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New Edition of CounterPunch The Return of Robert Rubin: Kerry, Jobs and the Economy by Alexander Cockburn; Party Favors: the Political Business of Terry McAuliffe by Jeffrey St. Clair; The Kill Zone: Caring for the Wounded in Fallujah by David Martinez. In April, CounterPunch Online was read by 16.1 million viewers--by far our biggest month ever. But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a (tax deductible) donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! Now Available: Hot New CounterPunch T-Shirts! Or Call Toll Free 1-800-840 3683 or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558

Cockburn / St. Clair's Scorching New History of a Decade of War Now Available! Today's Stories May 19, 2004 Elizabeth W. Corrie Caterpillar Should Do the Right Thing, Now May 18, 2004 Neve Gordon The Gaza Debacle Doug Stokes Imperial Policing: Why Abu Ghraib Shouldn't Surprise Us Bob Wing The Color of Abu Ghraib Vanessa Jones Man on a Leash Thomas P. Healy Chemical Trespass: the Body Burden Zeynep Toufe Torture and Moral Agency: the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations Kenneth Roth Mistreatment of Detainees in US Custody: a Letter to Bush Elaine Cassel Pre-empting the Bill of Rights: The Other War, One Year Later Website of the Day Truth Against Truth May 17, 2004 Kurt Nimmo The John-John Ticket: Kerry Woos McCain Laura Santina Military Conditioning and Abu Ghraib Mickey Z. With Friends Like These: More Election 2004 Madness Frederick B. Hudson Police Terror: Three Mothers Search for Justice Shakirah Esmail-Hudani Inside Abu Ghraib: the Violence of the Camera Boris Leonardo Caro The Revelations of Mr. W. Alex Dawoody Iraq: From Saddam to Occupation Victor Kattan On Watching the Execution of Nick Berg Ron Jacobs Rumsfeld's Sovereignty Shell Game   May 15 / 16, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Green Lights for Torture Douglas Valentine ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited John Stanton Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel Ben Tripp Torture: a Fond Reminiscence Brian Cloughley Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot Act Justin E. H. Smith Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey Brandy Baker Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism John Chuckman Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape Bill Glahn RIAA Watch: Goon Squad John Holt Fencing the Sky Ron Jacobs The Power of Patti Smith Brian J. Foley Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib? Robin Philpot Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide Eric Leser The Carlyle Empire Ray Hanania From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good War Crime Jeff Halper Dozers of Mass Destruction Joe Surkiewicz Inside the Baltimore Detention Center John Whitlow Iraq Goddamn Michael Leon Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video Poets' Basement Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert     May 14, 2004 Dr. Susan Block Bush's POW Porn Ron Jacobs Secret History of the War on Drugs William Blum God, Country and Torture Michael Donnelly The People v. Corporate Greed: A Victory on the North Coast Niranjan Ramakrishnan India Shines Stephen Gowans Building Democracy in Iraq and Other Absurdities     May 13, 2004 Dave Lindorff Where is Kerry? Colm O'Laithian Torture and Degradation: Revenge American Style? Saul Landau and Farrah Hassan Wal-Mart: Scrooge with Hi-Tech Accounting Practices Ralph Nader An Open Letter to Bush on the Inhumane Treatment of Iraqi Prisoners Willliam James Martin Deir Yassin Massacre Recalled Marc Salomon Reality TV Bites Forrest Hylton Law 'n Order in La Paz: All Quiet on the Southern Front? May 12, 2004 Blanton / Kornbluh Prisoner Abuse: Cheney Warned in 1992 Virginia Tilley So, Who's to Blame? Bruce Jackson James Inhofe, the Dumbest Senator of Them All Thomas P. Healy No Enemies: Making Peace with Bert Sacks Linda S. Heard Racism and Ignorance: a Lethal Cocktail in Iraq Norman Solomon Spinning Torturegate Lisa Viscidi The People's Voice: Community Radio in Guatemala Jack Heyman View from the Bay Bridge: Longshoremen Plan Mass Workers March on DC Niranjan Ramakrishnan Rummy's Reprieve CounterPunch Wire Teamsters Corruption Scandal: Hoffa Exec. Assistant Alleged to Have Quashed Investigation into Mob Influence Christopher Brauchli Detention Camp, USA William S. Lind Bush's Waterloo? May 11, 2004 Mark Engler On the "Necessity" of Torture Ray McGovern More Troops? A March of Folly Kurt Nimmo Dirty Nukes and Jefferson's Grand Experiment Mickey Z. Less Than Hero Christopher Reed Torture on the Homefront: America's Long History of Prison Abuse Dennis Hans When John Negroponte was Mullah Omar Bruce Jackson Pete Seeger at 85 Mike Whitney Killing al Sadr Simon Helweg-Larsen Shrinking the Guatemalan Military William A. Cook The Unconscious Country: Righteous Indignation, Nakedly Displayed   May 10, 2004 Robert Fisk From Hollywood to Abu Ghraib: Racism and Torture as Entertainment Wayne Madsen The Israeli Torture Template: Rape, Feces and Urine-Soaked Cloth Sacks Col. Dan Smith The Shame of Abu Ghraib Joe Bageant John Ashcroft, Keep Your Mouth Off My Wife! Ron Jacobs Rummy's Prisongate Blues: Don't Leave Mad; Just Leave Ben Tripp Getting in Touch with Your Inner Savage Ray Hanania Why They Hate Us: Racism, Bigotry and Abuse Reza Fiyouzat "Mishandled" Invasions Diane Christian Images & Abstractions & Genitals Website of the Day Crushing Iraqi Skulls with Tanks for Sport? May 8 / 9, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair Torture: as American as Apple Pie Adam Jones America's Srebrenica: What About the Hundreds of POWs Suffocated and Shot at Kunduz? Douglas Valentine Who Let the Dogs Out?: Torture, the CIA and the Press Kurt Nimmo Rush Limbaugh and the Babes of Abu Ghraib Brian Cloughley Humpty Dumpty is Falling Lucia Dailey Forbidden Games Joanne Mariner * * * *: Redacting Moussaoui Mickey Z. Please Forgive U.S.? (There Are No Innocent Bystanders) John Chuckman The Thing with No Brain Doug Giebel Someone Knew: There Were No WMDs Norm Dixon How the Bush Gang Exploited 9/11 Sam Bahour A Guiding Light Falls on Ramallah Susan Davis Disorderly Conduct as Fine Art Dave Marsh In a Pig's Eye: Alan Lomax, Dead But Still Stealing Laura Flanders Life with Dick and Lynne Dave Zirin Fans Push Spiderman Off Base Carolyn Baker Why I Won't Vote in 2004 Prince "Ain't No Sense in Voting" Dr. Susan Block Onan for Two: Liberating Masturbation Poets' Basement Smith, Sleeth, Ford, Albert and Saska   May 7, 2004 Human Rights Watch 10 Prisons; 9,000 Prisoners: US Detention Facilities in Iraq Ron Jacobs UnAmerican? I Wish It Were So Robert Fisk An Illegal and Immoral War Ahmad Faruqui The 50th Anniversary of Dien Bien Phu Alexander Zaitchik From Terrell Unit in Texas to Abu Ghraib: Doesn't It Ring a (Prison) Bell? Mike Whitney The Price of Victory Norman Solomon This War, Racism and Media Denial M. Shahid Alam A Comic Apology   May 6, 2004 Jeffrey St. Clair They Did It for Jessica: Smeared with Shit; Kicked to Death Kathy Kelly May Day in Pekin Prison: Prison Labor for the War Machine Werther The Sunk Cost Fallacy: War as Vegas Casino Game Lawrence Ferlinghetti Totalitarian Democracy Robert Fisk "Smoke Him": Video Shows Wounded Men Being Shot by US Helicopter John Janney Torturing the Way to Freedom? Christopher Ketcham Outlaw Heterosexual Marriage Now! Alan Farago Dead Oceans: So Long, Thanks for the Fish Sam Hamod Bush on Arab TV: Worthless and Demeaning James Brooks Sullen Spring William S. Lind On the Brink of Defeat in Iraq     May 5, 2004 Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba Complete US Army Report on Abuse of Iraqi Prisoners Kathleen and Bill Christison Kerry: a Lost Cause for Progressives? Will Youmans Deal with the Devil: a Palestinian Zionist and the End of the World Patrick B. Barr Terrorists R Us: the Powerful are Exempt from the Label Lawrence Magnuson Nightline's All-American Morgue Greg Moses Pocketbook of Denuded Ideals Niranjan Ramakrishnan Tormenting Prisoners, Torturing Truth Lee Ballinger Cinco de Mayo and Unity Gilbert Achcar Bush's Cakewalk into the Iraq Quaqmire Website of the Day Operation Phoenix & Iraq             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.     Subscribe Online

May 19, 2004 The US Can't Win The Failure of Its Aggressive Foreign Policies is Inevitable By BILL and KATHLEEN CHRISTISON former CIA analysts Recently a journalist in Singapore asked for our help on an article about U.S. foreign policies for an English-language newspaper on that island-nation. The journalist asked for our thoughts, in writing, on four specific questions that caused us to think about U.S. foreign policies in ways a little different from our normal approach, which is probably too closely tied to our past as Washington bureaucrats. Here are the questions asked by the Singaporean journalist, and the answers we came up with. ONE: Why is the global perception of U.S. foreign policies so negative? How have the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Iraqi prisoner abuses, and the fight against terrorism contributed to this perception? In our view, most of the world's ordinary people -- as opposed to their governments -- are convinced that present U.S. foreign policies are aimed at dominating the rest of the world, and most of them do not want to be dominated by the U.S. Over the past several decades, the poor almost everywhere have seen the gap between rich and poor grow ever wider. Even though the urban middle class, generally only a small part of any nation's population, has benefited in some countries from the privatized, minimally regulated globalization that is a major weapon used by the U.S. to extend its global power, the masses of people have not received any of the benefits. Instead, they see themselves as oppressed by the U.S., and they believe that the U.S., and often their own governments, neither respect them as human beings nor regard them as having any value other than as a reservoir of cheap labor. While most of the world's governments have supported George W. Bush's so-called war against terror, most of the world's people see this war as another weapon of the U.S. drive for global domination. Citizens of many nations are appalled at the U.S. hypocrisy in defining as terrorists only peoples or groups that Washington regards as enemies. Once Russia gave its support to Bush after September 11, only Chechens rebelling against Moscow could be roundly criticized as terrorists; no longer could Moscow itself be charged with terrorism. For a far longer period, it has been acceptable in U.S. government circles to charge Palestinians with terrorism, but never could any actions by Israeli settlers or the Israeli military be labeled as terrorism. In a more general sense, most people of the world believe that the United States' longstanding one-sided support for Israel against the Palestinians -- and particularly the Bush administration's intensified support -- is a major factor encouraging more terrorism against the U.S. and its allies, and that without a change in this policy, the threat of terrorism will never diminish. They see U.S. policy as not only wrong and unjust because it enables the oppression of weaker peoples, but as doomed to failure over the long run. The U.S.-initiated wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq, the killings of thousands of innocent people in each case (far more than were killed in New York and Washington on September 11), and the abuses of prisoners taken by the U.S. and its allies, have simply intensified these perceptions among people around the world. And we should never forget that underlying all the specific issues in this cauldron of hatreds is the strong suspicion that racism is at the basis of U.S. policies that allow too many Americans to treat poorer peoples of the world as subhuman. TWO: Why is it necessary for the U.S. to have such a wide-ranging foreign policy? How is it important for its interests? There is no good reason for the U.S. to pursue such aggressive and arrogant foreign policies. The U.S. has only 5 percent of the world's population and, no matter how wealthy and militarily powerful that 5 percent is, it cannot for long pursue a successful policy of global domination. If it tries to do so, the U.S. will inevitably fail and will impoverish its own people in the process. Even in the very short run -- the next one or two years -- these policies will not improve the living standards of the mass of average workers in the United States. But in this same very short run, the massive military superiority of the United States gives great power to a particular set of political forces that dominates the country's politics and wants to continue aggressive foreign policies. These political forces, which today pay massive amounts of money to elect presidents and members of Congress, are the leaders of the corporate and military power structure. This structure, of course, is far greater than just a small group of leaders. It includes many defense and high-tech workers, contractors, government employees, military personnel, investment firms and banks, many lawyers and judges, and foreign and domestic lobbyists -- all of whom see their future livelihood as dependent on the continuation of this system. This entire conglomerate, the military-industrial complex defined by Eisenhower over 40 years ago and now infinitely more powerful, has an agenda that includes a general, or global, aspect and another aspect that gives greater emphasis to the Middle East than to any other area. The global agenda includes constantly expanding U.S. military expenditures, a U.S. drive as described above for global domination, and increased control over the world's fossil fuel supplies. The Middle East agenda includes the strengthening of Israeli/U.S. partnership and hegemony throughout the region and, in furtherance thereof, advocacy of war, first against Iraq and then if necessary against Syria, Iran, and possibly other Middle Eastern states. We emphasize again that we do not believe these groups can continue to dominate U.S. foreign policies much longer. It is possible, however, with all the money they can command, that they can win the presidential election in November 2004. If they do, it will appear to be a major victory for them. Even if Bush loses the election this November, there will probably be few if any immediate changes in U.S. foreign policies. But we repeat, regardless of the election outcome later this year, we think it will prove impossible for any U.S. government to continue the present drive for global domination beyond the next two or three years. We admit that this is an optimistic judgment, but we feel strongly that it is correct. THREE: How is this foreign policy important for other countries around the world? U.S. foreign policies have a profound effect on other countries. It is very important that peoples and governments all over the world do everything they can to encourage the U.S. government to give up its drive for global domination as quickly as possible. The recent elections in Spain and India, which overturned governments seen to be overly compliant with U.S. goals and demands, are the most recent signs that the peoples of the world are protesting U.S. policies. We believe more such protests are vitally necessary FOUR: What are the implications for the world if countries choose not to support U.S. foreign policy or if anti-American sentiment is allowed to fester? How will it prevent/inhibit the U.S. from carrying out its foreign policies effectively? Present U.S. foreign policies already contain within themselves all the seeds that will bring about necessary changes in those policies. It is unfortunate, but probably a fact in this world that is still dominated by national governments, that U.S. voters will have the most influence on the timing of those changes. But citizens of all other nations of the world, who today are affected every bit as much as voters of the U.S. by everything that happens in America, should constantly shout out that they, too, are entitled to an equal voice in their own future. Spain and India are a good start. Bill and Kathleen Christison are both former CIA political analysts. Bill worked in the CIA for 28 years. Before retiring in 1979, he was a National Intelligence Officer and the Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis, a 250 person unit. Kathleen has been a freelance writer since resigning from the CIA in 1979, dealing primarily with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Her book Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy was published in 2001. A second book, The Wound of Dispossession: Telling the Palestinian Story, was published in 2002. They can be reached at: christison@counterpunch.org Weekend Edition Features for May 15 / 16, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Green Lights for Torture Douglas Valentine ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited John Stanton Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel Ben Tripp Torture: a Fond Reminiscence Brian Cloughley Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot Act Justin E. H. Smith Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey Brandy Baker Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism John Chuckman Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape Bill Glahn RIAA Watch: Goon Squad John Holt Fencing the Sky Ron Jacobs The Power of Patti Smith Brian J. Foley Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib? Robin Philpot Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide Eric Leser The Carlyle Empire Ray Hanania From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good War Crime Jeff Halper Dozers of Mass Destruction Joe Surkiewicz Inside the Baltimore Detention Center John Whitlow Iraq Goddamn Michael Leon Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video Poets' Basement Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert WWW http://www.counterpunch.org   Keep CounterPunch Alive: Make a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online! home / subscribe / about us / books / archives / search / links /