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By Nile Bowie

The rapid advance of radical Islamist militants across sections of northern and western Iraq has shaken the embattled government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to its core. As the country maneuvers to stave off the jihadist surge, the integrity of the Iraqi nation-state hangs in the balance.

Fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) have deepened their hold over Iraq’s Anbar province and western border crossings, while groups of volunteers are enlisting to defend their communities following a decree issued by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country’s highest religious authority.

Iraqi Army units have fled their posts in besieged regions through the country to help reinforce and fortify the capital, Baghdad, and other areas under threat. As Shiite militias respond to Ayatollah Sistani’s call to arms, ISIS militants are attempting to consolidate control over Sunni regions by capitalizing on popular disenchantment with Maliki’s government.

Sectarian bloodletting on a wide scale now seems inevitable, as the United States deploys 300 military advisers and prepares to carry out airstrikes against ISIS positions. The official position in Washington is that Maliki’s Shiite-dominated government, which began overtly sectarian policies following the US withdrawal in 2011, has alienated the Sunnis and created conditions for their rebellion.

On a recent trip to Iraq, US Secretary of State John Kerry made clear that the Obama administration wants Maliki out, in favor of a more representative leader capable of bridging sectarian differences and uniting the country. Washington, however, is also prepared to take military action against ISIS before any new government is formed.

Maliki’s Shiite populism

There is indeed some basis for the criticism leveled against Maliki, who is widely accused of stoking “Shiite chauvinism” and alienating Sunnis by discriminating against them politically and economically. Sunnis have taken part in several mass demonstrations over the past year, and were accused of being Ba’athists and members of al-Qaeda as the government met the protests with force, killing dozens and making mass arrests.

Sunni tribesman called for jihad against Maliki in response to the government’s crackdown on protests in the town of Hawija last year, though the peaceful nature of the Sunni protest movement is debatable. Demonstrators in Hawjia were armed and set fire to two military vehicles, while others made attempts to capture government checkpoints in the Sunni-dominated Anbar province.

 

Maliki is also accused of ruling unilaterally and escalating tensions against Kurdish and Sunni communities through his pursuit of Shiite populist policies. Others in the Shiite camp, such as the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, have openly criticized Maliki and pushed for laws to limit his authority. It should also be remembered that Maliki’s sectarian policies have been implemented against a backdrop of near-daily suicide bombings, mostly targeting Shiites, in the southern regions of Iraq.

The Islamic State of Iraq, the precursor to ISIS, claimed responsibility for numerous suicide bombings throughout the country in recent years, which further incited sectarian animosity. Sunnis are largely uncomfortable with the notion of Shiite governance, as evidenced by large sections of the community not taking part in Iraq’s first parliamentary elections. Many Sunni groups have instead resorted to insurgency.

Sunnis also view a Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad as being beneficial to Iran, which they view as a hostile regime. Maliki’s blanketing characterization of Sunni protests, as a revolt by al-Qaeda-style elements may not have been fair, but it was generally believable for many Shiites and Kurds given the prevalence and traumatizing impact of regular sectarian bombings.

The growth of ISIS

Even with Maliki’s flaws considered, it would be unreasonable to shoulder all on the blame for the current situation on his government’s sectarian leanings. The Obama administration has characterized Maliki as the problem precisely to absolve its responsibility for creating conditions for ISIS to thrive and expand, and also to downplay the destabilizing effects of the illegal US invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003.

The rise of ISIS is often described in US media as the unfortunate result of the Obama administration’s reluctance to support rebels in the Syrian civil war fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad. Proponents of regime change in Damascus argue that radical groups like ISIS have emerged due to insufficient support for moderate rebel groups.

This argument is entirely discredited by the substantial support given to rebel groups by the CIA, sanctioned by the Obama administration, which has supplied rebels with weapons, training, communications equipment, cash assets, and diplomatic backing. The United States has been heavily involved in coordinating rebel advances in Syria since the start of the war in 2011.

ISIS has emerged as the most efficient, discipline, and well-funded jihadist group in history, and it cannot have arrived at this position without enormous funding and support from external forces. Washington’s direct involvement in aiding ISIS is difficult to ascertain, but the Obama administration cannot pretend to be unaware that Saudi Arabia – its closest ally in the region – has been financing ISIS and affiliated groups throughout the duration of the war.

As the principal state-sponsor of radical jihadist groups operating in Syria and the puritanical Wahhabi ideology, Saudi Arabia is the party most responsible for the rise of ISIS. The Obama administration has largely turned a blind eye to the Kingdom’s operations in Syria because radical fighters have proved to be the most effective on the battlefield. US allies such as Qatar and Turkey have also played a significant role in aiding the rebels, and by extension, ISIS.

Furthermore, the Obama administration has contributed multi-million dollar budgets to supplying Syrian rebels with weapons, which have logically found their way into the hands of the most proficient fighters, who are self-evidently in the ISIS camp. Other voices in the US political establishment claim that Obama’s withdrawal of troops from Iraq in 2011, under an agreement made during the Bush administration, has contributed the current crisis.

Divide-and-rule policies

Despite how these arguments are weaved into the official narrative in American media, Washington’s interventions, rather than its reluctance to intervene, have exacerbated the crises in Syria and Iraq. The violence and disorder plaguing Iraq cannot be divorced from the Iraq War and the legacy of Washington’s flawed attempts at nation building by the notorious neoconservatives following the toppling of Saddam Hussein.

Paul Bremer, in his position as Governor of Iraq, entirely dismantled Iraq’s central government, state institutions, and armed forces with the stroke of a pen. Colonial divide and rule policies were put in place under the Bush administration that saw the rise of Shiites into positions of power to offset the Sunnis and the Ba’athists.

The failed attempt at nation building fueled sectarian divisions by favoring certain tribal groups and religious sects that were seen to be more advantageous and amenable to US interests, which inalterably and artificially restructured Iraqi society based on the dictates of neoconservative analysts and think-tanks.

Al-Qaeda and groups like it never existed in Iraq before the US occupation. Despite the deep sectarian rifts unfolding today, modern Iraq was known as a relatively secular state up until the 1970s. Divisions were still political rather than sectarian under Saddam Hussein, though his attempts to consolidate power by banning all political entities led to the politicization of places of worship, giving rise to political activism with more religious dimensions.

The sectarian explosion that has taken place since cannot be attributable to the previous regime. Figures such as Tony Blair and John Kerry have attempted to distance themselves from the anarchy of present day Iraq, but such unabashed dishonesty is to be expected from these men, who would prefer to blame Maliki for the disorder, primarily because he has moved too closely to Iran and has ceased to behave a like the leader of a US client regime.

The Obama administration isn’t wrong in calling for an inclusive leadership in Baghdad, but it is using the advance of ISIS – which it undeniably contributed to by varying degrees of separation – as a means for ushering in a friendlier government. Maliki was never the preference of Washington; he prioritized relations with Damascus and Tehran and rejected American demands that any US military forces stationed in Iraq be shielded from prosecution or lawsuits.

Iraq finds itself tangled in a complicated web of terrorism, interventionism, and sectarian violence. The immediate priority is pushing back against ISIS, which seeks to create an Islamic state encompassing both Syria and Iraq into a borderless caliphate. Iranian Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has voiced his disapproval of US intervention, and likely suspects that Washington is aiming to shuffle the leadership in Baghdad to the detriment of Tehran.

As US airstrikes are soon expected, Baghdad will continue to look towards Iran for assistance, which will likely provide the kind of training and support that allowed the Syrian army to consolidate and make gains against ISIS across large swathes of Syria. An inclusive and coordinated multi-sectarian force would be critical in thwarting the advance of ISIS, whether such a path is even possible at this stage remains to be seen.

Nile Bowie is a columnist with Russia Today, and a research affiliate with the International Movement for a Just World (JUST). He is also a Just member.

26 June 2014

By Lilly Martin

Syrian women are not downtrodden and voiceless in general. The west portrays Arab women as lacking rights or oppressed compared to American women. There are differences, but in some cases the Syrian women have more rights.

For example: the Syrian civil code, or law, is based on the FRENCH civil code, which I suppose goes back to the period of French occupation 1920-1946. Legally speaking, the Syrian legal system follows this French pattern. However, when it comes to FAMILY LAW, such as: marriage, divorce, child custody and inheritance, the Syrian system in the Islamic law. By Islamic law a women retains her maiden name, and she has full possession of all monies and properties she may own prior to marriage, and after marriage. Her husband can never ask for, or coerce her to give him money or property. Her stuff is hers forever.

Socially: the Syrian mother rules the house. This also goes back to the Koran, since it states that the home is commanded by the woman. The man’s job is to provide financially, but her job is to organize and conduct the working of the home. She asks for ‘stuff’ and it had better show up, or else. Syrian women are very strong personalities. You can say they are demanding, aggressive and they know how to complain. I have thought this probably comes from the fear of possibly being oppressed by males, so they over compensate and come out looking stronger than men. It is well known that Syrian homes are run by the female. Men dress up and look important when they leave the house to go into the real world, but at home the female is running the show.

Of course, in every stereo-type and generalization there are glaring exceptions to the case.

Syrian women are all educated. Syria is compulsory education at least through the 9th grade, and most do go through the 12th. Not everyone goes to University, but it is FREE of charge to anyone who will study and keep high grades. Syria is full of female Teachers, Doctors, Engineers, Lawyers and Judges. The Syrian government has a number of high level females, and the Parliament has a fair share of females.

Now I have set the stage, with some back story, and I will begin to tell you about some Syrian female refugees. The ‘revolution’ began in March 2011. The area surrounding Idlib (North East from Latakia) was a hot-bed of rebels. These were the first FSA. They got the cooperation of Turkey, a key sponsor of the crisis, and they took their wives, children and aged parents to Turkey, Gaziantep, and created a tented refugee camp there. This was the very first refugee camp of the Syrian crisis. I can look up the actual date, but I suppose it must be later 2011. Right away we heard of Turkish guards there who raped Syrian women and girls. Syrian women are not afraid to yell rape. They do not have any cultural hang-ups about the word Rape. They aren’t afraid of their husband, brother or father killing them out of ‘honor’ like they do in Pakistan. Syria doesn’t have many rapes, but their fair share of crimes, as does everywhere. But, rape is treated as a crime, just like stealing or murder, and there is no fear factor for a women or girl to state she was raped.

There were even many pregnancies because of these rapes. I think that the Turkish guards, who had no previous experience with refugee camps, probably thought they could get away with abusing these poor refugees, because they looked at them as homeless, and without rights. They probably regarded them as political pawns in a game, and since all the males were away in Syria fighting with FSA, these women and girls were ‘fair-game’.

The source of these stories were the women themselves. They gave many interviews about these claims to journalists who visited the camps. They began to demand to go HOME, back to Syria. They claimed not only the abuse, but also no proper shelter, no toilets, not enough water, and general bad living conditions. Turkey gets heavy snow in winter, so this is not the best place to sleep in a tent.

But, the Turkish government said “You can not go home.” That is when they put up the barbed wire and guard towers. I hope at the same time they also told their guards to STOP raping. The refugee camp turned into a concentration camp. Women wanted to go home to Syria, but Turkey could not allow it, because they needed the refugees in order to send an international message that: #1. Syria’s government is so bad on the civilians, that they have to flee to Turkey; #2. The refugees are coming more and more, proving the crisis is getting worse, not better. #3. Turkey is the savior of poor Syrians.

What does Turkey get out of housing the refugees? #1. They make a huge amount of money off international aid agencies who are providing for the refugees. #2. They make huge amounts of money off Saudi Arabia , from donations to help the refugees, as well as other Arab Gulf countries. #3. Turkey enjoys the PR image of caring, modern, democratic country, worthy of EU membership, because of their humanitarian response to the Syrian refugee influx. (Way to go Turkey!!!)

Why won’t Turkey allow Syrians to return home? #1. It would appear that the crisis in Syria is improving, and they do not want that image going out. They must make the refugees look bigger and bigger. If they can’t keep the refugees inside Turkey, then there is no more crisis. They need to crisis to last forever.

The Turkish started out paying the Syrian refugees $1,000.00 per month for a family of 4. They were promised it would not be a long war. The FSA were also on a payroll, but they were paid in Turkey in US dollars by a Saudi official. I do not know what pay-checks are being paid now.

During this crisis, Angelina Jolie, in her capacity as UN rep, has visited Gaziantep at least 2 times. I left messages for her at the UN, but she never replied. I had wanted to tell her that the women and children she was visiting were not just innocent victims of war, but in fact were part of the Free Syrian Army, they were the wives, daughters and sisters of the rebels.

But, after all is said and done, those women and children are not all there out of support of FSA. There are plenty of women who are not asked for their political stance, they are forced into living as a refugee just because their father, husband, brother chose to be a rebel. They may support that, or not.

I feel very strongly that those women and children in the various refugee camps have suffered a great deal, and that it is time for them to come home.

For example: I volunteer at a tented refugee community in Latakia, they are all from Aleppo, and have been here almost 2 years. These are from the same sect as those who went to Turkey, but these people did not want to play into the hands of the enemies of Syria. They preferred to suffer out the war right here in their own country, where at least they could be assured of free education and medical, as well as help on food, etc.

The Syrian refugees in Turkey have not had any education for 3 years. Those children have lost 3 years of learning. How will they catch up? When? The UN does check on them, and did a special seminar about how to promote education. But nothing happened. Turkey can not help with education, since they do not read or write either Arabic or English. The Syrian educational system is all Arabic and English and the Turkish system is Turkish only. That puts all the burden on UN, and they can’t bear it.

I think all parties thought that the Syrian crisis would be over soon and these minor inconveniences would be short lived. However, that was under-estimated.

I feel very strongly that the women and children of Gaziantep should be brought home to Syria before Sept 10th 2014, as that is back to school day. I want those kids to start the school year in Syria. The schools exist and they are all free, the teachers are here, all we need is those kids to come home.

The problem is: #1. Turkey will not allow them to leave, for the reason previously detailed, and #2. WHERE would they go? Their homes were mainly in the North of Syria, which still has terrorist infestation. We would need to designate a SAFE area for them, and then prepare homes or tents. This is do-able.

I could ask for Angelina Jolie, or others like her, to be an international neutral party to negotiate with Turkey, in order for them to be released. I can imagine Turkey and even the UN would want to complain, “But it is not safe for them to go home.” But, we can see that the people of HOMS have returned home, and the refugees from Lebanon are now pouring into the Qalamoun area, since it is safe again. There would have to be a safe area for them to settle at, for the purpose of getting the kids plugged back into educational system.

Lilly Martin is an American woman living in Latakia with her Syrian husband and their family. She has not been an activist until a war came to her doorstep.

24 June, 2014
Countercurrents.org

By Alan Hart

Could it be that the three Al-Jazeera journalists have been found guilty and each sentenced to seven years in jail to enable Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi to pardon and free them in order to give the impression that he is a kind, forgiving man and not on his way to becoming the Arab world’s most ruthless and repressive tyrant?

Only the coming days or weeks will give us the answer but while we wait I think the governments of the world should act. What could they do? For starters they could isolate Sisi’s Egypt diplomatically by expelling its ambassadors and withdrawing their own.

The conviction of Peter Greste, Mohammed Fahmy and Bahar Mohamed for allegedly supporting a terrorist organization has nothing whatsoever to do with justice. It’s all about sending a Zionist-like message to the world – “The truth is whatever the masters of Egypt say it is and anybody who tells and spreads an alternative version of events will be punished.”

On the social networks there was instant and universal condemnation of the Egyptian court’s politically motivated decision but there is no reason to suppose that governments will act.

The U.S. has, in fact, rewarded Sisi for his intimidation and suppression of all opposition to date. The day before the Egyptian court delivered its decision, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was in Cairo and with him came the announcement that the U.S. has released $575 million in military aid to Egypt that had been frozen since the removal of President Mohammed Morsi in a coup last year.

In what were described as “candid” talks with Sisi, Kerry emphasised “our strong support for upholding the universal rights and freedoms of all Egyptians including the freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association.”

If Kerry and his boss truly believe that Sisi has any intention of upholding those rights and freedoms they are, to say the least, naive in the extreme.

Kerry also pledged that Washington would “stand with the Egyptian people in the fight for the future they want.”

I find myself wondering what America’s position will be when in that fight Egyptians turn against Sisi.

Alan Hart is a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent. He is author of Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews.

24 June, 2014
Alanhart.net

 

By Michael Schwartz

Events in Iraq are headline news everywhere, and once again, there is no mention of the issue that underlies much of the violence: control of Iraqi oil. Instead, the media is flooded with debate about, horror over, and extensive analysis of a not-exactly-brand-new terrorist threat, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). There are, in addition, elaborate discussions about the possibility of a civil war that threatens both a new round of ethnic cleansing and the collapse of the embattled government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Underway are, in fact, “a series of urban revolts against the government,” as Middle Eastern expert Juan Cole has called them. They are currently restricted to Sunni areas of the country and have a distinctly sectarian character, which is why groups like ISIS can thrive and even take a leadership role in various locales. These revolts have, however, neither been created nor are they controlled by ISIS and its several thousand fighters. They also involve former Baathists and Saddam Hussein loyalists, tribal militias, and many others. And at least in incipient form they may not, in the end, be restricted to Sunni areas. As the New York Times reported last week, the oil industry is “worried that the unrest could spread” to the southern Shia-dominated city of Basra, where “Iraq’s main oil fields and export facilities are clustered.”

Under the seething ocean of Sunni discontent lies a factor that is being ignored. The insurgents are not only in a struggle against what they see as oppression by a largely Shiite government in Baghdad and its security forces, but also over who will control and benefit from what Maliki — speaking for most of his constituents — told the Wall Street Journal is Iraq’s “national patrimony.”

The Deconstruction of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq

Does anyone remember what Iraq looked like a dozen years ago, when Saddam Hussein still ruled the country and the United States was about to invade? On the one hand, Iraqis, especially Shiites and Kurds, suffered under the iron heel of an oppressive dictator — who may have killed 250,000 or more of his own people during his 25-year reign. They also struggled against the privation caused by U.S.-led sanctions — some estimates at the time placed the number of sanction-caused infant deaths alone at 500,000.

On the other hand, the country had a number of successful export-oriented industries like leather goods and agricultural products like dates that offered employment to hundreds of thousands of relatively well paid workers and entrepreneurs. It also had a resilient electrical, water, and highway infrastructure (though increasingly decrepit thanks to those sanctions). In addition, it had a best-in-the-region primary and higher educational system, and the finest (free) health care in the Middle East. In a nation of 27 million people, it also had — in comparison to other countries in the area — a large, mainly government-employed middle class of three million.

These pluses all flowed from a single source: the 2.5 million barrels of oil that Iraq produced each day. The daily income from the sale of the “national patrimony” undergirded the country’s economic superstructure. In fact, the oil-based government budget was so ample that it supported Hussein with multiple palaces, enriched all his relatives and allies, and financed his various wars, both on other countries and on Iraq’s Kurds and Shiites.

This mixture of oppression and prosperity ended with the U.S. invasion. Despite denials that it would ever touch the Iraqi “patrimony,” the Bush administration went straight for those oil revenues, diverting them away from the economy and into “debt payment” and soon enough, a pacification campaign. Despite promises from Washington that, under an American occupation, production would soon rise to six million barrels per day, the struggle to take control of energy production out of Iraqi hands ended up crippling the industry and reducing production by 40%.

In fact, the occupation government was a whirlwind of economic destruction. It quickly began dismantling all government-run (and oil-subsidized) industrial plants, bankrupting the private industries that depended on them. It disrupted or destroyed commercial agriculture, again by discontinuing Saddam-era oil-financed subsidies and by air attacks on insurgents in rural areas. It imposed both austerity measures and a “de-Baathification” program on the country’s educational and medical systems.

Since most Iraqis holding any position of significance had no choice but to belong to Saddam’s Baath Party, this proved a disaster for middle class professionals, a majority of whom found themselves jobless or in exile in neighboring countries. Since they had managed such systems, often under increasingly terrible conditions, the effect on the management of the electrical, water, and highway infrastructure was devastating. Add in the effects of bombing campaigns and the privatization of maintenance and you had a lasting disaster.

When, in 2009, the Obama administration first began withdrawing U.S. combat troops, Iraqis everywhere — but especially in Sunni areas — faced up to 60% unemployment, sporadic electrical service, poisoned water systems, episodic education, a dysfunctional medical system, and a lack of viable public or private transportation. Few Westerners remember that, in 2010, Maliki based his election campaign on a promise to remedy these problems by — that figure again — increasing oil production to six million barrels per day. Since the existing production was more than sufficient to operate the government, virtually all of the increased revenues could be used to reconstruct the country’s infrastructure, revive the government sector, and rehabilitate all the devastated public services, industries, and agricultural sectors.

The Corrupt Legacy of the U.S. Occupation

Despite his obvious Shia sectarianism, Sunnis gave Maliki time to fulfill his campaign promises. For some, hopes were increased when service contracts were auctioned off to international oil firms with the aim of hiking energy production to that six million barrel mark by 2020. (Some, however, just saw this as the selling off of that national patrimony.) Many Iraqis were initially reassured when oil production began to rise: in 2011, the Hussein-era mark of 2.5 million barrels per day was finally reached, and in 2013 production finally exceeded 3.0 million barrels per day.

These increases raised hopes that reconstruction from the invasion and occupation era would finally begin. With oil prices holding steady at just under $100 per barrel, government oil revenues more than doubled, from about $50 billion in 2010 to more than $100 billion in 2013. This increase alone, if distributed to the population, would have constituted a windfall $10,000 subsidy for each of the five million Iraqi families. It also would have constituted a very promising down payment on restoring the Iraqi economy and its social services. (The electrical system in itself required tens of billions of dollars in new investment simply to restore it to inadequate pre-war levels.)

But none of this oil wealth trickled down to the grassroots, especially in Sunni areas of the country where signs of reconstruction, economic development, restored services, or jobs were hard to discern. Instead, the vast new revenues disappeared into the recesses of a government ranked by Transparency International as the seventh most corrupt on the planet.

Demanding a Share of the National Patrimony

So here’s where Iraqi oil, or the lack of its revenues at least, comes into play. Communities across Iraq, especially in embittered Sunni areas, began demanding funding for reconstruction, often backed by local and provincial governments. In response, the Maliki government relentlessly refused to allocate any oil revenues for such projects, choosing instead to denounce such demands as efforts to divert funds from more urgent budgetary imperatives. That included tens of billions of dollars needed to purchase military supplies including, in 2011, 18 F-16 jets from the United States for $4 billion. In a rare moment of ironic insight, Time magazine concluded its coverage of the F-16 purchase with this comment: “The good news is the deal will likely keep Lockheed’s F-16 plant in Fort Worth running perhaps a year longer. The bad news is that only 70% of Iraqis have access to clean water, and only 25% have clean sanitation.”

In all fairness to Maliki, his government did use some of the new oil revenues to begin restaffing wrecked government agencies and social service institutions, but virtually all of the new employment went to Shia citizens in Shia areas, while Sunnis continued to be fired from government jobs. This lack of employment — which meant, of course, the lack of oil money — has been key to the Sunni uprising. As Patrick Cockburn of the British newspaper, the Independent, wrote,

“Sunni men were alienated by not having a job because government funds were spent elsewhere and, on occasion, suddenly sacked without a pension for obligatory membership of the Ba’ath party decades earlier. One Sunni teacher with 30 years’ experience one day got a crumpled note under his door telling him not to come to work at his school any more because he had been fired for this reason. ‘What am I to do? How am I going to feed my family?’ he asked.”

With conditions worsening, Sunni communities only became more insistent, supplementing their petitions and demonstrations with sit-ins at government offices, road blockades, and Tahrir Square-type occupations of public spaces. Maliki’s responses also escalated to arresting the political messengers, dispersing demonstrations, and, in a key moment in 2013, “killing dozens” of protestors when his “security forces opened fire on a Sunni protest camp.” This repression and the continued frustration of local demands helped regenerate the insurgencies that had been the backbone of the Sunni resistance during the American occupation. Once lethal violence began to be applied by government forces, guerrilla attacks became common in the areas north and west of Baghdad that the U.S. occupiers had labeled “the Sunni triangle.”

Many of these guerrilla actions were aimed at assassinating government officials, police, and — as their presence increased — soldiers sent by Maliki to suppress the protests. It is notable, however, that the most determined, well planned, and dangerous of these armed responses targeted oil facilities. Though the Sunni areas of Iraq are not major centers of oil production — more than 90% of the country’s energy is extracted in the Shia areas in the south and the Kirkuk region controlled by the Kurds — there are ample oil targets there. In addition to a number of small oil fields, the “Sunni triangle” has almost the entire length of the only substantial pipeline that exits the country (to Turkey), a significant refinery in Haditha, and the Baiji petroleum complex, which contains an electrical power plant serving the northern provinces and a 310,000 barrel per day oil refinery producing a third of the country’s refined petroleum.

There was nothing new about local guerrillas attacking oil facilities. In late 2003, soon after the U.S. occupation cut off the flow of oil revenues to Sunni areas, residents resorted to various strategies to stop production or export until they received what they felt was their fair share of the proceeds. The vulnerable pipeline to Turkey was rendered useless, thanks to more than 600 attacks. The Baiji and Haditha facilities held insurgents at bay by allowing local tribal leaders to siphon off a share — often as much as 20% — of the oil flowing through them. After the U.S. military took control of the facilities in early 2007 and ended this arrangement, the two refineries were regularly subjected to crippling attacks.

The pipeline and refineries returned to continuous operation only after the U.S. left Anbar Province and Maliki once again promised local tribal leaders and insurgents (often the same people) a share of the oil in exchange for “protecting” the facilities from theft or attack. This deal lasted for almost two years, but when the government began cracking down on Sunni protest, the “protection” was withdrawn. Looking at these developments from a petroleum perspective, Iraq Oil Report, an online industry newsletter that offers the most detailed coverage of oil developments in Iraq, marked this as a key moment of “deteriorating security,” commenting that the “forces guarding energy facilities… have historically relied on alliances with locals to help provide protection.”

Fighting for Oil

Iraq Oil Report has conscientiously covered the consequences of this “deteriorating security” situation. “Since last year when attacks on the [Turkish] pipeline began to increase,” the North Oil Company, in charge of production in Sunni areas, registered a 50% drop in production. The pipeline was definitively cut on March 2nd and since then, repair crews have been “prevented from accessing” the site of the break. The feeder pipeline for the Baiji complex was bombed on April 16th, causing a huge spill that rendered water from the Tigris River undrinkable for several days.

After “numerous” attacks in late 2013, the Sonangol Oil Company, the national oil company of Angola, invoked the “force majeure” clause in its contract with the Iraqi government, abandoning four years of development work on the the Qaiyarah and Najmah fields in Nineveh Province. This April, insurgents kidnapped the head of the Haditha refinery. In June, they took possession of the idle plant after government military forces abandoned it in the wake of the collapse of the Iraqi army in the country’s second largest city, Mosul.

In response to this rising tide of guerrilla attacks, the Maliki regime escalated its repression of Sunni communities, punishing them for “harboring” the insurgents. More and more soldiers were sent to cities deemed to be centers of “terrorism,” with orders to suppress all forms of protest. In December 2013, when government troops began using lethal force to clear protest camps that were blocking roads and commerce in several cities, armed guerrilla attacks on the military rose precipitously. In January, government officials and troops abandoned parts of Ramadi and all of Falluja, two key cities in the Sunni triangle.

This month, faced with what Patrick Cockburn called a “general uprising,” 50,000 troops abandoned their weapons to the guerrillas, and fled Mosul as well as several smaller cities. This development hit as if out of nowhere and was treated accordingly by much of the U.S. media, but Cockburn expressed the view of many informed observers when he termed the collapse of the army in Sunni areas “unsurprising.” As he and others pointed out, the soldiers of that corruption-ridden force “were not prepared to fight and die in their posts… since their jobs were always primarily about making money for their families.”

The military withdrawal from the cities immediately led to at least a partial withdrawal from oil facilities. On June 13th, two days after the fall of Mosul, Iraq Oil Report noted that the power station and other buildings in the Baiji complex were already “under the control of local tribes.” After a counterattack by government reinforcements, the complex became a contested area.

Iraq Oil Report characterized the attack on Baiji by insurgents as “what could be an attempt to hijack a portion of Iraq’s oil revenue stream.” If the occupation of Baiji is consolidated, the “zone of control” would also include the Haditha refinery, the Qaiyarah and Hamrah oil fields, and “key infrastructure corridors such as the Iraq-Turkey Pipeline and al-Fatha, where a collection of pipelines and other facilities deliver oil, gas and fuel to the center and north of the country.”

Further proof of this intention to control “a portion of Iraq’s oil revenue stream” can be found in the first actions taken by tribal guerrillas once they captured the power station at Baiji: “Militants have caused no damage and instructed workers to keep the facility online” in preparation for restarting the facility as soon as possible. Similar policies were instituted in the captured oil fields and at the Haditha refinery. Though the current situation is too uncertain to permit actual operation of the facilities, the overarching goal of the militants is clear. They are attempting to accomplish by force what could not be accomplished through the political process and protest: taking possession of a significant portion of the proceeds from the country’s oil exports.

And the insurgents appear determined to begin the reconstruction process that Maliki refused to fund. Only a few days after these victories, the Associated Press reported that insurgents were promising Mosul citizens and returning refugees “cheap gas and food,” and that they would soon restore power and water, and remove traffic barricades. Assumedly, this will be funded by upwards of $450 million (of oil money), as well as gold bullion, reportedly looted from a branch of the Central Bank of Iraq and assorted other banks in the Mosul area.

The oppressive regime of Saddam Hussein was racked with insurgency, and when vicious repression failed, it delivered a portion of the vast oil revenues to the people in the form of government jobs, social services, and subsidized industries and agriculture. The oppressive United States occupation was racked with insurgency precisely because it tried to harness the country’s vast oil revenues to its imperial designs in the Middle East. The oppressive Maliki regime is now racked with insurgency, because the prime minister refused to share those same vast oil revenues with his Sunni constituents.

It has always been about the oil, stupid!

Michael Schwartz is a Distinguished Teaching Professor, Emeritus, of sociology at Stony Brook State University.

24 June, 2014
TomDispatch.com

By Patrick Martin

Speaking at the end of a day-long series of meetings in Baghdad, US Secretary of State John Kerry warned Monday that President Obama could order military strikes against Sunni militants without waiting for the political restructuring of the Iraqi government that Washington has been demanding.

Kerry underscored the debacle facing the regime of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, which has lost control of a third of the country’s territory to a Sunni uprising headed by the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Shams (ISIS), an Islamic fundamentalist group with roots in Al Qaeda.

Indicating that US military action could come quickly, Kerry said that any decision by Obama to order an attack should not be considered an act of “support for the existing prime minister or for one sect or another.”

Pentagon officials also announced Monday that the Iraqi government had agreed to provide immunity from prosecution for all US military personnel deployed to Iraq in the course of the present crisis. This was the principal issue that blocked the conclusion of a Status of Forces Agreement between the US and Iraq in 2011, leading to the complete removal of all US troops from the country.

The US military has insisted on having such an agreement in place, ratified by the Iraqi parliament, to insure that no US officers or soldiers could face prosecution for war crimes. With that obstacle cleared, the 300 US Special Forces troops ordered to Iraq by Obama will begin arriving later this week to review the status of Iraqi Army units and gather targeting information for bomb and missile strikes.

Referring to the ISIS offensive, Kerry said, “They do pose a threat,” adding, “They cannot be given safe haven anywhere.” Given that the group controls significant territory in both eastern Syria and western Iraq, this statement amounts to a declaration that the US is preparing military action against Syria as well.

Underscoring the threat of a wider war, Israeli warplanes and missiles struck nine targets within Syria Monday, the biggest military action by Israel against Syria in the three years of mounting civil war in that country. The Israeli Defense Forces claimed the attack was retaliation for an incident in which an Israeli teenager was killed near the Syrian border, allegedly by an anti-tank missile. The IDF policy is to treat any armed attack from Syria, whether conducted by Assad supporters or rebels, as an official government action, and to target the Syrian military in response.

On the day of Kerry’s visit to the Iraqi capital, ISIS forces were consolidating their hold on nearly the entire western border of Iraq, after capturing key positions in a series of bloody battles on Saturday night and Sunday. Insurgents seized the towns of Qaim and al-Waleed, the last major Baghdad-controlled crossings into Syria.

Another ISIS force took Rutba, in the southwest corner of Anbar province, and attacked the town of Turabil, the main border crossing point into Jordan.

If the ISIS forces continue moving south, they would reach the Iraqi border with Saudi Arabia, which in alliance with the United States has financed and armed the organization and other Sunni Islamist groups as part of the operation in Syria.

There are no longer any effective Iraqi military forces along the entire stretch of border with Syria. The only remaining crossing point between Iraq and Syria not under ISIS control is held by the peshmerga, the militia force loyal to the Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq.

Iraqi military officials said they were trying to make a last stand in Sunni-populated Anbar province by concentrating their forces in the town of Haditha—site of one of the most notorious US war crimes during the occupation—and also the location of Iraq’s largest dam, controlling the flow of water for the Euphrates River, whose valley comprises the bulk of arable land in Iraq.

The conditions under which the US secretary of state visited Baghdad demonstrate the precarious state of the Maliki regime and its American patrons. Kerry was conveyed secretly to the center of the city, and filmed descending from his helicopter wearing a flak jacket, in a scene reminiscent of the last days of the US puppet regime in Vietnam. He did not spend the night in the Iraqi capital, instead flying to Amman, Jordan, where armed attacks were believed less likely.

Kerry met with Maliki and his top military and political aides, reportedly emphasizing the necessity for a political restructuring that would likely include the replacement of the prime minister by a Shiite figure less hated by the Sunni minority, and the incorporation of Sunni tribal and political leaders into the government. He later met with the leaders of Sunni, Kurdish and Shiite parties, including both allies of Maliki and bitter opponents.

Maliki has so far rebuffed demands that he step down, seeking instead to mobilize Shiite religious leaders and sectarian militias to bolster the crumbling military apparatus. On Saturday, tens of thousands of members of the Mehdi Army, the militia loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, marched through eastern Baghdad in an armed show of force.

The preferred US mechanism for engineering Maliki’s removal is a provision in the Iraqi constitution requiring parliament to convene and begin formation of a new government by July, following the elections held April 30. Maliki’s Shiite-based State of Law party won only 92 of the 325 seats. It is the largest single bloc, but would require support from Kurdish, Sunni or rival Shiite factions to establish a majority.

In 2010, after a similar splintered result in the parliamentary voting, Maliki simply ignored the constitutional requirement and held onto power until his rivals agreed to rubber-stamp a second term in office. This time around, both Washington and Maliki’s political enemies at home are using the constitutional deadline to provide leverage for his removal.

The official statement issued by the US and Iraq after Monday’s talks noted that Kerry “appreciated the Iraqi leaders’ commitment to the political process and its constitutional required dates.” Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the top Shiite cleric, seemed to give his backing to this maneuver, issuing an appeal read during Friday prayers calling on parliament to meet the constitutional deadline for forming a new government.

If the constitutional ploy fails, however, US support for the removal of Maliki by extralegal methods is certainly possible. There is little doubt that one reason Kerry chose to stop over in Cairo on his way to Baghdad, bestowing US benediction on the bloodstained military ruler and new president, former general Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, was to send a message to Maliki.

Al-Sisi wields supreme power after the military ouster of elected president Mohamed Mursi, which the US State Department assiduously refused to designate as a coup. The same thing could take place in Iraq, if Maliki proves obdurate.

For the time being, however, the Iraqi military is incapable of defending its own bases, let alone overthrowing the government. A scathing report in the Washington Post Monday was headlined, “Iraqi military facing ‘psychological collapse’ after losses, desertions,” and cited US analysts suggesting that complete dissolution of the army was possible.

Meanwhile a US senator blurted out the dirty secret of American policy in Iraq and Syria, during appearances on two Sunday morning television talk shows. Speaking on both NBC’s “Meet the Press” and CNN’s “State of the Union,” Kentucky Republican Rand Paul said that the crisis in Iraq was the result of the US arming of ISIS in the civil war in Syria against the Assad regime.

“I think we have to understand first how we got here,” he said on CNN. “We have been arming ISIS in Syria.” He continued, “We are where we are because we armed the Syrian rebels. We have been fighting alongside al Qaeda, fighting alongside ISIS. ISIS is now emboldened and in two countries. But here’s the anomaly. We’re with ISIS in Syria. We’re on the same side of the war. So, those who want to get involved to stop ISIS in Iraq are allied with ISIS in Syria. That is the real contradiction to this whole policy. “

Paul went on to endorse the policy being pursued by Obama in Iraq now, in sending in special forces to prepare for air strikes, thus demonstrating the bipartisan support of every Democrat and every Republican in Washington for the new crimes being prepared by American imperialism.

24 June, 2014
WSWS.org

 

 

By Sulak Sivaraksa.

At first sight, the most recent coup d’état on 22 May 2014 seemed to have learned admirably well from the failures of the previous coup in 2006. But what have and what haven’t the military leaders learned from the 2006 coup? Here are some observations.

1) The martial law was declared two days in advance of the actual seizure of state power. The Senate was allowed to linger on for a brief while and was subsequently dissolved. Power was seized and monopolized by one leader. Royal endorsement only came on 26 May at a ceremony in which the king was not present. The president of the Privy Council didn’t seem to play any role in this process too. And the junta leaders didn’t have an audience with the king. These measures were taken to show that there wasn’t any connection between the monarchy and the coup; the military alone was responsible for it. Whether or not this is plausible is entirely a different matter.
2) This time the coup group, officially known as the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), didn’t appoint a prime minister to govern on their behalf. The junta has moved swiftly to undermine or destroy Thaksin Shinawatra’s power-base by transferring to inactive posts the Ministry of Defense permanent secretary and the National Police Chief—along with a number of senior police officers and provincial governors who are said to be connected to Thaksin. We will have to see whether or not the military junta will be successful in eradicating Thaksin and Co.’s political power this time; the 2006 coup failed dismally in this feat.

3) The junta’s appointment of MR Pridiyathorn Devakula and Somkid Jatusipitak as advisors to handle economic and foreign affairs matters respectively is interesting. Both men belong to the opposite poles. They are however honest and highly competent. It will be interesting to see if they can work together and whether or not NCPO listens to their advices. Professor Yongyut Yuttawong is also capable and upholds a strong sense of ethics. Ultimately, how many more qualified technocrats will be enlisted to work for NCPO—aside from the legal experts who have served under every recent military dictatorship?

4) We have to wait and see whether or not the new set of administrators will courageously work to dismantle structural injustice and to what extent they understand the sources of poverty, oppression and exploitation faced by the majority of people in the country. Moreover, will they continue to denigrate local knowledge forms as well as autonomy? Will they attempt to move beyond the populist and corrupt policies of Thaksin and Yingluck?

NCPO’s plans to construct roads and dams around Bangkok may prove as disastrous as Yingluck’s approval of a massive budget for dam construction in the name of flood relief. Is it far-fetched to demand that NCPO call for a referendum before launching any massive construction projects?

5) The creation of the Military Court is a double-edged dagger. If the objective is to improve the justice process in the country, then it must be accompanied by the nourishment of mindfulness, emancipatory knowledge, and tolerance—and not to say of a major overhaul of the education and Sangha systems. I’m afraid these issues are not on the priority list of NCPO.

6) Summoning individuals to report to the junta or detaining them seems to have spiraled out of control. It may lead to a culture of misinforming and denouncing innocent persons, a kind of McCarthyism. The sooner this path is avoided, the better. (The suspension of US military aid to Thailand is simply a weak PR ploy. The US has always had deep ties with every postwar military dictatorship in the country.)

7) As shocking as this may sound but the present military leaders should look to Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat as a role model. Despite his terrifying flaws Sarit was also pretty clever. Sarit’s closest confidant as well as advisor was very talented. The Field Marshal was able to make highly competent individuals work for the wellbeing of the country such as Puey Ungphakorn in the domain of finance and economics and Tawee Boonyaket in the field of constitutional drafting.

8) NCPO won some praise as it disbursed payment to rice farmers under the rice pledging scheme of the previous government. But in the wake of the 2006 coup in an effort to reduce public dissent, the price of certain essential commodities was also cut. The 2006 coup-makers justified their action under the pretext of fighting corruption. Arguably, they ended up being even more corrupt than the deposed government.

9) Hopefully, the drafting of a new constitution and formation of a civilian government will not take an inordinate amount of time as during the Sarit years. Likewise, let’s hope that oppositional intellectuals and politicians will not be liquidated as during the Sarit dictatorship.

10) The Sangha Act of 1962 issued by Sarit is a root cause of the Sangha’s downfall in the country. If this Act is not amended or revoked, the future of Buddhism looks bleak in the kingdom.

Sulak Sivaraksa

PS

Perhaps, the leader of NCPO should take the time to study the life of Pompey, a great military-general-turned-political-leader. In his biography of Pompey Plutarch writes:

“Life out of uniform can have the dangerous effect of weakening the reputation of famous generals…. They are poorly adapted to the equality of democratic politics. Such men claim the same precedence in civilian life that they enjoy on the battlefield…. So when people find a man with a brilliant military record playing an active part in public life they undermine and humiliate him. But if he renounces and withdraws from politics, they maintain his reputation and ability and no longer envy him.” Anthony Everitt adds that “The trouble was that Pompey was a poor political tactician and also uninspiring public speaker.”

I am aware that the leader of NCPO doesn’t have the time to read this article. But if his trustworthy and clever subordinates alert him to the message in this postscript it may be beneficial to the present situation.

The English name of คสช is National Council for Peace and Order. Its Latin equivalent would be “otium cum dignitate.” That is, peace/leisure (otium) is inextricable from dignity (dignitate). If human rights are trammeled on and freedom of expression is denied, then an order is peaceful only in name. It will be a false peace.

25 June 2014

 

 

 

 

By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers

Ending Empire and the War Culture that Supports It are as Important as Confronting Wall Street

Take action: We can stop the next Iraq War. A majority of Americans oppose a military attack. Contact Congress tell them to warn President Obama: a military attack violates the Constitution and is an impeachable offense.

In the last week, there has been a rapid march toward military action in Iraq despite widespread opposition to more war among the US population for a variety of reasons. One concern is that it would require more military spending despite immense and unmet needs for funding in a broad array of areas at home. Unlike any other policy area, there never seems to be a lack of funds for a military attack or even a war. The military-industrial complex has a powerful hold on US lawmakers.

The hawks in Congress are exerting tremendous pressure for military action in Iraq to prevent ISIS and former members of Saddam Hussein’s government from taking control. On Thursday President Obama delivered a statement describing the steps he is taking on Iraq. These include:

– Reinforcing the US Embassy in Iraq by removing some Americans stationed there and adding military troops to protect it;

– Significantly increasing intelligence and surveillance to understand what ISIS is doing as well as what the US can do to counter their influence;

– Increasing support for the Iraq military, including sending 300 soldiers to Iraq to “advise” them and set up joint operation centers in Baghdad and northern Iraq;

– Repositioning additional US military assets in the region so that “ going forward, we will be prepared to take targeted and precise military action…”

– And finally, pursuing diplomacy in the region to support stability in Iraq.

While this is not the military attack that hawks are urging, it certainly is a policy that moves in that direction. This week, President Obama told congressional leaders that he did not need any authorization for the use of military force from Congress, but that he would keep congressional leadership informed of his actions.

Protests around the United States

The American public is sick and tired of war. It is a mistake for President Obama to decide that he can take military action in Iraq without congressional or UN approval . He likely made this decision because he knows that if Congress were allowed to consider the issue, there would be a tidal wave of opposition from constituents in an election year. If Congress really functioned as a check and balance, it would be warning President Obama that a military attack without congressional approval is an impeachable offense; that the Constitution is clear – only Congress has the power to declare war and a military attack is an act of war. The silence of Congress will mean complicity in another illegal military action and will again reveal the bi-partisan nature of the war machine.

If unchecked, it seems the most likely scenario is that the President will build intelligence to justify further intervention and will then use drones to bomb Iraq. The President, with the support of groups like Human Rights Watch, acts as if unmanned bombing is a legal military attack even though his drone policy is being questioned by the UN, the legal community and the public. This will ultimately lead to another US war in Iraq.

Perhaps this is the President’s desired purpose. The goal of having US military bases in Iraq to control the region, which is the center of the Middle East at a time when oil is desperately needed, has not been achieved. A justification for intervention would provide an excuse to re-occupy those bases.

If we re-occupy Iraq, we can expect a long-term presence. The (currently) most likely next president, Hillary Clinton, has a track record as a hawk. She has already signaled to the military-industrial complex that she is open to more war. Clinton recently said she was even open to staying in Afghanistan beyond President Obama’s already-too-slow exit from that country.

Opponents of war organized opposition quickly. This week Veterans For Peace (VFP) held nationwide protests against war in Iraq along with Military Families Speak Out and other organizations. They also protested the failure to adequately fund the Veterans Administration and to take care of current veterans when they return from war. VFP warned the President that military attacks will just add to the disaster in Iraq, result in the loss of more American and Iraqi lives and create more wounded veterans. They put out an action alert that included a variety steps people can take to oppose a military attack in Iraq and that listed the many organizations petitioning the government against war.

Iraq Veterans Against the War have spoken out against another military engagement in Iraq. They spoke as experienced veterans, writing:

“Many of our members deployed to Iraq during the recent US occupation. Those of us who were there know firsthand that US military solutions in Iraq do not serve the interests of the Iraqi people. We advocate for the self-determination of all people, in this case the people of Iraq. Any solution to this crisis must come from them. When the United States invaded and occupied Iraq, the formerly secular country was destabilized. The United States and the Department of Defense intentionally created and agitated sectarian divisions that would not have otherwise existed. The result of this is what we see today, and Iraqi civilians are paying for it.”

Americans are also protesting members of the previous administration. This week protesters disrupted a speech by Condolezza Rice at Norwich University in Vermont with a mic check which in part said: “I come here today to charge Condolezza Rice for having participated in and perpetrated crimes against humanity in the name of the citizens of the United States.” This is not the first protest against Rice. She was protested at the University Of Minnesota in April. Also at Rutgers, students protested Rice being invited to speak at their commencement. As a result of opposition by students and faculty , Rice declined to speak.

As Robert Brune of the DC Media Group points out , the Iraq War was based on lies about Weapons of Mass Destruction and now we see the lie of ‘the successful surge’ being exposed by the current violence. Too many lives have been lost, too much treasure has been squandered and there has been too much intrusion into Iraq and other nations.

Most Americans know that the current violence in Iraq is the result of the US invasion and US strategies that increased sectarian divisions in the country. As a result, we know that more military violence will continue to make things worse.

The chaos in Iraq demonstrates that those who opposed the war were right . Many people predicted that invasion and occupation of Iraq were likely to result in a civil war and ongoing bloodshed as well as anti-Americanism and strengthening those who hate US Empire. The media is trying hard to ignore those lessons by highlighting the voices that were wrong – the people who supported the Iraq War. American people across the political spectrum are not being fooled. They can see reality despite the media mythmaking.

Why Is It So Difficult to Learn from the Failure of War?

War and militarism are deeply ingrained in the American psyche. We call it War Culture. Youth are taught to admire the heroes of war and are rarely told of the long history of US war crimes. Just this week Occupy.com reported that in Dayton, Ohio youth in K through 12 are being pushed to build drones by the US military. With this report we added a Disney Junior video of a cartoon glorifying drone characters that spy on people and includes images of youth appearing in its bullseye. These are two examples of many of how early the pro-war brainwashing begins in the United States.

There is a lot of money to be made in war and militarism. The Congress is currently debating the military spending bill. Military spending makes up more than half of all US discretionary spending. This is particularly horrid at a time when the US economy continues to flounder, when there is no full employment program, when there is record poverty, when infrastructure is crumbling and when the country needs to transition to a new energy economy, among many other urgent domestic needs.

It is not only the obvious expensive weapons systems that are always over budget and corporations like Halliburton that make billions rebuilding nations destroyed by the US military – and the deep corruption in those industries, but this week we got a glimpse of another military profit center, the Police Industrial Complex. This is big business and includes vehicles , weapons and sophisticated surveillance technology . Even corporations are joining in the frenzy. A coal company purchased drones that fire pepper spray and bullets to be used against protesters. And a private corporation in Brazil received $22 million to provide weapons and gear used against World Cup protesters.

Part of the problem is that the American people are consistently lied to about war. Chelsea Manning, who is serving decades in prison for exposing the truth about the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, wrote a column in the New York Times about the Fog of War . Manning gave multiple examples of how the media is manipulated and controlled by the US military resulting in the American people being told false information about what is really occurring in wars. Manning reports “The more I made these daily comparisons between the news back in the States and the military and diplomatic reports available to me as an analyst, the more aware I became of the disparity.” Manning also notes there was never more than 12 hand-picked journalists embedded to cover a country of 31 million and more than 100,000 US troops.

The government and media work to manipulate the views of Americans because if the Americans new the truth they would be even more angry at the US war machine. As long-time military writer Tom Engelhardt writes , the United States has a war record of unparalleled failure. What major war has the United States been on the winning side of since World War II?

People have the Power to End War

Thanks to whistleblowers and new media outlets like Wikileaks, the truth is being exposed and propaganda is starting to fail. Unprecedented efforts by the US and its allies to suppress leaks have taken a toll on proponents of the truth but have largely been unsuccessful. Rather than shrinking, support for whistleblowers is growing.

Julian Assange, publisher and editor-in-chief of Wikileaks, marked two years of asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London this week. On his behalf , international organizations are petitioning the United Nations to protect Assange’s human rights. And new organizations to aid whistleblowers, ExposeFacts.org and the Courage Foundation , were launched this month. A new tool for whistleblowers called Secure Drop is being provided by media outlets such as the New York Times and The Guardian .

People have more power to end war and the destructive empire economy than we realize, although opponents of peace are aware of it. The US Department of Defense has been studying social unrest through its Minerva Research Initiative since 2008 and soldiers are preparing to suppress protests inside the US.

We can harness our power by working together across borders and by sharing our knowledge and tools. In a recent interview by Nafeez Ahmed of former CIA official Robert David Steele, Steele points out that open source technology is a key to defeating corrupt centralized power. Ahmed writes, “Open source everything, in this context, offers us the chance to build on what we’ve learned through industrialisation, to learn from our mistakes, and catalyse the re-opening of the commons, in the process breaking the grip of defunct power structures and enabling the possibility of prosperity for all.”

We must have a bold vision of what we wish to achieve – a world without war in which people participate in decisions that affect their lives. Movements to achieve these ends are growing globally. Jerome Roos tells us in his review of a new book on democracy by Marina Sitrin and Dario Azzelini that there are ‘laboratories of democracy’ all over the world. And World Beyond War is working to create a new global coalition to abolish war.

The growing movement for social, economic and environmental justice in the United States has done much to focus attention on the wealth divide and corrupt economy controlled by Wall Street. Likewise, we must also focus on the Empire economy and the War Culture that supports it. Through increased awareness and collaborative popular action we can weaken these pillars of power and build a just and peaceful society. We have the power if we choose to use it.

Take action: We can stop the next Iraq War. A majority of Americans oppose a military attack. Contact Congress tell them to warn President Obama: a military attack violates the Constitution and is an impeachable offense.

This article is produced by Popular Resistance in conjunction with AlterNet . It is a weekly review of the activities of the resistance movement. Sign up for the daily news digest of Popular Resistance, here.

Kevin Zeese, JD and Margaret Flowers, MD are organizers of PopularResistance.org ; they co-direct It’s Our Economy and co-host Clearing the FOG .

23 June, 2014
Countercurrents.org

 

By James Cogan
The Obama administration is responding to the uprising in Iraq led by the Sunni extremist Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) with intrigues and provocations that can lead only to yet more death and destruction in both Iraq and Syria, and risk triggering open war with Iran.

The weekend visit of Secretary of State John Kerry to Egypt, to embrace the dictatorship of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, effectively scuttled the tentative move by the White House toward a rapprochement with the regime in Tehran. Washington is instead pursuing an agenda in the Middle East that dovetails with the interests of Israel, the ruling elite and military in Egypt, and the reactionary Sunni monarchies in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. It will rest upon these forces, its traditional allies in imposing its imperialist dictates throughout region, to try and salvage its position in the Middle East.

Since Friday, both Kerry and President Obama have left no doubt that Washington is conspiring to oust Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, an Iranian-supported Shiite fundamentalist politician who took office in 2006 with Washington’s backing. The American political and media establishment is blaming Maliki for the religious and ethnic conflicts that US imperialism consciously fomented in Iraq to secure its grip over the country. Over one million Iraqis lost their lives due to the US military repression and sectarian bloodshed that consolidated the position of the Shiite-dominated government that Maliki heads.

On Friday, Obama attempted to rewrite history, telling CNN: “We gave Iraq a chance to have an inclusive democracy, to work across sectarian lines to provide a better future for their children, and unfortunately what we’ve seen is a breakdown of trust… Part of the task now is to see whether Iraqi leaders are prepared to rise above sectarian motivations, come together, compromise. If they can’t, there’s not going to be a military solution to this problem… There’s no amount of American firepower that’s going to be able to hold the country together and I’ve made that very clear to Mr. Maliki and all the other leadership inside Iraq… They don’t have a lot of time.”

On Sunday, Kerry declared: “The United States would like the Iraqi people to find leadership that is prepared to represent all of the people of Iraq, that is prepared to be inclusive and share power.” The US, he went on, “was not responsible for what happened in Libya and nor is it responsible for what is happening in Iraq today.”

The messages from the Obama administration are both incendiary and politically incoherent. According to Washington, the Shiite ruling elite that it elevated into power must make a “compromise” with the forces that have aligned with ISIS over recent weeks to rebel against Baghdad and carve out control over large areas of the country. It must make a deal with their Sunni-based rivals, who have been marginalised both during and following the US occupation.

The power-sharing arrangement that Washington is demanding, however, amounts to the de-facto partition of the country through the establishment of autonomous zones in the Sunni-populated areas, modelled on the Kurdish Regional Government that rules over the three majority-Kurdish provinces.

Maliki’s removal would be aimed at establishing a government that not only gives a blanket endorsement to Obama’s plans for revived US military operations in the country, but also allows the US, Egypt and the Gulf states to arm, supply and provide safe havens inside Iraq to the Sunni-based rebels that are seeking the overthrow of the Iranian-backed Syrian government of President Bashir al-Assad.

Kerry declared on Sunday that the US is “discouraging any kind of support to entities where it is unsure where the money is going… and that goes to any government, any charity, or any individual.” The truth, however, is that the proxy war fought on behalf of the US and European powers to overthrow Assad created the conditions in which ISIS gained adherents, weapons and resources. The militants who have seized Iraqi cities and towns were assembled and equipped in Syria. From the beginnings of the Syrian civil war, Sunni extremists have been the main component of the forces fighting Assad’s military.

Over the weekend, ISIS fighters took control of the border crossing between Iraq and Syria in the town of Al Qaim, along with several other towns along the Euphrates River, to facilitate even closer integration of its operations on either side of the border. From the cities they control in western Iraq such as Fallujah, ISIS fighters have now penetrated as close to Baghdad as the outer suburb of Abu Ghraib. In Syria, they are launching new offensives, using vehicles and weapons captured from US-equipped Iraqi army units.

As the trajectory of the US response to the debacle it faces in Iraq began to emerge over the weekend, the leading representatives of the Iranian regime issued bitter condemnations. Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told Iranian news: “We are strongly opposed to US and other intervention in Iraq. We don’t approve of it as we believe the Iraqi government, nation and religious authorities are capable of ending the sedition.”

The US, Khamenei declared, “is seeking an Iraq under its hegemony and ruled by its stooges.”

Iranian president Hassan Rohani denounced, without naming them, the ruling elites of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states for financing Sunni extremism in Syria, Iraq and throughout the region. “Those who spend their money and oil dollars to help terrorists today,” he stated, “know that tomorrow is your turn… Stop it. Stop the bloodshed.”

To comply with Obama’s policies in regards to both Iraq and Syria, an administration in Baghdad would have to appeal for US military support to carry out bloody purges against the Shiite factions that are linked with Tehran, sympathetic to Assad in Syria, and exert enormous sway within the Iraqi military, state bureaucracy and major Shiite population centres. On Saturday, one of the largest, the movement led by cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, paraded tens of thousands of its Mehdi Army militiamen through the streets of Baghdad, Najaf, Karbala, Amarah, Basra and other majority Shiite cities. Even in Kirkuk, the northern oil city that was occupied by Kurdish troops to prevent ISIS entering it, Sadrist militiamen marched in a show in strength.

The Shiite militia mobilisation centred on pledges to defend various Shiite shrines that ISIS has threatened to destroy, but anti-US slogans were also prominent in the demonstrations. In the early stages of the occupation, Sadr called for resistance, with the Mehdi Army actively supporting Sunni insurgents and ultimately fighting a series of pitched battles with American troops in 2004. After Sadr’s movement made a political agreement to support and participate in a Shiite-dominated puppet government, more radical off-shoots continued to wage guerrilla war over the following years, allegedly with the assistance of the Iranian military.

The inexorable logic of the developing situation, a confrontation with Shiite forces inside Iraq and with Iran by the US and its regional allies, was openly advocated yesterday by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanayu. Speaking on US television, he labelled both ISIS and Iran as “enemies of the United States.” Advising Obama, Netanayu declared: “There are two actions you have to take: one is to take the actions that you deem necessary to counter this ISIS takeover of Iraq, and the second is not to allow Iran to dominate Iraq the way it dominated Lebanon and Syria.”

23 June, 2014
WSWS.org

 

By Father Dave

Father Dave’s take on what is going on

So many crazy things are happening in the hell that is flowing from Syria into Iraq at the moment that it’s hard to know what is going on. As Christians we need to make a meaningful response to all this bloodshed and violence but it’s so hard to know where to start. Let’s begin then by anchoring ourselves to one unambiguous truth – that the U.S. and NATO are NOT particularly concerned about what ISIS will do to Iraq, despite all rhetoric to the contrary.

Why can we start with this as our bedrock truth? Because the Lord Jesus gave us a guiding principle that allows us to cut through all the propaganda that clouds such issues: “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Matthew 6:21). This is as true of countries as it is of individuals. It isn’t our rhetoric that indicates where our heart is. It’s our wallet!

If you want to know where the heart of the U.S. and NATO are don’t listen to their rhetoric. Rather, watch what they do and see where they invest their money! In the case of the ongoing violence across the Levant, there is no ambiguity. The U.S. has been continuing to pour money into their her allies in the region – Israel, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and at least two out of three of the above are actively funding offshoots of Al Qaeda – ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra – and have been doing so for years!

Yes, there seems to have been a marked change in the policies of both NATO and the U.S. recently. While Britain had been portraying the ISIS team as the spiritual descendants of Robin Hood and his merry men engaged in ridding Sherwood Forrest of its evil prince, last week the Brits suddenly decided that ISIS was a terrorist organisation after all! Likewise, whereas the U.S. had been looking on happily as those merry rebels employed sophisticated American weaponry against Assad, now all the smiles have been replaced with looks of shock and horror as those weapons are turned upon Iraq!

But the shock is only apparent. The looks of horror are hollow. The rhetoric is empty. How do we know? Watch where they are putting their money! Are funds being withdrawn from ISIS’s main funding agencies? Are the Saudi’s being summoned to the Whitehouse to answer for their role in this new round of violence? Has anything of substance actually changed?

Some have suggested that this entire ISIS invasion has been orchestrated by the U.S. as another attempt to accomplish regime change in Syria. This is unlikely, I think. The U.S. no longer has the financial resources to roll out such an ingenious plan of destruction. Of course, even if ISIS’s latest movements were not supervised by the US they may have provided Washington with the opportunity to start reigning death on all the ISIS-controlled regions, including Syria. Happy days in the Whitehouse?

Well … I don’t think we are going to see the U.S. or NATO put troops on the ground any time soon. The outcry from their relative constituencies will be far too great to ignore and, again, who can afford this sort of foreign adventure at the moment? We may well see a token number of tomahawk missiles fired off in the general direction of ISIS and/or Assad – a sufficient number to satisfy the shareholders of the major arms manufacturers – but none of the major Western war-lords can manage another full-scale invasion right now.

Besides all this, regime change in Syria was never Obama’s end-game in the Levant any more than the defeat of ISIS is now. Iran was always the real target and this latest development may give the U.S. a direct shot at Iran!

For those who aren’t familiar with the war that’s been waged on Iran by the U.S. and her allies for the last 60-something years, here’s a bit of history:

 In 1951 Mohammad Mosaddegh was elected Prime Minister of Iran and introduced a number of social reforms, including the nationalisation of the Iranian oil industry, formerly under the control of the British since 1913.

 In 1953 M16 and the CIA organised a coup that removed the democratically elected government and installed Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (the Shah) as Iran’s sole monarch. The Shah redirected control of Iran’s oil back to the Brits and the Americans.

 The much-hated Shah was eventually overthrown in the Iranian revolution of 1979, establishing Iran as an Islamic state under the rule of Ayatollah Khomeini, resulting in the US and Britain once again losing control of their oil!

The history of the relationship between the U.S. and Iran since that time has been one of unrelenting aggression of the former to the latter. Sometimes this has been overt, as with U.S. support for Saddam Husain in the Iran-Iraq war (that cost over a million lives). Sometimes this has been covert, such as through CIA efforts to fan the flames of sectarian division between Sunni and Shia (with the fabulous results that are now plain for all to see). Always it has been economic, with sanctions having been in place since the first days of the Iranian revolution – sanctions that not only inhibit trade but prevent the sick from accessing medicines and teenagers from accessing Facebook!

Why has Iran always been such a hated enemy of the U.S. ever since the days when it was a model secular democracy? It’s all there in Matthew chapter 6. The Iranians have treasure, and lots of it, and the U.S. and NATO have always had their hearts set on it! Moreover, if left unmolested, Iran would quickly become the most powerful economic force in the Levant, and so it poses an economic threat (nb. ‘economic’ not ‘existential’) to America’s and NATO’s middle-eastern allies.

Understanding the economic threat posed by Iran to the traditional economic power-players of the region is the key to comprehending much of the violence that has taken place across the region over the last generation, and most obviously in the last three years. In truth, no one in the West would have been remotely interested in the antics of Bashar Al Assad had Syria not been Iran’s closest ally? Likewise Hezbollah’s activities in the region would have gone largely unnoticed had she not been Iran’s only other ally. Iran is the target. The rest are just the supporting cast, and this latest development with ISIS and Iraq opens up entirely new opportunities for US-Iranian violence!

But of course the rhetoric is all the other way. There is talk of Washington and Tehran working together! It seems that both great powers now have a common enemy and that circumstances have serendipitously pulled them together to fight against terrorism side-by-side. Don’t believe it!

I’ll wager that the U.S. is not going to support Iranian military incursions into Iraq except perhaps by clapping and cheering (in a very muted kind of way). I don’t think this new era of US-Iranian cooperation is going to cost the US partner anything. Conversely, we may see Iran bleed to death economically through involvement in another protracted war, with Washington mouthing regret while continuing to indirectly fuel the furnace!

Perhaps I’m wrong. I hope and pray that I’m wrong. I hope and pray that Iran and the U.S. and all the countries represented in NATO will enter a new era of cooperation and dialogue and friendship. If you listen to the rhetoric that seems to be highly likely. But I haven’t seen anyone take their hands off their wallets yet! Western money is still pouring into Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and through them into the pockets and cartridge-boxes of ISIS. Until I see a change in spending habits I’m not ready to believe in a change of heart.

Father Dave.

21 June 2014
www.prayersforsyria.com

By Bill Van Auken
With nearly 600 Green Beret “advisors” and other US troops in or set to be sent to Iraq over the coming days, the Pentagon announced Friday that it is negotiating rules of engagement that the regime in Baghdad rejected two-and-a-half years ago, before the final pullout of the American military.

Key among these provisions, according to Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby, is blanket immunity from Iraqi or international law relating to the slaying of Iraqi civilians or other war crimes.

It was the refusal of the government headed by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to accept such provisions in 2011 that scuttled negotiations on a status of forces agreement that would have kept some 10,000 US troops indefinitely deployed at a number of strategic Iraqi bases.

The Pentagon spokesman attempted to deflect suggestions that the Obama administration is exploiting the debacle in Iraq to blackmail the teetering regime headed by Maliki into submitting to US terms, thus paving the way for the permanent bases that Washington initially sought.

“What we were talking post-2011 was a fairly sizable force of American troops that would remain in Iraq for a long period of time,” Kirby said. “What we are talking about here is a very small number, up to 300, whose mission will be of a limited duration.”

Anyone familiar with the history of the period leading up to the US war in Vietnam, however, knows full well that the dispatch of “advisors” to a war-torn country in Washington’s crosshairs can quickly lead to the deployment of a very “sizable force of American troops.”

There is every reason to suspect that President Barack Obama, who won his first election to the US presidency by posturing as an opponent of the Iraq war, is heading down just such a path.

In his statement delivered at the White House on Thursday Obama attempted to sell the renewed deployment of US forces in Iraq as part of Washington’s global war on terrorism—he repeated the words “terrorism” or “terrorist” 10 times in the short briefing. In reality, however, the US ruling establishment’s response to the collapse of the US-trained Iraqi military in the face of broad-based insurgency by Iraq’s Sunni minority is directed at pursuing far broader aims, both regionally and globally.

While claiming that the advances made by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in northern and western Iraq pose an eventual threat of terrorist attacks on the “homeland,” Obama added that Washington had “strategic interests in stability in the region.”

Spelling these out, he added that “obviously issues like energy and global energy markets continues [sic] to be important.”

In other words, the latest intervention—like the catastrophic nearly nine-year-long war and occupation that preceded it—is ultimately about oil and who controls this strategic resource.

It was to establish American imperialist hegemony over the oil reserves of the Persian Gulf that Washington launched its war based on lies in March 2003, killing upwards of a million Iraqis and sacrificing the lives of some US 4,500 troops in the process. US imperialism has never given up on this goal, even while forced to pursue it by other means.

Even as Obama was speaking, the Islamist insurgents were overrunning Iraq’s largest oil refinery in Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad. The loss of the facility, which is directed to domestic consumption, spells gasoline and power shortages for the embattled country.

The US intervention in Iraq is part of a broader intervention into a developing region-wide war that has been ignited by a succession of American military operations, ranging from the invasion of Iraq in 2003 to the use of Islamist militias as proxy forces in the 2011 US-NATO war for regime change in Libya and the instigation and support for the ongoing sectarian civil war in Syria by Washington and its allies, including Saudi Arabia and the other Sunni Persian Gulf monarchies.

Even as ISIS fighters were encircling the last holdouts among the government troops at the Beiji refinery Friday, the Syrian government reported a terrorist car bombing in the central city of Hama, which killed at least 34 and wounded some 50 more. The Al-Nusra front, an Al Qaeda affiliate that has clashed with ISIS for control of turf in Syria, claimed responsibility for the atrocity.

Meanwhile, in Lebanon, another suicide bomber, apparently linked to ISIS, attacked a checkpoint in the Beqaa Valley, killing two people and wounding dozens. The apparent target of the bombing was Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim, a Shiite official who is director of Lebanon’s General Security Directorate. On the same day in Beirut, police rounded up 20 members of ISIS who were suspected of preparing further assassination attempts.

While claiming that its intervention in Iraq is meant to quash ISIS, the reality is that this Islamist militia is Washington’s own Frankenstein’s monster. It was forged first through the US military destruction of Iraqi society and the divide-and-rule strategy of the American occupation that fueled the bitter sectarian bloodbath that wracked the country. While suppressed in Iraq, this tendency had a dramatic resurgence in Syria as the US, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and other regimes in the region funneled arms and other support to the Islamist-dominated “rebels” carrying out the sectarian war for regime change against the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

Last September, the Obama administration was forced—in the face of massive popular opposition—to back down from its plan to carry out US air strikes against the Assad regime, and in support of the ISIS and other Islamist formations. Now it is preparing to reverse this humiliating climbdown on the pretext of pursuing the ISIS both in Iraq and across the border in Syria.

US officials speaking to the Washington Post Thursday said that the administration sees Iraq and Syria as “a single challenge.” Under the pretext of fighting terrorism, such an intervention will be directed primarily at furthering the drive to topple the Assad government.

This position received support Thursday from Senator John McCain, a prominent critic of Obama’s Iraq policy, who stated his agreement that “we are going to have to act in Syria as well.”

Also noteworthy in terms of support was a statement issued following Obama’s press conference by Anthony Cordesman, a military strategist for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who has advised the Pentagon on the US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“The President’s decision to send 300 more US military advisors to Iraq is a key first step in dealing with the crisis,” Cordesman wrote. “It ensures that the United States as well as Iran will have a presence on the ground, while any US use of airpower alone would have effectively empowered Iran’s Revolutionary Guards because they would have been present with Iraqi forces.”

This points to another major strategic aim in the Iraq intervention, which is to weaken Iranian influence in the country as part of an overarching strategy of subduing every power that poses an impediment to US imperialism’s drive for global hegemony. This undoubtedly is a primary consideration as well in the ever more open campaign by Washington to oust Maliki—who was originally put in office by the US occupation—and replace him with a more pliant regime that will align itself with Washington against Tehran.

Thus, for all Obama’s talk about taking “targeted and precise military action,” the reality is that US imperialism is once again embarking on an aggressive policy that has the potential to ignite a regional and even world war.

21 June, 2014
WSWS.org