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Recent
Stories
July
21, 2003
Bruce
Jackson
Third and Arizona, Santa Monica
July
19 / 20, 2003
Arthur
Mitzman
Will the Pax Americana be More Sustainable
Than the Dot.com Bubble?
Julian
Bond
We Shall be Heard
Cynthia
McKinney
Bush's Racial Politics at Home and Abroad
Mel
Goodman
What is to be Done with the CIA?
Jason Leopold
Tenet Blames Wolfowitz
Mickey
Z.
History Forgave Churchill
Doug Giebel
Impeachment as the Message
Jon
Brown
Whipping the Post
Mano Singham
Cheney's Oil Maps
Steven
Sherman
Nickle, Dimed and Slimed at UNC
Robin Philpot
Liberia: History Doesn't Repeat Itself, It Stutters
Khaldoun
Khelil
Capturing Friedman
Jeffrey
St. Clair
You Must Go Home, Again: Gilad Atzmon's A Guide to the Perplexed
Lenni
Brenner
Sitting in with Mingus
Vanessa
Jones
Three Dog Night
Adam
Engel
Video Judas Video
Poets'
Basement
Foley, Smith and Curtis
Website
of the Weekend
Illegal Art
July
18, 2003
David
Vest
Drowning in Deep Doo-Doo
Rahul
Mahajan
Deceit Runs Deep
John Chuckman
Enron-style Management in a Dangerous World
Harold
A. Gould
The Bush-Musharraf Conclave
Alvaro
Angarita
In the Eye of the Storm: Colombia's War on Journalists
David
Grenier
Sovereignty and Solidarity in Indian Country...Rhode Island
Dave Lindorff
Bush and Hitler: a Response to the Wall Street Journal
Website
of the Day
Murder of a Whistleblower? Timeline in David Kelly Affair
July
17, 2003
Ron
Jacobs
Sometimes Even the President of the
United States Has to Stand Naked
Lisa
Walsh Thomas
Bush Country: the Venom and Adulation of Ignorance
Martin
Schwarz
Bush Pre-emptive Strike Doctrine is the Bane of Non-Proliferation
Watchdogs
Heidi
Lypps
Better Justice Through Chemistry? Forced
Drugging and the Supreme Court
Norman
Madarasz
Third Ways and Third Worlds: Lula at the Progressive Governance
Conference
Pankaj
Mehta
Criminalizing the Palestinian Solidarity Movement
Marjorie
Cohn
Bush, War Lies & Impeachment: the
Boy Who Cried Wolf
Hammond
Guthrie
(Dis) Intelligence Revisited
Website
of the Day
No Force, No Fraud: the Soul of Libertarianism
July
16, 2003
Jason
Leopold
Wolfowitz Told White House to Hype
Dubious Uranium Claims
William
Cook
Defining Terrorism from the Top Down
Elaine
Cassel
Judge Brinkema v. Ashcroft: She Whom
Must Not Be Obeyed
Jason
Leopold
How Can They Justify the War If WMDs Are Never Found?
Linda Heard
Bondage or Freedom?
Raymond
Barrett
From Detroit to Basra
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Back to the Future in Guatemala:
The Return of Gen. Ríos Montt
July
15, 2003
Kathleen
and Bill Christison
Why We Resigned from VIPS
Elaine
Cassel
Ashcroft's War on Legal Whistleblowers:
the Ordeal of Jesselyn Radack
Chris
Floyd
Barge Poles: Oil Wars and New Europe's Mercenaries
Jason
Leopold
CIA Warned White House Last October that Niger Docs were Forgeries
Gaius Publius
Considering the Obvious: Fool Us Once, Fool Us Twise...Please
John
Troyer
The Niger Syndrome
Becky Gillette
No Conspiracy at Coffeen Nature Preserve: a Response to David
Orrr
Uri
Avnery
The Bi-National State: The Wolf Shall
Dwell with the Lamb
Website
of the Day
Cost of Iraq War
July
14, 2003
Lisa
Taraki
Hot Days in Ramallah
Walter
Brasch
Bush: the Pretend Captain
SOA
Watch
Training Colombia's Killers in the US
Dan Bacher
Yurok Tribe Denounces Klamath River Salmon Killers
Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
Intelligence Unglued
Website
of the Day
Coalition for Democratic Rights and Civil Liberties
July 12 / 13, 2003
Arthur
Mitzman
The Double Wall Before the Future
Standard
Schaefer
The Coming Financial Reality: an
Interview with Michael Hudson
John Feffer
A Fearful Symmetry: Washington and Pyongyang
Ron
Jacobs
Shades of Gray in Iran
Elaine
Cassel
Judicial Terrorism Against the Bill of Rights
Tom
Stephens
Civil Liberties After 9/11
David Lindorff
New White House Slogan: "Case Closed. Just Move On"
Jason
Leopold
The Mini-War Against Iraq Prior to 9/11
Lee Sustar
What's Behind the Crisis in Liberia?
Mickey
Z.
AIDS Dissent and Africa
Sam Hamod
Semitic is a Language Group, Not a Race or Ethnic Group
Ramzy
Baroud
Awaiting Justice on an Old Blanket
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Savage Incongruities: the Photographic Life of Lee Miller
Adam
Engel
Parable of the Lobbyist
Robert
Sanders
A Review of Ralph Lopez's American Dream
Poets'
Basement
Albert, Witherup, Guthrie
July
11, 2003
Conn
Hallinan
The Coin of Empire
Tim
Wise
God Responds to Bush
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
The Two Faces of Bush in Africa
Edward
S. Herman
Whitewashing Sandra Day O'Connor
David Orr
Coffeen-gate: What's Going on at the Sierra Club Foundation?
David
Lindorff
An Iraq War & Occupation Glossary
Website
of the Day
Dead Malls
July
10, 2003
Ron
Jacobs
Dealing with the Devil: the Bloody
Profits of General Dynamics
Sean
Donahue
Bush and the Paramillitaries: Coddling Terrorists in Colombia
Yemi
Toure
Who Outted Bush in Afrika?
Robert
Jensen
Politics and Sustainability: an Interview
with Wes Jackson
Ali
Abunimah
US Leaves Injured Iraqis Untreated
Joanne
Mariner
Federal Courts, Not Military Commissions
Website
of the Day
Electronic Iraq
July
9, 2003
David
Lindorff
Is the Media Finally Turning on
Bush?
David
Krieger and Angela McCracken
10 Myths About Nuclear Weapons
Mickey
Z.
Why Speak Out?
Lee Sustar
The Great Medicare Fraud
John
Chuckman
The Worst Kind of Lie
Gary Leupp
"Pacifist" Japan and the Occupation of Iraq
Website
of the Day
Hail to the Thief:
Songs for the Bush Years
July
8, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
Bully on the Bench: the Pathological
Dissents of Scalia
Alan
Maass
Nights of Fire and Rage in Benton Harbor
Chris
Floyd
Troubled Sleep: Getting Used to the American Gulag
Linda
S. Heard
America's Kangaroo Justice
Brian
Cloughley
They Tell Lies to Nodders
Charles
Sullivan
Bush the Christian?
Saul
Landau
The Intelligence Culture in the National Security Age
Website
of the Day
Occupation Watch
July
7, 2003
William
Blum
The Anti-Empire Report
Harvey
Wasserman
The Nuke with a Hole in Its Head
Ramzy
Baroud
Peace for All the Wrong Reasons
Simon
Jones
What Progressives Should Think About
Iran
Lesley
McCulloch
Fear, Pain and Shame in Aceh
Uri
Avnery
The Draw
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 7/3
July
4 / 6, 2003
Patrick
Cockburn
Dead on the Fourth of July
Frederick
Douglass
What is Freedom to a Slave?
Martha
Honey
Bush and Africa: Racism, Exploitation
and Neglect
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Rat in the Grain: Amstutz and
the Looting of Iraqi Agriculture
Standard
Schaefer
Rule by Fed: Anyone But Greenspan in 2004
Lenni Brenner
Jefferson is for Today
Elaine
Cassel
Fucking Furious on the Fourth
Ben Tripp
How Free Are We?
Wayne
Madsen
A Sad Independence Day
John Stanton
Happy Birthday, America! 227 Years of War
Jim
Lobe
Bush's Surreal AIDS Appointment
John Blair
Return to Marble Hill: Indiana's Rusting Nuke
Lisa
Walsh Thomas
Heavy Reckoning at Qaim
David Vest
Wake Up and Smell the Dynamite
Adam
Engel
Queer as Grass
Poets'
Basement
Christian, Witherup, Albert & St. Clair
Website
of the Weekend
The Lipstick Librarian
Hot Stories
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
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
July
21, 2003
Shut Up and Shoot
Be All We Want
You to Be
By RON JACOBS
From an ABC News interview with a GI in Iraq:
"I've got my own 'Most Wanted' list," he told me. He
was referring to the deck of cards the U.S. government published,
featuring Saddam Hussein, his sons and other wanted members of
the former Iraqi regime. "The aces in my deck are Paul Bremer,
Donald Rumsfeld, George Bush and Paul Wolfowitz," he said
"None of us that wear this uniform
are free to say anything disparaging about the secretary of defense
or the president of the United States," General Abizaid
said during his Pentagon briefing. "We're not free to do
that. It's our professional code. Whatever action may be taken,
whether it's a verbal reprimand or something more stringent is
up to the commanders on the scene and it's not for me to comment."
Isn't it great? The very same people
who are supposedly fighting for freedom are not free to express
their opinion, even when those opinions concern their lives.
Welcome to the US Army, boys and girls. If it moves, salute
it. If it doesn't move, paint it. That's the joke my GI buddies
used to always tell when we were hanging out drinking a cold
one in their barracks over in Germany in the early 1970s. Back
then there was a pretty big resistance movement amongst the enlisted
guys, so one could get away with talking shit about the commanding
officer, whether he was in the building next door or in the White
House. Nowadays, such sentiments might get you some time in the
brig. Especially if your family is expressing similar sentiments
on the homefront, even if those are only expressed to the stateside
base commander.
What's been striking about the mutterings
of frustration and opposition to the Iraq mission by the GIs
in the field is that they seem to be coming from the demographic
least expected. That is, white guys from the Midwest and the
south. This is a part of the country that supported the war and
always supports the military. Furthermore, the Americans who
live in these regions tend to believe the myths Bush and Co.
used to get their sons and daughters into Iraq-freedom, weapons,
the fear of terrorism. If these guys don't like being used as
pawns in Washington's oil game and are willing to say so on national
television, that could signify a problem for the war party. Who
knows, maybe the GIs might even refuse to fight.
Even if the mutterings do not reach a
level comparable to the GI resistance during the latter part
of the war in Vietnam, the will for war could be broken. If the
soldiers don't want to fight, even though they signed up to do
so, and their families are sick of them being gone, even though
they knew this could happen, then who will get tired of this
nonsense next? The American people? We can hope so. Of course,
another scenario would be the situation between Israel and Palestine,
or Russia and Chechnya, where the war hawks in those countries
continue to send soldiers off to kill and die in wars of occupation
despite the opposition of a large part of the respective populations.
I'm not foolish enough to believe that
the men and women wearing the uniform of the American forces
over in Iraq have become anti-imperialist. After all, their
access to information that does not support their mission and
confirm their boot-camp enhanced prejudices is very limited--even
more so than the average FOX-CNN watching US civilian. Still,
the very fact that they are ticked off that they were lied to
about most every facet of their mission--from length of stay
to its purpose and ease--has got to be bad news for the armchair
generals inside the Beltway. Bad enough, in fact, for the Pentagon
to send a direct message to the more vocal soldiers and their
officers all the way from Virginia: a message telling them to
shutup and/or to forget about their careers.
It's up to us to support the right of
these GIs to express their anger. It's also up to us to get them
home before they do any more harm and any more harm is done to
them. More troops won't help them in the long run, no matter
what the Pentagon says. Indeed, more troops only increase the
number of targets. Military assistance from other countries under
UN auspices won't help either. That will only allow the ideologues
and fools in Washington to share the culpability. No government
not already involved would want a pirce of this growing mess.
There is not a military solution to the problems presented by
the US/UK war on Iraq. The only answer to the growing mess in
Iraq is a complete withdrawal of the forces from the invading
and occupying countries.
Ron Jacobs
is author of The
Way the Wind Blew: a history of the Weather Underground.
He can be reached at: rjacobs@zoo.uvm.edu
Weekend Edition Features for July 19 / 20, 2003
Arthur
Mitzman
Will the Pax Americana be More Sustainable
Than the Dot.com Bubble?
Julian
Bond
We Shall be Heard
Cynthia
McKinney
Bush's Racial Politics at Home and Abroad
Mel
Goodman
What is to be Done with the CIA?
Jason Leopold
Tenet Blames Wolfowitz
Mickey
Z.
History Forgave Churchill
Doug Giebel
Impeachment as the Message
Jon
Brown
Whipping the Post
Mano Singham
Cheney's Oil Maps
Steven
Sherman
Nickle, Dimed and Slimed at UNC
Robin Philpot
Liberia: History Doesn't Repeat Itself, It Stutters
Khaldoun
Khelil
Capturing Friedman
Jeffrey
St. Clair
You Must Go Home, Again: Gilad Atzmon's A Guide to the Perplexed
Lenni
Brenner
Sitting in with Mingus
Vanessa
Jones
Three Dog Night
Adam
Engel
Video Judas Video
Poets'
Basement
Foley, Smith and Curtis
Website
of the Weekend
Illegal Art
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