Maine Owl

"Hiroshima was our original sin."

Can we expect any other country, if it perceives it is cornered with its survival threatened, to forgo the same decision U.S. WWII leaders made in 1945?

War is failure

A theme of this blog lately has been the unseemly celebration of war and the instruments of war. One example, the celebratory impulses displayed for Bath Iron Works amongst media and politicians when the Pentagon lavishly funds its splendid warships. Another, the diabolic remote-control drones used by U.S. military and intelligence services to terrorize defenseless populations. (Why? Well, even at a 98% rate of collateral damage, they're "the only game in town in terms of confronting or trying to disrupt the al Qaeda leadership" according to DCI Leon Panetta.)

Perhaps the biggest mistake we can make is to assume all of these war-making activities have something to do with "preserving our freedom" or extending American ideals in a lawless world. I even have my doubts about American purity in the "good" wars, despite my awe at the sacrifices paid in World War II by the generation of my father. But these notions of American glory understandably are endemic to our culture. Sadly, this situation has enabled an apparently perpetual state of Terror War promoted with bottomless funding from American political leaders.

To show proper non-celebratory respect this Memorial Day, I offer Verse 31 of the Tao Te Ching:

Armies are tools of violence;
They cause men to hate and fear.
The sage will not join them.
His purpose is creation;
Their purpose is destruction.

Weapons are tools of violence,
Not of the sage;
He uses them only when there is no choice,
And then calmly, and with tact,
For he finds no beauty in them.

Whoever finds beauty in weapons
Delights in the slaughter of men;
And who delights in slaughter
Cannot content himself with peace.

So slaughters must be mourned
And conquest celebrated with a funeral.

And below is an excerpt from an article on Gandhi, nonviolence, and terrorism recently published in the Maine Peace Action Committee Newsletter by my friend, U Maine philosophy professor Doug Allen:

THIS story on MPBN radio "Maine Things Considered" illustrates why it is so very important to mount even small anti-war protests when the purveyors of death and destruction come to celebrate their achievements at Bath Iron Works.


Bruce Gagnon gets thirty-six seconds of public radio air time to say we're tired of war and that the weapons made in Bath are designed to hit first

I'll give MPBN reporter Tom Porter some credit here for making the protest an important part of the story--virtually the lede. Good. Otherwise the story would just have been the celebratory slosh we usually hear in media coverage of the Pentagon's favorite destroyer-building shipyard. Well, the report did become about the...

...enthusiasm felt by those behind the gates of Bath Iron Works - a unit by General Dynamics - over the likelihood of the shipyard being chosen to build the U.S. Navy's new class of destroyer. Inside the heavily-guarded facility, Defense Secretary Robert Gates presided over a pre-commissioning ceremony for the Wayne. E. Meyer - an Arleigh Burke-class, DDG51 destroyer.

"I've never visited a shipyard before so this has really been something, and I've really been impressed with the professionalism and the pride of the workers here at Bath, and the continuing innovation to try and wring costs and time out of production," Gates said.

"Whatever the navy wants, Bath Iron Works is prepared to deliver. This is a great shipyard, thank you Mr. Secretary," said Maine senator Susan Collins ...

Of course none of our delegation, including the Democrats, can mention a cross word about Bath Iron Works. Both Democrats, Rep. Chelli Pingree (1st District) and Rep. Mike Michaud (2nd District) were on hand yesterday too.

"Well you know there's a reason they say Bath-built is best-built," said Ms. Pingree.

What I would like to see is a revival of the long-awaited project to convert Bath Iron Works to "useful civilian production." Good idea.

Three "DDG1000 Zumwalt-class destroyers" are needed for what? Looking into that question does not seem to be on the media radar. Perhaps this is because BIW is so squeaky clean of controversy. Ending on a sad note, many years of small actions and protests have not changed this.

The United States Senate this week voted 86-3 to rubber stamp nearly $100 billion in off-budget war funding, including massive increases for funding of covert war and special forces activity in Afghanistan and Pakistan. However, as was quite a big story this week, the senate refused to allow the president funding to wind down the travesty known as Guantanamo. See HERE and HERE for previous Maine Owl posts on the matter.

The only senators to vote no were Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Russ Feingold (D-WI), and Tom Coburn (R-OK).

Senator Sanders: The bill contains $73 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan without providing, to my mind, the kind of exit strategy to both conflicts that I believe we need.

Senator Feingold: For years I have been fighting to bring an end to our involvement in the misguided war in Iraq. While I am pleased that President Obama has provided a timeline for redeployment of our troops, I am concerned that he intends to leave up to 50,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. I am also concerned that this supplemental may pad the defense budget with items not needed for the war. We should be paying for such items through the regular budget, not running up the deficit to purchase them. Finally, while the president clearly understands that the greatest international security threat to our nation resides in Pakistan, I remain concerned that his strategy regarding Afghanistan and Pakistan does not adequately address, and may even exacerbate the problems we face in Pakistan, problems made even more clear by the current rising tide of displaced civilians.

I could not find a specific statement on why Republican Coburn voted nay.

From the diaries at Turn Maine Blue:

Peace activists will hold a protest vigil in Bath, Maine on Friday, May 22 beginning at noon in front of Bath Iron Works (BIW) on Washington Street.

Secretary Gates is expected to meet with BIW workers and tour the weapons production facility at that time.

According to Bruce Gagnon, Coordinator of the Bath-based Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, "The Democrat and Republican politicians will line up to kiss the ring of Secretary Gates. This is what we do in America today - we build weapons of destruction. It's our #1 industrial export product. And when weapons are the number one industrial export product of a nation, what is your global marketing strategy for that product line? War, the more the better. We don't build rail systems, wind turbines, solar systems or other such useful technologies that we need to deal with climate change. But the politicians from both parties understand that the Pentagon has the big money these days so they are on their knees. We say that the time has come for our elected officials to get off their knees and say that we've had enough endless war. The people want health care, full education funding, our infrastructure fixed, and they want to see an end to spending more than $12 billion a month in Iraq-Afghanistan-Pakistan killing innocent civilians."

In a recent article called "The Disease of Permanent War," former New York Times foreign correspondent Chris Hedges writes, "Citizens in a state of permanent war are bombarded with the insidious militarized language of power, fear and strength that mask an increasingly brittle reality. The corporations behind the doctrine of permanent war... must keep us afraid. Fear stops us from objecting to government spending on a bloated military. Fear means we will not ask unpleasant questions of those in power. Fear means that we will be willing to give up our rights and liberties for security. Fear keeps us penned in like domesticated animals."

Activists from all over Maine are expected to attend the protest. The protest will call for the conversion of Bath Iron Works to useful civilian production.

Gates is poison. This is illustrated by the installation of the head of the JSOC executive assassination committee as the Afghan commander. Why Obama buys this approach I do not understand. Maybe we all should have listened to Bruce a lot more closely in MARCH 2008.

Listen to an interview with Chris Hedges and Laila al-Arian HERE.

Apropos of the previous post, Ramzy Baroud quotes Pakistan writer Abd Al-Ghafar Aziz in a piece for Palestine Chronicle,

Since the US attack on Afghanistan, the province [of Balochistan] has been accused of supporting terrorism and harbouring the leaders of Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Since then, US planes, especially drones, have been striking what it calls 'precious targets', resulting in the death of over 15,000 people.

I see. This is a good war because the recipients of U.S.-supported military attacks and U.S.-flown drone bombers are utterly defenseless. Call me namby pamby, without the "stomach" for it as Dick Cheney would say, but won't the killings--now in the 10s of thousands--and the displacements in the 100s of thousands--make a lot more people from this region mad at the U.S. than already are?

Here is a gem from H R 2346, the $96 billion off-budget war supplemental passed yesterday by the U.S. House of Representatives. Yep, $400 million for a full-throated covert war in Pakistan with all of the accouterments:

Pakistan counterinsurgency capability fund
(including transfer of funds)

There is hereby established in the Treasury of the United States a special account to be known as the `Pakistan Counterinsurgency Capability Fund'. For necessary expenses to carry out the provisions of chapter 8 of part I and chapters 2, 5, 6, and 8 of part II of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and section 23 of the Arms Export Control Act for counterinsurgency activities in Pakistan, $400,000,000, which shall become available on September 30, 2009, and remain available until September 30, 2010: Provided, That such funds shall be available to the Secretary of State, with the concurrence of the Secretary of Defense, notwithstanding any other provision of law, for the purpose of providing assistance for Pakistan to build and maintain the counterinsurgency capability of Pakistani security forces, and, on an exceptional basis, irregular security forces, to include program management and the provision of equipment, supplies, services, training, and facility and infrastructure repair, renovation, and construction: Provided further, That these funds may be transferred by the Secretary of State to the Department of Defense or other Federal departments or agencies to support counterinsurgency operations and may be merged with and be available for the same purposes and for the same time period as the appropriation or fund to which transferred, or may be transferred pursuant to the authorities contained in the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961: Provided further, That the Secretary of State shall, not fewer than 15 days prior to making transfers from this appropriation, notify the Committees on Appropriations of the House of Representatives and the Senate, and the congressional defense and foreign affairs committees, in writing of the details of any such transfer: Provided further, That the Secretary of State shall submit not later than 30 days after the end of each fiscal quarter to the Committees on Appropriations of the House of Representatives and the Senate a report summarizing, on a project-by-project basis, the transfer of funds from this appropriation: Provided further, That upon determination by the Secretary of Defense or head of other Federal department or agency, with the concurrence of the Secretary of State, that all or part of the funds so transferred from this appropriation are not necessary for the purposes herein, such amounts may be transferred by the head of the relevant Federal department or agency back to this appropriation and shall be available for the same purposes and for the same time period as originally appropriated: Provided further, That any required notification or report may be submitted in classified or unclassified form.

If this is what they appropriate publicly for the horror show they already have going in Pakistan, what do you suppose is in the black budget?

Thank you again, Mike & Chelli, for voting against this war.

Ick.

But Reps. Michaud AND Pingree joined the sixty who voted against the war supplemental.

Mike Michaud: "It would be disingenuous of me to support this funding just because the President happens to now be a member of my own political party."

Chelli Pingree: "Without a clear strategy for bringing our servicemen and servicewomen home, I could not vote for this request for additional war funding."

More at Turn Maine Blue, HERE.

Didn't Speaker Pelosi last June promise against more blank checks for war?

Bruce Gagnon wrote on Thursday:

Pingree-Michaud to Vote on War Supplemental Next Week

Dear Fellow Mainers:

Today I had a long talk with Rep. Chellie Pingree's Military Legislative Assistant, Eric Hansen, over the phone. He is based in the DC office. I called to ask him the status of the Iraq-Afghanistan-Pakistan war supplemental bill for the remainder of 2009.

Hansen told me the bill is in the House Appropriations Committee today and that it would likely be voted on in the House of Representatives as early as next week.

President Obama had requested $83 billion for the war supplemental but House Democrats have added $9.3 billion to that request to bring the supplemental to now stand at $94.2 billion.

I asked Hansen how Rep. Pingree would vote on the supplemental and he said that she wants to first "see what form the bill takes" before deciding on her vote. He told me that the Congresswoman was wanting to see if bench marks and timelines were included in the bill. So far Obama has not submitted any timelines on ending the Afghanistan occupation.

Hansen said that the war supplemental will also include funds for economic assistance to the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan. He talked about "soft power" options being important like moving some Pakistan funds from the Pentagon to the State Department's control for diplomatic purposes and for expansion of counter-insurgency capabilities.

Hansen also said that Rep. Pingree was seriously considering signing on as a co-sponsor to a bill presented by Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) that would "require the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to Congress outlining the United States exit strategy for United States military forces in Afghanistan participating in Operation Enduring Freedom."

As of today the cost of the war in Afghanistan to American taxpayers has been more than $172 billion and the Iraq war has cost more than $656 billion.

As of this writing we have not heard anything definitive from the offices of Rep. Mike Michaud on his position on this 2009 war supplemental. It is important to remember that Obama has also already requested $130 billion for war funding for fiscal year 2010.

Please make a call immediately to your member of the Maine Congressional delegation. Urge them to vote against any more war funding.

Bruce K. Gagnon
Coordinator, Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
(Blog)

Do Chelli Pingree, or Mike Michaud for that matter, really have anti-war positions? Maybe. According to Bruce, there is some ambiguity.

At another moment of concern after her trip last February, when quotes in a news story were seemingly at odds with Rep. Pingree's campaign promise that "Congress must stop funding the war," I ASKED that question. I was at least a little happy with her answers. But now will be a another moment of truth. Will Reps. Pingree and Michaud be able to stand up to Administration and Pentagon pressure?

Thanks for this information, Bruce. The key anti-war constituencies that helped elect both Chelli Pingree and Mike Michaud will be watching closely.