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Today's
Stories
November
1 / 2, 2003
Saul Landau
Cui
Bono? The Cuba Embargo as Rip Off
October 31, 2003
Lee Ballinger
Making
a Dollar Out of 15 Cents: The Sweatshops of Sean "P. Diddy"
Combs
Wayne
Madsen
The
GOP's Racist Trifecta
Michael Donnelly
Settling for Peanuts: Democrats Trick the Greens, Treat Big Timber
Patrick
Cockburn
Baghdad
Diary: Iraqis are Naming Their New Babies "Saddam"
Elaine
Cassel
Coming
to a State Near You: The Matrix (Interstate Snoops, Not the Movie)
October 30, 2003
Forrest
Hylton
Popular
Insurrection and National Revolution in Bolivia
Eric Ruder
"We Have to Speak Out!": Marching with the Military
Families
Dave Lindorff
Big
Lies and Little Lies: The Meaning of "Mission Accomplished"
Philip
Adams
"Everyone is Running Scared": Denigrating Critics of
Israel
Sean Donahue
Howard Dean: a Hawk in a Dove's Cloak
Robert
Jensen
Big Houses & Global Justice: A Moral Level of Consumption?
Alexander
Cockburn
Paul
Krugman: Part of the Problem
October
29, 2003
Chris
Floyd
Thieves
Like Us: Cheney's Backdoor to Halliburton
Robert Fisk
Iraq Guerrillas Adopt a New Strategy: Copy the Americans
Rick Giombetti
Let
Them Eat Prozac: an Interview with David Healy
The Intelligence
Squad
Dark
Forces? The Military Steps Up Recruiting of Blacks
Elaine
Cassel
Prosecutors
as Therapists, Phantoms as Terrorists
Marie Trigona
Argentina's War on the Unemployed Workers Movement
Gary Leupp
Every
Day, One KIA: On the Iraq War Casualty Figures
October
28, 2003
Rich Gibson
The
Politics of an Inferno: Notes on Hellfire 2003
Uri Avnery
Incident
in Gaza
Diane
Christian
Wishing
Death
Robert
Fisk
Eyewitness
in Iraq: "They're Getting Better"
Toni Solo
Authentic Americans and John Negroponte
Jason
Leopold
Halliburton in Iran
Shrireen Parsons
When T-shirts are Verboten
Chris
White
9/11
in Context: a Marine Veteran's Perspective
October 27, 2003
William
A. Cook
Ministers
of War: Criminals of the Cloth
David
Lindorff
The
Times, Dupes and the Pulitzer
Elaine
Cassel
Antonin
Scalia's Contemptus Mundi
Robert
Fisk
Occupational Schizophrenia
John Chuckman
Banging Your Head into Walls
Seth Sandronsky
Snoops R Us
Bill Kauffman
George
Bush, the Anti-Family President
October
25 / 26, 2003
Robert
Pollin
The
US Economy: Another Path is Possible
Jeffrey St. Clair
Outsourcing US Guided Missile Technology to China
James
Bunn
Plotting
Pre-emptive Strikes
Saul Landau
Should Limbaugh Do Time?
Ted Honderich
Palestinian Terrorism, Morality & Germany
Thomas Nagy
Saving the Army of Peace
Christopher
Brauchli
Between Bush and a Lobotomy: Killing Endangered Species for Profit
Laura Carlsen
Latin America's Archives of Terror
Diane
Christian
Evil Acts & Evil Actors
Muqtedar Khan
Lessons from the Imperial Adventure in Iraq
John Feffer
The Tug of War on the Korea Peninsula
Brian Cloughley
Iraq War Memories are Made of Lies
Benjamin
Dangl
and Kathryn Ledebur
An Uneasy Peace in Bolivia
Karyn
Strickler
Down
with Big Brother's Spying Eyes
Noah Leavitt
Legal Globalization
John Stanton
Hitler's Ghost Haunts America
Mickey
Z.
War of the Words
Adam Engel
Tractatus Ridiculous
Poets'
Basement
Curtis, Subiet and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Project Last Stand
October
24, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft's
War on Greenpeace
Lenni Brenner
The Demographics of American Jews
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Rockets,
Napalm, Torpedoes and Lies: the Attack on the USS Liberty Revisited
Sarah Weir
Cover-up of the Israeli Attack on the US Liberty
David
Krieger
WMD Found in DC: Bush is the Button
Mohammed Hakki
It's Palestine, Stupid!: Americans and the Middle East
Harry
Browne
Northern
Ireland: the Agreement that Wasn't
October
23, 2003
Diane
Christian
Ruthlessness
Kurt Nimmo
Criticizing Zionism
David Lindorff
A General Theory of Theology
Alan Maass
The Future of the Anti-War Movement
William
Blum
Imperial
Indifference
Stew Albert
A Memo
October
22, 2003
Wayne
Madsen
Religious
Insanity Runs Rampant
Ray McGovern
Holding
Leaders Accountable for Lies
Christopher
Brauchli
There's
No Civilizing the Death Penalty
Elaine
Cassel
Legislators
and Women's Bodies
Bill Glahn
RIAA
Watch: the New Morality of Capitalism
Anthony Arnove
An Interview with Tariq Ali
October 21, 2003
Uri Avnery
The
Beilin Agreement
Robert Jensen
The Fundamentalist General
David
Lindorff
War Dispatch from the NYT: God is on Our Side!
William S. Lind
Bremer is Deaf to History
Bridget
Gibson
Fatal Vision
Alan Haber
A Human Chain for Peace in Ann Arbor
Peter
Linebaugh
On the Bicentennial of the Hanging of Thomas Russell
October
20, 2003
Standard
Schaefer
Chile's
Failed Economy: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Chris
Floyd
Circus Maximus: Arnie, Enron and Bush Maul California
Mark Hand
Democrats Seek to Disappear Chomsky
& Nader
John &
Elaine Mellencamp
Peaceful
World
Elaine
Cassel
God's
General Unmuzzled
October
18 / 19, 2003
Robert
Pollin
Clintonomics:
the Hollow Boom
Gary Leupp
Israel, Syria and Stage Four in the Terror War
Saul Landau
Day of the Gropenfuhrer
Bruce Anderson
The California Recall
John Gershman
Bush in Asia: What a Difference a Decade Makes
Nelson P. Valdes
Bush, Electoral Politics and Cuba's "Illicit Sex Trade"
Kurt Nimmo
Shock Therapy and the Israeli Scenario
Tom Gorman
Al Franken and Al-Shifa
Brian
Cloughley
Public Propaganda and the Iraq War
Joanne Mariner
A New Way to Kill Tigers
Denise
Low
The Cancer of Sprawl
Mickey Z.
The Reverend of Doom
John Chuckman
US Missiles for Israeli Nukes?
George Naggiar
A Veto of Public Diplomacy
Alison
Weir
Death Threats in Berkeley
Benjamin Dangl
Bolivian Govt. Falling Apart
Ron Jacobs
The Politics of Bob Dylan
Fidel Castro
A Review of Garcia Marquez's Memoir
Adam Engel
I Hope My Corpse Gives You the Plague
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert, Guthrie and Greeder
October
17, 2003
Stan Goff
Piss
On My Leg: Perception Control and the Stage Management of War
Newton
Garver
Bolivia
in Turmoil
Standard
Schaefer
Grocery Unions Under Attack
Ben Terrall
The Ordeal of the Lockheed 52
Ron Jacobs
First Syria, Then Iran
David
Lindorff
Michael
Moore Proclaims Mumia Guilty
October
16, 2003
Marjorie
Cohn
Bush
Gunning for Regime Change in Cuba
Gary Leupp
"Getting Better" in Iraq
Norman
Solomon
The US Press and Israel: Brand Loyalty and the Absence of Remorse
Rush Limbaugh
The 10 Most Overrated Athletes of All Time
Lenni
Brenner
I
Didn't Meet Huey Newton. He Met Me
Website of the Day
Time Tested Books
October
15, 2003
Sunil
Sharma / Josh Frank
The
General and the Governor: Two Measures of American Desperation
Forrest
Hylton
Dispatch
from the Bolivian War: "Like Animals They Kill Us"
Brian
Cloughley
Those
Phony Letters: How Bush Uses GIs to Spread Propaganda About Iraq
Ahmad
Faruqui
Lessons
of the October War
Uri Avnery
Three
Days as a Living Shield
Website
of the Day
Rank and File: the New Unity Partnership Document
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The
New Unity Partnership:
A Manifest Destiny for Labor
October 14, 2003
Eric Ridenour
Qibya
& Sharon: Anniversary of a Massacre
Elaine
Cassel
The
Disgrace That is Guantanamo
Robert
Jensen
What the "Fighting Sioux" Tells Us About White People
David Lindorff
Talking Turkey About Iraq
Patrick
Cockburn
US Troops Bulldoze Crops
VIPS
One Person Can Make a Difference
Toni Solo
The CAFTA Thumbscrews
Peter
Linebaugh
"Remember
Orr!"
Website
of the Day
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Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
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True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
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Impeach
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Weekend
Edition
November 1 / 2, 2003
Landmine Mania
The Pentagon's Love Affair
with Anti-Personnel Mines
By JOHN STANTON
"A landmine is the most excellent
of soldiers, for it is ever courageous, never sleeps, never misses."
Khmer Rouge General
The United States is 1 of 45 countries that refuses
to sign the 1997 Ottawa Convention on the Prohibition of the
Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines
(APM's) and on their Destruction. 137 countries have bound themselves
to the rigorous provisions of that treaty. But the Pentagon,
never seeing a weapon system it didn't like, and the Bush Administration,
never having seen a treaty it liked, remain unmoved by the suffering
caused by APM's. Article 1 of the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty demands
that "each State Party undertakes never under any circumstances
to use anti-personnel mines." Article 4 of the Mine Ban
Treaty requires that all States Parties destroy their stockpiles
of APM's. The Pentagon is skittish about signing the Treaty as
it fears such a precedent will trigger similar campaigns against
other US weapons systems most notably those dependent on depleted
uranium.
Even though the US is the largest contributor
to demining and mine awareness programs ($80 million in FY 2002),
it has reduced funding by close to $24 million less over the
last two year period. But that's not a great surprise given that
private industry is stepping into what is a lucrative and eternal
mine-clearing business. With an estimated 40-50 million APM's
below ground around the globe, for-profit demining companies
stand to make a killing.
Terrified Pentagon
The Pentagon, and its allies in the US
Congress, has traditionally been averse to signing any piece
of international legislation that, in their view, limits the
use of military capability and that may place American commanders
under the spotlight of an International Tribunal. Indeed, APM's
remain an active part of US military doctrine as the US retains
a stockpile of 10.4 million APM's. US military forces in Afghanistan
are making use of minefields sown by the former Soviet military
for perimeter defense, refusing to de-mine them. And the US military
pre-positioned, but did apparently did not use, 90,000 APM's
in and around the 2003 Iraq theater of operations. That, even
though al least 31 US military personnel have been killed or
injured by APM's in Iraq and Afghanistan since the start of 2003.
More significantly, according to 1997
Nobel Laureate Jody Williams of the International Committee to
Ban Landmines (ICBL), and driving force behind the Mine Ban Treaty,
"The military is terrified to give into society's wishes."
Williams is one of only three American women to win the Nobel
Peace Prize. She indicated that the Pentagon understands that
the Mine Ban Treaty "has been one of the few examples of
successful multilateralism in today's world". According
to Williams, the Pentagon under Bush has recommended abandoning
the US policy goal of joining the Mine Ban Treaty by 2006 as
it has virtually all other international agreements.
The ICBL is composed of 1,400 citizen
groups in over 90 countries that brought pressure to bear on
their governments through grass-roots campaigning ultimately
bringing world attention to APM's. Remarkably, just 8 full-time
staff members oversee the ICBL. According to Williams, The Pentagon
recognizes that other favored weapons systems may find themselves
subjected to citizen-based campaigns similar to the ICBL which
shattered accepted arms control negotiations standards by working
around governmental institutions in the United States and the
rest of the world. "If you ban US landmines, then maybe
other weapons may be the subject of further campaigns."
"The United States has not renounced
APM production and they are keeping their options open,"
said Stephen Goose of Human Rights Watch at a recent press conference
publicizing the 2003 edition of the Landmine Monitor Report:
Toward a Mine Free World. The United States is not alone. "Lack
of adherence is notable among major antipersonnel mine stockpilers
particularly China, Russia, the United States, Ukraine, India
and Pakistan. These six are estimated to hold more than 185 million
stockpiled antipersonnel landmines, roughly 90 percent of the
world's total."
The Pentagon has deflected domestic and
international pressure to sign the Mine Ban Treaty first and
foremost because it views APM's as an "essential capability"
that must be maintained and be readily available for use in military
operations. To deploy or not to deploy depends on the best judgment
of US battlefield commanders. "Should an operational commander
determine that the use of APM's are required to support operations
or to protect U.S. men and women in uniform, he can request authority
to use them in accordance with pre-established rules," said
a DOD Official.
The Pentagon maintains that the Mine
Ban Treaty does not adequately consider legitimate US national
security requirements, nor does it fully address humanitarian
concerns raised by the use of APM's and anti-tank mines. The
Pentagon endorses the Amended Mines Protocol II--enacted in May
1996--which it believes will establish reasonable standards on
the use of landmines in order to minimize risks to noncombatants.
The Protocol is part of the larger United Nations Convention
on Conventional Weapons, to which the United States has acceded
and has been a state party since 1980. "Unlike the Mine
Ban Treaty, the Protocol includes restrictions on anti-tank mines
as well as anti-personnel landmines. It also restricts the use
of booby-traps and other devices that the Ottawa Convention [Mine
Ban Treaty] does not address. In addition to many states that
are parties to the Mine Ban Treaty, state parties to the Protocol
include key landmine producers and users, such as China, South
Korea, India and Pakistan that are not parties to the Mine Ban
Treaty," said a DOD Official.
The Pentagon supports the United States'
effort to press for other international measures to reduce further
the risks to civilians worldwide. "We are working with other
state parties to the United Nations Convention on Conventional
Weapons to adopt tighter restrictions on the use of anti-tank
landmines, similar to those applicable to anti-personnel landmines.
The Ottawa Convention does not address anti-tank mines. We are
also working with state parties on an instrument to deal with
explosive remnants of war. This instrument would deal with the
humanitarian problems posed by all types of munitions,"
said a DOD Official.
But according to Goose of the ICBL, the
value of the Protocol is limited almost exclusively to curbing
the use of anti-tank mines. In his view, the Mine Ban Treaty
has far more extensive obligations while the Protocol is full
of loopholes. "The reality is that at the end of the negotiations,
state's parties to that Protocol realized that the agreement
being finalized was wholly insufficient to meet the need to ban
APM's. In other words, the parties recognized before the ink
was dry that the Protocol was not the answer. And in some ways,
the Protocol contains justifications for producing more APM's.
India, Pakistan and Russia increased production in 2001 and 2002.
The US just hasn't learned."
Bad Company
The United States keeps the company of
Cuba, Libya, Iran and Syria, among others (www.icbl.org), who
want to retain the right to use APM's. The US has ignored the
entreaties of NGO's like the ICBL and trusted allies such as
the United Kingdom (State Party since 1998) and Spain (State
Party since 1999). It has also deflected the views of its own
military commanders. On March 19, 2001, Lieutenant General Hal
Moore, USA (Ret.), and seven other senior US military officers
sent a letter to President Bush urging his administration to
sign on to the Mine Ban Treaty.
"We feel strongly that it is in
the best interests of the American soldier and our country that
you "fast-track" US accession to the Mine Ban Treaty.
APM are outmoded weapons that have, time and again, proved to
be a liability to our own troops. We believe that the military,
diplomatic, and humanitarian advantages of speedy US accession
far outweigh the minimal military utility of these weapons."
They went on to rebut the oft-cited Korea Argument which states
that APM's are critical to the defense of Korea. "Several
of us are former commanders of elements of I-Corps (USA/ROK group),
and believe that APM are not in any way critical or decisive
in maintaining the peninsula's security. In fact, freshly scattered
mixed systems would slow a US and ROK counter-invasion by inhibiting
the operational tempo of friendly armor and dismounted infantry
units."
According to Goose, "The United
States has been in compliance with some provisions of the Mine
Ban Treaty for years. They are doing the right thing but can't
seem to make the leap to sign the treaty. That's interesting
because if they did they could bring China, Russia and other
non-signatories on board. The United States could exercise some
real leadership if they did," said Goose, "We wait
with baited breath"
No Loopholes
The Bush Administration was scheduled
to release new directives on APM's in the latter part of 2003
that would halt any effort to develop alternatives to APM's.
"I've heard some discouraging things from the Pentagon and
it may be that the US will roll back its current policies,"
Goose.
The current APM policy is outlined in
Presidential Decision Directive 64 issued by Former President
Bill Clinton in 1998. In that Directive, the United States committed
itself to signing the Mine Ban Treaty by 2006 if suitable alternatives
could be found. But in May of 2002, the Pentagon stated that
it could not meet the 2006 deadline since it has been unable
to design and field a satisfactory self-destructing alternative
to the "dumb" APM's currently in stock. Additionally,
the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty States Parties have taken a skeptical
view of next-generation APM's promoted by the United States and
there's little wiggle room for its negotiators. On a positive
note, the United States extended the legislative moratorium on
the export of landmines until October 2008 although it is sullied
with the brand producer and stockpiler of APM's.
According to Human Rights Watch, Mine
Ban Treaty participants rejected U.S. demands that "smart"
APM's like the CBU-89 Gator Mine System-- a 1,000-pound cluster
munition containing 22 antipersonnel mines and 72 antitank mines-be
exempted from the Mine Ban Treaty. The use of self-destructing
and self-neutralizing APM's, said Human Rights Watch officials,
will not prevent new mine victims and the clearance task will
be just as time-consuming and costly, perhaps even more so. Their
rationale follows.
· Self-destruct mechanisms are
not 100 percent reliable. The Landmine Protocol of the 1980 Convention
on Conventional Weapons (to which the United States is a State
Party) allows a 10 percent failure rate.
· The mines are scattered (or
remotely-delivered) from the air with little precision, there
is no way to accurately mark or map or fence the mined areas
to keep civilians out.
· Civilians in the mined areas
face the danger not only of accidentally detonating mines that
have failed to self-destruct, but of coming upon hundreds of
those mines randomly self-destructing at unknown times.
· The mines still deny land to
civilians. Because they are remotely delivered, they are found
on the surface of the ground, not buried. If they are aware the
area is mined, civilians will not enter it, knowing that the
visible mines may still be dangerous and fearing the presence,
in many places, of mines that have been overgrown or otherwise
obscured.
· Mines that have failed to self-destruct
but have self-deactivated will have to be treated by deminers
as live mines that may potentially explode. Thus, an area that
has unexploded mines in it will have to be cleared with the same
care as any other minefield. The time and cost will be similar.
· The clearance job may be made
more difficult by the large numbers of mines present (given the
propensity to use thousands at a time in remote-delivery systems).
U.S. Gator mines were still being cleared from Kuwait several
years after Operation Desert Storm.
Alternative APM's
The Defense Advanced Research Project
Agency (DARPA)--along with team leaders SAIC, Alliant-Technologies
and Sandia National Labs-continue to push forward with the Self
Healing Minefield System (SHMS). It consists of surface scattered
and networked antitank mines that can detect an enemy attack
of the minefield and respond autonomously, by having a fraction
of the mines airlift themselves-through the use of microrockets-into
the breach. SHMS uses a man-in-the-loop concept allowing remote
control detonation of the ordnance. DARPA claims that after 30
days, the SHMS will self-destruct and not pose any danger to
US troops or civilians. Such a system may meet the provisions
of the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty but it is far from being field-ready.
Novel technologies such as the Taser
Anti-Personnel Munition (TAPM) are being developed jointly by
industry participants General Dynamics, Ordnance and Tactical
Systems and TASER International. Rick Smith, CEO of TASER indicated
that TAPM is a hand emplaced remote control activated device
that fires two tethered darts up to 21 feet. Military personnel
place the devices in an array and remotely activate them. When
infrared sensors located within the devices are self-activated,
they release darts with up to 50,000 volts of electricity. "It's
like shooting a pair of jumper cables at a person." Temporary
and painful paralysis ensues, evidently with no loss of life.
Smith mentioned that US Marines he spoke with returning from
the war in Iraq indicated that they lost a lot of sleep patrolling
perimeters. "While TAPM would not obviate the need for personnel
to do that, it may let them make better use of their time. Further,
TAPM meets the political requirements of the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty
will providing area of denial capabilities that the US military
needs."
Technology Overwhelmed
Eradication of APM's in the field is
a painstaking process from both a cost and time perspective.
A United Nations report titled The Impact of Armed Conflict on
Children indicated that it costs as little as $3 each to manufacture
an APM but can cost up to $1,000 to remove just one. APM's can
be spread at rates of over 1,000 per minute, but it may take
a skilled expert an entire day just to clear by hand 20-50 square
meters of mine-contaminated land. A RAND report titled Alternatives
for Landmine Detection (www.rand.org), indicated there are approximately
40-50 million APM's still lying in wait for new victims. A mere
100,000 per year are removed from minefields the world over.
According to the RAND study, "at that rate clearing 45-50
million APM's will require 450-500 years assuming no new APM's
are laid."
Unfortunately, there is no reliable or
suitable replacement for bomb sniffing canines and their human
handlers, or those brave souls on bended knees probing underground
with 15th Century tools for 21st Century weapons. And there is
no substitute for the Mine Ban Treaty of 1997 which attempts
to rid the world of APM's.
The US continues to give the middle finger
to the rest of the world.
John Stanton
is a Virginia basd writer specializing in political and military
matters. Reach him at cioran123@yahoo.com
Weekend
Edition Features for Oct. 25 / 26, 2003
Robert
Pollin
The
US Economy: Another Path is Possible
Jeffrey St. Clair
Outsourcing US Guided Missile Technology to China
James
Bunn
Plotting
Pre-emptive Strikes
Saul Landau
Should Limbaugh Do Time?
Ted Honderich
Palestinian Terrorism, Morality & Germany
Thomas Nagy
Saving the Army of Peace
Christopher
Brauchli
Between Bush and a Lobotomy: Killing Endangered Species for Profit
Laura Carlsen
Latin America's Archives of Terror
Diane
Christian
Evil Acts & Evil Actors
Muqtedar Khan
Lessons from the Imperial Adventure in Iraq
John Feffer
The Tug of War on the Korea Peninsula
Brian Cloughley
Iraq War Memories are Made of Lies
Benjamin
Dangl
and Kathryn Ledebur
An Uneasy Peace in Bolivia
Karyn
Strickler
Down
with Big Brother's Spying Eyes
Noah Leavitt
Legal Globalization
John Stanton
Hitler's Ghost Haunts America
Mickey
Z.
War of the Words
Adam Engel
Tractatus Ridiculous
Poets'
Basement
Curtis, Subiet and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Project Last Stand
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