Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: International Issues

  • Memories of Hiroshima

    In late July 2004, as I opened the window curtains of my posh room in the Rihga Royal Hotel and looked out at the city of Hiroshima, I was struck by how marvelously it had been restored. Fifty-nine years ago, Hiroshima had been nearly obliterated by the fire and blast of the U.S. atomic bombing, which killed 140,000 people by the end of 1945 and left tens of thousands of others dying slowly and painfully from radiation poisoning. Now the city had been thoroughly rebuilt, with its sea of modern buildings, surrounded by green mountains, glittering in the sunshine. More than a million people lived there.

    Decades ago, Danilo Dolci, the Italian pacifist, had criticized the rebuilding of Hiroshima, claiming that its ruins should be left as a symbol of the horrors of nuclear war. It was a harsh judgment, but I could understand his point. If the human race could tidy up from its murderous nuclear follies this well, what would prevent it from repeating them? In a variety of forms, this question pressed heavily upon me throughout my stay in Japan.

    I was visiting the country for ten days to lecture on nuclear disarmament-related issues. As the author of a recently-completed trilogy, The Struggle Against the Bomb, I had been asked to speak at the Hiroshima Peace Institute, at the Peace Research Institute of Meiji Gakuin University (in Tokyo), at assorted venues in Tokyo and Hiroshima as an overseas guest of Gensuikin (the Japan Congress Against Atomic & Hydrogen Bombs), and by the Hiroshima Association for Nuclear Weapons Abolition. Through these talks and conversations with activists, I probably learned more from the Japanese than they learned from me.

    In a number of ways, the Japanese peace and disarmament movement was experiencing a difficult time. Although it continued to constitute a powerful presence in the nation’s life, its membership was declining and young people, particularly, did not seem to be drawn to it. Symptomatically, the number of visitors to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum was dwindling. To many Japanese, the antinuclear campaign seemed frozen in time, irrelevant to contemporary events. In addition, Gensuikin, one of the two major nuclear disarmament groups in Japan, had been undermined by the collapse of the staunchly antimilitarist Socialist Party and by the ebbing strength of the labor movement–for decades its two key pillars of support. Meanwhile, the leaders of the ruling conservative party (Japan’s misnamed Liberal Democratic Party) were planning to “revise” Article 9, the antiwar clause of Japan’s constitution. They had even begun to talk about developing nuclear weapons for Japan. Also, there was great frustration at the militarism of the Bush administration–particularly its war upon Iraq, its abandonment of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and its plan to build new nuclear weapons.

    Overall, then, there was a sense of frustration and, at times, pessimism, among peace-minded Japanese people. Again and again, I heard the question raised: With the hibakusha (the survivors of the atomic bombing) now elderly and dying, who will take up their key role in the nuclear disarmament campaign? When, during a Gensuikin-organized press conference, I was asked that question by a Japanese newspaper reporter, I did my best to answer it. But I am not sure I did a very good job.

    On the other hand, Japan’s nuclear disarmament campaign had a level of strength and integration in the broader society that North American peace groups might well envy. Gensuikin’s annual conference, which opened in Hiroshima on August 4, drew 3,500 registered participants. Its opening session, with thousands of activists in attendance, featured powerful antinuclear speeches not only by Shigetoshi Iwamatsu and Shingo Fukuyama (the chair and secretary general of Gensuikin), but by Tadatoshi Akiba (Mayor of Hiroshima and Chair of Mayors for Peace, a worldwide organization) and the president of Rengo (Japan’s labor federation). Its press conference was covered sympathetically by Japan’s major newspapers. Its local groups, usually headed by labor union activists, worked throughout Japan on issues ranging from opposing nuclear weapons, to defending Article 9, to agitating against the expansion of U.S. military bases.

    Furthermore, Japan’s nuclear disarmament movement found a powerful supporter in Hiroshima’s Mayor Akiba. A mathematician who was educated at MIT and, despite his progressive views, elected to the highest office in this rather conservative city, Akiba was a dynamic proponent of the movement. His administration had given very substantial funding to the Hiroshima Peace Institute and, in 2004, its staff members and the speakers at its annual symposium (including this writer) were wined and dined by the mayor at his official residence.

    Addressing Hiroshima’s annual atomic bombing commemoration ceremony on August 6, Akiba delivered an eloquent plea for the abolition of nuclear weapons. “The city of Hiroshima,” he stated, “along with the Mayors for Peace and our 611 member cities in 109 countries and regions,” had declared the period through the following August a “Year of Remembrance and Action for a Nuclear-Free World.” The goal would be the signing of a Nuclear Weapons Convention in 2010 and the abolition of nuclear weapons by 2020. He also denounced “the egocentric view of the U.S. government” (which had been “ignoring the United Nations and its foundation of international law”), criticized terrorists for their “reliance on violence-amplifying” strategies, and condemned North Korea and other nations for “buying into the worthless policy of `nuclear insurance.’”

    The August 6 commemoration ceremony at which Akiba spoke was quite impressive. Boy scouts and girl scouts distributed bouquets of flowers to participants, school children attended in large numbers, and perhaps 20,000 people turned out for the event, conducted in the Peace Park under a broiling sun. A representative of the United Nations delivered a speech by Secretary-General Kofi Annan that warned of “the shadow of nuclear war hanging over our world.” Two local sixth graders spoke of children’s stake in world peace. Even conservative Japanese Prime Minister Junichero Koizumi addressed the assemblage, professing his concern for peace and nuclear disarmament–although members of the audience later criticized his mumbled statement, which, given his dispatch of Japanese troops to Iraq and disdain for Article 9, they considered quite hypocritical.

    The most moving events occurred that evening, when thousands of people gathered to float colored lanterns down Hiroshima’s rivers, in honor of the lives lost in the atomic bombing. Unlike the commemoration ceremony, this was an informal venture, and the milling crowds, diverse music, and disparate activities in the adjoining Peace Park gave it a more spontaneous flavor.

    As our small group of Gensuikin activists and their overseas guests wended its way through the crowd, we came upon the Children’s Peace Monument, a statue of young Sadako Sasaki. At age two, Sadako had survived the atomic attack on Hiroshima; but, at age twelve, she was stricken by radiation-induced leukemia. Despite the pain, she began folding paper (origami) cranes in the hope of a cure, for there is a Japanese legend that if one folds a thousand cranes, one will be granted a wish. Sadako, however, died before reaching that number. Thereafter, her grief-stricken friends completed the process, and ever since then millions of Japanese schoolchildren–and people around the world–have folded cranes in her memory.

    As we approached Sadako’s statue, I noticed the vast number of tiny cranes that had been so carefully folded and strung together. And there was a group of young Japanese schoolchildren on the site, singing songs of peace. The children, I thought, were absolutely beautiful, and as I listened to their high-pitched voices raised in song, I had to make an effort not to burst into tears. How could the rulers of nations have approved the atomic bombing of such children in the past? How could they still be making plans to slaughter them in the future?

    Mulling over my experiences in Japan, I think that people should worry less about Hiroshima’s reconstruction and the aging of the hibakusha. We do not require the ruins of cities or even the testimony of survivors to remind us of the need to reject nuclear weapons. We have only to look at the beauty of the world–and especially its children–to understand that nuclear war is a monstrous crime.

    Lawrence S. Wittner is Professor of History at the State University of New York at Albany. His latest book is Toward Nuclear Abolition: A History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement, 1971 to the Present (Stanford University Press).

  • The Three Lessons of Srebrenica

    Today, 50,000 people are expected to crowd into the Bosnian village of Srebrenica, for a 10th anniversary that’s no celebration. July 11 is a day of mourning for Bosnians as they commemorate the worst atrocity in Europe since the Holocaust. On that day, the Serb militia separated more than 7,000 unarmed Muslim men and boys from their families, brutally murdered them, and threw their bodies into mass graves. ”Never again,” we had said. We were wrong. And we’ll be wrong again unless we learn three key lessons.

    First, the Srebrenica massacre demonstrates that genocidal aggression requires well-reasoned military intervention. Americans assured the Dutch that, if they would commit peacekeepers as a tripwire around the UN-designated ”safe haven,” the United States would lead forces to come in with air support to stop a Serb onslaught. Instead, we let ourselves be held back by a ”dual key” arrangement, whereby NATO would not take action without the UN’s affirmation.

    Secretary General Kofi Annan has since called the UN refusal to accept military intervention an appalling failure. We stood by, wringing our hands, as thousands were brutally executed in a massacre that might have been prevented by decisive action. Instead, we now have gruesome testimony for war crimes trials — a dishonorable substitute.

    After Srebrenica, when the United States finally led NATO going in with air power followed by troops, we did it mostly right. Local and international observers agree that demobilization and reintegration of Bosnian combatants has been a success, and no American soldiers were lost to hostile action. The tragedy is that we waited so long to call the Serbs’ bluff and that our force commanders initially refused to pursue the war criminals. Meanwhile, half of all Bosnians had lost their homes. In a country the size of Maryland, more than 150,000 were killed — that’s 50 World Trade Centers in three years.

    Even with security guaranteed by foreign troops, it has taken years for the international community to help survivors return to the hardest-hit areas, given a destroyed economy and all-too-strong presence of indicted war criminals still on the loose. In short, we should have intervened sooner.

    Second, many outsiders believe wrongly that ethnic hatred made the war inevitable. It’s easy for the international community to use the notion of centuries-old ethnic or religious divisions as an excuse for inaction. But it was President Slobodan Milosevic’s political power grab that led to the breakup of Yugoslavia. While there were enclaves of one group or another, in Bosnian cities up to 40 percent of marriages crossed ethnic lines.

    Before the war, holy days were often celebrated with friends of other faiths, although without differences of language or skin tone, many long-time neighbors and friends didn’t even know each other’s heritage. This was not a religious war. Instead, greedy politicians whipped up the animosity and fear that fueled the war through a barrage of propaganda invoking 14th century grievances. But in the minds of most Bosnians, lasting peace was, and is, possible.

    Third, we must expand our restricted approach to peace-building to include a broader range of stakeholders, including women. As US ambassador in Austria during the war, I hosted negotiations and organized conferences, trying to promote peace in Bosnia. Almost every Balkan or international policy-maker was a man, even though Yugoslavia had the highest proportion of women PhDs in Europe. Would women have made a difference, if they’d had a place at the table? Over the years I’ve met with women on all sides of the conflict. One, an engineer named Alenka Savic, represented hundreds of others I interviewed when she said: ”This was not our war.”

    During the conflict, most US military officials and diplomats were unaware that some 40 women’s organizations were operating under the radar. Unsupported by outsiders, they were unable to prevent or stop the war, but they’ve been an invaluable resource during reconstruction.

    I’ve worked with women from 40 conflict areas and found that they’re consistently underutilized. Which is to say that their untapped potential is vast. For sustainable peace, military leaders and other policy-makers must integrate them into reconnaissance, negotiations, disarmament, and governance. Today, as we remember the men and boys who died in Srebrenica, let’s also remember women who could be strategic partners to our efforts in Colombia, Afghanistan, or Liberia.

    Srebrenica reminds us that understanding when and how to intervene in a conflict requires challenging stereotypes and assumptions. We must gather as much information from the field as we can muster, making use of all the resources available to us, including the women who could be valuable strategic partners.

    With a new model of inclusive security, we honor the dead and show that we really mean it when we say ”Never again.”

    Swanee Hunt is director of the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and author of ”This Was Not Our War: Bosnian Women Reclaiming the Peace,” winner of the 2005 PEN/New England Award for nonfiction.

  • Why I Don’t Trust Them or Sleeping With the Enemy

    When G8 finance ministers announced last month a £40bn debt relief package for some of the world’s poorest countries, Bob Geldof praised it as “a victory for the millions of people in the campaign around the world”. Bono called it “a little piece of history”. Forget the immoral condition of enforced liberalisation and privatisation that it contained. That was not all. Bono went on to hail George W Bush as the saviour of Africa. “I think he has done an incredible job”, he pronounced, adding: “Bush deserves a place in history for turning the fate of the continent around.” He came across as serious. Does Bono know that the US is the lowest aid donor in the industrialised world, giving only 0.16 per cent of GNP? Does he not care about climate change and about Bush’s role as serial environmental abuser? Maybe he has forgotten.

    The mutual admiration club between Bono, Geldof, Blair and Bush – rock stars and men who would love to be them – has been the abiding symbol of the G8. It is deeply disturbing. It has nothing to do with the commitment and the passionate argument of the 225,000 people who took to the streets of Edinburgh on 2 July encircling the centre of Scotland’s capital to protest against global injustice. This demonstration – at which I was a speaker – provided the real backdrop, the real pressure for change. Not that many people, particularly those south of the border, would have known. Saturation television that day from Live8 in Hyde Park beamed pictures from as far away as Philadelphia, Berlin and Tokyo – cities united in superficial soundbites about desperately serious issues. The newspapers fared little better.

    Edinburgh was nowhere to be seen. Was it inadvertent, or did our celebrity musicians conspire to allow the biggest demonstration of people power in Scotland’s history and the biggest march against poverty the UK has seen to be erased from the public’s consciousness? When Gordon Brown announced his intention to take part in the Edinburgh March I was appalled. I finally understood the Machiavellian plan by prime minister and chancellor to neutralise and co-opt the efforts of hundreds of NGOs, grassroots organisations and people throughout the world united in their desire to see poverty eradicated. They achieved their aims with the help of Geldof and Bono. I know that we need to persuade politicians, but do we really need to sleep with the enemy?

    For years thousands of people have campaigned to draw the public’s attention to the harm globalisation has done to the developing world and to expose the unjust policies of the unholy Trinity – the World Bank, IMF and the World Trade Organisation. All of a sudden Brown wanted to march hand in hand with us. Was he going to protest against the policies the UK government was imposing on the poorest countries in the developing world? Was he aware the UK government has been instrumental in pushing an aggressive “free trade” agenda at the WTO, disregarding developing countries’ pleas that they should be allowed to defend their infant industries from predatory EU and US multinationals?

    Was he not aware that the UK also stands behind the damaging Economic Partnership Agreements designed to open markets, in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries, exposing small scale producers to overwhelming competition from powerful multinationals? Is he aware that the UK has taken the lead in promoting privatisation of public services in developing countries, despite the increase in poverty this has brought to million of peoples in Africa, Latin America and elsewhere? Does he not know that the department for International Development has channelled millions from the aid budget to privatisation consultants such as KPMG, Price WaterhouseCoopers and the Adam Smith Institute, engaged to “advise” developing country governments on the privatisation of their public services? What about the UK government’s efforts to undermine international calls to hold multinational corporations to account for their activities overseas, championing the voluntary alternative of “corporate social responsibility” rather than corporate regulation? Then come the arms industry, and Britain’s seemingly unquenchable thirst to sell to the poorest and most volatile of dictatorships.

    After all the excitement of the Live8 crowd, and the self-congratulation of the organisers for what we should acknowledge was perhaps the greatest rock music spectacle the world has seen, what will have been achieved? Beside the thrill of seeing some of the greatest artist alive perform, has Blair, the same politician who misled the world over WMD in Iraq, managed to reinvent his legacy as the prophet of the social justice movement? Has the consciousness of the world really been raised, or have the consciences of the political leaders simply been soothed?

    In Scotland, we were making concrete demands from the G8 leaders, to stop imposing the neoliberal policies that have contributed to exacerbating poverty in the developing world; perhaps our aims were a little too unsettling, and a little too unpalatable, for Bono and Bob. By ignoring the real issues in the Make Poverty History Campaign and by embracing politicians with uncritical enthusiasm, they have undermined the real movement for change, helping to preserve the cycle that keeps the developing world subjugated to the financial institutions that are making poverty inevitable.

    You may wonder why I feel so deeply about these issues, I was born in one of the 18 countries in the debt relief package; Nicaragua, the second poorest country in the southern Hemisphere. Throughout my life I have seen first hand the devastating effect that poverty has on children’s lives. For me, witnessing the death of a child is not just a dramatic click of a finger, it is a terrible tragedy. Bono and Bob Geldof’s blind ambition has led them to legitimise and praise George W. Bush and Tony Blair, perpetrators of the objectionable policies that are causing the demise of millions of innocent people throughout the developing world. Although, one cannot deny they have succeeded in bringing attention to Africa, one feels betrayed by their moral ambiguity and sound bite propaganda which have obscured and watered down the real issues that are at stake in the debate.

    Originally published in the New Statesman

  • I Wrote Bush’s War Words- In 1965

    President Bush’s explanation Tuesday night for staying the course in Iraq evoked in me a sense of familiarity, but not nostalgia. I had heard virtually all of his themes before, almost word for word, in speeches delivered by three presidents I worked for: John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard M. Nixon. Not with pride, I recognized that I had proposed some of those very words myself.

    Drafting a speech on the Vietnam War for Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara in July 1965, I had the same task as Bush’s speechwriters in June 2005: how to rationalize and motivate continued public support for a hopelessly stalemated, unnecessary war our president had lied us into.

    Looking back on my draft, I find I used the word “terrorist” about our adversaries to the same effect Bush did.

    Like Bush’s advisors, I felt the need for a global threat to explain the scale of effort we faced. For that role, I felt China was better suited as our “real” adversary than North Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh, just as Bush prefers to focus on Al Qaeda rather than Iraqi nationalists. “They are trying to shake our will in Iraq — just as they [sic] tried to shake our will on Sept. 11, 2001,” he said.

    My draft was approved by McNamara, national security advisor McGeorge Bundy and Secretary of State Dean Rusk, but it was not delivered because it was a clarion call for mobilizing the Reserves to support an open-ended escalation of troops, as Johnson’s military commanders had urged.

    LBJ preferred instead to lie at a news conference about the number of troops they had requested for immediate deployment (twice the level he announced), and to conceal the total number they believed necessary for success, which was at least 500,000. (I take with a grain of salt Bush’s claim that “our commanders tell me they have the number of troops they need to do their job.”)

    A note particularly reminiscent in Bush’s speech was his reference to “a time of testing.” “We have more work to do, and there will be tough moments that test America’s resolve,” he said.

    This theme recalled a passage in my 1965 draft that, for reasons that will be evident, I have never chosen to reproduce before. I ended by painting a picture of communist China as “an opponent that views international politics as a whole as a vast guerrilla struggle … intimidating, ambushing, demoralizing and weakening those who would uphold an alternative world order.”

    “We are being tested,” I wrote. “Have we the guts, the grit, the determination to stick with a frustrating, bloody, difficult course as long as it takes to see it through….? The Asian communists are sure that we have not.” Tuesday, Bush said: Our adversaries “believe that free societies are essentially corrupt and decadent, and with a few hard blows they can force us to retreat.”

    His speechwriters, like me, then faced this question from the other side. To meet the enemy’s test of resolve, how long must the American public support troops as they kill and die in a foreign land? Their answer came in the same workmanlike evasions that served Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon: “as long as we are needed (and not a day longer) … until the fight is won.”

    I can scarcely bear to reread my own proposed response in 1965 to that question, which drew on a famous riposte by the late U.N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson during the Cuban missile crisis: “There is only one answer for us to give. It was made … by an American statesman … in the midst of another crisis that tested our resolution. Till hell freezes over.”

    It doesn’t feel any better to hear similar words from another president 40 years on, nor will they read any better to his speechwriters years from now. But the human pain they foretell will not be mainly theirs.

    Daniel Ellsberg is a member of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s Advisory Council and is currently a Foundation Fellow. He worked in the State and Defense departments under Presidents Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon. He released the Pentagon Papers to the press in 1971. Daniel Ellsberg is the recipient of the Foundation’s 2005 Distinguished Peace Leadership Award.

  • Why 2017 Is Optimistic

    Iraq’s water is as important to the United States as control of Iraq’s oil. The Middle East is home to five percent of the world’s population and only one percent of the world’s renewable water supply.[1] In addition, the population in the Arab world is 280 million people. This population, comparable in size to the population of the United States, is on track to double by the year 2025.[2] Iraq is a critical strategic location for both al Qaeda and the United States not just because of Iraq’s oil, but because Iraq has the most extensive fresh water system in the Middle East.

    A nation without enough water is in a worse position than a nation without enough oil. Understanding the role of water in the Middle East explains why there is no exit strategy from Iraq and why many Middle East experts predict the United States will be in Iraq for decades. Even Donald Rumsfeld, with a track record of being overly optimistic about the cost and duration of the Iraq war, is now setting expectations that the war will continue until 2017.[3]

    There is a saying in the Arab world that the person who controls the well also controls the people. Knowing that Iraq’s water is a key reason our soldiers are being maimed and killed, can help you evaluate what is really going on in the Middle East. Pieces to the puzzle, like the locations of the 14 “enduring” or permanent military bases and likely duration of the American occupation, can suddenly become crystal clear when you consider the locations of the Euphrates, Tigris, Greater Zab and Lesser Zab rivers. One only need look at the Nasiriyah “enduring base” on the Euphrates in South-East Iraq to understand the strategic value of water.

    Water conflicts have been frequent in the Middle East. Israel is another country that needs a new source of fresh water to satisfy the needs of a growing population. As background, Israel and its neighbors experienced water-related fighting in 1951, 1953, 1965-66, 1967, 1969, 1982 and 2001.[4] Today, about 30 percent of Israel’s water comes from the Jordan, 40 percent from ground water, and 30 percent from treated wastewater.[5] Even if Israel does not withdraw from the Golan Heights, where the Mountain Aquifer is located, the supply of fresh water is insufficient for the area’s population.[6] Syria is unwilling and unable to help. Turkey’s Manavgat River could provide some relief. The problem with obtaining water from Turkey is, without alternative sources of water, Israel will increasing become dependent on a Muslim nation for a strategic resource.

    Iraq , with the region’s most abundant water resources, was out of the question as an Israeli source of water prior to the Iraq war. Israel for reasons that include and extend beyond water, hopes that the U.S. will be successful in pacifying Iraq. Control of Iraq’s rivers could alter the destiny of the Middle East for decades. While the Bush administration fears that Americans will not support fighting a war to control Iraq’s water, Americans deserve to know the truth. The truth is that in addition to oil, water is a real reason for the invasion of Iraq. Our soldiers, their parents, and all citizens have a right to know when the price that is required is in blood and in billions of dollars. Don’t be fooled by the occasional messages that our troops will leaving in a few years. The Pentagon is planning on occupying Iraq for decades. The Pentagon’s long-range strategic plan is likely to require an American occupation far beyond Donald Rumsfeld’s optimistic 2017 forecast.

    David J. Dionisi is a former military intelligence officer and author of American Hiroshima. American Hiroshima describes the next 9/11 attack in the United States and what can be done to prevent it. For information about the book, visit www.americanhiroshima.info.

    1. Diane Raines Ward, Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly and the Politics of Thirst ( New York, New York: Riverhead Books, June 2003), 188.
    2. Arab Human Development Report 2004: Towards Freedom in the Arab World, United Nations Development Programme Regional Bureau for Arab States, 2005.
    3. “Rumsfeld braces for more violence in Iraq: Says insurgency could endure ‘for any number of years,’ perhaps until 2017,” Associated Press, 26 June 2005 .
    4. Peter Gleick, The Worlds Water 2002-2003: The Biennial Report on Freshwater Resources ( Washington, DC: Island Press, 2002), 198-205.
    5. Ibid., 269.
    6. Yedidya Atlas, “ Israel’s Water Basics,” commentator for Arutz-7 Israel National Radio, article online on 20 September 2004. Internet address is www.freeman.org/m_online/nov99/atlas.htm. The West Bank provides 25% of Israel’s water. The water supply is stored in three main sources (i.e., Lake Kinneret, the Coastal Aquifer, and the Mountain or Yarkon-Taninim Aquifer).
    7. Marq De Villers, Water: The Fate Of Our Most Precious Resource ( New York, New York: First Mariner Books, 2001), 200. In 1997, Minister of Agriculture Refael Eitan said that Israel would be in mortal danger if it lost control of the Mountain Aquifer.

  • Human Rights and the US/UK Illegal Attack on Iraq

    Distinguished Members of the Jury of Conscience; Fellow Advocates; Ladies and Gentlemen, Friends –

    The testimonies have brought the reality of an Iraq tortured by the US/UK (and a coalition of willing clients) illegal attack, and illegal occupation, into our minds and hearts. With a sense of deep anger at the continued aggression and deep compassion with the victims we have witnessed the reality of crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity, including nuclear war through the use of depleted, radioactive uranium, on top of the genocidal economic sanctions, and the general “softening up” of Iraq for a quick, decisive war and remolding to the taste of the aggressors.

    Members of the Jury: what we are witnessing is the geo-fascist state terrorism of US imperialism, following the defunct British Empire, soon to follow it into the graveyard of empires. In my research-based opinion at the latest by 2020, but, past experience being a guide, there is more to come. By some counts the attack on Iraq is US aggression no. 239 after the Thomas Jefferson start in the early 19th century and no. 69 after the Second World War; with between 12 and 16 million killed in that period alone. All in flagrant contradiction of the most basic human rights, like the “right to life, liberty and security of persons” (UD:3) and the condemnation of the “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” (UD:5). In a Pentagon Planner’s chilling words: “The de facto role of the United States Armed Forces will be to keep the world safe for our economy and open to our cultural assault. To those ends, we will do a fair amount of killing”. [1]

    And in my drier words: “Imperialism is a transborder structure for the synergy of killing, repression, exploitation and brain-washing.”

    I hold up against this organized atrocity–whether attempted legitimized through packs of lies about weapons of mass destruction and links to Al Qaeda, or by invoking a divine mandate or a mandate to export democracy and human rights through dictatorship and world crimes–a slip of paper, Article 28 of the Universal Declaration:

    Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized. (UD:28)

    This admirable formulation provides an excellent linkage between various levels of social organization, from the individual level at which these rights are implemented or violated, to the structure of the social and world spaces. It indicates the spaces in which these conditions may be identified. The basic needs served by human rights are located inside the individual, but the conditions for their satisfaction are social and/or international, generally speaking. UD:28 is a meta-right, a right about rights, with nothing short of revolutionary implications.

    US imperialism in general, and its articulation in Iraq in particular, invokes the whole International Bill of Rights, but the focus is on the UD:3 right to life, in the context of Article 29:

    Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. (UD:29)

    There are no rights without duties, and right-holder and duty-bearer may also be the same actor. The word “community” rather than, but not excluding, “country” is used. This is very realistic as human beings developed personalities long before there were countries run by states and peopled by nations in our sense. But “communities” are as old as humankind itself. To a growing part of humanity the most important are non-territorial, like the NGOs.

    Problem: What are the rights that flow from the conjunction of UD:3 with UD:28, and what are the corresponding UD:29 duties?

    First Exercise: The entitlement to a social and international order where everything is done to resolve conflicts nonviolently.

    Obvious, but worth emphasizing: the US/UK continued warfare is not only criminal, even by intent as demonstrated by the Downing Street Memorandum, but also plainly stupid, a folly. The criminal and the stupid can operate singly, but they also often combine and reinforce, due to a simple mechanism. Criminal acts have to be planned in secret, also to deceive their own peoples, by small gangs with cojones, in Bush’s words. They do not benefit from the dialogue of open agreements openly arrived at in an open society, also known as a democracy. Democracy’s traitors easily become its fools.

    Barbara W. Tuchman, in her fine book The March of Folly, [2] gives us some leads. She studies Troy in the Battle of Troy, the Renaissance Popes during the Protestant Reformation, England and the American Revolution, and the USA in Viêt Nam and concludes that their action was simply foolish. [3] And she presents three criteria for a policy to be characterized as a “folly” [4]:

    [1] It was perceived as counter-productive in its own time; [2] A feasible alternative course of action was available; and [3] The policy was not the policy of one particular ruler only.

    All criteria are met in the US/UK illegal attack on Iraq. Hardly ever has a policy been so massively critiqued for being “counterproductive”, including the 15 February 2003 demonstration of 11 million in 600 places around the world, the biggest in human history. As I shall indicate, alternative courses were available. And there was more than one ruler involved, a whole coalition defying their people, headed by 2B, Bush-Blair, followed by clients like 2b, Berlusconi-Bondevik (the Norwegian fundamentalist prime minister). Only two countries were democratic in the sense that executive, legislature and public opinion coincided: the USA for the war, and our host country, Turkey, against. EU, take note.

    Two Security Council members, France and Germany, put forward an alternative course of action: continued, deeper inspection that could then be extended to a human rights inspection, gradually eliminating two of the pretexts for a war which obviously was for geo-economic. geo-political and geo-cultural (Judeo-Christian anti Islam, that is what the content of the torture and the desecration of the Qur’an are about). This proposal could easily have been developed into something that could serve to organize a General Assembly Uniting for Peace resolution, possibly also using the highly successful Helsinki Conference for Security and Cooperation of 1973-75 as a model (also to avoid US/UK veto).

    But this was not the road traveled. Not to do so was not a US/UK brutal act of commission, but an act of omission that always comes as a poor second in Judeo-Christian philosophy and Western jurisprudence. Many can be blamed, including France and Germany themselves for not having followed up, lesser coalition members, the UNGA for not mustering the collective courage against the bullying by Colin Powell telling that Uniting for Peace (in the UNSC-run UN) is seen by the USA as an “unfriendly act”.

    We are sensing here a missing human right with corresponding duty: the right to live in a “social and international order” where everything is done to solve conflicts nonviolently. That right can only be implemented if others fulfill certain duties. It is not for everybody to have an impact on the “social and international order” in such concrete and partly technical issues. In other words, for the right to be implemented somebody “high up”, socially and/or internationally, indeed including the media, will have to do a better job, being more open to nonviolent alternatives and more closed to violence, war and the “military option” in general.

    This point becomes even more clear in the next example, Saddam Hussein’s peace proposal in the New York Times (6 November 2003) ” Iraq said to have tried to reach last minute deal to avert war”:

    In February 2003 Hassan Al-Obeidi, chief of foreign operations of the Iraqi Intelligence Service, met with Imad Hage, a Lebanese-American Businessman in his Beirut office. Mr. Obeidi told Mr. Hage that Iraq would make deals to avoid war, including helping in the Mideast peace process. He said, “If this is about oil, we will talk about U.S. oil concessions. If this is about weapons of mass destruction, let the Americans send over their people.” Mr. Obeidi said Iraq would agree to hold elections within the next two years. Of all people Richard Perle seems to have been willing to pursue this channel, but was overruled by higher officials. Said Perle: The message was, “Tell them that we will see them in Baghdad”.

    The blame for this act of omission falls on the U.S. itself. But this is entirely in line with a very transparent U.S. approach: the U.S. reports its own proposals but not the other side, like in Viêt Nam, in the Rambouillet negotiations over to bomb or not to bomb Serbia, or in general over Israel-Palestine. When the other side, denied access to public space by the compliant media of the military-corporate-media complex, fails to accept U.S. proposals they can more easily be portrayed as being “against peace”.

    In a Helsinki style Conference for Security and Cooperation In and Around Iraq these proposals would be on the table, as “it” was about all those issues, holding Saddam Hussein to his words. “Oil issues” could be translated into quotas and put the U.S. in a negotiating rather than dictating position. WMD: the U.S. knew the program had been discontinued in 1995; the CIA is hardly that badly informed. And even if Hussein is not credible as a guardian of democracy these elections would not be under the U.S./corporate press/”one dollar one vote” control that gives democracy such a bad name, close to a synonym for “US client state”. However that may be, to have closed this channel was both criminal and stupid.

    Second Exercise: The entitlement to a social and international order where perpetrators of (major) crimes are brought to justice.

    With major perpetrators having major power through major veto, the UN today is not an adequate instrument for bringing US/UK to justice; the USA even having exempted itself from ICC adjudication. Yet they should not get away with impunity. Justice has to be done.

    When a government fails to live up to its duty civil society, meaning nongovernment, has to step in. When the major international instrument of governments, the UN, fails to live up to its duty the international civil society has to step in. This World Tribunal on Iraq is an example of a tribunal based on the international civil society. But how about the instruments of punitive justice?

    The answer is that the international civil society, everyone of us, has that instrument: an economic boycott of US/UK products. A boycott could include consumer goods (drinks and food of iconic nature, fuels), capital goods (like not using Boeing, a major death factory, aircraft whenever there are alternatives), and financial goods (like using other currencies than dollars for international transactions including tourism and price denomination; divestment from US/UK stock and bonds). It could relate to all products, or only to products from the most obnoxious, empire-related companies, like US/UK oil companies. It could be combined with a “girlcott” favoring non-coalition countries and acceptable US/UK companies.

    Members of the Jury: Everybody could find his/her own formula, seeing some boycott not only as a human duty but as a human right not to be interfered with. For Iraq a focus on oil is recommended.

    However, channels of communication should be kept open for dialogues. The goal is less to inflict pain than to bring about an end to an illegal aggression and, by implication and atrocities, illegal occupation. When the occupation is over, so is the boycott.

    Third Exercise: The entitlement to a social and international order without imperial structures perverting the order.

    We are today talking about a US empire, which may or may not have successors, in which case what follows also applies to them.

    The empire is a structure based on unequal exchange in the military, political, economic and cultural fields, and has to be counteracted in all four fields. Being the negation of the social and international order in the sense of UD:28 there is not only a human duty for people at all levels to counteract an empire but also a human right, not to be interfered with, to do so.

    Unequal exchange is injustice. To counteract it will be construed as hostile action, as “terrorism”, interfering with the “normal” flow of resources and products, “normal” as established by the empire (see Article 24 of the new NATO Pact of 1999).

    In reality, not to interfere is complicity, and to interfere is justice, and more particularly restorative justice. It restores not only victim countries, groups and individuals, but also the perpetrator, to normalcy and sanity, coexisting peacefully in a world of more equal, or at least less flagrantly unequal, exchange.

    The country to benefit most from the dismantling of the US Empire is the U.S. which, while enriching its upper classes at the same time has degenerated into a paranoid, angst-ridden country tormented by the existential fear that “one day they will do to us what we have done to them” (yes, one day they did: 9/11 2001.).

    I join the ranks of those who say “I love the US Republic, and I hate the US Empire”. The question is how to engage in these colossal acts of restorative justice. And the answer is that it is happening all the time militarily and politically, that more can and should be done, and that there is a need for action in the economic and cultural fields. And who are the actors? Everybody.

    How can it be done? Four examples, covering the four fields:

    Militarily this is happening all places in the world where that “most powerful country” is challenged by people shedding their uniform, dressing and living like the people around them with their total support and more dedicated than soldiers fed packs of lies.

    Members of the Jury: All resistance against an illegal attack is legitimate, and the Iraqi resistance is fighting for us all. But I also blame us in the peace movement for having been unable to share our insights in nonviolent resistance with our Iraqi friends.

    Politically regionalization is happening all over the world, in part motivated by getting out of the US grip: the EU, the AU and similar incipient movements in Latin America, OIC and East Asia.

    Economically there is the economic boycott, adding to punitive justice the restorative, gandhian aspect of taking on the challenge of developing your own products and helping the U.S. accommodate to a reasonable and equitable niche in world trade. In John Perkins Confessions of an Economic Hit Man lies the depth of U.S. insanity.

    Culturally we are confronted with US/UK legitimacy. It used to be that “the U.S. is chosen by God; the UK by the U.S.” like a pale moon reflecting that divine Anglo-American light. Today the idea of God using Bush as his instrument is sheer blasphemy, and countries chosen by the USA should ask, “what is wrong about me”. If you are so immature as to need a strong father seek psycho-therapy, not a mafia boss. To kill Iraqis as therapy is despicable.

    Members of the Jury: My own buddhism is sufficiently close to the gentle Christianity of a St Francis to sense the blasphemy. I call on the Jury to call on Christian communities to protest this blasphemy, including Pope Benedict XVI, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, who had the task of protecting the faith. The time to act is now.

    Notes: [1] From Susan George, “The Corporate Utopian Dream”, The WTO and the Global War System, Seattle, November 1999. He is missing the political dimension and might have added “a fair amount of bullying” or “arm-twisting” after killing. [2] The March of Folly, From Troy to Vietnam (New York: Knopf, 1984) [3] Visitors today to the ruins of Troy (in Turkey, near the Dardanelles, on the Asian side) will find a model of the famous wooden horse, and can judge for themselves the wisdom of letting such a thing within their walls. In the other three cases a little patience, flexibility, willingness to listen, and real dialogue might have come a far way. But then we might have had neither economic growth and individualizing democracy as we know them, if we accept that both are related to the world view of Protestantism, nor the end of the beginning of the US Republic, nor the beginning of the end of the US Empire. [4] Op.cit.., p. 5

    Johan Galtung, Dr. hc mult serves on the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s Advisory Council, is founder of the Oslo Peace Research Institute, founder of Transcend, and a recipient of the Right Livelihood Award.

  • Opening Speech at the World Tribunal on Iraq

    Let me express at the outset, on behalf of the Panel of Advocates our profound gratitude to the convenors of this Istanbul session of the World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) for their exceptional effort, and at the same time acknowledge the extraordinary contributions of the twenty earlier sessions of the WTI that have produced invaluable testimony and results that have increased awareness the world over of the criminality of the Iraq War. This unprecedented process of truth-telling about an ongoing war has produced what can best be described as ‘a tribunal movement’ of which this Istanbul session is the culminating phase to date of this process.

    The World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) is remarkable for two principal reasons: WTI bears witness to the depth and persistence of the popular mobilization of people throughout the world in opposition to the Iraq War. Such a mobilization against a particular war has never occurred before on such a scale. It started with the massive street demonstrations before the war on Feb. 15, 2003 in which some 11 million people took part in 80 countries and more than 600 urban communities. The WTI gives a continuing legal, moral, and political expression to this anti-war opposition which itself has entered a new phase: an insurgent war of liberation being waged in resistance to the illegal occupation of the country by the greatest military power in the history of the world. In this struggle, the Iraqi people are being denied their fundamental rights of self-determination, first by aggression and then by a cruel and criminal dynamic occupation.

    The second reason for claiming historical significance on behalf of WTI relates to this initiative of, by, and for citizens to hold leaders accountable for severe violations of international law, especially in relation to matters of war and peace. It is not that this is an entirely new idea. The first such effort was inspired by the eminent British philosopher, Bertrand Russell, who convened such a tribunal back in 1967 to assess the legal responsibility of the United States and its leaders for the Vietnam War. It gathered testimony and documented the massive abuses of Vietnamese sovereignty by a devastating war that took millions of innocent Vietnamese lives. Above all, this citizens’ tribunal was a cry of anguish intended to break the wall of silence behind which the crimes associated with the Vietnam War were daily committed. The Russell Tribunal in turn led to the formation of the Permanent Peoples Tribunal, located in Rome, operating since 1976 to reinforce the claims of international law by filling in the gaps where governments and even the United Nations are unable and unwilling to act, or even to speak. The WTI continues and extends this tradition of refusing to be silent or to be silenced. It accepts as a responsibility of democracy the obligation of citizens to insist on the relevance and applicability of international law to every use of force. This insistence includes a demand for criminal accountability, whenever a government disavows its commitment to respect international law. It is primarily to honor this commitment to uphold international law that this tribunal has been organized, and its mission is to confirm the truth of the allegation directed at the United States and the United Kingdom, while also extending to all governments that support directly or indirectly the Iraq War.

    We should be aware that such a commitment by the WTI is part of a longer journey of international law that has evolved by stages that can be identified.

    The initial stage was to create in some authoritative way the norms of law, morality, and politics associated with the prohibition of wars of aggression. The legal culmination of this process occurred in 1928 when leading states, including the United States and the UK, ratified without qualification the General Treaty for the Renunciation of War as an instrument of National Policy, also known as the Kellogg-Brand Pact;

    This was followed by a second stage that attached criminal consequences to the violation of this norm prohibiting aggressive war through establishing accountability. The criminal trial of German and Japanese leaders after World War II, the Nuremberg Judgment issued in 1945 was a milestone in this process. The Judgment declared: “To initiate a war of aggression…is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole,” and although Nuremberg was flawed by being an example of “victors’ justice,” the American prosecutor, Justice Robert Jackson, made what has been described as the Nuremberg Promise in his closing statement: “If certain acts in violation of treaties are crimes, they are crimes whether the United States does them or Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us” This promise has been broken, but such behavior is not acceptable, and we are gathered in part to insist even now that the promise that every state will pay the consequences if it wages a war of aggression.

    This treaty pledge to renounce aggressive war informed the United Nations Charter. The Charter imposes a core obligation on Members to refrain from the use of force in international relations except in circumstances of self-defense strictly defined and under the authority of the Security Council. It also, in a spirit relevant to the WTI, confirmed in its opening words that it is the peoples of the world and not the governments or even the UN that have been entrusted with the ultimate responsibility for upholding this renunciation of war: “We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war…” that set forth the duties of states in the UN Charter. This tribunal is dedicated to precisely this undertaking as a matter of law, as an imperative of morality and human rights, and as an engagement with the politics of global justice.

    Of course, this tribunal does not pretend to be a normal court of law with powers of enforcement. At the same time, it is acting on behalf of the peoples of the world to uphold respect for international law. When governments and the UN are silent, and fail to protect victims of aggression, tribunals of concerned citizens possess a law-making authority. Their unique contribution is to tell the truth as powerfully and fully as possible, and by such truthfulness to activate the conscience of humanity to resist. The US Government told a pack of lies in its feeble attempt to find a legal justification for the invasion of Iraq. The WTI will expose these lies by presenting evidence and testimony. The task of exposing lies and confirming truth has become easier as a result of the release of the Downing Street memos. These official documents show that British and American officials understood fully that the Iraq War was unlawful, and not only did they go ahead, but they fabricated evidence to build a completely dishonest legal case. Neither governments, nor the UN, nor most of the media will tell this story of deception, destruction, and criminality. It is the mission of the WTI, building on the efforts of the 20 or so earlier citizens’ tribunals, to tell this story and to appeal to the peoples of the world to join with the people of Iraq in opposing aggression against Iraq. The tribunal is formed on the basis of a Panel of Advocates and a Jury of Conscience. The Panel will present the evidence and the Jury will draw legal, moral, and political conclusions and offer recommendations. The pledge of advocates and jurors is to act in an honest, non-partisan, independent, and objective spirit to follow the evidence wherever it leads.

    This tribunal differs from a normal court of law in the following main respects:

    –it is an organ of civil society, not of the state;

    –its essential purpose is to confirm the truth, not to discover it;

    –its jurors are dedicated, informed, and committed citizens of the world, not neutral and indifferent individuals of the community;

    –its advocates are knowledgeable, wise and decent, but not legally trained specialists;

    –its trust for the future is not based on violence and police, but on conscience, political struggle, and public opinion.

    Nevertheless, we claim for this tribunal the authority to declare the law and to impose its judgment and to hope — hope that a demonstration of this criminality will not fall on deaf ears, but will awaken and exercise the peoples of the world to intensify their resistance to America’s plans for world domination and stand in solidarity with the Iraqi people.

    We need to realize that the Iraq war is the eye of a larger global storm. The storm expresses the fury of this American project to dominate the world by force of arms, to exploit the peoples of the world through the medium of economic globalization, and to administer its idea of security from its Washington headquarters. This project of World Empire hides its true colors beneath the banner of anti-terrorism. It justifies every abuse by pointing to the September 11 attacks. These attacks, even if they are what is claimed, do not justify aggression against states or the torture of individuals. We should remember that the imperial brain trust said before September 11 that only “a new Pearl Harbor” would produce the political climate needed to achieve global hegemony. And they got a new Pearl Harbor, or did they? Read David Griffin’s The New Pearl Harbor and you will never be able to take 9/11 at face value in the future. The convenors of the WTI are mindful of this wider context of the Iraq War.

    It should also be observed that Turkey is an appropriate site for this culminating session of the WTI, remembering that earlier sessions of the WTI in all regions of the world have gathered evidence of the illegality of the Iraq War and the criminal policies and practices that have been associated with its conduct. To begin with, Turkey stands at the crossroads between the old European geopolitical core and the Third World periphery. Earlier Russell, PPT initiatives were European. Now the moral, political, and legal platform is moving away from the Christian West. It was Turkey’s proudest moment when its parliament refused the request of the US Government to mount the invasion of Iraq from Turkish territory; this represented an expression of an increasingly robust democratic process here in Turkey. Turkey is also a natural site for the tribunal because it is an important neighbor of Iraq, and suffers a variety of bad consequences from the war and the turmoil in the region that has resulted. And further, the Turkish government has been complicit with the Iraq war, as well as with the preceding period of sanctions, by allowing its territory to be used for a strategic base that has been extensively used for the bombing of Iraq ever since 1990. It is a purpose of this tribunal to show that such complicity engages legal responsibility for Turkey, and for other governments in the region that support directly or indirectly such aggressive war making.

    A special concern of the WTI is to take sharp issue with American claims of exception whether based on an alleged freedom to wage war anywhere on the planet as a result of the 9/11 attacks or securing an exemption for itself in relation to the basic obligation to uphold international law. The pernicious American exceptionalism contradicts completely the role played by the United States in seeking to promote the Rule of Law, the Nuremberg approach, and the UN Charter after 1945. The claim of exception moves in two directions: it operates, first of all, as an explicit effort to exempt Anerican leaders from individual accountability for violating international law, specifically in relation to the recently established International Criminal Court; and secondly, in relation to the lawless barbarism of the detention of alleged terrorist and insurgency suspects being held in such notorious outposts of torture and official evil as Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq and Camp X-Ray at Guantanamo. This tribunal stands against such outrageous claims of exception, and operates beneath the jurisprudential principle that no government or leader is above the law and that every government and leader is criminally accountable for failures to uphold international law. If governments and the UN are unwilling to pass judgment, it is up to initiatives by citizens of the world to perform this scared duty. The WTI has been formed against the background of these essential beliefs.

    It should also be understood that the WTI views the Iraq War as part of this wider assault by the United States, and the UK, against wider prospects for a just world order. These prospects depend upon respecting the sovereign rights of all states, of working to achieve human rights, including economic, social, and cultural rights for all peoples, and to struggle on behalf of a humane world order, including a far more equitable world economy that is indispensable for achieving a sustainable world peace.

    There was a tart in this direction made during the 1990s, although amid an array of contradictions. But it is worth noting these progressive moves that have been stymied by the wars of aggression launched by the United States by relying upon the pretext of a war against terrorism. It is worth observing because it is important to revive these moves toward humane global governance based on the principles of global justice:

    –the spread of democracy, and especially the rise of global civil society and of global social movements in the area of environment, human rights, women, and peace;

    –the increased support for human rights by civil society actors and governments around the world;

    –the attention given to the remembrance and partial erasure of historic grievances toward indigenous peoples on all continents, toward the victims of forced labor, including so-called “comfort women” during World War II, toward the descendants of slavery;

    –and most of all, to the revival of Nuremberg ideas about criminal accountability, challenging impunity – the Chilean dictator Pinochet was indicted by Spain and detained by Britain; the UN established tribunals to prosecute those responsible for ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity in former Yugoslavia and for genocide in Rwanda; and over the objections of the leading states, the ICC was brought into existence due to the active coalition of hundreds of NGOs working together with dozens of governments dedicated to establish a framework for applying international criminal law.

    Such positive steps have been derailed, at least temporarily, by the firestorm released in the world by the US Government since the September 11 attacks. This tribunal hopes that truth-telling with respect to Iraq will also revive the emergent normative revolution of the 1990s, making us move again in the Puerto Alegre direction of insisting that “another world is possible,” and adding, “if possible, it is necessary,” and with this affirmation, the WTI will not only stimulate resistance to appression and solidarity with victims, but will revive the vision of the 1990s that can be best summarized as the cause of “moral globalization.”

  • Statement of Richard Falk at Press Conference for World Tribunal

    The World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) is a worldwide civil society undertaking to reclaim justice. The project consists of commissions of inquiry and sessions held around the world investigating various issues related to the war on Iraq, such as the legality of the war, the role of the United Nations, war crimes and the role of the media. On June 23rd to the 27th 2005, at the start of the third year of the occupation of Iraq, the culminating session took place in Istanbul, Turkey. Richard Falk, Chair of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s Board of Directors, delivered the opening remarks to the tribunal. Below is Falk’s statement at the WTI press conference. For more information, visit their website at www.worldtribunal.org.

    The World Tribunal on Iraq is an undertaking of historic importance. It is the culmination of a process of tribunal sessions on the legal dimensions of the Iraq War that have been held in all parts of the world. This kind of spontaneous initiative of concerned people around the world has never taken place before. It represents an expression of what might be called “moral globalization,” acting on the belief that no state and no leader is above the law when it comes to matters of war and peace. And it expresses the overwhelming sentiments of peoples throughout the world that the Iraq War was against international law and morality. This initiative here in Istanbul has a quality of urgency as people are dying and suffering every day in Iraq as we speak. This is not an academic gathering of experts to find out the relevance of law. It is primarily an expression of popular democracy, of ethical conscience about what is right and wrong in world politics, and an expression of resistance to what is understood around the world as an American project to achieve world domination. The Iraq War is the eye of the storm at the moment. But the wider concern of the WTI is with America’s hegemonic global ambitions that is bringing danger, violence, and exploitation to many parts of the world at present.

    The idea of a tribunal to judge legal responsibility of a state and its leaders for war is not new. After World War II the victorious governments convened tribunals at Nuremberg and Tokyo, and held the German and Japanese leaders responsible. The Nuremberg Judgment, a celebrated document, called aggressive war, that is, Crimes Against Peace, as the greatest of all crimes. The UN Charter has carried forward the idea that all wars that are not fought in self-defense or with the approval of the UN Security Council are illegal wars, and hence a Crime Against Peace. The WTI has been initiated by citizens of many countries who share the belief that the Iraq War is such an illegal war, and that the leaders of the USA and United Kingdom are individually and criminally responsible for its initiation and for the violations of the Law of War that have accompanied the occupation of Iraq.

    The work of the Tribunal is divided into a Panel of Advocates and a Jury of Conscience. The role of the Panel of Advocates is to document these charges through analysis and witnesses in a persuasive manner, and to appeal to a Jury of Conscience, composed of distinguished moral authority personalities from around the world, to pass judgment on the actors and their actions from the perspective of international law. We understand that the WTI is not a court of law with powers of enforcement. It is rather an informed inquiry by concerned, independent, non-partisan, and honest persons into the relevance of international law that is designed to discredit any claims by the governments who have supported the Iraq War that their action is somehow legal and morally and politically acceptable. It is designed to tell the truth as clearly and powerfully as possible with respect to all aspects of the Iraq War. In the end if democracy is to be the true basis of political authority, then leaders must be made accountable, especially if they fail to uphold the Rule of Law in the area of war and peace. If governments and the United Nations are unable and unwilling to discharge this responsibility, then citizens acting on behalf of civil society have the duty to challenge and oppose an illegal war and practices that violate international humanitarian law. It is after all, in the famous words of the UN Charter, “We the peoples of the world” who are “determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.”

    The WTI takes these words seriously as a call to action. We who are participating in this Tribunal are speaking here in Turkey as ‘citizens of the world’ who are part of a global movement to oppose aggressive wars and to resist the wider ambitions of the United States Government to override the sovereignty and independence of states. And we of the WTI are calling on others in every country who seek global peace and justice, including the protection of human rights, to join us in doing this vital work. It is time to understand that aggressive war has become something more than a struggle between particular states. It is an assault on the well being of people everywhere, and must be opposed everywhere. Aggressive war is not only a Crime Against Peace, it has also become the greatest Crime Against Humanity.

    The WTI is opposing aggressive war, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. It is not opposing the governments or the United Nations. Indeed it hopes to create pressure from below that will encourage law-abiding governments and the UN to do their proper job of protecting weaker countries and their populations against such illegalities. And beyond this protection we are promoting a world movement of peoples and governments to realize a humane form of globalization that is equitable with respect to the world economy, legitimate in upholding the human rights of all, and dedicated above all else to creating the conditions for sustainable peace based on justice for every nation on earth.

  • To the Graduates

    To the Graduates

    Congratulations on completing this phase of your life. I’m sure you have learned many things in your studies. Let me mention a few things about the world you are entering – things you may already feel but don’t yet fully understand. It is a world in which human life is devalued for many, and greed is often rewarded.

     

    Each hour, 500 children die in Africa: 12,000 each day. They die of starvation and preventable diseases, not because there is not enough food or medicine, but because these are not distributed to those who need them.

     

    Our world is not particularly kind to children, but it is very kind to the military-industrial complex. Global spending on the world’s militaries now tops $1 trillion. Of this, the United States spends nearly half, more than the combined totals of the next 32 countries. For just one percent of global military spending, every child on the planet could receive an education, but these are not the values we choose to espouse.

     

    Our world is also not very wise in preparing for the future. We are busy using up the world’s resources, particularly its fossil fuels, and, in the process, polluting the environment. So hungry are we for energy and other resources that we pay little attention to the needs and well-being of future generations. Our lifestyles in the richer countries are unsustainable, and they are foreclosing opportunities for future generations who will be burdened by a world with diminishing resources and a deteriorating environment.

     

    Militarism and social progress are inversely related. In 1949, Costa Rica dismantled its military force and devoted its resources instead to achieving a better life for its people. Since then, it has been a stable democracy in a region often shattered by turmoil. The country has a low infant mortality rate, a high life expectancy rate and a literacy rate of 96 percent.

     

    If someone were to observe our planet from outer space, that person might conclude that we do not appreciate the beauty and bounty of our magnificent earth. I hope you will never take for granted this life-sustaining planet – the only one we know of in the universe. The planet itself is a miracle, as is each of us.

     

    As miracles, how can we engage in wars that kill other miracles? War no longer makes sense in the Nuclear Age. The stakes are too high. In a world with nuclear weapons, we roll the dice on the human future each time we engage in war. These weapons must be eliminated and the materials to make them placed under strict international control so that we don’t bring life on our planet to an abrupt end.

     

    Leaders who take their nations to war without the sanction of international law must be held to account. This is what the Allied leaders concluded after World War II, when they held the Nazi leaders to account for crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity. No leader anywhere on the planet should be allowed to stand above international law.

     

    Every citizen of Earth has rights, well articulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other human rights documents. You should know your rights under international law, which include the rights to life, liberty, security of person, and freedom from torture. There is also a human right to peace. Take responsibility for assuring these rights for yourselves and others everywhere on our globe.

     

    We live in an interdependent world. Borders cannot make us safe. We can choose to live together in peace, or to perish together in war. We can choose to live together with sustainable lifestyles or to perish together in overabundance for the few and poverty for many.

     

    Our choice is relatively simple: to create a world with dignity for all, or to maintain a world with special privileges for the few. You will make your choice by how you live and who and what you support. You are fortunate in that you have received a good education. Now you must choose how you will use your education, whether you will devote your life to the pursuit of financial success and personal attainment only or to making a difference by helping improve our planet and the lives of those who inhabit it.

     

    The future, if there is to be a future, will be claimed by those who work for peace, justice and human dignity. I hope that you will be among them.

     

    David Krieger is the president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org), and a leader in the struggle for a nuclear weapons-free world. His most recent book is one of anti-war poetry, Today Is Not a Good Day for War.

  • US Nuclear Hypocrisy: Bad For The World

    US Nuclear Hypocrisy: Bad For The World

    Every five years the parties to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty meet in a review conference to further the non-proliferation and disarmament goals of the treaty. This year the conference ended in a spectacular failure with no final document and no agreement on moving forward. For the first ten days of the conference, the US resisted agreement on an agenda that made any reference to past commitments.

    The failure of the treaty conference is overwhelmingly attributable to the nuclear policies of the Bush administration, which has disavowed previous US nuclear disarmament commitments under the treaty. The Bush administration does not seem to grasp the hypocrisy of pressing other nations to forego their nuclear options, while failing to fulfill its own obligations under the disarmament provisions of the treaty.

    The treaty is crumbling under the double standards of American policy, and may not be able to recover from the rigid “do-as-I-say, not-as-I-do” positions of the Bush administration. These policies are viewed by most of the world as high-level nuclear hypocrisy.

    Paul Meyer, the head of Canada’s delegation to the treaty conference, reflected on the conference, “The vast majority of states have to be acknowledged, but we did not get that kind of diplomacy from the US.” Former UK Foreign Minister Robin Cook also singled out the Bush administration in explaining the failure of the conference. “How strange,” he wrote, “that no delegation should have worked harder to frustrate agreement on what needs to be done than the representatives of George Bush.”

    What the US did at the treaty conference was to point the finger at Iran and North Korea, while refusing to discuss or even acknowledge its own failure to meet its obligations under the treaty. Five years ago, at the 2000 Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, the parties to the treaty, including the US, agreed to 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament. Under the Bush administration, nearly all of these obligations have been disavowed.

    Although President Clinton signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996, the Bush administration does not support it and refused to allow ratification of this treaty, which is part of the 13 Practical Steps, to even be discussed at the 2005 review conference. The parties to the treaty are aware that the Bush administration is seeking funding from Congress to continue work on new earth penetrating nuclear weapons (“bunker busters”), while telling other nations not to develop nuclear arms.

    They are also aware that the Bush administration has withdrawn from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in order to pursue a destabilizing missile defense program, and has not supported a verifiable Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty, although the US had agreed to support these treaties in the 13 Practical Steps.

    The failure of this treaty conference makes nuclear proliferation more likely, including proliferation to terrorist organizations that cannot be deterred from using the weapons. The fault for this failure does not lie with other governments as the Bush administration would have us believe. It does not lie with Egypt for seeking consideration of previous promises to achieve a Middle East Nuclear Weapons Free Zone. Nor does the fault lie with Iran for seeking to enrich uranium for its nuclear energy program, as is done by many other states, including the US, under the provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It would no doubt be preferable to have the enrichment of uranium and the separation of plutonium, both of which can be used for nuclear weapons programs, done under strict international controls, but this requires a change in the treaty that must be applicable to all parties, not just to those singled out by the US.

    Nor can the fault be said to lie with those states that, having given up their option to develop nuclear weapons, sought renewed commitments from the nuclear weapons states not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states. It is hard to imagine a more reasonable request. Yet the US has refused to relinquish the option of first use of nuclear weapons, even against non-nuclear weapons states.

    The fault for the failure of the treaty conference lies clearly with the Bush administration, which must take full responsibility for undermining the security of every American by its double standards and nuclear hypocrisy.

    The American people must understand the full magnitude of the Bush administration’s failure at the Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference. This may not happen because the administration has been so remarkably successful in spinning the news to suit its unilateralist, militarist and triumphalist worldviews.

    As Americans, we can not afford to wait until we experience an American Hiroshima before we wake up to the very real dangers posed by US nuclear policies. We must demand the reversal of these policies and the resumption of constructive engagement with the rest of the world.

    David Krieger is the president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org), and the Deputy Chair of the International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility (www.inesglobal.org). He has written extensively on nuclear dangers.