Wednesday, March 26, 2003

-Anti-War Protestors Target Coca Cola as Demonstrations Grip Asia

Rebels in India destroyed Coca Cola bottles and blasted a Pepsi warehouse as mainly small-scale protests against the US-led war on Iraq were held across Asia.

As many governments tightened security outside British and American embassies, protests were held Monday in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, Indonesia and Australia while Afghanistan and the Philippines moved to put down rallies.

Indonesians filled the streets of several cities on Monday to protest at the US-led invasion of Iraq, with some denouncing President George Bush as a “terrorist” and a “vampire.”

In Jakarta police arrested 10 members of the hardline Islamic Youth Movement for intimidating a group of tourists who were eating at a US-franchised Sizzler restaurant.

Shouts of “Destroy the United States,” were heard from the protesters, mostly veiled women. They carried posters reading “Capture Bush Dead or Alive” and “No Blood for Oil.”

Some 200 members of the same group protested at Jember in East Java displaying placards reading “Bush is a Vampire” and “Bush is a Criminal and a Terrorist,” Elshinta radio said.

Muslim students from Bandung in West Java rallied in front of the strongly-guarded US embassy in Jakarta.

In the city of Semarang, hundreds of activists forced the closure of the local office of a US bank and two outlets of US food chains, Elshinta reported.

Protesters targeted US-franchised restaurants and called for a boycott of American products, but police promised to protect foreigners and overseas businesses.

In Australia, hundreds of anti-war protesters tried to storm parliament on Monday, demanding the withdrawal of Australian troops fighting in Iraq.

Police managed to hold back the 400 activists who were calling on Australian Prime Minister John Howard to come outside and address them.

India’s oldest and most violent rebel outfit, the banned People’s War Group, targeted soft drink giants Coca Cola and Pespi and liquor stores in two districts of the southern Andhra Pradesh state late on Sunday night.

Around half a dozen armed rebels raided a warehouse stacked with Pepsi bottles and used explosives to raze it to the ground, police said.

“The exact cost of damage is still being assessed but it appears the rebels targeted the soft drink giants and some other stores selling Indian made foreign liquor to protest against the war,” Anil Kumar Puneeth, superintendent of police told AFP.

In neighboring Pakistan, 200 blind students denounced the war and demanded protection for Iraqi children.

The protests came a day after some 200,000 people swarmed streets in the eastern city of Lahore on Sunday.

Meanwhile, the authorities in Bangaladesh braced for a new round of anti-war protests.

The “Anti-War Movement,” a pro-peace group of university teachers, was scheduled to hold a demonstration at Dhaka University later Monday as part of daily demonstrations after 3,000 protested Sunday.

Security has been stepped up at the US embassy and in other key installations in the Philippine capital Manila amid allegations that the Iraqi embassy there was funding anti-US street protests.

Philippine President Gloria Arroyo’ announced Monday that she had ordered the expulsion of an Iraqi diplomat and a non-diplomatic staff member of Iraq’s embassy in Manila on charges of spying.

About 3,000 people staged a demonstration in the Thai capital Bangkok Monday while the authorities in the eastern Afghan province of Laghman clamped down on a second day of demonstrations.

More than 10,000 people hit the streets of Laghman provincial capital Mehtarlam Sunday, chanting slogans and torching US and coalition flags in the first ever anti-US demonstration in Afghanistan.

Smaller demonstrations were held in South Korea.

-AGENCE FRANCE PRESS

- Egypt Torturing Anti-War Activists, Group says

by Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON - Anti-war activists and protesters detained by Egyptian authorities in recent days are being tortured by police, Human Rights Watch (HRW) charged Monday in a detailed release that includes accounts by eyewitnesses and activists.

The New York-based rights group added that hundreds more people have been injured by brutal police actions to contain and suppress the protests against the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and Israeli actions in the Occupied Territories, which have reportedly shaken the 21-year-old government of President Hosni Mubarak.

The security forces have used water cannons, clubs, dogs, and even stones against thousands of demonstrators at Tharir Square, Al-Azhar Mosque, Talaat Harb Square, Ramses Street, and the State Broadcasting Corporation beginning March 20.

Among those beaten or arrested are university professors, students, journalists, and even opposition members of parliament. In some cases, children as young as 15 years old were taken to jail with their parents, according to HRW.

Some detainees reported hearing others being threatened and then tortured with electroshocks at one detention facility controlled by State Security Intelligence.

“The crackdown many feared has come,” said Hanny Megally, executive director of HRW’s Middle East and North Africa division. “Fundamental freedoms in Egypt are now under serious threat,” he added.

The protests in Cairo, whose size and spontaneity have reportedly surprised authorities and diplomatic observers, are part of a series that have taken place throughout much of the Arab world in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion that began last week.

In Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, at least three people were killed and scores more injured during a violent clash involving tens of thousands of people over the weekend, while thousands of protestors fought with riot police in Amman, the capital of Jordan.

If the protests become more violent Arab leaders friendly to the United States could face “a serious threat”, a prominent political analyst in Cairo, Diaa Rashwan of the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, told Sunday’s Washington Post.

“Arab leaders, especially in Egypt and in the Persian Gulf, are in a very, very, very dangerous situation,” he said. “We could all feel this danger coming.”

Indeed, both Mubarak and King Abdullah of Jordan repeatedly warned the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush since last summer that an invasion of Iraq risked destabilizing the region.

In the last couple of weeks, influential moderate Muslim scholars, including many at Cairo’s Al-Azhar Al-Sharif Islamic Research Academy, perhaps the most prestigious center of Islamic learning in the world, have become increasingly outspoken against an invasion, even calling for Muslim rulers not to cooperate in any way with U.S. war plans.

Megally said that what began as isolated detentions of Egyptian anti-war activists in December and January has now become a sweeping repression of dissent.

Arrests followed a massive but generally peaceful demonstration in Tahrir Square, which was closed for some 10 hours by tens of thousands of protestors Thursday. While the police violently restrained demonstrators from marching from the square to the U.S. and British embassies, the protest was permitted to go on unhindered.

But on Friday smaller demonstrations throughout Cairo met a violent response by the authorities, who alleged that clashes broke out after a car was torched near Tahrir Square. At that point, police began subduing, beating and arresting large numbers of demonstrators with excessive force, said HRW.

On Saturday morning, arrests continued. At least three female students who have been prominent anti-war activists were arrested on their way to a demonstration on the Cairo University campus. One of them, who was pregnant, was reportedly beaten, bound and blindfolded, and her whereabouts have still not been established.

Most of the detainees were reportedly taken to al-Darrassa, a Central Security barracks in Cairo.

--from ONE WORLD NET

- Marines Losing the Battle for Hearts and Minds

Published on Tuesday, March 25, 2003 by the Guardian/UK

by James Meek outside Nassiriya

Hopes of a joyful liberation of a grateful Iraq by US and British armies are evaporating fast in the Euphrates valley as a sense of bitterness, germinated from blood spilled and humiliations endured, begins to grow in the hearts of invaded and invader alike.

Attempts by US marines to take bridges over the river Euphrates, which passes through Nassiriya, have become bogged down in casualties and troops taken prisoner. The marines, in turn, have responded harshly.

Out in the plain west of the city, marines shepherding a gigantic series of convoys north towards Baghdad have reacted to ragged sniping with an aggressive series of house searches and arrests.

A surgical assistant at the Saddam hospital in Nassiriya, interviewed at a marine check point outside the city, said that on Sunday, half an hour after two dead marines were brought into the hospital, US aircraft dropped what he described as three or four cluster bombs on civilian areas, killing 10 and wounding 200.

Mustafa Mohammed Ali said he understood US forces going straight to Baghdad to get rid of Saddam Hussein, but was outraged that they had attacked his city and killed civilians. “I don’t want forces to come into the city. They have an objective, they go straight to the target,” he said. “There’s no room in the Saddam hospital because of the wounded. It’s the only hospital in town. When I saw the dead Americans I cheered in my heart.

“They started bombing Nassiriya on Friday but they didn’t bomb civilian areas until yesterday, when these American dead bodies were brought in.

“We know the difference between a missile and a cluster bomb. A missile shoots to one target whereas a cluster bomb spreads after they release it.”

Mr Ali said marines now controlled the center of the city, but that fighting was continuing, with members of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party in the forefront.

Asked about the much-vaunted fedayeen militia, reported by some sources to be leading the battle, Mr Ali said: “They are children.” Other travelers from Nassiriya said they were press-ganged youths who went into battle dressed in black with black scarves wound around their faces and who fight for fear of the execution committees waiting to shoot them if they try to run.

Watching from behind a barbed wire barrier as hundreds of the marines’ ammunition trucks, armored amphibious vehicles, tankers, tanks and trucks lumbered past through clouds of dust as fine as talcum powder, Mr Ali asked why such a huge army was needed just to catch a single man. “We don’t want Saddam, but we don’t want them [the Americans] to stay afterwards,” he said. “Like they entered into Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar and didn’t leave, they will do here. They are fighting Islam. They’re entering under the pretext of targeting Ba’ath, but they won’t leave.”

Another Iraqi squatting next to him leaned over, pointed to the convoys and said: “This is better than Saddam’s government.”

The marine convoys, which have been passing northward now almost non-stop for two days, are using a partly-built concrete motorway bridge over the Euphrates which US military engineers have made strong enough to take one tank at a time.

At this point the river is a narrow, slow-flowing blue current. Nassiriya is at the western end of the waterlands once occupied by 200,000 Marsh Arabs, the Ma’dan, whose culture, thousands of years old, was all but destroyed by Saddam Hussein with terrible loss of life.

A few yards from the bridge it is possible to sit by the riverbank and watch the green spring reeds which defined the marshes bending in the wind. One of the Ma’dan’s high-prowed canoes drifts from side to side on its mooring rope.

But it is not long before the sound of the wildfowl and the lapping water is drowned out by a pair of ash-grey Huey helicopters, chugging low past the palm trees beside the bridge, and the whine of the next tank to cross.

Staff Sergeant Larry Simmons, a Floridian from a marine reconnaissance unit in a foxhole overlooking the bridge, was not impressed by what he saw. “You learn about the Euphrates in geography class, and you get here and you think: ‘This is the Euphrates? Looks like a muddy creek to me’.”

The marines are aggrieved: aggrieved that the Iraqis aren’t more grateful, aggrieved that the Iraqis are shooting at them, aggrieved that the US army’s spearhead 3rd Infantry Division tore through Nassiriya earlier in the invasion without making it safe.

“They didn’t clear the place, and then they left, and now the marines sure have to clear it,” he said. “Just like the goddamn army.”

And the Iraqis are aggrieved at the marines. A 50-year-old businessman and farmer, Said Yahir, was driving up to the main body of the reconnaissance unit, stationed under the bridge. He wanted to know why the marines had come to his house and taken his son Nathen, his Kalashnikov rifle, and his 3m dinars (about £500).

“What did I do?” he said. “This is your freedom that you’re talking about? This is my life savings.”

In 1991, in the wake of Iraq’s defeat in the first Gulf war, Mr Yahir was one of those who joined the rebellion against Saddam Hussein. His house was shelled by the dictator’s artillery. The US refused to intervene and the rebellion was crushed.

“Saddam would have fallen if they had supported us,” Mr Yahir said. “I’ve been so humiliated.”

Under the bridge, Sergeant Michael Sprague was unrepentant. The money, the marines said, was probably destined for terrorist activities - buying a suicide bomber, for instance. “The same people we determined were safe yesterday were found with weapons today,” he said.

Marine scouts shot two Iraqi men yesterday when they were seen carrying Kalashnikovs. Each man was found to be carrying three magazines, but they never fired at the marines before they were killed.

“They were pointing their weapons in an aggressive manner, and they were taken out,” said Sgt Sprague.

Nathen had been captured the previous day, along with dozens of others, and like them, had been let go, Sgt Sprague said. Then they caught him again with a Kalashnikov in mint condition and 3m dinars.

“So the question I would like to be asked is, if this person already went through EPW [enemy prisoner of war] questioning and was found to be OK, why on earth would he come back? The problem with these people is that you can’t believe anything they say.”

Could he understand the locals’ distrust of the US after what happened in 1991?

“If it weren’t for the liberal press, we might have taken Baghdad last time,” said the sergeant.

In the end the marines let father and son go on their way with gun and money, accepting that both were for personal use. But Sgt Sprague was none too happy to see them go. The convoys have, after all, come under sporadic mortar attack. “There’s a mad mortarman out there,” he said.

A few miles from the bridge to the south lie the ruins of the ancient city of Ur, founded 8,000 years ago, the birth place of Abraham and a flourishing metropolis at a time when the inhabitants of north-west Europe were still walking round in animal skins.

Sgt Sprague, from White Sulphur Springs in West Virginia, passed it on his way north, but he never knew it was there.

“I’ve been all the way through this desert from Basra to here and I ain’t seen one shopping mall or fast food restaurant,” he said. “These people got nothing. Even in a little town like ours of twenty five hundred people you got a McDonald’s at one end and a Hardee’s at the other.”

A few hundred yards downstream, a group of Iraqis, some of them hiding out in the country from the fighting in Nassiriya, invited journalists to strong sweet tea in a farmhouse of whitewashed mud. They spread carpets and cushions on the floor and generously allowed the guests not to take their muddy boots off. Light shone through a triangular window.

Mohsen Ali, a devout Shia fingering amber beads as he spoke, said the Iraqi people would fight for Iraq, if not for President Saddam, although he supported the dictator. The country needed a strong leader, he said - even a brutal one.

“If in Iraq there’s a leader who’s fair, he’ll be killed the next day,” he said. “Iraqis have hot blood. If he’s not tough, he dies the next day.”

-ANSWER is NOT Whole U.S. Peace Movement

Dear friends,

I’m sorry that the pressure of events has delayed my making any response to this post - now two weeks old. (referring to an ad by ANSWER for a Peace Action)

Please understand I do NOT want to start any “political faction fight” by email, but there are some points that I think do need to be made.

ANSWER is run by a small group of unusually orthodox Marxist/Leninsts called the Workers World Party. (Their origins are Trotskyist - they were formed in 1956 by a small group within the US Trotskyist movement which supported the Soviet invasion of Hungary). They have been very successful in pulling off major demonstrations here because while their membership is under 500, they are very hard working, and filled a vacuum caused by the failure of the other range of groups to get their act together sooner. They have also been able to use Ramsey Clark as their public figure (he doesn’t belong to WWP but is not critical of them - sometimes I think he may even be unaware of their politics).

Another tiny group (RCP - the Revolutionary Communist Party, whose politics are Maoist, and are enthusiastic supporters of the “Shining Path” in Peru) has also been successful in setting up NION (Not in Our Name), but somewhat to their credit, they have let “NION be captured” - RCP keeps their own politics very much in the background so that NION comes much closer to being a broad movement where the more sectarian elements are “submerged”.

In the rallies which ANSWER has pulled together, the speakers reflect the narrower, more militant elements of the left in the US. The broader outreach, including trade unions, church groups, etc., has occured under the new grouping United for Peace and Justice, (UPJ)

Please understand that I am not suggesting that because RCP or WWP are small that they don’t deserve a lot of credit for the work they have done. None of us are that large and I’m not trying to “trash” these groups. Only to make it clear that the American anti-war movement is much broader and I hope makes an early point of reaching out to the international peace movement. In short, ANSWER is not able to represent “the American movement” in any international coaliton - only to represent itself.

I am reporting this because I don’t know that UPF has had the money or even the awareness of the need to reach out to the international community - it would be very easy for any of your groups to mistake ANSWER for “the real American movement”. It is not - it is a PART of the US oppsition to Bush’s policy. They have done a good job but are not eager to embrace groups they feel are too moderate, while some of us (myself included) feel that the danger posed the world by those around Bush is so great that very broad coalitions must be formed. That “radicals and moderates” must work together - even conservatives should be deeply alarmed by the dangerously radical right wing direction in which the Bush group is taking us.

The good news is that yesterdays’ march in New York - Saturday the 22 - had over 200,000 people. This was organized by United for Peace and Justice and also supported by a range of other groups including ANSWER. The last event ANSWER called on their own - in Washington DC on March 15th - was not terribly large - perhaps 100,000 people, perhaps less.

Peace,
David McReynolds
(active in the pacifist and democratic socialist communities)

Note from Paul:  There have also been charges by some people engaged in civil disobedience that ANSWER tries to manipulate the movement by informing police of these actrions in advance so as to make themselves appear more respectable.  Everything must be
taken with a grain of salt, since the last time I heard these charges they were made by activists in Boston who also accused the police there of brutality when, in reality and in comparison to what I have heard about in New York or even Tokyo, was very low key and in response to an attempt by a very few to lead a very peaceful and tolerated breakaway march
onto a highway. I have also heard reports that 40 percent of the Boston police are anti-war which could account for the relatively mild behaviour on their part.  So while clearly there are good arguments for carefully planned civil disobedience and ANSWER has often been accused of trying to get on the good side of the police by taking the moral high road and condemning such actions, it is not automatically true that “anti-ANSWER” propaganda is true.  We saw a few weeks ago how NATION columnists, among others, tried to make the whole anti-war movement look bad and the “leadership” anti-semitic by distorting the treatment of Michael Lerner, presumably at the hands of ANSWER.  Look for further media/government attempts to paint the anti-war movement as crazy, sectarian, inconsistent, etc. as the war machine goes into high gear and the movement responds accordingly.  Be aware that while these distortions are just that, and part of a vicious propaganda campaign by the war mongers, that -as David McReynolds points out- the real anti-war movement is diverse and is not simply synonymous with the philosophy or actions of some of its smaller components, like ANSWER.

- Truth About Geneva Conventions Violations, More

Institute for Public Accuracy
915 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045
(202) 347-0020 * http://www.accuracy.org *
___________________________________________________

Monday, March 24, 2003

Interviews Available
* Geneva Convention * Water Supply
* Following Orders * ‘Fragging’

MARJORIE COHN,
A professor of law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, Cohn said today: “While the U.S. government has objected to Iraq broadcasting photos of U.S. POWs, the U.S. government has allowed the very same thing.... Photos of Taliban prisoners of war and John Walker Lindh were continually broadcast on U.S. media outlets. The Pentagon is refusing to abide by the Geneva Convention with regards to the prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay.”

DENIS HALLIDAY,
Former head of the U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq and former U.N. Assistant Secretary General of the U.N., Halliday today criticized plans for the U.N. Secretary General to be in charge of the oil for food program. He noted the legal obligations of the U.S. to provide water immediately to the people of Basra where the water system is cut off, noting the U.S.
military provides water to fight oil fires.

TOM NAGY, , http://www.progressive.org/0801issue/nagy0901.html,
http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/93.htm
A professor of expert systems at George Washington University, Nagy wrote the article “The Secret Behind the Sanctions: How the U.S. Intentionally Destroyed Iraq’s Water Supply” for the Progressive magazine. Nagy notes that the Geneva Conventions (Article 54) state that “It is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as ... drinking water installations...” Nagy has uncovered a Defense Intelligence Agency document written right before the Gulf War which spells out how sanctions would prevent Iraq from supplying clean water to its citizens: “Iraq depends on importing specialized equipment and some chemicals to purify its water supply,” the 1991 document states. “With no domestic sources of both water treatment replacement parts and some essential chemicals, Iraq will continue attempts to circumvent U.N. Sanctions to import these vital commodities. Failing to secure supplies will result in a shortage of pure drinking water for much of the population. This could lead to increased incidences, if not epidemics, of disease.” Nagy has recently uncovered the Air Force’s Doctrine Document 2-1.2 of May 1998 entitled “Strategic Attack,” which includes an analysis of Desert Storm: “The loss of electricity shut down the capital’s water treatment plants and led to a public health crisis from raw sewage dumped in the Tigris River.” This is under the section entitled “Elements of Effective Operations.”

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

_________________________________________________________________

- Press and Government Lying About War

March 24, 2003

MEDIA ALERT: “ALL THE INDICATORS ARE ALREADY RED”

BBC, ITN, Independent, Guardian: Deceit In The Service Of Power

Quote 1

“Iraq: The Human Cost Of War
50,000 civilian deaths?
500,000 civilians injured?
2,000,000 refugees and displaced people?
10,000,000 in need of humanitarian assistance?”
(Front cover of the March/April 2003 issue of “Amnesty”, Amnesty International UK’s magazine, quoting warnings by UN humanitarian agencies)

Quote 2

“All the indicators are already red and we are very, very concerned.” (Veronique Taveau, spokeswoman for the UN’s humanitarian co-ordinator, ‘Food warning issued by UN’, James Drummond and Mark Turner, Financial Times, 21 March, 2003, page 7)

Deceit In The Service Of Power

In one media alert after another, we have attempted to document the relentless stream of deceptions, omissions and outright lies that have enabled Washington and London, in full view of a horrified world, to undertake a massive, illegal and immoral invasion of a stricken Third World nation.

“We have not seen such systematic distortion of intelligence, such systematic manipulation of the American people, since the war in Vietnam,” wrote John Brady Kiesling, a 20-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service in his letter of resignation last month to Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Here in the UK, leading politicians, assisted by a largely compliant media, have engaged in a similar attempt to suppress, divert and mould public opinion. In the eyes of the Media Lens editors, and many people posting messages at the Media Lens website (http://www.MediaLens.org), the propaganda dished up regularly by BBC and ITN news bulletins has been truly shameful. Television images of pink mushroom clouds rising above the skies of Baghdad, with palm trees in the foreground, and green ‘night-sight’ footage of reporters filing meaningless live ‘progress’ reports back to the news studios, hide the devastating reality: that Iraqi men, women and children, as well as ‘coalition’ soldiers, are being ripped apart as a direct consequence of the global ambitions of right-wing US interests, supported by an arrogant UK government, in defiance of international law and global public opinion.

Not all mainstream commentators have been content to play along with the ‘momentum of war’, or to restrict their challenges within a narrow frame of thought that hardly ruffles the feathers of power. The veteran columnist Alan Watkins, for example, shrewdly notes that “Mr Blair strikes me as possessing the capacity of the religious maniac to regurgitate, with every appearance of sincerity, any piece of garbage which may be required in the temporary service of some higher cause.” (Alan Watkins, ‘He may have the sympathy vote. But not mine’, The Independent on Sunday, 16 March, 2003, page 25). Indeed, Media Lens has traced the deceptions and lies promulgated by Blair and his government in pursuit of an invasion of Iraq; an attack not sanctioned by the fig leaf of a second UN resolution, despite London and Washington’s best efforts of ‘diplomacy’, for which read ‘bullying’, ‘bribery’ and ‘coercion’.

But now that ‘war’ is underway, all such thoughts must be put behind us. Or, as an editorial in the Independent asserts: “The debate about the rights and wrongs of this war is over.” (’When democracies do battle with a despot, they must hold on to their moral superiority’, The Independent, 20 March, 2003, page 18). It is now time to ‘back our boys’, as the tabloid Sun would have it.

The BBC and ITN are taking a more subtle approach, with frequent bulletins from reporters ‘embedded’ within British fighting forces and relentless reiteration of government propaganda. Reports from Iraqi sources of Iraqi civilian deaths and injuries already carry the usual proviso “yet to be confirmed”, a warning that does not apply so readily to statements issuing from Washington and London. Meanwhile, disturbing images of the victims of the US-led invasion are not allowed to trouble western viewers.

Steve Anderson, controller of ITV News, said: “I have seen some of the images on Al-Jazeera television. I would never put them on screen. I’m not criticising them for that. There seems to be an acceptance of images I don’t think would be acceptable here.” Richard Sambrook, the BBC’s director of news, told a BBC Radio 5 Live discussion that such images “were not suitable for a British audience.” (’TV stations criticise the use of “images of war“‘, Ian Burrell, The Independent, 24 March 2003)

British audiences, therefore, are being spared the reality of war. We are not suggesting that shocking images of dead and wounded bombing victims should be paraded relentlessly on our screens and in our newspapers, but near-total suppression of the brutal effects of the illegal invasion of Iraq by US, UK and Australian forces is bias, pure and simple. Our main news bulletins are pitiful. Where are the interviews with Baghdad citizens waiting in fear of the next onslaught of “Shock and Awe”? Why is there so little attention given to the major humanitarian agencies that are fearful of the effects of water and power being cut off by ‘allied forces’ (deliberately or otherwise) for over 48 hours in Basra, Iraq’s second city? Where are the primetime news interviews with anti-war campaigners, or with ordinary members of the British public, who feel disgust, shame or dismay at the illegal and immoral intervention being carried out by ‘their’ own government?

How can “due impartiality” be claimed by news organisations broadcasting interviews with leading western politicians and military commanders who have planned, and are now undertaking, a massive assault that most authoritative commentators regard as a major breach of international law? A breach, moreover, that likely constitutes a crime against humanity, however much it is shrouded in the rhetoric of ‘liberation’ of the Iraqi people. The BBC, funded by the British television license payer, is failing in its supposed public duty “to report events as they develop with accuracy and impartiality; to provide the appropriate background information; and to air as wide a range of views as possible.”

But then, at ‘sensitive times’, the BBC has a long history of quietly dropping its Reithian norms of ‘impartiality’, ‘objectivity’ and ‘balance’; norms which, in any case, have only ever applied in a meaningless, rhetorical sense. During the Falklands War in 1982, journalist John Pilger notes:

“Leaked minutes of one of the BBC’s Weekly Review Board meetings showed BBC executives directing that the reporting of the war should be concerned ‘primarily with government statements of policy’ while impartiality was felt to be ‘an unnecessary irritation’. “ (John Pilger, Hidden Agendas, p. 492)

The BBC’s reporting of the 1999 Nato bombing campaign in the Balkans was another example of this august institution’s abdication of its public responsibilities; in particular, the station’s reluctance to bring home to the viewer the inconsistencies and deceit implicit in Nato’s pronouncements, as well as Nato’s terrorist actions in bombing civilian targets. Although BBC reporter John Simpson upset government spin doctors with his frank reports from Belgrade, the BBC did not inform its viewers and listeners of the terms of the Rambouillet ‘peace treaty’, nor did it query Nato’s claims about the Serbian ‘war machine’ being ‘degraded’. Nor, worst of all, did it systematically question the politicians and military planners about the many non-military targets being hit - atrocities routinely presented by Nato and the BBC (and the media as a whole) as ‘blunders’.

The BBC was not alone in acting as mouthpieces for Nato. Indeed, when the bombing was over, several journalists praised themselves for smoothing public opinion in Nato’s favour. Channel 4 correspondent Alex Thomson wrote, �?So, if you want to know why the public supported the war, thank a journalist, not the present government’s propagandist-in-chief [Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister’s press secretary]�? (Quoted by Charles Glass, ZNet daily commentary, 1 August, 1999, [url=http://www.zmag.org]http://www.zmag.org)[/url]

The Guardian’s Maggie O’Kane, made the same point: “Campbell should acknowledge that it was the press reporting of the Bosnian war and the Kosovar refugee crisis that gave his boss the public support and sympathy he needed to fight the good fight against Milosevic.�?(Glass, ibid). Even the BBC’s John Simpson spoke up for the media’s support of Nato: “Why did British, American, German, and French public opinion stay rock-solid for the bombing, in spite of Nato’s mistakes? Because they knew the war was right. Who gave them the information? The media.�? (Glass, ibid)

In the ongoing ‘Gulf War’, actually a full-blown invasion of Iraq, the media is going to have a much tougher time of keeping public opinion ‘rock-solid’, especially given that the attack was already launched in the face of overwhelming public opposition: a clear sign, if any were still needed, that our ‘democracy’ is a cruel sham. The American writer Edward Herman makes the point well:

“In democracies governments are supposed to represent the people, so that there shouldn’t be a need for massive protests to get the government to do what the public wants done. We shouldn’t see ‘democratic’ governments trying furiously to drag their country into actions that people oppose - and that many oppose passionately – even after being subjected to intense propaganda and disinformation.” (War-makers, Bribees, And Poodles Versus Democracy, Edward Herman, February 18, 2003, [url=http://www.zmag.org]http://www.zmag.org)[/url]

Powerful political leaders will pursue their own world-shaping agenda unless western electorates becomes so defiant that the political costs of trampling public opinion become unsustainable. We are still a long way off reaching that point: unsurprising when the majority of the public are shielded from uncomfortable facts and critical modes of reasoning by a servile media system.

The exceptions shine through. Robert Fisk, with his typical combination of compassion and clarity, focuses attention on the civilian casualties of the Bush-Blair attack on Iraq:

“Donald Rumsfeld says the American attack on Baghdad is ‘as targeted an air campaign as has ever existed’ but he should not try telling that to five-year-old Doha Suheil. She looked at me yesterday morning, drip feed attached to her nose, a deep frown over her small face as she tried vainly to move the left side of her body. The cruise missile that exploded close to her home in the Radwaniyeh suburb of Baghdad blasted shrapnel into her tiny legs they were bound up with gauze and, far more seriously, into her spine. Now she has lost all movement in her left leg.” (’This is the reality of war. We bomb. They suffer. Veteran war reporter Robert Fisk tours the Baghdad hospital to see the wounded after a devastating night of air strikes’, Independent on Sunday, cover story, 23 March 2003)

Contrast the above with an online BBC news article by BBC ‘defence’ correspondent Jonathan Marcus on US aims for the ‘war’, which barely considered the likely humanitarian cost. Instead, he concentrated on ‘coalition’ technology and strategy. Virtually all he said on the human costs was:

“There will be civilian casualties. But the aim of the US and British is to reduce these to a minimum and to reduce damage to the civilian infrastructure to a minimum as well.”

This may be the +stated+ aim of the US and the UK. But why would a responsible journalist take it at face value?

Marcus then goes on to say:

“Clearly much can go wrong. But the outcome of this conflict is not in doubt. How long it takes and the level of casualties on both sides will depend upon the degree of Iraqi resistance.”

This is astonishing. Does the likely level of Iraqi casualties really depend more upon the “degree of Iraqi resistance” than the lethal firepower now being inflicted upon them under the “Shock and Awe” nightmare by US forces?

How can Jonathan Marcus, as an ‘impartial’ BBC reporter, claim that the level of casualties will be determined by the resistance shown by those being bombed, rather than by the immense violence imposed upon them by those doing the bombing? It takes a particular brand of highly trained professional to write such words untroubled by logic or shame. (’US aims for swift, crushing war’, BBC Online, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2835661.stm, 17 March, 2003)

We have already noted elsewhere that many people are so disgusted, confused or alienated by mainstream propaganda that they are now seeking out ‘alternative’ sources of news and comment on the analysis. A Media Lens reader told us recently that when he challenged Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger on The Guardian’s omissions, deceptions and distortions on Iraqi coverage, the response was smug or, perhaps, incredulous: “What are you going to read instead then?” (email to Media Lens reader, 19 March, 2003).

The fact is, many people are +already+ reading excellent material at ZNet, Indymedia, SchNEWS and elsewhere.

This is the kind of contemptuous response that faces us wherever we look. Similarly, Blair confronts us, in effect, with the question: ‘Well, who else are you going to vote for - the Tories?!’ Modern democracy, in the media as well as in politics, is all about choices that are denuded of meaning. For those of us who seriously aspire to rein in state-corporate violence and domination, the choice between The Guardian and the Times, or between Tony Blair and Iain Duncan Smith, are not choices at all. In attempting to escape from the labyrinthine ‘nightmare of history’, freedom does not consist in choosing from different cul de sacs. What we need are ways out!

It is crucial, now more than ever, not to give in to anger, frustration or despair. As Noam Chomsky, repeatedly points out: “We basically have two choices: give up, and be sure that the worst will come; try, and it may make things better. Because a great many people make the second choice, the world does become a better place. A good shot in the arm is to spend a little time with people who do not share our immense privilege, but go on to struggle, without ever asking questions, facing terrible risks and sometimes enduring harsh punishment, even assassination. It’s a humbling experience.”

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Write to the heads of BBC news and ITN expressing your views:

Richard Sambrook, BBC director of news.
Email:

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Email:

Jonathan Munro, head of ITN newsgathering.
Email:

Write to the editors of The Guardian, The Observer and The Independent:

Alan Rusbridger, Guardian editor
Email:

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Email:

Simon Kelner, Independent editor
Email:

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- What a great day! Saturday in Manhattan

David McReynolds, Sun Mar 23, 2003

The week didn’t start that well. Two days before the first bombs fell, the civil disobedience actions began - I was one of over 40 arrested at the US Mission to the UN (and released early - I think the cops were needed for St. Patrick’s Day duty). The day after the bombing began we all went to midtown to try and close Times Square. It got closed OK, but it was raining hard and bitter cold.

After an hour or so of marching around with soggy signs, and everyone’s shoes sloshing in cold water, we broke up, while far off in San Francisco something like 1200 people were arrested in the largest CD of the week. (In Chicago my old friend Quinn Brisben, of the
Socialist Party - our candidate for President a couple of races back - got arrested by the cops because they wouldn’t accept his explanation that he needed his portable chair for demonstrations because his health wouldn’t let him stand - Quinn, I should note, was in
Baghdad only a few weeks ago, as one of many who wanted to establish human links with the “enemy").

Saturday, March 22, was the day when United for Peace and Justice had called for a mass legal march through the heart of Manhattan. How many would turn out? War had begun, Congress had voted almost unanimous support, the corporate controlled media was giving us
“24 hour a day Rumsfeld”, the puppet master who has Bush on a string. Would people turn out?

Our small group of folks from War Resisters League, along with folks from the Socialist Party, led by Greg Pason, the SP National Secretary, started out at 40th Street and joined what was a march that covered the street, from sidewalk to sidewalk, and could barely move because of the sheer numbers.

We were blessed by a sunny sweet day in spring, the weather Gods on our side, calling the city to march. But so many! Wave after wave of the official blue and white United for Peace and Justice posters and hundreds upon hundreds of hand made posters, furious and funny. One woman carried a poster saying “The Only Bush I Trust Is My Own” (in San Francisco a ten year
old boy was carrying one that read “If Bush Is On Earth, Who Is Running Hell?"). There were outrageous costumes, funny hats. Every sect in town was there with their papers and leaflets - and God bless them all, every last rigidly correct little leftist sect. The veterans were there. The old folks were there, balanced by thousands upon thousands of students. Survivors of
the sixties, battered by time, some bearded, some sagging a bit, were in the line of march. More than one poster said “This Is What Democracy Looks Like”.

Ralph DiGia of the War Resisters League - who had gotten a remarkably good profile in that day’s issue of the New York Times - marched with the WRL contingent, one of many in their 80’s (Ralph is 88) who didn’t stay home.

There were a few hecklers but more people who opened their windows and cheered us on. Block after block after block the river of humanity poured down from Times Square to Washington Square, a solid line of people covering every block for the whole distance, where it finally dissolved (there were a few inevitable arrests - you can’t expect less when you have close to a quarter of a million people).

The meaning of this demonstration and the many others across the United States, make it clear that the public is not behind Bush. The pro-war demonstrations organized in NYC on Sunday rallied only a few hundred. This is not a popular war. The opposition has not been
struck dumb by the “Shock and Awe” attacks - rather, those who oppose the war have been struck with shame by the horrific air attacks on Baghdad.

The hundreds of thousands who demonstrated weren’t radicals - they ranged from Republicans to Socialists,from Quakers to Catholics to Jews, young, old, straight, queer, black, white - we were all there. This is, truly, what democracy looks like - and not the corporate media of Time/Warner and Fox News.

In the days and weeks ahead it is certain that there will be wide public support for efforts to bring peace immediately to Iraq, to focus on regime change here, to support the United Nations if the General Assembly can be convened.

Bush and those who write his speeches have not won. We have not lost. Now is a time when silence is treason against the future. Or, in the words of a button my old friend Maggie Phair had made up: “In a time of universal deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary
act . . . George Orwell”.

Monday, March 24, 2003

-Bush the Liar

A Scientific Theory To Predict Future Actions of US President Bush The UN has failed to keep wolrd peace by failing to prevent the US from starting a war of aggression against Iraq. The US President George W. Bush has violated international law and by that declared war against democracy practised in the institution of the UN and the UN Security Council. That makes him no longer a democratic president but a dictator on a larger scale, a world wide scale. This goes far beyond hegemony. His behavior gives further indication of dictatorship: 1. His definition of friend and allie is a state that will follow his will without questioning and without discussion or disagreement. 2. He tries to legitimize his actions by forging proof (as UN Inspector Hans Blix has brought into the open). Clearly showing that he has no real proof. 3. He sways opinion by repeating the same lie over and over again until the people believe it. For example: He keeps on proclaiming Iraq supports al Qaeda terrorists and by that is linked to the 9/11-bombing. This has been prooven wrong by several security agencies. Al Qaeda has been supported by a few saudis, not the sunits. The sunits (a certain group within the muslim world the Iraqi leadership belongs to) are their declared enemy. 4. He unmasks his long pretended goal, the disarmament of the Iraq, as unimportant. He stops the disarmament by forcing the UN-inspectors who are controling the process out of Iraq. 5. He has given ultimata he knew the Iraqi leadership could not meet: Disarming in a too short period of time, going into exile while a few thousand accomplices of the regime would prevent that. 6. He invented a doctrine of preventive defense that would not stand any ground in front of a US-court, if a thug or murderer would plead to it. 7. He has already split the spoils of war under his priviledged sponsors in the oil industry unmasking his true interest. 8. He has favored close friends in the oil industry with preverential treatment like allowing oil drillings in Alaska and passing tax deferments for the wealthy. 9. He is trying to decrease freedom of speech by putting pressure on film companies. A black list has shown ist first effect at the Oscars where Dustin Hoffman and Richard Gere were not invited at first. 10. He is trying to sidetrack the people from increasing unemployment rates, from a recession in US economy and from his inabillity to change that. 11. He is refusing prisoners of war at Guantanamo Bay rights they are entitled to under the Geneva Convention, but even though dares to call Iraq an ?genemy who has no regards for conventions of war rules and morality?g. 12. He tryed to prevent a proper count of the presidential election votes in Florida. 13. He is not the elected president of the majority of the people of the United States of America. The US under Bush who definitely shows features of a dictator have become a potential threat to long term world peace, free markets and predictible international relations all absolutely essential to a thriving world economy. Any country – asian, african, european – has to face a possible military action, if it does not comply with the wishes of the US – today it is oil in Iraq, tomorrow it might be water in Norway. Countries world wide, friendly or unfriendly to the US will take precautions. New alliances will be formed, forces increased to meet the US-american threat. This will make the world a more dangerous place by far. To prevail US interests by any means will only lead to short term success for US economy. Like in any other dictatorship only a few people around the leader will profit. General US economy can not succeed isolated from the rest of the world and Bush has started alienating the US from the rest. This will soon lead to isolation, if he is not stopped. 

Friday, March 14, 2003

-INDYMEDIA

TOKYOPROGRESSIVE will be on vaction for the next 3 weeks.  BUT, IndyMedia JApan
is now working on a trial basis, so please visit.  We will be working closely with them, being part of the IndyMedia Japan collective.

You can write articles there as well. 

Take care, and please help stop the war from starting. If it does, do not despair. It depends on us to stop it, as we did during the Vietnam war.  Protest must continue.

IndyMedia Japan

Friday, March 07, 2003

-ASH WEDNESDAY AT BOEING WORLD HEADQUARTERS

Chicago, IL - Three of us from Voices in the Wilderness--Amy Mooney, Heidi Holliday and Ceylon Mooney-- celebrated Ash Wednesday at Boeing World Headquarters, 100 North Riverside Plaza in downtown Chicago. As our nation moves closer to war, we found it necessary to confront Boeing World Headquarters, in the tradition of nonviolence, with the consequences of their business of weapons and war; we brought ashes and photographs of children killed by a Boeing AGM-130 in Iraq on January 25, 1999.

We presented these photographs to employees and security, speaking of the weaponry which killed these children in Iraq; we spoke of our experiences in Iraq, of meeting these children’s families and staying in their homes, then began our Ash Wednesday service. We were charged with criminal trespass and released in time to attend a rally at Chicago’s Federal Plaza topping off today’s National Stop the War Moratorium, where students gave testimony of their day of walk-outs, teach-ins, direct actions and rallies.

“The ashes with which we bless this picture are a testament to our faith,” we offered. “We call for penance by Boeing in for death of this 6-year-old girl--the rebirth of Boeing from these ashes--that this company invest its resources into those which advance human lives, not reduce them to ashes.” Reactions were varied; many Boeing employees walked into the office wearing ashes on their foreheads.

Boeing is the second largest weapons company in the U.S.; Boeing manufactures Tomahawk Cruise missiles, integration systems for nuclear weapons, Joint Direct Attack Munitions (or JDAM, a conversion system to create “smart bombs"), and Apache combat helicopters; Boeing’s weapons have been used against civilians in the Israeli-occupied territories, Columbia, and Iraq.

Boeing moved its world headquarters to Chicago, IL, with massive tax breaks: up to $41 million in state tax breaks and various grants over 20 years and $19 million in city property-tax relief over a similar period; Chicago also pledged $1 million to retire the lease of the existing tenant in the space that Boeing will occupy. This support of the Boeing is inconsistent with the resolution the Chicago city council passed in opposition to war against Iraq.

Boeing is another link in the chain of “profits over people"-both the Iraqis who will lose their lives and the Boeing employees who lost their jobs. We poured ashes to show Boeing what their cruise missiles do to Iraqi civilians. It’s not “collateral damage"-human lives, both Iraqi and American, are at stake.

Since September 11, 2001, Boeing has laid off more than 30,000 employees while netting billions in profits from arms sales alone; 2002 saw a net increase in sales to the U.S. Department of Defense-up $3.3 billion from 2001. Boeing has an annual lobby budget in excess of $8 million.

We entered the lobby of Boeing at 8:30AM, laid our photographs on the ground, scattered ashes, and offered the following litany:

In Judeo-Christian and Pagan traditions, ashes are a symbol of both rebirth and atonement for one’s sins. Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the Christian Lenten season leading up to the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. We carry to the world headquarters of Boeing, the second largest arms company in the United States, faces of Iraqis whose homes, lives and children have been reduces to ashes by a Boeing AGM-130.

For this we must atone: -For the 23 million Iraqis sentenced to war by political leaders and arms companies. -For the crucifixion of Jumeriyah in Basra, Iraq on January 25, 1999. -For the lives of Nor and her sister, reduced to ashes by a Boeing AGM 130

To be born again, we must: -Face the consequences of our pursuit of mass destruction. -Divest our vast wealth from pursuit of death to embrace of life. -Build a nonviolent future by scattering the ashes of a violent present.

The little girl in this picture was named Nor, which means “light” in Arabic. At 9:30AM on January 25, 1999, the United States bombed her slum neighborhood in Basra, killing her and several other children. Nor’s light was burnt to ashes by a Boeing AGM-130. Nor and her family represent the more than one million Iraqi civilians killed by U.S.-led economic sanctions and U.S. air strikes and the more than 10,000 Gulf War veterans who have died since Desert Storm. Nor and her family represent the millions of Iraqis who will face famine as they are bombed out of their homes, and the thousands of Iraqi civilians waiting to die at the hands of the Pentagon’s “shock and awe” and Boeing’s weapons. Boeing builds and sells these killing machines, the people of America foot the bill, and the ordinary Iraqi civilians pay the price.

A Prayer

Lord and lover of humankind, Teach us to groan as you must groan, Mourners all of us. Instruct us in the language of lamentation.

With the ashes of war and terror, The ashes of so many lives gone, We mark ourselves this Ash Wednesday.

Good Lord, hold us in your arms As we ask the hard questions: Is this the hour to trample down violence, To deny death any more lives, To refuse the false safety of walls and weapons, To beat swords into plowshares And to bring new life from ashes?

Lord, hear us. Lord, be merciful to all.

Amy Mooney Heidi Holliday Ceylon Mooney On Behalf of Voices in the Wilderness and the ordinary civilians of Iraq

Visit our new talking points on our website under “Sanctions and War: Myths and Realities.”

Voices in the Wilderness 1460 W. Carmen Ave Chicago, IL 60640 773-784-8065 [url=http://www.vitw.org]http://www.vitw.org[/url] [url=http://www.iraqpeaceteam.org]http://www.iraqpeaceteam.org[/url]

-Confronting the War Machine-April 5-6 2003

London, 3 March 2003 Reclaim The Bases: War Resisters’ International calls for nonviolent action at military bases on 5/6 April 2003

Dear friend, After the impressive demonstrations on February 15th, War Resisters’ International is now calling for nonviolent action at military bases on 5/6 April 2003.

This call to “reclaim the bases” is a specific call following our “Say No!” statement from September 2001, which was so far signed by more than 1,000 people. With this letter, we send you our call to “Reclaim The Bases”, including reports on inspiring actions, and again our “Say No!” statement.

We hope you will be able to get involved in Reclaim the Bases, and we are looking forward to receiving your report - and would welcome photos from your activities. Please get in touch with the WRI office as soon as you know what you are planning for 5/6 April.

It is always encouraging to know that a lot of people take similar action on the same weekend all over the world - we only can know if you tell us. War Resisters’ International will provide updated information - and additional resources - on its website at
http://wri-irg.org/news/2003/reclaim.htm

Again, we need your information to update our website, and to spread the word about growing resistance to war. War Resisters’ International needs your support to turn “Reclaim The Bases” into a successful action. Your donation helps us to coordinate the weekend of nonviolent action, and to continue our resistance against the war on Iraq - and against war in general.

Thank you for your support.

Andreas Speck
(War Resisters’ International)

EXAMPLES:

Citizens weapons inspections. Inspect military bases in your country for weapons of mass destruction;

Nonviolent blockades of military bases, headquarters, recruitment offices, or weapons manufacturers;

Vigils and demonstrations in front of military bases;

And many other creative actions.

CONTACT WRI here:

http://wri-irg.org/site/mailform.htm

Thursday, March 06, 2003

-An Appeal from Dr. Helen Caldicott to the Pope

Please read the following appeal and if it makes sense to you, do as suggested and write to His Holiness. Time is short. If you think this action could make a difference, do it now!

In peace and hope, Heather Souter

PS Please note that I added the sentence regarding Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the sample letter found at the end of the appeal.

Dear Friends

I write this appeal for your help as a pediatrician, a mother, and a grandmother—and I am writing about the lives of tens of thousands of children.

Although the current administration has demonstrated it has no reservations about slaughtering up to 500,000 innocents in Iraq, there is one person whose life they absolutely will not risk. That person is Pope John Paul II. While the Pope has already formally denounced the proposed war, calling it a defeat for humanity, as well as sent his top spokesperson to meet with Saddam Hussein, he now must take a historically unprecedented action of his own and travel to Baghdad. The Pope’s physical presence in Iraq will act as the ultimate human shield, during which time leaders of the word nation can commit themselves to identifying and implementing a peaceful solution to this war that the world’s majority clearly does not support.

To persuade the Holy Father to take this unusual but potent action, he must hear from you and millions of others around the world who have already been inspired to stand up and speak out for peace. A mountain of surfacemail, email, faxes, and phone calls are our devices to inspire him. Please understand that your taking just a few minutes right now to communicate with him may ultimately spare the lives of thousands of innocent people who at this moment live in complete terror from the threat of an imminent U.S.-lead military strike on their homeland.

So here is what you can do to be a part of this powerful final action to stop the march to war in Iraq.

1. Do not forward the letter below. Its power depends upon your sending it directly, as a personal communication to the Pope.

2. Simply cut and paste the letter below into a new email. Also cut and paste the Vatican email address we have provided.

3. At the close of the letter, type in your name, city and state--no need to include your address.

4. Either email, () FAX ([from USA] 011-39-06698-85378--from other countries drop the 011 prefix—or send a hardcopy of this letter to the addresses in the letter below. DO NOT put “Italy” anywhere on the envelope, as this will send your mail into the Italian mail system which is independent of the Vatican system. Should you wish to phone the Vatican directly, (from USA) dial 011-39-06-69-82--all other countries must use their appropriate international prefix.

5. Pass this original email on to as many people you can so as to assure a critical mass is reached in this action.

6. Note that as you and others begin sending your letters, faxes and emails, there will be a simultaneous effort to alert the media of this action, so as to be sure it is publicly known throughout the world.

Thank you for participating in this formal request of the Pope. We just may stop this war in Iraq—and save these childrens’ lives.

Dr. Helen Caldicott

-------------------------------------------------------
LETTER TO POPE JOHN PAUL II

His Holiness John Paul II

Apostolic Palace

00120 Vatican City State

Europe

Father, why has thou forsaken me?

Your Holiness:

I write to you today out of a sense of great urgency. As you know the United States of America is on the verge of launching what may be one of the most cataclysmic wars in history using weapons of mass destruction upon the Iraqi people, fifty percent of whom are less than 15 years of age.

Conservative estimates are that such a war will result in the death of 500,000 Iraqis. If you had been in Hiroshima or Nagasaki at the time of WWII, would the US have dropped either atomic bomb? I think not. And, at this time in history, it seems clear that you are the only person on Earth who can stop this war. Indeed, your physical presence in Baghdad, will prevent the impending slaughter of hundreds of thousands of human beings, and force the international community of nations to identify and implement a truly peaceful resolution to this unprecedented, preemptive aggression.

I implore you to travel to Baghdad and to remain there until a peaceful solution to this crisis has been implemented. The lives of the people of the people of Iraq rest in your hands as does the fate of the world.

With hope,

Your name