East Timor: US Backed Genocide

                   Timor is an island just north of Australia across the Timor Sea. Today, Timor is essentially split in half. East Timor is an independent nation that gained independence in 2002 as a result of the right to self-determination and West Timor is under the control of Indonesia. East Timor was a Portuguese colony and the west was a Dutch colony until Indonesian independence in 1945. In 1974, the Portuguese military dictator was overthrown in a coup. Portugal decided to give up its colony of East Timor. Political parties emerged in East Timor but two specifically had a lot of support, the Timorese Democratic Union (UDT) and the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor (Fretilin). By September it was clear that Fretilin, described as a “populist” party, had emerged victorious. In August 1975, an attempted coup by UDT, backed by the Indonesian dictator Suharto, led to a brief civil war in which two to three thousand people were killed. One thing that was clear is that the people of East Timor – 78% of voters - wanted an independent state, separate from the brutal rule of Suharto.

                Noam Chomsky said this about what ensued on the island of Timor, “If we do not like what we find when we look at the facts – and few will fail to be appalled if they take and honest look – we can work to bring about changes in the practices and structure of institutions that cause terrible suffering and slaughter… To the extent that we see ourselves as citizens in a democratic community, we have the responsibility to devote our energies to these ends.” He also said that “what has happened” is “very much under our control, so directly that blood is on our hands.”  So let’s take an honest look and remember that this is not an isolated event, things like this are still happening today.  

                Immediately following the civil war, the country was opened up to foreign observers. Journalists and aid organizations came in with quite positive reactions.  Journalists were impressed by how much popular support Fretilin had. The Fretilin government had made measures for agricultural reform and they introduced literacy programs.

Suharto with President Ford and Kissinger

                The Indonesian government wanted to control East Timor and so the Indonesian navy surrounded the island to prepare for an attack. Fretilin asked Portugal to take responsibility, in accordance with UN mandates, for the process of decolonization and to send international observers to deter any act by Indonesia but the requests fell on deaf ears. Fretilin declared  independence on November 28, 1975 and then on December 7, the Indonesian armed forces launched an invasion and took the capital city of Dili. The attack took place just a few hours after President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger boarded a plane to leave the capital city of Indonesia, Jakarta. The army that invaded was supplied with arms from abroad, 90 percent of which were supplied by the US. This is despite the fact that the US Congress had imposed a six-month arms ban on Indonesia in response to the invasion.

                The invasion was more brutal and murderous then anyone could imagine. By 1977-78, Indonesia was engaged in full-scale destruction of East Timor. All the familiar techniques of brutal military conquest were employed including massive bombardment, forced population removal, and the destruction of crops and villages. The pre-war population was about 700,000 and of this at least one-quarter of the population was slaughtered or starved to death as a result of the invasion. The remaining population fled, hid and suffered from starvation or turned themselves over to the Indonesian army which stuffed them into concentration camps. Many of the people in the concentration camps suffered similar fates to the victims of the initial invasion. Scholars compare the genocide here to that of Pol Pot in Cambodia. Throughout the genocide, the US continued to give the necessary military and diplomatic support so that the slaughter could continue.

                The United Nations condemned the Indonesian aggression and called for the Timorese to be able to exercise their right to self-determination. In his memoirs the US Ambassador to the UN, Daniel P. Moynihan remembers the East Timor genocide. “The US wished things to turn out as they did, and worked to bring this about. The Department of State desired that the United Nations prove utterly ineffective in whatever measures it undertook. The task was given to me, and I carried it forward with no inconsiderable success.” Moynihan obeyed orders even though he knew what was going on in East Timor. In 1976, he cited an estimate by the deputy chairman of the provisional government of East Timor - put in place by Indonesia - “that some sixty thousand persons had been killed since the outbreak of civil war.” To clarify, 2 to 3 thousand died in the civil war, the other 57,000 were because of the invading Indonesian army.

                After the invasion, the situation virtually disappeared from the news. The silence by American media stands as solid evidence that the propaganda machine was working very well. Throughout, the US government pretended as if they knew nothing of atrocities. Much the same as they did two decades later in Rwanda. It was all lies, they knew exactly what was happening in both cases. Government officials were cited saying that “the sensible and human course is to recognize Indonesian control.”

                The US Human Rights Administration was the institution responsible for ensuring the flow of arms to the Indonesian military. The so-called “human rights” reports of the State Department completely ignore the incredible amount of evidence of the massive atrocities. They also had the audacity to act as if everything was normal. These “human rights” officials were silencing the atrocities just to ensure that the US could keep pouring weapons into Indonesia. A report that was prepared by the infamous Congressional Research Service (CRS) in November of 1979 states that “reports from Timor indicate a partial return to normalcy there although genuine self-determination for the Timorese is a dim prospect.”

                Government concealment coupled with the corporate lackey media in America succeeded in allowing these atrocities to continue. Let’s look at the New York Times, one of the most prominent and respected media sources in the United States. In 1979, the Times interviewed Father Leoneto Vierira do Rogo, an eyewitness and 63 year old Portuguese priest who spent 3 years in the mountains before surrendering to the Indonesia army in January of 1979. When he surrendered he was suffering from malaria and starvation, and he was sent to a concentration camp for interrogation. Here’s what he told the NY Times:

“Problems started in early 1977. A full-scale bombardment of the whole island began. From that point there emerged death, illness, despair. The second phase of the bombing was late 1977 to early 1979, with modern aircraft. This was the firebombing phase of the bombing. Even up to this time, people could still live. The genocide and starvation was the result of the full-scale incendiary bombing… We saw the end coming. People could not plant. I personally witnessed – while running from protected areas, going from tribe to tribe – the great massacre from bombardment and people dying of starvation. In 1979 people began surrendering because there was no other option. When people began dying, the others began to give up.”

Father Leoneto estimated that 200,000 people had died during the four years of invasion. Of all of this, the NY Times printed just this, “He said that bombardment and systematic destruction of croplands in 1978 were intended to starve the islanders into submission.”

                The brutal offensives of 1977-79 ironically coincided with the sharp increase in arms supplies from the Human Rights Administration. Food and medical supplies that were sent for the famine were being taken by the Indonesian troops. A report in the Observer in London in 1979 quoted a Fretilin official saying “We appeal to anyone left in the world with a minimum sense of human rights to ensure that relief goes directly to our people.” The article went on to state that “they claimed Indonesian troops were terrorizing the local population with arrests, torture, and summary executions. They described the methods by which the authorities manipulated tours by visiting journalists.” There is “growing evidence of the corruption and violation of human rights in East Timor… where the US is particularly involved.”

                David Watts of the London Times, went on a “tour supervised by the Indonesian military” in December 1979. He reported the success of the Red Cross operation in “saving the lives of tens of thousands of people on the brink of starvation.” He continued, “others will die, but at least help is coming to the innocent victims of the vicious starvation policy practiced by the Indonesian armed forces against the Marxist militant and civilian alike in East Timor.” Watts continues that “the people were reduced to stealing what they could, and when they could not get supplies they lived on leaves, mice, and dead dogs.” But Watts is utterly silent on the role of the United States.

                For four long bloody years of war, the US media, was utterly silent and kept close to the US government propaganda line. Before the invasion there was plenty of reporting in East Timor. Henry Kamm, the Pulitzer Prize winning Southeast Asian correspondent of the NY Times, did not even mention East Timor until 1980, after the worst offensives had already passed. What does that say about journalism in the US, a Pulitzer Prize winner decided that interviewing Indonesian generals to find the “facts” was sufficient after being silent throughout the worst parts of the genocide. In 1980, Kamm finally breaks his silence about East Timor. He reports that 300,000 Timorese were “displaced by persistent civil war and that “the Fretilin hold over the population” was broken by an offensive by Indonesia in 1978. These conclusions were based on interviews with the Indonesian authorities.They had no factual basis.

                In late 1979, the news began to trickle out even though the US role is downplayed or ignored. This is despite the fact that the atrocious acts that Father Leoneta and many others describe were the direct responsibility of the US government. The truth is that genocide of a population is a matter of no significance when measured against other US goals. The sale of arms and planes is more important then life. The exploitation of Indonesian resources is more important then stopping genocide. A little history on Indonesia-American relations can help one understand this a bit better.
                     In 1965, the Indonesian military took power in a coup that led to the slaughter of almost one million people by the new President, General Suharto. The US was very closely involved in the coup.  In the late 1960s, the US was providing Suharto with lists of "potential communists" to expose of.  Now they are just part of that “almost one million” figure. It is also important to note that in 1965, Suharto met with US government officials as well as corporate officials (from BP, Ford, GE etc) to basically divide up Indonesia for exploitation. In return, Suharto was given assurance that the US would keep him in power. In this potentially extremely wealthy country, much of the population, not including the victims of Suharto death squads and mass murder, suffer from extreme poverty and hunger. US business is stripping the country of its wealth and the people are suffering.

                In October of 1979, UN correspondent of the New York Times, Bernard Nossiter, turned down an invitation to a press conference in East Timor because he believed the issue was “rather esoteric.” He did not report a single word on the UN conference, which included testimony from refugees and others on the atrocities and the United States involvement. 

                As I mentioned in the beginning, East Timor did not gain independence until 2002. The US finally cut off funding for the Indonesian army in the early 1990s. A main recipient of US funding and training continued to be Indonesia until that time. A report released on the US military receiving training from other armies (which really means us training them but not saying so because we can’t) in 1998 stated that “of the twenty-eight Army/ Air force exercises known to have been conducted since 1982, Pentagon documents indicate that twenty have involved” the Indonesian army. The US continues to prop up dictators and ignore atrocities so that it can further its economic interests. We see this in the Middle East, as well as South America today. Do not believe what they tell you. Take everything they say and assume there is more to the story because there is. Just in this year, 2012, we have seen propaganda triumph in Libya, Iran, Syria, Yemen, and Jordan. When will we start questioning the “official word.” The time is now!

                

Documentaries, Speeches

Noam Chomsky and Amy Goodman talk about East Timor 

  

The East Timor Genocide




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Minority of the Opulent

                The US claims to be a “democratic” society but in policy in the US trend tends to suggest otherwise. This blog is an examination of the roots of our democratic theory. This is a look into the thinking of philosophers, political scientists, politicians, and others that have shaped the image of the US democratic society as we see it today. It is an image of society in which a “minority of the opulent” or “responsible men”, as they call themselves, decide the direction in which society is going to go because they know what is best for the rest of us. The elite tend to think that they have the right to dictate policy because we, as a population, do not have the ability to govern and choose for ourselves. This examination starts with the idea that a democratic society should be based on the principle of “consent of the governed.” We will see how leaders have historically manipulated the meaning of consent to further their own interest, which they claim morally and intellectually superior.

                David Hume, the 18^th century Scottish philosopher, historian, and economist is one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy. Hume was very intrigued by “the easiness with which the many are governed by the few, the implicit submission which men resign” their livelihood and fate to their leaders. Hume was surprised by this tendency because he believed that “force is always on the side of the governed” and if people would realize that, they could rise up and overthrow corrupt leaders with relative ease. This assessment may not be as simple today with modern weaponry and the huge institutions in place to repress the masses but it is still true. Hume decided that government’s foundation of control laid in its ability to dictate public opinion. He believed that the more “free and popular” a government was going to be, the more it needed to control public opinion in order to ensure that the population submits to its wills. He observed that in a democracy, the population has a right to consent, but nothing more than that. He said that the governed could be “spectators,” but not “participants.” He also emphasized that the population needed to be especially excluded from the economic arena, because that is where society is largely controlled.

                The first real modern democratic upsurge was witnessed in 17^th century England. A conflict arose between the King and the Parliament on who was to govern the population. But a large part of the population did not want to be governed by either of the two, they wanted to be governed by “countrymen like ourselves, that know our wants.” These are wishes that we can all relate to today. These revolutionary ideas greatly threatened “the men of best quality”, as they called themselves or “responsible men”, as they refer to themselves today. These “men of best quality” were prepared to give the population some rights but within limits because they felt that they were a better quality of person, more capable of making decisions for the incompetent people.

                One of Hume’s greatest influences was a Scottish philosopher and a founding father of the Scottish Enlightenment named Francis Hutcheson. Just a few years before Hume wrote of his ideas about a democratic society, Hutcheson came up with a variation of “consent of the governed.” His writings would be emphasized later by American sociologist and economist, Franklin Henry Giddings. Hutcheson and subsequently Giddings argued that the principle of “consent of the governed” is not violated when the rulers impose decisions on the dissenting public, if later the “stupid” and “prejudiced” masses “well heartily consent” to what they have decided.

                There are hundreds of examples of this if you look at US foreign policy. The government does something that the people don’t agree with and claims that it is in their or our best interest, we just don’t realize it yet. But let’s look at the example of the Philippine-American war which lasted from 1899 to 1902. In the normal US quest for oversees empire, the US forces killed anywhere from 250,000 to 500,000 Filipinos. The US government argued that they were liberating the Filipino people. In the US press it said that they were “slaughtering the natives in English fashion” so that “the misguided creatures” who are resisting will at least “respect our arms” and later come to realize that we are trying to “liberate” them. You know, the usual rhetoric. This became a form of “consent by the governed.” Giddings put it as this, “if in later years, the conquered people see and admit that the disputed relation was for the highest interest, it may be reasonably held that authority has been imposed with the consent of the governed.” This is obviously a very dangerous way of thinking. But it is historically rooted in US political thought.

                The people were now required to submit to the wishes of their leaders without really giving any consent. The thoughts of 17^th century Englishmen had migrated to the colonies of North America. And you can see that the founding fathers of this nation had some of the same ideas that the British “men of best quality” did. Alexander Hamilton called the people a “great beast” that must be tamed. His colleague John Randolf said, “when I mention the public, I mean to include only the rational part of it. The ignorant and vulgar are as unfit to judge of the modes of government, as they are unable to manage its reins.” Again, the common person was not going to be represented by people like themselves, but by elites, gentlemen, lawyers, and other “responsible men”.  Essentially, men that could be trusted to maintain the power structure.  John Jay, the President of the Continental Congress and first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court said that “the people who own the country ought to govern it.”

                The “Father of the Constitution” and fourth president of the US, James Madison held similar views. He argued that if elections in England “were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place.” He obviously didn’t feel that people without land had a right to it. Madison spoke and wrote of the rights of minorities but specifically what he called the “minority of the opulent.” He believed that there were rights of property but not rights to property. The Madisonian principle became the idea that government must protect the rights of people generally, but it must provide extra and special support for the rights of property owners.

                Madison believed this threat to “democracy” was only going to get worse because of the increasing “proportion of those who will labor under all the hardships of life, and secretly sigh for a more equal distribution of its blessing.” He was concerned by what he called the “symptoms of leveling spirit.” Madison stated that the people “without property, or the hope of acquiring it, cannot be expected to sympathize sufficiently with its rights.” He would draw on the old ideas of England and ensure that the political power was kept in the hands of people who “come from and represent the wealth of the nation,” what he called the “more capable set of men”.

                But let me rewind for just a second because I think that this short account of Madison is unfair in one crucial area. Madison was from the precapitalist era, and he was very anticapitalist at heart. When referring to these opulent men, he believed they would be “enlightened Statesmen” and “philosophers”. Men, with superior wisdom, that could determine the country’s interests for the population. Elitist, yes but an elitist with good intentions. He argued that these men would “refine” and “enlarge” the “public views” while guarding the true interests of the country. I don’t think he imagined the capitalism take-off that we have witnessed. But unfortunately Madison had to face the reality of what had happened because of this elitist way of thinking. Madison found that Adam Smith was dead on when he warned of the “vile maxim” of leaders. The vile maxim is the idea of “all for ourselves, and nothing for other people.” Madison warned in 1792 that this newly developing capitalist state was “substituting the motive and private interest in place of public duty,” leading to “a real domination of the few under an apparent liberty of the many.”

                John Dewey, an American philosopher would describe this phenomenon by emphasizing that society will lose its democratic content when big business rules the “means of production, exchange, publicity, transportation and communications, reinforced by command of the press, press agents and other means of publicity and propaganda.” Madison’s warning rings even louder today with the establishment of enormous private tyrannies, corporations. Theories were devised to justify these “collectivist legal entities,” or corporations. But the ideas of those theories are based on the ideas that also underlie fascism. These entities now have almost complete control over the domestic and international economy as well as the information and education systems, which was another one of Madison’s concerns.

                From this an enormous public relations industry formed. Edward Bernays was an Austrian-American public relations and propaganda guru in the 20^th century. He believed that “the conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society.” This was viewed by the ruling elite as an essential task. According to Bernays, “the intelligent minorities must make use of propaganda continuously and systematically” because only they “understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses.” The elite had given themselves justification to garner consent without consent and now created a massive device in order to manipulate the minds of the population. Bernays said that propaganda gave leadership a way “to mold the mind of the masses” so that “they will throw their newly gained strength in the desired direction.” He believed leadership could “regiment the public mind every bit as much as an army regiments the bodies of its soldiers.” And that this process of creating “consent” was the “essence of the democratic process.”

                This propaganda machine is a way of avoiding what liberal elites call “the crisis of democracy”. This is when the disconnected and passive population decides to become organized and enters the political arena to pursue their own interests, which threatens “stability” and “order.” So the elite decided to develop new machines “to mold the mind of the masses.” Institutions like Woodrow Wilson’s Committee on Public Information was the first US state propaganda agency, which Edward Bernays developed his reputation with. Wilson had his own views about the “minority of the opulent.” He believed that the elite had “elevated ideals” that were “needed to preserve stability and righteousness”.

                It is this intelligent minority of “responsible men” who must be in control of decision making. Another product of Wilson’s propaganda committee was Walter Lippmann. He was probably the most respected US journalist for half of a century. He described the intelligent minority as a “specialized class” who were given the responsibility for “the formation of a sound public opinion.” He believed that the population were “ignorant and meddlesome outsiders.” Lippmann believed that the public must “be put in its place,” their “function”  was to be the “spectators of action” and not to actually participate in decision making. Howard Lasswell, one of the founders of modern political science said that the intelligent minority must be aware of the “ignorance and stupidity of the masses” and must not give in to “democratic dogmatism about men being the best judges of their own interests.” These men believed that the masses must be controlled for their own good. And when these men couldn’t use force, there needed to be social managers to use propaganda to control the masses.

                The Civil Rights Movement and the “hippie” movements of the 60s showed that the ignorant population wanted to participate in decision making. This created fear in the “minority of the opulent.” In 1973, David Rockefeller founded the Trilateral Commission. The commission did its first major study on this “crisis of democracy.” The commission described the phenomenon of the 60s as “excessive democracy,” and hoped to go back to the days when “Truman had been able to govern the country with the cooperation of a relatively small number of Wall Street lawyers and bankers.” Of the utmost concern to the commission was institutional failure “for the indoctrination of the young.” The commission set out to change the schools, universities, and churches in order to put the masses in their place. The commission wanted to restore discipline and wanted the public to return to obedience. The Commission was made up of international sectors of power and intellectual life from the US, Europe, and Japan. President Jimmy Carter’s administration was taken almost entirely from this commission.

                It can be seen every day in America that the business agenda precedes the wishes of the people. The agenda of the business world continues to be implemented. The effects of this on the public are the normal, cut social spending and increase the budget of the Pentagon. The reasons for the increases in Pentagon spending are easy to understand when we realize that the domestic role of the Pentagon is to transfer funds from the people to the business world. This is observed in massive subsidies and Pentagon contracts to big corporations. Also if we take a look at marketing expenses which are largely tax-deductible and the US spends almost 1/5 of GDP on marketing alone. The people are paying for their attitudes and beliefs to be manipulated.

                Two months after Bill Clinton took office, the front page of the Wall Street Journal read “on issue after issue, Mr. Clinton and his administration come down on the same side as corporate America” as if this is a good thing. Cheers came from corporate CEOs and Wall Street but also surprisingly the public because they re-elected him to a second term. And we all know about Bush’s ties to big business. No need to mention that. And the trend continues with Obama. Will we wake up this time or continue to let these elite rule this country into devastation.  

               

Fallujah: The Complete Destruction of a City

Fallujah before the attack

                 In 2004 and 2005, during the Iraq war, the US launched a murderous attack on the city of Fallujah. It is critical to give an honest account of what happened to the city to understand the nature in which the US is “freeing Iraq”. First the US sent in planes to bomb the city and then the US launched a full scale ground invasion leaving the city in ruins. Many people were killed. One prominent Iraqi historian and scholar said that “Hulagu Khan was humane compared to the Americans”.

                Hulagu Khan was the leader of the Mongol Empire from 1256 to his death in February of 1265. The grandson of Genghis Khan, Hulagu used the great army to expand the Mongol Empire across southwest Asia, which included modern day Iraq. In January of 1258, the Mongol army, led by Hulagu met the Caliph’s army on the outskirts of Baghdad. The Mongol army flooded the Tigris River behind the Caliph’s army, trapping the army between the Mongols and the flooded river. The Mongols proceeded to slaughter the Caliph’s army, many of which were drowned in the flooding waters behind.

                The Mongol army proceeded to seize the city of Baghdad, raping, killing, looting, and destroying much of the city. The army looted and destroyed precious historical documents and books. Death counts from this time are hard to be pinpointed, but estimates range from 90,000 to 200,000 people killed in the conquest of Baghdad. The army destroyed mosques, libraries, and hospitals. They hunted down the Caliph’s sons and killed all but one of them. Marco Polo writes that Hulagu starved the Caliph to death, but other accounts suggest that the Caliph was rolled in a carpet and trampled to death by Hulagu’s men on horses.

                The comparison between this and the current destruction of Iraq was not made in jest. We know that the death toll in Iraq is much higher than 200,000 and that the US had Saddam hung, while killing his sons as well. The city of Fallujah is a perfect example of this utter destruction in the name of “Iraqi Freedom”.

And after the bombing campaign

                The first report of a visitor to Fallujah after the attacks of November 2004 and early 2005, was by an Iraqi doctor named Ali Fadhil. Fadhil said that the city was “completely devastated” and that the modern city now “looked like a city of ghosts.” According to Fadhil there were very few dead bodies of Iraqi fighters in the streets, but there were plenty of civilians dead. Fadhil says that Iraqi fighters were ordered to leave the city just before the attack. Fadhil talked to other doctors in the city that told him that the entire medical staff of the various hospitals had been “tied up” when the US attack began. The orders to tie up the medical personal came directly from the US leadership, ensuring that the hospitals would not be able to function. The attitudes of the invaders can be summed up by a message that was written on a mirror in one of the hospitals, the message was written in lipstick and said “Fuck Iraq and every Iraqi in it.”

                People began limping back to Fallujah in the ensuing weeks after Fadhil’s report. Reports are made as the people “enter a desolate world of skeletal buildings, tank-blasted homes, weeping power lines and severed palm trees.” The city of Fallujah, population 250,000 before the attack, was now ruined and “devoid of electricity, running water, schools or commerce.” The US imposed a strict curfew and continued to occupy the city they had just demolished. But let’s take a step back to November 2004.

                In November 2004, the US occupation forces began the second attack on the city. It had been previously attacked but not to the same extent and this attack was in response to the first. In March of 2004, Iraqi insurgents ambushed a convoy of private military contractors (Blackwater) as it entered the city. They killed 40 of Blackwaters men and the US had to retaliate. The city was still standing so the US decided to change that. The attack began with a several week-long bombing campaign from the air. This was said to be done in order to drive out everyone but the adult males in the city. But of course it had other effects. The US-led forces “cut off or restricted food and water to encourage residents to flee.” Even though using hunger and deprivation of water in a war against a civilian population is a flagrant violation of the Geneva Conventions. When men ages 15 to 45 attempted to flee, the occupying forces made them go back without question. It didn’t matter if they supported the US or the Iraqi opposition, they were sent back to their death. The plans outlined for Fallujah by the US were starting to look a lot like the early stages of the genocide at Srebrenica in July of 1995. But the Serbian military did truck the women and children out of the city before the massacre. The US did not. The exit roads to the city were closed and the occupying US forces were sure not to let anyone out. The bombing attacks killed whole families, including babies and pregnant women.

                After the bombing campaign, the US sent in the ground troops to finish off the city. The NY Times even reported that at the beginning of the ground campaign, “patients and hospital employees were rushed out of rooms by armed soldiers and ordered to sit or lie on the floor while troops tied their hands behind their backs.” People that were in the hospital because of the “conflict” – which, let’s remember that the US uses the word conflict, as a euphemism for US aggression – or for any other reason were removed from care and tied up. This was also a horrible violation of the Geneva Conventions, which state that “fixed establishments and mobile medical units of the Medical Service may in no circumstance be attacked, but shall at all times be respected and protected by the Parties of the conflict.”

                The US bombing campaign had destroyed the Central Health Center in Fallujah. One doctor was able to escape and reported that at least “thirty-five patients and twenty-four staff” had been killed in the initial bombing campaign. Shortly after the attack, the entire health center collapsed on itself and the people inside. The US leadership said that these reports were “unsubstantiated”. There is only one hospital that survived the attack that has inpatient care, but the access to this hospital was impeded by US forces. In another gross violation of the Geneva Conventions and international law, the US denied the Iraqi Red Crescent from entering Fallujah. This was despite the fact that the Iraqi Red Crescent was given a UN mandate to “meet the needs of the people of the local population facing a huge crisis.”

                Joe Carr of the Christian Peacemakers Team described the situation as a “painful similarity” to the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories in which he had just came from. Assistance and aid was held up for many hours at the very limited entry points to the city, more for harassment than for security. The occupying US army would regularly destroy produce in the city where food was scarce and prices were high because of the US control of all things that came into the city. The US-forces were blocking ambulances from transporting people for medical treatment. Dozens of people are forced to pack themselves into a “burned out shell” of a building as a home.  And of course all the other acts of brutality that are seen in the Palestinian territories, such as blowing up of homes, assault and murder of innocent civilians. Carr wrote that the “ruins of Fallujah, are even worse than Rafah in the Gaza Strip” which has been completely destroyed by the Israeli (with US help) occupation.

                Where was the media and the responsible journalism on this near-genocidal action by the US. Outside the US it did exist but inside we saw much of the same propaganda and lies as always. CNN described the situation as the US military “achieved nearly all their objectives well ahead of schedule,” as “much of the city lay in smoking ruins.” There is a front-page story in which the author interviewed a senior marine commander who says that the attack in Fallujah “ought to go down in the history books.”

                Responsible journalism was not even considered. Al-Jazeera, which is the most critical new channel in the Arab world, was openly criticized by US officials because they had “emphasized civilian casualties” in Fallujah, as if this was irresponsible reporting. The US showed later how it would deal with what it perceived as problematic media. The US kicked Al-Jazeera out of the country as the US prepared to prop up a pro-US leader in the “free” elections.

                Even if you are to look up reports of Fallujah in the US media sources today, you will find inaccurate accounts of what happened there. The media acts as if it was a battle. The media constantly says that “most of the civilian population” was able to flee the city. I am not arguing that no one was able to flee the city but most is a horrible misrepresentation.

                The destruction of Iraqi cities and specifically historical artifacts, historical and religious buildings, documents and other treasures that defined Iraqi civilization has not been seen since the time of Hulagu Khan. And that is why I think he was making the comparison. Modern cities like Fallujah have been utterly destroyed. The US has not only destroyed the physical necessities of Iraqi life but also thousands of years of cultural history. All of this in the name of “Iraqi Freedom”. Freedom that has seen a decline in wages by at least 50%, the destruction and stealing of jobs, and significant food shortages. An operation that destroyed cities and sent Iraq from a relatively advanced society - with modern hospitals and medicine - to over 500,000 Iraqi children who are suffering from malnutrition. Acute malnutrition doubled in Iraq within sixteen months of the occupation. It has dropped below the levels of Uganda and Haiti, two of the most desperate populations on the planet. 

Documentaries to learn more...

Fallujah: The Hidden Massacre 

Fallujah: The Real Story 

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Ron Paul: The Issues

   I recently read an article in Rasmussen that talked about the issues that are most important to Americans. In a series of polls, Rasmussen determined that the economy (unemployment, debt etc..) was the most important issue to Americans. Following behind was health care, foreign policy, government corruption, and social issues such as gay marriage and abortion. I want to lay out Ron Paul's policies on these most important issues.

Economy

  

   Ron Paul is an advocate for the Austrian school of economics which essentially argues that a free-market is the only true regulator of the market. The "free-market" is going to weed out any irresponsible or corrupt business practices and of course the inept businesses. Its a kind of economic Darwinism.  Any government interference will only make the problem worse and that economic planning or socialism is going to lead to much larger problems then the ones they were attempting to address. In the end socialism (government managed economic policies) will lead to a totalitarian state. You can read more about this in The Road to Serfdom by F.A Hayek. Ron Paul traces our economic issues back to 1913.

   In 1913, Congress adopted the Federal Reserve Act which gave congressional powers to a private institution, the Federal Reserve. Congressional powers are laid out in Article 1. Section 8 of the Constitution. The include that only gold and silver should be legal tender. This is where Ron Paul traces our current economic problems to. Congress gave their power to a private institution that is not answerable to the people and only to what interest they determine necessary. I must add that the Fed charges interest on the money that is created for the US government. Congress could  create this money on their own without interest and that should be enough to want to end the Federal Reserve. The US owes more money to the Federal Reserve because of this process then it does to China.

   The big banks were behind the creation of the Fed and the adoption of the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. You can read about this in The Creature from Jekyll Island by G. Edward Griffin. Ron Paul argues that this central bank is unconstitutional. The Constitution explicitly prohibited a central bank from controlling the nation's money supply, Jefferson warned about these exceptional powers. 

"The central bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the Principles and form of our Constitution. I am an Enemy to all banks discounting bills or notes for anything but Coin. If the American People allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the People of all their Property until their Children will wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered." - Thomas Jefferson

   Ron Paul believes that this is the underlying issue with the economy. The Fed has been seen as a convenience or as protection by the masses because they don't clearly understand the implications of the Fed. Read End the Fed by Ron Paul if you want to learn more. In reality, the Fed is able to create money out of thin air, the dictate the value of the dollar, and to manipulate interest rates in order to serve the big money interests that lobby for them in Washington. A safety net was created to ensure that the big banks, corporations and Wall Street would be protected from their immoral activities. The Fed acts as big money's safety net. It does not work for the people of the United States.

   The Fed's manipulation of the money system creates a boom-bust cycle. The boom comes when the Fed lowers interest rates and pumps a bunch more money into circulation. In reality, this is just Bernanke authorizing someone to punch a number into a computer screen, which is not truly creating more wealth. Banks start lending to anyone. It's an artificial boom. Then the Fed has to reel it in a bit. It raises interest rates, inflation sets in, and people cannot get more money to support the debt they just put themselves in. The recession is inevitable. Ron Paul predicted the collapse of the housing market and the economic meltdown of 2008. He argues that the longer you prolong the inevitable collapse the worse it will get. The bailout's and stimulus packages are just prolonging the inevitable. The more money the Fed creates the worse the problem is going to get. 

   Ron Paul talks about inflation a lot. Inflation is not just rising prices, it is really the increase of the money supply which results in the former. If more money is in circulation then one unit has less value, hence higher prices. Then because of the fractional-reserve system, the banks are allowed to lend out 90% of that credit that was created, the money enters the system and is lent out many times over. Many people are holding the same fabricated wealth. What if everyone cashed in? They would all be trying to get the same money. There would not be enough. 

   Inflation takes its toll on the lower and middle classes. If you look at 1930s Germany, you can see what hyperinflation will do to a middle class, completely wipe it out. Then through bailouts, the money is taken from the middle and lower classes and is given to the wealthy. What a system huh? Not only are the lower and middle classes bailing out the rich, they are also the first to lose their jobs in a recession, and inflation is going to affect them much more then the rich. The Fed does this on a daily basis, creating money in order to fund wars or bailout their buddies and the lower and middle classes just bend over. 

   Ron Paul also talks about the gold standard. This plays in to the whole creation of money because before 1972, US notes were backed by a resource of actual wealth. Now, since Bretton Woods, the Fed does not have a standard and they can create as much money as they want. It does not matter how much actual wealth the country has because they have the unlimited printing press.

   Ron Paul has argued and argues, rather vehemently, that we ultimately have to address monetary policy and the Fed's control of it, if we want to address our economic problems in this country. The actions that can be taken to curtail the power of the Fed are out there but ultimately, getting rid of it is the optimal recourse. If he became president he would work to cut taxes and cut spending. This is unheard of in Washington and sounds utopian but it makes sense if you listen to the man. 

   He suggests that we eliminate our foreign policy that is only in place to secure the economic interests of the elite. Do we realize how much money this would free up? Think of our Defense budget (880 billion), NATO (600 billion), UN (not sure), military support to other countries etc... We are talking in the trillions of dollars a year. I will get more into this below. He also says that we should eliminate the IRS, the CIA, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Education, etc.. He argues that federal bureaucracies such as the departments are wasteful and mismanaged and that the people are competent enough to run their own schools, their own hospitals etc.. and don't need some federal bureaucracy telling them how and what they should be doing. If you take those funds and allocate them at a much smaller level, the needs of that specific region could be better addressed. 

   Ron Paul suggests that we go back to the gold standard (or any standard with actual tangible wealth), that we balance our budget by eliminating unnecessary spending and we END THE FED, which would cease the creation of money out of nothing. If the government can just print money, they will never have to cut spending and therefore can ensure their re-election.

   Obama is proposing a policy made famous by Reagan. He says that we are going to raise taxes for the moment and then we will set up committees to look into cutting spending. Ha, its all bologna, he does not plan to cut spending. Reagan never did, even though he promised to cut $3 of spending for every $1 in increased taxes. Also the Balanced Budget Amendment is not being written by the Obama administration. He is just paying us a bunch more lip service. Ron Paul believes if you eliminate the criminal monetary policy the economy will truly boom and our economic issues will be alleviated.

Health Care

   I am going to shorten the sections, I promise. Ron Paul sees the problems of health care as issues of our political history, monetary policy and government management. He believes that the "free-market" can deliver health care more effectively and much more inexpensively. He traces the problems back to the early seventies, when Nixon introduced "manage care" policies. The government basically decided that they needed to play a part in health care and needed to direct funds to the health care system. With this came mandates and forced all people to participate in the health care system. 

    From this "manage care", corporate medicine developed. Companies and big interests that have the best access to government funds became the dictators of health care in this country. Drug companies and insurance companies lobbied there way into receiving funds and now basically run the health care system. Not only did they start receiving massive funds, they also imposed their interest on government health care policies so that the policies benefited them and not people who need health care. This made the system very ineffective.

   The costs of medical care began to rise because insurance costs were rising. By giving the power to big drug and insurance companies, and through inflation, costs have risen. This is  mostly because there is little competition in health care. The government has subsidized the monopolization of a few companies. With less competition, big companies are able to keep prices high. The government started mandating more licenses and certificates that are expensive and did not allow all to participate independently of these big companies. Look at plastic surgery as an example. Insurance does not cover cosmetic plastic surgery, which made surgeons fight for business through prices. The prices of plastic surgery have all fallen while all other medical costs have gone up.

   Insurance is intended to measure risk, assess the risk and then provide insurance accordingly. It was originally intended to protect people from accidents and major diseases such as cancer. But since insurance companies have dictated policy, they now cover regular checkups, drugs,etc... If insurance is going to cover the bill for everything then they are going to drive prices up. Before the 70s and even into the 90s it was very inexpensive to go in and get a regular check up because it was not covered under insurance. Now the insurance companies are dictating the price of health care. 

   With the government protecting these large companies, and paying the bill a lot of the time, facilities are going to charge the most for care instead of competing for business by offering the lowest prices. The same works for insurance, when insurance is covering the bill, the facility will charge the most they can. We see this phenomena in all different walks of life. And to fix the problem, the people are asking the government (who created the problem) to fix the problem. 

   We are going from corporate medicine which was extremely ineffective to socialized medicine, government managed medicine. Back to the solution Nixon came up with in the 70s which is the root of the existing problem. Paul argues that we should reintroduce the notion that people have the right to choose. He argues that medical costs should not be dictated by the government in coalition with Big Pharma and insurance companies but by true competition in a free market. 

Foreign Policy

   Ron Paul is very clear on how he feels about foreign policy. He believes that our intervention throughout the world is the biggest threat to our national security. He believes that we need to mind our own business and stay out of the affairs of other countries. That we should use diplomacy instead of coercion by force. We do this mainly to ensure our economic interests throughout the world so you can't forget that. Our monetary policy goes hand-in-hand with our foreign policy. In order to police the world and maintain our empire, we have to employ the foreign policy that we do. 

   He also makes the constitutional argument, that we can only go to war if Congress declares war. This has not been the trend. The founders made the same argument, they warned about foreign entanglements and advised us to be friends with other countries. Basically the suggested using diplomacy and not just running around imposing our will on weaker countries. Which is one of the main problems the founders had with British policy, how they treated their colonies. So why are we making the same mistakes we revolted against in the first place. Well, because of our economic policy. 

   No candidates are proposing that we cut our foreign policy expenditures. Look at Obama's record. He continued wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, went to war in Libya, Pakistan, Yemen, and now Syria. He is also fomenting a war with Iran. Its the same thing all over. From 2004-2008 the US acquired 10 trillion dollars in debt just from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And that is just the debt, that does not include what the tax payer paid for. Ron Paul argues if you want to address economic problems at home, you have to eliminate foreign adventurism in order to secure economic interests.  

   The US always goes to war on "humanitarian" grounds. But come on, when have we ever done anything for purely humanitarian reasons. Let's look at the track record. Rwanda, Cambodia, Sudan, the Philippines, Indonesia all saw near or genocidal actions by the government. Did the US race over there to save humanity? No, because we don't have economic interests that needed to be protected. Then we have Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan. Do we have economic and strategic interests there? Yes we do and that is why we are there. Not to mention, most of these leaders are not the ruthless dictators we portray them to be. 

   If we stopped propping up dictators then we wouldn't even have the humanitarian issues that we see around the world. But the US put these men in power to ensure their economic interests, then when it comes to light that they are killing people, we run over there to ensure our economic interests and prop up another dictator. Its all pretty stupid.

   It is what Ron Paul refers to when he says "blowback". Chalmers Johnston wrote the book Blowback, which talks about the results of our actions in other countries. Ron Paul advocates this foreign policy. If you prop up dictators, support terrorist groups, overthrow governments, exploit populations and resources, there will be ramifications of your actions. This is the reason for 9/11 (maybe?), but definitely the hostage crisis of 1980, other terrorist attacks, the current hostage crisis in Egypt etc.. If we want to maintain imperialist policies we cannot be surprised when people fight back. Come on, what would we do if another country was doing the same to us? We would fight back and have.

Government Corruption

   Ron Paul has been consistent for over 30 years. He has been the one trying expose the government for its corruption. I think to address this, you only have to look at his voting record. He is not a corrupt politician, he does not get his contributions from Wall Street, Big Pharma, big banks or the military industrial complex like Obama or Mitt. I think this is one of the most obvious truths about Ron Paul, the man is not corrupt.

   He does not and will not participate in the lucrative congressional pension program. He has never voted to raise congressional pay. Who doesn't vote that they should get a raise. He has never taken a government paid junket. He never voted to increase the power of the executive branch. He has never voted to raise taxes. He has never voted for an unbalanced budget. He didn't vote for the Patriot Act. He is against internet censorship. He voted against the Iraq war and opposes all other wars. 

   

Gay Marriage

   Ron Paul said that they "can do whatever they want and call it whatever they want". He doesn't believe it is up to the government to determine what is marriage and what isn't. He thinks the government should just get out of it. He believes that churches and private contractors should be able to decide for themselves who they will marry and who they won't. 

   He believes that every person is entitled to their own standards on marriage. He says that he has his own standards and should not impose those standards on to others. Also others should not be allowed to impose their standards on to him. I think this is a very noble stance, we are all so quick to tell others how they should be living. But with this like anything, Ron Paul believes that all people have an inherent amount of personal liberty, that people are free to choose how they live their lives. 

   He believes if it is to be decided by the government it should happen on a state level. Each individual state should determine what is best for their state. He expresses this in his support for the Defense of Marriage Act. It is often improperly stated that Ron Paul voted yes on this because he wants marriage to be defined as the union between one man and one women. If you listen to him talk about it he says first, that he did not vote on it but he did endorse it. He says he endorsed it because it gave state's protection from the federal government decisions on marriage.