Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: International Issues

  • Challenging ‘Pre-emption’

    The older I get, the more I become convinced that wisdom is enhanced by age, and I think the same can be said of The Nation magazine. It is more than a good read. It has become, over the years, an essential publication and a voice for the loyal opposition that is needed today as perhaps never before.

    Tonight, I have been asked to speak about Iraq.

    Early this morning came news of the capture of Saddam Hussein. That is good news. Despite his fall from power many months ago, the specter of a possible return to power had cast a constant shadow over Iraq and the Iraqi people. I applaud the tenacious work of the military and intelligence communities for their success today.

    But that success does not diminish the challenges that remain in Iraq, and it certainly does not tamp the passions inflamed against the United States throughout the Muslim world by our actions in Iraq. The capture of Saddam Hussein will not be the keystone for peace in that volatile region. This day’s news does not lessen the danger that the Bush doctrine of pre-emptive strike poses to international peace and stability.

    In order to bring lasting stability to Iraq, that nation needs the help of the entire world, not just America and her fighting needs.

    As each day passes and as more American soldiers are killed and wounded in Iraq, I become ever more convinced that the war in Iraq was the wrong war at the wrong time in the wrong place for the wrong reasons. Contrary to the President’s rosy predictions–and the predictions of others in the Bush Administration–the United States has not been universally greeted as a liberator in Iraq. The peace–if one can use the term “peace” to describe the chronic violence and instability that define Iraq today–the peace is far from being won. Iraqi citizens may be glad that Saddam Hussein is no longer in power, but they appear to be growing increasingly resentful that the United States continues to rule their country at the point of a gun.

    What a huge price we are now paying for the President’s bullheaded rush to invoke the unwise and unprecedented doctrine of pre-emption to invade Iraq, an invasion without provocation, an invasion without the support of the United Nations or the international community.

    It would be tragic enough if the casualties of the Iraq war were confined to the battlefield, but they are not. The casualties of this war will have serious repercussions for generations to come. Truth is one casualty. Despite the best efforts of the White House to contort the invasion of Iraq into an extension of the war on terror, there was never a connection between Saddam Hussein and September 11. There was never a connection between Iraq and September 11. Not a single Iraqi was among the nineteen hijackers of those four planes. Despite dire warnings from the President, Saddam Hussein had at his fingertips neither the means nor the materiel to unleash deadly weapons of mass destruction on the world. Despite presidential rhetoric to the contrary, Iraq did not pose a grave and gathering menace to the security of the United States. The war in Iraq was nothing less than a manufactured war. It was a war served up to a deliberately misled and deluded American public to suit the neoconservative political agenda of the Bush White House.

    A lasting casualty is the international credibility and reputation of the United States of America. We have squandered the good will that had rallied to our side after the attacks of 9/11, attacks that struck just a few short blocks from where we sit tonight. At the end of that fateful day, the world was with us. The French newspaper Le Monde proclaimed, “We Are All Americans.” But we squandered that good will. We turned our sights on Iraq and turned our back on the United Nations. As a result, in some corners of the world, including some corners of Europe and Great Britain, our beloved nation is now viewed as the world bully.

    Finally, and most disheartening to me, Congress allowed the Constitution to become a casualty of the Bush doctrine of pre-emptive strikes. Congress allowed its constitutional authority to declare war to fall victim to this irresponsible strategy. Just a little more than a year ago, in October 2002, the Senate obsequiously handed to the President the constitutional authority to declare war. It failed to debate; it failed to question; it failed to live up to the standards established by the Framers. Like a whipped dog, the Senate put its tail between its legs and slunk away into the shadows, slunk away from its responsibility. Congress–and I mean both houses–Congress delegated its constitutional authority to the President and effectively washed its hands of the fate of Iraq. It is a dark and despicable mark on the escutcheon of Congress.

    The roots of this travesty can be traced directly back to the President’s doctrine of pre-emption, that cockeyed notion that the United States can pre-emptively attack any nation that for whatever reason may–may!–appear to pose a threat in the future. Not only is the doctrine of pre-emption a radical departure from the traditional doctrine of self-defense but it is also a destabilizing influence on world affairs. The Bush doctrine of pre-emption is a dangerous precedent. The Bush doctrine of pre-emption is a reckless policy. The rising tide of anti-Americanism across the globe is directly attributable to the fear and distrust engendered by this Bush doctrine of pre-emption.

    Yet too many Americans are willing–yes, even eager–to swallow the Administration line on pre-emption without examining it, without questioning it, without challenging it.

    Thank God for courageous institutions–like this one–which are willing to stand up to the tide of popular convention. I commend The Nation magazine for filling this vacuum, and I urge you to continue in your mission, without fear, without constraint, and with an unyielding commitment to truth.

    Today, for better or worse, the United States has embroiled itself in the future of Iraq. But that does not mean that we need to continue to be the lone wolf in Iraq. Unfortunately, the Administration’s latest edict to freeze out the French, German, Russian and Canadian companies from Iraq gives me little reason to hope that the President is even remotely interested in internationalizing the political, economic and security reconstruction effort. As a result, the White House continues to feed the perception throughout the world that Iraq’s reconstruction is a spoil of war. Reconstruction contracts, funded with $18.6 billion from the American taxpayer, seemingly have become kickbacks to those countries which dared not speak out–as Germany, France, Russia and Canada did speak out–against a policy of pre-emptive war.

    Like all roads to peace in the Middle East, the path to stability in Iraq may still face obstacles. We cannot precisely what those obstacles will be. But we must demand accountability from the Bush White House. We must continue to raise questions. We must continue to seek the truth. We must continue to speak out against wrongheaded policies and dangerous strategies.

    I am reminded of the closing lines from Tennyson’s “Ulysses”:

    …tho’

    We are not now that strength which in old days
    Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are–
    One equal temper of heroic hearts,
    Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will,
    To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

    For my part, I will continue to speak out, I will continue to challenge, to question, and never to yield in defense of the Constitution, the United States Senate and the American people. For your part, I hope that The Nation magazine will sail on, always serving as an advocate for the truth and an antidote to the tide of imperialism that threatens to encompass our government. Congratulations on your remarkable achievements.

    *Remarks on the 138th Anniversary Celebration of The Nation Magazine in New York City.

  • Toward The 2005 Non-Proliferatioin Treaty Review Conference

    Toward The 2005 Non-Proliferatioin Treaty Review Conference

    The State of the World

    As we move toward the 2005 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference, the world is experiencing increased extremism and instability. The extremism has manifested in the form of significant attacks by clandestine international terrorist organizations, such as those on 9/11, and acts of retaliation by powerful states that may or may not be directly related to the initial assaults. Neither the terrorists nor the state leaders involved have demonstrated reasonable regard for established rules of international law.

    In the background of this clash between extremist organizations and governments lurks the ever present danger of the use of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. The possibility of course exists that groups like al Qaeda could somehow acquire nuclear weapons from a sympathetic state or from criminal elements. Should such a group attain nuclear weapons it is unlikely they could be deterred from using them, particularly since they have no fixed location that could be threatened with retaliation in accord with the theory of deterrence.

    At the same time, the United States has put in place policies that appear to lower the barriers to the use of nuclear weapons. The 2001 Nuclear Posture Review calls for contingency plans to use nuclear weapons against seven countries, including at least four that are non-nuclear weapons states. It is also declared US policy to use nuclear weapons against chemical or biological weapon stores or in retaliation for the use of these weapons.

    With its doctrine of preventive war, the US administration is undermining the system of international law set in place after the Second World War “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.” It has chosen a path of unilateralism and “coalitions of the willing” over multilateral approaches in accord with international law. The US government is further undermining international law by its failure to support many existing treaties and by its active opposition to the creation of an International Criminal Court (ICC) to hold leaders accountable for the most egregious crimes under international law.

    The Role of the NPT

    The NPT was established primarily to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons to states other than the first five nuclear weapon states. The treaty was the brainchild of the US, UK and Russia, who believed that the world would be a safer place if they, along with France and China, controlled the world’s store of nuclear weapons. It was largely a self-serving proposition, not one that offered much inducement for other countries to sign off on nuclear weapons. The NPT bargain contained two elements that presumably benefited the countries that agreed to give up their right to develop or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons. First, the treaty promised them assistance in developing the “peaceful” uses of nuclear energy, going so far as to describe nuclear power as an “inalienable right.” Second, the treaty had provisions that the nuclear weapons states would engage in “good faith” negotiations for nuclear disarmament and called for a cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date.

    The NPT was put forward in 1968 and entered into force in 1970. The non-nuclear weapons states are undoubtedly wondering when the “good faith” negotiations by the nuclear weapons states will begin and why the United States in particular still seems intent on developing new nuclear weapons, such as mini-nukes and “bunker busters.”

    At the 2000 NPT Review Conference the parties to the treaty adopted by consensus a Final Document that contained 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament. These steps included the ratification of a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), negotiations on a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, the preservation and strengthening of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, and called for the nuclear weapons states to take unilateral as well as multilateral steps to achieve nuclear disarmament. It also called for greater transparency with regard to nuclear arsenals and for making irreversibility a principle of nuclear weapons reductions. On virtually every one of these commitments, the US, under the Bush administration, has shown bad faith. It is demonstrating that US commitments are not likely to be honored and that the most powerful country in the world finds nuclear weapons useful and is attempting to make them more usable.

    Iraq, Iran and North Korea

    In his 2001 State of the Union Address, President Bush described Iraq, Iran and North Korea as an Axis of Evil. In 2002 he began mobilizing US troops in the Middle East and threatening Iraq. In March 2003 he initiated a preventive war against Iraq, which his administration justified on the grounds that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction that posed an imminent threat to the US. In the aftermath of the initial combat phase in Iraq, despite extensive searching, no weapons of mass destruction have been located in Iraq.

    Observing the US threats and attacks against Iraq might well have led Iran and North Korea to pursue nuclear weapons programs aimed at deterring US aggression. At this point, North Korea has withdrawn from the NPT, as is its legal right, and Iran is cooperating with inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

    Six nation talks (US, North Korea, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia) have been going on to try to resolve the impasse over North Korea’s withdrawal from the NPT and its declared intention to develop a nuclear arsenal. The CIA estimates that North Korea may currently have one or two nuclear weapons and the materials to make another six or so weapons in the short-term. North Korea is asking for the US to provide it with a non-aggression pact as the price for giving up its nuclear ambitions. It is a small price. The US has vacillated on whether to do this, but recently has indicated its willingness to give informal assurances. It remains unclear whether such assurances will be sufficient to bring North Korea back into the NPT as a non-nuclear weapon state.

    Current Problems with the NPT

    In addition to North Korea’s withdrawal from the treaty, there are other problems. First, its promotion of nuclear energy and nuclear research create the ever-present possibility of countries using the nuclear materials to develop clandestine nuclear weapons programs. Second, it lacks universality and the countries that have refused to join (India, Pakistan and Israel) have all developed nuclear arsenals and have thus, in a sense, been “rewarded” for not joining. Third, there are many unfulfilled commitments, particularly the nuclear disarmament commitments by the nuclear weapons states, which give the appearance that these countries are just making empty promises that they have no intention of keeping.

    There has been virtually no progress on any of the 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament agreed to at the 2000 NPT Review Conference. It is difficult for the non-nuclear weapon states to view this in any way other than as a sign of bad faith on the part of the nuclear weapons states.

    The Role of NGOs

    Given the state of the world and the current problems with the NPT, it seems appropriate for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the disarmament area to question the value of the treaty. What good is a treaty in which the most powerful states do not fulfill their obligations or keep their promises? There is no doubt that the behavior of the nuclear weapon states, and particularly the US, have undermined the value of the NPT and raised serious questions about it in the minds of many observers.

    The New Agenda Coalition (NAC) states have made a diligent effort to get the NPT back on track with their resolutions in the United Nations, but they have been stonewalled by the US and most of its allies. The Middle Powers Initiative, a coalition of eight international non-governmental organizations, has attempted to support and promote the positions of the NAC throughout the world. Through these efforts, they achieved a slight crack in the stone wall when Canada, a NATO member, voted in support of the NAC resolution in the First Committee of the United Nations in November 2003.

    NGOs will likely continue to support and promote the efforts to make the parties to the NPT live up to their obligations, but at the same time are undoubtedly disheartened by the ongoing failure of the nuclear weapon states to meet their obligations or even show minimal good faith. In the years since the NPT was extended indefinitely in 1995 and despite the end of the Cold War, there has been no substantial progress toward the elimination of nuclear weapons.

    NGOs must choose the points of greatest importance and leverage, and stress these in their activities.

    First, it is long past time for the nuclear weapon states to provide legally binding security assurances to the non-nuclear weapon states.

    Second, there should be no regression on the moratorium on nuclear testing.

    Third, there should be far tighter controls of nuclear materials in all states, including the nuclear weapon states.

    In a November 3, 2003 statement to the UN General Assembly, Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General of the IAEA, called for “limiting the processing of weapon-usable material (separated plutonium and high enriched uranium) in civilian nuclear programmes – as well as the production of new material through reprocessing and enrichment – by agreeing to restrict these operations exclusively to facilities under international control.” In light of the increasing dangers of proliferation, it is amazing that such a proposal was not implemented long ago. It is a minimum acceptable standard for what must take place immediately if proliferation to both other states and terrorists is to be prevented. NGOs should certainly support this proposal.

    NGOs should also press for nuclear weapon free zones in the Middle East, Northeast Asia and South Asia. These are dangerous hotspots where the development of nuclear weapons has threatened regional stability and security. To achieve these goals will require concessions by the nuclear weapons states and faster movement toward fulfilling their disarmament obligations under the NPT. A primary activity of NGOs should be to expose the hypocrisy of the nuclear weapon states and try to develop stronger anti-nuclear sentiments among the populations of these countries and translate such sentiments into political power.

    At the moment there are not many hopeful signs, but one that stands out is 2020 Vision: An Emergency Campaign to Ban Nuclear Weapons by the World Conference of Mayors for Peace. This innovative campaign, spearheaded by the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, calls for the 2005 NPT Review Conference to launch “a negotiating process committed to adopting a comprehensive program for progressive and systematic elimination of nuclear weapons by the next NPT Review Conference in 2010,” and then actually eliminating these weapons over the following decade. It is time-bound program that picks up the baton from Abolition 2000.

    I would encourage NGOs to help promote the effort of the World Conference of Mayors for Peace. NGOs must not give up because, in effect, this would be giving up on humanity’s future. That is what is at stake and that is why our work to support the NPT promise of the total elimination of nuclear weapons is so essential.

    David Krieger is the president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). This speech was given on November 23, 2003 at the 2nd Nagasaki Global Citizens’ Assembly for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.

  • The Krakow Initiative: Another Blow from Bush

    On May 31, 2003 in the royal castle of Wawel, Krakow, during a state visit to Poland, U.S. President George W. Bush, delivered another forceful blow. This latest onslaught is part of the hegemonic strategy of absolute domination that the Bush administration has assumed in its efforts to consolidate a unipolar vision of the world that the international community rejects with certain timidity but, with a few exceptions, has ended up accepting in real life.

    Significantly, little is known and even less has been commented on in relation to the so-called “Krakow initiative” or, more formally, the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), in principle aimed at halting the trafficking and increase in weapons of mass destruction (WMD). In formalizing his proposal, Bush’s explanation was as follows: “The greatest threat to peace is the spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. And we must work together to stop proliferation …. When weapons of mass destruction or their components are in transit, we must have the means and authority to seize them.”

    Although he attempted to cloak his words in the rhetoric of legality, the U.S. president promoted and continues to promote a dependent mechanism used by Washington, outside the confines of the United Nations, to control international air space and maritime routes. Initially, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom responded to the call, emphasizing, according to an official statement from the White House released on September 4, 2003, “the need for proactive measures to combat the threat from the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.”

    The goal, to be sure, appears worthy of approval. In practice, however, other nations — Brazil, China, Canada, Russia, South Korea, India, and Pakistan, for the time being, have expressed their concern that the United States seeks to use an instrument of such a scope to strengthen its supremacy in the production of cutting-edge nuclear, ballistic, biological, and chemical technology and to control global transportation routes.

    If the PSI is indeed concretized as conceived by Bush and his strategists, Washington will monopolize espionage, the interception of ships on the high seas and aircraft in international air space, and multilateral control devices, all under the pretext of the simple suspicion that WMD or their components could be in transit.

    The countries that openly oppose the U.S. proposal have pointed to the danger of a quite flexible interpretation of the legal basis for intercepting international transport, as understood by Washington. A first consequence would be the displacement of other producers of weapons and chemical, biological and nuclear products, in favor of the U.S. industrial complex.

    According to the interpretation offered by the Bush administration, almost all cutting-edge technology products can be used in the production of WMD and for the same reason, they can be subject to confiscation by the United States and its allies. This immediately and directly threatens compliance with purchase-sale contracts worldwide and with free international trade, which would become a virtual monopoly of large U.S. corporations and, to a lesser extent, Washington’s European and Asian partners.

    The threat of bioterrorism, for example, which has still not thus far been concretized in specific incidents, has allowed Washington to unilaterally impose much stricter measures of control over foodstuffs and agricultural products exported to the United States and its allied or nearby countries. This, in reality, is an instrument of pressure on exporter countries, which contradicts the norms of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

    In this sense, the law on bioterrorism that is expected to be approved next October is, from the point of view of the Latin American countries, a new and virtually impenetrable barrier to the development of free international trade in agricultural products. This measure, coupled with the U.S. government’s protectionist measures, will sooner than later, cause the collapse of the economies in the region.

    To be sure, no one can have doubts on the importance of strengthening measures to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and in this sense, Bush’s initiative is aimed in the right direction. However, the way in which its functioning has been structured moves away from such real and desirable objectives, to become an element of hegemonic domination.

    The principles that should prevail in the Proliferation Security Initiative should respect international law and the system of norms accepted within the framework of the United Nations. Otherwise, the blow to world legality will be devastating and perhaps definitive.

    *The author is President, Latin American Circle for International Studies (LACIS).

  • Vietnam and Iraq Have More Similarities Than Differences

    CHICAGO — To my immense surprise, I recently ran into the American scholar who, for many correspondents in Vietnam, offered the most fair-minded analysis of the war.

    Suddenly, there was Gerald “Gerry” Hickey at the Chicago Public Library, a little grayer after 35 years, but still much the same, with a big smile on his face and a welcome “Hello!”

    I remembered well how Gerry, then the Rand Corp.’s top man in Vietnam, had meticulously explained for us the cultures and behavior of highland tribes such as the Montagnards, but also the Viet Cong and the “pro-American” Saigon government.

    “And now we’re doing the same thing all over again,” he said as we talked about Iraq. “First, we suffer from the same invincible ignorance about Iraq that we suffered over Vietnamese culture. Second, in Vietnam we set the military impact with no concern about our effect on South Vietnamese culture. By the time we left in 1975, they were just exhausted. They were just tired out — and so was I.

    “It is so sad now that I can see the same mistakes being made in Iraq. The GIs busting down the doors, breaking into homes, doing everything wrong. But, you know something,” he went on, sadness outlining his voice, “I’m shocked at much of what we are seeing in Iraq: The Americans are much crueler than they were in Vietnam. Remember, when American correspondents found American troops burning down houses — that was remarkable then; today it’s the norm.”

    Gerry and I talked a long time that day, mulling over our common experiences, wondering primarily why the United States can’t ever pause to analyze a country correctly, and above all comparing the two conflicts.

    Despite the myriad voices in the press insisting, “Iraq is not a Vietnam!” the indisputable fact is that, if you consider the passions and principles applied there, it really IS another Vietnam. Among the causes for the war are obscurantist theories about foreign threats that have little basis in reality; civilians at the top who play with the soldiers they have never been; and the underlying lies that give credence to special interests (the Bay of Tonkin pretense in Vietnam, the supposed weapons of mass destruction in Iraq).
    In Vietnam, we were following the bizarre notion of the “domino theory,” the idea that a communist Vietnam would mean that all of Southeast Asia would fall to communism. The Johnson administration refused to realize that it was a colonial war, and that in colonial wars, people fight forever.

    With Iraq, the second Bush administration accepted the idea, perfervidly pushed by civilian neoconservatives, that Iraq was the center of terrorism, the cause of 9/11 and an immediate threat, ignoring the Greek chorus of voices warning against such intellectual, military and moral folly.

    Curiosly, in both cases it was civilian ideological fanatics in the Pentagon, enamored of American technology and with no knowledge of history or culture, and not the U.S. military, who pressed for the wars. (It was Robert McNamara and his “whiz kids” then; now it’s Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Richard Perle and others.)

    Perhaps the old American maxim of civilian control of the military might be changed, with what we are seeing, to military control of the civilians.

    Other comparisons of the two wars:

    Today, one hears a doublespeak that almost echoes the communists of the old days. In Vietnam, it was, “We had to destroy the village to save it.” With Iraq, it is President Bush’s statement of last week that “the more successful we are on the ground, the more these killers will react!”

    Today, it’s called “Iraqization.” In Vietnam, it was called “Vietnamization” — late-hour attempts to make everything look as though it’s working. As military historian William Lind wryly remarked to me of Iraqization, “It presumes that because you pay someone, he’s yours.”

    In 1967 in Vietnam, I spent a lot of time interviewing officers and troops all over the country, and I wrote a series of articles that my paper, the Chicago Daily News, headlined with: “The GI Who Asks ‘Why?’” Today’s GIs are beginning to ask that same question.

    America needs to look seriously at these two wars and analyze why it repeatedly gets involved in painful and costly faraway conflicts. Why, when we could with little effort be a great example for mankind, do we allow the driven and arrogant technocrats of the Vietnam era and the cynical and extremist Jacobins today to carry us to war after useless war?

  • Edward W. Said: In Memoriam

    When Words Fail

    In memory of Edward Said

     

    The eye sees but cannot tell

    The heart knows but cannot say

    The mind weeps but cannot cry

    Such feelings do no more

    than announce such a death

     

    To feel this loss

    alone in moments of shared silence
    comes closer to words than words

    as even apt and precious words

    die of grief on our tongue

    never to be born

    or possibly, stillborn

    escaping as if exhaled smoke

    escaping as birds streaking south

    as autumn vanishes

     

    And yet this loss is far from forgetfulness

    the heartbeat of memory lives as before

    his words, his passion, his grace
    remind us daily of anguished absence

    yet equally of haunting presence

    as vital as the lives we lead.

     

    When Edward Said died on September 25th I lost a close and beloved friend, and the world lost a powerful and distinctive presence, one of a handful of public intellectuals whose words literally resonated throughout the entire planet. Edward was an eloquent and distinctive voice on behalf of the Palestinian people, but he was also a most gifted interpreter of the interface between culture and politics, especially in the context of the imperial relationship between the West and the world. His book Orientalism is as widely read and discussed as any single book written in the past several decades, brilliantly accounting for the distorted renderings of the Arab world by Western colonial and post-colonial scholars, and indeed, depicting a whole way of mis-representing that has lethal consequences when enacted in political action. Said’s illuminating critique of how to not see “the other” remains of acute relevance, especially during these days of American military preeminence and expansionist ambitions. Never has our citizenry and leadership been more in need of “self-scrutiny,” beginning with the challenge of listening closely to those others whom we seek to subjugate by force of arms.

    The originality of Edward Said cannot be separated from his life and work. Perhaps, alone among world class scholars and intellectual figures, Edward as a Palestinian living in the United States, was able to express both the reality of Palestinian victimization and the dangerous reality of the United States with its self-anointed mandate to rule the world. His experience and insight were deeply affected by this interplay between a dual identity as a Palestinian “out of place” (as suggested by the title of his autobiography) and as a widely admired American professor of comparative literature at a leading university, but in fundamental respects, also out of place.

    Those of us who had known Edward for a long time were deeply moved by his brave struggle against leukemia for an anguishing period of twelve years. During these years, despite many torments, Edward sustained his struggle and continued to write at a furious pace, and to travel around the world giving lectures to overflowing lecture halls. Periods of exertion alternated with periods of relapse, the disease retreating and advancing in sinister fashion. Toward the end of his life, when asked how he was doing, he would often respond, “It is my anger that keeps me going.”

    It would be a mistake to think of Edward only as an exceptional literary scholar or eloquent advocate of Palestinian rights and critic of Israeli and American wrongs. He was, above all, a complete human being, with a range of talents and appetites, and frailties. I heard him perform as a classical pianist at a wonderful concert given at Columbia University. Edward served for many years as the music critic of The Nation, and was especially appreciated for published commentaries on opera. He was a talented squash and tennis player as I discovered to my despair. Edward cared about all facets of life, valuing friendship, collecting fancy pens, delighting in gourmet food, and indulging in playful banter. It was always hard for me to comprehend how one person could be so accomplished in so many different domains of life. Edward’s son, Wadie, delivering the eulogy at his father’s funeral noted that he never understood how his father managed to write so much because he always seemed to be talking on the phone. And it was astonishing and humbling how he managed to keep in close contact with friends and colleagues, as well as a wide array of journalists from around the world, and yet be so productive even during this last period of illness.

    Edward’s life, scholarship, and personality are inseparable from his engagement with the struggle of the Palestinian people. Ever since the Oslo years, beginning in 1993, Edward stood outside the Palestinian mainstream by his refusal to see any hope for a just peace emerging from such a one-sided process. I recall trying to persuade him to stand within the debate, but he stubbornly refused, and has been vindicated by subsequent developments. Edward resigned from the Palestinian National Council and rejected the leadership of Yasir Arafat, yet remained steadfast in his commitment to Palestinian self-determination. When all realist voices on both sides were trying to craft the contours of a two-state solution, Edward insisted that only a state that brought the two peoples together in a unified political community could bring enduring peace and justice. Again, his prophetic voice is only recently gaining adherents, as more and more observers on both sides, come to realize that the Israelis have created so many “facts on the ground” as to make it impossible at this point to imagine a workable two-state outcome. What is most impressive to me, however, is not this gift of political insight and individuality exhibited by Edward, but rather his strength of will and character, ignoring on principled grounds the pressures of “responsible” and “reasonable” people. I found this capacity and willingness to stand by unpopular beliefs part of what made Edward such an inspirational figure for me and for so many others.

    If we ask about Edward’s legacy, I think it safe to conclude that his such main works as Orientalism and Culture and Imperialism will be read within academic circles for as long as serious cultural and literary reflection persists. As well, Edward is likely to be singled out as an, and possibly as the, exemplary public intellectual of this era, combining first-class scholarship with lucid media commentary on the great events of the day. And finally, Edward’s role in articulating the Palestinian struggle, while appreciating the need to safeguard the future of the Jews in Israel, was a characteristic of his approach that was not appreciated by extremists in either camp. I was struck at the funeral that the great Israeli pianist, David Barenboim, was the only person listed on the formal program who was not a member of the Said family, contributing three beautifully rendered musical works. It was a final expression of Edward’s extraordinary combination of passionate engagement with his even more extraordinary insistence on reconciliation and empathy with the supposed enemy. Edward is gone, but he and his work will not be forgotten.

    A line from the great Palestinian poet, Mahmoud Darwish, perhaps best summarizes both Edward’s life and his legacy: “What use is our thought if not for humanity.” [from “The Hoopoe,” Unfortunately, It Was Paradise] And in a more personal final note, I would endorse the spirit of another line of poetry, this from May Swenson: “Don’t mourn the beloved. Try to be like him.” Edward’s last words to his children was to carry on with the struggle, and in some attenuated sense, I would like to think that we are all Edward’s children!

    *Richard Falk is chair of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara. 

  • Istanbul Mission Statement for the creation of an International Tribunal of Justice on the War and Occupation on Iraq

    Origins of the project

    The idea that had sprung up in several places upon the planet of having an international tribunal against the war in Iraq, was discussed and in principle supported at the Anti-War Meetings in Berlin, Jakarta and Geneva, Paris and Cancun. The Jakarta Peace Consensus made a declaration committing itself to the realization of an international war crimes tribunal. The Networks Conference (European and Cordoba Networks for Peace and Human Rights) organized by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in Brussels also devoted time and space for the discussion of the issue and the idea received broad support.

    The working group formed at the Networks conference organized by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in Brussels on 26/27 June, 2003, discussed the idea and possibilities of convening an international tribunal to investigate and establish the crimes perpetrated against the people of Iraq and humanity. The group in Turkey was entrusted with the task of acting as the secretariat and clearing house, carrying out the coordination in close contact with the groups in Brussels, Hiroshima, New York, London and others.

    The meeting of the Coordination Committee in Istanbul on October 27-29 2003 decided upon the concept, the form and the aims of the project.

    The legitimacy of the project

    A war of aggression was launched despite the opposition of people and governments all over the world, yet there is no court or authority that will judge the acts of the US and its allies. If the official authorities fail, then moral authority can speak for the world.

    Our legitimacy derives from:

    – Taking this initiative owing to the failure of official international institutions to hold accountable those who committed grave international crimes and constitute a menace to world peace.
    – Being part of the worldwide anti-war movement which expressed its opposition to this invasion.
    – The Iraqi people resisting occupation
    – We are convinced of the duty of all people of conscience to take action against wars of aggression, war crimes, crimes against humanity and other breaches of international law.
    – Acting on the basis of the struggles of the past to develop systems of peaceful co-existence and prevent future aggression and breaches of the UN Charter.
    – Giving voice to the voiceless victims of this war we are articulating the concerns of civil society as expressed in the most active parts of the social justice and peace movements.
    – Bringing the principles of international law to the forefront. Our legitimacy is earned through the process of achieving our aims.

    The tasks of the tribunal

    The first task of the tribunal is to investigate the crimes committed by the US government in launching the Iraq war. In spite of the world movement that condemned this war and against all international legislation the US government forced its premeditated war-strategy upon the world. Moreover the US-government requests impunity and puts itself above all international laws and conventions.

    The second task is to investigate allegations of war crimes during the aggression, crimes against occupation law, genocide and crimes against humanity. These may include the sanctions, the use of illegal weapons which kill over generations, such as uranium weapons.
    The third task is the investigate and expose the broader context of the New Imperial World Order. The tribunal would therefore consider the doctrines of “pre-emptive war” and all its entails;benevolent hegemony;full spectrum dominance; and;multiple simultaneous theatre wars; In this process the tribunal will investigate the vast economic interests that are involved in this war-logic.

    The tribunal would, after examining reports and evidence, listening to witnesses (Iraqi and internationals), hearing interventions by victims, would reach a decision.

    The aims

    In organizing this International Tribunal we pursue four fundamental aims. Our first goal is to establish the facts and to inform the public about crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes during the occupation, about the real goals behind this war, about the inspiration of the American politics and the dangers they present for world peace. This is especially important to contribute in breaking the wall of lies diffused by the war-coalition and their imbedded press.

    For the peace movement and the global anti-war protest, the tribunal presents an opportunity to continue mobilization. The tribunal should not remain an academic endeavor but should be backed by a strong international network. Anti-war and peace movements, which carried out the big mass movements against the attack on Iraq have in principle adopted the idea of indicting the aggressors and turning this into a campaign.

    We consider the tribunal as a continuing process. The investigation of what happened in Iraq is of prime importance to restore truth and preserve collective memory against the constant rewriting of history. We have to challenge the silence of the international institutions and impress on them to fulfill their obligations to international law. In judging the recent past our aim is to prevent illegal wars in the future. In this process the tribunal can formulate recommendations on international law and expand notions of justice and ethical political awareness. It can contribute to break the tradition of victors’ tribunals and give a voice to the victims of the war. In doing so we support the demand of large parts of world public opinion and the Iraqi people to end the occupation and restore Iraqi sovereignty.

    The International Tribunal initiative wants to inscribe itself in a broader movement to stop the establishment of the new imperial world order as a permanent state of exception with constant wars as one of its main tools. The Tribunal can bring a moral, political and partly juridical judgment that contributes to build a world of peace and justice.

    Form of the tribunal

    The general plan is to hold an independent world tribunal with : associated events, associated commissions of inquiry, commissions of investigation, hearings and specific issue tribunal sessions in various countries, culminating in a final tribunal session in Istanbul. So far, there will be hearings in Brussels and Hiroshima. Other proposals at the moment include New York, Copenhagen and Mexico. Associated events will be held in London and Mumbaï.

    Being confronted with the paradox that we want to end impunity but we do not have the enforcement legal power to do so, we have to steer a middle way between mere political protest and academic symposiums without any judicial ambition on the one hand, and impeccable procedural trials of which the outcome is known beforehand. This paradox that we are just citizens and therefore have no right to judge in a strict judicial way and have at the same time have the duty as citizens to oppose criminal and war policies should be our starting point and our strength.

    Although these commissions of inquiry or investigation will be working in conformity with an overall concept that will apply to the whole tribunal (spelled out in the Charter), the hearings will also have some autonomy concerning format. By approaching the Iraq case from as many angles as possible (international law, war crimes, occupational law, political and economical analysis…) we strengthen our common objective to end impunity and resist the imperial wars. In this way the hearings will mutually enforce each other and all the findings will be brought together in the final session in Istanbul.

    In order to be as inclusive as possible, we will support and recognize all endeavors to resist impunity. The project will endorse and support the efforts to bring national authorities and warmongers to national (like the complaint against general Tommy Franks in Belgium) or international courts (ICC).

    Timing

    The series of hearings will start on Wednesday April 14 2004 in Brussels and end in final tribunal session in Istanbul that will start on March 20 2005, second anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq. These will be preceded by intensive inquiries, networking and campaigning.

    Appeal to the national and international movements

    We address an appeal to all organizations and individuals to support this project.
    We invite organizations to endorse and participate at various levels. They could:

    1. Undertake to organize a hearing or an associated event.
    2. Host a hearing.
    3. Contribute by contacts, names of people who would qualify to take part in the various components of the tribunal and establish the initial contacts with those people.
    4. Contribute names & contacts of persons and organizations of expertise who are already researching into the various aspects of the crimes and violations in question.
    5. Undertake to follow up with the preparation of certain reports and make them available for the use of the tribunal.
    6. Build a web page in as many languages as possible and constant flow of information.
    7. Undertake to organize the local campaigns around the tribunal.
    8. Contribute financially towards meeting the expenses involved in realizing this tribunal.

     Click here for PDF Version

  • The Emperor Has No Clothes

    Mr. President, the Emperor has no clothes. This entire adventure in Iraq has been based on propaganda and manipulation. Eighty-seven billion dollars is too much to pay for the continuation of a war based on falsehoods.

    In 1837, Danish author, Hans Christian Andersen, wrote a wonderful fairy tale which he titled The Emperor’s New Clothes. It may be the very first example of the power of political correctness. It is the story of the Ruler of a distant land who was so enamored of his appearance and his clothing that he had a different suit for every hour of the day.
    One day two rogues arrived in town, claiming to be gifted weavers. They convinced the Emperor that they could weave the most wonderful cloth, which had a magical property. The clothes were only visible to those who were completely pure in heart and spirit.

    The Emperor was impressed and ordered the weavers to begin work immediately. The rogues, who had a deep understanding of human nature, began to feign work on empty looms.

    Minister after minister went to view the new clothes and all came back exhorting the beauty of the cloth on the looms even though none of them could see a thing.

    Finally a grand procession was planned for the Emperor to display his new finery. The Emperor went to view his clothes and was shocked to see absolutely nothing, but he pretended to admire the fabulous cloth, inspect the clothes with awe, and, after disrobing, go through the motions of carefully putting on a suit of the new garments.

    Under a royal canopy the Emperor appeared to the admiring throng of his people – – all of whom cheered and clapped because they all knew the rogue weavers’ tale and did not want to be seen as less than pure of heart.

    But, the bubble burst when an innocent child loudly exclaimed, for the whole kingdom to hear, that the Emperor had nothing on at all. He had no clothes. That tale seems to me very like the way this nation was led to war.

    We were told that we were threatened by weapons of massestruction in Iraq, but they have not been seen.

    We were told that the throngs of Iraqi’s would welcome our troops with flowers, but no throngs or flowers appeared.

    We were led to believe that Saddam Hussein was connected to the attack on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, but no evidence has ever been produced.

    We were told in 16 words that Saddam Hussein tried to buy “yellow cake” from Africa for production of nuclear weapons, but the story has turned into empty air.

    We were frightened with visions of mushroom clouds, but they turned out to be only vapors of the mind.

    We were told that major combat was over but 101 [as of October 17] Americans have died in combat since that proclamation from the deck of an aircraft carrier by our very own Emperor in his new clothes.

    Our emperor says that we are not occupiers, yet we show no inclination to relinquish the country of Iraq to its people.

    Those who have dared to expose the nakedness of the Administration’s policies in Iraq have been subjected to scorn. Those who have noticed the elephant in the room — that is, the fact that this war was based on falsehoods – have had our patriotism questioned. Those who have spoken aloud the thought shared by hundreds of thousands of military families across this country, that our troops should return quickly and safely from the dangers half a world away, have been accused of cowardice. We have then seen the untruths, the dissembling, the fabrication, the misleading inferences surrounding this rush to war in Iraq wrapped quickly in the flag.

    The right to ask questions, debate, and dissent is under attack. The drums of war are beaten ever louder in an attempt to drown out those who speak of our predicament in stark terms.

    Even in the Senate, our history and tradition of being the world’s greatest deliberative body is being snubbed. This huge spending bill has been rushed through this chamber in just one month. There were just three open hearings by the Senate Appropriations Committee on $87 billion, without a single outside witness called to challenge the Administration’s line.

    Ambassador Bremer went so far as to refuse to return to the appropriations Committee to answer additional questions because, and I quote: “I don’t have time. I’m completely booked, and I have to get back to Baghdad to my duties.”

    Despite this callous stiff-arm of the Senate and its duties to ask questions in order to represent the American people, few dared to voice their opposition to rushing this bill through these halls of Congress. Perhaps they were intimidated by the false claims that our troops are in immediate need of more funds.

    But the time has come for the sheep-like political correctness which has cowed members of this Senate to come to an end.

    Mr. President, the Emperor has no clothes. This entire adventure in Iraq has been based on propaganda and manipulation. Eighty-seven billion dollars is too much to pay for the continuation of a war based on falsehoods.

    Mr. President, taking the nation to war based on misleading rhetoric and hyped intelligence is a travesty and a tragedy. It is the most cynical of all cynical acts. It is dangerous to manipulate the truth. It is dangerous because once having lied, it is difficult to ever be believed again. Having misled the American people and stampeded them to war, this Administration must now attempt to sustain a policy predicated on falsehoods. The President asks for billions from those same citizens
    who know that they were misled about the need to go to war. We misinformed and insulted our friends and allies and now this Administration is having more than a little trouble getting help from the international community. It is perilous to mislead.

    The single-minded obsession of this Administration to now make sense of the chaos in Iraq, and the continuing propaganda which emanates from the White House painting Iraq as the geographical center of terrorism is distracting our attention from Afghanistan and the 60 other countries in the world where terrorists hide. It is sapping resources which could be used to make us safer from terrorists on our own
    shores. The body armor for our own citizens still has many, many chinks. Have we forgotten that the most horrific terror attacks in history occurred right here at home!! Yet, this Administration turns back money for homeland security, while the President pours billions into security for Iraq. I am powerless to understand or explain such a policy.

    I have tried mightily to improve this bill. I twice tried to separate the reconstruction money in this bill, so that those dollars could be considered separately from the military spending. I offered an amendment to force the Administration to craft a plan to get other nations to assist the troops and formulate a plan to get the U.N. in, and the U.S. out, of Iraq. Twice I tried to rid the bill of expansive, flexible authorities that turn this $87 billion into a blank check. The American people should understand that we provide more foreign aid
    for Iraq in this bill, $20.3 billion, than we provide for the rest of the entire world! I attempted to remove from this bill billions in wasteful programs and divert those funds to better use. But, at every turn, my efforts were thwarted by the vapid argument that we must all support the requests of the Commander in Chief.

    I cannot stand by and continue to watch our grandchildren become increasingly burdened by the billions that fly out of the Treasury for a war and a policy based largely on propaganda and prevarication. We are borrowing $87 billion to finance this adventure in Iraq. The President is asking this Senate to pay for this war with increased debt, a debt that will have to be paid by our children and by those same troops that are currently fighting this war. I cannot support outlandish tax cuts that plunge our country into potentially disastrous debt while our troops are fighting and dying in a war that the White House chose to begin.

    I cannot support the continuation of a policy that unwisely ties down 150,000 American troops for the foreseeable future, with no end in sight.

    I cannot support a President who refuses to authorize the reasonable change in course that would bring traditional allies to our side in Iraq.

    I cannot support the politics of zeal and “might makes right” that created the new American arrogance and unilateralism which passes for foreign policy in this Administration.

    I cannot support this foolish manifestation of the dangerous and destabilizing doctrine of preemption that changes the image of America into that of a reckless bully.

    Mr. President, the emperor has no clothes. And our former allies around the world were the first to loudly observe it.

    I shall vote against this bill because I cannot support a policy based on prevarication. I cannot support doling out 87 billion of our hard-earned tax dollars when I have so many doubts about the wisdom of its use.

    Mr. President, I began my remarks with a fairy tale. I shall close my remarks with a horror story, in the form of a quote from the book Nuremberg Diaries, written by G.M. Gilbert, in which the author interviews Hermann Goering.

    Mr. President, I began my remarks with a fairy tale. I shall close my remarks with a horror story, in the form of a quote from the book Nuremberg Diaries, written by G.M. Gilbert, in which the author interviews Hermann Goering.

    “We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction.

    “. . . But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship.

    “There is one difference,” I pointed out. “In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars.”

    “Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.”

  • Declaration of the Ministers of the New Agenda Coalition

    1. The Foreign Ministers of Egypt, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden and Brazil met at the 58th session of the United Nations General Assembly to review developments on nuclear disarmament and to renew their commitment to achieve a world free from nuclear weapons.

    2. The Ministers paid tribute to the memory of Anna Lindh, Foreign Minister of Sweden, on the occasion of her sad passing away, and deplored the loss of a devoted colleague who had been a driving force in the common cause.

    3. The Ministers expressed their deep concern at the lack of progress to date in the implementation of the thirteen steps on nuclear disarmament to which all States parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons agreed at the 2000 NPT Review Conference.

    4. The Ministers stressed that each article of the NPT is binding on the respective States parties, at all times and in all circumstances, and that all States parties must be held fully accountable with respect to the strict compliance of their obligations under the Treaty, and reiterated that the implementation of undertakings therein on nuclear disarmament remains the imperative.

    5. The Ministers recalled that a fundamental pre-requisite for promoting nuclear non-proliferation is the continuous irreversible progress in nuclear arms reduction. In this context, they called upon the Russian Federation and the United States of America to make the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions (“the Moscow Treaty”) irreversible and verifiable and to address non-operational warheads, thus making it a nuclear disarmament measure.

    6. The Ministers stressed that the recent international debate on weapons of mass destruction has only highlighted that the sole guarantee against the use of any weapon of mass destruction anywhere, including nuclear weapons, is their total elimination and the assurance that they will never be used or produced again.

    7. The Ministers reiterated their deep concern at emerging approaches to the broader role of nuclear weapons as part of security strategies, including rationalizations for the use of, and the development of new types of nuclear weapons.

    8. The Ministers urged the international community to intensify its efforts to achieve universal adherence to the NPT. They called on India, Israel and Pakistan to accede to the Treaty as non-nuclear-weapon States and to place their facilities under comprehensive IAEA safeguards. They recalled the commitment of all NPT States parties to promote the universality of the NPT.

    9. The Ministers expressed their deep concern with the announcement by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea of its intention to withdraw from the NPT and related developments. In this connection they called upon the DPRK to reconsider and supported all efforts for an early, peaceful resolution of the situation, leading to the DPRK’s return to full compliance with the provisions of the NPT.

    10. The Ministers stressed that the International Atomic Energy Agency must be able to verify and ensure that nuclear facilities of the States Parties of the NPT are being used for peaceful purposes only, and called upon States to cooperate fully and immediately with the International Atomic Energy Agency in resolving issues arising from the implementation of their respective obligations towards the Agency.

    11. The Ministers reaffirmed their conviction that the establishment of internationally recognized nuclear-weapon-free zones on the basis of arrangements freely arrived at among the States of the regions concerned enhances global and regional peace and security, strengthens the nuclear non-proliferation regime and contributes towards realizing the objective of nuclear disarmament, and in this regard they expressed their hope that more regions would follow this path.

    12. The Ministers underlined the significance of the current NPT review process to assess progress in implementation and to consider actions needed on nuclear disarmament. They stressed the importance that the Third Preparatory Committee of the 2005 NPT Review Conference submits substantive recommendations regarding nuclear disarmament, as well as on the matter of security assurances to the Review Conference.

    13. The Ministers highlighted that multilateralism must remain at the forefront of all international security efforts and, with the purpose of contributing further to the objective of a nuclear-weapon-free world, stressed that their initiative will continue to be pursued with determination and announced their intention to submit two draft resolutions – entitled “Towards a nuclear weapon free world: a new agenda” and “Reductions of non-strategic nuclear weapons”- to the 58th session of the General Assembly.

    — Declaration issued by the Foreign Ministers of the New Agenda Coalition (NAC), United Nations Headquarters, New York, 23 September 2003

  • Mistakes of Vietnam repeated with Iraq

    “Welcome to Vietnam, Mr. President. Sorry you didn’t go when you had the chance.”

    The president of the United States decides to go to war against a nation led by a brutal dictator supported by one-party rule. That dictator has made war on his neighbors. The president decides this is a threat to the United States.

    In his campaign for president he gives no indication of wanting to go to war. In fact, he decries the overextension of American military might and says other nations must do more. However, unbeknownst to the American public, the president’s own Pentagon advisers have already cooked up a plan to go to war. All they are looking for is an excuse.

    Based on faulty intelligence, cherry-picked information is fed to Congress and the American people. The president goes on national television to make the case for war, using as part of the rationale an incident that never happened. Congress buys the bait — hook, line and sinker — and passes a resolution giving the president the authority to use “all necessary means” to prosecute the war.

    The war is started with an air and ground attack. Initially there is optimism. The president says we are winning. The cocky, self-assured secretary of defense says we are winning. As a matter of fact, the secretary of defense promises the troops will be home soon.

    However, the truth on the ground that the soldiers face in the war is different than the political policy that sent them there. They face increased opposition from a determined enemy. They are surprised by terrorist attacks, village assassinations, increasing casualties and growing anti-American sentiment. They find themselves bogged down in a guerrilla land war, unable to move forward and unable to disengage because there are no allies to turn the war over to.

    There is no plan B. There is no exit strategy. Military morale declines. The president’s popularity sinks and the American people are increasingly frustrated by the cost of blood and treasure poured into a never-ending war.

    Sound familiar? It does to me.

    The president was Lyndon Johnson. The cocky, self-assured secretary of defense was Robert McNamara. The congressional resolution was the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. The war was the war that I, U.S. Sens. John Kerry, Chuck Hagel and John McCain and 3 1/2 million other Americans of our generation were caught up in. It was the scene of America’s longest war. It was also the locale of the most frustrating outcome of any war this nation has ever fought.

    Unfortunately, the people who drove the engine to get into the war in Iraq never served in Vietnam. Not the president. Not the vice president. Not the secretary of defense. Not the deputy secretary of defense. Too bad. They could have learned some lessons:

    Don’t underestimate the enemy. The enemy always has one option you cannot control. He always has the option to die. This is especially true if you are dealing with true believers and guerillas fighting for their version of reality, whether political or religious. They are what Tom Friedman of The New York Times calls the “non-deterrables.” If those non-deterrables are already in their country, they will be able to wait you out until you go home.

    If the enemy adopts a “hit-and-run” strategy designed to inflict maximum casualties on you, you may win every battle, but (as Walter Lippman once said about Vietnam) you can’t win the war.

    If you adopt a strategy of not just pre-emptive strike but also pre-emptive war, you own the aftermath. You better plan for it. You better have an exit strategy because you cannot stay there indefinitely unless you make it the 51st state.

    If you do stay an extended period of time, you then become an occupier, not a liberator. That feeds the enemy against you.

    . If you adopt the strategy of pre-emptive war, your intelligence must be not just “darn good,” as the president has said; it must be “bulletproof,” as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld claimed the administration’s was against Saddam Hussein. Anything short of that saps credibility.

    If you want to know what is really going on in the war, ask the troops on the ground, not the policy-makers in Washington.

    In a democracy, instead of truth being the first casualty in war, it should be the first cause of war. It is the only way the Congress and the American people can cope with getting through it. As credibility is strained, support for the war and support for the troops go downhill. Continued loss of credibility drains troop morale, the media become more suspicious, the public becomes more incredulous and Congress is reduced to hearings and investigations.

    Instead of learning the lessons of Vietnam, where all of the above happened, the president, the vice president, the secretary of defense and the deputy secretary of defense have gotten this country into a disaster in the desert.

    They attacked a country that had not attacked us. They did so on intelligence that was faulty, misrepresented and highly questionable.

    A key piece of that intelligence was an outright lie that the White House put into the president’s State of the Union speech. These officials have overextended the American military, including the National Guard and the Reserve, and have expanded the U.S. Army to the breaking point.

    A quarter of a million troops are committed to the Iraq war theater, most of them bogged down in Baghdad. Morale is declining and casualties continue to increase. In addition to the human cost, the war in dollars costs $1 billion a week, adding to the additional burden of an already depressed economy.

    The president has declared “major combat over” and sent a message to every terrorist, “Bring them on.” As a result, he has lost more people in his war than his father did in his and there is no end in sight.

    Military commanders are left with extended tours of duty for servicemen and women who were told long ago they were going home. We are keeping American forces on the ground, where they have become sitting ducks in a shooting gallery for every terrorist in the Middle East.

    –Max Cleland, former U.S. senator, was head of the Veterans Administration in the Carter administration. He teaches at American University in Washington.

  • What Victory?

    What Victory?

    What a difference a few months can make.

    At the end of April 2003, just four months ago, Donald Rumsfeld was in the Qatar headquarters of General Tommy Franks, effusively comparing the US victory in Iraq to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the liberation of Paris.

    The fall of the Berlin Wall marked the end of the Cold War and a reuniting of East and West, and the people of Paris actually welcomed the Allied forces as liberators from the Nazis in World War II. In neither case was it necessary for American forces to remain as an occupying force; in neither case did the US government have its eyes on the oil.

    As Rumsfeld savored US military dominance over the far inferior Iraqi forces, he triumphantly crowed, “Never have so many been so wrong about so much.” He was presumably referring to the “many” who doubted American military tactics in the war, not those who thought the war was immoral, illegal and unnecessary.

    It was clearly a day of jubilation for Rumsfeld and he was enjoying trumpeting to the world that he had been right all along.

    A few days later, a triumphant George W. Bush, dressed up like a combat pilot, was flown some thirty miles off the California coast to the flight deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. Bush announced to the assembled troops on the carrier that major combat operations in Iraq had ended.

    Bush said: “With new tactics and precision weapons, we can achieve military objectives without directing violence against civilians.” He did not mention that approximately twice as many innocent civilians died in the Iraq War as had died on September 11th. Nor did not mention the Iraqi children who had lost arms and legs and parents as a result of the war, and would carry their injuries through their lives.

    The president, looking to all the world like the military hero he was not, continued: “No device of man can remove the tragedy from war.” He did not say, presumably because he did not think, that with wisdom the tragedy of war might be prevented. Nor did he say that, in the case of this war, it was initiated illegally without UN authorization based on arguments by him and his administration to the American people that the Iraqi regime posed the threat of imminent use of weapons of mass destruction.

    The combat pilot impersonator went on, “Yet it is a great advance when the guilty have far more to fear from war than the innocent.” He might have added that this is especially true when it is he and his colleagues, and them alone, who decide who is guilty and who is innocent.

    As the television cameras rolled on, Bush said, “The battle of Iraq is one victory in a war on terror that began on September 11, 2001, and still goes on.” Four months out his perspective on victory is questionable, and there remains no established link between the regime of Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 terrorists. He was also wrong to conclude that the “battle of Iraq” was a victory or had ended.

    While an action doll of Bush in military garb is being marketed across the country, almost daily young Americans in the occupation force are being killed in what now appears to be an on-going war of liberation from the Americans.

    Saboteurs are blowing up and setting fire to oil pipelines, disrupting water supplies, and attacking UN relief workers. US occupation forces appear helpless to stop the new terrorists that have been created as a result of this war.

    The former Army Chief of Staff, General Eric Shinseki, had argued for a far larger occupying force in Iraq. Rumsfeld overruled him, concluding that a larger force wasn’t needed. It now appears that General Shinseki was right and Rumsfeld was wrong.

    The weapons of mass destruction that the Bush administration alluded to in order to frighten the American people and justify the war have not been found, despite our being told by Cheney that he knew where they were located.

    Four months after Rumsfeld crowed about the liberation of Paris and Bush declared an end to the major combat phase of the war, there is a deadly continuing war of attrition against US and British troops in Iraq. America, far from being hailed as a liberator, has created even more enemies in the Middle East and terrorists seem to be growing in numbers and boldness.

    Paraphrasing Rumsfeld, who himself was paraphrasing Churchill, it might be said: “Never have so few been so wrong about so much.” Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney and Wolfowitz are the leaders of the militant and shortsighted few. There has been no victory in Iraq, and under the circumstances victory is not possible. We now need a public dialogue on how best to extract ourselves from the perilous situation these men have created before we become ensnared in an oil-driven equivalent of the Vietnam War.

    The starting point for ending this peril is to awaken the American people by a full and open Congressional investigation of the misrepresentations by the Bush administration regarding Iraq’s purported weapons of mass destruction as a pretext for the war. In Britain, the misrepresentations of the Blair government are being vigorously investigated by Parliament, but in the US an investigation of the Bush administration is being blocked by Congressional Republicans. What is needed is an investigation as rigorous as that being pursued in Britain.

    Additionally, as an intermediate step to transferring full administrative authority to the Iraqi people, the United States and Coalition Forces should move immediately to turn over authority for the administration of Iraq to the United Nations. Such a recommendation assumes, perhaps too readily, that the UN would be willing to accept this role and would be able to act with sufficient independence of Washington. By entrusting the future of Iraq to the UN, the United States would make clear that it is not administering Iraq in order to dictate the political future of the country or to enrich US-led corporations with ties to the Bush administration. It would also allow for sharing the security burden in Iraq and make possible the earlier return of the US troops presently in Iraq.
    *David Krieger is the president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is the editor of Hope in a Dark Time (Capra Press, 2003).