Hallelullah!
It works.
We blew the shit out of them.
We blew the shit right back up their own ass
And out their fucking ears.
It works.
We blew the shit out of them.
They suffocated in their own shit!
Hallelullah.
Praise the Lord for all good things.
We blew them into fucking shit.
They are eating it.
Praise the Lord for all good things.
We blew their balls into shards of dust,
Into shards of fucking dust.
We did it.
Now I want you to come over here and kiss me on the mouth.
Harold Pinter -- American Football
(A Reflection upon the Gulf War)
Once a week the POTUS – Barack "This is contrary to who we are" Obama – meets with the military and the "intelligence" community and decides who to murder. Advise to Michelle Obama: Never rub your husband the wrong way. IANAL, but this is warrant-less, court-less, cold-blooded murder, and therefore IMHO in violation of *EVERY* law – US and international, civil and military – written for the protection of people against being robbed of their life.
It would be bad enough if the military went, based on an "presidential murder decree" (is this something like a fatwa? Or more like a ukaz?), and apprehended a person, identified him (without a doubt) and then execute him (or rather Mafia style: execute him, make some trophy photos as evidence for the boss, and then proceed to dump the corpse in the ocean). It is be bad enough that those in power in Washington murder without habeaus corpus. It is already bad enough that they only denied their murder victims a fair trial for their crimes (real and imaginary). But Washington does not care to actually find out what those murder victims did, Washington does not care to find out if they actually did all those evil things.
But what is even worse is that the US murder machine does not even bother to properly check someone's identity before killing them. And why should they? Washington does not even need to check the identity of their murder victims after they kill people! In a tradition going back to (at least) the "Vietnam" war, every person killed by the US military is declared an "enemy". Kill, and don't ask questions.
On the topic of "quality assurance", I would say leading a "war on terror" like that should not be considered "good practice".
An huge problem arises because the "war on terror" is an "asymmetric" war. For a "normal" war the rules are (somewhat simplified): You can stop the enemy by any means necessary (including killing the enemy, but not including cruel means) if you are engaged with him – and the enemy can be readily identified because his soldiers wear different uniforms than yours.* As an example: You are wearing an US army uniform and mowed down with your machine gun a group of people wearing an Wehrmacht uniform, who were running across the street 100 yards from your position? Good job! Get a cookie! That is the advantage of a clearly identifiable enemy. Mow down in the same street a group of people wearing civilian cloth? Uh, uh. Better hide that war crime. That's the beauty of the Hague Conventions. Easy and instant quality assurance!
But in an asymmetric war? The enemy is not different from an civilian in a readily identifiable way (unless he is foolish enough to drive an "tactical" pickup truck, or carry an RPG). Whether in the post-2001 failed state of Afghanistan, or in the post-2003 failed state of Iraq (with the survival of both failed states hinging on the continued military support of US): Civilians are routinely armed. Civilians wear the same cloth, drive the same vehicles, and even carry the same weapons as "insurgents" or "al Qaeda operatives". So if you have an regular army operating by the same rules as in "normal" war – identify the enemy, kill the enemy – but no longer have criteria by which your army grunts can clearly tell an enemy from an civilian, you get a huge problem. Cue in "collateral murder": They have identified the enemy, they have killed the enemy. Good job, get a cookie. And nobody in the military even notices that they have just committed an war crime. Like everyday. Probably. Nobody knows. Nobody cares.
Because everybody killed by the US is per definition an enemy. Simple as pie.
The Hague Conventions does not apply here. All those rules that are meant to protect the civilians, and limit warfare to the armies of the belligerents just flew out of the window. People living in some poor country the US is waging war against (or using any some form of "restricted" military force, or somesuch euphemism) have no protection against being falsely killed.
Image how many people (so called "civilians" or even "innocent civilians") have been killed, poeple who's sole "crime" was that the lived in a country that found itself at the wrong end of the US military machine? And the US does not even apologize for these killings. How could they, if they don't even investigate them. Imagine what it does to the population of such an country if the US kills and maims countless civilians (and they are countless, as the US does not bother to actually count them) without even the slightest bit of remorse? Would you be motivated to fight against the USA after having your friends and relatives murdered like that?
But shouldn't there be legal restrictions that protect people against being falsely killed? False imprisonment can be made undone. But a false killing? How do you undo that? And aren't there already legal restrictions already? Like "international laws" and "human rights"? And shouldn't those restrictions be more demanding than those against being falsely imprisoned? And shouldn't we enforce those "international laws"? Draw a red line? Maybe bomb Washington? At least a little bit? One Tomahawk for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and one for the Capitol, and one for the Pentagon? You know, to send a signal. Maybe bomb a TV station in Atlanta and a military hospital in Bethesda? Destroy some bridges in New York? Or how about some signature drone-strikes against US generals? Or one could bomb the shit out of the Los Angeles harbour? And as icing on the cake, maybe impose some crippling trade sanctions to bring the US back to the negotiation table? Freeze the bank accounts of all US citizens? After all, this is the way transgressions of international law (real and imaginary) are usually punished by the US imperial machine.
Speaking of falsely imprisoning someone: In Guantanamo almost 200 people still languish in an extra-legal limbo, now for over a decade, their access to the legal system, lawyers and even basic information severely restricted (not that the crooked US legal system would help much). IANAL, but regardless whether you consider them PoW or suspected(!) criminals, this is in violation of *EVERY* law, US and international, civil and military, written for the protection of people against being robbed of their freedom. Out of the almost 800 people who had been interned in Gitmo, only 7(!) had been sentenced by a court to have done something that would warrant a punishment – for comparison, in the same time 9 prisoners have died in Gitmo.
Now the extra-legal limbo of Gitmo would be bad enough, but you will be hard pressed to find a prisoner of Gitmo who had *not* been subjected to several forms of cruel and unusual punishment. Prisoners, 99% of who had *not even* been charged with any crime by a court of law. These human beings were transported shackled, gagged, hooded, chained to the floor of a cargo plane – like cattle, I want to write. But even if the human rights would not apply to these prisoners, you couldn't treat a cow in the US like that. These prisoners were depraved of sleep by being exposed in their cells for day and night to bright lights and loud music (and don't think the US military played their favourite music – I take it they liked to play Heavy Metal). Many had been waterboarded multiple times, a form of torture that is indistinguishable from drowning for the prisoner. The target was, I take it, that the prisoner confesses to their crimes (I take it KSM admitted to shooting Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, setting fire to the Reichstag in Berlin, while working for our eternal enemy Eastasia).
Granted, some of the worst transgressions happened during "Dubya" Bush, not during "contrary to who we are" Obama. Yes, the brutal force feeding of hunger-striking prisoners happened while Bush was commander in chief – but it continues on Obama's watch. This is the only means the prisoners have left to petition the government for redress of grievances: refusing to eat, to starve themselves, to death if necessary. (But then again they are probably not "people" in the sense of the US constitution, and the "contrary to who we are" Obama administration is not "their" government). Not only are those protesting prisoners brutally force fed, but it is insisted that it is for their best. And to add insult to injury, those who died in the past as a result of their protest, who have took their life in protest of torture, those are maligned as doing it to spread terror in their terrorist-ways – as if it was their great terrorist plan to get captured, cruelly punished and then to protest it by the only means left to them.
The extra-legal limbo and torturous treatment in Gitmo alone would have been bad enough, but the prisoners who reached Gitmo had it good, I take it. Many did not survive long enough to be shackled, gagged, hooded and strapped to the floor of a cargo plane.
There are those prisoners (supposedly surrendered "al Qaeda" fighters) who died in containers at Sheberghan prison, as recounted in "Afghan Massacre: The Convoy of Death". How many died? Nobody knows. To cite Pinter: It never happened. Nothing ever happened. Even while it was happening it wasn't happening. It didn't matter. It was of no interest. Where were the cries that the UN is doing nothing to stop this? It didn't matter, as the prisoners fought for al Qaeda. Has General Dostum, an US ally, been investigated for these alleged crimes? That was of no interest to the US. Dostum still does politics, without being threatened by the US like Assad is now. By the way, it seems to have never been of interest that Dostum fought on the Soviet side in the eighties – Dostum changed his allegiance fast enough, and after all, an ally is an ally, right?
Then there is the way in which many prisoners landed in the custody of the US. You see, when the minds of US citizens are not occupied by bombing the shit out of far away nations, then their thoughts start to revolve around money. So Americans seem to think it is a good idea to pay a substantial prize for every "al Qaeda fighter" they get delivered by the local Afghans tribes – no questions asked. So the local tribes round up some unlucky fools (be it some foreign fool, or some unlucky chaps from some rival tribe) and sell them to the US. And the Americans say: "If the locals say these are al Qaede fighters, then by god they must be al Qaeda fighters." Why bother to find out the truth? Nobody ever got in trouble for falsely imprisoning an "al Qaeda" member (real or imaginary) – and quality assurance is unnecessary work after all.
Leaving shortly Afghanistan, I suppose one could write books on the topic of "extraordinary renditions". And expect lengthy apologies by the US government. Possibly something along the line: "This is contrary to who we are." And maybe someone from Fort Benning (Florida) would disagree: "No, this exactly who we are." I leave the topic of extraordinary renditions to the so inclined reader, as it would burst this already lengthy column.
Then there is Bagram, which alone should be basis for the US to never stop apologizing. The "Bagram Theater Internment Facility" (as it was known among other names) did give Abu Ghraib a run for its money. What was used by the US at these sites as "interrogation methods", like for example "stress positions", had been developed by SS-"doctors" in KZ-camps. But of course it is a dirty rumor that Henry K. Beecher had learned these torture methods from Walter Schreiber (who had been involved in human experiments in KZ-camps) at the CIA run "Villa Schuster" facility in Kronberg ("Camp King", West-Germany) during the cold war. So of course it is an coincidence that the US uses fascist KZ-camp torture methods.
And there are supposedly still prisoners in Bagram.
For some prisoners that US had in their custody, it got worse after they had been flown out of Afghanistan. As Bob Baer put it:
If you want a serious interrogation, you send a prisoner to Jordan. If you want them to be tortured, you send them to Syria. If you want someone to disappear—never to see them again—you send them to EgyptWait, what? The US extradited prisoners to Syria to be tortured? Isn't Assad like Hitler, or something? Were was the outcry of the political class back then? Surely it must be a shameless lie that the US worked together with Syria! Otherwise the current US government would have to apologize for this, now wouldn't it? Right? RIGHT?
Right.
Then in addition to countries like Syria, Egypt or Jorda – which could be used as convenient "black holes" for unwanted humans – there were countless black sites jointly created by the US and (among others) the "democracies" of "New Europe". How many have there been? What happened there? Are they still operating? Has there been an investigation? I apologize for again using that Pinter quote: It never happened. Nothing ever happened. Even while it was happening it wasn't happening. It didn't matter. It was of no interest. Well at least Obama closed those black sites, though it is hard to assert what has and has not been done in that regard.
If it is true that the black sites no longer operate, than a reasonable assumption is that the system of "extraordinary renditions" has simply been replaced be the "presidential murder decrees" – by US President "contrary to who we are" Obama. Give him a Nobelprize for Peace for that! Why extra-legally kidnap and torture people, when you can simply murder them? Much cheaper, and less fuss.
So, how should one classify those acts ordered by the POTUS? The political class makes very fine distinctions that such acts are not warfare (even so it is part of a so called "war on terror"). A very nuanced vocabulary is used when other nations are attacked by the USA, the euphemistic character of which goes all the way to eleven:
- An (limited) intervention (the military is doing stuff the military does, but this is most definitely not war)
- Sending a signal (possibly by bombing the communication infrastructure)
- Drawing a red line (as opposed to threatening a nation with war)
- If necessary: low intensity warfare (and promised to be 100% free of war crimes and 100% free of civilian deaths, but 100% the same taste as real war – or your money back!)
- The afore mentioned fight against terrorism (as opposed to committing acts of terrorism against an civilian population)
- Bringing someone to the negotiation table (where one resides supposedly all the time, and not at the warfare table, where only the enemy resides)
- And most of all: upholding international law (which is constantly broken by the enemy, and it falls again and again to the US government and its valiant military to restore international law, alone) in order to keep the world a safe place (Yeah!)
So again, what are these "presidential murder decrees", and the acts committed based on them? Are they act of wars? Contrary to what the political class in the US claims, these acts bear some hallmark features of acts of war. For these acts, the US uses mainly military means (I sure hope that kill lists and murder-drones will never be considered part of reasonable police work). These acts thoroughly lack criminal investigation and due process. The information basis is – as with all "intelligence" information – dubious at best. The legal basis is thin ice, which would not stand in any legal system worth the name. These acts are not directed at apprehending and questioning a suspect. (Why do I even have to write this? Shouldn't this be obvious?). That it is not a declared war (declared in the classical sense, as not even the "war on terror" had ever been formally declared in any way by any side) does not really make things better. De facto, these are acts of war.
But if these are acts of war, then probably they should be considered war crimes. Persons "hors de combat" (outside of combat), and those not taking part in hostilities, shall be protected and treated humanely – or so Wikipedia claims. The political class must therefore claim that these acts are not, and can not be considered, acts of war.
Fine, what about the contrary position, that these acts are not acts of war? After all, the targets of these presidential kill lists live in a murky twilight of not really being considered as "soldiers of an army" by the Hague Conventions. But what position would kill lists and murder-drones have in international law or any "civilian" legal system? The simple answer is that no Rechtsstaat – a "state of justice" – can operate like that and still be considered a state in which there exists justice. There is however a term for states in which the head of state orders people to be killed without oversight through an independent legal system: Such a state is called an dictatorship.
But what are these acts then, if they are not warfare? Imagine the Head of State of Iran, Russia or Syria ordering such acts based on whimsical "intelligence", and they would be rightfully branded as state terrorism. And that is what they are: Terrorism, no qualifier needed. And it is only through the American military might, and the collaboration of "US-friendly" governments, that it is possible to keep such acts of blatant disrespect for international law in a Heisenberg like state of being both acts of war and not being acts of war – existing outside of international law, unchecked and unchallenged. America is enforcing its grotesque version of international law, and not for the "benefit of the nation" (nor for the benefit of its population), but in the interest and for the benefit of a ravenous alliance between political class, military and capital.
When John Pilger wrote about "the silent military coup that took over Washington", one of his main points was that the US military has an relinquishing grip on US (foreign) policy, an grip that remained untouched by "contrary to who we are" Obama. After all, Obama said it quite clearly when he remarked that the "Afghan" war (and therefore the "war on terror") is a war of necessity. The military however came to power long before Obama. Pilger carefully avoided to pin-point the time this coup had happened. One could argue that the military–industrial complex is as old as the Pentagon, and was forged in the Second World War (as Eisenhower infamously tried to warn us about). One could argue that the Monroe doctrine formally established US militarism (and imperialism) a good hundred years before WWII, to reign in a era when the US military was used both inside and outside of the USA (with its expanding territory) in the interest of American corporations, banks and generally America's financial interests. Or one could go back fifty years before that to the American Revolutionary War, and polemically claim that rich white fucks used military force in their own interests (mainly to rid themselves of the rivals for power, in the form of British feudalism and imperialism), laying the foundation for US militarism. And speaking of British imperialism: One could probably argue that there is a good bit of British heritage in US imperialism. Arguably imperialism packed with a bit more proclaimed civil liberties and rights to make it more palatable for the masses. (Rights which in effect mainly protect those old white males wielding power in the name of US imperialism, rights which were not made for women, or blacks, or – good god! – slaves when the "Union" started its imperial business.)
My point is: This is nothing new. Michael Parenti was once asked (and I paraphrase here): "Is Iraq like Vietnam?", to which he answered "No. But Washington is still Washington."
But yeah, "we" urgently need to bomb the shit out of Syria. It is for the good of the Syrian people that we bomb the shit out of them. Their human rights demand it that we bomb the shit out of them. Gavrilo Princip (alone) started the first world war, and Hitler (alone) the second. Assad is like Hitler, therefore we have to bomb Syria, there is no way round. It is the right thing to do for Washington, as it always have been the right thing to bomb Hitler, as it was America that killed Hitler. The Russians are protecting Assad, as they have never done anything to fight against Hitler.
Munich 1938: The international community is paralysed by Russia's veto, which prevents action to be taken against Hitler.
9th of May 2005, the 60th anniversary of the end of fascist Germany: Like every year Russia celebrates its decision to do nothing against Hitler.
// This is a generic comment on the United States of America
// I could have written more (maybe), but what I have written is already too much in every respect
// Adjust things like $POTUS_NAME and $ENEMY_NAME were needed, and add current US transgressions to keep it up to date
// Don't ever attempt to create a exhaustive list of US transgressions
// Any sarcasm is intentional
Let me add one last thing. Harold Pinter once read an excerpt from Pablo Neruda's "I'm Explaining a Few Things" in the context of the 2003 war against Iraq:
And one morning all that was burning,Harold Pinter then added:
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood.
Jackals that the jackals would despise
stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers that the vipers would abominate.
Face to face with you I have seen the blood
of Spain tower like a tide
to drown you in one wave
of pride and knives.
Treacherous generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain:
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.
And you will ask: why doesn't his poetry speak of dreams and leaves
and the great volcanoes of his native land.
Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood in the streets.
Let me make it quite clear that in quoting from Neruda's poem I am in no way comparing Republican Spain to Saddam Hussein's Iraq. I quote Neruda because nowhere in contemporary poetry have I read such a powerful visceral description of the bombing of civilians.I have nothing to add to that.
--
* The Hague Conventions became necessary as the governments were leading wars that were more and more ugly, much more ugly than wars already were – hence some rules were needed to keep the business of killing thy enemy a bit "civilized", to remain acceptable in the population (nobody minds killing an dangerous enemy, but slaughtering "innocent" civilians makes it all to clear what wars are about…). BTW: Special, more murky rules apply when one is not directly engaged with the enemy. It was probably the bombing of civilians through the fascist Luftwaffe, followed by the retaliationary bombing of civilians through the RAF a few years later (as at the time it was the main thing the RAF was build to do) that made it acceptable to bomb civilians. This regression should have been rolled back – but then again if you start questioning parts of "modern" warfare, you might end up questioning the entire business of war, war that is usually fought in the name of some never quite clearly defined "national interests", so better not go there…
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