomach, on the right hand and on the right ear.

    On the next bed, Omar`Ali, 12 years old, was one of 12 members of his family injured Friday night in the residential district of Al Shorta when a bomb hit near their house. There also also Majid Mahmoud, aged 57 and father of two, injured the very first night of bombing, and Hussein Jassim Fleh, aged 36 and father of a young daughter, injured Saturday night in the back, and on both arms and legs.

    Was the shrapnel from US missiles and bombs, or from falling Iraqi anti-aircraft artillery? Given the delicate hospital conditions in which these visits were made, and the lack of expert ballistics evidence, it is difficult to tell what actually caused these injuries, and scores of others in hospitals across the country,. <Whatever the origin of the shrapnel, Bush must bear full responsibility because he chose to impose this war on Iraq. These people would not have been injured otherwise, commented an Iraqi TV reporter filming the wounded.

    Members of the delegation were able to take photos of some of the injuries.

    On March 24, several IPT members were taken on a tour of sites that have been bombed recently. These sites included one entire block in the Karadat Miryam district that included three- and four-floor buildings with commercial storefronts on the ground floor and residential dwellings on the upper floors. No military or governmental sites were noticed nearby. Almost all of the windows and frames and the iron gates that covered windows in these buildings had been knocked out on all floors. At least some injuries likely resulted from the tremendous blast(s) that caused this extensive damage

    On March 24, an IPT team went to a home that had been hit by what appeared to be a missile. The house was a 2-story home in a residential neighborhood. The weapon came through the roof and landed in a second-floor room that appeared to be a bedroom. There was what seemed to be a picture on the wall of some female pop star. The team was unable to meet any of the family who were in the home at the time of the attack; they are now staying with family members. A brother of the owner gave us an account, which was recorded in Arabic and will be translated later. He said the weapon hit about 7:30pm on Saturday, March 22, as the family was eating dinner, or getting ready for dinner. There were no serious injuries even though there were 8 people in the home at the time.

  • Iraqi Students Wonder What U.S. Goal is With War

    Few dialogues have taken place between Iraqi and American students on the topic of war in recent months. It seems remarkable that even when governments have ceased talking, students across the time zones are able to find a way to communicate their fears, concerns, angers and dreams to one another.

    Recently, eight students from Santa Barbara and seven students from Baghdad talked to each other in radio stations for nearly two hours. The talk was candid. We asked them about liberation, an argument for the war that has won over many Americans. Answering honestly, they felt anything but grateful for the prospect of 3,000 bombs falling on their city. What good will liberation be if they’re all dead?

    The students asked what authority we Americans have to impose our will on them. They reminded us that their nation in the 1950s had risen up to overthrow a monarchy that did not serve the people. What right have we, they asked, to determine who should rule their country, and how? Even if they exist in an imperfect system, the only truly democratic reform could happen from the inside. No one mentioned the end of the first Gulf War, in which the first President Bush asked the Shiites in the south to rise up against Saddam Hussein only to be disavowed by the U.S. military, which had promised the resisters protection.

    Our Iraqi friends not so gently reminded us that ours is the only country to have used nuclear weapons of mass destruction in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

    The students grilled us about why we don’t do more to end war. Those of us sitting in the room were speechless. We all feel like we do so much: We write, we speak, we organize, we demonstrate and we work nonviolently to persuade public opinion that this war is one of the saddest, most unhealthy and insane policies ever proposed on Earth. Yet, they struck the Achilles’ heel of the peace movement, the well-intentioned people here in the United States who cannot get it together enough to galvanize voters to elect true representatives and initiate real reform, even with all our constitutional freedoms. We pacifist Americans who have had nominal successes and noble failures need to start playing to win, said the Iraqi students. Regime change starts at home, they prodded.

    Joining most recently two career U.S. foreign diplomats and a host of other United Nations officials such as Hans von Sponeck and Denis Halliday, British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook resigned, stating that he could not accept responsibility for what Britain was prepared to do in concert with the United States and Spain. These folks have put their careers on the line for peace. What’s holding us back? Why did we not speak out before, addressing some of the real underlying concerns? Few address the issue of the sanctions, the more than 12 years of deprivation at the hands of the United Nations Sanctions Committee, commandeered by the United States and Great Britain. No one talks about the relocation of the marsh Arabs in Iraq, done by the current Iraqi regime under the watchful eye of the United States and Great Britain in the southern no-fly zones. And who in the United States was mourning the Kurdish massacre last year at this time? CNN certainly wasn’t.

    I couldn’t help but think of my freshman seminar in college called “The Decline and Fall of Empires.” We studied the last days of Greece, Rome, Sweden, Spain and Great Britain. The Azores Summit smacked of irony, placing two of the world’s great fallen empires on podiums next to the United States. It seems like we are following the legacy of all those nations, cutting spending on social programs, over-extending our military resources and acting not in our own self-interest on crucial domestic policy issues.

    Despite the United Nations, our former allies — France, Germany and Russia and maybe even China — the pleadings of Iraqi students and a massive people’s movement worldwide, my country has decided to plunge further into the wrongness of this war.

    The conversation with Iraqi students punctuated all the experiences I have had with friends there. Our group concurred that bombing Iraq is different now that we know people, now that we have heard their stories and their frustrations. We lamented that if more people had a personal connection, it would be harder to support the war.

    And all of us sank in our chairs when our friends said they hoped to be alive to have another conversation with us, feeling both guilty and lucky that we are bound to our friends in Iraq because we know each other’s stories and names.
    * Leah C. Wells recently returned from her third trip to Iraq. She is Peace Education Coordinator at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.