Forewarned Is Forearmed

BANGKOK - With the number of dead and injured from Sunday's tsunami in Asia still unknown, the world's attention has already shifted to what the UN says may be the biggest relief effort ever undertaken.

The death toll in South and Southeast Asia from an earthquake off Indonesia is nearing 24,000. And Indonesia's vice-president said early Tuesday the number of dead in his country alone may eventually top 25,000.

CBS News

The Diego Garcia naval base is located at "7 degrees south latitude off the off the tip on India," according to the official military website. That particular expanse is known as the British Indian Ocean Territory. That curiously dated designation, an anachronism from the Auld Empire, is entirely apt. Not much has changed. The United States Navy operates Diego Garcia by virtue of a lease from the British. The base represents just one example of the "special relationship" between the two imperial powers and it also symbolizes the persistent attitude of colonial militarism.

According to initial reports the naval base, which consists of a coral atoll and peaks at 22 feet above sea level, emerged unscathed from the horrific disaster. When one considers the materiel that regularly moves in and out of its waters, Diego Garcia is probably some of the most expensive real estate, per acre, in the world. Smack dab in the middle of a highly volatile and strategic expanse, it serves as a staging area for several pieces of the most technologically advanced and lethal arsenal in the history of mankind. It isn't much of a stretch to assume that the personnel stationed at the base were alerted of the approaching threat. Meanwhile, dozens of people are feared dead in the African nation of Somalia, which lies some 3,000 miles west of the quake's epicenter and was struck by the 500-mph waves six hours after the seismic event.

Diego Garcia stages support missions for the occupation of Iraq and God Knows What Else. In February 2003 the AFP reported that the U.S. air force "has built climate controlled shelters in Fairford, England and the British island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to be able put the bombers nearer to Iraq." Climate controlled shelters, mind you. Not the sort of thing you want getting washed into the coral beds by tsunamis.

Dispatches from the areas devestated by this tragedy all stress that no warning system exists that could have prevented the massive loss of life. Even nations who have deployed sensor bouys and other monitoring equipment along their Pacific Rim waters hadn't yet thought to employ the same measures for the Indian Ocean. Nothing was done to mitigate the potential disaster. And the United States, with all its vast resources and technical acumen, is clearly not in the business of protecting anything but its strategic interests. With billions of dollars of equipment at its disposal, the military's response to potential aid is tepid at best:

A Navy official says three P-3 Orion aircraft have been deployed to Thailand. The aircraft are geared for survey work. A spokesman says they don't engage directly in search and rescue operations, but they are an invaluable resource for such missions. Their crews can spot people stranded in the tidal wave area and can even drop life rafts to them.

Navy officials say cargo flights may be initiated later -- to bring in food, water and other supplies. Officials say the State Department is now mulling the possibility of using military transport planes to bring American tourists back home, but no decision has been made yet.

Associated Press

The military is not in the business of mitigating or responding to natural disasters. While the military certainly can and does provide support for relief and recovery efforts, their primary role is killing people. Or liberating people, if you prefer. But the following official Mission Statement for Diego Garcia presents a clear dilemma for anyone who wonders whether we couldn't spare a couple billion dollars, here and there:

One Island

Strategically located in the middle of the Indian Ocean

Operationally invaluable

Environmentally pristine

One Team

US Navy, Air Force, Army, Merchant Seaman, Civilian, Contract employees, and UK military, working in unison to …

Enhance quality of life

Preserve the environment

Ensure mission success

One Mission

Support…

For the strategically essential missions of our deployed units For the readiness of our organic strategic deterrence capabilities. For the needs of our Sailors, soldiers, airmen, Marines, merchant seaman, and civilian contract employees.

US Navy

One island. One team. One mission. Pity, no one has yet formulated the strategic vision that counts every person as an inhabitant of Spaceship Earth. Intelligence agencies receive images of 1-meter resolution from reconnaissance satellites but...

Officials in Thailand and Indonesia conceded that immediate public warnings of gigantic waves could have saved lives. The only known warning issued by Thai authorities reached resort operators when it was too late. The waves hit Sri Lanka and India more than two hours after the quake.

But governments insisted they couldn't have known the true danger because there is no international system in place to track tsunamis in the Indian Ocean, and they could not afford the sophisticated equipment to build one.

Associated Press

Apparently, the trucks, tanks, and planes these same governments have purchased from the USA over the years didn't come equipped with AM radios.

The Army You Have

MOSUL, Iraq (AP) -- It was a brilliant, sunny day with blue skies and warmer than usual weather in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Hundreds of U.S. soldiers had just sat down for lunch in their giant mess hall tent.

It was about noon Tuesday when insurgents hit their tent with a suspected rocket attack.

Soldiers were knocked off their feet and out of their seats. A fireball enveloped the top of the tent, and shrapnel sprayed into the men. Twenty-four people were killed.

Amid the screaming and thick smoke that followed, quick-thinking soldiers turned their lunch tables upside down, placed the wounded on them and gently carried them into the parking lot.

"Medic! Medic!" soldiers shouted.

Medics rushed into the tent and hustled the rest of the wounded out on stretchers.

Scores of troops crammed into concrete bomb shelters outside. Others wobbled around the tent and collapsed.

"I can't hear! I can't hear!" one female soldier cried as a friend hugged her.

Near the front entrance to the chow hall, troops tended a soldier with a gaping head wound. Within minutes, they zipped him into a black body bag. Three more bodies were in the parking lot.

Source

"We were there! We are there! We have a special capacity and a special pedagogical responsibility to stop others from taking the air for granted, because that air is contaminated. It is poisoned by the criminality at the very genetic core of this whole system, that needs Agent Orange and Depleted Uranium to enforce its will on those it would dominate and those who refuse to surrender their own humanity to this criminality.

Who we call statesmen are often as not thieves. Who we call statesmen are often as not vandals. Who we call statesmen are often as not mass murderers, and who better to out them for what they are than those of us who have been held closest to their criminal hearts in their time of need." -- Stan Goff

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A portrait of President Bush using monkeys to form his image that was banished from a New York art show last week amid charges of censorship was projected on a giant billboard in Manhattan on Tuesday.

"Bush Monkeys," a small acrylic on canvas by Chris Savido, created the stir last week at the Chelsea Market public space, leading the market's managers to close down the 60-piece show....

The original picture will be auctioned on eBay, with part of the proceeds donated to parents of U.S. soldiers wishing to supply their sons and daughters with body armor in Iraq.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld came under fire from soldiers in Kuwait earlier this month who complained that they had to use scrap metal to armor their vehicles.

"Many of my friends are over in Iraq," Savido said in a statement.

...This is the ugly reality that National Guard Spc. Thomas Wilson was apparently trying to convey to Donald Rumsfeld in Kuwait last week. There is no front line in Iraq. Or, to be more precise, the front line is wherever the insurgents decide it is. And very often they decide it should be trucks and unarmored Humvees at the back of supply lines—what used to be known, in other wars, as the rear area. Because the insurgents present a 360-degree threat, the most vulnerable units are often the ones the Army pays the least attention to: poorly equipped National Guardsmen or reservists in supply and transport companies. During a Q&A while the Defense secretary was stopping off in Kuwait, Wilson asked Rumsfeld: "Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles?"

Rumsfeld's initial response was testy. "You go to war with the army you have," he barked. Wilson's question, it turned out, had been planted by a reporter embedded with Wilson's 278th Regimental Combat Team, which was about to head into Iraq in a long convoy of unarmored vehicles. But Wilson's brave words brought applause and shouts of approval from the other 2,300 soldiers in the hangar at a base in Kuwait.

Newsweek

Newly Obtained FBI Records Call Defense Department’s Methods "Torture," Express Concerns Over "Cover-Up" That May Leave FBI "Holding the Bag" for Abuses

NEW YORK -- A document released for the first time today by the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that President Bush issued an Executive Order authorizing the use of inhumane interrogation methods against detainees in Iraq. Also released by the ACLU today are a slew of other records including a December 2003 FBI e-mail that characterizes methods used by the Defense Department as "torture" and a June 2004 "Urgent Report" to the Director of the FBI that raises concerns that abuse of detainees is being covered up.

"These documents raise grave questions about where the blame for widespread detainee abuse ultimately rests," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. "Top government officials can no longer hide from public scrutiny by pointing the finger at a few low-ranking soldiers"...

The two-page e-mail that references an Executive Order states that the President directly authorized interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and "sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc." The ACLU is urging the White House to confirm or deny the existence of such an order and immediately to release the order if it exists. The FBI e-mail, which was sent in May 2004 from "On Scene Commander--Baghdad" to a handful of senior FBI officials, notes that the FBI has prohibited its agents from employing the techniques that the President is said to have authorized.

ACLU

"We" are at war with the army we have. However, "we" are not in a war anyone in his or her right mind would want or wish for. Only the most callous and amoral leaders drive young men and women into the teeth of an unjustified conflict where they are asked to live with split second decisions about identifying innocents from insurgents. In Iraq today, Britain's Prime Minister declared that the attack in Mosul was part of a struggle between democracy and terrorism. That's easy for him to say. What about the struggle between occupation and sovreignty?

What is so terrifying about questioning the role of the American government in their actions and position taken in the world? This is what we call the Fifth Estate -- to monitor those whom we have chosen for office and demand that they be held accountable for their actions and also to demand that the media fulfill their true role and choose journalism over reporting. This is true in the abuses at Abu Ghraib, with every death of an Iraqi civilian, and with every death of a member of the armed services. It's time to start seeing the quag for the mire and pursue every instance of hellish, reality-based criminal behavior up to the masterminds. All the way to the top.

When we find the actions of our country despicable, it is our duty to call attention to their deviation from what we hold true and dear. Politicians who hide behind the myth of patriotism, security and fear should be chased from the shadows of their own lie and made to stand accountable for their choices and actions.

Iraq is a mess. It is our duty to demand that those with power stand accountable for their choices in manufacturing a cause for war which now, in the echo of all these lives lost, is finally revealed for the lie that it always was.

Maybe the writing is on the wall for Donald Rumsfeld but marching him out the door is only one small step in examining the deep and systemic problems that plague us. We have to remember who actually owns this frightful machine, grind all the gears, and slam it into reverse.

On Becoming a Realist

Writing a blog is a new and fantastic experience for me. Some weeks the comments posted here are my own. Sometimes they are a collaborative effort with my cohorts Slack and The Safety Wolverine. But the content of the website is always the result of a tacit, almost telepathic understanding, distilled from the alchemy of collaborating on the Radio Sub Rosa programs. Weeks and weeks of work and discussion go into producing the programs, as well as a great deal of much-appreciated input from close friends. For every five minutes of finished audio there's at least an hour of pure discussion and arguement, fleshing out ideas and concepts, dissecting history, and focusing our collective vision. The blog is a bit different but still part of that vision. When I write something and post it I know that we're on the same page, literally and figuratively.

There's a few different themes running through the Radio Sub Rosa programs. One that I'm always harping on is summed up with the following statement from the opening track of Emerald Empire:

Why are spending all this money to build things for the sole purpose of blowing things up when we could be using all this money to build things

The topic has singular relevance to me because my father is a retired thermal dynamics engineer, literally a rocket scientist, who spent his entire career with one foot in aerospace and one foot in the defense industry. I admired the work he did on the massive space shuttle engines and even witnessed a couple of open air tests, awesome, fiery displays the shook the desert floor and crackled the air. I watched with rapt attention videos he brought home when the shuttle was in service, shot from a camera in the vehicles cargo bay as tiny communications satellites were deployed, spinning up from their cases in the space shuttle bay and into the web of orbital space. Once he showed me a video of a satellitte that failed to "burn" properly and was lost. He was trying to figure out what went wrong. The video showed the motor fire--it looked like a tiny cotton blossom in a field of black--then suddenly flare and vanish. My father just said, "Huh," quietly and watched it a dozen more times. How he possibly deduced any useful information from the three or four seconds of burn is beyond me. He had the instincts, I suppose. He was one of the three or four Thiokol engineers who pleaded with NASA not to launch the Challenger on that fateful day in January 1986. Afterwards, he was sent to pick through the pieces of the failed motor and determine the catastrophe's cause.

As I grew older his other work began to perplex and then trouble me. One night at a restaurant I noticed my father lost in thought, eyes fixed in a thousand yard stare, utensils and food forgotten. I asked him if he was okay. He composed himself immediately and said, "Sorry, it's those damn missiles." I asked what he meant and he replied, "I was thinking of something I need to work out. I've been stuck on it for a week." Those "damn missiles" were, as I recall, the MX system, the "Peacekeeper." I also remember him showing me a long, threaded shaft he'd brought home. He explained the shaft, one of four, was attached to a motor that would turn it at high speed and extend a missiles thrust cone in less than a second just prior to ignition.

"What for?"

"So we can place them on tractor trailers or a train car. The cone collapses and takes up much less room. Then it's raised into firing position and the cone extends like that." He snapped his fingers.

He rarely brought his work home because so much of it was secret. I both admired his work and abhored it. The latter started getting to me in my teens and I even had nightmares of the nuclear apocalypse. In one, my father got the whole family to safety by placing a call on a phone I'd never seen in the house before. That was telling. As time went on I had a growing sense of just what kind of secrets my father worked on. I remember being conflicted when seeing or reading reports of massive demonstrations in West Germany (there were two Germanies then, of course) over the proposed deployment of a new American missile system there. That was the first I'd heard of the Green Party. It was also, I think, my political awakening.

These days, long retired near the end of his life, my father agrees with me that far too much is spent on defense. He calls the original "Star Wars" system a waste of resources and feels the new efforts are much more about dominating the weaponization of space than about defense. In other words, a good offense is the best defense. He calls Bush and his War Cabinet "zealots" and fears a century of warfare with the Islamic peoples. The Cold War he viewed as necessary because he held deep-seated animosity for totalitarian systems. He views the war in Iraq as the unnecessary and rash action of a superpower that could and should be policing the world, not destabilizing it.

I remember as discussion we had sometime after the Soviet Union imploded. I told him about an idea I had for truly transforming the American presence in the world by channeling the "peace dividend" we were promised into something evolutionary. The idea was a fleet of ships for global humanitarian relief and natural disaster response and recovery operations. I suggested developing powering them with gradually cleaner and cleaner propulsion systems and some hi-tech wind power gadgets I'd read about. To my surprise, my father not only agreed with me but added, "And my company could be used to develop those." I found hope in that--an old cold warrior and patriot seeing the chance to transform his industry and maybe the world.

That was the time to make the term Realist mean something other than a person who only sees the world as a dangerous place. There is danger in the world, of course, and dangerous people. But nothing in the post-Cold War world suggested America was prepared to admit, let alone confront the potential fallout of questionable and coercive policies from decades of the standoff with Soviet militarism. Now we have more fear, more coercion, and double doses of jingoism. The Kneejerk Yankee Doodle in the White House considers himself a Realist. His cyclopian vision of the world's dangers are not only terrifying in themselves. They are an insult to people like my father who truly believed a better world was possible and hoped to contribute through astonishing advances in technology and communications, even if some of those developments were frightening beyond reason. It was believed the Cold War should be won and the peace kept.

It's time again to redefine a Realist as someone who isn't afraid to evolve.

Iraq Police Boom

Iraq faces descent into chaos, says CIA chief -- Mail & Guardian, December 9, 2004

CIA Cable Bears Dire Predictions for Iraq -- All Things Considered, NPR, December 7, 2004

Report: CIA Official Warns Iraqi Security Getting Worse -- Baku Today, August 12, 2004

CIA Report Draws Bleak Iraq Picture -- Islam Online, December 8, 2004

Secret CIA memo pessimistic on security for Iraqi elections -- WIS Channel 10 NBC Columbia, SC, December 8, 2004

CIA Warning: Iraq's Getting Worse -- ABC News, December 7, 2004

That's the problem with surfing the big WWW these days. It's all doom and gloom. Meanwhile, the vast left wing conspiracy that is the liberal media just provides a sounding board for those radical leftists inside... the CIA.

This particular assessment is problematic precisely because it's the work of an undercover CIA station chief who has been inside Baghdad for at least a year. They go soft, you know, after too much exposure to the cold, grim reality of occupation, superpower style. Henceforth, as the new Director of the CIA Porter Goss made clear in his first offical act as Administration Toady, the ultimate goal of the agency is to support the Administration's policies. That's how you separate the wheat from the chaff, after all. That's the way to counter the negative image proffered by the media. The real measure of success comes from the boys and girls actually doing the fighting:

US Marines keeping a tenuous peace in the battered Iraqi city of Fallujah say they expect an explosion of violence as rebels hiding among returning refugees renew their deadly campaign of bombings and ambushes.

They also fear the insurgency will find increasing support from Fallujah residents who return to find their homes and businesses devastated by last month's massive US-led assault on the Sunni Muslim enclave.

"Our assessment is the die-hard guys have gone to ground and are just waiting for the refugees to return so that they can blend in, come back and start their IED (improvised explosive device) campaign," said Captain Tom Tennant of the 1st Batallion, 3rd Marines, who have dug into northeast Fallujah.

Middle East Online

Hrm. Okay, wait a second here. Just what did that CIA guy have to say?

Significantly, the gloomy cable was dispatched to CIA headquarters after, and not before, U.S. forces completed what they called a significant victory over the rebels to gain control of Fallujah, west of Baghdad. Moreover, the station chief’s basic conclusions were echoed by a senior CIA official who recently visited Iraq, The Times reported. And they mirrored other gloomy assessments, notably a formal National Intelligence Estimate that was prepared for the White House last summer.

These candid and confidential warnings contrast sharply with the upbeat public remarks of President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other administration leaders. The fact is, the administration has consistently underestimated the requirements of the Iraq war since before it even began.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Now, just a goddamn minute. Let's make one thing perfectly clear; the only thing we "underestimated" was the degree to which Iraqis were prepared for liberation. If the Iraqi people had accepted their lot, acknowledged American infallibility, and embraced their duly appointed leaders we wouldn't be in this mess. Now do you understand why we have to rein in the CIA and other rogue agencies? Think about it -- if we listened to the CIA in the first place we would never have sold the American public on the connections between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, trumped up suspicion that Iraq orchestrated the 9-11 attacks, or lied to the United Nations about absolutely everything. It's about time we stopped listening to anyone who actually has to witness the war in Iraq and started listening to those paid to lie about it.

Jesus Plus Nothing

“You guys are here to learn how to rule the world.... We elect our leaders. Jesus elects his.” -- David Coe

Jesus Plus Nothing, Harper's, March 2003

Jeffrey Shartlet's article for Harper's is a first person account of life inside Ivanwald, a community tucked discretely within a Washingtion DC neighborhood, where aspiring young men learn how the Lord works--and governs--in mysterious ways. These young men are not wayward youth or troubled souls, however. They are part and parcel of the political elite, training and yearning for positions of privelege within the United States government or the numerous conservative think tanks that feed off the Beltway and corrode the media. They are the creme de la creme, The Best and The Brightest, the cult of the everpresent. Their mentors are savvy political operatives with satchels full of agenda. Their patrons are smooth operators. In this rarefied atmosphere a man like former Attorney General Ed Meese regularly leads prayer breakfasts and folks like Doug and David Coe advise politicians on matters both esoteric and concrete.

Take congressman Todd Tiahrt:

[Tiahrt] wanted to know the best way “for the Christian to win the race with the Muslim.” The Muslim, he said, has too many babies, while Americans kill too many of theirs.

Doug agreed this could be a problem. But he was more concerned that the focus on labels like “Christian” might get in the way of the congressman's prayers. Religion distracts people from Jesus... and allows them to isolate Christ's will from their work in the world.

“People separate it out,” [Coe] warned Tiahrt. “'Oh, okay, I got religion, that's private.' As if Jesus doesn't know anything about building highways, or Social Security. We gotta take Jesus out of the religious wrapping.”

“All right, how do we do that?” Tiahrt asked.

“A covenant. Like the Mafia... Look at the strength of their bonds.” He made a fist and held it before Tiahrt's face....

“See, for them it's honor. For us, it's Jesus.”

Mysterious ways, indeed. Christ is much more than your spiritual light and savior; He understands pork barrel projects, the privatization of Social Security, and the code omerta. Men like Tiahrt concern themselves with producing enough able-bodied soldiers for the Great Conflict. Men like Coe concern themselves with producing the pro-life vote for the Great Election. Meanwhile, millions of Americans believe their vote helped take the moral high ground.

Among some conservative Christians, there is a belief that President Bush received a "moral mandate" to win the recent presidential election — and they are calling on him to act on their agenda now.

"I believe Our Lord elected our president and I believe he put him in office and it is my prayer that he will sustain him in office," said one woman at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Another was asked if she believed that God intervened in the election. "Absolutely," she said.

"Values" voters delivered for the president, and the president must now deliver for them — especially in the courts, said Gary Cass, head of a grassroots political organization affiliated with Coral Ridge, called the Center for Reclaiming America.

"It's about the next 40 years and how the courts are going to affect the world in which my children and grandchildren are going to be raised in," he said.

ABC News

This suggests nothing more than a radical transformation of the American system. And this view is hardly isolated. Numerous articles and broadcasts since the election have echoed these themes as the media have suddenly become infatuated with the "values divide." The ABC report sums it all up nicely by stating, "[Evangelists] believe that if their agenda is not implemented quickly — if their concerns are not addressed in a timely fashion — God will be angry."

If God is anxious to transform America, He must be downright giddy with developments in the Middle East, where all those muslims are busily having babies. In Iraq, God must be most pleased withe Bush Administration's efforts to win the hearts and minds. In the Harper's article Shartlet quotes a former senator speaking on the situation in Rwanda, then as now an incredibly unstable and dangerous place, as one where the combatants should "stop worrying about who gets the oil and the diamonds and start worrying about who gets Jesus... 'Power sharing is not going to work unless we change their hearts.'" This echoes Ann Coulter's infamous post-9-11 outburst that America's mission in the world should be to invade, depose, and convert. Leave the "worldly" stuff, like resources and government structure, to the management teams and contracted multinationals. The President and his military have embarked on a divine mission.

It doesn't seem to be playing that way in the countries where this mission is being carried out, of course. According to a recently released report by the U.S. Department of Defense Defense Science Board:

Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the long-standing, even increasing, support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states. Thus, when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy.

Christian Science Monitor

The next 40 years look worrisome, all right. But the concepts expressed by those who claim a mandate for the world's future are hardly the stuff of deep thought or even thoughtful compassion. It's time to turn these discussions on their head and present true alternatives. Time to get over the disappointment of Kerry's defeat and get beyond the two-party thought machine. In the next few weeks Ritual Reality will explore ways of doing just that.