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Here's the second in Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair's series as they describe Hillary Clinton's years in Little Rock and her narrow escape from federal charges that would have destroyed her political career for ever. PLUS KEVIN ALEXANDER GRAY on how Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards are failing Black America even as they hunt for votes in So uth Carolina's "Black Primary." Get your copy today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Remember contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now
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Today's Stories August 28, 2007 Uri
Avnery Bill
Quigley Charles
Peña Anthony
Papa
Jorge
Mariscal Bill
Christison Manuel
Garcia, Jr. Anthony
DiMaggio Bruce
A. Roth John
Walsh Dave
Lindorff Ron
Jacobs Binoy
Kampmark Russell
D. Hoffman Website
of the Day
August 25 / 26, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn James
Petras Jeffrey
Buchanan / Marjorie
Cohn Rev.
William E. Alberts Robert
Fantina Brian
Concannon Ralph
Nader Laura
Carlsen Fred
Gardner David
Michael Green Stephen
Soldz Mike
Ferner Paul
Krassner Ben
Tripp Missy
Beattie Website
of the Weekend
August 24, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Greg
Moses William Schroder Alan
Farago Jackie
Corr Jeff
Ballinger Bill
Quigley Dave
Zirin Richard
Rhames Ryan
Haygood Website
of the Day
August 23, 2007 Kathy
Kelly P.
Sainath Ron
Jacobs Christopher
Brauchli D.K.
Wilson Joshua
Frank Dan
Bacher Brenda
Norrell John
Wright David
Vest Website
of the Day
August 22, 2007 Norman
Finkelstein Marc
Levy Lawrence
R. Velvel Ray
McGovern Norman
Solomon John
Walsh Michael
Dickinson William
S. Lind Bill
Hatch Kenneth
E. Foster and John Joe Amador David
Vest Website
of the Day
Saul
Landau Alan
Farago John
Stauber Phillip
Rizk Debbie
Nathan Binoy
Kampmark Martha
Rosenberg Sunsara
Taylor Website
of the Day
August 20, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Uri
Avnery Rannie
Amiri John
Ross Harvey
Wasserman Robert
Billyard Dave
Lindorff James
Rothenberg David
"DC" Larson Website
of the Day August 18 / 19, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Saul
Landau Ralph
Nader Patrick
Cockburn Robert
Fantina Robert
S. Eshelman P.
Sainath Dave
Lindorff Anthony
DiMaggio Fred
Gardner Ron
Jacobs Tom
Turnipseed Paul
Krassner Ben
Tripp Andrew
Wimmer Nancy
Oden N.D.
Jayaprakash Rick
Smith Missy
Beattie Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
Joanne
Mariner Paul
Craig Roberts Shepherd
Bliss Dave
Lindorff John
Muthyala Patrick
Cockburn Sherwood
Ross Phil
Doe David
Michael Green Website
of the Day
Jonathan
Cook Christopher
Brauchli Norman
Solomon Lee
Sustar / George
Bisharat Binoy
Kampmark Evelyn
Pringle Hugo
Blanco Website
of the Day
August 15, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Michael
Neumann Jordan
Flaherty Sonja
Karkar Felice
Pace Joshua
Frank Dave
Lindorff Carla
Blank David
Vest Harvey
Wasserman Peter
Rost, M.D. Russell
Mokhiber Website
of the Day
August 14, 2007 Paul
de Rooij Winslow
T. Wheeler David
Rosen Gary
Leupp Clifton
Ross Muhammad
Idress Ahmad Jacquelyn
Godin Uri
Avnery Ramzy
Baroud James
McEnteer Website
of the Day
August 13, 2007 Jeremy
Scahill F.
William Engdahl Alexander
Cockburn Kathy
Kelly Chris
Floyd Paul
Craig Roberts William
Blum Kenneth
Couesbouc Rannie
Amiri Brenda
Norrell Fran
Shor Ron
Jacobs Website
of the Day
August 11 / 12, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Stan
Goff Ralph
Nader Vijay
Prashad Greg
Moses Alan
Farago Patrick
Cockburn Ben
Tripp Robert
Fantina John
Ross Seth
Sandronsky Paul
Krassner Website
of the Weekend
August 10, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Stan
Goff Marjorie
Cohn Saul
Landau Chris
Floyd Daniel
Ellsberg Anthony
Papa Farzana
Versey Sgt.
Kevin Benderman Nuri
Nuri Website
of the Day
August 9, 2007 Stan
Goff Paul
Craig Roberts Alan
Farago William
S. Lind Doug
Giebel Harvey
Wasserman Jacob
Hill Raul
Zibechi Dave
Zirin Website
of the Day
August 8, 2007 Andy
Worthington Jeff
Halper Greg
Moses Nurit
Peled-Elhanan Sukant
Chandan Robert
Fisk George
H. Strauss D.K.
Wilson Bill
Day Tim
Campbell Website
of the Day
August 7, 2007 Patrick
Cockburn Andy
Worthington Kathy
Kelly Stan
Cox Sonja
Karkar Sen.
Russ Feingold Alan
Farago Norman
Solomon Binoy
Kampmark Dave
Lindorff John
Stauber Website
of the Day August 6, 2007 Bill
Quigley Kathy
Rentenbach Uri
Avnery Col.
Dan Smith Ralph
Nader James
Neshewat D.K.
Wilson Greg
Moses Fidel
Castro Mike
Whitney
August 4 / 5, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Peter
Linebaugh Saul
Landau Alan
Farago Dave
Zirin Barucha
Calamity Peller Anthony
DiMaggio Dave
Lindorff Fred
Gardner Nicola
Nasser Benjamin
Dangl Rannie
Amiri Daniel
Gross Sherwood
Ross Manuel
Garcia, Jr Missy
Beattie Ron
Jacobs Website
of the Weekend
August 3, 2007 Gabriel
Matthew Schivone Jonathan
Cook Patrick
Cockburn Little
Steven Van Zandt Christopher
Brauchli D.
K. Wilson Linda
Ford and Ira Glunts Kelly
Overton Monica
Benderman Manuel
Garcia, Jr. Website
of the Day
August 2, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Stanley Heller Eric
Ruder Robert
Fantina Alan
Farago Chris
Floyd Franklin
Lamb Sen.
Russ Feingold Anthony
Papa Norman
Solomon Website
of the Day
August 1, 2007 Debbie Nathan Fred
Gardner Gary
Leupp David
Rosen Winston
Warfield Daniel
McBride Glen
Ford Thomas
P. Healy John
V. Whitbeck David
Krieger Website
of the Day
July 31, 2007 Kathy
Kelly Clancy Sigal Paul Krassner Joe
DeRaymond Diane
Christian Chris
Floyd Ramzy
Baroud Alan
Farago Fidel
Castro Dan
Bacher
July 30, 2007 Marjorie Cohn: Independent Counsel Time Patrick Cockburn Peter Quinn Uri Avnery John Ross Ron
Jacobs David
Vest Jeffrey
St. Clair Website
of the Day
July 28 / 29, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Ralph
Nader Robert
Fantina Fred
Gardner
July 27, 2007 John
Ross Arthur
Neslen Dave
Lindorff Julene
Blair Christopher
Brauchli Jesse
Hagopian Charles
Modiano Bill
Day Walter
Brasch M.D.
Mitchell Website
of the Day
July 26, 2007 Kathleen
Christison Andy
Worthington Clancy
Chassay Marjorie
Cohn Susie
Day David
Price Marie
Trigona Norman
Solomon William
S. Lind Natsu
Saito John
Stauber Website
of the Day
July 25, 2007 Andy
Worthington Gary
Leupp Ray
McGovern Dr.
Susan Block Joshua
Frank Tina
Richards Ben
Terrall Farzana
Versey Mohammad
Ali Salih Laura
Carlsen Ron
Jacobs Sunsara
Taylor Website
of the Day
Saul
Landau Kathy
Kelly Russell
Mokhiber M.
Shahid Alam Patrick
Cockburn and Anne Penketh Dave
Lindorff Binoy
Kampmark Richard
Neville Cindy
Sheehan Evelyn
Pringle Norman
Solomon CP
Newswire Website
of the Day
July 23, 2007 Andy
Worthington Uri
Avnery Patrick
Cockburn Sousan
Hammad John
Walsh Harvey
Wasserman Martha
Rosenberg Collin Baber
Reza
Fiyouzat Stephen
Lendman Website
of the Day
July 21 / 22, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Werther Ralph
Nader David
Keen Fred
Gardner Gary
Leupp Robert
Fantina Saker Rannie
Amiri Mike
Whitney Dr.
Susan Rosenthal, MD Monica
Benderman Dan
Bacher Michael
Baney Missy
Beattie Ron
Jacobs Adam
Engel Thomas
Naylor Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
July 20, 2007 Eliza
Szabo Pam
Martens Alan
Farago Harvey
Wasserman Marjorie
Cohn Dave
Zirin Anthony
DiMaggio Scott
Liebertz Linn
Washington, Jr. Bill
Piper / Anthony Papa Ramzy
Baroud Website
of the Day
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August 28, 2007 "I Am Alden Pyle"Bush's Vietnam FantasyBy CHINA HAND President Bush recently attracted considerable attention and criticism by stating before the Veterans of Foreign Wars that the takeaway from Vietnam was that we cut and ran too soon, and we should not duplicate that mistake in Iraq. Actually, the president had advanced this line of reasoning last November during the APEC summit in Vietnam. My comment at the time is still, I think, on the mark:
The new element in President Bush's Vietnam reverie, one that attracted considerable headscratching and eyerolling from the cognoscenti, was his invocation of Alden Pyle, the blindly confident and profoundly destructive do-gooder in Graham Greene's The Quiet American:
Hmmm. Contrary to the president's assertion, the central lesson of Greene's book is not that Pyle's (read Bush's) courage, energy, and idealism were betrayed by the lazy, ignoble disdain of lesser men (read Democrats) for a multi-decade crusade on behalf of Vietnamese (read Iraqi) freedom. Greene's powerfully-argued theme is that Pyle sacrificed the moral high ground, doomed his venture at its inception, and sowed the seeds of his own destruction by orchestrating a terrorist bombing in a profoundly misguided and indecent attempt to advance a foolish, unrealistic, and catastrophic political agenda. Greene got it right in Vietnam and, I would say, in Iraq. President Bush gets it wrong. The thought that President Bush is perhaps relying on this fictional portrayal of a deluded naif to stoke personal fantasies of omniscience, moral clarity, and perhaps even (political) martyrdom in the face of widespread repudiation of his policies is, to say the least, disturbing. Who was Alden Pyle supposed to be? Jean de Lattre de Tassigny, the brilliant, driven general who was High Commissioner to Indo-China and the last, best hope of France's desperate counterinsurgency effort against Ho Chi Minh, had this to say about Robert Blum, head of the US Economic Aid Mission to Indochina (Blum is sometimes cited as Greene's model for Pyle):
And was the United States-represented in Greene's fiction by Alden Pyle-dangerous enough to connive with a Vietnamese warlord in a terrorist attack in Saigon in 1951? That was the explosive allegation at the heart of The Quiet American. The Quiet American culminates with a bloody bombing in a square off the rue Catinat in central Saigon, precipitated by the naïve, bookish Pyle's disastrous attempt to end-around the French and package a thuggish warlord, General The, as the leader of a nationalistic and democratic "Third Force". In real life, as in the book, the blast was set off by a "General" The, a renegade officer who had left the private army of the Caodai sect to set up business for himself near Saigon. He had apparently attracted the interest of American, keen for a nationalist third force that would supplant both Communism and the French-backed Bao Dai regime. To make a splashy arrival on the political scene, The executed two bloody bombings in Saigon. Not only that, he took credit for them in a radio broadcast, despite initial attempts by the US to blame the Vietminh for the atrocities. The later on became a fixture in the US-backed Diem government. The Quiet American infuriated Americans when it came out. New Yorker writer A.J. Leibling, fresh from liberating the wine cellars of Paris and flush with the self-regard born of the good war, excoriated Greene in a famous review. Not surprisingly, the current Vietnamese government loves the book for its depiction of a US intervention morally and strategically doomed from its inception. The Quiet American is apparently available all over the Vietnam and the government gave full support to the filming of Philip Noyce's excellent adaptation, which was finally released in 2002 after much 9/11-related anguish. But the interesting and unanswered question is, what exactly did The get from the United States in 1950 and 1951? Most American histories of the Vietnam mess give relatively short shrift to the period before 1954. That was the year of Dienbienphu, Geneva, Diem, and all that, and Vietnam officially became America's exclusive tar baby. That's why Graham Greene's The Quiet American and volume two of Norman Sherry's authorized biography of Greene The Life of Graham Greene (Penguin, 2004) are such fascinating and important additions to the history of the period. Greene worked as a correspondent in Vietnam in the early 50s, and many of the characters and incidents are direct distillations of his experiences. He wrote "Perhaps there is more direct rapportage in The Quiet American than in any other novel I have written". Sherry's diligence in retracing Greene's steps and providing context for his work and life have become legendary. It appears highly likely that in 1950-51 the US aid mission, actually a hive of CIA spooks, was chafing at the limited role and information the French were willing to grant them in the effort against the Vietminh. The survival of the French presence in Vietnam and its Bao Dai regime was clearly a matter of no more than a year or two. The US had no qualms about pursuing Third Force options independently and displayed little sympathy for French objections or the destabilizing and demoralizing effects that their actions had on the desperate French effort to stabilize Vietnam. Greene, himself a MI6 officer in the Second World War and sympathetic to the French view, undoubtedly learned of America's playing footsie with people like The from indignant sources in the French Surete. Did The, as Greene alleges in his book, get explosives, know-how, and direction from the CIA? And did the US have prior knowledge of the attacks and, instead of stopping them, encouraged them and planned around them and exploited them for propaganda purposes? Norman Sherry is extremely cautious and circumspect in weighing the evidence for the more sensational allegations. Greene was clearly hearing Gallic tittle-tattle as suspicious French intelligence, military, and diplomatic personnel monitored the growing and increasingly assertive U.S. presence in Saigon. The most damning was information from the French No. 1 in Vietnam, General Salan, that he had arrested an American consular officer on the Dakow Bridge (where Alden Pyle meets his end in the book) with plastic explosives in the trunk of his car. However, Mr. Sherry did not uncover any whistleblowers within the ranks of Americans stationed in Saigon in '50/'51 who supported Greene's story that the Catinat bombing was carried out by The with guilty American foreknowledge, assistance, and approval-or even that the US had any serious contacts with The prior to 1954. Case not proven to legal standards is the conclusion I extracted from Chapter 29, which discusses the era and the events of the bombings in great detail. However, on artistic grounds the situation in Vietnam provided a suitable basis for Greene to depict the deaths in rue Catinat as the direct consequence of callous and overconfident American adventurism. Examining the historical context of The Quiet American provides an illuminating picture of the creeping American intervention and sidelining of the French, which came into the open only in 1955, when the US sided with Ngo Van Diem-and General The-and closed the books on the French experience in Vietnam. The French struggle to regain control of Vietnam after World War II was a political, human, and financial catastrophe for the French homeland. No question that the French needed American help, which Truman and Eisenhower provided. By the time the French packed it in after Dien Bien Phu, America had underwritten 80% the cost of the failed French effort. Nevertheless, the United States was an unenthusiastic and suspicious partner. Truman's anti-communism had replaced Roosevelt's support for self-determination in the liberated countries of Southeast Asia as America's guiding ideology, but the US was never able to look upon French aims, methods, or capabilities in Vietnam with any enthusiasm. The corrosive distrust and dislike between the French and the Americans is fully documented in Greene's book. The takeaway from Greene's book is not that he was wrong about the nature of US engagement in the brief period when Vietnam was slipping from French control. It was that he was profoundly right about the twenty-year nightmare that the US and Vietnam were embarking on together. Greene's life and art were nourished by a stew of self-loathing and self-knowledge. France's doomed, disgusted struggle for Vietnam resonated with Greene's sense of sin and cynical despondency. On the other hand, he took the blithe, assertive ignorance of the Americans-symbolized by Alden Pyle-as a personal affront. In 1951, to indicate the disastrous consequences of virtue blindly asserted without awareness of personal sin and weakness, Greene makes the naïve Pyle knowingly complicit in a horrific crime: the terror bombing of a square filled with innocent civilians in the center of Saigon. Later on, American errors in Vietnam would be characterized more by sins of omission by the intentionally blind and willfully ignorant, and all-too-knowing sins of commission by people who harbored no illusions about the decency of their own methods. People like Edward Lansdale. Thankfully, Sherry's book lays to rest the canard, repeated in Stanley Karnow's Vietnam and countless other works-and promoted by Landsdale himself--that Edward Lansdale was the model for Alden Pyle. Lansdale was the antithesis of Pyle: an egomaniacal blowhard, grandstander, and loose cannon whose eccentricity bordered on the pathological. He famously put one over on Graham Greene, conspiring with director Joseph Manckiewicz to shoot the first version of The Quiet American, in 1959, in direct contradiction to the book and Greene's intentions. When the movie appeared, Alden Pyle-played by Audie Murphy-was the hero; and Greene's alter-ego-the jaded English journalist Fowler-is the dangerous naïf who precipitates the carnage in the square. In explaining why his version would prevail, Lansdale wrote to Manckiewicz:
Landsdale did not officially enter the Vietnam arena until 1954, when he appeared as Diem's minder. Greene wrote his book in 1952. But that doesn't mean that Lansdale's shadow isn't over the events in rue Catinat. Before Lansdale gained notoriety as John Kennedy's go-to guy for spectacular failures, first in Vietnam and then Operation Mongoose-the increasingly harebrained strategies for destabilizing Cuba and assassinating Castro that attracted the attention of the Church Committee--he presided over one of the greatest successes in post-world war II US foreign policy-the crushing of the Philippine insurrection. He did it in alliance with an energetic, talented, and compliant military office, Ramon Magsaysay. Tactics included enlarging and upgrading the army, limiting abuses against the population by state military forces, aggressive irregular counterinsurgency operations, lots of psyops, and some land reform. Also highly trained hunter-killer squads and unreliable paramilitaries. Amazingly, everything worked , at least against the isolated Huk movement, which at its height claimed 15,000 troops and only drew on the population of Luzon-1.5 million-for support. The Philippines is still the acme of American counterinsurgency, and one thinks it would be cited in the same breath with British suppression of the Malay Uprising, which seems to get all the positive ink as the only truly successful counterinsurgency operation in the modern period. According to Lansdale, in 1954 he was ordered to Vietnam "to do there what you did in the Philippines." An academic at the University of the Philippines, Roland Simbulan, stated:
After his stint in the Philippines using propaganda, psywar and deception against the Huk movement, Lansdale was then assigned in Vietnam to wage military, political and psychological warfare. When the Americans looked at Vietnam, they believed the French had a formula for failure, and America had the recipe for success. During World War II, Roosevelt had already touted America's policy supporting Philippine independence as a template for Vietnam. The Pentagon Papers record that President Roosevelt offered the De Gaulle Filipino advisors to help them out in Vietnam. De Gaulle's response to the astounding suggestion that the banner of European civilization and French honor could best be shouldered with the help of brown folks from the Philippines was "pensive silence". The Americans-like Alden Pyle-were too impatient of success and confident in their methods to work with the French. Once the French were left, the American magic would work in Vietnam as it had in the Philippines. All it required was U.S. prestige and aid, an innovative and ruthless cadre of advisors, and a seamless coordination between the American patron and the Vietnamese client, all constellated around a charismatic, competent leader. But the differences turned out to be more important than the similarities. Instead of Magsaysay, a dynamic man on horseback, we put our money on Diem, a (literally) cloistered Catholic and out of touch egoist. Instead of the hapless, isolated Huks, we got iron-hard NVA soldiers with an impregnable base in North Vietnam, safe-haven borders, and Russian and Chinese assistance. We got a counterinsurgency operation fatally compromised from its outset by excessive American reliance on political and military violence. And of course, we got defeat instead of victory. That's the tragedy Graham Greene foresaw in the rue Catinat. I think I'll let Philip Noyce, director of the 2002 film adaptation of The Quiet American, have the last word. From a Salon interview in early 2003, as America teetered on the brink of the Iraq invasion:
China Hand edits the very interesting website
China Matters.
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