David Ignatius of the Washington Post provides yet another in a seeming proliferation of stories to the effect that the US really doesn't want Israel to attack Iran:

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has a lot on his mind these days, from cutting the defense budget to managing the drawdown of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. But his biggest worry is the growing possibility that Israel will attack Iran over the next few months.

Panetta believes there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June — before Iran enters what Israelis described as a zone of immunity to commence building a nuclear bomb. Very soon, the Israelis fear, the Iranians will have stored enough enriched uranium in deep underground facilities to make a weapon — and only the United States could then stop them militarily.

Ignatius reveals himself as a skilled practitioner of political comedy with the conclusion of what the Post characterizes as an opinion piece:

U.S. officials see two possible ways to dissuade the Israelis from such an attack: Tehran could finally open serious negotiations for a formula to verifiably guarantee that its nuclear program will remain a civilian one; or the United States could step up its covert actions to degrade the program so much that Israelis would decide that military action wasn’t necessary.

Serious negotiations? Of course, Ignatius knows that this is the last thing the US wants, he is just using it as a capstone to one of the funniest propaganda pieces in recent memory. After all, Iran has sought to negotiate with the US several times since 9/11, but has been rebuffed every time, most recently when it accepted a US proposal put forward through Turkey and Brazil. Naturally, the US thereafter abandoned it when the objective of demonstrating the intransigence of Iran failed to materialize. But, oops, I forgot to mention that the Iranian nuclear program is a civilian one, something that Ignatius no doubt knows as well. Just goes to show how easily one can start internalizing the imperialist narrative when it comes to Iran.

Beyond this, the notion that the US could degrade the Iranian research program covertly is farcical. The objective of Ignatius' humorous propaganda is obvious, to distance the US from any Israeli attack while reaping the anticipated reward, regime change. And, keeping his options open, Ignatius relies upon the indirectly quoted US officials to put forward rigged alternatives that justify a military attack. In other words, we tried to stop it, but, there was really no alternative, anyway.

When things get too politically hot, characterize the action as a unilaterial Israeli one, like, for example, when Israel sold weapons to South Africa or trained the militaries of South American dictatorships. In both instances, there was a serendipitous coincidence between the purported unilateral action and the objectives of US foreign policy. In this instance, it appears that the disinformation campaign was launched by a Mark Perry article in Foreign Affairs to the effect that Israeli intelligence agents had posed as CIA agents to assist Jundallah in carrying out violent attacks inside Iran. The whole thing sounds implausible, all the way down to Perry's reportage to the effect that Bush was outraged when he heard about the operation because it might put Americans at risk. Bush spent his entire presidency putting Americans at risk, regardless of whether they wore uniforms or not.

Indeed, one gets the impression that a secondary purpose of the Foreign Affairs article, beyond distancing the US from covert operations consistent with foreign policy objectives, is to establish plausible deniability for Bush and Obama. For example, consider this howler:

Since Obama's initial order (scaling back joint US-Israel intelligence programs targeting Iran), U.S. intelligence services have received clearance to cooperate with Israel on a number of classified intelligence-gathering operations focused on Iran's nuclear program, according to a currently serving officer. These operations are highly technical in nature and do not involve covert actions targeting Iran's infrastructure or political or military leadership.

We don't do bang and boom, a recently retired intelligence officer said. And we don't do political assassinations.

Israel regularly proposes conducting covert operations targeting Iranians, but is just as regularly shut down, according to retired and current intelligence officers. They come into the room and spread out their plans, and we just shake our heads, one highly placed intelligence source said, and we say to them -- 'Don't even go there. The answer is no.'

Right. We don't do bang and boom . . . we don't do political assassinations. Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and other countries around the world are littered with the victims of bang and boom and political assassinations, and, yet, we are supposed to believe that Bush and Obama objected to it when Israel proposed to subject Iran to similar treatment, assuming that Israel had to propose it at all.

Labels: "War on Terror", American Empire, Barack Obama, Bush, Iran, Israel, War with Iran

UPDATE: From a CNN report:

The lives of ordinary Iranians have been deeply touched by the Western sanctions. Several spoke to CNN about how they are coping with staggering inflation and a plunging national currency, although none felt comfortable being fully identified, fearful of the Islamic Republic's long reach into private lives.

Farhad, 47, was once comfortable, but things began sliding downhill when sanctions came and the foreign oil firm that employed him packed up and left.

As a taxi driver, he works hard but saves little money. With the latest round of U.S. sanctions imposed on Iran's Central Bank last month, he has seen staggering inflation; the price of meat and milk have skyrocketed by as much as 50 percent.

He and his wife have stopped having guests at their home or going out to eat. They can't remember when they bought new clothes and no longer send their suits to the cleaners.

I feel bad for the cleaners, he says. They must be suffering as a result of people like me not using their services.

Farhad has a savings account that is shrinking fast as he dips into it to make ends meet.

His 21-year-old son works two part-time jobs while he earns a degree in computer science. Farhad feels bad that he can't afford to buy him the computer equipment he needs.

I wait and pray for something to spark the economy and get it going, but I am not holding my breath, he says. Life must go on. We can only wait and see what the future has in store for us.

In the meantime, he says, the only way for his sons to live a decent life is to fall in with influential people or make shady business deals like trading foreign currency on the black market.

INITIAL POST: Alexander Cockburn believes that war with Iran is inevitable. Indeed, he maintains, as have a number of others, that the conflict has already begun. Beyond the black budget covert operations, there is the direct US assault upon the country's economy, as revealed by a precipitous decline in the value of the Iranian currency, the rial. The embargo of Iranian oil, to be enforced by punitive measures against international corporations that facilitate the sale of it, is beginning to inflict greater and greater hardship upon the Iranian populace, no doubt in the expectation that the real US objective, regime change, will soon be accomplished. The European Union, consistent with its history of hesitant support for US imperial action, has agreed to embargo Iranian oil this summer.

Meanwhile, voices for war in the US have privileged access to the media, with outlets like the New York Times, NPR and PBS providing a veneer of understated, urbane legitimacy to the more populist, shrill expressions of militarism found elsewhere. Journalists and foreign policy analysts perpetually reference a non-existent nuclear weapons program, subject only to subsequent, tepid criticisms buried within newspapers and websites. Furthermore, as noted by John Glaser of antiwar.com, while opponents of military action have been granted the opportunity to challenge the case for war, the media has confined the debate within the boundaries of the acceptance of the necessity to stop the Iranian nuclear research program.

Of course, the reason for such a circumscribed debate is obvious. As already noted, the real objective of US policy is regime change. Indeed, it would not be shocking if, upon the emergence of a new, acceptable Iranian government, the US, Europe and Israel permitted the nuclear research program to proceed. After all, as explained here last year, there are few endeavors so perfectly suited to the proliferation of the hierarchy of specialization and the accumulation of capital than the construction of nuclear research facilities and power plants. Iranian nuclear research scientists currently trying to avoid assassination would find themselves welcome at academic conferences and research programs around the world. Accordingly, the Iranian nuclear research program is merely a MacGuffin that accelerates the plot of the regime change narrative.

Hence, any public discussion in the US that would result in a candid discussion of the US relationship with Iran, and the true objectives of US policy, must be suppressed. Cockburn, for understandable reasons, analogizes current US policy towards Iran with US policy towards Japan before the attack upon Pearl Harbor. But, a more contemporary, and perhaps, more apposite one, is US policy towards the Allende government in Chile. Just as the US waged an economic war upon Chile in the early 1970s, the US is now doing so against Iran. But, as Pepe Escobar has recognized, the consequences of such economic warfare are as likely to hurt the G-20 countries as much as Iran because of the growth suppression associated with increased oil prices. He astutely notes that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner actually argued against the sanctions bill as it made its way through Congress. With characteristic hyperbole that contains grains of troubling insight, Escobar concludes: the name of the game in 2012 is deep global recession. Conversely, Iranians may be able to offset the inflated prices of imported goods with increased employment as a devalued rial makes domestically produced goods more competitive.

Unfortunately, that's the more optimistic scenario. As Behzad Yaghmaian said today:

The United States and its allies are using elaborate economic sanctions to drain the resources of the Iranian regime, ignite domestic revolt, and force the government to abandon its nuclear ambitions. Sanctions are, however, chocking the Iranian people. While the government continues enriching uranium, sanctions penalize the Iranian people through dizzying increase in the price of food, gasoline and other basic items in ordinary people’s basket of consumer goods. Food inflation in Iran is currently at 50%, more than double the official inflation rate.

Fear of new sanctions and war also created an exodus from the local currency to the dollar and other major currencies. The nearly 60% depreciation of the Iranian rial, and the embargo on Iran’s oil exports will further increase food and other consumer goods prices. The dire economic conditions of Iranians with fixed income is a painful reminder of standing in long line for hours to buy milk, oil, and other basic necessities during the war with Iraq.

Yaghmaian concludes with a warning, that the passivity of the Iranian people should not be misunderstood as support for military confrontation. In this, they possess an insight beyond many Americans, particularly those who respond to the exhortations of Republican presidential candidates for military action with applause. Even more troubling is the possibility that the economic elites of the G-20 have decided that Iran is the next great capital accumulation opportunity of disaster capitalism. Just imagine the prospects for private military contractors, private security and surveillance firms and construction companies. Exponentially more in billions await them than they received over the course of the Iraqi occupation. For now, they are still patient enough to find out if the sanctions will work because they can avoid the risks associated with military conflict. But, with no fear of significant public resistance, the way is clear for them to seek a military resolution if they fail.

Given the acquiescence of liberals and social democrats in the US and Europe, the likelihood of protests against such a war on the scale of February 2003 is nil. This is most terrifying aspect of the current situation in the Gulf, the fact that there is not even the pretense of a restraint upon their ability to launch an indefinite, tremendously destructive war in order to further concentrate their wealth and power. But what comes afterwards? The great variable is the response of the burgeoning population of young people around the world, the people who fight the police on the streets of Athens, Cairo, Rome, Manama, London, Oakland, Lyon and Santiago, among other places, the people who realize that their future is bleak because of the avariousness and violence of those who have come before them. What will they do? The success or failure of this hideous venture is dependent upon the answer.

Labels: Activism, American Empire, Europe, Iran, Neoliberalism, War with Iran

Despite his anachronistic social and economic perspectives, Ron Paul has performed a great public service by exposing the lies by which those in the military, the government and the media are using to try to persuade the public to support an attack upon Iran. To date, I haven't noticed any progressive organization, such as, for example, MoveON.org or Rebuild the Dream, say anything at all about it. My search query at the website for each, using the term Iran, humorously generated a Nothing Found result.

Labels: American Empire, Iran, Liberals, MoveON.org, War with Iran, YouTube

The bottom line, from Charles Hugh Smith:

The top 5% of Americans by income are responsible for 37% of all consumer spending-- about the same as the entire bottom 80% by income (39.5%).

David Stockman, director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Reagan, recently noted in an editorial that the top 1% of Americans received two-thirds of the gain in national income from 2002 to 2006.

Over the past 25 years since 1985, the top 1 percent's share of national income has doubled; in 2007, it netted 23 percent of the nation’s total income. The income of the wealthiest Americans--the top 0.1 percent—has tripled in that 25 year period. This wafer-thin slice of Americans now earn as much as the bottom 120 million people.

Out of 113 million households, 1/100 of 1% rake in $10 million or more annually. As consumers, the top 5% carry the same weight as the bottom 80%. The top 10% take in 50% of the income. (The sources are listed in Two Americas: The Gap Between the Top 5% and the Bottom 95% Widens August 18, 2010.)

This explains how Nordstroms' earnings can rise by a healthy 43% while Wal-Mart's sales in the U.S. can decline. Frequent contributor Cheryl A. reported that on a trip to Wilmington, DE, the shopping mall was packed with shoppers and people dining out: It's like there never was a recession.

Meanwhile, I took an old friend who was visiting the San Francisco Bay Area to a restaurant in San Francisco that has never failed to be busy in the past 10 years, and the place had more empty tables than customers. The sidewalks were crowded with people, but how many were spending money?

I think the answer is obvious: the top 20% are spending money lavishly, as per their consumerist lifestyle, while the bottom 80% are taking the kids to Costco for entertainment.

For an illustration of how income has increased dramatically for the top 20% since Reagan became President, in the absence of any significant growth for the remaining 80%, go here. In the remainder of this article, as well as some others, Smith has some interesting observations about the extent to which much of the populace is now dependent upon some form of government assistance, even if his perspective is rightist (for example, some of the forms of assistance included in Smith's calculation are ones, such as Social Security, where the recipients have already pre-paid a substantial portion of the benefit).

Even so, Smith retains an acute sense of the nature of class conflict in the US:

The net result of this rising inequality is a high concentration of political power which flows from (and protects) the unearned income streams derived from the highly concentrated wealth. . . . The Political Class, the super-wealthy with vast unearned income and those drawing entitlements are all satisfied with this arrangement. Cash and cash equivalents paid to individuals by the Central State have ballooned up 80% above inflation, taxes on the super-wealthy are modest, and the difference--the $1.5 trillion annually needed to keep the swag flowing to the concentrated wealth/power holders (the Plutocracy) at the top and the complicit bottom (standard-issue welfare)--is borrowed from the Federal Reserve and global mercantilist sources of excess dollars accumulated from monumental trade imbalances.

Since the political class of conservatives and progressives are equally dependent on and beholden to the holders of concentrated wealth for their political power, then their protests against the deficits, welfare, corporate power, etc. all ring hollow.

Leaving aside Smith's deficit hawkery, it is clear that he is painting a familiar picture. It is precisely what transpired in many countries around the world that embraced neoliberal orthodoxy, countries such as Argentina, Greece, Ireland and the United Kingdom, among others. It is a social model that has, as predicted, concentrated wealth and power within a smaller and smaller group of people. Smith's insight is that it has also shrunk the base of consumption within our economy as well.

Among some liberals and leftists, there has been a tendency to consider such a social model as unsustainable precisely because of the narrowing of consumption described by Smith. For liberals, it is another example of their tendency to assert that US capitalism cannot escape the gravitational pull of the New Deal. At the end of the day, US capitalists will fall back upon a more egalitarian distribution of wealth for their long term survival. For leftists, it is a softer variation of an old theme that the demise of capitalism is just around the corner.

Of course, elites face the challenge of implementing this vision in such a way so as to avoid the explosion of civil unrest. But, by one important measure, things are going well:

American businesses earned profits at an annual rate of $1.659 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. That is the highest figure recorded since the government began keeping track over 60 years ago, at least in nominal or noninflation-adjusted terms.

The government does not adjust the numbers for inflation, in part because these corporate profits can be affected by pricing changes from all over the world and because the government does not have a price index for individual companies. The next-highest annual corporate profits level on record was in the third quarter of 2006, when they were $1.655 trillion.

Corporate profits have been doing extremely well for a while. Since their cyclical low in the fourth quarter of 2008, profits have grown for seven consecutive quarters, at some of the fastest rates in history. As a share of gross domestic product, corporate profits also have been increasing, and they now represent 11.2 percent of total output. That is the highest share since the fourth quarter of 2006, when they accounted for 11.7 percent of output.

This breakneck pace can be partly attributed to strong productivity growth — which means companies have been able to make more with less — as well as the fact that some of the profits of American companies come from abroad. Economic conditions in the United States may still be sluggish, but many emerging markets like India and China are expanding rapidly.

What's not to like? Productivity increasing, expanding markets in East and South Asia accompanied by a quiescent domestic workforce. So, perhaps, I am a pessimist, but, to date, austerity has been quite effectively imposed by refusing to take action to reduce unemployment (such as, for example, providing direct assistance to the states to reduce budget deficits, increasing the the percentage of wage replacement for recipients of unemployment and stalling the rate of home foreclosures through cram down and loan modifications). Now, it is time to move on to the next stage, As long as the federal government, through its control of the money supply, can continue to do so without recourse to the immediate, draconian measures that are now required in Ireland and the UK, the prospects for success remain favorable. The inexorable depreciation of the US dollar is one of the best weapons in this effort.

With unassailable control over the US political system, the wealthy can manipulate the provision of social welfare to preserve their wealth while maintaining social order. Hence, now is the time for more permanent, structural changes to their advantage. Indeed, one can argue that this is the mission of Obama's Deficit Reduction Commission. It is possible to characterize the goal of the Commission as guaranteeing the future profits for those who earn their money from investment by ensuring low rates of taxation through cost containment of federal expenditures. Even if the short term prospects of the Commission's proposals are speculative, we can anticipate that many of them will form the basis for future legislative action.

Meanwhile, where should we look for developments that suggest a different, more contentious prognosis? First, and most obviously, the emergence of overt conflict among the major trading regions of the world, between the US, Europe, India and East Asia. Here, there are some signs of serious disagreement, particularly between the US, Germany and China, as expresssed over the Federal Reserve's new qualitative easing program, but it would be a stretch to characterize them as indicative of a permanent rift. Second, there is a possibility of social unrest, but the likelihood of the creation of a strong movement centered around changing the economic structure of the US remains remote, although there is a chance that resistance to austerity in Europe could ignite stronger resistance globally.

Finally, there is that great unmentionable, the eruption of a mutiny within the US military in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan. Given the stresses placed upon people serving in the military (there is an ongoing epidemic of suicides among troops who have returned home), I wouldn't discount such an action as implausbile. And, finally, there is the possibility that the US may actually stumble into a war with Iran, which would radically reconfigure the global order, most likely to the detriment of the US. In any event, there is much organizing to be done. As Marx said, history is not deterministic, it requires us to seize the opportunity to create a better world. The capitalist endeavor to liberate capital from labor constraints, particularly the dependency upon wage labor generated demand, is a potentially dystopian catastrophe unless we collectively push in a different direction.

Labels: Bailout of Finance Capitalists, Europe, Neoliberalism, Sub-Proletarianization of America, Sub-Proletarianization of Europe, War with Iran

(snip)

Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event––like a new Pearl Harbor.

(snip)

In A Journey: My Political Life, Blair depicts Cheney as believing the United States was at war not only with Islamic terrorists but with rogue states that supported them and that the only way of defeating [this threat] was head-on, with maximum American strength.

Cheney wanted forcible regime change in all Middle Eastern countries that he considered hostile to U.S. interests, according to Blair.

He would have worked through the whole lot, Iraq, Syria, Iran, dealing with all their surrogates in the course of it – Hezbollah, Hamas, etc., Blair wrote. In other words, he [Cheney] thought the world had to be made anew, and that after 11 September, it had to be done by force and with urgency. So he was for hard, hard power. No ifs, no buts, no maybes.”

(snip)

The majority concludes its opinion with a recommendation of alternative remedies. Not only are these remedies insufficient, but their suggestion understates the severity of the consequences to Plaintiffs from the denial of judicial relief. Suggesting, for example, that the Executive could “honor[ ] the fundamental principles of justice” by determining “whether plaintiffs’ claims have merit,” [see Maj. Op. at 13554] disregards the concept of checks and balances. Permitting the executive to police its own errors and determine the remedy dispensed would not only deprive the judiciary of its role, but also deprive Plaintiffs of a fair assessment of their claims by a neutral arbiter. The majority’s suggestion of payment of reparations to the victims of extraordinary rendition, such as those paid to Japanese Latin Americans for the injustices suffered under Internment during World War II, over fifty years after those injustices were suffered [Maj. Op. at 13554], elevates the impractical to the point of absurdity. of Similarly, a congressional investigation, private bill, or enacting of “remedial legislation,” [Maj. Op. at 13556], leaves to the legislative branch claims which the federal courts are better equipped to handle. See Kosak v. United States, 465 U.S. 848, 867 (1984) (Stevens, J., dissenting).

Arbitrary imprisonment and torture under any circumstance is a “ ‘gross and notorious . . . act of despotism.’ ” Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, 556 (2004) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (quoting 1 Blackstone 131-33 (1765)). But “ ‘confinement [and abuse] of the person, by secretly hurrying him to [prison], where his sufferings are unknown or forgotten; is a less public, a less striking, and therefore a more dangerous engine of arbitrary government.’ ” Id. (Scalia, J., dissenting) (quoting 1 Blackstone 131-33 (1765)) (emphasis added).

(snip)

Yet nothing comes closer to Titus Andronicus than the insistent, terrible stories of gang rape by United States personnel in Abu Ghraib. You hear this repeatedly in Amman, and a very accurate source of mine in Washington – a man who deals with military personnel – tells me they are true. This, he says, is why Barack Obama changed his mind about releasing the photographs which George W Bush refused to make public. The pictures we saw – of the humiliation of men – were outrageous enough. But the ones we haven't seen show Americans raping Iraqi women.

Lima Nabil, a journalist who now runs a home for on-the-run girls, sips coffee as the boiling Jordanian sun frowns through the window at us. In Abu Ghraib, she says, women were tortured by the Americans much more than the men. One woman said she witnessed five girls being raped. Most of the women in the prison were raped – some of them left prison pregnant. Families killed some of these women – because of the shame.

Labels: 9/11, Abu Ghraib, Afghanistan, American Empire, Cheney, Occupation of Iraq, PNAC, Sadomasochism, Tony Blair, War with Iran, YouTube

My, how things have changed in less than two years. In November 2008, the election of Barack Obama precipitated a crisis on the left. Recognizing that Obama was unlikely to bring about a fundamental shift is US domestic and foreign policy, leftists wondered about how they would be able to continue to reach liberal and progressive allies on issues of importance. How could they retain what marginal influence they had in the face of Obama's personal charisma and strong public support? Some subsequently perservered, while others unequivocally supported Obama as consistent with a long term, evolutionary strategy of change within the US. Meanwhile, liberals and progressives believed that 30 to 40 years of tireless political activity was about to be rewarded with the implementation of much of their agenda.

Now, just 19 months later, liberals, progressives and leftists find themselves entirely put to rout. The Obama administration has placed itself solely at the service of capital, and expanded US military intervention in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It remains deaf to the exhortations of those who advocate policies that have been historically proven to generate economic growth, persisting in the implementation of supply side measures that do little to generate demand. It manipulates contradictory concerns over the deficit and the stalled economic recovery to chart a clear course of corporate subsidy and worker austerity. Hence, the administration's support for a 200 billion dollar tax credit for equipment alongside a deficit reduction commission that will recommend cuts in Social Security, Medicare and the social safety net more generally. Similarly, while it remains a contentious subject, my personal view is that most of the Bush tax credits for the high income people will be renewed.

No doubt, administration appointees like Rahm Emanuel, Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers persuaded Obama that, through the implementation of such Machiavellian measures, a corporatized Democratic Party would retain power for a generation, assuming, of course, that he needed any persuasion at all. There's just one problem: the policies have failed miserably in the real world. Instead of generating a mild economic recovery, where capital interests could skim the cream off the top without resentment, as planned, they have done nothing to revive the economy, and the public knows it. Home foreclosures and 99ers (people who have exhausted their 99 weeks of unemployment benefits without finding work) have become a seemingly permanent feature of everyday life.

With Obama in the White House, and Reid and Pelosi in control of the Congress, the Democrats cannot blame Bush for the country's economic stagnation. Academic liberals like Eric Alterman may write approximately 17,000 words seeking to buttress support for Obama by claiming that a progressive presidency is impossible, but outside the echo chambers of The Nation and The American Prospect, no one is listening, because they know that the Democrats failed to help them. They may or may not know that the Democrats have relied upon the arcane procedural rules of the Senate to justify their inaction, but that's irrelevant for people facing the loss of their home, the health care and their jobs. They didn't vote Obama into the White House in order to hear Professor Alterman lecture them that it is impossible for him to do anything for them. They have already tuned out the great communicator of this generation.

Thus, a terrible reckoning awaits the Democrats in November. Poll numbers are looking worse and worse, so much so that they may lose control of both houses of Congress, while Obama's popularity drains away by the day. Out here in California, there is amazing prospect that the Republicans may win both the governorship and a seat in the Senate. Among Obama critics in the liberal blogosphere, some still express the hope that he can turn it around by taking it to the Republicans with a daring economic stimulus plan that will capture the public imagination. Surely, with a humiliating defeat staring him in the face, he must seize this last opportunity. But it is too late for that now, and he is not so inclined. Although no one will say it, he has passed the point of no return, and absent a dramatic turn of events, he will be even more reviled upon his departure from the White House than Carter. Republicans will run against him for decades.

But Obama will be remembered for more than just the damage that he has inflicted upon the Democratic Party. He has seriously undermined public confidence in the political process, and the consequences, while still speculative, will be profound. After vaguely campaigning on the prospects for progressive change that would reach much of the populace, he has exposed the reality that we face a choice between a merciless, social Darwinist party, the Republicans, and a inclusive, neoliberal one, the Democrats. No one is ever going to believe that a future Democratic candidate for President will be the next Bobby Kennedy, the next FDR or the next LBJ. Instead, they will be perceived as either the next Clinton or, with Republican assistance, the next Obama. Most Americans are disenfranchised by this choice, alienated by a political system in which capital interests dictate the outcome of all major political decisions behind the scenes. The tentative steps towards social democracy in the 20th Century are being consigned to the history books, with the current targets being Social Security and Medicare. Within 10 years, they are likely to be a shadow of what they are today.

Meanwhile, the wars will go on and on. Of course, the great unanswered question is whether Obama will attack Iran. Certainly, a Republican victory in November would increase the pressure upon him to do so. Such a conflict would initiate an open ended war that, much like the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, would last several years, and intensify violence all around the world. Domestically, it would accelerate the transformation of the US economy from manufacturing to services to one centered around military operations, weapons procurement and social control. It is hard to know how the populace will respond to these changes, but, given that liberals, progressives and even some on the left, will be tarred with the failings of the Obama presidency, there is no visible left alternative to the ascension of the radical right. The right will never become dominant, as it will always remained contained within the boundaries of its natural constituency, but it will increasingly dominate the public discourse, even more so than today, because all other ideological possibilities will have been either discredited or invisible.

Labels: American Empire, Bailout of Finance Capitalists, Barack Obama, Democrats, Liberals, Neoliberalism, Sub-Proletarianization of America, War with Iran

A truly must read article from a couple of months ago, chronicling a history of nearly 30 years of assertions that Iran is developing nuclear weapons. An excerpt:

For nearly three decades we have been hearing or reading dire predictions by the officials of the United States, Israel, and their allies that Iran is on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Such warnings have been common, but none has come true. Now that the talk of imposing crippling sanctions on or even attacking Iran is heating up again, it is instructive to take a look at the history of such false prophecies.

The most astonishing aspect of the predictions about Iran’s imminent nuclear bomb is that, when Iran actually declared in the 1970s that it was indeed pursuing nuclear weapons, the West and Israel were absolutely silent, but Iran’s declarations since the mid-1980s that it is not seeking nuclear weapons have been greeted with disbelief and mockery.

Again, please consider reading the article in its entirety. It's quite an eye opener.

Labels: American Empire, Iran, War with Iran

While many responded to the release of the Afghanistan war logs by WikiLeaks with a belief that it would politically damage the Obama administration, as I did, or undermine support for the war, as others did, Chris Floyd was a contrarian:

So in the end, what really is the takeaway from this barrage of high-profile revelations dished up by these bold liberal gadflies speaking truth to power? Let's recap:

Occupation forces kill lots of civilians. But everybody already knew that -- and it's been obvious for years that nobody cares. How does this alter the prevailing conventional wisdom about the war?

Pakistan is pursuing its own strategic interests in the region: interests that don't always mesh with those of the United States. Again, this has been a constantly -- obsessively -- reported aspect of the war since its earliest days. How does this alter the prevailing conventional wisdom about the war?

The Afghan government installed by the occupation is corrupt and dysfunctional. Again, this theme has been sounded at every level of the American government -- including by two presidents -- for years. How does this alter the prevailing conventional wisdom of the war?

There is often a dichotomy between official statements about the war's progress and the reality of the war on the ground. Again, has there been a month in the last nine years that prominent stories outlining this fact have not appeared in major mainstream publications? Is this not a well-known phenomenon of every single military conflict in human history? How does this alter the prevailing conventional wisdom about the war?

Iran is evil and is helping bad guys kill Americans and should be stopped. It goes without saying that this too has been a relentless drumbeat of the American power structure for many years. The occupation forces in Iraq began blaming Iran for the rise of the insurgency and the political instability almost the moment after George W. Bush proclaimed mission accomplished and all hell broke loose in the conquered land. The Obama administration has continued -- and expanded -- the Bush Regime's demonization of Iran, and its extensive military preparations for an attack on that country. The current administration's diplomatic effort is led by a woman who pledged to obliterate Iran -- that is, to kill tens of millions of innocent people -- if Iran attacked Israel. The American power structure has seized upon every single scrap of Curveball-quality intelligence -- every rumor, every lie, every exaggeration, every fabrication -- to convince the American people that Iran is about to nuke downtown Omaha with burqa-clad atom bombs.

So once again, and for the last time, we ask the question: How does this alter the prevailing conventional wisdom about the war?

It doesn't, of course. These media bombshells will simply bounce off the hardened shell of American exceptionalism -- which easily countenances the slaughter of civilians and targeted killings and indefinite detention and any number of other atrocities anyway.

Floyd is on to something here, even I don't agree with his conclusion, as it strikes me as too reductionist. Admittedly, the logs have a multifaceted quality that tend to confirm the preconceived notions of those who learn about them. Hence, in the US, the emphasis has been, as noted by Floyd, upon the the purported deceit of the Pakistanis and the alleged covert operations of the Iranians. We may well paradoxically remember the release as part of the inexorable momentum in support of an attack upon Iran. But, as I noted on Monday, the primary impact of the disclosures is in Europe, where restive populations of the UK and Germany have been even more disquieted by US mendacity and lack of concern about civilian casualties.

But there is more to it, more to the US intervention in Afghanistan that has been commonly understood, and the WikiLeaks release does little to clarify it. As I remarked here on Tuesday:

Unlike the invasion of Iraq, which has been a tawdry exercise in imperialist competition, the occupations of Afghanistan, both the Russian and the American ones, are about something else. Both have been modernization exercises, attempts to coerce a pre-industrialized society into the circuits of globalization. It is an effort similar to the centuries long effort of sedentary, agricultural societies in China and Southeast Asia to enclose the more migratory hill peoples and reduce them to state subjects, as described by James Scott in his magisterial The Art of Not Being Governed.

As explained by Scott, peoples that remain outside the state system are considered existential threats. Hence, the contemporary designation of regions around the world with limited to non-existent state authority as especially perilous, as rogue states, failed states and terror havens. David Graeber, the anarchist anthropologist, has, much like Scott, a different perspective as expressed in his articles based upon his field work in Madagascar in the late 1980s and early 1990s. For him, the erosion of centralized authority creates an opportunity for people to develop their own informal practices of government and social relations.

Thus, in regard to Afghanistan, the liberal emphasis upon subjects such as the lack of any significant al-Qaeda presence in the country or the need to redirect our effort away from military activities to economic development misses the point. People within much of Afghanistan, as well as the hill regions of Pakistan, object to modernization as imposed from the outside, whether by force or by economic assistance. Given that the state and capital are interwoven forms of social control that must expand to encompass all the space provided, both outwardly (the entirety of the territory of the world) and inwardly (every aspect of daily life, including the extremes of childhood and human sexuality), the war in Afghanistan is a perpetual one, one in Brezhnev, Bush and Obama have all found themselves on the same side.

Afghanistan is therefore a foreshadowing of possible conflicts throughout the most impoverished regions of the lesser developed world, especially Africa, which has become a Pentagon preoccupation.

Labels: Afghanistan, Africa, American Empire, Neoliberalism, War with Iran

An update on the possible consequences of the use of depleted uranium munitions in Fallujah in 2004:

Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study.

Iraqi doctors in Fallujah have complained since 2005 of being overwhelmed by the number of babies with serious birth defects, ranging from a girl born with two heads to paralysis of the lower limbs. They said they were also seeing far more cancers than they did before the battle for Fallujah between US troops and insurgents.

Their claims have been supported by a survey showing a four-fold increase in all cancers and a 12-fold increase in childhood cancer in under-14s. Infant mortality in the city is more than four times higher than in neighbouring Jordan and eight times higher than in Kuwait.

Dr Chris Busby, a visiting professor at the University of Ulster and one of the authors of the survey of 4,800 individuals in Fallujah, said it is difficult to pin down the exact cause of the cancers and birth defects. He added that to produce an effect like this, some very major mutagenic exposure must have occurred in 2004 when the attacks happened.

Tom Eley of the World Socialist Website provides more background:

According to the authors of a new study, “Cancer, Infant Mortality and Birth Sex-Ratio in Fallujah, Iraq 2005–2009,” the people of Fallujah are experiencing higher rates of cancer, leukemia, infant mortality, and sexual mutations than those recorded among survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the years after those Japanese cities were incinerated by US atomic bomb strikes in 1945.
The epidemiological study, published in the International Journal of Environmental Studies and Public Health (IJERPH), also finds the prevalence of these conditions in Fallujah to be many times greater than in nearby nations.

The new public health study of the city now all but proves what has long been suspected: that a high proportion of the weaponry used in the assault contained depleted uranium, a radioactive substance used in shells to increase their effectiveness.

In a study of 711 houses and 4,843 individuals carried out in January and February 2010, authors Chris Busby, Malak Hamdan, Entesar Ariabi and a team of researchers found that the cancer rate had increased fourfold since before the US attack five years ago, and that the forms of cancer in Fallujah are similar to those found among the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors, who were exposed to intense fallout radiation.

In Fallujah the rate of leukemia is 38 times higher, the childhood cancer rate is 12 times higher, and breast cancer is 10 times more common than in populations in Egypt, Jordan, and Kuwait. Heightened levels of adult lymphoma and brain tumors were also reported. At 80 deaths out of every 1,000 births, the infant mortality rate in Fallujah is more than five times higher than in Egypt and Jordan, and eight times higher than in Kuwait.

Strikingly, after 2005 the proportion of girls born in Fallujah has increased sharply. In normal populations, 1050 boys are born for every 1000 girls. But among those born in Fallujah in the four years after the US assault, the ratio was reduced to 860 boys for every 1000 female births. This alteration is similar to gender ratios found in Hiroshima after the US atomic attack of 1945.

One suspects that similar, if not more destructive, radiation weapons would be used in an attack upon Iran, with potentially even more severe consequences.

Labels: "Support the Troops", American Empire, Iraqi Deaths, Occupation of Iraq, War with Iran

UPDATE: Daniel Ellsberg believes that Assange could be assassinated or otherwise physically harmed by the US:

SHENON: Yeah, he [Assange] said last week, at this New York gathering that he had been instructed by his lawyers not to return to the United States.

ELLSBURG: You know, may I say, the expression he used, I was supposed to do a dialogue with him at that conference, that’s why I went to New York. And he explained, the explanation he used was that he was understood that it was not safe for him to come to this country. And then later he explained now when the Bradley Manning arrest was announced, he said now you understand why I didn’t come. I think it’s worth mentioning a very new and ominous development in our country. I think he would not be safe, even physically entirely, wherever he is. We have after all for the first time, that I ever perhaps in any Democratic country, we have a president who has announced that he feels he has the right to use special operations operatives against anyone abroad, that he thinks is associated with terrorism. That he suspects of it. And that includes American citizens. One American citizen has even been named. Now Assange is not an American citizen. But I listen to that with a special interest. Because I was in fact the subject of a White House hit squad in November on May 3rd, 1972. A dozen Cuban assets were brought up from Miami with orders, quote, quoting the prosecutor, to incapacitate Daniel Ellsberg totally. on the steps of the capital, it so happens when i was in a rally during the vietnam war. And I asked the prosecutor, what does that mean, kill me? And he said, the words were “to incapacitate you totally.” But you should understand, these guides, meaning these c.i.a. operatives never use the word “kill.” i actually think it was to silence me at that particular time. For worries they had that I would leak president Nixon’s nuclear threats, which he was making at that precise time in 1972. Now as I look at Assange’s case, they’re worried that he will reveal current threats. I would have to say puts his well-being, his physical life, in some danger now. And I say that with anguish. I think it’s astonishing that an American president should have put out that policy and he’s not getting these resistance from it, from congress, the press, the courts or anything. it’s an amazing development that I think Assange would do well to keep his whereabouts unknown.

INITIAL POST: From the The Daily Beast:

Pentagon investigators are trying to determine the whereabouts of the Australian-born founder of the secretive website Wikileaks for fear that he may be about to publish a huge cache of classified State Department cables that, if made public, could do serious damage to national security, government officials tell The Daily Beast.

The officials acknowledge that even if they found the website founder, Julian Assange, it is not clear what they could do to block publication of the cables on Wikileaks, which is nominally based on a server in Sweden and bills itself as a champion of whistleblowers.

We’d like to know where he is; we’d like his cooperation in this, one U.S. official said of Assange.

American officials said Pentagon investigators are convinced that Assange is in possession of at least some classified State Department cables leaked by a 22-year-old Army intelligence specialist, Bradley Manning of Potomac, Maryland, who is now in custody in Kuwait.

And given the contents of the cables, the feds have good reason to be concerned.

As The Daily Beast reported June 8, Manning, while posted in Iraq, apparently had special access to cables prepared by diplomats and State Department officials throughout the Middle East, regarding the workings of Arab governments and their leaders, according to an American diplomat.

The cables, which date back over several years, went out over interagency computer networks available to the Army and contained information related to American diplomatic and intelligence efforts in the war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq, the diplomat said.

Hopefully, Assange has gone underground, as Ellsberg did during the publication of the Pentagon Papers by the New York Times. But times have changed. If Assange gave them over to the Times today, the Grey Lady wouldn't touch them. Fortunately for us, he can now publish them on the Internet, if Wikileaks really has them as there is some doubt about it. If the material has been accurately described, the release has the potential to expose the concealed hypocrisies of the governments involved in the so called war on terror, both overt and covert, just as the Pentagon Papers revealed that the US government had deliberately lied to us about our involvement in Vietnam.

But, if Assange did release them over the Internet, one wonders whether the US, like the Chinese government that is so frequently condemns, would seek the cooperation of internet service providers to prevent us from reading them. As with the suppression of photographs of torture at Abu Ghraib, the real purpose of such suppression is to preserve our ignorance. And, then, of course, there is Bradley Manning, the brave man who set all of this in motion. Hopefully, Daniel Ellsberg and others are working to put together an effort to protect him.

Finally, there is the question as to why there is such urgency in hunting down Assange and preventing the release of the records, beyond the political consequences already noted. Could it, perchance, have something to do with a possible attack upon Iran? Just imagine what might happen if numerous confidential US military and diplomatic communications related to the US effort to bring about regime change in Iran were publicly released. If so, we can only urge Assange to immediately get them out in the public domain. It may be our last chance to prevent another conflagration.

Labels: "War on Terror", Afghanistan, American Empire, Occupation of Iraq, War with Iran

Charlie Davis has an excellent post summarizing the policy that Defense Secretary Gates wants to pursue in relation to the Iranian nuclear program:

. . . Iran could remain a signatory to the NPT while maintaining a virtual weapons capability is a concession that developing such a capacity is perfectly legal under the treaty. That being the case, what then would be the justification under international law for taking action -- in the form of economic or aerial warfare -- to stop Iran from possessing the enrichment capacity and knowhow to possibly someday build nuclear weapons, if it chose to do so (which even U.S. intelligence agencies don't believe the Iranians have decided to do)? My money's on a Security Council resolution.

Still, what is clearly illegal under international law and the NPT is not having a nuclear breakout capacity -- as Iran stands accused not of possessing, but seeking to possess -- but the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any States, as the non-proliferation treaty itself notes. That's something to be remembered the next time a U.S. official declares all options are on the table when dealing with Iran, and contrasted with the Obama administration's recently stated policy in its Nuclear Posture Review of maintaing the right to use nuclear weapons against those it deems in violation of the NPT (e.g. Iran).

I periodically encounter people who don't believe that the US will attack Iran. Eli Stephens over at Left I on the News has expressed this view over the years, and I have tentatively come around to agreeing with him.

But, maybe, we shouldn't be so sanguine about it. Consider this historical nugget, offered to us by Uri Avnery when he evaluated the issue in July of 2008:

On the basis of all these considerations, I dare to predict that there will be no military attack on Iran this year - not by the Americans, not by the Israelis.

As I write these lines, a little red light turns on in my head. It is related to a memory: in my youth I was an avid reader of Vladimir Jabotinsky's weekly articles, which impressed me with their cold logic and clear style. In August 1939, Jabotinsky wrote an article in which he asserted categorically that no war would break out, in spite of all the rumors to the contrary. His reasoning: modern weapons are so terrible, that no country would dare to start a war.

One wonders, what does Avnery think in 2010? Has his opinion changed, and, if so, why? There are a number of reasons to support a belief that an attack is now more probable: the failure of the protests to topple the Islamic regime, the naivete of a new President who acts and speaks as if he must actually confront issues, such as health care, social security, Medicare and financial reform, among others, not to mention the Taliban and Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, that he asserts have been wilfully evaded and the possibility that US pressure on Israel, no matter how slight, to enter in a peace agreement with the Palestinians is a pragmatic display of realpolitik designed to lessen the global backlash in the event of military action.

Recall that, in 1991, President Bush called a Likud government to the negotiating table in Madrid after Operation Desert Storm. Recall also that the Iranian regime tries to mitigate global opposition to its repressive characteristics by positioning itself as the preeminent advocate for the Palestinian people. Because of its alignment with the maximalist goals of the Israeli right, the second Bush administration could not take the step of brokering a peace deal in order to open the way for an attack upon Iran, while the Obama administration can. Even so, on the merits, I remain agnostic.

If addressed rationally, as Admiral Mullen has done on a number of occasions, the consequences of an attack upon Iran are frightening to contemplate, even for an institution as powerful as the Pentagon. Everyone knows that the US military is overstretched in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and an attack could ignite an even more intensified period of violence by both state and non-state actors. Unfortunately, though, as we all know, people don't always act rationally, as the Jabotinsky column remembered by Avnery reminds us.

Labels: American Empire, Barack Obama, Iran, Nuclear Attack, US Military, War with Iran

Or, maybe worse, because, unlike W, O is serious?

Labels: American Empire, Barack Obama, Israel, NPT, War with Iran

First, we found ourselves subjected to a mendacious Pope, now, we must additionally endure a mendacious President. As Alexander Cockburn trenchantly observed in regard to Obama's purportedly landmark speech in Cairo:

“I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, “ Obama declared in Cairo, “and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year.” Vivid in the minds of many Muslims listening to this passage would have been the fate at the start of this week of Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih -- a 31-year old Yemeni who had been in a wire cage since February, 2002 (more than seven years) without charges and declared by his U.S. military jailers “an apparent suicide”. Salih, on hunger strike, was down to 85 pounds.

Torture is certainly the label any morally balanced person would attach to his travails and it’s quite reasonable to speculate that his end came amid yet another attempt to forcibly feed him. Air Force One headed for Cairo with one Muslim barely in the ground after having been tortured to death in a US prison. Many in Obama’s audience would have been well aware too that even if – a big “if” – Guantanamo does get shut down, its inmates will endure similar horrors in Bagram, and that Obama favors imprisonment, permanent if necessary, of enemy combatants, without charges or trial.

Obama’s talk of the evils of Al Qaida’s “violent extremism ” will have fallen ironically on the ears of Palestinians who endured Israel’s monstrous and criminal onslaught in Gaza earlier this year, or of Afghans still seething at the loss of civilians in US bombing raids. The noble pledges about economic assistance to the Muslim world sound hollow against the realities of how US aid really gets administered, starting with the huge sums filched by the “non-profit” aid agencies.

Domestically, the speech was euphorically received, except among Christian conservatives who can't abide any engagement with Arabs and Muslims that doesn't involve seizing them, detaining them, killing them and decimating the infrastructure of their societies.

Meanwhile, the contours of Obama policy in the region remain the same: covert operations and military engagement in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. In Lebanon and Palestine, Israel, with American supplied weapons, carries out the attacks, while in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the US does so directly. Recent terror attacks in Iran have been carried out by a group that receives covert US assistance.

Yet, Obama would have us believe that the real problem in the Middle East is Holocaust denial, as he said nothing to condemn the horrific conditions imposed upon the Palestinians by Israel. As As'ad Abukhalil has frequently observed, it is impermissible for anyone in a position of political responsibility in the US to attribute the suffering of the Palestinians to the acts of Israelis. Instead, one is left with the impression that the Palestinians are the victims of some sort of intergalactic conspiracy requiring the intervention of Captain Kirk and Mister Spock.

But, of course, when it comes to the Palestinians, it is very different. Unlike Israelis, Palestinians must abandon violence. His subsequent remarks to the effect that the Palestinians must seek to attain their nationalistic aspirations through non-violence were straight out offensive. Historically, whenever Palestinians have sought to do so, they have been imprisoned, deported and stripped of their land, their property and their citizenship, if not killed. And, as we all know, the US has done nothing to stop it, to do anything that would create a space for viable non-violent civil disobedience within Palestine.

Let's be blunt: If Martin Luther King had been Palestinian, and launched an action like the Montgomery bus boycott in the occupied territories in 1956, he would have been lucky if Israel had only expelled him from the country and stipped him of his citizenship. More likely, he would have been imprisoned, tortured and probably killed, as Stephen Biko was in South Africa. For the president of a country that has done nothing to protect Palestinians to lecture them on the virtues of non-violence is an embarrassment.

Meanwhile, Obama, in relation to Iraq and Afghanistan, stated that the US has no intention to retain permanent military bases in these countries. Has he not read his own plan for withdrawing from Iraq, which contemplates leaving nearly 50,000 troops behind? Perhaps, he is more sincere when he speaks of Afghanistan, but it is hard to reconcile such a statement with his decision to send more troops to the country and launch drone attacks within both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Or, is there something Machiavellian to it, a careful parsing of language designed to conceal that that the future face of the occupation will increasingly be one of death delivered by drones launched and controlled from US soil?

Time will tell, but there was nothing in this speech to suggest anything other than the continuation of US policies designed to preserve hegemonic domination. With the passage of time, and a growing awareness of the consequences of these policies, the glow surrounding this speech will fade, and it will be recognized for what it is, yet another example of an American president seeking to dress up policies of imperial expansion in the garb of idealism. The most striking aspect of it was Obama's polished invocation, through a respectful characterization of the virtues of Islam, of the allure of diversity and multiculturalism to support the enterprise.

Labels: Afghanistan, American Empire, Barack Obama, Israel, Occupation of Iraq, Pakistan, Palestine, Political Violence, War with Iran

From the Associated Press:

Venezuela and Bolivia are supplying Iran with uranium for its nuclear program, according to a secret Israeli government report obtained Monday by The Associated Press.

The two South American countries are known to have close ties with Iran, but this is the first allegation that they are involved in the development of Iran’s nuclear program, considered a strategic threat by Israel.

“There are reports that Venezuela supplies Iran with uranium for its nuclear program,” the Foreign Ministry document states, referring to previous Israeli intelligence conclusions.

It added, “Bolivia also supplies uranium to Iran.”

The report did not say where the uranium was from.

There was no immediate comment from officials in Venezuela or Bolivia about the report.

Perhaps, Israel can launch airstrikes against them, too, expanding any war with Iran to South America as well. All in all, it sounds remarkably similar to the Niger forgeries, documents leaked by Italian intelligence in 2002 that purportedly established that Iraq had been attempting to purchase processed uranium from Niger for nuclear weapons development.

By way of background, there is a strong belief among Venezuela leftists and some in the military that Israel was involved in the 2002 unsuccessful coup attempt against Chavez. I was also told during my trip to Venezuela in 2005 that Chavez, sometime after taking office in 1998, removed a number of Israeli operatives providing unspecified services to the Venezuela military and intelligence services. He did it because he believed that they were using these positions to gather information that could be used against him. Recently, Chavez ordered the removal of the Israeli ambassador in Caracas in protest against the assault upon the civilian populace of Gaza.

One should not dimiss the possibility that the hostility towards Israel within Venezuela is coloured by a residue of anti-semitism directed towards Jews generally. Even so, Chavez apparently had good reason to be concerned. After all, Israel supported Somoza in Nicaragua, and subsequently provided military assistance to the contras. Not surprisingly, Israel also provided provided military assistance to El Salvador and Guatemala in their armed struggles with the left during this same period. In the case of Guatemala, Israel assisted the government's brutal campaign of near extermination against its indigenous populace when the US was legally prohibited from doing so. And, as you might have guessed, Israel had good relations with Pinochet in Chile as well, selling weapons to him, despite his flirtation with a notorious neo-Nazi sect.

Closer to home, at least from a Venezuelan perspective, Israel has supplied weapons to Colombian paramilitaries since the 1980s, and continues to do so. Similarly, Israel participated in the dirty war in Argentina. Chavez, and the left throughout South America, understand what many in the US do not, that Israel has been an implacable enemy of leftist movements in South America, violent or non-violent, for decades. Furthermore, it has provided material assistance in their violent suppression by rightist governments and social movements. Such a history lends credibility to the belief of some Venezuelans that Israel, through the Mossad, was involved in the 2002 coup. No doubt the Bolivians are aware of this history as well, and wary about Israeli involvement in their country.

But are Venezuela and Bolivia supplying Iran with uranium? Hard to say, although the report comes across as embarrassingly propagandistic. The Associated Press article states that Venezuela has undertaken no action to mine its estimated uranium reserves, while Bolivia does so. It is, of course, possible that Venezuela is involved in the delivery of Bolivian uranium to Iran. If so, what is the significance? Is it illegal for them to do so? Of course, it is common for countries to sell uranium to other countries for use in nuclear power generation facilities, as Australian does in relation to China, and Russia now does in relation to the US. If Iran is merely involved in the development of nuclear power, consistent with the most recent National Intelligence Estimate and the findings of the International Atomic Energy Agency, one would assume that such purchases, if they ever happened, transgress no international laws. Oh, by the way, did I forget to mention that the report also claims that Venezuela is also a Hizbullah sanctuary?

Labels: American Empire, Bolivia, Israel, Neoliberalism, South America, Venezuela, War with Iran

Remember a couple of weeks ago when it appeared that the Obama administration was going to send a letter to Tehran as a gesture towards reestablishing relations? Forget about it, the neoconservatives have won this one.

At his press conference on Tuesday, President Obama quite deliberately repeated the old canard that Iran is attempting to develop nuclear weapons, as did his incoming CIA director Leon Panetta in testimony before Congress. As recognized by antiwar.com, they did so despite a 2007 National Intelligence Estimate to the contrary:

While the Iranian government continues to express its desire to improve relations, Obama and associates just keep hurling accusations at Iran’s civilian nuclear program. There’s one thing the administration is missing though, and that’s evidence. Officials concede there is no evidence that undercuts the 2007 findings, but like the Bush Administration, the newcomers don’t seem to want fact to get in the way of good rhetoric.

Indeed, Tuesday, February 10, 2009 may be recalled as a seminal day in the history of the Obama administration. It was the day in which President Obama publicly embraced the broad contours of the neoconservative policies of his predecessor, while his Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, announced a bank rescue plan that perpetuated the principle of saving US banks at all costs bequethed to him by Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke. The transcripts of their public comments on this most important day of all days should be filed away for future reference.

Labels: "War on Terror", Bailout of Finance Capitalists, Barack Obama, Global Recession, Neoliberalism, War with Iran

From The Guardian:

Officials of Barack Obama's administration have drafted a letter to Iran from the president aimed at unfreezing US-Iranian relations and opening the way for face-to-face talks, the Guardian has learned.

The US state department has been working on drafts of the letter since Obama was elected on 4 November last year. It is in reply to a lengthy letter of congratulations sent by the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on 6 November.

Diplomats said Obama's letter would be a symbolic gesture to mark a change in tone from the hostile one adopted by the Bush administration, which portrayed Iran as part of an "axis of evil".

It would be intended to allay the ­suspicions of Iran's leaders and pave the way for Obama to engage them directly, a break with past policy.

State department officials have composed at least three drafts of the letter, which gives assurances that Washington does not want to overthrow the Islamic regime, but merely seeks a change in its behaviour. The letter would be addressed to the Iranian people and sent directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, or released as an open letter.

Will the letter be sent? We will just have to wait and see. Now that the drafts have been publicized, there will undoubtedly be intense opposition from the usual suspects to prevent it. If sent, a small step to be sure, but one that starts a journey down the road to more normalized relations, relations based upon the boundaries of disagreement and conflict, instead of threats of regime change and military action. It would also suggest movement towards a less confrontational relationship with Chavez and Morales in South America as well. If it isn't sent . . . well, let's not think about that too much for now.

Labels: "War on Terror", American Empire, Neoconservatives, War with Iran

Keep this scorecard for future reference, an excellent article by Jeremy Scahill profiling the rightward emphasis of the Obama foreign policy, military and intelligence appointees.

Labels: "War on Terror", Afghanistan, American Empire, Iraq War, Neoliberalism, War with Iran

The Clintons rolled Obama on foreign policy. Not only are we not getting out of Afghanistan, we aren't getting out of Iraq, either:

Before Hillary Clinton has been formally offered the job as Secretary of State, a purge of Barack Obama's top foreign policy team has begun.

The advisers who helped trash the former First Lady's foreign policy credentials on the campaign trail are being brutally shunted aside, as the price of her accepting the job of being the public face of America to the world. In negotiations with Mr Obama this week before agreeing to take the job, she demanded and received assurances that she alone should appoint staff to the State Department. She also got assurances that she will have direct access to the President and will not have to go through his foreign policy advisers on the National Security Council, which is where many of her critics in the Obama team are expected to end up.

The first victims of Mrs Clinton's anticipated appointment will be those who defended Mr Obama's flanks on the campaign trail. By mocking Mrs Clinton's claims to have landed under sniper fire in Bosnia or pouring scorn on her much-ballyhooed claim to have visited 80 countries as First Lady they successfully deflected the damaging charge that he is a lightweight on international issues.

Foremost among the victims of the purges is her old Yale Law School buddy Greg Craig, a man who more than anyone led the rescue of his presidency starting the very night Kenneth Starr's lurid report into the squalid details of the former president's sex scandal with Monica Lewinsky were published on the internet in 1998. Despite his long and loyal friendship with the Clintons, Mr Craig threw his lot in with Mr Obama at an early stage in the presidential election campaign. As if that betrayal to the cause of the Clinton restoration was not enough, Mr Craig did more to undermine Mrs Clinton's claims to be a foreign policy expert than anyone else in the some of the ugliest exchanges of the battle for the Democratic nomination.

Until this week he was poised to be the eminence grise of the State Department, organising as total revamp of America's troubled foreign policies on Mr Obama's behalf. Its turns out that Mrs Clinton's delay in accepting the president elect's offer to be his top foreign policy adviser had much to do with her negotiating the terms of the job and insisting on the right to choose her own state department staff and possibly even some of the plumb Ambassador postings. She wanted guarantees of direct access to the president – without having to go through his national security adviser. Above all she did not want to end up like Colin Powell who was completely out-manoeuvred by the hawkish Vice President Dick Cheney who imposed neo-conservative friends like John Bolton on the State Department and steered the US towards a policy of using torture to achieve its aims.

Leonard Doyle of The Independent tells the story as primarily one of political inside baseball, a story of personalities caught up in the fight for spoils as a new administration takes power. But it is much more serious than that. Hillary Clinton has been consistently hawkish in regard to Iraq and Iran, and her advisors, the people that are now going to find themselves in the State Department, despite backing the losing candidate, share those views:

It should come as no surprise that during the run-up to the Iraq invasion, Obama spoke at a Chicago anti-war rally while Clinton went as far as falsely claiming that Iraq was actively supporting al-Qaeda. And during the recent State of the Union address, when Bush proclaimed that the Iraqi surge was working, Clinton stood and cheered while Obama remained seated and silent.

Clinton's advisors are similarly confident in the ability of the United States to impose its will through force. This is reflected to this day in the strong support for President Bush's troop surge among such Clinton advisors (and original invasion advocates) as Jack Keane, Kenneth Pollack and Michael O'Hanlon.

Clinton's top foreign policy advisor -- and her likely pick for Secretary of State -- Richard Holbrooke, insisted that Iraq remained "a clear and present danger at all times." He rejected the broad international legal consensus against such offensive wars and insisted European governments and anti-war demonstrators who opposed a U.S. invasion of Iraq "undoubtedly encouraged" Saddam Hussein.

Clinton advisor Sandy Berger, who served as her husband's national security advisor, insisted that "even a contained Saddam" was "harmful to stability and to positive change in the region" and insisted on the necessity of "regime change." Other top Clinton advisors -- such as former Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright -- confidently predicted that American military power could easily suppress any opposition to a U.S. takeover of Iraq.

By contrast, during the lead-up to the war, Obama's advisors recognized as highly suspect the Bush administration's claims regarding Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" and offensive delivery systems capable of threatening U.S. national security.

Now advising Obama, former Carter National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, for example, argued that public support for war "should not be generated by fear-mongering or demagogy." Brzezinski seems to have learned from mistakes like arming the Mujahideen. He warned that invading a country that was no threat to the United States would threaten America's global leadership because most of the international community would see it as an illegitimate act of aggression.

Another key Obama advisor, the Carnegie Endowment's Joseph Cirincione, argued that the goal of containing the potential threat from Iraq had been achieved as a result of sanctions, the return of of inspectors, and a multinational force stationed in the region serving as a deterrent. Meanwhile, other future Obama advisors -- such as Susan Rice, Larry Korb, Samantha Power, and Richard Clarke -- raised concerns about the human and material costs of invading and occupying a large Middle Eastern country and the risks of American forces becoming embroiled in post-invasion chaos and a lengthy counter-insurgency war.

These differences in the key circles of foreign policy specialists surrounding these two candidates are consistent with their diametrically opposing views in the lead-up to the war, with Clinton voting to let President Bush invade that oil-rich country at the time and circumstances of his choosing, while Obama was speaking out to oppose a U.S. invasion.

Hillary Clinton has a few advisors who did oppose the war, like Wesley Clark, but taken together, the kinds of key people she's surrounded herself with supports the likelihood that her administration, like Bush's, would be more likely to embrace exaggerated and alarmist reports regarding potential national security threats, to ignore international law and the advice of allies, and to launch offensive wars.

By contrast, as The Nation magazine noted, a Barack Obama administration would be more likely to examine the actual evidence of potential threats before reacting, to work more closely with America's allies to maintain peace and security, to respect the country's international legal obligations, and to use military force only as a last resort.

In terms of Iran, for instance, Cirincione has downplayed the supposed threat, while Clinton advisor Holbrooke insists that "the Iranians are an enormous threat to the United States," the country is "the most pressing problem nation," and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is like Hitler. This is consistent with Clinton's vote for the Kyl-Lieberman amendment that opened the door to a potential Bush attack on Iran, and with Obama's opposition to it.

Or, to put it concisely, Obama has subcontracted foreign policy out to Clintonista hawks.

Oh, but you say that he will stand up to them when Hillary, taking advantage of her direct line to the President, pushes their crazy interventionist ideas? Sure he will, just like he stood up to her when she and Bill demanded that he throw some of his most loyal foreign policy advisors over the side of the boat. This is beginning to look more and more like an unmitigated catastrophe. Even I'm shocked at the rapidity by which Obama is abandoning loyal constituencies in a misguided attempt to consolidate his power inside the Beltway. Meanwhile, I continue to get self-congratulatory e-mails from local progressives who supported Obama even as the election is stolen from them.

UPDATE: The content of The Independent article is briefly confirmed in a soft focus personality piece in today's New York Times.

Labels: American Empire, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Iraq War, War with Iran

Time to support antiwar.com during its quarterly fund drive. Yes, antiwar.com is libertarian instead of left, but for the reasons that I first presented back in 2006, it is still worthy of support, especially now as we face the possibility that liberals, having attained a slice of power, will abandon any efforts to pull the military out of Iraq and Afghanistan:

. . . I believe that it is very important that we support antiwar.com during its quarterly fund drive. Fund drives are always challenging, and it is easy to succumb to the temptation that a wealthy saviour will step forward at the last minute, as has appeared to have happened during previous antiwar.com drives. In this instance, we need to resist it, and show our appreciation for the most dynamic American anti-imperialist site on the Internet.

Admittedly, antiwar.com is not a leftist one, it is avowedly libertarian. I have substantial disagreements with the social and economic beliefs of the people who operate it. Even so, on the most important issue of our time, the expansion of the American empire through extreme violence and economic coercion, the people involved with antiwar.com are unequivocal and forthright in their opposition to it.

It is the portal to news articles and columns from around the world regarding the war in Iraq, the war on terror, a possible war in Iran and the perpetual attempt of the Israelis to colonize the entirety of Palestine. It has played an essential role in destroying the monopoly of information that the US media once possessed. No longer are we at the mercy of the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN and, worst of all, FOX News.

The breath of news and commentary at antiwar.com is, quite simply, without peer. Ideologically, one finds the anarchist Noam Chomsky alongside Reaganite Paul Craig Roberts, the Tory Peter Oborne with Tom Engelhardt of The Nation Institute. Indispensable reports and analysis from Dahr Jamail, Aaron Glantz and Jorge Hirsch are readily available. Without antiwar.com, it would be much more difficult to readily access such disparate sources of information.

The thread tying them all together is the essential cause of creating a broad based coalition from right to left to resist the predations of the American empire, a cause that has become even more urgent as a consequence of neoconservative control over US foreign policy. The quarterly fund drive goes through this Sunday at midnight, but donations will, of course, be accepted at any time. . . For anyone else who is interested, please click here.

And, of course, war with Iran remains a real possibility. Times are tough, but it is essential that we preserve anti-imperialist voices like those found at antiwar.com. On a programming note, I hope to have a book review of Victor Serge's novel, Unforgiving Years, posted in the next couple of days.

Labels: Alternative Media, American Empire, Iraq War, Libertarians, Mainstream Media, Occupation of Iraq, War with Iran

Turns out the that Israelis have been supplying the US trained Georgian army with weapons. It was reported that they stopped such sales a few days ago:

Israel has decided to halt all sales of military equipment to Georgia because of objections from Russia, which is locked in a feud with its tiny Caucasus neighbor, defense officials said Tuesday.

The officials said the freeze was partially intended to give Israel leverage with Moscow in its attempts to persuade Russia not to ship arms and equipment to Iran. They spoke on condition of anonymity as Israel does not officially publish details of its arms sales.

Russia has repeatedly refused to comment on reports its is selling S-300 air defense missiles to Iran.

Among the items Israel has been selling to Tbilisi are pilotless drone aircraft. Russian fighters shot one down in May, according to UN observers.

Other types of weaponry include the following:

. . . . Israel has also been supplying Georgia with infantry weapons and electronics for artillery systems, and has helped upgrade Soviet-designed Su-25 ground attack jets assembled in Georgia, according to Koba Liklikadze, an independent military expert based in Tbilisi. Former Israeli generals also serve as advisers to the Georgian military.

Interesting. Israeli arms sales to Georgia are purportedly halted, and the Georgians invade South Ossetia in less than a week. There are also reports today that the Georgians have shot down Russian aircraft, which brings this story from April to the top of the queue:

Russia asked Israel last week whether it had supplied Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to Georgia, for it to use in military operations against secessionists from Abkhazia.

An Israeli security source confirmed that the UAVs being used by Georgia are manufactured by Israeli firm Elbit. A diplomatic source in Jerusalem said that the Russians did not have proof of this, however, and that the request for clarifications was based on suspicions. He added that Israel does not sell any attack weapons to countries that border with Russia and only sells them defensive equipment.

Georgia accused Russia of using a MiG-29 to shoot down one of its UAVs over Abkhazia and produced a video to back up its claim. The video was shot by the UAV seconds before it was shot down, and it shows a MiG-29. Georgia's president said he spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin and demanded an end to the "unjustified aggression against Georgia's sovereign territory."

Of course, the subject that keeps intruding into this saga is Iran. Is the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia meant to pressure the Russians into severing economic and military ties with the Iranians? The Israelis supposedly halted arms sales to Georgia in an effort to persuade the Russians to refuse to supply Iran with a new air defense system. Did that effort fail, or was it merely a pretense before the launching of the Georgian invasion?

Perhaps, the invasion has also been prompted by competition between the US, Russia and Europe over access to hydrocarbons in the Caucasus and Central Asia. Along these lines, consider this July 30th article by former Indian diplomat M K Bhadrakumar:

From the details coming out of Ashgabat in Turkmenistan and Moscow over the weekend, it is apparent that the great game over Caspian energy has taken a dramatic turn. In the geopolitics of energy security, nothing like this has happened before. The United States has suffered a huge defeat in the race for Caspian gas. The question now is how much longer Washington could afford to keep Iran out of the energy market.

Gazprom, Russia's energy leviathan, signed two major agreements in Ashgabat on Friday outlining a new scheme for purchase of Turkmen gas. The first one elaborates the price formation principles that will be guiding the Russian gas purchase from Turkmenistan during the next 20-year period. The second agreement is a unique one, making Gazprom the donor for local Turkmen energy projects. In essence, the two agreements ensure that Russia will keep control over Turkmen gas exports.

The consequences for the US are reportedly significant:

Until fairly recently Moscow was sensitive about the European Union's opposition to the idea of a gas cartel. (Washington has openly warned that it would legislate against countries that lined up behind a gas cartel). But high gas prices have weakened the European Union's negotiating position.

The agreements with Turkmenistan further consolidate Russia's control of Central Asia's gas exports. Gazprom recently offered to buy all of Azerbaijan's gas at European prices. (Medvedev visited Baku on July 3-4.) Baku will study with keen interest the agreements signed in Ashgabat on Friday. The overall implications of these Russian moves are very serious for the US and EU campaign to get the Nabucco gas pipeline project going.

Nabucco, which would run from Turkey to Austria via Bulgaria, Rumania and Hungary, was hoping to tap Turkmen gas by linking Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan via a pipeline across the Caspian Sea that would be connected to the pipeline networks through the Caucasus to Turkey already existing, such as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline.

But with access denied to Turkmen gas, Nabucco's viability becomes doubtful. And, without Nabucco, the entire US strategy of reducing Europe's dependence on Russian energy supplies makes no sense. Therefore, Washington is faced with Hobson's choice. Friday's agreements in Ashgabat mean that Nabucco's realization will now critically depend on gas supplies from the Middle East - Iran, in particular. Turkey is pursuing the idea of Iran supplying gas to Europe and has offered to mediate in the US-Iran standoff.

The geopolitics of energy makes strange bedfellows. Russia will be watching with anxiety the Turkish-Iranian-US tango. An understanding with Iran on gas pricing, production and market-sharing is vital for the success of Russia's overall gas export strategy. But Tehran visualizes the Nabucco as its passport for integration with Europe. Again, Russia's control of Turkmen gas cannot be to Tehran's liking. Tehran had keenly pursed with Ashgabat the idea of evacuation of Turkmen gas to the world market via Iranian territory.

Bhadrakumar skillfully exposes the Russians and the Iranians as commercial competitors even as they remain involuntary geopolitical allies. For our purposes, however, the essential thread that emerges from his analysis is the urgency for the US (and the Israelis) to act quickly to disrupt Russia's ability to bring natural gas from Turkmenistan to the European market. Otherwise, the US will be forced, to the great dismay of Israel, to broker a deal with Iran so as obtain access to Iranian natural gas to break the Russian monopoly.

Hence, we now see a Georgian invasion of South Ossetia about a week after the Russian announcement of its natural gas agreements with Turkmenistan. If one accepts this reasoning, the invasion of South Ossetia is a strong signal that the US prefers confrontation with the Russians over negotiating a new commercial relationship with the Iranians. In other words, it suggests that the US still sees war as the ultimate solution of its disagreements with them.

The invasion also suggests that the US is incapable of choosing an ally in the region, and persists in the hope that it can economically and militarily dominate both the Russians and the Iranians, and through them, just about every country in the Caucasus and Central Asia. Such arrogance is likely to be ruinous for all involved. A dirty adventure, indeed.

(Hat tip to Big Bopper for pointing out the Israeli connection.)

Labels: American Empire, Central Asia, Georgia, Israel, Russia, War with Iran