Month: July 2011

Despite his campaign promises (a trite phrase at this point), Obama has relentlessly tried to blanket the United States government in secrecy in order to both protect the abusive injustices it engages in from public scrutiny, as well as to ensure the continuance of such wrongdoing for as long as possible. After using the state secrets privilege to avoid judicial scrutiny in cases where innocent people were brutally tortured, as well as to avoid having to answer to anybody while targeting U.S. citizens for assassination, things seemed bad enough. Then came Obama’s war on whistleblowers, from the prosecution of Thomas Drake for leaking valuable public information about waste at the N.S.A., to journalist James Risen for exposing a reckless Iran policy at the CIA, to State Department consultant Steven Kim who simply uttered an opinion about North Korea’s response to U.S. sanctions, to Bradely Manning who has faced cruel treatment without charge for allegedly leaking to Wikileaks. More illustrations of Obama’s secrecy abound, but now here from Secrecy News, another:

[L]ast month the Department of Defense issued a proposed new rulethat appears to subvert the intent of the Obama policy [this one, that he never intended to uphold] by imposing new safeguard requirements on “prior designations indicating controlled access and dissemination (e.g., For Official Use Only, Sensitive But Unclassified, Limited Distribution, Proprietary, Originator Controlled, Law Enforcement Sensitive).”

By “grandfathering” those old, obsolete markings in a new regulation for defense contractors, the DoD rule would effectively reactivate them and qualify them for continued protection under the new Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) regime, thereby defeating the new policy.

Even more broadly, the proposed rule says that any unclassified information that has not been specifically approved for public release must be safeguarded.  It establishes secrecy, not openness, as the presumptive status and default mode for most unclassified information.

“Unclassified Government information shall not be posted on websites that are publicly available or have access limited only by domain/Internet Protocol restriction,” the proposed rule baldly states at one point.

The breathtaking implications of the DoD proposal have come as a shock not only to those who still believe in the possibility of open government, but to the DoD contractors who are expected to implement the sweeping new policy.  See “Contractors resist DoD’s tougher info rules” by Sean Reilly, Federal Times, July 10.

Meanwhile, many executive branch agencies have not met their obligations to post basic agency information on their web sites, such as staff directories, reports to Congress, and congressional testimony, according to a new survey from Openthegovernment.org.

Government that acts within the law can allow openness and transparency. Unrestrained outlaw government desperately needs to keep its behavior in the shadows in order to sustain itself. Obama’s attempt, not only to use state secrets to dismiss troublesome legal action against him and his government, but to classify vast arrays of government documents in order to keep the American people in as profound a state of ignorance about their own administering institutions, makes clear which kind of government is ours.

Stephen Walt asks a good question: Whatever happened to the war in Libya? The front-page-worthy Obama War #4 has flickered out a bit in the past week or two, yes. This is indicative of a few things. First, it is hard to decide what to focus on when the national security state has put so much on our plate, as Glenn Greenwald lists in this introduction:

In just the past two months alone (all subsequent to the killing of Osama bin Laden), the U.S. Government has taken the following steps in the name of battling the Terrorist menace: extended the Patriot Act by four years without a single reform; begun a new CIA drone attack campaign in Yemen; launcheddrone attacks in Somalia; slaughtered more civilians in Pakistan; attempted to assassinate U.S. citizen Anwar Awlaki far from any battlefield and without a whiff of due process; invoked secrecy doctrines to conceal legal memos setting forth its views of its own domestic warrantless surveillance powers; announced a “withdrawal”plan for Afghanistan that entails double the number of troops in that country as were there when Obama was inaugurated; and invoked a very expansive view of its detention powers under the 2001 AUMF bydetaining an alleged member of al-Shabab on a floating prison, without charges, Miranda warnings, or access to a lawyer.  That’s all independent of a whole slew of drastically expanded surveillance powers seized over the past two years in the name of the same threat.

But secondly, it is notable that the national security state absolutely relies upon the forgetfulness and apathy of the American people. A fourth unnecessary war is appalling at first, but when it persists for over 100 days, working up the same disgust and protestation can be difficult. This is one aspect of the public sentiment that ensures the national security state a free pass when they decide to start another war (here is another). That Americans are getting used to (and apathetic about) the illegal Libya adventure is precisely what Obama and the Pentagon were counting on to allow the continued bombing that we’ve seen along with what seems like the inevitable introduction of ground troops/long-term occupation. As this Wikileaks release of a CIA report regarding public opinion on the war in Afghanistan proved further, “Public Apathy Enables Leaders to Ignore Voters.”

It’s been evident for some time now that ground troops will eventually be “necessary,” but Walt offers some additional historical context for that notion (in addition to the American public’s apathy giving the war parties a free pass):

back when NATO first got involved, a number of people made the obvious comparison to the 1999 war in Kosovo. Both wars were launched on impulse, there were no vital strategic interests involved, and both wars were fought “on the cheap” through the use of airpower. NATO leaders expected the targets to succumb quickly, and were surprised when their adversaries (Milosevic in 1999, Qaddafi today) hung on as long as they did.

But there’s another parallel that deserves mention too. Serbia eventually surrendered, and I expect that Qaddafi or his sons will eventually do so too. But in the case of Kosovo, NATO and the U.N. had to send in a peacekeeping force, and they are still there ten years later. And Kosovo has only about 28 percent of Libya’s population and is much smaller geographically (some 10,000 square kilometers, compared with Libya’s 1,800,000 sq. km.) So anybody who thinks that NATO, the United Nations, or the vaguely defined “international community” will be done whenever Qaddafi says uncle (or succumbs to a NATO airstrike) should probably lower their expectations and prepare themselves for long-term involvement in a deeply divided country.

I simply cannot see a near-term end to the Libya war in which the U.S. and NATO simply pick up and leave. Can you?

In response to the Obama administration’s “pause” in U.S. military aid to Pakistan, China has slipped in to fill the gap. This is just the latest development in the passive aggressive power war between the U.S. and China; any new regional allies for China represents a threat to U.S. leverage in the region. Also in the news today was the visit to China by Adm. Mike Mullen, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. He was sent to China “with a vow to maintain the U.S. military presence in Asia and a warning that recent incidents in the disputed waters of the South China Sea could escalate into conflict.” This was a response to China’s recent calls to the U.S. to stop holding military drills with our vassal states like “Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei,” as they are seen as a provocation. Mullen reportedly acknowledged China’s regional power, “but urged its military to ease regional concerns about its rapid modernization by playing a more cooperative, responsible and transparent role in the world.” Translation: stop threatening our military and technological hegemony; We Own the World, not you.

“The U.S. is not going away,” [Mullen]  said. “Our enduring presence in this region has been important to our allies for decades and it will continue to be so.”

I wrote about this clash between the reigning U.S. empire and China’s rising ambitions to be the successor last month:

In Singapore last week, Defense Secretary Gates spoke at an International Institute for Strategic Studies meeting and argued for “sustaining a robust [U.S.] military presence in Asia.” He spoke of overcoming “anti-access and area denial scenarios” that the U.S. military faces in Asia, which threatens America’s access to strategic markets and resources. Predominantly, Gates explained, U.S. military presence in Asia-Pacific is important in “deterring, and if necessary defeating, potential adversaries.”

While perhaps more straightforward than reigning politicians and diplomats, Gates’ explanation of U.S. military strategy was nothing new. As was reiterated in the 2002 National Security Strategy, it was of foremost importance that “our forces will be strong enough to dissuade potential adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes of surpassing, or equaling, the power of the United States.”

[…Asia is] a region of emerging markets that the U.S. national security state wants command over. It’s also one where attempts to terrorize the world into deference to U.S. hegemony has failed to prevent a rising military rival like China.

America’s debt crisis has yet to incentivize Washington to cut the defense budget, and while a great deal of that is because the Afghan and Iraq wars are not drawing down, another primary reason is that maintaining U.S. military hegemony throughout the world is a major aim of the ruling elite. China’s audacious requests for less U.S. imperialism in the region, along with their increasing military budgets and capabilities, is likely to push America’s military budget still further. Any global competition is the Pentagon’s foremost concern. The potential for an arms race between the two is seen as likely by many experts, portending eventual insolvency for the U.S.

But the real concern is what may happen in the meantime. The U.S.-Soviet arms race not only empowered state war machines manifold, but it also became the pretext for numerous proxy wars (Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Nicaragua among the most egregiously treacherous). This sort of military one-upsmanship is good for the state and for the glorification of war, bad for peace and liberty.

Ideally, all members of the France-based Flytilla would have been allowed entry into Israel and Palestine. Because of Israel’s policy of forbidding vocal and prominent opponents of Zionism and the Israeli state, such as Noam Chomsky and Norman Finklestein, most of the Flytilla activists were denied entry into Israel. Some, however, arrived in Tel Aviv only to be flagged, held, and eventually deported:

“Over 120 passengers were denied entry and are awaiting deportation for security reasons, they will leave within the next 24-48 hours,” said police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.

…

Hundreds more pro-Palestinian activists hoping to join those that arrived in Israel were prevented from boarding flights for Tel Aviv from various European airports after Israel told airlines that certain people on passenger lists would not be allowed into the country.

As the number of Flytilla activists was rumored to be in the hundreds, it appears that the Flytilla was shot down just like the Flotilla was sunk.

The Israeli government’s policy of preventing humanitarian activists from helping the plighted Palestinian people is indicative of the fascist atmosphere permeating throughout Israel. Whether it be pledging loyalty to a “Jewish and democratic state”, forbidding Arab Israelis from living in your community, or denying vital reconstruction materials to the Palestinians, it is becoming clearer and clearer by the day that Israel is far from a democracy, and certainly not one to be looked upon as a model for the rest of the Middle East. The myth of Israel being a bastion of democracy and western values in the world’s most turbulent region is being uncovered for all to see, with much thanks to the free flow of information via the internet. There still remains a lot of debunking, eye opening, and educating to be done. Hopefully in the future, Americans will realize the truth about their supposed unwavering, democratized, western ally.

Yesterday the House spent an hour “debating” a resolution condemning efforts to gain support for a Palestinian state via the UN General Assembly, and demanding that the Palestinians negotiate on Israel’s terms. (It is worth noting that UN recognition of Israel came as a result of a vote by the UN General Assembly, not by negotiation.)

The “debate” consisted mostly of condemnations of the Palestinian leadership and unqualified support for Israel as a theocratic religious state.

Only 6 House members voted to opposed the resolution (3 Republicans and 3 Democrats).

Rep. Ron Paul explained why he voted against the measure:

Mr. Speaker I rise in opposition to this resolution. While I certainly share the hope for peace in the Middle East and a solution to the ongoing conflict, I do not believe that peace will result if we continue to do the same things while hoping for different results. The US has been involved in this process for decades, spending billions of dollars we do not have, yet we never seem to get much closer to a solution. I believe the best solution is to embrace non-interventionism, which allows those most directly involved to solve their own problems.

This resolution not only further entangles the US in the Israeli/Palestinian dispute, but it sets out the kind of outcome the United States would accept in advance. While I prefer our disengagement from that conflict, I must wonder how the US expects to be seen as an “honest broker” when it dictates the terms of a solution in such a transparently one-sided manner?

In the resolution before us, all demands are made of only one side in the conflict. Do supporters of this resolution really believe the actors in the Middle East and the rest of the world do not notice? We do no favors to the Israelis or to the Palestinians when we involve ourselves in such a manner and block any negotiations that may take place without US participation. They have the incentives to find a way to live in peace and we must allow them to find that solution on their own. As always, congressional attitudes toward the peace process in the Middle East reveal hubris and self-importance. Only those who must live together in the Middle East can craft a lasting peace between Israel and Palestine.