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APC SA NEWSLETTER JUNE 2004
Nicholas Berg
When Nicholas Berg was so cruelly beheaded in Iraq the TV news
showed his father erecting a sign on his front lawn which said "War is not
the Answer"
We sent a message of sympathy to the family and received a card with the
following message in reply:
Dear Irene + Members of the Peace Committee, Thank you for your words of
comfort. Your continued efforts to achieve world peace and justice for all are
the most appropriate and comforting words I have received.
I'm glad someone gets that the tragedy is the war. Michael Berg.
Mayors for Peace
MAYORS FOR PEACE -- EMERGENCY CAMPAIGN TO BAN NUCLEAR WEAPONS:
In 1970, the world's nuclear powers and nearly all other nations (a total of 189
now) decided to eliminate nuclear weapons. This decision took the form of a
bargain: the non-nuclear nations agreed not to develop their own nuclear weapons
and the nuclear-weapon states (the US, the former USSR, England, France and
China) agreed to get rid of theirs. This bargain was articulated in the Treaty
on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, usually called the NPT. However,
during the Cold War, the nuclear-weapon states claimed that their national
security depended on nuclear weapons, so they continually put off their end of
the bargain.
The final document adopted at the NPT Review Conference in 2000 included the
promise of 'an unequivocal undertaking by the nuclear-weapon states to
accomplish the total elimination of the nuclear arsenals' as steps toward the
abolition of nuclear weapons, for which Hiroshima and Nagasaki have earnestly
wished.
When we look at the current world situation, the United States, the only nuclear
superpower, has publicly declared its readiness to launch a pre-emptive first
strike with nuclear weapons. It has allocated funds to the development of small
'useable' nuclear weapons. North Korea has withdrawn from the NPT and has
mentioned that it plans to build and possess nuclear weapons. All of these
efforts are clear violations of the NPT bringing it to the verge of collapse;
and the prospects for a nuclear-free world.
Such behaviour is creating an extremely dangerous situation. It has provoked
greater rigidity among other actual or potential nuclear-weapon states to obtain
nuclear weapons as a deterrent. Nations, states, and cities around the world are
tightening security in the effort to fight terrorism; many cities are
overhauling their plans to respond to terrorist attacks with weapons of mass
destruction.
Though it may be reasonable for cities to make plans for attacks by biological
or chemical weapons, no city can prepare in any meaningful way for a nuclear
attack. There is only one sure way to protect ourselves from these heinous,
illegal weapons. We must get rid of them all as soon as possible.
The main events of the campaign are:
1) The NPT PrepCom that will take place in New York April 26 to May 7. During
this time, the main public event will be the demonstration that will take place
on May 1. Please be in New York on May 1 if you possibly can. If you can't go to
New York, please organize a sympathy demonstration in your city.
2) Hiroshima-Nagasaki Days 2004. **We need to see events taking place around the
world on and around August 6 and 9 this year. If you need help getting something
to happen in your city, please contact us.
3) The NPT Review Conference that will take place in New York late April early
May 2005. The exact dates will appear on this page as soon as they are
announced. Please begin now talking to your community and ensuring that as many
of you as possible will be in New York at that time. Those who can't go should
organize events in their own cities. These events should be as big and as
high-profile as possible, and they should clearly state the demand that the NPT
Review Conference produce a meaningful ban on nuclear weapons and a plan for
getting rid of them.
4) The next events will be determined based on the results of the Review
Conference. If the Review Conference fails to produce satisfactory results, we
intend to move to a track-2 negotiation process similar to the Ottawa Process
that produced the international ban on landmines. We intend to have a meaningful
ban on nuclear weapons one way or another.
Letter from Mayor of Hiroshima 23 Feb. 2004
This past January 16 at the World Social Forum in India, Arundhati Roy said:
"This movement of ours needs a major global victory. It's not good enough
to be right. Sometimes, if only in order to test our resolve, it's important to
win something. In order to win something, we need to agree on something. That
something does not need to be an overarching preordained ideology into which we
force-fit our delightfully factious, argumentative selves. It does not need to
be an unquestioning allegiance to one or another form of resistance to the
exclusion of everything else. It could be a minimum agenda."
I am writing to ask you to support what I consider to be the most promising
immediate "minimum agenda"- the Emergency Campaign to Ban Nuclear
Weapons. I am aware that, in a world of continual outrage over the obscene greed
of the rich, the needless suffering of the poor, and the inexorable destruction
of our habitat, not everyone considers the elimination of nuclear weapons a top
priority. Nevertheless, I dare to beg your support for three reasons.
First, the issue of nuclear weapons is a higher priority than you may realize.
The world has yet to recover from the fear and hatred released on September 11.
Imagine the long-term outcome had the US lost half of Manhattan to a small
nuclear device. Most of the world understands the danger and knows that the only
way to protect our modern civilization is to eliminate them all.
Second, this campaign doesn't ask for much.
We ask only that you pay attention to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT)
review process. We ask you to go to New York on May 1, 2004, or organize events
at home. We ask you to hold high profile events in your own cities during
Hiroshima-Nagasaki Days this year (August 6-9). We ask you to go to New York or
hold your own events in late April 2005. There is no need to abandon any of the
worthy activities in which you are already engaged. Please go to:
http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/mayors/english/index.html
Australia's close relationship with the United States supports
its further development of nuclear weapons, through uranium mining, US bases on
our soil and by our acquiescence in American rejection of international nuclear
non-proliferation treaties.
THE MAYOR OF HIROSHIMA SAYS: END NUCLEAR WARFARE NOW.
Concerned citizens can join the Mayors for Peace Campaign, a campaign to Ban
Nuclear Weapons started by the Mayor of Hiroshima to mobilise community opinion
through local governments. The campaign advocates effective negotiations by all
countries, including Australia, at the crucial Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
in 2005. See details inside, and the enclosed leaflet about the ceremony to be
held in Adelaide on 8 August at the Effective Living Centre, 26 King William Rd,
Wayville from 2.30-4.30pm. Bring your friends!
The multibillion robbery the US
calls reconstruction
The shameless corporate feeding frenzy in Iraq is fuelling the
resistance. -- Naomi Klein, June 26, 2004 The Guardian
Good news out of Baghdad: the Program Management Office, which oversees the
$18.4bn in US reconstruction funds, has finally set a goal it can meet. Sure,
electricity is below pre-war levels, the streets are rivers of sewage and more
Iraqis have been fired than hired. But now the PMO has contracted the British
mercenary firm Aegis to protect its employees from "assassination,
kidnapping, injury and" - get this - "embarrassment". I don't
know if Aegis will succeed in protecting PMO employees from violent attack, but
embarrassment? I'd say mission already accomplished. The people in charge of
rebuilding Iraq can't be embarrassed, because, clearly, they have no shame.
In the run-up to the June 30 underhand (sorry, I can't bring myself to call it a
"handover"), US occupation powers have been unabashed in their efforts
to steal money that is supposed to aid a war-ravaged people. The state
department has taken $184m earmarked for drinking water projects and moved it to
the budget for the lavish new US embassy in Saddam Hussein's former palace.
Short of $1bn for the embassy, Richard Armitage, the deputy secretary of state,
said he might have to "rob from Peter in my fiefdom to pay Paul". In
fact, he is robbing Iraq's people, who, according to a recent study by the
consumer group Public Citizen, are facing "massive outbreaks of cholera,
diarrhoea, nausea and kidney stones" from drinking contaminated water.
If the occupation chief Paul Bremer and his staff were capable of embarrassment,
they might be a little sheepish about having spent only $3.2bn of the $18.4bn
Congress allotted - the reason the reconstruction is so disastrously behind
schedule. At first, Bremer said the money would be spent by the time Iraq was
sovereign, but apparently someone had a better idea: parcel it out over five
years so Ambassador John Negroponte can use it as leverage. With $15bn
outstanding, how likely are Iraq's politicians to refuse US demands for military
bases and economic "reforms"?
Unwilling to let go of their own money, the shameless ones have had no qualms
about dipping into funds belonging to Iraqis. After losing the fight to keep
control of Iraq's oil money after the underhand, occupation authorities grabbed
$2.5bn of those revenues and are now spending the money on projects that are
supposedly already covered by American tax dollars.
But then, if financial scandals made you blush, the entire reconstruction of
Iraq would be pretty mortifying. From the start, its architects rejected the
idea that it should be a New Deal-style public works project for Iraqis to
reclaim their country. Instead, it was treated as an ideological experiment in
privatisation. The dream was for multinational firms, mostly from the US, to
swoop in and dazzle the Iraqis with their speed and efficiency.
Iraqis saw something else: desperately needed jobs going to Americans, Europeans
and south Asians; roads crowded with trucks shipping in supplies produced in
foreign plants, while Iraqi factories were not even supplied with emergency
generators. As a result, the reconstruction was seen not as a recovery from war
but as an extension of the occupation, a foreign invasion of a different sort.
And so, as the resistance grew, the reconstruction itself became a prime target.
The contractors have responded by behaving even more like an invading army,
building elaborate fortresses in the green zone - the walled-in city within a
city that houses the occupation authority in Baghdad - and surrounding
themselves with mercenaries. And being hated is expensive. According to the
latest estimates, security costs are eating up 25% of reconstruction contracts -
money not being spent on hospitals, water-treatment plants or telephone
exchanges.
Meanwhile, insurance brokers selling sudden-death policies to contractors in
Iraq have doubled their premiums, with insurance costs reaching 30% of payroll.
That means many companies are spending half their budgets arming and insuring
themselves against the people they are supposedly in Iraq to help. And,
according to Charles Adwan of Transparency International, quoted on US National
Public Radio's Marketplace programme, "at least 20% of US spending in Iraq
is lost to corruption". How much is actually left over for reconstruction?
Don't do the maths.
Rather than models of speed and efficiency, the contractors look more like
overcharging, under performing, lumbering beasts, barely able to move for fear
of the hatred they have helped generate. The problem goes well beyond the latest
reports of Halliburton drivers abandoning $85,000 trucks on the road because
they don't carry spare tyres. Private contractors are also accused of playing
leadership roles in the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. A landmark
class-action lawsuit filed by the Centre for Constitutional Rights alleges that
Titan Corporation and CACI International conspired to "humiliate, torture
and abuse persons" in order to increase demand for their
"interrogation services".
And then there's Aegis, the company being paid $293m to save the PMO from
embarrassment. It turns out that Aegis's CEO, Tim Spicer, has a bit of an
embarrassing past himself. In the 90s, he helped to put down rebels and stage a
military coup in Papua New Guinea, as well as hatching a plan to break an arms
embargo in Sierra Leone.
If Iraq's occupiers were capable of feeling shame, they might have responded by
imposing tough new regulations. Instead, Senate Republicans have just defeated
an attempt to bar private contractors from interrogating prisoners and also
voted down a proposal to impose stiffer penalties on contractors who overcharge.
Meanwhile, the White House is also trying to get immunity from prosecution for
US contractors in Iraq and has requested the exemption from the new prime
minister, Iyad Allawi.
It seems likely that Allawi will agree, since he is, after all, a kind of US
contractor himself. A former CIA spy, he is already threatening to declare
martial law, while his defence minister says of resistance fighters: "We
will cut off their hands, and we will behead them." In a final feat of
outsourcing, Iraqi governance has been subcontracted to even more brutal
surrogates. Is this embarrassing, after an invasion to overthrow a dictatorship?
Not at all; this is what the occupiers call "sovereignty". The Aegis
guys can relax - embarrassment is not going to be an issue.
·A version of this article first appeared in the Nation. www.nologo.org
Causes and futility of war
Pauline Mitchell, of *CICD, speaking at the Unitarian Church,
Melbourne 25.4.2004.
Wars are never entirely futile; it all depends on where you are.
Wars are fought to extend influence, empires and secure riches and resources and
those that declare war usually don't take part in it.
Wars are futile only for those that fight it, they have the grief and suffering;
if they do return as victors from the battlefield they are no better off
materially and have to live with the horrors that they have seen and done.
Reasons may vary as to the causes of war but the common thread is greed.
Historians have calculated that a total of more than 14,500 wars have been
fought in the world, the worst was the 2nd World War where over 50 million were
killed, but the death toll in small wars since then almost rival that of the 2nd
WW.
Is it any wonder then, that there is a saying that 'There have always been wars
and there always will be' in fact there are two sayings that one often hears
people quoting to explain away recurring circumstances.
1. There have always been wars and there always will be … and
2. There has always been hunger and there always will be.
Soon after the 2nd World War it was decided to investigate these two old sayings
to see if they had any relevance to some sort of natural law.
The first to be investigated was 'There has always been hunger etc…'
The task was undertaken by Josua DeCastro a former President of the Food and
Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations he was assisted by a number of
scientists and other experts from a number of countries.
Anthropologists examined deposits and fossilized skeletons of the most primitive
of human groups and none showed signs of chronic hunger; some skeletons showed
signs of dietary deficiencies but it was not long standing and was put down to
weather and crop failure at that particular time in history.
Examinations were carried out up the human family scale, and it was only in
skeletons of the more advanced societies that showed the biological etchings of
hunger. Then they made another discovery - they found caches of weapons and
signs of organised warfare.
From this it was concluded that hunger and war arrived together when humankind
had reached a stage in development when he began to accumulate reserves and
goods and needed armies and weapons to defend that collected wealth.
Hunger and War began when the unequal distribution of natural riches began;
today the end result of that inequality is the economic system of Capitalism.
Under the exploitive system of Feudalism, as well as the wars, the King and
ruling class sent their soldiers around to extract crippling taxes from their
people, plunging them even deeper into hunger and poverty.
Under Capitalism, there are taxes but things are much more sophisticated, it's
all about markets. Food is destroyed, ploughed back into the ground or dumped at
sea and cattle are slaughtered, all to keep market prices high for the
capitalist enterprises, and some governments, particularly the United States
pays its farmers to keep land out of production. Also the system profits from
others misfortune. If crops fail in other lands or stock has to be destroyed
because of disease, it opens up markets for other capitalist to supply - but
only if those in need have the money to buy.
It doesn't matter how hungry people are, or sick, if they haven't got the money
to pay the price for food or medicine, they don't get it.
Another United Nations report in 1957 said that 10% of the world's grain
production was being destroyed by rodents, insects and fungi, because of poor
methods used in storage. This amount is large enough to feed 250 million people
a year. Farming and storage methods have improved enormously now and even though
the world's population has increased we still have the capability to feed
everyone.
The problem is not production it is distribution and the will to distribute.
It is this exploitive and unequal system that breeds war and unrest.
Every country excels at something and has something valuable, it need not be
poor.
Early in the 1970's the United Nations held a conference on a New International
Economic Order. It did not seek a revolutionary change of capitalisms economic
system but it did call for the people to be allowed to own their own resources
and to get a fair price for selling their products.
The Capitalists, though, did not like that suggestion and it was never carried
out. However it would have been beneficial to them in the long run because it
would have opened up more markets for them as the poorer countries would have
had more money to spend on buying other goods from the industrialised countries
- but the capitalist corporations want their profits now. not in one or two
years time.
If a country has oil, it is considered rich. Africa, the poorest continent on
Earth, abounds in oil and Western oil executives have called Chad the New
Persian Gulf. But the people in the oil town in Chad are still living in mud
huts and are still waiting for amenities including AIDS drugs.
There is a number of oil fields in Africa - Nigeria, Angola, Gabon, Congo,
Cameroon, Chad and others and oil represents 70% of Africa's exports to the
United States. But for the bulk of citizens in Africa oil has not improved their
quality of life at all.
Oil companies also have their own private armies to control and protect the oil
from people's wrath … and there are other pitfalls - some oil companies make
payments to repressive regimes and corruption flourishes as dividends from oil
continue to be appropriated by the rich and powerful elite. So far from being a
blessing oil is making the people's lives even worse by providing the funds to
keep authoritarian regimes in power.
In Angola a quarter of the oil revenue is still unaccounted for each year.
In Equatorial Guinea, one of the most criminalised states in the world, oil
companies do business with its brutal regime. With one of the smallest
populations and oil revenues of $500 million last year Equatorial Guinea should
be one of the richest countries in Africa, instead it is the third from the
bottom on the United Nations Human Development index.
Congo Brazzaville has a $6.4 billion overseas debt, although it is the fourth
largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa.
And there are other riches in Africa, the minerals, which provide money for
warring groups.
Then there is Australia's action regarding the oil in East Timor. East Timor is
one of the world's poorest countries, but Australia has claimed nearly all of
its oil. When Australia went into East Timor in 1999 to assist the people could
there have been a hidden agenda?
In the rich industrialised countries the majority of the people haven't all they
need either - there has never been full employment, never been enough houses,
health care or education facilities and as the system of capitalism develops
into monopoly capitalism the division between rich and poor becomes wider and
more noticeable. Although there is a safety net of social security payments, it
is not nearly enough as the numerous charitable organisations will tell you and
they are finding it increasingly hard to cope with the growing number of people
that desperately need food assistance and other basic help. Different political
parties may have a different approach to the problems facing the country and its
people but as capitalism develops there is less and less room to manoeuvre to
benefit the people and stay within the capitalist framework.
A capitalist society is for the benefit of capital and everything is geared
towards making profits, and those profits must increase every year.
To increase these profits the company must sell more, or increase prices, or
decrease services, or sack workers, or go to another country where labour is
cheaper - when this happens and companies more off-shore some people say that it
indicates that wages are too high here and the Unions are the problem. No one
blames the Companies insatiable appetite for profits and no one including the
government says that the companies have any responsibility at all towards the
people.
It is bad enough when civilian industries make huge profits at the expense of
the working people but the most profitable of all the capitalist enterprises are
the armament firms - they profit from deliberately manufacturing instruments of
death and destruction.
The arms companies sell to any government or group willing to pay their price,
there are few restrictions, the government gets taxes from them and export
revenue.
Another plus to the government is that these huge companies are big employers
although they are not as labour intensive as they once were.
The arms manufacturers have on-going security, huge government contracts, the
government buys their product, if these killing devices are not used in wars,
they become outdated and superseded and the government then buys the new system.
So the armaments industries are always working to capacity and always making
mega-profits.
Military spending is rising in all countries of the world and military spending
in the developing countries, the ones that can least afford it, is growing by
about 6 or 7% annually; but no one country can come even close to the United
States military spending or to their access to weapons. It takes a group of the
Industrialised countries.
The circumstances of eternal poverty and oppression spawns National Liberation
Fronts, people that are struggling for a better future and national liberation
struggles are the Just Wars.
It is not against international law to struggle to promote social progress and a
better standard of life. The United Nations Charter sets out the right to
develop equal rights and the self-determination of people and the Geneva
Convention also sets out the right of people to fight for their liberation.
The Palestinians have the right to fight for their liberation and the Geneva
Convention also distinguishes between war and occupation. An occupied people
should be protected and their occupier is responsible for their safety. But that
is not happening in the case of Palestine or in Iraq.
World War 2 was a Just War - to fight fascism - but it did have many more trends
towards the end.
The expenditure on armaments takes money from much needed social services. Each
day in the paper we see accounts of poverty, the health system is in tatters,
there is a shortage of nurses, doctors, teachers, nursing homes, child care,
schools are being run down and university students have to go into debt if they
want to pursue their studies.
The government complains of shortages but doesn't encourage young people to
further their education in these or any other field.
Instead the government is talking about filling this void with skilled migrants
- creating a Brain Drain for other countries.
But just one item - we are going to buy 50 second-hand tanks from the United
States, tanks that are said to be unsuitable for Australia's needs. The tanks
cost just over $9 million each, so what could the cost of one tank - $9 million
- do for our civilian economy, for our students … plus that money flows out of
Australia's economy entirely.
So besides threatening us with war, armaments do enormous damage to the civilian
economy by slowing down economic growth in the civilian sector.
Now we have globalisation and Free Trade Agreements. Whatever the government
tries to tell us these agreements are made to benefit capital and big business.
After the 2nd WW the confrontation between the two economic systems of
Capitalism and Socialism became very dangerous; a study of the history of
confrontation between these two powers will show that the USSR made many efforts
to secure peace and détente and for the two social systems to live side by
side. But the predatory nature of capitalism and the need to keep increasing
profits plus the expansion of the most profitable business of all, the arms
industry, finally saw the end of the USSR and its bloc of countries. The system
of socialism could not cope with the wasteful and bottomless pit of arms
expenditure and stay within its social intent or its constitution.
Webster's dictionary definition of Socialism is - that it is a theory of social
reform the main feature of which is to secure a reconstruction of society, with
a more equal division of property and the fruits of labour through common
ownership."
After the fall of socialism about 98% of the world is now capitalist and the
mega-corporations have penetrated everywhere. Industrialised countries depend on
oil so the United States made a special effort to secure the vase oil deposits
of the Caspian Basin by making sure there were US friendly governments in the
former Republics.
One of the oil pipelines was to go through Afghanistan but the Taliban were not
being very co-operative , so when the United Sates invaded Afghanistan in search
of Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban government was overturned and the oil pipeline
is on again.
The War on Terror has now taken the place of the confrontation between the two
social systems - but actually the war on terror is better for the USA than the
Cold War because there are now no restrictions, no balances, and the war on
terror has no boundaries, no limits, no end; it is not defined at all and can be
used in any circumstances also the laws that have been passed in the name of
terrorism can be used to protect corporations against protesters and
anti-globalisation-ists, in fact, against any kind of dissent. After Afghanistan
came Iraq, the second biggest oil producer in the world, in the war that ensued,
and it is not over, 12,000 Iraqi's have been killed and their country ruined and
their social system has been destroyed. The oil has now been secured by the big
oil companies, it is no longer nationalised, it is foreign owned.
By controlling the oil, the lifeblood of industrialised nations, the United
States can control most of the world, especially the growing economies of Japan
and the European Union, which rely entirely on oil imports for their
continuance.
The United States intention to dominate the world was contained in the document
'Project for a New American Century' written by the ultra conservatives of the
Bush 2 Administration; but this only spelt out in further detail the Pentagon
document that was labelled 'The New World Order' and came out under the Bush 1
Administration, the one that said that it would discourage advanced
industrialised nations from challenging United States leadership…..' etc.
Since the fall of the Soviet Union the United States has moved quickly to extend
its Empire, and its global presence is like no other Empire in history - it has
troops in at least 70% of the worlds countries, no country can match the reach
and lethality of the United States armed forces. The United States can deploy a
navy across every ocean and there are 12 huge aircraft carriers each carrying a
modern air armada larger than the air force of some countries. The US can
quickly despatch land forces to any battlefield in the world - now they want to
put weapons into space.
Besides the 'War on Terror' there is another danger - the unrestricted march of
corporate capitalism is decreasing the world's assets at an alarming rate, fish,
forest, wildlife, water, arable land etc.
Several conferences have taken place to discuss the environment, in particular
the harm of pollution in the ground and the atmosphere. Measures have been taken
to phase out CFC's that harm the ozone layer, but the biggest culprit is the
burning of oil and fossil fuels - the basis of the industrialised countries
economies.
Scientists have warned for years about the danger of Greenhouse gases, the harm
to the ozone layer and about Climate Change.
The biggest producer of these 'greenhouse gases' is the United States because of
its huge consumption of oil - but the USA will not commit itself to signing the
Kyoto Protocol which aims to curb the use of greenhouse gases - in fact the Bush
2 Administration has repeatedly denied that Climate Change exists and says that
the weather change is due to a natural cycle.
The Bush Administration has very close links with the high-powered energy and
oil companies and this is why the evidence of scientists is repeatedly ignored.
But now, another report has surfaced, a report from the Pentagon and which was
forwarded to the White House about the beginning of the year. The report says
that Climate Change over the next twenty years could result in global
catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars natural disasters. It says that
climate change should be elevated to a national security concern as the threat
to global stability by climate change far outweighed the threat of terrorism…and
so on.
It was an absolutely damning report and could be a source of humiliation for
President Bush Jnr.
But, President Bush does not have to admit that he is wrong about Climate
Change, because all the scenarios outlined by the Pentagon can be dealt with
under the 'War on Terrorism'. Taking measures to curb the greenhouse gasses
responsible for Climate Change would affect big business, especially the energy
and oil companies. It would not be in their interests. For example, an item in
the Australian 19/4/04, tells of a revolt by Victoria's biggest manufacturers
over the Bracks Government's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. All the
big power users and biggest emitters of carbon dioxide will lobby to try to head
off what they call an aggressive policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,
saying that it will increase business costs and threaten investments and perhaps
force them to go elsewhere where there are no rules.
In the United States it would be worse if the government tries to enforce rules
on business. Under President Bush Jnr's administration all the Clean Air laws
have been rolled back and environment budgets have been cut.
Then there is the pollution of food. In Victoria we have been told recently that
chicken nuggets contain 50% fat and are not good for us - also that there is too
much salt in processed food so we must be aware of it an not eat too much, then
there is mercury in fish, so we shouldn't eat it more than once a week. It is
helpful to be told these things, however the big business producers of these
products were not fined or told to clean up their act.
Then there are cigarettes - this is perhaps the craziest of all.
It has been proved over and over again that smoking is bad for your health and
notices to this effect has to be prominently displayed on cigarette packets -
also all advertising of cigarettes is banned - and smoking is banned in most
public places - then the government spends millions of dollars on adds to
discourage smoking…..But the production and sale of cigarettes is still a
legitimate business! And in the United States the industry is subsidised by the
government because it is a big employer.
The system that allows these things is a system that perpetuates and supports
inequality, unrest and eventually war and as the system goes to monopoly
capitalism it will get worse.
People know that there are injustices in the system but say that it is the only
system we've got because socialism failed.
But, for whom did socialism fail? It failed for the capitalists because they
couldn't'
buy into it - all enterprises were state owned and the profits went back into
the civilian society.
The Reverend Rich Lang from the Trinity United Methodist Church in Seattle USA
has written a paper about George Bush, his imperial presidency and his Christian
principles. Rev. Lang describes this period in history as 'emerging corporate
fascism'.
The United Nations was set up to save succeeding generations from war and it
says that everyone has a right to peace, it is a human right. But peace is not
merely the absence of war, it also includes the right to be free of social ills,
economic deprivation, hunger and starvation and the protection of the
environment is vital - it is not only a right for those living today but it is
the right of unborn generations to come.
The legality of a system that treats the ever-widening gap between great riches
and extreme poverty as normal and tolerates discriminatory practices against
developing countries and their people, is a system that causes conflict and war.
And a system that knowingly releases dangerous gasses into the very air that we
breathe - and lets companies get away with it - is perpetuating a criminal act
… we need governments that will enforce rules and laws that benefit all
humankind, not sections of it.
*CICD = Campaign for International Cooperation & Disarmament
Letters
Letter to the Editor: 6 June 2004 - from Jack Forward.
I have lost all faith in the possibility that the general public will with
persistence and regularity protest about defence and foreign policy, so I have
decided to put my views directly to the government and to parliament while, at
the same time, attempting to influence the man and woman in the street via the
letter columns in the press.
Howard has been to London and to Washington. Incongruously he is attending the D
Day commemoration in Normandy without apparently reflecting on how inappropriate
it is for himself and the two other warmongers, Bush and Blair, hypocritically
to manifest sadness and regret in their speeches about the sacrifices of the men
and women, military and civilian on June 6 1944. Truly they have skins like
elephants, consciences encased in ice and are incapable of embarrassment of
shame.
Thanks for all your efforts in the most important cause - peace.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
JUNE 1, 2004 - Senator the Hon Robert Hill
Leader of the Government in the Senate, Minister for Defense, Parliament House,
Canberra, ACT 2600.
Dear Minister,
Since 1 last wrote to you in October 2003 the international situation has not
improved. A lot of money has been spent with little positive effect. Some would
assert that the situation is considerably worse.
The indications now are that high world military spending will continue unless
changes in perceptions and policies are tried to obviate it, but none seems
prepared to propose changes for fear of exposing the fact that 'the Emperor has
no clothes'.
The answer to the world's war problem was drafted in 1948 in the creation of the
United Nations. The necessary authority to apply International Law was, however,
denied the organisation by nations unable to accept the authority of that
organisation, to prevent the use of war and the threat of military force. None
can extract us all from a dangerous world by following the worn out old
prescription for peace that says it can be achieved by every country being armed
to defend itself against countries that also say they are armed only to defend
themselves.
Australia could pioneer change but it is locked into the alliance with the USA
(not with New Zealand (the NZ in the acronym ANZUS is redundant) which cannot
support world disarmament, the essential ingredient of practical change, because
its political, economic and diplomatic power is dependent on its military power.
Australia cannot afford to be perceived in Washington as breaking ranks with it
and so isolating it. Thus Australia is locked into present world military
spending of a trillion dollars every year which the President of the World Bank
described recently as madness.
Before this country spends more billions on defense we need (a) an objective
independent assessment of the real dangers, if any, we face and (b) an
examination of alternatives to every country being armed at enormous cost at the
same time as millions in the world are denied the basic means of survival, and
essential services in most countries, including this one, are deprived of the
funds needed to meet all their people's needs. Yours truly, Jack Forward,
Wamberal, NSW
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting
the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies
it. Through violence you may murder the liar but you can not murder the lie, nor
establish the truth. Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not
murder the hate… Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding
deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness can not drive out
darkness, only light can do that. Hate can not drive out hate; only love can do
that. -- Martin Luther King
Man is the only animal that deals in that atrocity of atrocities, War. He is the
only one that gathers his brethren about him and goes forth in cold blood and
calm pulse to exterminate his kind. He is the only animal that for sordid wages
will march out... and help to slaughter strangers of his own species who have
done him no harm and with whom he has no quarrel.... And in the intervals
between campaigns he washes the blood off his hands and works for "the
universal brotherhood of man" - with his mouth. -- Mark Twain
Patriots always talk of dying for their country and never of killing for their
country. -- Bertrand Russell, attributed
I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in. --
George McGovern
The ability and inclination to use physical strength is no indication of bravery
or tenacity to life. The greatest cowards are often the greatest bullies.
Nothing is cheaper and more common than physical bravery. -- Clarence Darrow,
Resist Not Evil
Letter to the Editor
Labor supports the Coalition in charging the poor and sick more
for their drugs while Defence Minister Hill is about to sign a 25 year agreement
committing Australia to tens of billions of dollars of taxpayers' money to a
Star Wars "defence system" around our population centres.
What Hill is not telling us is that the anti-ballistic missile system is part of
America's nuclear-backed pre-emptive strike doctrine. It's objective is to give
the US the ability to strike anywhere, anytime with nuclear tipped missiles if
necessary, while disabling any missile retaliation.
This lunatic policy will only drive a new arms race to develop MIRVd (Multiple
Independently targetable Re-entry Vehicle) missiles to overwhelm any defensive
system.
You can bet your bottom dollar that the first population centres
"protected" will be Alice Springs and Pine Gap, Kirribilli, Sydney and
Parliament House, Canberra.
-- Gareth Smith (NDP candidate for Richmond) Byron Bay
GROVIL
G R O V I L Grassroots Resistance Opposing Violations of
International Law, Byron Bay NSW 2481
MOB:0415153635 Email maxigar@internode.on.net
GROVIL OFFERS $5,000 REWARD FOR CITIZENS' ARRESTS -- Gareth Smith, founder of
GROVIL, which accurately describes Australia's stance toward the Bush
Administration, is offering $500 reward for each of 10 arrests of any MP who
supports the war on Iraq. He attempted to arrest Prime Minister Howard recently
but recommends citizens catch their MP whilst electioneering.
"Disguise yourself as an avid Coalition supporter and attend an MP function
where you will have the chance to shake hands. Once physical contact has been
made announce in a loud voice that the MP is under arrest for complicity in war
crimes and then deliver them ASAP to the police or a magistrate. Australians can
set a good example to citizens in the US, UK and other members of the Coalition
of the Stupid; we must take back our countries and Uphold the Law, our motto is
Make Law not War. In northern NSW Federal MPs Larry Anthony and Ian Causley will
soon get arrest warrants which we will effect asap", says Gareth.
Reasons to oppose a new US Base
by Australian Anti-Bases Campaign Coalition
· The decision to establish a new US training base is another step in the
militarisation of Australia. It dovetails perfectly with current US military
policy which emphasises a network of small bases or 'transit points' dispersed
around the Asia-Pacific region together with the development of global dominance
through the militarisation and control of space.
· Australia's current military spending of $55 million a day steals the
resources needed to provide human and social needs. It has been estimated by
State governments that an extra $600 million (about 2 weeks military spending)
spent on public hospitals each year would overcome their critical problems.
Similarly a percentage of current military spending should go to ugrading public
schools, reducing the cost of university education, supporting childcare,
developing Medicare, assisting the needy in our community and maximising
employment opportunities.
· US bases on Australia's soil contribute to the US's war fighting strategy.
Another base here will assist the US to prosecute wars against the poor in our
region and beyond and help swell the list of Australia's enemies. Instead of a
military alliance, Australia needs friendly and mutually beneficial relations
with all countries. Unfaltering support for US aggression, illegal invasion and
occupation of other countries cannot ensure security for Australians.
· Around the world US bases have become the centre of major social problems. An
Anglican Church report from Hobart details frequent sexual assaults on juvenile
men and women by US service people. There have been many other incidents of
misbehavior such as US MPs assaulting Aborigines in an Ipswich pub during the
1997 Tandem Thrust war games and a February 2004 court case in Darwin when two
US servicemen were tried for rape. The Governor of Okinawa has said the US bases
on his island brought a major increase in levels of prostitution, drugs,
alcoholism, rape, sexually transmitted diseases, and abuse of women and
children.
· Every US military base in the world has resulted in soil and/or ground water
contamination from toxic chemicals in munitions, fuel, paint and thinners,
greases, heavy metals, acids, PCBs, oils and solvents.
· The proposed new training base will lock up huge areas of our land and
contaminate it with unexploded ordnance. Training will include live firings,
particularly of tank rounds which may be depleted uranium rounds. Whatever the
munitions used, they will pollute the environment and make it unusable for
productive human activity (farming, cattle, tourism, etc.).
· Integration into the US war machine brings with it massive secrecy and denial
of national sovereignty. The Australian parliamentary Joint Standing Committee
on Treaties has complained that MPs are kept in the dark about the US base at
Pine Gap and are "entrusted with less information than can be found in a
public library".
· US bases in Australia are an obvious target for people enraged by the
terrible impact of US policies on their countries. The Australian Government
should be doing everything possible to protect our citizens and avoid
terrorist attacks in our country.
· Military spending creates far fewer jobs that spending the same dollars on
civilian projects and businesses. A new US base will not provide jobs but it
will provide rich pickings for a US corporate thug. There are no longer any
quartermasters in the US military. Provisioning the US military is now done by
Halliburton, US Vice President Dick Cheney's corporation. This company has been
frequently indicted for malpractice and over charging. Halliburton has just
built what is a strategic railway from Alice Springs (near Pine Gap) to Darwin,
the city tipped to be the site for the new US base. Darwin is a port city ideal
for control of the strategic Timor Gap naval passage and for US plans for
containment of China.
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Radio program A Peace of the Action
is dedicated to commentary on peace and social justice issues.
Radio Adelaide 101.5FM every Sunday at 12.30.
Ron Gray
Human Rights Foundation
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