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Today's
Stories
October 15,
2004
Leah Caldwell
From
Supermax to Abu Ghraib: the Masterminds of Torture and Abuse
October 14,
2004
Darcy Richardson
The
Other Progressive Candidate: the Lonely Crusade of Walt Brown
Willliam A.
Cook
Turning
Myths into Truth
Laura Santina
Water, Women and War
Evelyn Pringle
Free Speech Banned by Big Pharma: What You Can't Say About Drug
Importation
Alan Farago
Lessons
from Nature
Rep. Maxine Waters
A Letter to Colin Powell on Haiti
Nicole Colson
Maimed
for Oil and Empire
October 13,
2004
Bishop Thomas
Gumbleton and Bill Quigley
Aftermath
of a Coup: The Other Disaster in Haiti
Sharon Smith
Barak
O-Bomb-a?: Democrats Target Iran
Christopher Brauchli
God and the Bush Administration
Mike Whitney
The Real Meaning of the Hamdi Case
Paul de Rooij
Amnesty
International: a False Beacon?
Website of
the Day
Operation
Truth
October 12,
2004
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
"Indian
Country"
Greg Bates
The Year of Voting Dangerously: a Survey Request of Nader Voters
in Swing States
Steven Conn
Progressives as Pawns: Kerry's War on Nader
Jason Leopold
Under Cheney, Halliburton Helped Saddam Siphon Billions from
UN Oil-for-Food Program
Security Scholars
for a Sensible Foreign Policy
Time for a Change of Course
Timothy J. Freeman
Dying for a Mistake
Pierre Tristam
Deconstructing Bush
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The 2nd Debate: the Blurring of Act and Audience
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Israel as Sideshow
Website of the Day
John Kerry's Personal Off-Shore Tax Shelters
October 11,
2004
Robert Fisk
Iraq:
Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises
Kevin Pina
The
Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti
Patrick Gavin
Rethinking
Columbus Day
Chris Floyd
Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan
Daniel Wolff
Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most
Dangerous Nuclear Plant
Walter Brasch
The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and
40% of All Americans
Mike Whitney
The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink
Ari Shavit
"He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with
Sharon's Lawyer
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Debates and the Big Lie
Website of the Day
Dylan's Greatest Recording?
October 9 /
10, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
"There
Are No Innocents"
Paul de Rooij
Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry
Adams
M. Shahid Alam
Making Sense of Our Times
Laura Carlsen
Protest and Populism in Latin America
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court
Col. Dan Smith
Bush's Credibility Gap
Paul Craig
Roberts
Faith-Based Economics
Greg Bates
What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand?
Joshua Frank
Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left
Felice Pace
Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable
Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement
Walter A. Davis
Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium
William A.
Cook
The Agony of Colin Powell
Phyllis Pollack
Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later
Poets' Basement
Klipschutz, Albert, Ford
Website of the Weekend
Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes
October 8,
2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
The
Israeli Invasion of Gaza
Moshe Adler
Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities
David Swanson
Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition
to Iraq War
Dave Zirin
CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team!
Rep. Ron Paul
The Draft is a Form of Slavery
William S. Lind
Keeping Our SA Up
Samar Assad
Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine
Jim Ingalls
and Sonali Kolhatkar
The Elections in Afghanistan
October 7,
2004
Dave Lindorff
All
Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air
Masha Hamilton
Fear in Kandahar
Christopher
Brauchli
Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay
Jason Leopold
Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush?
Bruce K. Gagnon
Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida
Meredith Kolodner
Where
is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge
October 6,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
"Please,
Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah
Ron Jacobs
Going
Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives
Michael Colby
The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead?
Tarif Abboushi
More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates
Matthew Behrens
Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood
Mike Whitney
Rethinking WMDs
John Pilger
Stealing Diego Garcia
Ben Tripp
Kerry's "Triumph"
Kevin McKiernan
Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target
Patrick Cockburn
Elections
Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq
Website of the Day
Is There an Islamic Problem?
October 5,
2004
Anthony Loewenstein
Rupert
Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes"
Mark Clinton
and Tony Udell
The
Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran
Greg Bates
Trading
Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman
Dave Lindorff
What's
the Frequency, Karl?
Norm Dixon
Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers
Larry Kearney
God Talk and Burning Children
Bill Linville
Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government
Gary Leupp
What
Edwards Should Ask Cheney
Website of
the Day
A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate
October 4,
2004
Diane Christian
The
Gates of Hell
Joshua Frank
An Interview with David Cobb
Doug Giebel
Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie?
John Chuckman
Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump
Ramzy Baroud
Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage
Julia Stein
Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM
Sean Donahue
Outsourcing
Terror: Kerry and Special Forces
Website of
the Day
Mapping
Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks
October 2 /
3. 2004
Paul Wright
John
Kerry on Criminal Justice
Kathleen and Bill Christison
An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris
Kathie Helmkamp
My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill
Phillip Cryan
Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia
Lenni Brenner
The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel"
Ron Jacobs
It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia
Ben Tripp
Sticker Shock
William S.
Lind
The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces
Dave Zirin
The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC
Dave Lindorff
Lies from the Great Debate
Luscon Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway
Zoe Moskovitz
& Sasha Kramer
Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti
Nelson P. Valdes
Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned
Cuban Academics
Alan Farago
The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades
Nancy Haley
What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us?
Alex Billet
Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years
Steve Fesenmaier
Save and Burn: The War on Libraries
Poets' Basement
Smith, Holt, Albert
October 1,
2004
Steve Breyman
Kerry's
Missed Opportunities
Rose Gentle
My
Son Died for a Lie
Lee Sustar
Iran
in the Crosshairs
Ralph Nader
What
We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy?
Walter Andrews
We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever
Mike Whitney
Pandora's
Government
Mickey Z.
Debate
This
Saul Landau
The
Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
October 15, 2004
Empire of Insanity
Kerry's
Iraq Numbers
By
GREG BATES
Where's Richard Nixon when you need
him?
Taking a leaf from his record
on sustainable energy, John Kerry now wants to make the war in
Iraq sustainable. Just for today, let's put aside all our objections
to the carnage and look at it from Kerry's point of view.
Some progressives cling to
the hope that a vote for Kerry is a vote for peace. Such wishful
thinking could lead many to breathe a mistaken sigh of relief
in the event of a Kerry victory. We need an accurate picture
of what Kerry's game plan means so that protests continue to
grow. On October 13, 2004 The Wall Street Journal provided
a sobering antidote to progressive hopes, by pegging Kerry right.
It stated on the front page that, "On Iraq and the war on
terror, George Bush and John Kerry differ mainly on tactics,
assessments, and tone, while sharing the same broad goals."
But even within Kerry's own
framework, the numbers don't add up.
Kerry's plan for reducing what
we might call the empire man's burden is to build an international
coalition so that we don't continue to "bear 90% of the
costs and 90% of the casualties." Of course, we'll leave
aside the fact that while our dead number 1,100 or so, Iraqi
dead number over 30,000, making our burden of the dead 3 percent,
not 90%.
As Alex Cockburn put it powerfully,
Kerry's attempts at coalition building would be about as fruitful
as General Custer asking the Canadians for help prior to his
last stand. Imagine being a world leader, Jacque Chirac, say,
and you get the call from President Kerry. Kerry is willing to
give you lucrative reconstruction contracts, a share of the oil.
Tempting, but you look over your shoulder at the electorate.
In Spain, voters replaced their government because they got embroiled
in this war. Or you ponder the fate of Tony Blair, who is hanging
onto his career by his fingernails, having exhausted all domestic
political capital by his support of Bush.
As you consider this request
to put your troops and your career on the line, you might recall
Kerry's language during the first presidential debate. He said
he would "lead" the coalition. Shouldn't Kerry be talking
more about building consensus with you as your equal, and less
about leading you? Wouldn't you find the assumption of a U.S.
president that he is your leader an insult?
You might want to clue Kerry
in to what's really going on in Iraq by gently telling a story
or two from your days in the military fighting a hopeless war
in Algeria. Chirac warned Bush and the world prior to the invasion,
but it fell on deaf ears.
Taking a brief break from this
fantasy, recall that Kerry has criticized Bush's coalition as
"the coerced and the bribed." Yet Kerry has also criticized
Bush for not giving reconstruction contracts to countries that
didn't participate in the invasion. Putting those two statements
together, we can see more clearly what Kerry's beef really is:
Bush's bribes weren't big enough!
Let's return to Kerry's fantasy
and assume he offers you, as leader of your country, bribes that
you just can't resist. You say, okay, I'll risk my troops for
your war. For the sake of considering what a Kerry success would
mean, let's say you commit 10,000 soldiers, an amount that exceeds
the 8,000 or so British troops. Then Kerry goes on to score similar
commitments from 4 other countries, expanding the coalition by
5, raking in foreign troops to be used as fodder to the tune
of 50,000 soldiers. It would be a huge win, beyond what I believe
even Kerry would hope for.
(Note that there is a plausible
path to coalition building, but Kerry, or any other American
president, would never take it. Shortly after the heinous train
bombings in Madrid on March 11 2004, the socialists were swept
into office, replacing the conservatives who had earlier defied
the 80% of the population that didn't want Spanish troops in
Iraq. But contrary to the impression given by widespread media
reports, the newly elected Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez
Zapatero, did not pledge to remove his 1,300 troops unconditionally.
Rather, he was more nuanced, saying:
"If the United Nations
does not take over the situation and there is not a rethinking
of this chaotic occupation we are living through, in which there
are more dead in the occupation than in the war phase, the Spanish
troops are going to return to Spain."
That is a call for the use
of force in accordance with international law. If we stay in
Iraq it must be under UN, not U.S. auspices. It's just the kind
of cooperation one might think John Kerry is advocating: avoid
unilateralism, work through international institutions.
But Kerry rebuked Zapatero
unequivocally. The Boston Globe of March 19, 2004, quoted
him as saying, "I call on Prime Minister Zapatero to reconsider
his decision and to send a message that terrorists cannot win
by their acts of terror." In other words, simply saying
that you require a UN mandate to participate in occupying a country
is, in effect, sending the wrong message to terrorists.
So coalition building, at least
from a European perspective, might be possible, but is hampered
by the U.S. insistence that its forces remain outside international
law.)
It is this unlikely coalition
that is the basis for Kerry's claim that, by the end of 2005,
he can reduce the number of American soldiers in Iraq.
Here's why, even if Kerry succeeded,
that plan is insane. Kerry quotes General Shinseki, the Army
chief of staff as saying we needed several hundred thousand troops
to pacify Iraq. From a rational perspective, Kerry's criticism
of Bush for not implementing Shinseki's recommendation is essentially,
we should have hammered them harder; your war crime just wasn't
big enough. But putting aside the matter of criminality, let's
just accept that a grisly pacification of Iraq is a good idea.
Remember, from Kerry's perspective, we are the good guys.
It follows that if we didn't
have enough troops then, we don't have enough troops now. If
we needed several hundred thousand back at the initial invasion
(back when we could make a dubious claim to be improving life
for Iraqis by ousting Saddam) how many more do you think we need
today, now that we are accurately perceived as occupiers and
torturers? For the sake of argument, let's stay in denial of
the hardening Iraqi resolve and believe that we can still "win"
with Shinseki's earlier estimate of just a few hundred thousand
troops. To give Kerry the benefit of the doubt, let's lean toward
a Rumsfeldian optimism and hope Kerry can get the job done on
the cheap for 200,000.
As of September, we reportedly
have some 110,000 troops in Iraq. Top that up with a hugely optimistic
50,000 foreign troops to 160,000 and we're still at least 40,000
troops short of what's needed to "win the peace." In
other words, we need an increase in our own troop strength of
more than one-third (110,000 plus 40,000), and that's based on
the assumption that we get more foreign troops than any rational
estimate would suggest.
If Shinseki's number really
is right, and several hundred thousand are needed, not 200,000,
then even armed with Kerry's fantasy coalition, we'll be short
over 100,000 troops. To do the job, and I shudder what that term
really would mean in this context, we might easily have to double
American troop presence in Iraq. It's the best evidence I've
seen for predicting a return of the draft.
You can see now why I pine
for Nixon. Running for election in 1968, he was smart enough
to claim he had a secret plan to end the war, which had to remain
classified. Even though he later intensified the war, he knew
what people wanted to hear. He gave it to them and they bought
it. It's easy to see why Kerry, in contrast, is less popular
than Nixon: Kerry's pledge to win the peace is a public plan
to escalate the war.
Greg Bates is the founding publisher at Common
Courage Press and author of Ralph's
Revolt: The Case For Joining Nader's Rebellion. He can be
reached at gbates@commoncouragepress.com.
Weekend
Edition Features for September 18 / 19, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Forgeries,
Fingerprints and Forensic Fakery
Jeffrey St. Clair
High Plains Grifter: Bush's Mask of Anarchy
Patrick Cockburn
Into the Abyss: the Week Iraq's Dream of Peace Fell Apart
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Financial Torture (Asset Forfeiture)
Joe Allen
The Comrades Kerry Abandoned: the Real Story of Vietnam Vets
Against the War
George Corsetti
Poletown Revisited: Finally, Some Vindication
Scott Handleman
The Knock-Knock of a Sledgehammer: Sequestered in Nablus
Richard Ward
Two Weeks in Beit Arabiya
Conn Hallinan
Ashcroft and Indonesia
Lori Smith
Health Care in America: And Then I Got Sick...
Dave Zirin
Hold the Booyah!: SportsCenter Out of the Middle East
John L. Hess
Rather Will Take the Heat, As Bush's War Deteriorates
Brian J. Foley
W is for Wimp: So Why do Manly Men Love Him?
Mickey Z.
Pat Tillman and Osama bin Laden: Odd Juxtapositions
Poets' Basement
Vest, Landau & Albert
Website of the Weekend
Eye on the NYTs
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