Thursday, December 25, 2003
Mitsubishi Workplace Discrimination in Japan
Hi,
SUBMITTED TO US
I am a native of India, a graduate of Indian Institute of technology (IIT) who was brought to Japan by trick and made to work in Mitsubishi’s computer works in Japan. Intentional workplace racial discrimination and harassment followed soon that resulted in a human rights lawsuit filed by my lawyers from Tokyo Bar Association.
Details on my http://www.kamalsinha.com/mitsubishi/ that includes media account (including Japanese scanned images) on http://www.kamalsinha.com/mitsubishi/media.html .
By the way, I have another site http://www.mitsubishisucks.com that deals with the worst industrial group in the world.
If you like these sites, please link to them and tell your friends about tthem.
Thanks.
Thursday, December 04, 2003
-Citizens succeed in stopping Iwate prefecture’s GM rice!”
Press Information - NO! GMO Campaign Japan
December 1, 2003
Declaration of Victory
“Citizens succeed in stopping Iwate prefecture’s GM rice!”
On November 28, more than 450 people from all over Japan gathered in Morioka
city, Iwate, to participate in a gathering “No to GMO National Assembly in
Iwate”.
At the Assembly more than 407,000 signatures were collated of people from
all over Japan who had expressed support for a petition demanding a stop to
the GM rice(*) research taking place in Iwate.
All the participants then set off down the street in the cold to take the
petition to the Iwate prefectural government. It was taken into the
Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Department.
After receiving the 407,212 signatures from 20 representatives from the
Assembly, Mr. Masakatsu Sasaki, the Director of the Agriculture Department,
publicly stated that Iwate has decided to abandon its GM rice research.
Iwate conducted an outdoor GM rice experiment this year, which had been due
to continue for a further year.
The Director also stated that Iwate will not conduct any further outdoor
experiments involving GM rice or any other GM crops.
This is yet another victory for the citizens of Japan and follows on from
last year’s success in halting Monsanto’s GM rice in Aichi prefecture.
As a result of that successful citizens’ campaign to stop the Monsanto-Aichi
GM rice, Japanese private sector corporations completely abandoned GM rice
R&D. However the research facility of the former Ministry of Agriculture,
Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) - now an independent administrative
corporation - together with the Iwate Biotechnology Research Centre,
maintained their strong commitment to develop GM rice. Despite which, people
power has now succeeded in halting this GM rice research programme in Iwate.
MAFF is currently discussing how to tighten the regulation of outdoor
experimental releases of GM crops at research centres, in order to accord
with the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, which will enter into force in
Japan from 19 February 2004. Iwate’s decision is bound to have a strong
influence on MAFF’s review.
It is now no longer at all easy to work on GM rice R&D in Japan. The same
applies to other GM foods as well.
“We do not want GM food! We do not eat GM food! We will not let GM food be
produced!”. These are the words that are being repeated again and again by
the Citizens of Japan and their efforts look set to bring some big results
very soon.
In terms of a global perspective on GM farming, the US company Monsanto’s
attempt to rest control over global food production has not diminished, and
the GM farming area is enlarging. In addition, commercialisation for GM
wheat is being sought in the US and Canada.
NO! GMO Campaign’s next step is to increase its cooperation with other
citizens from all over the world in order to bring a halt to GM food.
NO! GMO Campaign
Keisuke Amagasa
For more information please contact:
Keisuke Amagasa (Mr)
Masako Koga (Ms)
NO! GMO Campaign
75-2F, Wasedamachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-0042 Japan
TEL: +81-3-5155-4756 FAX: +81-3-5155-4767
(*) The Iwate Biotechnology Research Center was established in April 1992
with 100% funding from Iwate Prefecture. On 3 April 2003, the MAFF approved
outdoor trials for a low-temperature resistant rice variety “Sub29”
developed by the Iwate Biotechnology Research Center. This GM rice variety
(Sasanishiki) contains the glutathione-S-transferase gene, which imparts
multiple functions such as herbicide resistance and cold resistance. The
problem with this rice variety is that it produces enzymes with multiple
functions, and thus contains many uncertain factors. Simply anything could
happen, and it is possible that previously unknown problems will arise with
this variety in the future. (Source: Citizens’ Biotechnology Information
Center -CBIC)
Further reading:
NO! GMO Campaign: http://www.no-gmo.org/
Citizens’ Biotechnology Information Center:
http://www5d.biglobe.ne.jp/~cbic/english/index.html
GM Rice Watch Center Japan:
http://www.gmrwatch.org/e/index.html
Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (Japan acceded on 21 November 2003)
http://www.biodiv.org/biosafety/signinglist.aspx?sts=rtf&ord=dt
-Do you know about the recent BY NOTHING DAY?
Here is Gaby’s report from Kyoto
Media:
Word spread like wildfire through internet and NGO networks, especially IMC
Japan
http://www.kinyobi.co.jp/Recent > will carry a story on BND. But at least in Kyoto, we had brought our own media- photo cameras (Markuz, Taro), video cam (the Nishidas), and independent media savy! In past year’s, newspapers refused to carry our story because they thought it was not a message they want to put out there when the economic situation is not good. (Kyoto Shinbun).
So this year we put into our press release that BND is good for the economy: “the fair trade economy! the organic and local economy!”, and quoted a business owner, “BND is good for all of us!” But I guess they only care about the GDP after all (and whatever happens in Tokyo). So more than ever I think- BND and the Big Question Campaign
http://adbusters.org/campaigns/question/ ("economists must learn to subtract") need to go together! Again and again: When people go isnt it bad for the economy? We have to ask back: Is the economy good for us?
Actually, the biggest BND media event was the un-commercial
http://adbusters.cool.ne.jp/schedule.htm broadcast on the Discovery Japan channel in Tokyo and Yokohama! Three cheers to Taizo (also the brains and muscles behind the adbusters japan website) who pulled it off again!
Network:
Helps to have a well-maintained website with our own fancy domain!http://www.bndjapan.org
NGO networking is tops: the emerging Slow Life movement, the popular antiwar movement as well as the brand-new Indymedia Japan are our natural allies- and we’re starting to get hooked up ! Vocal support from and for fair trade and organic food both business and NGOs (endorsements from Tengu Natural Foods
http://www.alishan-organic-center.com/
and Global Village http://www.globalvillage.or.jp/ ).
Mailing List: Lots of new mailing list sign ups (Japanese and English lists)- now we’re up to combined 260 people from all over Japan, up 60 from Mid-October! Website was crammed with posters, flyers and stickers for downloads, some of which even got used hahaha!
Photos from Kyoto, Messages to Zenta Claus, voices from the streets,
participant reports from Okinawa and Osaka- all up on
http://www.bndjapan.org
(easier than wading through these long messages of mine...)
Still expecting more reports and photos from you guys out there!
Gabi
PS: dutch BND also picked up some of our pix. http://www.koopniets.nl/
-U.S. Military Families in Iraq Surprised by REAL situation
Relatives of U.S. military personnel stationed in Iraq are currently in
Baghdad. They are meeting with members of the Governing Council and
ordinary Iraqis, as well as with U.S. soldiers including their loved ones
stationed in Iraq.
Today they expressed surprise at the dire conditions of schools and
hospitals that they have visited. They also report that many Iraqis they
encounter want direct elections.
In the United States, media can contact: Andrea Buffa
[andrea@globalexchange.org] and Victoria Cunningham
[victoria@codepinkalert.org]. They are in touch with members of the
delegation and can arrange interviews upon their return to the U.S. after
December 8.
Family members of U.S. military personnel currently in Iraq include:
* MICHAEL McPHEARSON, http://www.occupationwatch.org
McPhearson, who has a son in the military, said: “Both George Bush and
Hillary Clinton have a hidden agenda. They are both using their trips to
Iraq to better position their political parties in the upcoming elections.
The only agenda of our delegation is to uncover the truth.”
* FERNANDO SUAREZ DEL SOLAR,
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1202-09.htm
Fernando Suarez del Solar, whose son Jesus was a Marine who died in combat
in Iraq, said: “Our mission is not photo ops. Our mission is talking to
ordinary Iraqis and U.S. troops, figuring out why things have gone so
terribly wrong and what we can do to stop the violence and bring the troops
home.” He is also bringing thousands of letters of peace from children in
the United States to children in Iraq, as well as medical supplies for
hospitals.
* ANABELLE VALENCIA, http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1129-06.htm
Valencia, a military mother and school teacher traveling with the
delegation, said: “I want to see my son and daughter and talk to the other
troops. I want to talk to the Iraqi people, especially the women. And I
want to talk to the U.S. authorities and ask them when they are going to
send our troops home and allow the Iraqis to run their own country.”
* MIKE LOPERCIO,
http://www.napanews.com/templates/index.cfm?template=story_full&id=719D8775-D0FC-4DAB-BF4B-F93D1773A601
A businessman from Tempe, Arizona, whose son is stationed in Iraq, Lopercio
said: “I want to ask Iraqis how they feel about our presence and if they
understand and agree with our objectives. I want to find out if the current
attacks on our troops are acts of a small minority or supported by most of
the population.”
For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
-N.Y. Times Columnist Friedman wrongly attacks Bush protesters for ignoring same-day bombing
ACTION ALERT:
Is Thomas Friedman Even Listening?
Columnist wrongly attacks Bush protesters for ignoring same-day bombing
December 2, 2003
In Thomas Friedman’s November 30 New York Times column, he chides anti-war
activists participating in a protest against George W. Bush’s visit to
London for not acknowledging the bombing of British targets in Istanbul
that had occurred on the same day (11/20/03) just hours before.
“Sorry, but there is something morally obtuse about holding an antiwar
rally on a day when your own people have been murdered-- and not even
mentioning it or those who perpetrated it,” Friedman wrote. The lack of
acknowledgment of the Turkish bombings made Friedman “wonder whether
George Bush had made the liberal left crazy.”
Friedman appeared to base his analysis of the protest’s message on a
survey of signs carried by activists in the march; he complained that none
that he saw made any reference to the killings in Istanbul. It is
difficult, of course, to respond to a breaking news event on a handheld
sheet of cardboard-- particularly since they are often painted the day
before a march. If Friedman had actually listened to what the speakers at
the rally had to say, however, he would have heard plenty of discussion of
the day’s violence.
For example, a report in the London Independent (11/21/03) quoted Damon
Albarn, lead singer of the rock group Blur, as addressing the bombings in
his speech to the gathering: “That’s going to happen increasingly because
of the policies of the Western world. The attacks in Turkey and Bush’s
visit to Britain were no mere coincidence. People are playing for very
high stakes.” The paper described Alburn as being “among those who
pointed to yesterday’s bombings in Istanbul as evidence of the need to
demonstrate.”
Another such speaker, according to the Glasgow Herald (11/21/03), was the
British Green Party’s Caroline Lucas, who told the crowd that the violence
in Istanbul “shows us our world is anything but more secure today.”
In defense of Friedman, very few news accounts of the rally gave any
indication whatsoever of what the speakers had to say. But the columnist
would only have to read his own paper’s account of the rally to know that
the violence in Turkey was very much on the minds of marchers: “News of
Thursday’s bombings in Istanbul-- which killed more than two dozen people,
including Britain’s consul general, and wounded hundreds of others--
appeared to galvanize the protesters’ opposition to the continuing
operation in Iraq,” the New York Times reported (11/21/03). “If anything,
many protesters said repeatedly, the war on Iraq created more instability
in an already volatile region.”
In any case, before one declares that a political movement is “morally
obtuse” or even “crazy” for ignoring a significant event, one might be
expected to check to see whether it has in fact been ignored. This
mischaracterization of the event’s treatment of the Istanbul bombings is a
significant error and it deserves to be corrected. It also raises the
broader question of whether Friedman is pontificating about the left
without listening to what the left has to say.
ACTION: Please write to the New York Times to ask that Thomas Friedman
correct his inaccurate assertion that those who held an anti-war rally in
London did not even mention the bombings that occurred the same day.
CONTACT:
New York Times
mailto:nytnews@nytimes.com
Toll free comment line: 1-888-NYT-NEWS
As always, please remember that your comments are taken more seriously if
you maintain a polite tone. Please cc with your
correspondence.
----------
Your donation to FAIR makes a difference:
http://www.fair.org/donate.html
-Networks Hide the Important Story of why politicians support medical care plan
http://www.fair.org/activism/medicare-networks.html
ACTION ALERT:
Networks Don’t Follow the Money in Medicare Story
December 2, 2003
The nightly network newscasts devoted significant broadcast time to the
debate over the restructuring of Medicare. But while some reports
described the corporate interests that stood to gain under the plan to
offer a prescription drug benefit, few addressed the question of why
Congress would pass a law so beneficial to the pharmaceutical and health
insurance industries. In short, network news failed to heed the old
advice: follow the money.
A CBS Evening News report-- aired on November 25, after the bill had
passed-- mentioned that the “biggest corporate winner by far is the drug
industry itself, mostly because under the new law Medicare is barred from
negotiating drug discounts.” Such admissions were not uncommon. But left
unmentioned was the fact that pharmaceutical companies, as well as health
insurers and HMOs, are big contributors to the same politicians who cast
the votes on this legislation.
The pharmaceutical industry gave $21.7 million to Republicans and $7.6
million to Democrats in the last election cycle alone, according to the
Center for Responsive Politics. The insurance sector gave $11.7 million
to Democrats and $25.9 million to Republicans during the same time frame.
In fact, those contributions, the CRP has found, were a fairly reliable
indicator of how a given member of Congress voted on the bill: House
Republicans who supported the bill got more than three times as much
pharmaceutical money as the minority of Republican opponents; the handful
of Democratic supporters in the House received more than twice the health
insurance contributions taken in by Democrats who voted no (Capital Eye,
11/24/03).
The simple fact that the “winners” in the Medicare debate were also big
political contributors was mentioned in only one report in the weeks
before the bill passed, according to a search of the Nexis database. This
was a November 23 segment on ABC’s World News Tonight. Correspondent Jake
Tapper noted that “buried in the energy and Medicare bills are goodies for
many corporations,” and he referred to a report by the group Common Cause
describing “Bush policies that directly benefit contributors’ companies.
The Medicare bill should boost earnings for Pfizer, the Federation of
American Hospitals and Johnson & Johnson.” Tapper also raised another
important point: “Campaign contributors not only sometimes benefit from
laws their favored politicians support, they also often help write them as
they did with these two bills.”
In another ABC World News Tonight report (10/19/03), on the health
insurance industry, ABC medical correspondent Tim Johnson noted, “With
tremendous clout in Washington-- the industry spent more than $37 million
on political donations last year-- reform has been slow in coming.”
Unfortunately, reporting that tied the Medicare bill’s benefits for the
healthcare industries with those industries’ generosity to politicians was
extremely rare. Back in July, CBS Evening News aired a report on the
Medicare issue by Joie Chen (7/25/03) that made the connection:
***
Chen: Lawmakers were blunt about the influence drug companies have on the
debate.
Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D.-Ill.): There’s a pharmaceutical lobbyist and a half
for every member of Congress. They have spent over $100 million in
contributions, entertainment and lobbying expenses all focused on us.
Chen: And expect that influence to increase this fall as the House and
Senate try to work out their differences over how to fix Medicare and make
prescription drugs more affordable for seniors.
***
But whether that influence increased or not, CBS never again mentioned
pharmaceutical or other healthcare industry contributions in its coverage
of the Medicare debate.
NBC Nightly News, meanwhile, seems to have never mentioned the Medicare
bill and healthcare industry campaign contributions in the same story all
year. When NBC analyzed the politics of the Medicare debate (11/24/03),
reporter David Gregory claimed that “the president knew keeping a campaign
promise on prescription drugs could be a key to his re-election,”
explaining that “it’s older Americans who will make up crucial voting
block next year, an estimated one out of every four votes.” Bush,
according to Gregory, pushed the Medicare bill because he calculated that
“this campaign promise could result in political gold.” The actual
political gold that Bush and the legislators who voted for the bill will
receive-- in the form of millions of dollars worth of campaign
contributions-- was apparently not worth reporting.
ACTION: Encourage ABC World News Tonight and CBS Evening News to do more
reporting on the role of campaign contributions in congressional debates.
Tell NBC Nightly News that covering such debates without even mentioning
political donations is not responsible journalism.
CONTACT:
ABC World News Tonight
Phone: 212-456-4040
mailto:PeterJennings@abcnews.com
CBS Evening News
Phone: 212-975-3691
mailto:evening@cbsnews.com
NBC Nightly News
Phone: 212-664-4971
mailto:nightly@nbc.com
As always, please remember that your comments are taken more seriously if
you maintain a polite tone. Please cc with your
correspondence.
-Peaceboat: No SDF Soldiers to Iraq
This is late, but here is one group which has been fighting against the sending of SDF soldiers to Iraq.
Tell Koizumi: No SDF Troops to Iraq!
Street E-mail Campaign
Place: Shinjuku East Exit (opposite Alta Bldg.)
Date: Tuesday December 2, 2003
Time: 5:00 - 7:00pm
Peace Boat heading the rising tide of public opinion strongly rejects the
decision taken by the Government to dispatch SDF troops to Iraq. The rapidly
rising death toll there, which now includes two Japanese diplomats murdered in
Tikrit on November 29, is making it clearer by the day that blindly following US
foreign policy in the so-called “war against terror” will only lead to the
further loss of innocent lives. It is therefore unacceptable for Japanese young
people to be sent to participate in and possibly become victims of this morally
unjustifiable and illegal war.
Peace Boat is calling on the Government to listen to abandon its decision to
send troops - a call which has the backing of the majority of people in Japan. A
Direct Action Centre will be set up on site as part of the event so that the
public have a chance to have their voice heard by sending emails directly to the
Prime Minister’s homepage. This display of direct democracy is a way to gives a
voice to young people who may not be able to vote or who feel ignored by the
current government’s reckless foreign policy.
The event will include:
- Slideshow presentation
- Speech by Kazuo Takahashi - Associate Professor of Middle East Studies,
University of the Air (planned)
- Direct street e-mail campaign to send messages to Prime Minister Koizumi.
For more information, contact:
Paul Mason, Peace Boat International Division, Tokyo
Tel: (03) 3363 8047 Mobile: (080) 3382 8033 Fax: (03) 3363 7562
http://www.peaceboat.org/english
-ZNet Commentary: Perhaps Hussein Read Tolstoy And Bush’s People Didn?ft
Support Znet’s Sustainer program
http://zmag.org
There is an eerie similarity between Leo Tolstoy?fs novel, War and Piece, which
describes with considerable accuracy Napoleon?fs 1812 invasion of Russia and George
Bush?fs 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Napoleon, after quick victories throughout Europe, decided to take on his former
ally, Russia. Napoleon had the most powerful army in Europe. He liked to use small,
fast units for surprise and speed. When he entered the borders of Russia, he
expected a ferocious the battle for Moscow in which he would destroy, once and for
all, the Russian military machine. But to his surprise, his invasion of Moscow was a
cakewalk. There was no big battle with the Russian military machine. Napoleon?fs
troops quickly entered Moscow and dug in.
George Bush, commander-in-chief of the most powerful military machine in history,
had a Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, who preferred to use small, fast units
for surprise and speed. He had at his command high technology, an Air Force and
tanks unmatched in the world. After Bush had enjoyed a quick victory over the
Taliban in Afghanistan, he decided to invade the former ally of the United States,
Saddam Hussein?fs Iraq.
The troops of Bush the Younger, like Napoleon entering Moscow, had a cakewalk into
Iraq. There were token shots here and there, but no big earth works to slow vehicles
in ambushes. No tank traps to paralyze the fearsome Abrams tanks. No massive mine
fields to make every American move a dance of death that would delay the advancing
troops. Most surprising was no Republican Guard, Hussein?fs most effective army. The
quick-moving U.S. special forces quickly enveloped Baghdad where they waited for the
big battle. But there was no huge battle. There was no visible Republican Guard. And
there was no Saddam Hussein. . Like Napoleon waiting to polish off the Czarist army,
Bush also waited to finish off the Republican Guard. But no Republican Guard was in
sight. Saddam Hussein was nowhere to be found.
President Bush assumed it was all over. It was time to put the formidable White
House public relations into high gear. In the now famous photo op, the President
dressed in fighter-pilot uniform made a landing on the aircraft carrier, Abraham
Lincoln. Nearby, the city of San Diego was clearly visible --- but not to the
American public because the TV cameras on the carrier were placed by White House
operatives to point only toward the other side of the ship in the direction of the
open seas.
As millions of American watched on television, President Bush, now re-uniformed in a
Presidential black suit and, by precise pre-arrangement, made his famous victory
swagger across the open deck toward the carefully focussed TV cameras. Pre-arranged
was a huge sign on the carrier?fs superstructure: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. At a
microphone, Bush told the American people the invasion was complete and combat
ended.
Napoleon and Bush both were surprised by a speedy, un-opposed easy victory. The
massed Czarist troops of General Mikhail Kutuzov seemed to have evaporated. Saddam
Hussein?fs Republican Guard also seemed to have evaporated.
In the War of 1812, Kutuzov?fs army had not, of course, evaporated. They had simply
moved beyond Moscow, out of sight, and waited for the penalty of time and a vicious
winter to decimate Napoleon?fs Grand Army.
At this writing, there is no definitive word on what happened to Hussein?fs
Republican Guard. But after the invasion there were unexpected huge explosions,
expert booby traps for the Abrams tanks, and a steady toll of American soldiers
killed and wounded by hidden sharpshooters. Shoulder-fired missiles destroyed U.S.
army helicopters and their occupants, and a series of ambushes killed more United
States soldiers. It all had the earmarks of planned and skilled guerrilla warfare.
It is possible that Hussein?fs elite Republican Guard had shed their uniforms and
were behind the mounting American casualties. Once the small, beleaguered U.S.
troops were shown to be vulnerable, it loosed the anger of Iraqi civilians who,
without water, electricity, or food, demanded that the American occupiers who ruined
the country by precision bombing do something about it.
There was no American plan to do “something about it.” The invasion and reduction of
cities and infrastructure to rubble has been precisely planned. But no plan for what
came afterward. How could this have happened? In the elaborate war games that
precedes every invasion, didn?ft anyone ask, “OK, after the bombing and our troops
control Iraq, what do we do next?"Apparently, no one in charge asked “what do we do
next?”.
It seems inexplicable. But perhaps it is explainable.
Among neo-conservatives, there has been a basic long-term plan for the United States
and for the rest of the world. In the United States the plan is open and even given
a name: “Starve the Beast.” The “Beast” is the United States government. The
starvation is to have the government so loaded with debt or other limiting
obligations that it makes it easier to cancel a wide range of government programs,
or so cripple them they will not work. These are programs like Social Security,
Medicare, Medicaid and other fixtures that mainly benefit the middle-class
Americans, environmental protections, anti-pollution laws, and the entire range of
programs the neo-conservatives wish to privatize or cancel. The 2003 Republican
White House and Congress already are engaged in the plan.
But this is not limited to the United States. It is a plan that the neo-con group
foresees implanting in all the newly developing countries and in as much of the rest
of the world as possible. This includes Iraq.
It is important to remember that the invasion of Iraq came out of the blue, suddenly
depicted as a country with imminent danger to the United States with weapons of mass
destruction and nuclear capacity. It was, as we now know, a false alarm that should
have been known by the neo-con planners like Rumsfeld to be a false alarm. If the
group did not know it was a false alarm, it is even more alarming. If they believed
it was not a false alarm, it would mean that the planners have become so obsessed
with their own goals, that they are capable of profound self-deception.
After the Taliban had been bombed in Afghanistan, Iraq seemed a convenient country
with which to extend the neo-con program. The word “convenient” is not mine. It was
used by one of the inner group who planned the whole thing, Paul Wolfowitz, in an
article in Vanity. In that article, Wolfowitz said a number of countries were
considered as targets but Iraq was decided as the most “convenient.” One assumes
that it was “convenient” because politically Hussein is properly despised as a
monster who does monstrous things to his own dissenters (though he was our monster
in 1980).
That the war hawks had no plans for what to do after bombing Iraq into rubble and
putting our troops in occupation seems like idiocy. But the war hawks do not have
the usual characteristics of ignoramuses. They are well-educated and have
considerable intellectual skills.
Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense, had been Dean and Professor of the Nitze
School of Advanced International Relations at Johns Hopkins University. Condoleeza
Rice, President Bush?fs National Security Advisor, had been Provost and a Dean at
Stanford University, professor of political science, and author of three books on
European and Soviet History. Richard Perle (known by his opponents as the Prince of
Darkness), was chair of the Defense Policy Board, has a BA and Masters from
Princeton. Rumsfeld is a Princeton man.
How does one explain the blindness of these defense intellectuals, even with the
dream of their own kind of world., knowing something was wrong about the celebrated
United States initial cakewalk into Iraq with only token resistance. They knew that
Hussein?fs most effective army was his Republican Guard, yet the Guard were never in
evidence to resist the invasion. In all their education at prestigious universities,
were they never acquainted with Leo Tolstoy?fs great novel, War and Peace about the
War of 1812?
It is a huge tome with more than 3 million-plus words, but it is also on any list of
the world?fs great literature. And any course in European history will have dealt
with Napoleon and the War of 1812. More important, it provides a striking warning of
precisely what seems to have happened in the aftermath of the invasion of Iraq.
Tolstoy describes—with historical accuracy-- how Napoleon?fs terrifying
500,000-man Grand Army, approached Moscow ready for a great battle with the Czarist
troops under command of the aging, sleepy-eyed General Mikhail Kutuzov. Napoleon had
his cakewalk into the city of Moscow with no hindrance from Kutuzov?fs big army.
Kutuzov had merely withdrawn his army well east of Moscow and let Napoleon take over
Moscow and then waited patiently for time and winter to destabilize Napoleon?fs
control of Russia.
Bush accepted the Iraq war plan and quickly savored the glory of a quick and
successful invasion. It is possible that Bush, not known as an insatiable reader of
books, might not remember much about Napoleon, Moscow and Kutuzov. But Bush?fs
generals did because one thing the Pentagon does well is to make sure every person
who reaches the rank of a senior General has been to graduate school and studied in
detail every important war from classical times to the present.
The War of 1812 is certainly in the curriculum. Perhaps that is why so many of
Bush?fs generals insisted the American invasion army was too small and not
sufficiently prepared. And why senior people in the CIA expressed doubt about the
intelligence about Iraq.
The problem, of course, is that Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Perle, were known to feel
they understood military matters better than his generals and the intelligence they
collected was distinct from the CIA They selected whatever information they could
that supported their plans and dismissed the rest as bureaucratic incompetence. The
Iraqi mess that followed the invasion has become a monument of those who have
impenetrable self-confidence in their own superiority.
The President hung up a “Keep Out” sign for the United Nations, made derogatory
remarks about the country?fs most powerful allies—Germany and France—and
boasted of his support from some lesser Eastern European countries like Slovakia and
Slovenia who were delighted with sudden recognition as “military allies” of the
United States.
Rumsfeld and company must have felt that they could simply order the Air Force to
reduce Iraq to rubble, move in the small American special forces and then let lesser
people worry about petty details --- details like what happens after the troops are
in and there is no water, electricity, or food, and a population hat will become
desperate and hostile. There were far more casualties after “Mission Accomplished”
than occurred during the invasion itself.
It may demonstrate something related not to the military but to the human race.
Every one of Bush?fs war hawks undoubtedly has a I.Q. But a high I.Q. has never been
a reliable defense against arrogance or lack of wisdom. Most of all, a high I.Q. is
vulnerable to hubris, which the dictionary defines as “overbearing pride or
presumption; arrogance.” The penalties of hubris in high places, as readers of the
classics and careful observers of human experience realize, are too chilling as a
fate for the innocent citizens and soldiers of the United States and for the rest of
the world.
-Why Japan Remains a Threat to Peace and Democracy in Asia
by Kenichi Asano
Kenichi Asano is a Professor of Communication Studies at Doshisha
University, Kyoto, Japan.
from Censored 2004
Most people from this region, as well as other parts of the globe, would be
quite surprised to hear the assertion that Japan is one of the most
underdeveloped states when it comes to the development of democracy and
healthy journalism in the Asia-Pacific region-and that politically, Japan is
not yet a fully independent nation. And why shouldn’t they be surprised?
Most people assume that since Japan is a highly industrialized country with
one of the highest standards of technology in the world, it must therefore
be a democratic state as well.
In fact, this is not the case. I would even go so far as to say that Japan
remains a threat to peace and prosperity in Asia.
MY EXPERIENCE AS A NEWS REPORTER
In examining the media situation and political governance in Japan, let me
first introduce my experience as a correspondent in Southeast Asia. For 22
years, I worked as a news reporter for Kyodo News, Japan’s representative
wire service, including a stint as Kyodo’s Jakarta Bureau Chief from
February 1989 to July 1992. In 1992, I was deported by General Suharto’s
military regime.
I also covered the Cambodian conflict and democratization process in
Thailand. I have been an independent journalist for eight years, having also
taken a position as professor of mass communications at Doshisha University
in April 1994.
I have a special interest in media ethics, mainly how the news media should
cover crimes and criminal victims, as well as suspects, defendants, and
convicts. I often compare media-accountability systems in various countries.
I also try to monitor the “independence” of journalists from the political
centers of local and national power that they cover.
Let me share with you my experience, in particular, in Indonesia. I was
blacklisted by the Indonesian military and Japanese embassy in Jakarta for
my critical reporting on the Indonesian human rights situation and for
reporting on some shady ties with corrupt Japanese politicians.
WHY JAPAN IS SO UNDEMOCRATIC
Let me now turn to why Japan is one of the most underdeveloped states when
it comes to healthy journalism and democracy in the Asia-Pacific region.
Firstly, according to opinion polls in late September 2002, more than 55
percent of the Japanese public reportedly support Prime Minister Junichiro
Koizumi’s cabinet, even after he twice worshipped at Yasukuni Shrine near
Tokyo, a Shinto shrine where Class-A war criminals from World War II
(including Japan’s then-prime minister Hideki Tojo) are enshrined as gods.
Yasukuni Shrine was the center of state-sponsored Shintoism during the years
of Japan’s invasion of the Asia-Pacific region since 1895, when Japan
annexed Taiwan by military force. To make a comparison, that would be like
the current German president paying an official visit to Adolf Hitler’s
graveyard on the day that Nazi Germany surrendered to Allied forces.
Moreover, Shintaro Ishihara, the current governor of Tokyo-infamous for
repeatedly denying Japanese atrocities in the Nanjing Massacre in China
during the 1930s-ranks number one in Japanese public opinion polls as the
politician most favored to be the next premier of Japan. It is safe to say
that on the political spectrum, Ishihara is to the far right of Jean Le Pen
of France.
Most Japanese citizens, to this day, refuse to admit that Japan ever invaded
any Asia-Pacific countries. They even go so far as to emphasize that
Japanese military occupation in the region has helped these countries to
gain independence from Western imperialism.
Japanese Emperor Hirohito was acquitted of wartime atrocities at the close
of World War II, and since then, most Japanese people have closed the book
on taking any responsibility for their government’s own past crimes against
humanity. From that time up to the present day, Japan’s ruling party, the
Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has been dominated by ultra-right politicians
and bureaucrats.
Herbert P. Bix’s recent Pulitzer Prize-winning biography, Hirohito and the
Making of Modern Japan shows in painstaking detail the many ways that the
former Emperor led Japan’s military wartime regime, and how he was later
protected by Occupation forces after the war. The book, which has been out
in English since 2000, was finally translated into Japanese mid-2002, the
language that would expose it to its most important audience. Japanese
publishers had been reluctant to publish Bix’s book in fear that they will
become targets of right-wing violence. Kodansha, leading publishing firm in
Tokyo, published its translation. Most Japanese newspapers criticized the
book in their book reviews. What makes Bix’s book so threatening is the high
quality of his scholarship, revealing the truth of the matter with
indisputable facts. Mr. Minoru Kitamura, one of several Japanese historians
seeking to prove that the Nanjing Massacre in China never happened, has
written a new book called “The Massacre Myth.” Kitamura accused Mr. Harold
Timperley, correspondent to China for the then-Manchester Guardian newspaper
of Britain, of “creating” the story of the massacre.
Kitamura stresses that Timperley, author of the widely read book “The
Japanese Terror in China,” was an agent of the Chinese Kuomintang, the
nationalist party then in government. Mr. John Gittings, a Guardian
correspondent to Shanghai, wrote an article about it titled “Japanese
Rewrite Guardian History: Nanjing Massacre Reports Were False, Revisionists
Claim” on October 4, 2002.
Gittings, by analyzing Guardian archives in London, found out that the
reason for the misquoting of the numbers of massacred people was due to
Timperley’s references to the Yangtze River delta being omitted at the time
by Japanese diplomats in China. I too firmly believe that the number of
victims of the massacre committed by Japan is still not clear, simply
because the Japanese government has burnt or otherwise nullified evidence of
its crimes all over the world.
More recently North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has admitted that his country
kidnapped Japanese citizens-and that at least four were still alive. “It is
regretful and I want to frankly apologize,” Kim said to Japanese Prime
Minister Koizumi, as the two leaders held talks in Pyongyang during their
first face-to-face meeting on September 17.
Eight Japanese nationals, who were abducted in the 1970s and 1980s, are
confirmed as being dead. Mr. Kim reportedly said that those responsible for
the kidnappings had been “sternly punished.” Six out of 11 people, whom
Tokyo has long claimed were abducted, were confirmed to have died in North
Korea.
In a joint statement that followed the meeting between the two nations’
leaders, North Korea said it would abandon compensation from Japan’s 35-year
imperial invasion of the Korean Peninsula. In turn, it demanded Japanese
official development aid and expected private investment from Japan.
Pyongyang has long held complete compensation from Japan’s colonialism as a
pre-condition for talks over normalizing relations between the two
countries. But suddenly, North Korea let Japan’s responsibility for wartime
atrocities just fade away.
In this sense, the Japan-North Korea joint statement is worse than the 1965
so-called “peace treaty” between Japan and the military government of South
Korea. Mr. Kim of North Korea now badly seems to need Japanese economic help
as well as diplomatic support, at a time when he is under intense pressure
from the United States. North Korea can no longer afford to make so many
demands.
Revisionists and ultra-rightists in Japan have acquired renewed political
power following North Korea’s admission that it abducted Japanese citizens
several decades ago. The Japanese media, and most Japanese citizens, are
behaving as if they are innocent victims of some brand of devilish “outlaw
state.” It seems to me that they have all conveniently forgotten what their
own Japanese Imperial Army had done to the people of several Asia-Pacific
countries since 1895. Among many other things, Japan had abducted more than
three million Koreans, forcing them to be soldiers, mine workers, and “sex
slaves.”
In this instance with North Korea, as with many other past issues, the major
Japanese newspapers, magazines, and TV networks again showed their bad side:
carrying out their reporting via the phenomenon known as “pack journalism.”
In “pack journalism,” the employees of news organizations throng to a single
news source like a pack of animals, pursue the story almost as one herd, and
report mass amounts of information that end up in stories nearly identical
to one another. This is exactly the term the New York Times once used to
describe Japanese news reporters, when the corrupt president of the Toyoda
Shoji company was stabbed to death by a mobster in 1985, right in front of
the reporters.
Mr. Kim Sok-pom, a Korean writer born in Japan, severely criticized the
Japanese nation and its media recently during an October 26 citizen’s group
meeting on monitoring the media coverage of the North Korea abduction cases.
Kim stated publicly: “The mass media in Japan have been reporting the
abduction cases without mentioning what Japan has done to Koreans. This kind
of reporting by the Japanese mass media, which incites anti-Korean sentiment
among the Japanese public, is a kind of violence against Koreans born in
Japan. Japan has neglected to commemorate the massacre of Koreans born in
Japan during the massive earthquake in the Kanto area [of Japan] on
September 1, 1923, as well as all kinds of atrocities during Japanese
colonial rule. Is there any country like Japan in the world?”
Kim Sok-pom added that “Japan is suffering from amnesia.” He further accused
the Kim Jong-il government of an “act of treachery and shameful diplomatic
policy” when it recently gave up its right of any future claims to Japan’s
cruel occupation of the past.
Japanese revisionists have made great strides in erasing any written
references to ianfu-former “sex slaves” of the Japanese Imperial Army-and
the Nanjing Massacre in China from Japanese school textbooks. Very few
Japanese citizens today know about Japanese modern history in any real
depth.
Secondly, Japan is still under the military occupation of the United States
of America. Following Japan’s unconditional surrender to the U.S.-led Allied
forces on August 15, 1945, and the subsequent end of World War II, Japan was
placed under U.S. military control. The American military forces have never
left Japan since then. More than 40,000 U.S. troops remain based in Japan
today, as we speak. This is ostensibly to protect Japan from “enemies” like
North Korea-and yet no U.S. military bases in the area, outside of those in
South Korea, are facing imminent war with North Korea.
The Japanese news media and citizens are now criticizing North Korea’s
nuclear weapons plan. However, the Japanese have also totally forgotten that
there are functioning nuclear reactors all over Japan, not to mention large
numbers of nuclear weapons located on U.S. military bases in Japan.
Yet the Japanese government has confidently claimed that Japan’s nuclear
program will never be used for weapons and that U.S. armed forces are
restricted under the antinuclear policies of the Japanese constitution from
bringing nuclear weapons into Japan.
And this propaganda seems to be working well. One would be hard-pressed to
find any large demonstrations against U.S. bases in Japan by Japanese
students or Japanese workers. One can find an active anti-U.S. base movement
only in the southern island of Okinawa, where most of the beautiful beaches
are essentially occupied by the U.S. military. Extremely weak trade unions
and university student bodies in our country make it very easy for the
ruling class to control people. The Japanese, I would say, have politically
changed very little since 1868, when the shogun-ruled Edo period ended and
the Western-leaning Meiji period began.
Thirdly, the Japanese people have never experienced any real social
revolutions in their history, unlike nations in many other parts of the
world that have fought hard to acquire democracy at the cost of enormous
numbers of their own citizens.
JAPAN’S LAP DOG PRESS
I would like to assert one good reason why Japanese democracy is not yet
matured, despite Japans enjoyment of a high technological standard of
living: the problem known as “lap dog journalism.”
The press in Japan is as free and open as that of any nation in the world,
including the U.S. and European countries. Freedom of the press in Japan is
absolutely and strongly protected by the constitution that Japan adopted
after World War II. Any kind of censorship is strictly forbidden. Yet
self-censorship runs rampant. Those who work in Japanese media circles do
not use their constitutional right to carry out investigative reporting. The
Japanese press, as a whole, lacks any skepticism toward authority.
Lack of diversity and variety is the cause of such weak journalism. There is
only one local newspaper in most of the local prefectures of Japan. Major TV
networks are owned by prominent newspaper companies, which enjoy high
business profits. Japan has the highest number of newspaper readers per
capita of any country in the world.
And still, ironically, journalists and the general public alike in our
country do not realize that Japan’s freedom of expression was a “gift”
bestowed upon us by the Allied forces at the cost of 23 million victims
throughout the Asia-Pacific region during World War II. Major newspapers
throughout Japan since the 1950s have acted as if their highest duty were to
help enforce the continuing rule of the LDP.
A healthy, tense atmosphere between news sources and journalists is
indispensable for solid journalism to flourish.
In Japan, news sources try to curry favor with journalists only so they can
obtain favorable coverage of the organizations they belong to. But this is
not right. Journalists should be independent of any news source if they are
to effectively carry out their duty of working for the citizens’ right to
know.
According to a survey taken in Japan in the late 1980s, 90 percent of news
stories in the Japanese press originate from government officials and Big
Business. This is because the majority of mainstream news reporters get
their “facts” through a system known as the “kisha clubs,” or press club
system imposed on media outlets from above. Under this system, the n - H
media serve merely as mouthpieces for those in power. The number of
commentators and academics who appear daily on major television networks in
Japan are overwhelmingly scholars whose work is patronized by the
government.
A lack of objective, balanced reporting principles is another problem. The
Japanese media as a whole pay little or no attention to clarifying news
sources and attribution of those sources.
You may be surprised to know that very few professional journalists in Japan
have ever studied journalism before entering their profession. Only a few
universities-out of about 400 universities in all of Japan even have a
journalism department. A professional journalist is only regarded to be such
when he or she becomes gainfully employed by any of the news organizations.
Generally speaking, Japan’s concept of democracy is just like one that
Professor Noam Chomsky of the United States defines as “an alternative
conception of democracy.” That is, under this conception, citizens must be
barred from managing their own affairs and the means of information must be
kept narrowly and rigidly controlled.
CONCLUSION
In closing, I could see with my own eyes how the people of Thailand fought
against the regime of General Sutchinda in May 1992 in seeking democratic
reforms, and how the people and journalists of Indonesia waged a courageous
struggle to oust General Suharto in the 1990s. Likewise, the people of the
Philippines fought against the former dictator Ferdinand Marcos and
contributed to the eventual withdrawal of U.S. armed forces from their
country.
Journalists in those Asian nations were always to be found in public
demonstrations, alongside laborers, students and activists of
nongovernmental organizations.
If Japan is ever to attain the status of a truly democratic state in the
modern world, then it is precisely this type of free and open journalism
that Japanese journalists will need to vigorously practice and defend.
-Targeting North Korea
By Gregory Elich
(Note: This is an updated version of an article that originally ran on ZNet a couple of months ago.)
For all the ballyhoo surrounding the North Korean admission of a nuclear weapons program in meetings with U.S. officials, one salient fact has been overlooked. It never happened. Western news reports repeated endlessly the claims that North Korean officials admitted to a nuclear weapons program in an October 2002 meeting with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly and again during an April 2003 meeting, yet no evidence was presented other than Kelly’s assertions. On this matter, the word of the Bush Administration was accepted as sufficient evidence, the same Bush Administration that has consistently lied about every issue.
Citing the issue of a North Korea nuclear weapons program, the Bush Administration deliberately set about creating an international crisis on the Korean peninsula, eventually compelling North Korea to engage in a desperate bluff in hopes of ensuring its survival. To fully understand what took place during that those ill fated meetings and the mounting confrontation between the two nations it is necessary to view events in the broader historical context of U.S.-North Korean relations. This context is also important for explaining why the Bush Administration wanted a crisis, using the nuclear issue as a pretext for imposing punitive economic and political measures aimed at bringing about the collapse of North Korea.
Read the full story here, with numerous references.
http://www.zmag.org/elich_korea.htm
