March 16-22 Docudharma is doing a week-long Focus on War. This is a pilot project - an experiment in collective blogging.
Featured Post Schedule (9 PM Eastern) Mar 16
Mar 17 Something The Dog Said Mar 18 dharmasyd Mar 19 MouseOfSuburbia Mar 20 meteoriot Mar 21 pinche tejano Mar 22 Militarytracy
Call for Submissions: Anyone who wants to write an essay that has anything to do with war can participate. All you have to do is include the "Focus On War" tag in your essay. Essays with Action are particularly encouraged: give us some reasons to write LTEs, contact Congress, or to support an anti-war candidate or your favorite charity. Yell Louder!!!
Here are some more ways to contribute:
To submit war-related artwork, YouTubes, blogs & websites, and causes that are worthy of donations, please go to one of the following.
(Focus On War - Tonight's featured essay! - promoted by On The Bus)
I know you're tired, me too and I'm just about to take a break here soon. Step away from the Redwood though and try to keep your hands to yourself for just a minute. Now get into your Prius and drive your ass on over here for a chat. Pull up a latte and let's get your Friedmans straight first before we start this adventure into the intellectualization (a defense mechanism where reasoning is used to block confrontation with an unconscious conflict and its associated emotional stress. It involves removing one's self, emotionally, from a stressful event) of serious people.
Not a serious person, just a kinky Friedman and we don't need to worry too much about his not serious intellectualizations. At least not this election cycle.
American Nobel Laureate economist and public intellectual who passed away in November of 2006 and who was much loved by the Reagan administration. He personally loved him some deregulation, privatization, and smaller government so we could all get more money. I don't know about you but I got some money and my kids got to eat a little lead paint while my husband got to dodge some of that small government privatized Blackwater Security lead in shoot em up Iraq.
One look at this picture and you know you are dealing with a very serious person here!
And there is another serious Friedman out there right now that I want you all to focus on. You need to know about him because he is sort of a Republican Obama master of words and thoughts and his Iraq study is already making its rounds and landing on the desks of serious people all over this great land. This is the photo of him that I was able to copy off of a principles of war website.
This is Dr. George Friedman. George Friedman, Ph.D., is an internationally recognized expert in security and intelligence issues relating to national security, information warfare and computer security. He is founder, chairman and Chief Intelligence Officer of STRATFOR, (Strategic Forecasting Inc.) a private intelligence company that provides customized intelligence services for its clients and provides an internationally acclaimed Web site, www.stratfor.com, that analyzes and forecasts trends in world affairs. Friedman's column, Intelligence Brief, is syndicated by Tribune Media Services. And just try to swipe an image off of this website you hippies! If you follow the link though he'll let you look at his serious face there.....but not here.
This is the story of the vigil that refused to die -- or at least refused to be snowed under. Friday was a horrendous day in Milwaukee as Spring arrived with a huge snowfall that may end up being more than a foot (it's still falling as I write this.) This was the noon report:
Nearly five inches of snow has fallen this morning at General Mitchell International as a winter storm warning remains in effect, keeping police and firefighters busy with multiple accidents reported on local streets and highways.
"Boy it's bad outside," said Milwaukee Battalion 1 Fire Chief Steven Gleisner, who was making rounds to the firehouses in his battalion this morning. "I almost spun out in a 4-wheel drive vehicle, a 6,000 pound Chevy Suburban, and I'm having a tough time getting around. I've never done that in a four-wheel drive vehicle. I'm like, 'No. I'm heading home. Plus, the visibility is lousy."
He suggested others do the same."If folks don't have to go out today, I wouldn't go out," he said.
It just got worse as the day went on. Side streets were nearly impassible, buses were running late if at all, the airport eventually closed. Many churches even canceled Good Friday services. So organizers of a 5 p.m. Iraq Moratorium vigil, a monthly action held on downtown's busiest corner, conferred during the afternoon. Should the show go on? Your humble scribe, having ventured out once in his lightweight car, really didn't want to do it again. However, having written a rather macho online essay earlier in the day, about how weather doesn't stop Wisconsinites from stopping the war, staying home didn't seem like an option.
In mid-afternoon, Peace Action's George Martin said he planned to show up with signs, flags and paraphernalia, since some people were bound to show up no matter what. But he called about 4 p.m. to say the event was off. Let's be honest; I breathed a sigh of relief. I could stay home with a clear conscience, although I might have to eat a little crow about that blog.
But, I looked out at 4:30 p.m. and, although the snow was still falling heavily, our street had miraculously been plowed. So, staying only on a few main arterial streets, I managed to make it to the site of the alleged vigil. There, at Water Street and Wisconsin Avenue, four young people huddled on the corner. One had a rolled-up sign, so it seemed plausible they were there to protest the war, not catch a bus. That turned out to be the case. I told them the vigil was canceled, and asked if they'd at least stay long enough for me to haul a brand new Iraq Moratorium banner out of my car and take a photo. Once there was a banner and a few more people showed up with their own signs, everyone decided to stay for the scheduled hour-long vigil. We ended up with 10 people.
So Milwaukee's record is intact. Seven vigils in the seven months since the Iraq Moratorium began in September. Although this was the smallest turnout ever, it may have been the most satisfying one to be a part of. The people in these photos are winter soldiers, indeed.
Reports from other actions are beginning to trickle in from around the country. Read them, or post your own accounts of what you did, at IraqMoratorium.org
Before and after an hour in the snow in 30-degree temperatures:
Last night, 3-21-08, on the PBS Bill Moyers Journal, Bill talked
with Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro on the true cost of war and their documentary, BODY OF WAR
The filmmakers talk about Iraq war veteran Tomas Young who was shot and paralyzed less than a week into his tour of duty. Three years in the making, BODY OF WAR tells the poignant tale of the young man's journey from joining the service after 9/11 to fight in Afghanistan, to living with devastating wounds after being deployed to Iraq instead.
It's Iraq Moratorium day, so of course it's snowing heavily here in Wisconsin, where more than a dozen outside vigils are planned.
There is already several inches on the ground in Milwaukee, and it is still coming down heavily. By our 5 p.m. downtown vigil tonight there could be a foot of the stuff.
But those who can get there will be there, just as they have been during the winter when temperatures and wind chills were sub-zero. (Pictured are folks in Whitewater, WI at their February Moratorium vigil.)
Why?
I have to wonder myself sometimes. Why do we persist, when other public events are being canceled left and right?
The easiest answer is that people are committed to ending this senseless, bloody war -- and they want to demonstrate their commitment.
Last week, Iraq Veterans Against the War held Winter Soldier hearings, to testify about what life is like on the ground, and what our troops are being asked to do in the name of "freedom."
Winter Soldier, modeled after the 1971 Vietnam Winter Soldier hearings, takes its name from these words of Thomas Paine, written during the terrible winter of Valley Forge:
"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph."
So, maybe the weather today is just testing whether we are "summer soldiers and sunshine patriots" or are really committed.
I've talked myself into it: I'll be there tonight, whatever the weather.
Whether you're battling the snow or basking on the beach, please join us in doing something today to show your opposition to the war and occupation of Iraq.
Wear a button or an armband. Write a letter. Send an email. Donate to a peace group. Whatever. But do something. You'll find ideas for individual action and a list of group events at IraqMoratorium.org
The following Video was left as a reply in my Daily KOS posting, yesterday, on Nadia and 'Veterans Village'.
How far have we come as to what Wars do to those we send to fight them?
We don't Execute?, but we Still don't Understand, some Denie, and we Don't Give The Care Needed!
Societies 'Love War', at first, especially Wars of Choice, but Societies only send a small fraction of to engage, than they make them Fight for what it does to them!
(Focus On War - Tonight's featured essay! - promoted by On The Bus)
I've been singing the song "Masters of War" a lot lately. Every time I practice, I play it. I'd guess I've worked through it, either listening or playing, at least 500 times since September. The verses are burned into my consciousness. Every word is still relevant; the military industrial complex is every bit as powerful now as it was when Dylan wrote about it in 1963 at the ripe old age of 22. 22! And he created what's gone down as one of the most succinct, eloquent protest songs of all time, certainly one of the landmark antiwar pieces.
But for all its brilliance, what futility he must have felt. A guitar and a voice vs. the military-industrial complex. These people didn't hear a word he said. They were tucked away, safe and sheltered. That their trade was a curse on the whole world was not their problem, and mere criticism could not and did not move them. If Bob Dylan was president, maybe they'd mind, but he wasn't even a speck. But he did have two things: the moral high ground, and the First Amendment. That's all anybody has, really. If right is on your side, you can be vocal about it and hopefully others will hear and join. Accusation, for all its pitfalls, is a necessary step toward justice.
This was meant to be posted yesterday but unfortunataly Youtube was down for maintenance, so here it is a day late.
I couldn't be in D.C. today, I imagine that was true for most of you. My solution was to put together a quickie anti-war video. Follow me below the fold for part what this war has meant. Feel free to add you own comments, this is a protest after all.
Friday is Iraq Moratorium #7, and people across the country are marking it in dozens of different ways, from rallies, marches, protests, vigils to individual actions to call for an end to the war and occupation.
There's even been a bit of civil disobedience by people willing to make arrest to make their point.
It all fits (as long as it's non-violent) under the umbrella of the Iraq Moratorium, a loosely-knit national grassroots movement to end the war and bring the troops home.
Not that this occasion really calls for a present....
However, I would like to take this time to share a video I made this evening from photos I collected from around the tubes...
If you have any you would like to add, put the photo/s in comments.
This is my contribution to the FOW project.
(You may use this video anytime, anywhere, any blog-if you'd like)
(Focus On War: Tonight's Featured Essay! - promoted by On The Bus)
"The war could last 6 days, 6 weeks... I doubt 6 months."
-- Donald Rumsfeld, Speaking on 2-7-2003, in Italy
Background The same person who spoke those words also told us about building realities. I'm confused, Mr. Rumsfeld; did we set out to fail and succeed?
Rumsfeld was trying to be clever when he talked about zigzagging through false realities. He implied the deception was intended for "the enemy", even while Cheney was saying 9/11 and Iraq to Tim Russert over and over on Press the Meat. If it were just a matter of evil people lying to us, then there would be nothing new here. What is new is that the evil liars were at the helm of a (supposedly) benevolent superpower, and the evil liars were hopelessly inept to a degree that is almost supernatural.
Some statistics are frightening, but that doesn't make them wrong - only unbelievable to some. For instance, 50% of all doctors graduated at the bottom half of their class, but 80% of the people think theirs is an above average doctor. In order to take a realistic measure of this administrations ineptness in prosecuting this war, we have to strip it down to the basics and try to separate fact from fallacy.
Was the premise of the war correct? No: there were no WMD's.
Did we forget anything before we went all the way there? Yes: divisions of soldiers.
Were candy and hugs the only arms and projectiles we faced? No.
How many dead-enders is a few dead-enders?
You want fiction? Here's some to mark today's 5th Anniversary of the Iraq War.
Scene 1
September, 2006: Brothers George, John, and Ringo stand together in the front hallway on George's house. They have just answered the door, greeting Petraeus, President of a local construction company. They exchange greetings and lead him to the kitchen table, where the conversation begins.
GEORGE: We're, uh, glad you could come to see us, Mr. Petraeus. As I think my brother John told you when he called, it's about the house we're having built on the lot we inherited from our parents.
PETRAEUS: Yes, I've taken a look at the house and I've talked to the contractors, and the contractors before that, and the original contractors.
JOHN: Well, as you should know then, you can see that the construction process has been a complete disaster.
GEORGE: I wouldn't say it's been a disaster, exactly.
Lest you think that five years of bloodshed in Iraq, with perhaps a million dead and 4 million more displaced from their homes, has given The Decider any pause, today he said the war is "noble, necessary, and just." Some pertinent excerpts from his speech today at the Pentagon on the first day of Year 6 in Iraq.
The battle in Iraq has been longer and harder and more costly than we anticipated -- but it is a fight we must win....
Defeating this enemy in Iraq will make it less likely that we'll face the enemy here at home...
There's still hard work to be done in Iraq. The gains we have made are fragile and reversible...
The surge has done more than turn the situation in Iraq around -- it has opened the door to a major strategic victory in the broader war on terror...
The challenge in the period ahead is to consolidate the gains we have made and seal the extremists' defeat. We have learned through hard experience what happens when we pull our forces back too fast ... General Petraeus has warned that too fast a drawdown could result in such an unraveling -- with al Qaeda and insurgents and militia extremists regaining lost ground and increasing violence.
Men and women of the Armed Forces: Having come so far, and achieved so much, we're not going to let this to happen...
Any further drawdown will be based on conditions on the ground and the recommendations of our commanders -- and they must not jeopardize the hard-fought gains our troops and civilians have made over the past year.
The successes we are seeing in Iraq are undeniable ...
More than 4,400 men and women have given their lives in the war on terror. We'll pray for their families. We'll always honor their memory.
The best way we can honor them is by making sure that their sacrifice was not in vain. Five years ago tonight, I promised the American people that in the struggle ahead "we will accept no outcome but victory." Today, standing before men and women who helped liberate a nation, I reaffirm the commitment. The battle in Iraq is noble, it is necessary, and it is just. And with your courage, the battle in Iraq will end in victory.
In short, we are "winning", whatever that means -- and the way to honor those who have died is for even more to die.
Lieutenant General Tommy Franks, who led the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan during his time as head of US Central Command, once announced, "We don't do body counts." This blunt response to a question about civilian casualties was an attempt to distance George Bush's wars from the disaster of Vietnam. One of the rituals of that earlier conflict was the daily announcement of how many Vietnamese fighters US forces had killed. It was supposed to convince a sceptical American public that victory was coming. But the "body count" concept sounded callous - and never more so than when it emerged that many of the alleged guerrilla dead were in fact women, children and other unarmed civilians.
Iraq was going to be different. The US would count its own dead (now close to 4,000), but the toll the war was taking on Iraqis was not a matter the Pentagon or any other US government department intended to quantify. Especially once Bush had declared "mission accomplished" on May 1 2003 - after that, every new Iraqi who died by violence would be a signal that the president was wrong, and would show that a war conducted in the name of humanitarian intervention was exacting a mounting humanitarian toll of its own.
But even though the Americans were not counting, people were dying, and every victim had a name and a family. Wedding parties were bombed by US planes, couples driving home at night were shot at checkpoints because they missed a flashlight warning them to stop, and hundreds of other unarmed civilians were killed for no legitimate cause. In just the last three weeks of April 2003, after Saddam's statue and his regime were toppled, US forces killed at least 266 civilians - a pattern of overeager resort to fire which has continued to this day.
So five years after Bush and Tony Blair launched the invasion of Iraq against the wishes of a majority of UN members, no one knows how many Iraqis have died. We do know that more than two million have fled abroad. Another 1.5 million have sought safety elsewhere in Iraq. We know that the combined horror of car bombs, suicide attacks, sectarian killing and disproportionate US counter-insurgency tactics and air strikes have produced the worst humanitarian catastrophe in today's world. But the exact death toll remains a mystery.
The article examines the various estimates that range from "100,000 dead to well over a million". It is well worth the time to read.
Four at Four continues below the fold looking at the five year anniversary of the war in Iraq and its occupation.
"War is merely a continuation of politics by other means." Though Clausewitz didn't intend it to be used this way, the quote has gained a life of its own for the bald truths contained within it. First that war is always a choice (though, rarely, the only other choice is surrender) and second....that it is a choice made by politicians.
My fellow citizens, at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger.
George Bush, March 19, 2003
.
What if that choice didn't exist? What if war was not an option for politicians?
.
America must not ignore the threat gathering against us. Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.
George W. Bush
We can't allow the world's worst leaders to blackmail, threaten, hold freedom-loving nations hostage with the world's worst weapons.
George W. Bush
We know that dictators are quick to choose aggression, while free nations strive to resolve differences in peace.
George W. Bush
I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace.
George W. Bush
Though Clausewitz was merely reflecting the reality of our times...he was wrong. War is not a continuation of politics, it is the failure of politics, and of diplomacy, and reason, and imagination...and most importantly, will. It is the choice of dullards. Dullards who inevitably, somehow, manage to profit from their failures to achieve peace. War is always.....a failure.
I remember reading a story in the New York Times magazine, in October of 2004 about terrorism and John Kerry's view on it.
Kerry had a far different view of what should be done to counter terrorism:
But when you listen carefully to what Bush and Kerry say, it becomes clear that the differences between them are more profound than the matter of who can be more effective in achieving the same ends. Bush casts the war on terror as a vast struggle that is likely to go on indefinitely, or at least as long as radical Islam commands fealty in regions of the world. In a rare moment of either candor or carelessness, or perhaps both, Bush told Matt Lauer on the ''Today'' show in August that he didn't think the United States could actually triumph in the war on terror in the foreseeable future. ''I don't think you can win it,'' he said -- a statement that he and his aides tried to disown but that had the ring of sincerity to it. He and other members of his administration have said that Americans should expect to be attacked again, and that the constant shadow of danger that hangs over major cities like New York and Washington is the cost of freedom. In his rhetoric, Bush suggests that terrorism for this generation of Americans is and should be an overwhelming and frightening reality.
When I asked Kerry what it would take for Americans to feel safe again, he displayed a much less apocalyptic worldview. ''We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance,'' Kerry said. ''As a former law-enforcement person, I know we're never going to end prostitution. We're never going to end illegal gambling. But we're going to reduce it, organized crime, to a level where it isn't on the rise. It isn't threatening people's lives every day, and fundamentally, it's something that you continue to fight, but it's not threatening the fabric of your life.''
This analogy struck me as remarkable, if only because it seemed to throw down a big orange marker between Kerry's philosophy and the president's. Kerry, a former prosecutor, was suggesting that the war, if one could call it that, was, if not winnable, then at least controllable. If mobsters could be chased into the back rooms of seedy clubs, then so, too, could terrorists be sent scurrying for their lives into remote caves where they wouldn't harm us. Bush had continually cast himself as the optimist in the race, asserting that he alone saw the liberating potential of American might, and yet his dark vision of unending war suddenly seemed far less hopeful than Kerry's notion that all of this horror -- planes flying into buildings, anxiety about suicide bombers and chemicals in the subway -- could somehow be made to recede until it was barely in our thoughts.
Remember? Remember when Bush said he didn't think the "war on terror" could ever be won? Remember when he and Cheney were running around on every talk show and media newshour one could think of, telling Americans we should live in fear, that it wasn't just probable but inevitable that we would be attacked again?
On this day, 3-19-08, the 5th anniversary of the Occupation of Iraq, some may attend the thousands of candlelight vigils around the country.
Some may have other vigils of remembrance planned.
Some may write of their feelings.
Some may have other ways to observe and remember the Fallen and Maimed of our Military and the Tens of Thousands of the Innocent Killed and Maimed and Millions thrust into refugee status due to our countries Failed Policies.
A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimates that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred.
...
It is more than 20 times the estimate of 30,000 civilian deaths that President Bush gave in a speech in December. It is more than 10 times the estimate of roughly 50,000 civilian deaths made by the British-based Iraq Body Count research group.
...
(update)The survey was done by Iraqi physicians and overseen by epidemiologists at Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health
655,000 Iraqis are dead.
That's a scary number. And a big number. I tried to comprehend how big it is, but my imagination failed me. What's needed is a visual model that illustrates the enormity of the situation.
Reform Immigration -
March on Washington
Lieutenant General Tommy Franks, who led the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan during his time as head of US Central Command, once announced, "We don't do body counts." This blunt response to a question about civilian casualties was an attempt to distance George Bush's wars from the disaster of Vietnam. One of the rituals of that earlier conflict was the daily announcement of how many Vietnamese fighters US forces had killed. It was supposed to convince a sceptical American public that victory was coming. But the "body count" concept sounded callous - and never more so than when it emerged that many of the alleged guerrilla dead were in fact women, children and other unarmed civilians.
