EU ‘loses faith,” U.S. AfIraqPak rises war dead

Re-reporting, editing, comment by Carolyn Bennett

Troubling reports attest to a dangerous arrogance in U.S. government higher echelon that continues to order and perpetrate violence, to arm volatile states and states in regional conflict — all the while refusing to take advice from either U.S. diplomats or leaders in the UN Security Council and European Union.

In two theaters

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting December 5, 2010

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 201]

Wounded 32,937-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: November 22, 2010

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

99,021 – 108,094

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,429 U.S., 4,747 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,416 U.S., 2,247 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

• Just Foreign Policy Iraqi deaths due to U.S. invasion —

“The number is … at least 10 times greater than
most estimates cited in U.S. media

yet it is based on a scientific study of violent Iraqi deaths

caused by the U.S.-led invasion of March 2003”:

1,421,933

http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq

AL JAZEERA REPORTS FROM
U.S. aggression, occupation in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan

AFGHANISTAN December 5
In leaked U.S. diplomatic cables, European Union president Herman Van Rompuy (at the time president-designate) is quoted as saying, “the European Union no longer believes that U.S. and NATO forces can succeed in Afghanistan but [it] continues to commit troops to the fight ‘out of deference to the United States.’”

Herman Van Rompuy in December 2009 tells U.S. ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman that 2010 “would be the ‘last chance’ for Afghanistan in European eyes.…

“About 30,000 European troops are on the ground in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Force. The total U.S. and NATO force in the country is about 150,000-strong.… NATO and the U.S. have sustained heavy losses during the nine-year conflict in Afghanistan and there are very few signs that the violence is slowing.” The number of foreign soldiers killed is up from last year’s figures.

AFGHANISTAN December 3
Twenty-five-year-old U.S. army medic Robert Stevens on Wednesday at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma, Washington, pleaded guilty to firing on “two Afghan men for no apparent reason. He said “he and other soldiers were acting on orders from a squad leader during a patrol in March in Kandahar.” For his crimes, Stevens received a nine-month prison sentence. “He will serve [the] nine months at a detention facility — without pay — and will be demoted to E-1 private, the lowest U.S. Army rank.” The soldier “will be allowed to stay in the [U.S.] military.…

“Five of the 12 soldiers named in [this] case are accused of premeditated murder in the most serious prosecution of alleged atrocities by U.S. military personnel since the war began in late 2001.… On Monday, a U.S. army general ordered a court-martial for another one of the 12 U.S. infantry [personnel] accused of terrorizing civilians and fellow soldiers as part of a rogue platoon in Afghanistan earlier this year.”

AFGHANISTAN November 29
Six NATO troops died Monday when a man disguised as an Afghan police officer turned his weapon on International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) during a training session in Nangarhar province in eastern Afghanistan. … The incident was the worst casualty toll suffered by ISAF since eight troops died in five separate incidents on October 14.

“The U.S. military is bankrolling a training program for Afghan forces so that they will be able to take responsibility for security in their country by 2014.”

IRAQ December 4
Seventeen (est.) people died and more than 100 suffered wounds Saturday when a series of explosions targeted Shia Muslim pilgrims in Baghdad… The deadliest attacks, two almost-simultaneous blasts — caused by a car bomb and a derelict house filled with explosives — took place close to a rest house popular with Iranian religious tourists.… The violence comes a day after 14 Iranian pilgrims died when two buses collided in southern Iraq…

“Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims, many of them from Iran and other countries with large Shia Muslim populations, visit the city of Najaf and Iraq’s other major Shia shrines in Samarra, Karbala and Baghdad every year.…”

PAKISTAN December 2
The United States has increased its “campaign of alleged drone strikes in Pakistan, despite the Pakistani military refusing calls for an operation in the North Waziristan region.”

PAKISTAN December 1
Confidential cables released by the WikiLeaks website reveal U.S. and UK diplomats’ concerns that Pakistani nuclear material may be given by a state employee to groups opposing Western governments.

“The cables also show that the diplomats worried that a nuclear-armed Pakistan may undertake a grave conflict with neighboring India, with which it maintains a mutual enmity.

“In one cable sent in early 2009, U.S. ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson told Washington, ‘Our major concern is not having an Islamic militant steal an entire weapon but rather the chance someone working in government of Pakistan facilities could gradually smuggle enough material out to eventually make a weapon.’…

“A September 2009 U.S. diplomatic cable stated that in a meeting between U.S. and UK foreign office teams, senior UK official Mariot Laslie said, ‘The UK has deep concerns about the safety and security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.’…

“Cables also showed that Russia conveyed its concern to the U.S. over the transfer of nuclear materials in Pakistan… ‘There are 120,000-130,000 people directly involved in Pakistan’s nuclear and missile programs. … There is no way to guarantee that all are 100 per cent loyal and reliable.’”

Sources and notes
“EU ‘losing faith’ in Afghanistan — Leaked U.S. cables quote EU president saying that European troops are deployed in NATO force in ‘deference’ to the U.S.,” December 5, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2010/12/2010125125337676886.html
“U.S. soldier sentenced in Afghan case — A U.S. soldier, one of 12 facing charges, pleads guilty to shooting unarmed Afghans,” December 2, 2010,
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/12/201012253539228197.html
“NATO troops killed in Afghan attack — Six shot dead by a man wearing Afghan police uniform during training session in eastern Afghanistan,” November 29, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/2010112914164461612.htm
“Iraq blasts target Shia pilgrims — At least 17 people killed as bombing attacks across the capital target religious tourists,” December 4, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/12/201012481736901244.html
“U.S. widens use of drones in Pakistan — U.S. steps up alleged drone strikes saying Pakistan’s not dealing with armed groups in North Waziristan,” December 2, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/video/asia/2010/12/201012253519587763.html
“Fears over Pakistan nuclear arms — Leaked US diplomatic cables show concerns that nuclear arsenal may be given to opposition groups,” December 1, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/20101130205022351315.html



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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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War-making powers rooted in deeply entrenched lies— Swanson

Push for cuts to military machine as key part of ending economic crisis
From Mickey Z. Interview with David Swanson on War Lie
Excerpt, re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett

Author and activist David Swanson his latest book War Is a Lie appeared this week on FAIR’s [Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting’s] CounterSpin. This is some of what Swanson said in an earlier interview with Mickey Z.

“A little consideration of the past suggests that we have been fooled more than enough times. It is not only in the incidents invented, manufactured or seized upon to initiate wars that are lies.

“The stories we are told to keep wars going once begun, the whitewash of them once they are over — as well as the pretense that they are over when they are not — are likewise based on lies.

“A web of long-accepted lies supports the destruction of our economy by diverting our wealth into wars, into preparation for wars, and into a network of military bases around the globe.

“The idea that we can survive this war machine environmentally, economically or with a representative government intact is built on pure lies.

“And the secret, unaccountable war-making powers established by deeply entrenched lies about what endangers us and what protects us enables the rising threat of small and secret and proxy and even unmanned wars — wars that can be launched without any specific lies required.”

David Swanson says his goal in writing War is a Lie is “to move people to the point where we don’t support wars even when they’re new.…

“We have to push for cuts to the military machine as a key part of the answer to the economic crisis, without letting up on the central moral argument against the evil of war. Beyond that, should you work on counter-recruitment or media, lobbying or nonviolent protest, education or web design — all are required. It depends on what you find most rewarding.”

Sources and notes
Author and activist David Swanson, in addition to his books, is author of ‘The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. Bush’ by Dennis Kucinich (2008). Swanson has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including press secretary for Dennis Kucinich’s 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.


Swanson is co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org, creator of ProsecuteBushCheney.org and Washington Director of Democrats.com, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, the Backbone Campaign, Voters for Peace, and the Liberty Tree Foundation for the Democratic Revolution, and chair of the Robert Jackson Steering Committee. Swanson is a commissioner on the North American Truth and Accountability Commission on Human Experimentation. Beginning in November 2009, he served as an online organizer and blogger for a campaign to oppose First Amendment free speech rights for corporations: http://freespeechforpeople.org and served on a volunteer basis for another similar campaign at http://movetoamend.org. David Swanson holds a master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia. http://davidswanson.org/about; http://davidswanson.org/warisalie

Mickey Z. Interviews David Swanson on War Lies by David Swanson [“War Is Over (If You Want It”)], November 23, 2010, http://davidswanson.org/content/mickey-z-interviews-david-swanson-war-lies

Mickey Z. is the author of 10 books, including Seven Deadly Spins: Exposing the Lies Behind War Propaganda. “Until the laws are changed or the power runs out, he can be found on the Web at http://www.mickeyz.net”

Also David Swanson on “War is a Lie” (CounterSpin (11/26/10-12/2/10), http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=4198

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting November 27, 2010

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 201]

Wounded 32,921-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: November 22, 2010

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

98,876 – 107,938

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,429 U.S., 4,747 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,404 U.S., 2,231 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Al Jazeera reports Southwest Asia/Middle East 

Afghanistan [U.S./Soviet nine and nine] November 27
“Afghanistan has been referred to as the ‘Graveyard of Empires’ as it has never been successfully conquered by a foreign army.…

“U.S.-led forces have now been in Afghanistan for 3,338 days, the same amount as the ultimately unsuccessful occupation by Soviet forces in the 1980s.…

“The Soviet army arrived with a force of 40,000 soldiers in 1979; and by 1985, there were 118,000 troops in the country. In 1989, Afghan fighters — armed by the CIA and known as the Mujahidin — drove the Soviets out. Over the course of those nine years, 15,000 Soviet soldiers and as many as 1.3 million Afghans, mostly civilians, died.

“Twelve years later, in October 2001, the U.S. toppled the Taliban government with a force of more than 5,000 troops; but now the war against the Taliban is being fought by nearly 150,000 U.S.-led foreign troops, with an additional 112,000 private contractors working for the U.S. department of defense.… The Americans, like the Soviets before them, have repeatedly killed civilians, turning the public against them.” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/2010112711249788109.html.

Afghan election fraud November 26
“Afghan authorities have arrested at least four people as part of an investigation into fraud in the country's September parliamentary vote.… Candidates claiming they were victims of phony vote tallies have taken to the streets across the country to protest after Wednesday’s announcement of final vote results for 33 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces.…

“Election authorities have invalidated about 1.3 million of the 5.6 million votes cast after receiving more than 5,000 complaints of fraud in the wake of the poll. Of those, 2,500 complaints were classed as ‘serious.’” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/2010112522395634861.html

Pakistan suffers U.S. drones November 16
Twenty people died when a U.S. missile strike destroyed a suspected Taliban training center in Pakistan’s tribal area near the Afghan border.... “More than 220 people have been killed in over 40 strikes since September 3.” As a rule “the U.S. does not confirm drone attacks but [the U.S. military and Central Intelligence Agency operating in Afghanistan are the only forces that deploy the pilotless aircraft in the region.” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/20101116667386262.html

Iraq's ups and downs November 25
Iraq’s president Jalal Talabani asked incumbent Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki to form a new government following the conclusion of a power-sharing deal between the country’s divided factions sealed two weeks ago.… “A day after [the deal] was agreed, about 60 Iraqiya MPs walked out of a session of parliament, protesting that it was not being honored. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/11/20101125174651619450.html

Note: The al-Iraqiya List [official name the Iraqi National Movement (INM)] is an Iraqi political coalition formed to contest the Iraqi parliamentary election 2010 by Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi’s Renewal List, the Iraqi National List led by former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, and the Iraqi National Dialogue Front led by Saleh al-Mutlaq. The party includes both Shia leaders (like Allawi) and Sunni leaders (like al-Mutlaq and al-Hashimi) and claims to be secular and non-sectarian” [Wikipedia].

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

U.S. war, occupation — world reacts

News reported re-reported, compiled, edited by Carolyn Bennett

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting November 5, 2010

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 199]

Wounded 32,900-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: October 18, 2010

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

98,585 – 107,594

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,427 U.S., 4,745 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,364 U.S., 2,190 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

USA’s record on human rights assessed by UN member states —

At a United Nations forum in Geneva on Friday the United States came in for sharp criticism from world nations, allies and not allies.

“United States conduct in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and its campaign against terrorism — notably its treatment of prisoners in the Guantanamo Bay prison and the Abu Ghraib jail near Baghdad — has come under heavy criticism from many human rights organizations in recent years.”

China among dozens of countries urged the U.S. to ratify key international conventions on the rights of women and children.

Cuban ambassador Rodolfo Reyes Rodriguez called on Washington to end its embargo and respect the people of Cuba’s right to self-determination.

European countries said Washington should ban the death penalty.

Indonesia called on Washington to better promote religious tolerance

Iran’s delegation accused the United States of violating human rights through covert CIA operations ‘carried out on the pretext of combating terrorism.’

Mexico urged the U.S. to halt racial profiling and the use of lethal force in controlling migration over their shared border.

Russia urged the U.S. to abolish the death penalty.

Venezuelan envoy German Mundarain Hernandez said the United States should close Guantanamo, secret detention centers around the world; punish people who torture, disappear, and execute detainees arbitrarily; compensate victims.

Several delegations questioned the legality of U.S. use of force in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

The UN Human Rights Council’s first review of the U.S. rights record was part of a gradual four-year examination of the performance of all 192 UN member nations.


The United States/foreign forces’ two-country war deepens and spreads —
AFGHANISTAN/PAKISTAN border

Twelve people (est.) died when U. S. drones attacked northwestern Pakistan.

The first unmanned aircraft fired two missiles at a vehicle in the Qutab Khel area of Miran Shah, the main town in North Waziristan; “five fighters from Uzbekistan” died. Missiles in the second attack allegedly struck a house and a vehicle in Khaso Khel village, near Mir Ali. Four “suspected fighters” died.

Details on the North Waziristan attack on the border with Afghanistan could not be independently confirmed because the area “is too dangerous for outsiders to visit.” Last month there were at least 20 such U.S. missile attacks in Pakistan’s northwestern region.

PAKISTAN

Sixty people (est.) died and dozens suffered wounds yesterday when a 17-year-old suicide bomber struck a Sunni Muslim mosque in northwest Pakistan during prayers.

Later on Friday, a second attack struck a mosque in the town of Badabher, near Peshawar. Three people (est.), among them an imam, died; 20 suffered wounds.

Last month on the outskirts of Peshawar, three people died and 22 suffered wounds when a bomb hit a Sunni mosque during Friday prayers.

In this week’s violence, press accounts said, “There [were] blood and body parts everywhere. Elderly people and children [were] among the dead and wounded.”

War continues, flashes back
IRAQ (Baghdad)

Fifty-seven people (est.) died and 250 suffered wounds Tuesday when 11 coordinated car bombings hit Shiite districts across Baghdad.

One hundred and ninety-four (194) Iraqis died last month (including 53 deaths last Sunday during a hostage drama by Al-Qaeda gunmen at a Baghdad church).

IRAQ Flashback — “U.S. ‘exploited’ Iraq communal strife”

“The revelation by WikiLeaks of a U.S. military order directing U.S. forces not to investigate cases of torture of detainees by Iraqis has been treated in news reports as yet another case of lack of concern by the U.S. military about detainee abuse,” writes investigative historian and journalist Gareth Porter. The deeper significance of the order (missed by the news media) “is that [the order] was part of a larger U.S. strategy of exploiting Shia sectarian hatred against Sunnis to help suppress the Sunni insurgency when Sunnis had rejected the U.S. war.

“General David Petraeus was a key figure in developing the strategy of using Shia and Kurdish forces to suppress Sunnis in 2004-2005.

“... A second stage of the strategy of sectarian war against Sunnis,” Porter says, “came after the new Shia government’s takeover of the Interior Ministry in April 2005. The Shia minister immediately filled the Iraqi police – especially the commando units – with Shia troops from the Badr Corps, the Iranian-trained forces loyal to the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. Within days, the Badr Corps, along with the Wolf Brigade, began a campaign of mass arrests, torture and assassination of Sunnis in Baghdad and elsewhere that was widely reported by news agencies.

“… The U.S.-sponsored Shia assault on the Sunnis gave al-Qaeda a new opportunity.

“In mid-2005, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, announced the creation of a special unit, the Omar Brigade, to combat the Shia commando torture and death squads. That led to the massive sectarian bloodletting in Baghdad in 2006, when thousands of civilians were dying every month.”

ENDLESS
Consequences of war
Iraq Veterans against the War responds —

“We grieve for the Iraqi and Afghan lives that were lost and destroyed in these wars. We also grieve for our brothers and sisters in arms, who have been lost to battle or suicide.…

“As veterans, we know that the violence documented in the Iraq War Logs traumatizes the people living under occupation. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan also have been marked by staggering rates of military trauma and suicide among the troops tasked with carrying out these orders.

“Last year, 239 soldiers killed themselves and 1,713 soldiers survived suicide attempts; 146 soldiers died from high-risk activities, including 74 drug overdoses.

“A third of returning troops report mental health problems, and 18.5 percent of all returning service members are battling either Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder or depression, according to a study by the Rand Corporation.

“Our Operation Recovery campaign, launched on October 7, seeks to end the cruel and inhumane practice of redeploying troops suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Military Sexual Trauma, Traumatic Brain Injury, and other mental and physical wounds--a practice that underlies the continued occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

“…The Iraq War Logs bring home part of the harsh reality of these wars, a reality that we as veterans live with everyday.

“We demand a real end to both wars — including the immediate withdrawal of 50,000 ‘non-combat’ troops remaining in the Iraq.

“The Iraq War Logs underscore the urgent need for peace, healing, and reparations for all who have been harmed by these wars. The first step is to bring our brothers and sisters home.”

Sources and notes


“U.S. defends human rights record at UN” (Reuters, Stephanie Nebehay), November 5, 2010,
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20101105/twl-oukwd-uk-usa-rights-d4a870c.html


“U.S. defends human rights record before UN body, — GENEVA – The U.S. stood accused Friday of human rights violations ranging from racial discrimination to prison overcrowding and abuses by its troops, … friends and foes lined up to chide Washington in a UN forum of which the U.S. has pledged to be an equal member, rather than shun, as the past administration,” November 5, 2010, http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101105/ap_on_re_eu/un_un_us_human_rights_4


“U.S. drone attacks strike Pakistan — Attacks by US drones kill at least 12 suspected fighters in the country's northwestern tribal region,” November 3, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/20101131439262731.html


“Pakistani Taliban blamed for suicide bombing that has killed at least 60 people in first of two attacks in northwest,” November 5, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/201011594145750575.html


“57 killed by Baghdad car bombs,” November 3, 2010, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20101103/twl-iraq-unrest-attacks-toll-575b600.html


“Thirty killed in car bombings in Shiite districts in Baghdad,” November 3, 2010, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20101103/twl-iraq-unrest-baghdad-575b600.html


“U.S. ‘exploited’ Iraq communal strife — U.S. military deliberately sent Shia and Kurdish commandoes into Sunni areas for torture, Wikileaks documents show” (Gareth Porter), November 5, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2010/11/2010115112630560418.html
Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing in U.S. national security policy.


Iraq Veterans against the War, http://www.ivaw.org/blog/ivaw-statement-iraq-war-logs-call-accountability


Iraq Veterans against the War publishes its mission as “[mobilizing] the military community to withdraw its support for the war and occupation in Iraq. Iraq Veterans against the war emphasizes; specific goals:

Immediate Withdrawal of all occupying forces in Iraq
Reparations for the human and structural damages suffered in Iraq so that the peoples there might regain their right to self-determination
Full Benefits, adequate healthcare (including mental health), and other supports for returning service members
Iraq Veterans against the War has also passed resolutions opposing the war in Afghanistan, in support of non-violence , and opposing the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy, http://www.ivaw.org/about  

Operation Recovery fights “to stop the deployment of traumatized troops and by doing so end the occupations. The Operation Recovery Campaign is in the popular research and base building phase in which the group is “doing consolidated outreach to GIs and Veterans, submitting Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, surveying GIs and Veterans about the issue, and compiling the facts to build our case.”


Veterans Day week, November 8-15, the Campaign Team will focus on supporting outreach efforts at strategic locations and Operation Recovery Teach-ins about “deploying traumatized troops” and the “campaign to end the egregious practice, and end the occupations.”
http://www.ivaw.org/blog/veterans-day-week-outreach-nov-8th-15th



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Bennett's books available at New York independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY] Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY] Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY] Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530] The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]

Never violate “rights” for “democracy”—Broadbent

No nation knows it all
Excerpt, editing, compilation, notes by Carolyn Bennett

“[English philosopher Michael] Oakeshott warned of the folly of attempting to impose our institutions and values on other people. ‘Only they can truly understand themselves, their traditions and institutions and find appropriate answers to their political problems.” Canadian Ed Broadbent was writing in 2008.

“‘No nation has all the answers.

“‘Nations can and do learn from another’s mistakes and successes but in the end each nation must make its own decisions and innovations in the context of its own traditions, institutions, and particular circumstances.’

“This emphasis on respect for the traditions and values of each particular society raises hard questions about where and how to draw the line between respect for cultural differences and a belief in certain universal human rights.

“Most of the world now believes young girls should have the same opportunities as young boys. Unfortunately, many remain who do not share this belief in equality. There is no easy answer to this but we can certainly adopt a basic rule of thumb in practice.

“The International Bill of Human Rights must be the global standard. However, when it comes to the details of implementation in any given country, it is up to the human rights activists within that country to take the lead …. They know best their own culture and circumstances.

“… We should not be passive. We should promote the global development of democracy and rights …but also we must show modesty and tolerance: Tolerance to accept that there is more than one legitimate road to democracy; Modesty in understanding that our particular institutions may not be best for others. Modesty in understanding that, in the real world, the best plans can have disastrous consequences.

“We must never in the name of democracy, violate fundamental rights in order to achieve our goal of democracy.”

Sources and notes
“Global Democratic Development: What should and should not be done — how can we best encourage the growth of genuinely democratic governments in countries where it is now absent… ‘No Nation Has All the Answers’” (Ed Broadbent), Peace Magazine, April-June 2008, http://www.peacemagazine.org/archive/v24n2p12.htm
John Edward ‘Ed’ Broadbent (PC, CC, Ph D, LL.D; born March 21, 1936, Oshawa, Ontario), is a Canadian social democratic politician and political scientist; 1975-1989 leader of the federal New Democratic Party (NDP). In the 2004 federal election, he returned to Parliament for one additional term as the Member of Parliament for Ottawa Centre. Briefly, in the 1980s, he was “the most popular politician in Canada, scoring higher in public opinion polls than then Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Broadbent stepped down as leader of the federal New Democratic Party in 1989 after what he called a disappointing election result. The party had just won the most seats in its history, but Broadbent wanted more.” NDP leader Jack Layton “coaxed Broadbent back into politics and [he] ran for and won a seat in Ottawa Centre in 2004. He quit politics in 2005 because of his wife's illness.” CBC News, INDEPTH: ED BROADBENT, Timeline
CBC News Online May 4, 2005, http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/broadbent/
Also at Wikipedia and Rights and Democracy
English philosopher Michael Joseph Oakeshott (December 11, 1901 – December 19, 1990) wrote about political thought and the philosophy of history, religion, aesthetics and law. He is widely regarded as one of the most important conservative intellectuals of the twentieth century as well a liberal thinker [Wikipedia].

Nevertheless Occupation continues

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting

August 9, 2010 (accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 186]

Wounded 31,902-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides [estimated] 18 a day

Latest update on this site July 23

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count figures

97,196 – 106,071

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties IRAQ: 4,414 U.S., 4,732 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,226 U.S., 2,002 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

August 14, 2010
Pakistan
Today is Independence Day in Pakistan:
63 years of independence from British colonial rule

Six people died and three suffered injuries today in Quetta when armed men opened fire. The victims were reportedly “painting a home that was stormed by the assailants.” Last night ten people died when armed men attacked a bus in Aab-e-Gum in the southwest of the Pakistan, 75 kilometers from the border city of Quetta. Quetta is the capital of Baluchistan province, close to the border with Afghanistan.

Pakistan “is currently suffering its worst ever flooding since becoming a state.”

Pakistan’s slow-motion disaster: millions suffering, thirty-seven bridges out, water contaminated

Sixteen hundred (1,600) people have died since July 29 in the flooding in Pakistan and “the UN fears the final death toll could be far higher.” Millions of acres of crops are under water. Fourteen to 20 million people are suffering ─ “7 million cases of diarrhea of which 300,000 can be cholera.”

The United Nations and International Committee of the Red Cross are warning of at least six million people already without clean drinking water.

August 12, 2010
Afghanistan
“‘Death to the United States’” hundreds of villagers shouted, as they blocked a main road in eastern Afghanistan after a NATO raid Wednesday night killed three people. Zarin Khil village Elders (Wardak province) said U.S. troops stormed into a family house and shot dead three brothers before taking their father into custody; [and] for several hours, an estimated 300 protesters blocked the highway linking Kabul and southern Afghanistan.

The United Nations reported this week that the number of civilian casualties was up one-third in the first half of 2010, with fighters killing seven times more civilians than NATO-led troops; however, 386 civilians died at the hand of NATO or Afghan government forces, including 41 during search-and-seizure operations such as night raids.

Civilian casualties have been a sensitive issue in Afghanistan where 150,000 (est.) foreign troops’ military campaign approaches nine years.

August 10, 2010
Iraq
Four people died and 21 people suffered wounds Tuesday in Baghdad when a series of improvised explosive devices detonated. Two other explosions in the Iraqi capital involved bombs attached to vehicles.

August 11, 2010
Ramadan
Across the world, more than one billion Muslims begin observance of Ramadan. For 30 days, adherents to Islam practice abstinences in observance of their holiest month of days.

Invasion, occupation sources and notes
“Deadly attack on Pakistan bus,” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/08/20108148414139876.html
“Pakistan floods stoke cholera fears,” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/08/201081442342515262.htm
“Civilian deaths spark Afghan unrest,” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/08/201081214759771683.html
“Deadly blast hits Baghdad,” news/middleeast/2010/08/2010810123223488123.html
“Muslims begin Ramadan observance,” http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/08/2010811122934556812.html

War’s endless consequences ─ suicide, mercenaries, rights abuse

Re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett
“Totally lost”

“The best way to support our troops is to BRING THEM HOME NOW and to take good care of them when they get here.” [Gold Star Families Speak Out]

“I remember sitting there [thinking], ‘Who is this person? This isn’t my son.’ I didn’t understand what he was saying. It seemed like it was my son’s body but the person was no longer my child. He was totally changed … he was lost. He was in his own world of everything going through his head, not really looking at me, just staring out and reliving things … saying things in fragments, so that you never really got the whole story; but you knew whatever he had gone through was horrific to him.” [Soldier’s mother Joyce Lucey]

“I found the dog tags Jeff had worn from the moment he had come home, no doubt beforehand. He took them off only two times: on December 24, 2003, when his younger sister went in to check on him and, with tears in his eyes, he had tossed the dog tags at her and said he was nothing more than a murderer; and when I found them resting on his bed the day he hanged himself, June 22.”

[Soldier Jeffrey Lucey] had identified the dog tags as belonging to “two men that he had killed, two unarmed Iraqi soldiers.”  Though the military has never verified the story, “we believe it in our hearts. We know that it is the truth.”  [Soldier’s father Kevin Lucey]

Joyce and Kevin Lucey appeared today on the Democracy Now program.

Jeffrey Lucey turned 22 the day before the U.S. began its full bore assault on the people of Iraq. His unit was activated and he was part of the first wave of troops to head into the combat zone, according to an entry on the Gold Star Families Speak Out website. By the time he came home, Jeffrey Lucey was a mess. He told gruesome stories and though all could not be verified, there was no doubt that this once healthy young man had been shattered by his experiences. He had nightmares. He drank furiously. He withdrew from his friends. He wrecked his parents’ car. He began to hallucinate. On the afternoon of June 22, 2004, surrounded by photographs of his platoon, his sisters, his parents, the family dog, and himself (the dog tags nearby), 23-year-old Jeffrey Lucey ended his life.

Suicide with another root

During the first six months of this year, 65 members of the Guard and Reserve took their lives compared with 42 in the same period last year. Thirty-two soldiers among them 11 Guard and Reservists killed themselves this past June. Seven of the suicides took place in Iraq or Afghanistan.

A few days ago U.S. president Barack Obama said in a speech before an audience of veterans that the U.S. ‘combat mission’ in Iraq is ending but with 50,000 soldiers remaining purportedly “supporting and training Iraqi forces, partnering with Iraqis in counterterrorism missions, and protecting our civilian and military efforts,” this seems doubtful. An occupying soldier is a combatant and Iraqis know it. Some believe “they never will see the end of America’s military presence in their country.”

The American justice and political activist Dahlia Wasfi (Wilmington, Delaware) told Press TV today that the al-Qaeda the U.S. is leaving force against whom to defend the U.S. embassy, the “al-Qaeda in Iraq,” was not in Iraq until we showed up. “If you have to use the most powerful military in the world to defend an embassy, then that might be an indication that people living there [the Iraqi people] do not want us there.” The cycle of violence and occupation will not end, only the faces will change. Private contractors and mercenaries [unregulated soldiers] will replace redeployed official U.S. troops and continue raking in millions upon millions of U.S. tax payer dollars to subjugate the Iraqi people.

Wasfi asked, “Who am I as an American to condemn any other country for exporting terror, when my country has over 700 bases in more than 120 countries around the world, and their objective there is to control and subjugate.

“The greatest threat to global security, if you ask people around the world, they tell you they are the United States and Israel. That is why I advocate for the immediate unconditional withdrawal of forces and mercenaries from Iraq and Afghanistan. I advocate cutting military aid to Israel in compliance with our domestic and international law.”

Government’s Mercenaries: impunity, human rights be damned

Despite or because of the United States’ wide use of unchecked “soldiers,” the world at large is concerned. A five-year- old UN working group on the use of mercenaries will brief permanent missions at the UN, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and academics on a proposal resulting from its monitoring activities of mercenaries and private military and security companies (PMSC), their impact on human rights, and such activities’ lack of accountability. The independent experts reportedly are “calling for more stringent regulations, oversight and monitoring of mercenaries and PMSC at both national and international levels.”

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting

August 6, 2010 (accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 185]

Wounded 31,888-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides [estimated] 18 a day

Latest update on this site July 23

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count figures

97,172 – 106,047

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties IRAQ: 4,515 U.S., 4,733 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,216 U.S., 1,984 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Sources and notes
“With Military Suicides on the Rise, Parents of Two Soldiers Who Took Their Own Lives Say Obama’s Words Ring Hollow,” August 6, 2010, http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/6/with_military_suicides_on_the_rise
Gold Star Families Speak Out, a chapter of Military Families Speak Out, is comprised of members whose loved ones served in the military during the period including the build-up to the war in Iraq (fall, 2002) to the present, and have been killed or have died. The group believes “the best way to support our troops is to BRING THEM HOME NOW and to take good care of them when they get here.” http://www.gsfso.org/FailedbytheVA.html; http://www.gsfso.org/
“Army Suicides Reach One a Day; Epidemic Spreads to National Guard and Reserves,” July 29, 2010,
http://www.allgov.com/Controversies/ViewNews/Army_Suicides_Reach_One_a_Day_Epidemic_Spreads_to_National_Guard_and_Reserves_100729;
“Obama Keeps Combat Troops in Iraq…and They will Still Engage in Combat,” August 5, 2010,
http://www.allgov.com/Top_Stories/ViewNews/Obama_Keeps_Combat_Troops_in_Iraq_and_They_will_Still_Engage_in_Combat_100805
“‘U.S. greatest threat to global security,’” August 5, 2010, http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=137557
“UN experts on mercenaries seek stronger regulation of private security companies, Mercenary soldiers,” July 26, 2010, http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=35421&Cr=human+rights&Cr1=

Lasting consequences

There is no escaping the protracted fallout of invasion and occupation. There is no cure apart from stopping invasion, ending occupation.
Re-reporting, editing, brief comment by Carolyn Bennett

DOMESTIC DESERTION

9-11, 9-11! Call to war abandons U.S. victims
House Rejects Bill to Help Sick Ground Zero Workers
Soldier suicides ignored

The U.S. government has approved and sealed legislation hemorrhaging more deficit spending including $37 billion [pushing past a $ trillion] for wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. However, the U.S. House of Representatives “failed to pass a $7.4 billion bill to provide free healthcare and compensation payments to U.S. rescue and cleanup workers who were exposed to dangerous toxic chemicals at the World Trade Center site following the 9/11 attacks.”

Soldier suicide has risen above the rate among civilians since the Vietnam War. Between October 1, 2008 and September 30, 2009, 160 active-duty Army personnel committed suicide. A third of soldiers take at least one prescription drug. Fourteen percent of them take powerful painkillers. The U.S. Army report citing the figures “faulted commanders for ignoring rising mental health, drug and crime issues among soldiers.”

INVASION, OCCUPATION
THEFT, DISRUPTION
DISEASE, DEATH
RESISTANCE, RETALIATION

Afghanistan

As the month ends, July goes on record as the deadliest (63 troop deaths) for the U. S.’s nearly nine-year invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. The missing bodies of Navy sailor Jarod Newlove (Renton, Washington) and sailor Justin McNeley (Wheat Ridge, Colorado) were found earlier in the week.

KABUL: A NATO vehicle crash into a civilian car killing occupants of that car has led today to rioting outside the U.S. embassy in Kabul. Witnesses reported four passengers died when one of two military vehicles moving in convoy hit the civilian car. In 2006, a similar traffic incident led to massive riots that shook the capital and left at least 14 people dead. Young Afghan men responded by throwing stones and shouting ‘death to foreigners’ and “‘death to [Afghan president Hamid] Karzai.’”

Iraq

Billions of U.S. deficit dollars pumped into Iraq’s reconstruction have failed to rebuild the country’s ravaged infrastructure. “Money was just spent,” British journalist Patrick Cockburn said today on Democracy Now. “Nobody quite knew where it went. This was happening well after we knew that fraud had been occurring everywhere... Up to quite recently, there seems to have been a free-for-all with Iraqi funds.…”

Moreover, Iraq’s children are sick and dying as Japan’s children suffered and died in the fallout of World War II. “A new medical study has found dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukemia among people in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, a city bombarded by U.S. Marines in 2004.

Infant mortality is more than four times higher than in neighboring Jordan, eight times higher than in Kuwait. Cancer rates exceed those reported by survivors of the U.S. atomic bombs dropped in 1945 on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Iraqi cases are “‘similar to the Hiroshima survivors who were exposed to ionizing radiation from the bomb and uranium in the fallout.”

FALLUJAH west: One soldier died and five people suffered wounds when a bomb exploded on a parked motorcycle near an army checkpoint.

MOSUL north: One police officer died and another two suffered wounds near the convoy of a police chief

BAGHDAD north: Sixteen people died (among them nine security personnel) and 14 suffered wounds Thursday when several bombs hit Baghdad’s Sunni district of Al-Adhamiyah. Three soldiers died and 12 suffered wounds Thursday when a car bomb exploded near an army base in Al-Sharqat, north of Baghdad in Salaheddin province. On different routes to the scene of the attacks, 13 people died among them three soldiers and three police officers. Among the wounded were seven police officers and two civil members of civil defense.

Sources and links
Democracy Now headlines July 30, 2010, http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/30/headlines
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/29/patrick_cockburn_on_missing_billions_in
“Afghans riot in Kabul after deadly NATO crash Module body,” July 30, 2010,
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/100730/world/afghanistan_unrest_accident_riot_1
“16 dead, 14 wounded in Baghdad attacks,” AFP July 30, 2010, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100730/twl-iraq-unrest-575b600.html

U.S. ‘mangoes’ diplomacy, Iran wants freedom from big-power domination

Re-reporting, compilation, editing, minor comment by Carolyn Bennett

PAKISTAN
U.S. secretary of State Hillary Clinton today in Pakistan promised [mango trade] “massive aid” for that country and proposed building relations with this “wavering anti-terror ally.” The U.S. plan delivered by Clinton reportedly includes water dam projects in the areas of Gomal Zam, Satpara and Baluchistan; renovation of three hospitals in Karachi, Lahore and Jacobabad; and programs devoted to agriculture, training of farmers in dairy production and increasing production and export of mangoes.

Meanwhile, seriously, in
GENEVA
Former Iranian chief disarmament negotiator now speaker of Iran’s parliament said today “The current prevailing structure of power has not only been unable to secure international peace and security, but has also led to the emergence of such new phenomena as terrorism in a very dangerous and organized framework. No doubt this inability is due to the double standards and unilateral policies exercised by the big powers, including the USA,” Ali Larijani said. He was speaking to an audience that included U.N. secretary-general Ban Ki-moon.

The U.N. Security Council [China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States] imposed new sanctions on Iran in June over its nuclear program. Russia and China supported U.S. proposals aimed at putting increased pressure on Tehran. Western powers believe Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons. Iran says its program is only for peaceful purposes.

IRAQ
Mosul
Four foreigners died and five Iraqi civilians suffered wounds when a suicide bomb exploded into an armored vehicle and a British security company’s convoy in northern Iraq on Monday. Everyone inside the vehicle died.

AFGHANISTAN
Kabul
Six Afghan police officers and two U.S. troops died and four others suffered wounds today when roadside bombs exploded in southern Afghanistan. The troops were traveling south by vehicle to Kandahar.

June was the deadliest month for U.S. and international forces. One hundred and three military personnel have died including 60 Americans. This month so far in Afghanistan 57 NATO troops have died including today’s deaths among them 42 from the United States.

Sources - Wire reports
“Attack on British security firm in Iraq kills 4,” July 19, 2010,
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100719/twl-oukwd-uk-iraq-violence-britons-13abf6c.html
“Road bombs kill 6 Afghan policemen, 2 US troops,” July 19, 2010,
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/ap/20100719/twl-as-afghanistan-2nd-ld-writethru-38359fb.html
“U.S. to announce aid package to Pakistan,” July 18, 2010, http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20100718/twl-us-to-announce-aid-package-to-pakist-2802f3e.html; http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20100718/twl-us-to-announce-aid-package-to-pakist-2802f3e.html
“Iran calls for world body free of big power control,” July 19, 2010, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100719/twl-oukwd-uk-iran-larijani-13abf6c.html
“U.S. announces new Pakistan aid,” July 19, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/07/2010719449787390.html

The United Nations Security Council is composed of five permanent members: China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The current ten non-permanent members (with year of terms’ end) are: Austria (2010), Japan (2010), Turkey (2010), Bosnia and Herzegovina (2011), Lebanon (2011),  Uganda (2010), Brazil (2011),  Mexico (2010), Gabon (2011),  Nigeria (2011) [http://www.un.org/sc/members.asp].

Old Soldiers, old wounds, endless-war dead

Re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett

PERSISTENT FOREIGN PRESENCE IN
AFGHANISTAN
Anti-war activists in a congressional hearing hall wave signs saying ‘No More War,’ ‘New General, Old Graveyard.’

U.S. and NATO casualties are soaring and undercutting U.S. and Europe’s public support for eight years of an overt war against Afghanistan. U.S. allies Canada, the Netherlands and Poland have announced plans to withdraw combat forces.

Entrenched General David Petraeus takes over U.S. forces in Afghanistan and in congressional hearings [echoing U.S.-led Iraq invasion-occupation-speak] engages in doublespeak. “Any drawdown would be based on security conditions on the ground, gradual and limited to the 30,000 ‘surge’ troops… It is going to be a number of years before Afghan forces can truly handle the security tasks in Afghanistan on their own.” By the way, the U.S. House of Representatives is headed toward a vote “within 72 hours on [another] $33 billion emergency war funding” bill.

June 30 update Afghanistan
A suicide bomber detonated an explosive in a vehicle at the gate of a NATO base occupying Afghanistan. Other fighters armed with AK47s and rocket-propelled grenades stormed the airport.

The Taliban said the attack was a message to the head of U.S. Central Command, David Petraeus, put forward by the U.S. president to takeover leadership of NATO and U.S. operations in Afghanistan that they can strike at will. The Taliban attack was in Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan.

“Violence in Afghanistan is reported to be “at an all time high,” this month being “the deadliest month for international forces ... since the war began nine years ago.” [“Taliban attacks NATO base,” June 30, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/201063053238108506.html]

JULY 1 UPDATE AFPAK
Eighteen people (est.) died today and more than 70 suffered wounds when suicide bombs exploded in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore. Doctors said Lahore’s main hospital has declared a state of emergency and they expect the death toll to rise. Lahore has experienced a string of attacks against minority communities in recent months. In May of this year, more than 80 people died when twin attacks hit mosques of the Ahmadi minority sect.

IRAQ
Twelve people died and 18 suffered wounds Tuesday when bombs went off in the town of Baiji in northern Iraq and in the capital city, Baghdad. Recent attacks have targeted Iraq’s economic institutions.

SAUDI ON
PALESTINE
Saudi Arabia’s 86-year-old King Abdullah is scheduled to meet today with the U.S. president at the White House. The discussion is expected to cover Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking, the nuclear standoff with Iran, the U.S. policy in Afghanistan, mutual national security efforts, and economic co-operation. Next week President Obama is due to meet Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.… “The Saudis have linked achieving a Palestinian-Israeli peace deal to alleviating other regional tensions, including the perceived threat from Iran.”

IRAN, TURKEY, ISRAEL
Despite concerns and objections of UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, “Israeli municipal authorities moved ahead with plans to demolish 20 Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem” and establish more Israeli settlements in the area. The secretary general said again that the planned moves were “contrary to international law and against the wishes of Palestinian residents.”

“Israeli commandos shot at activists on the Mavi Marmara [part of the six-ship ‘Freedom Flotilla’] from their helicopters.” The Association of Human Rights and Solidarity for Oppressed Peoples (MAZLUM-DER) stated during a press conference on Monday referencing autopsy reports.

Stepping back into international negotiations despite the new wave of sanctions imposed on Tehran over its nuclear work, Iran said today it will soon resume nuclear talks with Turkey and Brazil but under certain conditions and not before the end of August.

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has postponed talks between the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany over his country’s nuclear program. The Iranian president has called for new negotiating partners, saying that more countries should be involved.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in a television interview on Monday, “Israel has atomic bombs and it refuses to comply [with] the NPT [Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty] but no one is imposing sanctions on it. How do you explain that? [A fair world would] scrutinize Israel as much as one does North Korea.”

Israel [estimated to retain an arsenal of 100-200 nuclear warheads, often threatening attack on the Islamic republic] recently has refused U.S. and international calls to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and to open its facilities for IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] perusal. Iran has vowed to meet certain conditions of the nuclear swap deal crafted by Turkey and Brazil, Erdogan said, and in signing the Tehran agreement Iran promised “to enrich uranium only for peaceful purposes … If Tehran fails to comply with the ten articles of the agreement, we will impose sanctions ourselves.” As it stands, Erdogan concluded, “Iran was being punished over a mere possibility that it could make nuclear weapons in the future.”

HOW MANY (estimated) two-theater U.S.-led WAR DEAD?
Casualty sites reporting

June 29, 2010 (accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 181]

Wounded 31,865-100,000;

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000;

Suicides 18 a day

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count figures:

96,813 – 105,563,

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties IRAQ: 4,408 U.S., 4,726 Coalition;

AFGHANISTAN: 1,144 U.S., 1,889 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Sources
“Top U.S. general plays down Afghan expectations,” June 30, 2010,
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100630/twl-oukwd-uk-afghanistan-usa-d4a870c.html
“Twelve die in Iraq unrest, suicide bombing ,” June 30, 2010, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100629/twl-iraq-unrest-575b600.html
“Saudis urge U.S. on Middle East peace,” June 29, 2010,
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/06/201062951518293452.html
“UN blasts razing of Jerusalem homes,” June 24, 2010,
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/201062411715429597.html
“Turkish autopsy: Israeli soldiers shot activists from choppers,” World Bulletin June 29, 2010, http://www.worldbulletin.net/news_detail.php?id=60670
“Iran postpones nuclear talks,” June 28, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/2010628124311454616.html
“Turkey slams ‘blindness’ on Israel atomic bombs (charges international concerted action with ‘blindness’ on Israel’s nuclear arsenal over Iran’s nuclear program),” World Bulletin June 29, 2010, http://www.worldbulletin.net/news_detail.php?id=60654
“Iran to resume nuclear talks with Turkey, Brazil before powers,” World Bulletin June 29, 2010, http://www.worldbulletin.net/news_detail.php?id=60669

Week’s geopolitics: looming U.S. Asia conflict

June 13 update ─ The report on Pakistani intelligence (below) leaves no other conclusion than that the United States government ─ while claiming to fight “an enemy” and killing and traumatizing thousands of Afghanis, Pakistanis, Americans and sundry foreign nationals ─ is simultaneously funding (with debt and taxes) the very group it insists is a mad “extremist” bent on destroying “the West’s way of life.”
Compiled and edited with comment by Carolyn Bennett

Without constantly factoring in these engagements, theaters, and proxies, which critically affect social, educational, governmental, structural policy and action in every sense ─ often looming silenced in a room ─ any talk about U.S. foreign or domestic conditions and relations is nothing more than empty rhetoric.

MIDDLE EAST

Israel’s “Double game”
“When dealing with world superpowers, Israel has long played a double game whenever its relationship with the U.S. permitted it. In the 1990s, Israel tried to help China out of its global isolation following the Tiananmen massacre. It even tried to lobby Washington for Chinese interests. The Israelis have long boasted of lobbying the U.S., the White House, Congress and media in favor of countries of little importance to the United States; countries with poor human rights records; or merely need U.S. support.… Eventually many tapped Israel and its U.S. lobby for help in return of better relations with a country long considered an international pariah.…One wonders if boasting that its lobby has major influence in Washington doesn't indirectly fuel anti-Semitic claims of Jewish influence and control.…

“The Netanyahu government’s aggressive policies and settlement expansion in occupied Palestinian lands following his predecessor’s war on Lebanon and Gaza is driving Israel further to isolation. The only regional issue that has kept Israel in the loop is the Iranian nuclear issue.…” [“Israel shakes down China,” (Marwan Bishara in Imperium on June 10th, 2010), http://blogs.aljazeera.net/Israel shakes down China Al Jazeera Blogs].

Palestine
A Palestinian died Friday when Israelis opened fire in occupied East Jerusalem. “Palestinian witnesses said the man was standing on the side of the road when Israeli police officers started firing indiscriminately, killing him and seriously injuring a young woman.” Israelis said the man had attempted to ram his car into two Israeli police officers. It remained unclear whether the incident was an accident or a deliberate attack. Israeli security forces were deployed across East Jerusalem in large numbers in anticipation of possible unrest. Israeli police had announced a policy of limited-access for under-40-year-old Palestinian men travelling from East Jerusalem to the al-Aqsa Mosque for Friday prayers. Tensions between Israelis and Arabs in East Jerusalem remained high [“Israeli police kill Palestinian man,” June 11, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/201061116939579309.html].

Iraq blowback
June 8
Video footage from a helicopter cockpit shows a deadly aerial strike carried out in 2007 in the Iraqi capital. Twelve civilians died in the attack among them two Reuters’ journalists.

Twenty-two-year-old U.S. Army Specialist Bradley Manning deployed at a base near Baghdad last year allegedly leaked the classified combat video to a whistleblower website Wikileaks. Manning was arrested last month after he reportedly bragged online about leaking the video and U.S. diplomatic cables. The U.S. military is reported to have issued a statement saying the soldier currently in Kuwait is in “‘pre-trial confinement for allegedly releasing classified information’” [“U.S. solider arrested over Iraq video,” June 8, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/20106815818808270.html].

Yemen
June 7
Fifty-five people among them 14 women and 21 children died in this attack. Amnesty International released photographs on Monday apparently showing parts of a U.S. cruise missile and cluster munitions gathered from the site of the military strike last December in the village of al Ma'jalah in southern Yemen.

After the rights group published what is said to be new evidence of U.S. involvement in the strike, the United States faces fresh questions concerning its role in the 2009 attack on an alleged al-Qaeda camp in Yemen. Fourteen alleged al-Qaeda members also died.

“The Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Program said, ‘A military strike of this kind against alleged militants, without an attempt to detain them is, at the very least, unlawful.… The fact that so many of the victims were actually women and children indicates that the attack was in fact grossly irresponsible, particularly given the likely use of cluster munitions’” [“‘U.S. missile’ used in Yemen strike,” June 7, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/20106653442608341.html].

Yemen
June 12
Tribal fighters in eastern Yemen today blew up an oil pipeline in retaliation for an army raid on the home of one of their leaders accused of harboring al-Qaeda operatives. “The sabotage targeted a section of the pipeline that runs about six kilometres east of Maarib, capital of the province of the same name” [“Oil pipeline blown up in Yemen,” June 12, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/06/20106126547917129.html].

SOUTHWEST ASIA
AF/PAK

Afghanistan
June 9
Four foreign soldiers died Wednesday in Afghanistan when their helicopter was shot down in the south of the country.

U.S. and British forces stationed in southern Afghanistan are planning major operations in the Kandahar area where the U.S. president has said 30,000 more U.S. troops will be deployed. Following the plane hijacking of September 11, 2001, the U.S. government accused Taliban of harboring al-Qaeda in the area and invaded Afghanistan [“NATO troops killed in Afghanistan,” June 9, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/20106911642572476.html].

Afghanistan
June 10
More than 40 people in a wedding party in Kandahar died on Wednesday. Dozens suffered wounds. Afghan president Hamid Karzai called the incident ‘a crime of massive inhuman proportions.’

Rising deaths among foreigners (nearly 300 British soldiers have died in Afghanistan since 2001) and rising costs straining already stretched public finances “are eroding the UK's public support for the war” [“Karzai condemns Kandahar bombing,” June 10, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/201061010921894475.html].

Afghanistan
June 11
Eleven civilians (among them women and children) and two U.S. soldiers died Friday in violence across southern Afghanistan. Taliban fighters have increased attacks ahead of the planned U.S.-NATO operation. Nine of the civilian deaths occurred when a roadside bomb struck a minibus in the city of Kandahar. The other two civilians died in Zabul, a province neighboring Kandahar, when a suicide bomber detonated explosives in a shopping area of Shahjoy district. Sixteen people suffered wounds [“Many killed in Afghan blasts,” June 11, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/201061174818697945.html].

Pakistan
June 11
Fifteen people have died in two U.S. drone attacks launched “against alleged Taliban strongholds.” Carried out 12 hours apart, these attacks hit “west and east of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan, a tribal region near the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.” U.S. policy prohibits confirming drone attacks but “the U.S. army and Central Intelligence Agency are the only forces in the region with access to pilotless drones.”

More than 900 people among them many civilians have died “in nearly 100 drone raids on Pakistan since August 2008 and there have been at least 35 suspected drone attacks so far this year. This is a large increase over previous periods.”

Commenting on these drone killings the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions issued a report this month questioning the legality of CIA-directed drone attacks and calling them ‘license to kill without accountability.’ Moreover, critics have called these attacks “extra-judicial killings that create a ‘video-game warfare’ mentality … where civilian lives are not seriously valued” [“Deaths in Pakistan drone attacks,” June 11, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/201061113424264165.html].

EASTERN EUROPE/WESTERN ASIA

U.S.-Russia-Afghanistan Connection
NATO is said to have begun moving military supplies to Afghanistan through Russia after its convoys moving through Pakistan faced deadly attacks from the local Taliban. … Cargo had previously been shipped to the Pakistani port of Karachi and then transported into Afghanistan. The Alliance “cannot ship supplies through Iran’s southeastern port of Chahar Bahar due to the political dispute over Iran’s nuclear program [and] the Chinese route through the Wakhan Corridor is impractical “because the dirt road is blocked by snow for much of the year” [“NATO route opens through Russia,” June 12, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/06/2010611204927850979.html].

EAST ASIA

Koreas
Following the sinking of a South Korean warship in March, South Korea has put up loudspeakers in 11 locations along the tense border in order to resume anti-Pyongyang broadcasts, suspended since 2004. The North Koreans are calling the move ‘a direct declaration of a war’, a ‘flagrant violation’ of the inter-Korean declaration for peace and reconciliation signed in 2000. North and South Korea technically have remained at war since the end of the 1950-53 conflict and each side has waged cross-border propaganda campaigns during and since the end of the Cold War [“S Korea warned over loudspeakers,” June 12, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2010/06/20106124113542531.html].

Notes and more sources
“Yemen, an international quagmire,” Inside Story, January 5, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/insidestory/2010/01/20101562037795156.html
“Threats from al-Qaeda frightened the U.S. and the UK into indefinite closure of their embassies in Yemen. According to the U.S. embassy website, the danger is that the group’s Yemen-based offshoot, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, is growing stronger and planning attacks on Western targets.”
Al Jazerra report May 30, 2010
A UN report released in January of this year revealed that at least 2,412 civilians had died in the Afghan conflict in 2009. The figure represented a 14 per cent increase over the previous year. NATO and Afghan government forces were responsible for 25 per cent of the deaths; and of those, about 60 per cent were due to airstrikes [“U.S. crew faulted in drone deaths,” May 30, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/05/201053034934522302.html].

Casualty sites reporting

June 12, 2010 (accurate totals unknown)
• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 177]

Wounded 31,844-100,000;

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000;

Suicides 18 a day

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count figures:

96,663 – 105,409,

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties IRAQ: 4,405 U.S., 4,723 Coalition;

AFGHANISTAN: 1,114 U.S., 1,823 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

AF/PAK/IRAQ
UPDATE ─ UK
Iraq
June 13
“Baghdad bombings hit central bank,” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/middle_east/10304652.stm
Twelve people died today when bombs went off within a few minutes of each other in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. The attacks come on the eve of the Iraqi parliament’s first day in its new session.

Britain/Afghanistan
June 13
“[UK] Armed forces chief to quit early - Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup is to quit as head of the armed forces in the autumn, before the end of his term in April 2011.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/default.stm
Britain’s most senior military officer Jock Stirrup will cut short his tenure and leave his position in the autumn. As Air Chief Marshal, Jock Stirrup has been chief of the defense staff since 2006. The previous Labour government had asked him to extend his term. The UK Ministry of Defense civil servant Bill Jeffrey will also leave his position.

“British troops joined a U.S.-led coalition that invaded Afghanistan because the Taliban in that country were accused of providing a sanctuary for al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.” Approximately 295 British service personnel have died in Afghanistan since military operations began in 2001.

June 13
Pakistan
“Pakistani agents ‘funding and training Afghan Taliban’ ─ Pakistan's links with the Taliban could go much deeper than thought,” http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/default.stm
“Pakistani intelligence gives funding, training and sanctuary to the Afghan Taliban on a scale much larger than previously thought, a report says. London School of Economics authors of the report suggest that support for the Afghan Taliban was ‘official ISI policy.’

“The ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence] first became involved in funding and training militants in Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion in 1979. Since 2001 the ISI has been a key U.S. ally, receiving billions of dollars in aid in return for helping fight al-Qaeda.”

Wikipedia ref. note: “The Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (also Inter-Services Intelligence or ISI) is the largest intelligence service in Pakistan. It is one of the three main branches of Pakistan’s intelligence agencies.”

The report on Pakistani intelligence leaves no other conclusion than that the United States government ─ while claiming to fight “an enemy” and killing and traumatizing thousands of Afghanis, Pakistanis, Americans and sundry foreign nationals ─ is simultaneously funding (with debt and taxes) the very group it insists is a mad “extremist” bent on destroying “the West’s way of life.”