Tonight, Webdiary�s information clearing house on the latest in Iraq and what it means, Webdiarist Tim Gillin’s guide to the best websites on the war and American foreign policy, and caustic comments from Steve Wallace, Tony Yegles, Peter Gellatly and Robert Lawton.
To begin, Margaret Curtain’s quote for the future:
“I think that people want peace so much that one of these days government had better get out of their way and let them have it.” Dwight D. Eisenhower.
In Australia, Keysar Trad put out a press release today announcing that the Mufty of Australia, Sh. Taj Aldin Alahilali. would join a rally in Auburn, in Sydney�s West, calling for all Coalition troops to leave Iraq. �The Mufty has sent a letter to Mr. Bush calling for the cessation of all bombardment and killings and calling on Mr. Bush to find a peaceful way to pull coalition troops out of Iraq,� Trad said.
Juan Cole reports: �Abdul Karim al-Muhammadawi, legendary leader of the Iraqi Hizbullah, which organized the Shiite Marsh Arabs to fight Saddam, has suspended his membership in the Interim Governing Council (IGC) in order to protest American actions in attacking the Sadrist movement. Al-Muhammadawi met Friday with Muqtada al-Sadr, whom the Americans say they will arrest. Were Muhammadawi and the Marsh Arabs to turn against the Americans, they would be formidable foes. Rumors are flying that many IGC members have fled Iraq in fear of their lives, afraid of a backlash against them because they are cooperating with the Americans attacking Iraqi cities.�
For on the ground coverage from a female Iraqi blogger, see riverbend.
Maggie Churchward: “Check out raedinthemiddle, a very different viewpoint from many other bloggers. He makes sense rather than spouting platitudes which many others seem to do.”
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WHAT�S GONE WRONG
Allen Jay: A complement to Matt Southon’s piece As seen on TV: the decline and fall of the American empire:
President Bush’s options appear extremely limited, and there is little doubt that the United States will continue to decline as a decisive force in world affairs over the next decade. The real question is not whether U.S. hegemony is waning but whether the United States can devise a way to descend gracefully, with minimum damage to the world, and to itself. Immanuel Wallerstein, The Decline of American Power, The New Press, New York, NY, 2003, page 27.
Scott Burchill: In Iraq, a ‘perfect storm’, US commander will not take blame for unrest and Phoenix, Assassination and Blowback in Iraq.
Brian McKinlay: A Superpower Defeated by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr:
The news from and about Iraq, chronicling a quickening spiral of disaster for the US, is spilling out faster than even the experienced surfer can follow. The news is of a country united in a common cause: driving out the foreign invader and occupying power; of a militarized, imperial, foreign government attempting to run an ancient civilization, about which it knows or cares nothing; and of the impassioned desire for self-government proving to be more powerful than history’s wealthiest and most powerful state.
In the thick of all this blood, gore, destruction, killing, and hate, not even the ridiculous posturing of the Bush administration, forever promising to stick out this test of will, can reasonably dispute what is beginning to be obvious to everyone: the Superpower has been defeated.
Marilyn Shepherd: Iraqis told them to go from day one, Resistance will continue to spread until the occupation ends:
What went so wrong that the US-led war to “liberate” the Iraqi people turned into the daily slaughter of the victims of Saddam’s tyranny? The answer is simple: nothing has gone wrong. Despite the mythology, most Iraqis were strongly against the invasion from the start, though it has taken 12 months for the world’s media to report that.
What has changed is that many Iraqis have decided that the peaceful road to evict the occupiers is not leading anywhere. They didn’t need Sadr to tell them this. They were told it loudly and brutally a few days ago by a US Abraham tank, one of many facing unarmed and peaceful demonstrators not far from the infamous Saddam statue that was toppled a year ago. The tank crushed to death two peaceful demonstrators protesting against the closure of a Sadr newspaper by Paul Bremer, the self-declared champion of free speech in Iraq. The tragic irony wasn’t lost on Iraqis.
For analysis of Condi Rice’s S11 evidence, David Spratt recommends Condi Gets A Reality Check for the truth behind her opening statement spin and Scott Burchill recommends Rice Testimony Before 9/11 Commission.
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TIM GILLIN’S GUIDE TO WEBSITES ON THE WAR AND U.S. FOREIGN POLICY
1. Slate’s “War Stories” columnist Fred Kaplan
He provides an intelligent, moderate and informed critical view of US military policy. Some years ago he wrote a great book on the US nuclear weapons strategists and their sub-culture called The Wizards Of Armageddon.
Hard to classify. Near impossible to predict. It usually takes a different point of view than anything elsewhere in mainstream media. Sometimes I think they are different just for the sake of it.
Generally pro-war in content, this site provides a wide selection of quality articles from the world’s press on various issues impacting Iraq and the war on terror.
4. anti war
Anti-war news and commentary with a staunchly non-interventionist editorial point of view. The product of a trio of activists from San Francisco, the site was subject to hacking attacks when it opposed NATO intervention in Yugoslavia that just may have had it’s origin in government or military circles.
“News you won’t find on CNN”. Includes Dick Cheney’s Song of America, a classic must read article originally published in Harper’s magazine.
6. amconmag
Website of Pat Buchanan’s “The American Conservative” magazine. Buchanan in the 1990s campaigned against George Bush Senior’s first Gulf War. He has been smeared by and has debated with the “neocons” fora dozen years before that label hit the headlines. Every month TAC posts a couple of articles on line. Their archive has quality articles from American and British authors (often contributors from The Spectator). TAC’s mostly conservative critics of Bush policy make Mark Latham look like a conga line wannabe.
7. Noam Chomsky’s “official” blog.
Surprisingly patchy in quality. Maybe he should stick to books.
8. Counterpunch
Edited by Alexander Cockburn. Often features articles by Robert Fisk. “America’s best political newsletter”. Leftist progressive slant.
9. Soldiers for Truth and Hackworth
The voice of the grunts? Run by David Hackworth, one of the “most highly decorated” US military veterans. He won the United Nations Medal for Peace for anti-nuclear work in Australia . Neither pro-war or anti-war, but definitely pro-soldier. Or is Hack just a con man?
Archive of Karen Kwiatkowski, USAF Lt.Col (retired). Kwiatkowski was assigned by the Pentagon to work in Rumsfeld’s “Office of Special Plans. Kwiatkowski didn’t like what she saw.
11. ipsnews
The archive of Jim Lobe, a journalist who specialises in reporting on the neocons. Often used as an expert commentator by ABC’s “Four Corners” and BBC�s “Panorama”.
12. War is a racket
Classic text, a damning critique of the business end of war. Makes Chomsky look like a piker. Written by double Congressional Medal of Honor winner and former US Marine Corps Major-General Smedley T Butler. Butler was the youngest man to hold that rank.
13. Harper’s Index
It makes you think! The March 2004 edition of the Index includes a link to a speech made by Donald Rumsfeld attacking war profiteering by US military contractor Brown & Root)
14. History News Network.
Where historians comment on the news.
15. The Onion.
Enough said!
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YOUR COMMENTS
Steve Wallace
I have no recollection at all of �cut and run� being Australian vernacular. When did we import this ridiculous term? Was it from some septic sitcom? I won�t do �cut�, and I don�t do �run�. Well, I get a runny nose now and then in winter and I hate it.
Margo, why are we obsessed with such stupid terms, and fail so dismally to see what�s really going on? I thought we were supposed to be so much smarter than our parents, the �Vietnam� generation.
Let�s �cut and run�, just to prove a point. Australians always respond to marketing.
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Tony Yegles
When Howard says that Iraq is nothing like Vietnam we must take him at his word. After all he is the Prime Minister and as such his every word carries a lot of weight. This is especially true when it comes to National Security.
In Howard’s World Iraq still possesses WMD but they have not been found yet. No WMD may have been found yet but instead unspeakable atrocities by Saddam Hussein were discovered by the Liberals for the first time in 30 years.
Anyone with any logic should know that the presence of 200 Australian troops is crucial to the success or failure of the Iraq operation and can make or break democracy, freedom and stability. So that means that roughly 1 Aussie Soldier is worth about 600 US soldiers. We really are punching above our weight, as Downer remarked last year.
Anyone supporting a pullout by Christmas is obviously playing into the hands of Al Qaeda. These must be the same (Un)Australians who were giving succour to Saddam with their anti-war stance. In any case setting arbitrary deadlines in Iraq is irresponsible unless it is done by George Bush.
The Iraq War has not increased the terrorist threat to this country. How could it? It has made the world a safer place. We have seen proof of that this week.
But then nobody really cares as people have moved on.
If Howard had his time over again, he would do the same thing again.
Oh what a wonderful world…
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Peter Gellatly
An open email to Alan Ramsey
Well, you’re really on a tear over all this – and who could blame you? But I contend you are avoiding the real issue: namely the Australian public’s inattention to the true cost of “independence”, and likely unwillingness to pay it. It is this issue which has trapped Howard – and, frankly, would likely have trapped PM Latham, whatever his heady rhetoric from the opposition benches.
I concede at once that Howard (whom I in any case can’t wait to be rid of, for myriad other reasons) may not enjoy the luxury of Kirribilli House sans bearing personal responsibility for participation in egregious error – however forced he felt that participation to be. This balance of perks and responsibilities is merely part of the price of prime ministership.
But Latham’s pronouncements on the subject are drivel. Your closing quote of his January 29 remarks says it all:
“Our foreign policy has three pillars. Our membership of the United Nations, our alliance with the United States, and comprehensive engagement with Asia. Those three pillars rest on a rock. And the rock is an independent, self-reliant Australia. When I have to make a decision on Australia’s national security, I’ll only ask one question: what is in Australia’s national interest?”
Since the “rock” of “an independent, self-reliant Australia” is nothing more than fraudulent mythology, any true assessment of “Australia’s national interest” must recognise this fact. To publicly assert otherwise is to mislead the Australian people on a scale far in excess of l’affaire Iraq.
Latham continues:
“I believe in the American alliance, but with Australia as an equal partner, not as deputy. I believe in ANZUS, but not as a rubber stamp. I haven’t got it in me to bite my tongue and stay silent if Australia’s interests are on the line…”
Australia as “an equal partner” with the US? Wake up! Recapping the Vietnam War, former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara omits to even include Australia as one of the US’s “allies”! Why would he: allies, after all, are those nations truly capable of independent action. They are not to be confused with client states.
So my question Alan – addressed to you, and to Latham – is by what specific measures is a mooted independent Australian foreign policy to be underpinned, what shall such underpinning cost, and how is the Australian public to be persuaded to bear that cost?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all in favour of such action – indeed I have lobbied for it for years. I just get a little cross at the continual pretence that the Utopia is already in place.
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Robert Lawton
I too have a Japanese friend in the middle east (see Japanese hostages: a plea for help). She is in Amman in Jordan at present and emailed me today. She is working for a Japanese NGO on Iraqi projects, but from Jordan.
All the Japanese NGOs working in Iraq of which she is aware have no Japanese staff inside Iraq. Although, as she observes, this is discriminatory – casualties working for Japanese NGOs aren’t news in Japan, while the death of a Japanese daughter or son is news indeed back home – the Japanese aid profession has been careful not to expose itself to risk.
She finds it amazing that the Japanese hostages, who are very young and without expert assistance from other internationals (code for non Muslim Westerners) thought that they could arrive in Iraq and stay safe. In her view they are at best naive, at worst stupid.
I think that the world really has gone mad when you tell us we should email Al Jazeera and explain that these people are peace activists and should be freed. (Margo: I did no such thing. I published an email from a reader requesting that action.)
Iraq is a dangerous place and there are many ways to die there. People who put themselves in situations like this, where they can be used to play to the emotions by thugs, should be left to their own bizarre devices. In any case, it’s possible the entire thing is a hoax.
The point is worth making though: we here in the West are still interested in the affairs of other countries (Bush, Latham, Kingston, Chomsky, everyone!). In Iraq, they want the foreigners out and they couldn’t care less about the intentions of such foreigners. Not a surprising attitude really.
At some point in the not too distant future the US and its various assistants will get out of Iraq. Maybe the bases that the Bush administration thought they’d get in Iraq will be working by then, or maybe they will have to stay in Saudi Arabia.
At that point we might all get back to the main issue, which is the very busy schedule of Islamic terror groups.
Is it not clear from all this that Islamic terror is intolerant, and that multiculturalism and the campaigning spirit of liberalism doesn’t have a place in its world view?
Also – when everyone on Webdiary has stopped slavering over the prospect of a government without John Howard at its head dealing with the Yanks, it might be worth considering this. Latham’s speech to the Lowy Institute was nothing new for a Labor leader. The intelligence and defence signals relationship with the USA (which is many times more significant than a few hundred service people in Iraq) will go on as it always has. We will remain part of the US war on terror, whether it’s run by neo-conservatives in the Pentagon or old fashioned liberals in the State Department. Kim Beazley might even become Ambassador to Washington, his dream job.
Our real issue in foreign affairs should be our relationship with China. But that’s harder to put into a 10 second grab, so we can keep reading the UK and US papers for information on that country and its fascinating stories.
It is possible that Jemaah Islamiya or similar might try to destroy the Opera House or the Harbour Bridge. But where is the local Muslim audience? September 11 apart, terror attacks seem to be directed at countries with majority Muslim populations or an irredentist history (Spain). The lack of terror activity in Latin America – which has several countries with significant Muslim populations, in particular Brazil, in similar proportion to ours – seems to indicate that Australia is an unattractive place for Islamic terror to do its work.
I consider London and Paris, the site of some recently foiled plots, to be world cities like New York or Washington and thus similarly vulnerable. The rest of the UK or France should be considered differently to the capitals.
Sydney, for all its self confidence, is not a world city of the same kind.
As for the gender balance on Web Diary, the woman who made the point about men sitting at desks having time to think and write…and thus dominate the conversation is spot on. I used to write from such a desk, while the world was maintained around me – in public sector employment!
Now I snatch a few moments at a laptop, at home, usually in the middle of the night, between part time work, part time study and fatherhood.
The best Web Diarist is the one who have not yet spoken… (Zen wisdom)