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Recent
Stories
April
15, 2003
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Robert
Jensen
Self-Determination in Iraq? Then the
US Must Leave
Dr.
Susan Block
The Rape of Iraq
Ron Jacobs
Aiming at Syria: Stop Them Before They Kill Again
Robert
Fisk
The Final Sacking of Baghdad
Col. Dan
Smith
Post-War Iraq: Asking the Right Questions
Ali
Abunimah and Hussein Ibish
A Cycle of Chaos and Confrontation: Misadventures of the NeoCons
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/15
April
14, 2003
Chris
Floyd
Bush's War Without End
Uri Avnery
Gunboat Democracy: This is Only the Beginning
Wayne
Madsen
Americans: The New Mongols of the Mideast?
Shahid
Alam
Iqra: Iraq is Free
Hani
Shukrallah
Day of the Chicken Hawks
Terry
Jones
The Iraq Gravy Train
John
Chuckman
The Iraq War's Trashiest Piece of Propaganda
Patrick
Cockburn
US has a Lot to Answer For: Violence,
Misery and Poverty in Iraq
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/14
April
12 / 13, 2003
Carol
Lipton
Wag the Kennel: the Kenneth Joseph
Story
Wayne
Madsen
Meet the New Butcher of Baghdad: Maj.
Gen. Buford Blount III
John
Brown
"They Got It Down": the Toppling
of the Saddam Statue
Kathy and
Bill Christison
Final Thoughts from Palestine
William
Blum
Our Vulnerable Warmongers' Rush to Justify Devastation
Wallace
Gagne
Let the Stealing Begin
Ann
Harrison
Rosenthal Update: Judge Delays Ruling in Medical Pot Mistrial
Case
Henry Miller
What is the Greatest Treason?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Render Unto Cesar
Zeljko
Cipris
Mocking Militarism: On Ishikawa Jun's Song of Mars
Ishikawa
Jun
The Song of Mars
Jamey Hecht
Chairman of the Sandwich Board
Adam
Engel
Hell of a Town: Mayor Bloomberg and
the News
Poets'
Basement
Chang Yang-Hao, Adam Engel and Hammond Guthrie
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/12
April
11, 2003
Omar
Barghouti
From Saddam to Uncle Sam
Ron
Jacobs
Greed is Rewarded
David
Vest
The Corporate War on Iraq
Paul
de Rooij
Propaganda Stinkers: Fresh Samples from the Field
Anthony
Gancarski
Foreign Aid: Embezzlement as Public Policy
Mas'ood
Cajee
Franklin Graham: Spiritual Carpetbagger
Michael
Neumann
Now What?
Michael
Berry
The Neo-Cons Have a Dream
Stew Albert
Oh Freedom
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/11
Website
of the Day
About Those Dancing Crowds
April
10, 2003
Zoltan
Grossman
The Perils of Occupation: the Easier
the Victory, the Harder the Peace
Uri
Avnery
The Night After
Wayne Madsen
The Telltale Signs of Empire
David Krieger
Before You Become Too Flushed with Victory, Think of Ali Ismaeel
Abbas
Jeremy
Brecher
What Can the World Do Now That Tanks Prowl Baghdad?
Robert
Jensen
The Unseen War
Geoffrey
Neale
Ashcroft's War on the Constitution:
A Patriot Attack on America
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Last Tango in Baghdad
Hammond
Guthrie
Rumors of War
Joseph
Heller
Nately's Old Man
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/10
Website
of the Day
The
Third Page
April
9, 2003
David
Lindorff
Secret Bechtel Docs Reveal: Yes,
the War Is About Oil
Doug
Lummis
Saving Private Lynch: Hollywood and
War
Susan
Davis
The New York Times and the Peace Movement
David Vest
Smoking Gun? You're Watching It
John
Chuckman
America's Sovereign Right to Do
as It Damn Well Pleases
Akiva
Eldar
Gary Bauer and AIPAC: an Unholy Alliance
with the Christian Right
Ray
Hanania
Suicide Bombers without the Suicide:
Racism, Hypocrisy and the War on Iraq
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/9
April
8, 2003
David
Lindorff
Killing the Messengers: It Doesn't
Matter If It's Deliberate or Accidental
Richard
Lichtman
Dr. Phil in the Trenches
John
Brown
Why Uncle Ben Hasn't Sold Uncle Sam:
a Former Foreign Service Staffer on Bush's Policy Failures
Ben
Terrall
Report from the Oakland Docks: "The
Cops Had No Reason to Open Up on Them"
Jason Leopold
FERC and Wall Street: Conversations
May Have Violated Federal Law
Anthony
Gancarski
Conyers Heeds the Call on Perle
Linda Heard
Journalists Die, the Networks Lie, Iraqis Ask "Why?"
Ahmad
Faruqui
Wallowing in Hypocrisy
Wallace
Gagne
Baghdad Babble
Harry
Browne
Report from the Protests at the Bush/Blair
Summit
Larry Kearney
I Understand There's a Boy in
a Baghdad Hospital
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/8
M. Shahid
Alam
The Israelization of America
April
7, 2003
Todd
Chretien
Wooden Bullets & Grenades: Oakland
Cops Attack Peace Protesters and Dock Workers
David
N. Gibbs
Spying, Secrecy and the University:
The CIA is Back on Campus
Harry Browne
War and Peace Summit a Royal Farce
Gideon
Levy
America is Not a Role Model
Diane
Christian
A Scene from an Obscene War
Jules
Rabin
Remembering Deir Yassin
James Davis
Oddsmaking in Dublin: Will Bush
Shake Gerry's Hand?
Robert
Fisk
The Twisted Language of War
Patrick
Cockburn
Slaughter on the Road to Dibagah
John
Mackay
War and Art
Seth Sandronsky
Wars and the Color Line
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/7
April
5, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
The Iraqi Humanitarian Relief is
in Shambles
Anne
Gwynne
A Drowning in Salem
Uri
Avnery
Roadmap to Nowhere
Chris
Floyd
Hell for Leather: Bombs, Bullets, Bibles and Bush
William
Cook
Would You Have Sent Your Son (or Daughter) Off to War If...
Gila
Svirsky
A Busy Day for Bulldozers
Mike Ferner
Back from Baghdad: What Next for the Peace Movement?
Joanne
Mariner
Civilian Deaths and Official Apologies
John Stanton
Bush Takes His Killing Orders
from the Lord
Romi
Mahajan
Learning to Count the Dead
Aluf Benn
After Iraq, US Vows to Deal with
Other Mideast Regimes
Mary
Ellen Peterson
Gay Marine Refuses to Fight
William
MacDougall
Country Music and the Crimes of Patriotism
Ron
Jacobs
War and Occupation
Bernie
Pattison
Aborigines and the Different God
Mark
Engler
Iraq War as Arms Expo
Adam Engel
Li'l Box of Love: a Novelini
Poets'
Basement
Tripp, Albert, Katz
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Flesh and Its Discontents: the Paintings of Lucian Freud
Norman
Madarasz
Canada and the War
April
4, 2003
Anthony
Gancarski
Colin Powell's Shame
John
Chuckman
Was Einstein Right About Israel?
David
Krieger
The Meaning of Victory
Tom
Gorman
The Mantra of the Troops: Support
or Treason?
Adam
Federman
The Absence of War
Vijay
Prashad
There Are No More Arguments
Tom
Stephens
The End of the Innocence
Mickey
Z.
Makes Me Sic (Sic): Copy Editing
Bush Speak
Pierre
Tristam
War Coverage: a Dishonest Reality
Show
Hammond
Guthrie
The Deadly Mihrab
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 04/04
April
3, 2003
Uri
Avnery
A Crooked Mirror: Presstitution and
the Theater of Operations
David
Vest
Can You Hear the Silence?
Anthony
Gancarski
Colin Powell Telemarketer
David
Lindorff
Takoma: the Dolphin Who Refused
to Fight
Michael
Roberts
War, Debts and Deficits
Ramzy
Baroud
Now That Iraqis Are Being Killed Is Israel Any More Secure?
Jo Wilding
From Baghdad with Tears
Anton
Antonowicz
Cluster Bombs on Babylon
Alison
Weir
Israel, We Won't Forget Rachel Corrie
Bruce
Jackson
Hating Wolf Blitzer's Voice
Eliot Katz
War's First Week
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 04/03
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April 18,
2003
"They
Died Trying to Become Students"
The Future for Latinos in an Era of
War and Occupation
by
JORGE MARISCAL
With the U.S. assault on Iraq moving from the
invasion to the occupation phase and the saber rattling continuing
to echo out of Pentagon, it is time to reflect on where the Latino
community in the United States finds itself within the larger
context of the New World Order. Like many working class youth,
Latinos and Latinas who buy into the vision of military service
as a short cut to college or job training are simply looking
for a way to grab a piece of the American Dream. But the reality
of that Dream continues to be relatively distant for the Chicano/Mexicano
community. More specifically, alternatives to military service
available to Mexicano youth are significantly fewer than for
other groups. Until this fact is understood, the fundamental
injustice of Mexican and Chicano youth dying to "liberate"
Iraq (or any other developing nation) cannot be fully grasped.
One of the more remarked upon facts during
the early days of the war was the number of Spanish-surnamed
soldiers and marines killed or missing in action. The sense
that Latino communities were disproportionately sacrificing their
youth once again, as they had in Viet Nam, was widespread. Media
outlets began to comment on the fact that Latinos in the military
are over represented in combat and supply units (especially in
the Army and Marines) and thus more likely to see hazardous duty.
The American public learned that thousands
of non-citizens were now in the U.S. military (approximately
3% of enlisted personnel, a third of whom are from Latin America).
The Bush administration had established a fast track naturalization
process for foreign recruits in July 2002 as part of the "war
on terror." Instead of waiting three years before applying
for citizenship, green-card holders in the armed forces who entered
after September 11, 2001 could apply immediately for citizenship.
Such offers are often granted in limited form during periods
of "military hostilities" (This week John McCain,
Ted Kennedy, and eight other senators introduced a bill that
would reduce permanently the waiting period from three to two
years and provide benefits for non-citizen spouses of non-citizen
soldiers killed in action).
Although the Bush Executive Order contained
no guarantees that citizen status would be granted or even expedited,
the rumor that automatic citizenship was being granted for military
service began to circulate in Latino communities both here and
abroad. The number of permanent resident enlistees jumped from
300 a month before the fast track reform to 1,300 a month. Mexican
nationals reportedly flooded consulates attempting to volunteer.
Both citizen and non-citizen recruits
most often enlist as a way to get an education, seduced by the
recruiters' promise of technical training or money for college
contingent upon an honorable discharge. For the permanent residents
who found themselves in Iraq, their circuitous path to college
carried them from Latin America to the U.S. to Baghdad, al-Nasiriyah,
and Mosul. Some of them will not be attending classes as they
and their families had hoped. Instead they died in the line
of duty and subsequently received posthumous citizenship amidst
much fanfare and flag-waving.
Many in Latino communities, including
some parents of the fallen soldiers, sought refuge in traditional
patriotic sentiments. The father of colombiano Diego
Rincón, an Army private killed in a suicide bombing, was
quoted as saying "The only thing that keeps me going now
is to make sure that he's buried as an American. That will be
my dream come true" (USA Today, 4/9/03). Writing on the
LatinoLA website about the death of Guatemalan national José
Gutiérrez, Gil Contreras wrapped himself in the flag,
"honor," and "Semper Fi" before criticizing
Chicano and Chicana antiwar protestors for complaining too much.
The subtitle of Contreras's article made the cynical assertion
that Latino casualties proved that "Latinos can be more
than gang members & criminals." Not unlike assimilationists
from earlier periods, Contreras apparently prefers dead heroes
to living and productive citizens.
For other Latinas and Latinos, the bestowal
of posthumous citizenship was bitterly ironic. Did Mexican or
Central American immigrants have to die to win the approval of
the majority of American society? Or as an old Chicano ballad
from the Viet Nam war put it: "Now should a man/Should
he have to kill/In order to live/Like a human being/ In this
country?" If Latinos were good enough for military service
(so much so that the military academies continue to employ affirmative
action policies), why were they not good enough to receive a
decent education? Finally, how could one reconcile the fact
that foreign nationals from Latin America were fighting with
the U.S. military in Iraq at the same time that armed vigilante
"ranchers" hunted Mexican workers along the Mexico-Arizona
border for sport?
Despite the fact that Latino communities
were divided on the issue, initiatives for expedited citizenship
began to proliferate. Two senators from Georgia, where the Latino
population increased by 299.6% during the decade of the 1990s,
introduced a bill that would make posthumous citizenship automatic.
Leaders in the Catholic Church made similar recommendations.
Little was said about the fact that posthumous citizenship was
a purely symbolic gesture with no rights or privileges accruing
to the deceased person's family (Last week, Representative Darrell
Issa (R-Ca) proposed automatic citizenship for the surviving
spouse and children of non-citizen soldiers killed in battle
and given posthumous citizenship).
WHY LATINOS AND LATINAS
ENLIST
"Why should you consider getting
an education in the Navy?" [cut to aerial shot of aircraft
carrier] "This is one of your classrooms."
-- U.S. Navy television ad, April 2003
On one level, Latino and Latina GIs are
no different from other poor youth drawn into the web spun by
military recruiters. It has been widely reported that former
POW Jessica Lynch, the daughter of a poor family from Appalachia,
joined because she wanted to be a teacher. According to his
former mentor, the young man from Guatemala, José Gutiérrez,
joined the Marines to get an education. Twenty-one year old
Francisco Martinez Flores, killed when his tank fell into the
Euphrates, enlisted so that he could go to college and become
a stockbroker or an FBI agent, according to his friends (Betsy
Streisand, "Latin Heroes," U.S. News and World Report,
4/14/03). In short, what motivated these young people to enlist
was less the defense of "our freedom" or "honor"
than it was simply to increase their access to a decent education
and a better life.
The myth that the primary mission of
the armed forces is education was given a boost by former Secretary
of the Army Louis Caldera during the Clinton years. Throughout
the 1990s, the Army was not meeting its enlistment quotas. Caldera
and Pentagon planners realized that Latinos were the fastest
growing population in terms of young people of military age,
and they began to pitch the Army's program offering to pay for
GED certificate training (roughly equivalent to a high school
diploma). The goal, according to Caldera, was to increase access
to the "Hispanic market" as a major recruiting pool.
Aircraft carriers became "classrooms."
The promise of education sat in an uneasy
relationship to other more traditional messages having to do
with what the Pentagon perceived to be Latino "machismo."
The racializing undertones of this approach cannot be ignored.
An article in the ArmyLink News pointed out that many of the
surnames on the Viet Nam memorial were Spanish and that three
soldiers captured during the Kosovo conflict were of Mexican
descent. The author's conclusion? -"By these and many other
measures, Hispanics are one of America's more martially inclined
ethnic groups" (Sydney J. Freedberg, Jr., "Not Enough
GI Joses," ArmyLink News, August 1999). Some recruiters
reported that even those Mexican American recruits who "tested
out of the infantry" (i.e., scored high enough to qualify
for other military jobs) opted to enter the infantry anyway (this
despite a 1999 RAND study that explained low numbers of minorities
in Special Operations units because of their "preference
for occupations with less risk"). Caldera himself claimed
that Hispanics were "predisposed" to military service
even as he argued that the Army provided the "best education
in the world."
And so the Pentagon launched a massive
publicity campaign targeting the Hispanic market. "$30,000
for college" claimed the glitzy ads although the fine print
did not point out that very few veterans would ever see such
amounts of money. Nor was it mentioned that longitudinal studies
show that people who go directly to college earn more money over
the length of a career than those who enter the military first.
"Education" became the recruiter's buzzword because
the Pentagon had learned from studies contracted out to the Rand
Corporation and other think tanks that Latino and Latina recruits
joined the military primarily in search of "civilian job
transferability." With the possible exception of careers
in law enforcement, however, small arms expertise and truck driving
did not translate well into civilian success. Military service
does not close the economic gaps separating the majority of Latinos
from the rest of society but potentially widens them.
CHICANOS/MEXICANOS
AND THE LACK OF OPTIONS
According to the September 2002 Interim
Report of the President's Advisory Commission on Educational
Excellence for Hispanic Americans, ethnic Mexicans in the United
States fall below every other Latino group "on almost every
social and economic indicator." First-generation Mexican
immigrants, who make up 54% of all legal Latin American immigrants,
have significantly reduced life chances than their U.S. born
Mexican American counterparts. High-school drop out rates of
around 30% for U.S. born Mexican Americans are bad enough, but
the rate more than doubles to 61% for new immigrants.
Although Mexican Americans do better
in the field of education than their recently arrived counterparts,
when their educational achievement is compared to every other
Latino subgroup they lag behind. Among all Latinos over the
age of 25, for example, only 10.8% of ethnic Mexicans hold a
Bachelor degree or higher compared to 13.9% for Puerto Ricans
and 18.1% for Cuban Americans (2002 Interim Report).
Although Latinos have a high rate of participation in the labor
force, over 11% of Latino workers live in poverty. About 7%
of Latinos with full-time jobs were still living below the poverty
line in 2001 (compared to 4.4% of African Americans and 1.7%
for whites). Among all private sector employees in the U.S.,
41.5% are considered blue collar, but 63.5% of all Latinos hold
blue collar jobs (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
1998). In 2002, 61% of all workers in agricultural production
were Latinos, the vast majority of Mexican descent. While nearly
11% of non-Hispanic whites earn more than $75,000 a year, only
2% of all Latinos earn as much. Among all high school graduates
who attend graduate and professional programs, Latinos make up
only 1.9% (compared to 3% Black, 3.8% Whites, and 8.8% Asian).
One could elaborate further this bleak
picture of what the future holds for Latino communities. The
paucity of good union jobs and the decline in public funding
for cultural workers only adds to the sense of diminished opportunities.
Is it any wonder, in the face of these daunting material conditions,
that young Latino and Latina faces are filling the lowest ranks
of the military in the lowest-tech occupations? As they do so,
the pipeline of Latino and Latina teachers, doctors, and other
professionals continues to dry up, a fact that will have devastating
consequences for our communities for decades to come.
So Latino blood now flows in the ancient
waters of the Tigris and Euphrates. An historical irony of stunning
proportions--that the spirits of the descendants of the great
indigenous civilizations of Mesoamerica now mingle with those
of the heirs of ancient Mesopotamia. What can we say of the
young Latino men who sacrificed their lives in Iraq? That they
fought without knowing their enemy, played their role as pawns
in a geopolitical chess game devised by arrogant bureaucrats,
and died simply trying to get an education; trying to have a
fair shot at the American Dream that has eluded the vast majority
of Latinos for over a century and a half; dying as soldiers who
just wanted to be students.
Jorge Mariscal
is a Viet Nam veteran who wonders how much longer Latinos will
have to die on the battlefield before they are granted the basic
opportunities promised to all citizens. He can be reached at:
gmariscal@ucsd.edu
Today's
Features
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Robert
Jensen
Self-Determination in Iraq? Then the
US Must Leave
Dr.
Susan Block
The Rape of Iraq
Ron Jacobs
Aiming at Syria: Stop Them Before They Kill Again
Robert
Fisk
The Final Sacking of Baghdad
Col. Dan
Smith
Post-War Iraq: Asking the Right Questions
Ali
Abunimah and Hussein Ibish
A Cycle of Chaos and Confrontation: Misadventures of the NeoCons
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/15
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