Coming
in October
From AK Press
Today's
Stories
September 5, 2003
Robert Fisk
We Were
Warned About This Chaos
Recent
Stories
September 4, 2003
Stan Goff
The Bush
Folly: Between Iraq and a Hard Place
John Ross
Mexico's
Hopes for Democracy Hit Dead-End
Harvey Wasserman
Bush to New Yorkers: Drop Dead
Adam Federman
McCain's
Grim Vision: Waging a War That's Already Been Lost
Aluf Benn
Sharon Saved from Threat of Peace
W. John Green
Colombia's Dirty War
Joanne Mariner
Truth,
Justice and Reconciliation in Latin America
Website of the Day
Califoracle
September 3, 2003
Virginia Tilley
Hyperpower
in a Sinkhole
Davey D
A Hip
Hop Perspective on the Cali Recall
Emrah Göker
Conscripting Turkey: Imperial Mercenaries Wanted
John Stanton
The US is a Power, But Not Super
Brian Cloughley
The
Pentagon's Bungled PsyOps Plan
Dan Bacher
Another Big Salmon Kill
Elaine Cassel
Prosecutors Weep' Ninth Circuit Overturns 127 Death Sentences
Uri Avnery
First
of All This Wall Must Fall
Website of the Day
Art Attack!
September 2, 2003
Robert Fisk
Bush's
Occupational Fantasies Lead Iraq Toward Civil War
Kurt Nimmo
Rouind Up the Usual Suspects: the Iman Ali Mosque Bombing
Robert Jensen / Rahul Mahajan
Iraqi Liberation, Bush Style
Elaine Cassel
Innocent But Guilty: When Prosecutors are Dead Wrong
Jason Leopold
Ghosts
in the Machines: the Business of Counting Votes
Dave Lindorff
Dems in 2004: Perfect Storm or Same Old Doldrums?
Paul de Rooij
Predictable
Propaganda: Four Monts of US Occupation
Website of the Day
Laughing Squid
August 30 / Sept. 1,
2003
Alexander Cockburn
Handmaiden
in Babylon: Annan, Vieiera de Mello and the Decline and Fall
of the UN
Saul Landau
Schwarzenegger
and Cuban Migration
Standard Schaefer
Who
Benefited from the Tech Bubble: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Gary Leupp
Mel Gibson's Christ on Trial
William S. Lind
Send the Neocons to Baghdad
Augustin Velloso
Aznar: Spain's Super Lackey
Jorge Mariscal
The Smearing of Cruz Bustamante
John Ross
A NAFTA for Energy? The US Looks to Suck Up Mexico's Power
Mickey Z.
War is a Racket: The Wisdom of Gen. Smedley Butler
Elaine Cassel
Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Show Isn't Winning Many Converts
Stan Cox
Pirates of the Caribbean: the WTO Comes to Cancun
Tom and Judy Turnipseed
Take Back Your Time Day
Adam Engel
The Red Badge of Knowledge: a Review of TDY
Adam Engel
An Eye on Intelligence: an Interview with Douglas Valentine
Susan Davis
Northfork,
an Accidental Review
Nicholas Rowe
Dance
and the Occupation
Mark Zepezauer
Operation
Candor
Poets' Basement
Albert, Guthrie and Hamod
Website of the Weekend
Downhill
Battle
August 29, 2003
Lenni Brenner
God
and the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party
Brian Cloughley
When in Doubt, Lie Your Head Off
Alice Slater
Bush Nuclear Policy is a Recipe for National Insecurity
David Krieger
What Victory?
Marjorie Cohn
The Thin Blue Line: How the US Occupation of Iraq Imperils International
Law
Richard Glen Boire
Saying Yes to Drugs!
Bister, Estrin and Jacobs
Howard Dean, the Progressive Anti-War Candidate? Some Vermonters
Give Their Views
Website of the Day
DirtyBush
August 28, 2003
Gilad Atzmon
The
Most Common Mistakes of Israelis
David Vest
Moore's
Monument: Cement Shoes for the Constitution
David Lindorff
Shooting Ali in the Back: Why the Pacification is Doomed
Chris Floyd
Cheap Thrills: Bush Lies to Push His War
Wayne Madsen
Restoring the Good, Old Term "Bum"
Elaine Cassel
Not Clueless in Chicago
Stan Goff
Nukes in the Dark
Tariq Ali
Occupied
Iraq Will Never Know Peace
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Behold, My Package
Website of the Day
Palestinian
Artists
August 27, 2003
Bruce Jackson
Little
Deaths: Hiding the Body Count in Iraq
John Feffer
Nuances and North Korea: Six Countries in Search of a Solution
Dave Riley
an Interview with Tariq Ali on the Iraq War
Lacey Phillabaum
Bush's Holy War in the Forests
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Website of the Day
The Dean Deception
August 26, 2003
Robert Fisk
Smearing the Dead
David Lindorff
The
Great Oil Gouge: Burning Up that Tax Rebate
Sarmad S. Ali
Baghdad is Deadlier Than Ever: the View of an Iraqi Coroner
Christopher Brauchli
Bush Administration Equates Medical Pot Smokers with Segregationists
Juliana Fredman
Collective Punishment on the West Bank: Dialysis, Checkpoints
and a Palestinian Madonna
Larry Siems
Ghosts of Regime Changes Past in Guatemala
Elaine Cassel
Onward, Ashcroft Soldiers!
Saul Landau
Bush:
a Modern Ahab or a Toy Action Figure?
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
August 25, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Israeli Outlaws in America
David Bacon
In Iraq, Labor Protest is a Crime
Thomas P. Healy
The Govs Come to Indy: Corps Welcome; Citizens Locked Out
Norman Madarasz
In an Elephant's Whirl: the US/Canada Relationship After the
Iraq Invasion
Salvador Peralta
The Politics of Focus Groups
Jack McCarthy
Who Killed Jancita Eagle Deer?
Uri Avnery
A Drug
for the Addict
August 23/24, 2003
Forrest Hylton
Rumsfeld
Does Bogota
Robert Fisk
The Cemetery at Basra
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity
Insults to Intelligence
Andrew C. Long
Exile on Bliss Street: The Terrorist Threat and the English Professor
Jeremy Bigwood
The Toxic War on Drugs: Monsanto Weedkiller Linked to Powerful
Fungus
Jeffrey St. Clair
Forest
or Against Us: the Bush Doctor Calls on Oregon
Cynthia McKinney
Bring the Troops Home, Now!
David Krieger
So Many Deaths, So Few Answers: Approaching the Second Anniversary
of 9/11
Julie Hilden
A Constitutional Right to be a Human Shield
Dave Lindorff
Marketplace
Medicine
Standard Schaefer
Unholy Trinity: Falwell's Anti-Abortion Attack on Health and
Free Speech
Catherine Dong
Kucinich and FirstEnergy
José Tirado
History Hurts: Why Let the Dems Repeat It?
Ron Jacobs
Springsteen's America
Gavin Keeney
The Infernal Machine
Adam Engel
A Fan's Notations
William Mandel
Five Great Indie Films
Walt Brasch
An American Frog Fable
Poets' Basement
Reiss, Kearney, Guthrie, Albert and Alam
Website of the Weekend
The Hutton Inquiry
August 22, 2003
Carole Harper
Post-Sandinista
Nicaragua
John Chuckman
George Will: the Marquis of Mendacity
Richard Thieme
Operation Paperclip Revisited
Chris Floyd
Dubya Indemnity: Bush Barons Beyond the Reach of Law?
Issam Nashashibi
Palestinians
and the Right of Return: a Rigged Survey
Mary Walworth
Other People's Kids
Ron Jacobs
The
Darkening Tunnel
Website of the Day
Current Energy
August 21, 2003
Robert Fisk
The US
Needs to Blame Anyone But Locals for UN Bombing
Virginia Tilley
The Quisling Policies of the UN in Iraq: Toward a Permanent War?
Rep. Henry Waxman
Bush Owes the Public Some Serious Answers on Iraq
Ben Terrall
War Crimes and Punishment in Indonesia: Rapes, Murders and Slaps
on the Wrists
Elaine Cassel
Brother John Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Salvation Show
Christopher Brauchli
Getting Gouged by Banks
Marjorie Cohn
Sergio Vieira de Mello: Victim of Terrorism or US Policy in Iraq?
Vicente Navarro
Media
Double Standards: The Case of Mr. Aznar, Friend of Bush
Website of the Day
The Intelligence Squad
Hot Stories
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
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
William Blum
Myth
and Denial in the War on Terrorism
Standard Schaefer
Experimental Casinos: DARPA and the War Economy
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
September
5, 2003
What Needs to be Done
A
Return to the UN?
By PHYLLIS BENNIS
The recent Bush administration's draft UN resolution
proposing a new role for the United Nations in Iraq would be
a welcome step if it was done to help improve the lives of Iraqi
citizens. But the reassessment is not a reflection of any concern
regarding the illegality of the occupation, the lack of legitimacy
of the U.S. presence in Iraq, or the impact on Iraqis of Washington's
abject failure to provide for even the minimal humanitarian needs
of the population. Instead, it reflects a growing concern regarding
what the New York Times called the "high cost of occupation"
for the U.S. in Iraq--costs both in U.S. soldiers' lives and
in dollars.
The high price in dollars is being paid
by U.S. taxpayers as the administration is planning an emergency
request of $60-70 billion to cover current fighting and reconstruction
costs. This follows $79 billion that was released in April 2003.
The beneficiaries are corporations close to the Bush administration,
notably Halliburton and Bechtel, which are earning billions of
dollars. The high price in lives is being paid by U.S. troops
assigned to state-building duties for which they have no training,
by Iraqi translators and other Iraqis working with and for the
U.S. occupation authorities, and by UN humanitarian staff who
are seen as working under or within the U.S. occupation structure.
The highest price in lives is paid by Iraqi civilians, both in
armed attacks and as a result of the lack of sufficient clean
water, electricity, and medical care.
The current proposal under consideration
calls for the creation of a UN-endorsed multilateral military
force to join the U.S. occupation force in Iraq. It would function
as a separate, parallel force with a separate command structure,
but the commander would be an American. U.S. officials make clear
their intention that the multilateral force would be accountable
to the Pentagon's strategic control. There is a history of this
kind of U.S. control of UN peacekeeping operations through imposing
a U.S. general or admiral as UN commander. This was U.S. practice
during the Clinton administration in Somalia, Haiti, and elsewhere.
But what is unprecedented is that the
plan does not envision Washington even sharing authority and
decisionmaking with the UN itself or with the governments sending
international contingents, let alone ending its occupation and
turning over full authority to the UN to oversee a rapid return
to Iraqi independence.
A number of countries, facing U.S. pressure,
might be prepared to send troops with a new UN resolution providing
an international imprimatur. U.S. officials have actually described
a new UN resolution's value as providing "political cover"
to governments wanting to participate but restrained by public
opposition. Countries under particular pressure to send troops
include Pakistan, Turkey, and India. It is likely that many members
of the Security Council might be willing to cave in to such pressure.
Any resolution, however, would also have to win approval from
Russia, Germany, and especially France--which have made positive
remarks about the resolution but are likely to demand more control
for the Security Council over the mission. French Foreign Minister
Dominique de Villepin said that "the eventual arrangements
cannot just be the enlargement or adjustment of the current occupation
forces. We have to install a real international force under a
mandate of the United Nations Security Council."
The new UN resolution also encourages
other countries to contribute funds, as well as troops, to the
U.S. occupation. A donors conference is scheduled for late October
in Spain, a key U.S. ally. If a UN resolution is passed before
that date with little acrimony in the Security Council, new amounts
of financial support will be forthcoming.
What Should Be Done
1. Any new UN resolution aimed at providing
more legitimacy for the U.S.-UK occupation of Iraq should be
opposed. Countries should not send troops or funds to maintain
or strengthen or "internationalize" Washington's occupation.
2. Oppose Richard Perle's claim that
"our main mistake is that we haven't succeeded in working
closely with Iraqis before the war so that an Iraqi opposition
could have been able to immediately take the matter in hand."
Instead, the over-reliance of the Bush administration on the
claims of the exiled Iraqi opposition, driven by self-interest
and ideological fervor rather than grounded information, is one
of the main reasons for the U.S. failure to anticipate the post-war
crisis in Iraq.
3. Only after the U.S.-UK occupation
has ended should the United Nations and a multilateral peacekeeping
force return to Iraq. Their mandate should be for a very short
and defined period, with the goal of assisting Iraq in reconstruction
and overseeing election of a governing authority.
4. As belligerent powers who initiated
the war, and as occupying powers, the U.S. and the UK are required
to provide for the humanitarian needs of the Iraqi people. While
their military occupation should be ended immediately, Washington
and London remain obligated to pay the continuing costs of
Iraq's reconstruction, including the bulk of the cost of UN humanitarian
and peacekeeping deployments. The U.S. should immediately make
public a realistic estimate for the cost of reconstruction in
Iraq. Washington should turn over funds to UN authority, beginning
with a direct grant of at least $75 billion (the initial amount
spent on waging the war) for reconstruction work. These funds
should be raised from an excess profits tax on corporations benefiting
from the war and post-war privatization in Iraq, as well as from
Pentagon budget lines initially aimed at carrying out war in
Iraq.
5.The U.S. should use this moment to
reverse its longstanding opposition to the creation of a standing
UN rapid-reaction military force, beginning with reconstituting
the UN Charter-mandated Military Staff Committee.
Phyllis Bennis
is a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and writes regularly
for Foreign Policy in Focus.
She is the author of Calling
the Shots: How the US Dominates the UN. Bennis can be reached
at: pbennis@compuserve.com.
Weekend
Edition Features for August 30 / Sept. 1, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
Handmaiden
in Babylon: Annan, Vieiera de Mello and the Decline and Fall
of the UN
Saul Landau
Schwarzenegger
and Cuban Migration
Standard Schaefer
Who
Benefited from the Tech Bubble: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Gary Leupp
Mel Gibson's Christ on Trial
William S. Lind
Send the Neocons to Baghdad
Augustin Velloso
Aznar: Spain's Super Lackey
Jorge Mariscal
The Smearing of Cruz Bustamante
John Ross
A NAFTA for Energy? The US Looks to Suck Up Mexico's Power
Mickey Z.
War is a Racket: The Wisdom of Gen. Smedley Butler
Elaine Cassel
Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Show Isn't Winning Many Converts
Stan Cox
Pirates of the Caribbean: the WTO Comes to Cancun
Tom and Judy Turnipseed
Take Back Your Time Day
Adam Engel
The Red Badge of Knowledge: a Review of TDY
Adam Engel
An Eye on Intelligence: an Interview with Douglas Valentine
Susan Davis
Northfork,
an Accidental Review
Nicholas Rowe
Dance
and the Occupation
Mark Zepezauer
Operation
Candor
Poets' Basement
Albert, Guthrie and Hamod
Website of the Weekend
Downhill
Battle
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