Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Limbering Up for May

Yesterday afternoon, Occupy Chicago sprang back to life at LaSalle and Jackson. It was wonderful to turn the corner onto Jackson and hear the drums and the chants!

The occasion was a nationwide day of action to STOP! the Suppression of the Occupy Movement. Chicago was one of the major action centers, and the Chicago action was unanimously endorsed by Midwest Antiwar Mobilization, Cangate, and others. The February 28 action was widely publicized on places like Twitter (#F28); high-profile endorsements included a video message from Noam Chomsky.


ANONYMOUS: #DontSuppressOWS rallies nationwide ...


I learned three things on #F28:

First and foremost: getting out into the public square and protesting is like a muscle that must be exercised in order to remain healthy. There have been other actions in which Occupy Chicago has protested in recent months -- like the Bradley Manning protest in December, the January 11 protest against Guantanamo, indefinite detention, and the NDAA, the February 4 protest against U.S. war moves on Iran, and others -- but #F28 was all about getting back to Occupy Chicago basics. It felt great to be back at LaSalle and Jackson, and to be marching through the Loop.



The Planet Over Profits(Photo courtesy FJJ)


Second: passersby took note. There were looks of recognition, and lots of smiles -- and LOTS of honks. It was almost as if people in the street were saying, "Where you been?" And, yes, the people who have always felt threatened by Occupy Chicago -- the people who act dismissive of it, the ones who brush by and can't be bothered -- were back to flexing those muscles on #F28. Which is exactly why the wake-up call must continue . . . .


The Fly in the Ointment: Occupy Chicago at "The Horse"
(Photo courtesy FJJ)


Third: the police were out in force and acting very peculiar. As the NLG speaker who reviewed the recent "Sit Down and Shut Up!" ordinances pointed out, there were all kinds of ordinance violations going on right there -- starting with the very fact that we were assembling in public without a permit. Of course, a fact that was brought out into the blinding light of day during the ordinance hearings -- and that the speaker emphasized last night -- is that Chicago's modus operandus is to have TONS of ordinances that it can then go ahead an enforse selectively. Kind of makes a mockery of equal protection, doesn't it?

Last night, the Chicago Police Department was on their best behavior. I imagine that they were under orders that went something like this: "OK, these people are out calling attention to the fact that we've been suppressing their free expression and walking all over their Constitutional rights. Whatever you do, DON'T arrest anyone!"

It is this last point that bears further thought. Just how long will it be before Rahm Emanuel changes direction once again and cracks down on free expression in Chicago? Certainly no one has any illusions that he is going to allow people to criticize NATO/G8 when they are in town. So it's just a matter of time, isn't it?

And another thing: How long will it be before the members of the CPD get fed up with the ridiculous position that Rahm has put them in: arranging for a hugely unpopular summit in Chicago, stirring up righteous indignation across the city and across the country, attracting the attention of every activist who has a pulse, putting in place draconian prohibitions on free expression, beefing up the police force ... and then telling the police to keep a lid on protest but don't create any headlines? WTF!!!

It feels good to be getting limbered up. May, 2012, can't come soon enough!


"the 1% are KLLLING US!"
Occupy Chicago
(Photo courtesy FJJ)

Related posts

Posterboard and markers: $21.79
Leaflets: $7:50
Bullhorn: $99.99
Standing up for peace and justice when everyone around you is saying "Get a job!" and "GO F**K YOURSELF!": PRICELESS!

(See Dissent: PRICELESS!)






Like a full-service prophet, Ron often has to be his own interpreter and explain to people what the expression "fly in the ointment" means! However, when he shows them his sign, with the big gross fly on it, they intuitively understand the role of social critic in making people uncomfortable and pointing up the need for change. And they understand that the role is not
always welcomed.

(See Flies in the Ointment and Plumb Lines for Israel)











Guantanamo and Chicago '68 live in the public's subconscious, where they lurk in the shadows, threatening anyone who has a dissenting thought. It's time we dragged those images out into the open, forcing people to consciously address the way people are being intentionally terrorized by our government. Only if we can do this -- put a name to the threat -- will the ordinary Chicagoan wake up and say, "You expect me to be intimidated? HELL NO!"

(See Twin Specters of Repression in America

Monday, February 27, 2012

"Dangerously Unreliable" in Afghanistan

Suddenly everybody is noticing the violence in Afghanistan.

It's about time.

In the wake of the Koran-burning incident, Americans have been shocked -- SHOCKED -- to discover that tensions are running high in Kabul.


"Where's my home?"
After a U.S. Predator Hellfire missile attack in Afghanistan
( Photo from Out of Central Asia Now website


This statement in the New York Times coverage of the latest incident in Afghanistan caught my eye:
Despite an American-led training effort that has spanned years and cost tens of billions of dollars, the Afghan security forces are still widely seen as riddled with dangerously unreliable soldiers and police officers. The distrust has only deepened as a pattern of attacks by Afghan security forces on American and NATO service members, beginning years ago, has drastically worsened over the past few days.
Wait a minute: so the problem is that it is the Afghans who are "dangerous"? And "unreliable"? What has the US and NATO submitted Afghanistan to for the last DECADE?

This reminds me of the article I previously critiqued, which suggests that it is everybody ELSE's nuclear weapons that are threatening, while the U.S. is treated as a benign presence (!) .

Let's face it: the U.S. and NATO are running for the exits in Afghanistan. I won't even belabor the point here about how DANGEROUS and DESTABILIZING the combat presence in Afghanistan has been. So let's just focus on the additional work -- beyond just removing combat troops -- that the U.S. and NATO need to do. Stop for a moment to consider the full range of actions that must be taken in order to DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan ... and to remove the DANGER and INSTABILITY that has been introduced by the U.S. and NATO!


Related posts

Is the School of the Americas (SOA) model now being transferred to Afghanistan? The SOA model is to use U.S. money and ideas to enable power holders in another country to persecute and kill ideological enemies, while denying that the U.S. is engaging in violence in that country, much less exposing U.S. combat troops to violence in that country, and making every effort to disavow the consequences of U.S. guidance of the violence (and crimes) being carried out in that country.

(See Is the SOA Coming to Afghanistan?)


You don't need to be in Chicago to protest NATO. I'm asking everybody -- and especially everyone who has ever participated in #AfghanistanTuesday -- to help protest NATO from wherever they are. We want to build a crescendo of opposition that culminates in a clear message to NATO on May 20/21 when they meet in Chicago: #DEMILITARIZEafghanistan!

(See #DEMILITARIZEafghanistan )


With the New York Times publishing "analysis" like this, is it any wonder that Americans can say things like . . . "It won't be a war. We're just going to drop a few well placed bombs on them" . . . "the object of fighting a war is to 'cause devastation'" . . . "my finger is on the button. Run back to your mud hut or I am going to press it!" . . . "when war is devastating, then people will do everything possible not to get into it!" . . . as some of my high school classmates wrote on Facebook today?

(See The Bankruptcy of U.S. Nuclear Doctrine )

Friday, February 24, 2012

Dissent: PRICELESS!

This blog post was inspired by my high school friend who always comes at me like an attack dog every time I post something remotely political on Facebook -- in other words, pretty much every day. (He knows who he is.)

Most recently, in response to my post about the need to stand up against the suppression of the Occupy movement, he posted this message: "I think Boston decided to cap the expense to taxpayers at $3 Mil.." And as I thought about it, it occurred to me, "Well, if we're putting a price tag on things . . . what's the value of having people stand up to change what's wrong?"


Dissent is Patriotic

And I thought about those commercials -- you know the ones -- where some string of ordinary purchases are capped with the word "priceless," such as:
Flowers: $35
Lunch: $47.50
Carriage ride around Central Park: $25
Finding out the magic is still there like the day you first met: Priceless
(I know, gag me . . . . )

So let's talk about something really important. How about:
Posterboard and markers: $21.79
Leaflets: $7:50
Bullhorn: $99.99
Standing up for peace and justice when everyone around you is saying "Get a job!" and "GO F**K YOURSELF!": Priceless
"Priceless."

I sure hope "Priceless" hasn't already been copyrighted to the point where it's off limits to the movement.

On second thought, who cares?

OCCUPY "PRICELESS" !


Image: Jeff Ball art


Related posts

When someone asks you, "Does it really matter whether you sign up for those Facebook events?" or "Why go out and participate in those rallies and marches?" this is what you can tell them . . .

(See Stand Up and Be Counted )













Steven Salaita has forced us to speak quite openly about three rather distinct things that get treated (incorrectly) as if they were the same thing: the state of Israel (and whether you criticize it or support it); the ideology of Zionism (and whether you criticize it or support it); and the religion of Judaism (and whether or not you share in its values and beliefs).

(See "What good is a tweet?" (The Packing and Unpacking of Meaning and the Steven Salaita Case) )


Make no mistake: the powers that be have know that they have cowed most of the public into being afraid to talk about Guantanamo, and that suits them just fine. Our power to act starts with talking widely -- beyond just our usual circles -- about the way in which we're being scared ... and why a government would possibly want to scare its own people.

(See Pentecost, Guantanamo, and the Moment When Talk Becomes Priceless)


Despite the difficulties associated with engaging in effective solidarity with dissidents in China, it is important to make the effort. A fundamental tenet of all peace and justice activism is that if we have the power to speak we can do anything, and if "they" succeed in shutting us up, it's the beginning of the end.

(See What is the US Peace and Justice Movement Doing for Dissidents in China?)












The occasion was a nationwide day of action to STOP! the Suppression of the Occupy Movement. Chicago was one of the major action centers.  I learned three things . . . .

(See Limbering Up for May )

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

The Most Important Place to Be in America on 2/28

On Tuesday, February 28, 2012, people all over the country will protest the suppression of the Occupy Movement. Demonstrations will take place in New York City, L.A., Minneapolis-St. Paul, Cleveland, and other cities. But the most important one will be in Chicago. Here's why . . . .


Clearly, the U.S. government is terrified of what the Occupy Movement everywhere represents: a new tendency among Americans to meet in the public square and insist on finding solutions to the things that are broken in our country. But the government is particularly terrified of what it might mean if dissent and resistance takes hold in Chicago at the very moment when our country's oligarchs prepare to meet here to engage in one of their periodic spoils-sharing and occupation-planning exercises -- the NATO/G8 meetings taking place May 19-21. (Not to mention the peremptory coronation of the the second Obama presidency, on the home turf of Obama's chief enforcer, Rahm Emanuel.) That is why the City has made sure to arrest every occupier in sight, and dangle charges over their heads to frustrate their rights to protest and dissent when NATO/G8 is in Chicago.


There have been shameful attempts to suppress the Occupy movement in city after city. But if there is one city in which the push-back must be IMMEDIATE and MASSIVE, it is Chicago. We need to make it clear that this is not the end of the resistance to U.S. wars and impoverishing policies ... it's the beginning of the end for NATO/G8.

Stand with Occupy Chicago on February 28 to "STOP the Suppression of the Occupy Movement!" -- "Join" the February 28 event on Facebook and invite ALL your friends! Email them. Call them. Let's make sure we have TEN people in the street on February 28 for every one who has been arrested* !


*P.S. - For more on this concept, see "Never Try to Silence a Tuesdayista"

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

March 18: Chicago to Protest Ongoing WARS!

A march will take place on March 18 in Chicago's leading South Asian neighborhood to protest ongoing U.S. wars:

3 PM, Sunday March 18
Devon Avenue & Hoyne Street
Chicago
The event is cosponsored by: Pakistan Federation of America, Pakhtun Jirga, Pakistan United Parade Committee and the Midwest Anti-War Mobilization. Please "join" the Facebook page for this event and "invite friends" as widely as possible!


A particular focus of this march will be the militarization of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and other countries by U.S. drones. I have written frequently about the threat of drones:

The Obamoid and the Eva Test
Obama Nobel Peace Prize - REVOKED!
VAU Afgh 101: Extrajudicial Executions
Not Your Father's Antiwar Movement
I { love | hate } the Chicago Air & Water Show
Drones, Dronespeak, and Death TV: "Intense"
The Drone-Pandora Connection (and I'm not talking about music)
Drones, 1984, and Foucault's Panopticon

So ... on March 18 ... please plan to participate in this important event!

* * * * *
And DRONES are just part of the larger problem: the urgent need to DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan!
* * * * *

Sunday, February 19, 2012

THE ARCHIPELAGO: U.S./NATO's Parting Gift to Afghanistan

When I was growing up, we were giving a very searing image of what was wrong with the Soviet Union -- and, by contrast, what was supposed to be right about the United States -- by a book by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. "The Gulag Archipelago" referred to the chain of prisons throughout the U.S.S.R to which enemies of the state were sent, and from which they never returned. You didn't have to actually read the book to get the point; the title said it all.


AFGHANISTAN

After several years of working with the film about Guantanamo -- "The Response" -- I've become aware that the U.S. also engages in the same practice -- setting up places to which enemies of the state are sent, and from which they never return. It's called "indefinite detention." And the highly visibly symbol of Guantanamo is just the tip of the iceberg of a chain of prisons and black sites around the world. A huge number of those prisons are in Afghanistan.

We all know the name "Bagram" -- the detention site controlled by the U.S. in Afghanistan. But much of the detention of people in Afghanistan is a joint undertaking by the U.S. in combination with the Afghanistan government, which operates the actual sites. As reported in the New York Times, a recent investigation "found evidence of routine human rights abuses and torture at 16 detention centers" in Afghanistan. That's out of 47 detention facilities, in 22 provinces, that were reviewed. It is these detention centers to which the U.S. consigns prisoners.

(And in case you thought Bagram itself was closing, see "U.S. Super-Sizing Afghan Jail It Promised to Abandon")

Beyond the question of proven abuse in these sites is the fundamental question: who are the detainees and what are the terms of their detention? Are they civilians? Or P.O.W.s? Or something in-between? Do they have a future? Or is their future indefinite detention?

What is the total number of prisoners held in the detention archipelago set up by the U.S. in Afghanistan? Five thousand? Ten thousand? More?

The U.S. (and its NATO partners) will not be done in Afghanistan until it has undone the damage that it has done by filling an archipelago of prisons -- hidden from sight -- with the "enemies" that the U.S. wants to make disappear.


The ARCHIPELAGO is just a part of the larger problem: the urgent need to DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan!


Related posts

It's not enough to just pull U.S. combat troops out of Afghanistan - we need to ground the drones, clear the prisons we've filled with detainees, remove the bases, get rid of the contractors, stop the training activities -- DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan!

(See DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan)











“The worst thing is the administrative detention regime the Afghans are adopting is exactly the same as what the U.S. government has been doing for the last 10 years .... The legacy left here by the U.S. is people disappeared into legal black holes.”

(See In June: REMEMBER #BAGRAM! )


Read this important blog post on U.S. complicity in torture in Afghanistan as captured prisoners are turned over to prisons that are known to torture them. "[E]ven though our coalition partners had already stopped transferring detainees to Afghans known to use torture in interrogations, the US continued doing so until last month."

(See VAU Afgh 101: Torture )


Saturday, February 18, 2012

DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan

This is a short blog post, but a big request.

In May, NATO will meet in Chicago. Big protests are planned. But what exactly will the point of the protests be?


NATO Summit in Chicago - May 20-21, 2012


It looks like the top priority for NATO in May will be Afghanistan. (Iran is an issue that may overshadow it, but that's very hard to tell moment to moment.)

NATO wants to discuss the question of how to extricate itself from Afghanistan, particularly how to withdraw combat troops. Clearly, this must be done, and much more quickly than NATO will likely want to do so. But there's more . . . .

To quote Tom Engelhardt, "what remains doggedly remarkable, as Nick Turse reports in the latest post in his TomDispatch series on the changing face of empire (supported by Lannan Foundation): the U.S. military continues to build in Afghanistan as if modest progress were indeed the byword, limited success a reality, and corners still there to be decisively turned -- if not by a giant army of occupation, then by drones and special operations forces. Go figure." [emphasis added]

For more on this, see the article by Nick Turse, "Prisons, Drones, and Black Ops in Afghanistan"

I propose that protesters in Chicago need to demand that NATO must fully DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan, including:

NATO must do more than just withdraw combat troops. Even Afghanistan President Karzai is pushing back against the U.S., demanding an end to night raids and the handover of control of detention centers.


Feb 21, 2012: #OccupyChicago Don't let #NATO *leave* 
#Chicago until it agrees to DEMILITARIZE #Afghanistan!


Afghanistan is but a single problem at which NATO is the root. However, successfully demanding that NATO demilitarize Afghanistan -- fully -- would be a significant first step in starting to confront NATO and the full range of damage that it has done.


Related posts

You don't need to be in Chicago to protest NATO. I'm asking everybody -- and especially everyone who has ever participated in #AfghanistanTuesday -- to help protest NATO from wherever they are. We want to build a crescendo of opposition that culminates in a clear message to NATO on May 20/21 when they meet in Chicago: #DEMILITARIZEafghanistan!

(See #DEMILITARIZEafghanistan )


#AfghanistanTuesday on Twitter is starting to get traction. It's time to ask, "What -- besides awareness -- might be achieved by having everyone talking about the war in Afghanistan every week?"

(See Six Outcomes from #AfghanistanTuesday )











When Afghan activist Malalai Joya spoke to a group in Chicago, she said it is not enough for the U.S. to pull out its remaining combat troops. The presence of U.S. bases assures that the violence and instability will continue. The bases are an especially important problem. Their presence virtually guarantees a whole chain of military activity.

(See Malalai: The "Big Lie" of U.S. Troop Withdrawal from Afghanistan)

Saturday, February 11, 2012

The Obamoid and the Eva Test

The path-breaking computer scientist Alan Turing defined a fundamental divide in thinking about artificial intelligence. He asked us to think about a device which, when a human interacts with it, cannot be distinguished from a human. This gave rise to the notion of the "Turing test" - in which a person interacts with a counterpart and tries to tell whether it is a computer or a person.

My mother had her own version of the "Turing test" -- let's call it the "Eva test" -- in which someone would try to lie to her face, and she would look down, and then say hesitantly, "That doesn't sound true to me." You see, her problem was that she just couldn't understand the idea of a "little" lie.


The Obamoid
(graphic: "Obama Robot to be Set Loose in Central Florida")


I thought of Mom the other day when I read some quotes from an interview with Barack Obama that appeared on Youtube. For instance, the New York Times quotes the President as saying, "I want to make sure that people understand: actually, drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties.... For the most part they have been very precise precision strikes against Al Qaeda and their affiliates.... a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists.” Yet the same article cites a report "by the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism, [which] found that at least 50 civilians had been killed in follow-up strikes after they rushed to help those hit by a drone-fired missile. The bureau counted more than 20 other civilians killed in strikes on funerals." Further, the bureau "counted 260 strikes by Predator and Reaper drones since President Obama took office, and it said that 282 to 535 civilians had been 'credibly reported' killed in those attacks, including more than 60 children."

"[A]ctually, drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties" ???

Actually? Actually, I shudder to imagine Mom's discomfort in the face of such mangling of the truth.

In another report, the the New York Times quotes the President as saying, "I’ve been very clear that we’re going to do everything we can to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and creating an arms race, a nuclear arms race, in a volatile region."

"[C]reating an arms race" ? Iran is creating an arms race?? Really? You can say that with a straight face? (I refer -- once again -- to the real numbers behind the proliferation of nuclear weapons in the world today ... which I believe must form the basis of any meaningful discussion of how we are to avoid the next war.)

We can see how Barack Obama is doing on the "Eva test." It makes you wonder how he would do on the Turing test. Perhaps it's not a coincidence that in an age in which we have been lulled to sleep by the assurances that drones and robots can do all the fighting, and shield us from the consequences of or responsibility for violence and injury, we are becoming more and more insensitive to the inhuman proportion of the lying going on all around us.

Maybe it's time for more of us to start administering "Eva tests" of our own -- and start demanding truth from our leaders.


Related posts

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")


Recently, some of us have been wandering the Twittersphere, searching for a congressman or congresswoman who will speak openly about their opposition to drone killing and drone surveillance.

(See The Diogenes Project: Can Anyone Find an Anti-Drone Congressman? )








A big Hollywood production of Ender's Game is scheduled for release on November 1. It's a perfect opportunity for us to ask: Are we happy seeing our schools turned into "Battle Schools"?

(See "Ender's Game" and the Militarization of Youth: Can We Talk About This? )



Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Why Does Iran Arouse So Much Hostility?

We're scared . . . of this?
[This post dates from the period in early 2012 when there was much talk of a U.S. attack on Iran. Eighteen months later it is as relevant as ever. See IRAN: 3 Reality Checks on the Emerging U.S. Narrative.]

If we are going to stave off a U.S. war against Iran, we are going to have to have some very difficult conversations with other Americans. Some people are extremely hostile. It's confusing and a bit frightening, but we're going to have to confront it.


Hostility Against Iran

When we protested U.S. war moves against Iran in Chicago on February 4, I felt an unusually high level of hostility from some people. Of course, we found the usual number of people who just didn't want to face what we were talking about. But other people were outright hostile. For instance, how can someone respond to, "Excuse me, would you like to take a quiz about Iran?" by saying, "GO F**K YOURSELF!" ??

Similarly, the image of a very irate SUV driver shaking his fist at the demonstrators and shouting at us, even as he sped up Dearborn, is hard to shake.

And then there was the middle-aged man who sputtered in incredulity as he watched us marching against the idea of war: "This is unbeLIEVable! What the -- ? How can you -- ?

I noticed the report from Hawaii about the February 4 protest there described similar reactions: "[A] shocking number of people (mainly older men) responded with comments like: "kill 'em all," "they're going to nuke us...are you crazy?," "bomb 'em" and worse."
Prejudice:
A Tool of Permawar

(I wonder if people elsewhere have encountered the same level of hostility? Comments please ....)

Prejudice: A Tool of Permawar

What happens in the popular culture in countries that are getting ready for war?

I've been reading a new book about the Japanese war against China a hundred years ago (The Sino-Japanese War and the Birth of Japanese Nationalism, by Saya Makito). It's amazing to me how some things never change: in Japan in the 1890s -- as in the U.S. today -- the public support for war against China was fed by all kinds of expressions of disdain and prejudice against the "culturally inferior" and "backward" Chinese.

Today, islamophobia and other forms of cultural prejudice against people in Iran is a handy tool for getting Americans to support yet another in the endless series of American wars: "permawar".

See A Force for Peace:
Getting to Know Iran Through Film
A first step in resisting "permawar" is to reject prejudice against people from other countries and cultures. Maybe when we look honestly at ourselves, instead of spending all our time finding fault with others, we will start to realize that we have many areas of similarity with the people we have been demonizing.

I can't think of a better way for people to push back against existing prejudices of Iran than to go see, think about, and discuss the current movie, A Separation. I have very little doubt it will win the Oscar for best foreign film. That provides an excellent opportunity for us to have a serious national conversation about the simple fact that Iranian people are people, too; they live lives strikingly similar to our own; and it is time to get rid of our ugly prejudices.

The Nuclear Paradox

I think the ultimate American hypocrisy lies in its nuclear stance. Consider this logic:

* Iran doesn't have nuclear weapons, and has not been proved to be working to obtain nuclear weapons, but may harbor a desire to have nuclear weapons.

See "The Bankruptcy of U.S. Nuclear Doctrine"
* Nuclear weapons exist because the U.S. invented them.

* Nuclear weapons are abundant because the U.S. has produced large numbers of them.

* Most people in the world despair of ever getting rid of the threat of nuclear weapons because the countries that have nuclear weapons -- led by the U.S. -- are not moving convincingly to get rid of them.

* The world knows the awful consequence of nuclear weapons because the U.S. has used them to injure civilian populations.

* ALL OF THE ABOVE NOTWITHSTANDING ... if Iran does, in fact, harbor a desire to have nuclear weapons, it makes THEM despicable and worthy of being attacked by the U.S.

When did Americans become so illogical?

Conversations Needed
See #NoIranWar

Are Americans capable of confronting their own illogic? What we need now are conversations -- a lot of them. (Do we still have time?)

For more on this and related issues, see my blog post on seven big reasons people should be VERY wary of any and all statements about how Iran is "asking for it".




Related posts


I often refer to how important the films of Iran have been in helping me open my mind to the possibilities of a peaceful relationship with that country.  I have been fortunate to be able to go see some of the best films from Iran every year at the wonderful Siskel Film Center in downtown Chicago. The will be another Festival of Films From Iran showing there in February, 2014.

(See A Force for Peace: Getting to Know Iran Through Film)








As the Obama administration prepares in the days ahead to pivot from its focus on Syria to something truly startling -- talking to Iran! -- it is important that the American public devotes some time and energy to learning and thinking about Iran, the history of the U.S.-Iran relationship, and what the U.S.-Iran relationship means in the larger context of the effort to reduce the risk of war and violence in the world.

(See IRAN: 3 Reality Checks on the Emerging U.S. Narrative)


Officials said that, under the chain of events in the war game, Iran believed that Israel and the United States were partners in any strike against Iranian nuclear sites and therefore considered American military forces in the Persian Gulf as complicit in the attack.

In other words, "We can't allow it to appear as if we're working in concert with Israel against Iran, because if and when Israel does attack Iran, we will have no place to hide from the Iranian retaliation."

(See U.S. War-Mongering: STOP! Now, or Be Estopped Later )


Other related links

"The real reason Persepolis was banned in the Chicago Public Schools last year is because it showed people in the Middle East as human beings, said Marjane Satrapi, the cartoonist who created it," reports Aimee Levitt in "What we learned at the 2014 Chicago Humanities Festival" in the Chicago Reader (November 13, 2014).

Monday, February 6, 2012

Is the SOA Coming to Afghanistan?

I read the description in yesterday's New York Times of how the U.S. is planning to escalate withdrawal of regular combat troops from Afghanistan, and rely on Special Forces (Green Berets) to guide the work of local troops and police.

I don't know how this strikes other people, but it seems to me like the School of the Americas (SOA) model transferred to Afghanistan. The SOA model is to use U.S. money and ideas to enable power holders in another country to persecute and kill ideological enemies, while denying that the U.S. is engaging in violence in that country, much less exposing U.S. combat troops to violence in that country, and making every effort to disavow the consequences of U.S. guidance of the violence (and crimes) being carried out in that country.


"U.S. Green Berets training Pakistani Frontier corpsmen"
(Photo: COIN Central Website)


As the New York Times explains, "Created by President John F. Kennedy in the 1960s, the Green Berets have as one of their core missions what is called 'foreign internal defense' — using combat, mentoring, language and cross-cultural skills to train local forces in rugged environments, as they are today in missions conducted quietly in dozens of nations around the world."

In other words, "It's just 'training'!"

I've written elsewhere about how the use of unmanned drones is part of a morally dangerous trend toward making war injury-free for Americans while making it more deadly than ever for people everywhere else. The type of "outsourcing" of fighting -- of the type long carried out through the SOA and now being talked about for Afghanistan, under the guise of "foreign internal defense" -- is also wrong and must be stopped.

When NATO meets in Chicago in May, a major issue on the table will be involvement in Afghanistan. It seems to me that now is our moment to say that taking the SOA model to Afghanistan is unacceptable.

I'd like to hear what other people have to say about this.


The Afghan SOA is just a part of the larger problem: the urgent need to DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan!


Related posts

Wait a minute: so the problem is that it is the Afghans who are "dangerous"? And "unreliable"? What has the US and NATO submitted Afghanistan to for the last DECADE?

(See "Dangerously Unreliable" in Afghanistan )







 
It's not enough to just pull U.S. combat troops out of Afghanistan - we need to ground the drones, clear the prisons we've filled with detainees, remove the bases, get rid of the contractors, stop the training activities -- DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan!

(See DEMILITARIZE Afghanistan)











For alert Americans, the announcement that "As part of the deal with Manila, the U.S. is promising to step up military assistance and training with the Philippine military . . . . " is worrying. The first question to ask is this: how many "military advisers" is the U.S. putting in the Philippines, and what is it leading to?

(See "Military Advisers" - The Third Rail of US Engagement in SE Asia )








 
One thing that Andy Thayer and other activists have helped me do is to understand the connectedness of injustices being experienced by people in diverse places, under diverse pretexts; and to see the way U.S. government actions form a common thread in those injustices.

(See Honduras Election: What Happened? What Responsibility Does the U.S. Bear? )







Isn't "adviser" just another word for "pre-escalation"?

(See Military Advisers to Iraq: What Could Go Wrong?)

Saturday, February 4, 2012

The Children Are Waiting

Today I'm thinking about Alanna.
* * * * * *
When Alanna was a little girl, we would go to the Art Institute of Chicago together and draw. Sometimes we took part in organized drawing classes, where groups of kids and their parents would troop up to the galleries to study some work of art or the other. Sometimes we would just wander around and find something interesting and start to sketch.

One of our favorite games was to sit in one of the galleries and each sketch something in the room. Then the other person had to figure out which painting or sculpture was being copied.

Sometimes one of us would sketch something, and then the other would color it in. I still like to go back and page through those drawings. ("Here's one that she drew, and then I colored it in with watercolors!")

Sometimes we would just wander from gallery to gallery, and say, "Remember this one?" Sometimes one of the galleries would be reorganized, and one of Alanna's favorites would be missing, and she would put her hands on her hips and frown, as if to say, "What the -- ?"

Below is an example of one of Alanna's sketches from one of our trips to the Art Institute; she must have been about 7 at the time she drew it.


* * * * * *
The sketch above is of a sculpture by Giovanni Maria Benzoni. Here is what Benzoni's sculpture looks like:


Unless you do sketching yourself, you may not realize that this is a very challenging composition to sketch. In fact, it's probably one that most adults should not take on. You probably have to be a child to be fearless enough to tackle it. Ideally, about 7 years old.

The title of the sculpture is "Flight from Pompeii." Once you know the title, it's easier to make out what's happening -- the two figures are trying to cover their heads as they escape, and the woman is holding a child. The flying sparks and hot ash from the volcano have to be imagined.

I've always loved looking closely at Alanna's rendering of this family:


The father is looking at the mother; he seems to be saying, "Don't worry, I'm here." The mother is looking at the father; she seems to be saying, "It's going to be alright, isn't it?" The baby is hanging out of the mother's arms, the way squirmy babies do.

I'm not sure I saw all this in the original sculpture. But Alanna did. Alanna is always watching very carefully.
* * * * * *
Oh, and one more thing about Alanna's sketch. She filled in the background that Benzoni left to the imagination:



I don't think Alanna and I ever talked about what it must be like to be trying to escape a shower of sparks and hot ash. But she seemed to know that the sparks and hot ash are too important a part of the picture to be left out.
* * * * * *
Alanna's middle name is Skye. I'm not sure exactly why we picked out that name for her, except that it sounded beautiful -- and we knew she would be beautiful -- and it sounded boundless -- and we knew she would be unlimited.
* * * * * *
The paintings and sculptures at the Art Institute weren't the only things that Alanna was watching. From time to time I would say something or do something, and Alanna would say, "Dad, before you said ...." It was kind of reassuring to know that someone was watching.

One time, though, I had a shock. I was talking about some anti-war activity that I was involved in -- hoping, I think, to "set a good example" for Alanna -- and she said, "Dad, before you said there have to be wars because countries have to be able to work out their problems that way."

( ! ! )

I told her I had thought some more about it and decided I had been wrong.

The look on her face said, "About time ...."
* * * * * *
It guess it's kind of reassuring to know that someone is waiting for you to get it right. But you can't expect people to wait forever. Today, Alanna is 16 and I reckon she's got more important things on her mind than waiting around for me to see clearly. She looks my way from time to time, but I can't expect her to be watching me at every moment! I guess I'll have to start taking responsibility for myself. And I think I'm ready.
* * * * * *
I think a lot of children are waiting. The sparks and hot ash are very visible to them, and it is very clear to them that everything hinges on whether the grownups really know what they're saying when they say, "Don't worry .... " and "It's going to be alright .... " Maybe it's time for us to start taking responsibility for ourselves. Maybe we have to start working to put an end to war like we really mean it.

The children are waiting.

Happy Birthday, Alanna.


Listen to this amazing performance of "Look to the Children"  featuring Esther Satterfield and Chuck Mangione on Youtube.


Related posts


With the New York Times publishing "analysis" like this, is it any wonder that Americans can say things like . . . "It won't be a war. We're just going to drop a few well placed bombs on them" . . . "the object of fighting a war is to 'cause devastation'" . . . "my finger is on the button. Run back to your mud hut or I am going to press it!" . . . "when war is devastating, then people will do everything possible not to get into it!" . . . as some of my high school classmates wrote on Facebook today?

(See The Bankruptcy of U.S. Nuclear Doctrine )

I wonder if, years from now, we will be thinking back to today and feeling surprise at how little we thought about some of the developments in our world, and in our country, and how we talked about them even less. Someday will I have to explain to my kids, or to my kids' kids, why it was that "people just weren't talking about it" . . . ?

(See Why Weren't People Talking About It? )


Any day that starts with morning glories on "Point Alanna" is a good day!

(See Morning Glories on Point Alanna )